Town and Countryside in the Age of the Black Death: Essays in Honour of John Hatcher

The arrival of the Black Death in England, which killed around a half of the national population, marks the beginning of one of the most fascinating, controversial and important periods of English social and economic history. This collection of essays on English society and economy in the later Middle Ages provides a worthy tribute to the pioneering work of John Hatcher in this field. With contributions from many of the most eminent historians of the English economy in the later Middle Ages, the volume includes discussions of population, agriculture, the manor, village society, trade, and industry. The book’s chapters offer original reassessments of key topics such as the impact of the Black Death on population and its effects on agricultural productivity and estate management. A number of its studies open up new areas of research, including the demography of coastal communities and the role of fairs in the late medieval economy, whilst others explore the problems of evidence for mortality rates or for change within the village community. Bringing together broad surveys of change and local case studies based on detailed archival research, the book’s chapters offer an assessment of previous work in the field and suggest a number of new directions for scholarship in this area.