In the years following the plague, as peasants and merchants gained more economic freedom, tensions grew between lower and upper classes of society as the upper classes stood to lose their status and way of life.
In the Wake of Death: Socioeconomic Effects of the Black Death in Medieval England
April 14, 2018 by
The family or the farm: a Sophie’s choice? The late medieval crisis in the former county of Flanders
March 21, 2018 by
The county of Flanders provides an interesting test case with which to verify the neo-Malthusian Duby-Postan thesis about the so-called late medieval crisis.
Wasteland: Buffer in the Medieval Economy
October 4, 2017 by
At the end of the Roman period the area of wasteland seems to have increased. Since the increase or decrease in wasteland is closely linked with the economy in general, we can discern several periods of decline and growth.
Wild to domestic and back again: the dynamics of fallow deer management in medieval England
October 1, 2017 by
The medieval fashion for parks transformed the English landscape: it is estimated that by 1300 AD over 3000 had been established, covering about 2% of the total area of countryside
The character of commercial fishing in Icelandic waters in the fifteenth century
August 28, 2017 by
The character of commercial fishing in Icelandic waters in the fifteenth century By Mark Gardiner Cod and Herring: The Archaeology and History of Medieval Sea Fishing, eds. J. Barrett and D. Orton (Oxbow Books, 2016) Abstract: From the early fifteenth century English vessels began fishing in Icelandic waters. They adopted a mixed approach of fishing and trading to […]
Tips on being a good CEO from a medieval abbot
June 18, 2017 by
In many ways, Abbot Samson would resemble the Chief Executive Officer of a company – indeed, he was actually running a corporation that would have been worth tens of millions of pounds in today’s money
Common Rights and Natural Resources: The 1217 Charter of the Forest in Historical Perspective
May 9, 2017 by
It is the 800th anniversary of the Charter of the Forest in 1217.
Historical rise of waterpower initiated the collapse of salmon stocks
December 22, 2016 by
We demonstrate that populations declined by up to 90% during the transitional period between the Early Middle Ages (c. 450–900 AD) and Early Modern Times (c. 1600 AD).
Historical evolution of forest management in Europe and in Japan
March 3, 2016 by
This paper describes in brief the historical evolution of forest management in Europe and in Japan and the motivations of these changes. In particular, the paper analyses three periods: pre-industrial (from the Middle-ages until the mid-17th century), industrial (from the mid-17th until the mid-20th century) and the post-industrial period (from the late-20th century until today)
Living by the Sea: Women, Work, and Family in Maritime Communities in Medieval England
December 30, 2015 by
I want to focus on how we can gender female the maritime world of ships, waterfronts, and coastal communities– a world that scholars have largely populated with adult males– focusing on four questions.
BOOK REVIEW: The Butcher Bird by SD Sykes
December 29, 2015 by
My review of SD Sykes follow up to “Plague Land”, her latest book, “The Butcher Bird”.
Approaches to famine in medieval England
December 20, 2015 by
Given the potential importance of famine in medieval England, it is at least surprising that so little has been written on it. If we consider the greatest single famine event of the middle ages, the great famine of the early fourteenth century, a crisis event that may have killed something in the region of 10 per cent of the English population, the degree of historical discussion of this, relative to say investigation of the Black Death, is really quite muted.
The World’s Earliest Dated Tide Mill
December 16, 2015 by
Thomas McErlean discusses the story of the discovery the earliest mill in Ireland and the earliest presently known example of a tide mill in the world.
Fish commoditization and the historical origins of catching fish for profit
July 29, 2015 by
Herring trade expanded in the late 1300s with the introduction in Holland of an improved curing process that allowed the salting of fresh herring in barrels at sea.
How Much Taxes Did a Medieval Peasant Pay? The numbers from Sweden
July 16, 2015 by
A new study on taxation in late medieval Sweden has revealed fascinating details about how much peasants had to pay to the royal government in taxes.
Medieval poaching site discovered in England
June 8, 2015 by
Archaeologists working in northern England have uncovered a stone-lined cess pit that was filled with dozens of bones from deer. The evidence suggests that they were dumped here by poachers.
Environmental Crusading: The Teutonic Knight’s Impact After the Baltic Crusades
March 12, 2015 by
Environmental archaeologist and Professor of Archeology at Reading, Dr. Aleks Pluskowski, examined Malbork and several other sites across Eastern and Northern Europe in his recent paper, The Ecology of Crusading: The Environmental Impact of Holy War, Colonisation, and Religious Conversion in the Medieval Baltic. Pluskowski is keenly interested in the impact the Teutonic Knights and Christian colonisation had on the region. His ambitious 4 year project on the ecological changes in this area recently came to a close at the end of 2014.
Local and Traditional on the Millennial Scale: Sustainable Waterfowl Management from Viking Age Iceland
March 9, 2015 by
Inhabited by Vikings since approximately 600 AD, the islands hosts an abundant, but terribly fragile resource, puffins, flightless birds that nest on rocky exposed cliffs, in easy range of the islanders other prime food source, pigs.
The imperial abbey of Ellwangen and its peasants: a study of the polyptych of 1337
January 31, 2015 by
This paper presents an analysis of Ellwangen Abbey’s polyptych of 1337, with a view to understanding better the nature of the south German rural economy in this period.
‘Falseness Reigns in Every Flock’: Literacy and Eschatological Discourse in the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381
November 30, 2014 by
The literature of the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381, a miscellany of fourteenth-century poetry and prose penned before, during, and after the insurrection, often stresses the importance of literacy to the nonaristocratic population of England.
Of sagas and sheep: Toward a historical anthropology of social change and production for market, subsistence and tribute in early Iceland
November 6, 2014 by
This dissertation deals with the formation of chiefdoms, communities, ecclesiastical institutions and state, and with production for market, subsistence and tribute in early Iceland in the context of climatic change and ecological succession.
The Importance of Parks in Fifteenth-Century Society
October 21, 2014 by
In this paper, my aim is to consider the role of parks in the fifteenth century.
The Contours, Frequency and Causation of Subsistence Crises in Carolingian Europe (750-950)
October 7, 2014 by
The Contours, Frequency and Causation of Subsistence Crises in Carolingian Europe (750-950) Timothy P. Newfield Crisis Alimentarias en la Edad Media: Modelos, Explicaciones y Representaciones (Milenio, Lleida, 2013), pp. 117-172. Abstract The subsistence crises of Carolingian Europe have been widely overlooked in modern histories of the early Middle Ages. Detailed treatment has yet to be […]
BOOK REVIEW: Plague Land by SD Sykes
September 4, 2014 by
My review of SD Sykes brilliant medieval thriller, Plague Land.
Manor Village and Individual in Medieval England
August 25, 2014 by
This thesis explores peasant life of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries in England from information found in the manorial court rolls-the village court records–of Ramsey Hepman grove and Bury.
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