Agricultural History Review, Volume 52 Part 2 (2004), p. 215

It is good to see these two basic texts up-dated and republished. J.E.C.Peters’ book The development of farm buildings in west lowland Staffordshire up to 1880 was published in 1969 and is regarded as one of the founding texts in farm building studies. Discovering tra ditional farm buildings draws both on Peters’ Staffordshire work and his continued studies in the field. As with all Shire Publications the text is clear and straightforward and the book well-illustrated with both black and white photographs and informative architectural drawings. The main differences between this edition and the earlier one is in the revised ‘Places to visit’ and bibliography. Its format, length and price make it an ideal book to recommend to extra-mural students and those embarking on fieldwork for the first time.

John McCann’s book was first published in 1983 and has now been re-issued with an updated bibliography and colour photographs which makes for an attractive format. The subject of clay and cob buildings is considered historically and the various techniques and regional differences are also clearly described. The main reasons for the use of clay were its cheapness as a raw material in areas where stone was not available, and the lack of bricklaying or masonry skills needed by the builder. This meant it was much favoured for cottages and farm buildings from the late-eighteenth century, especially outside closed or estate villages, where such cottage building as landowners permitted was most likely, at least in the clay area, to use bricks produced in estate brick kilns. In open villages, speculators looking for the cheapest way to build often used one of a number of building techniques based on clay, like clay lump (building blocks made of sun-dried clay with straw mixed in). But there were exceptions, as McCann points out. The Duke of Bedford and his agent were enthusiastic builders in pisé (dry clay heavily rammed down within shuttering so that it consolidated to form, in effect, artificial rock), while Copinger Hill in Suffolk wrote on the use of cob (mud walls, built up gradually and allowed to dry at each stage before the next layer was added). There is certainly room for further research in this field.

This book is mainly concerned with surviving examples of these techniques and their continuing use. Although the fact that the use of unfired earth was known in the ancient world is acknowledged, there is only a passing reference to its use in medieval Britain. It is likely that as wood became scarcer, the use of clay with less and less in the way of timber support increased considerably. However these buildings would have been the humblest cottages and evidence for them is usually confined to excavations and it was not until the eighteenth century that any reference to them is to be found in print. A fascinating mid-eighteenth-century drawing from Essex Record Office showing a ‘Cottage built for the Smallest Quantity of money as possible ... Done with Clay wall’ (p.15) is included and may be the earliest documentary evidence of the technique.

As a factual guide and basis for further work this is a useful book well up to the standards we have come to expect from Shire Publications.