Craftland: In Search of Lost Arts and Disappearing Trades
By James Fox
Crown
ISBN: 978-0-593-73507-7
What was work like before industrialisation? This book looks back at Britain before the rise of modern industry, exploring the professions and occupations that once played an important role in people’s everyday lives.
Excerpt:
Britain was once a craft land—a nation of workshops and studios, masters and apprentices; a society grounded in the act of making things by hand. For much of our history, craft wasn’t a quaint pastime but an engine of social and economic life. Without it, the country would have quite literally ground to a halt. Most villages had their own blacksmiths and wheelwrights, their own thatchers and boot-makers. If you wandered down to the river, you’d have seen millers tinkering with waterwheels and tanners drying hides by the reed-beds. In the woods, coppice-workers managed groves of hazel, sawyers cut trees into timber, and bodgers turned wood under makeshift shelters. In cottages up and down the land, women and children spun wool, plaited straw, and threaded lace by the fireside before selling their wares at the local market.
Who is this book for?
It would not be accurate to call this a history book; instead, it aims to give readers a feel for the past, in this case a world that has largely disappeared. The author takes us on a tour of Britain, telling us about some of the trades people practised during what could broadly be termed medieval and early modern times. Some will be familiar to today’s readers, such as fishermen, while others, like rush-strewers, who collected and laid rushes to cover floors, have largely been forgotten.
The book has a certain vagueness that would make it difficult for medievalists to use for research, but it can be helpful for those who want to gain a better understanding of everyday life in medieval times. If you enjoy history more generally, it can also be an interesting and enjoyable read.
“Fox works hard to stiffen his account of Britain’s lost crafts with statistics, places and dates. Despite this, there is a feeling that this genre of impressionistic place-writing is reaching its own expiry date.” ~ review by Kathryn Hughes in The Guardian
Craftland: In Search of Lost Arts and Disappearing Trades
By James Fox
Crown
ISBN: 978-0-593-73507-7
What was work like before industrialisation? This book looks back at Britain before the rise of modern industry, exploring the professions and occupations that once played an important role in people’s everyday lives.
Excerpt:
Britain was once a craft land—a nation of workshops and studios, masters and apprentices; a society grounded in the act of making things by hand. For much of our history, craft wasn’t a quaint pastime but an engine of social and economic life. Without it, the country would have quite literally ground to a halt. Most villages had their own blacksmiths and wheelwrights, their own thatchers and boot-makers. If you wandered down to the river, you’d have seen millers tinkering with waterwheels and tanners drying hides by the reed-beds. In the woods, coppice-workers managed groves of hazel, sawyers cut trees into timber, and bodgers turned wood under makeshift shelters. In cottages up and down the land, women and children spun wool, plaited straw, and threaded lace by the fireside before selling their wares at the local market.
Who is this book for?
It would not be accurate to call this a history book; instead, it aims to give readers a feel for the past, in this case a world that has largely disappeared. The author takes us on a tour of Britain, telling us about some of the trades people practised during what could broadly be termed medieval and early modern times. Some will be familiar to today’s readers, such as fishermen, while others, like rush-strewers, who collected and laid rushes to cover floors, have largely been forgotten.
The book has a certain vagueness that would make it difficult for medievalists to use for research, but it can be helpful for those who want to gain a better understanding of everyday life in medieval times. If you enjoy history more generally, it can also be an interesting and enjoyable read.
“Fox works hard to stiffen his account of Britain’s lost crafts with statistics, places and dates. Despite this, there is a feeling that this genre of impressionistic place-writing is reaching its own expiry date.” ~ review by Kathryn Hughes in The Guardian
The Author
James Fox is a Cambridge art historian, writer, curator and multi-award-winning, BAFTA-nominated broadcaster. You can read this interview in the New York Times where James talks about this book.
You can learn more about this book from the publisher’s website.
You can buy this book on Amazon.com | Amazon.ca | Amazon.co.uk
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