Agricultural History Review, Volume 56 Part 2 (2008), p. 217

Studies of disputes among the late medieval gentry have long assumed major historiographical importance. The eruption of violent disagreements concerning property were once thought to reflect the decay of the feudal system until detailed prosopographical studies revealed a complex society made up of many-layered networks and allegiances. In recent years, historians have come to look beyond the fragmentation of regional and local society to emphasize the vertical ties between gentry, nobility and crown. The north-east of England has, to some extent, been left out of this scholarly tradition, characterized as a border region different from the rest of the kingdom. Barker’s detailed analysis of one particular dispute between Durham and Northumberland families is therefore to be welcomed.

The story told in this paper is a gripping tale of marital strife and decades of legal wrangling which took place in the shadow of the great northern magnate families of Neville and Percy. Before his death in 1378, doubtful of his wife’s fidelity and therefore the legitimacy of her children, Walter Tyndale alienated his inheritance to the Claxtons. The inheritance included lands in Northumberland and, given the links between the Claxtons and the Nevilles, threatened Percy territorial interests. Barker develops the narrative by alternating his focus between the gentry dispute and the magnate interests at stake. Following a settlement in 1398–9, the dispute was renewed in the 1420s after the death of the Claxtons’ political patron Ralph Neville, first earl of Westmorland. With obvious Percy backing, a self-proclaimed Tyndale heir emerged and seized Dilston by force. Matters were not resolved until the 1440s when, with the Neville family bitterly divided, Robert Claxton became a Percy retainer and secured the Tyndale inheritance.

Barker uses this case study to demonstrate the links between the gentry in north-east England, the great magnate families and, by extension, the kingdom at large. The dispute was carried out in a way similar to other such disputes elsewhere in the kingdom, undermining notions of the distinctiveness of the region. Likewise, competing Neville influence in Durham, expressed through the Claxtons, and Percy influence in Northumberland, exercised through the Tyndales, suggest the North-East should not always be regarded a homogenous region. Barker’s conclusions raise interesting questions concerning the representativeness of this particular dispute, especially in the light of recent work by Liddy on the distinctiveness of gentry society in the Bishopric of Durham. Barker’s study is clearly written and he has provided a useful glossary, family trees, a map and the transcription and translation of a key document.