Agricultural History Review, Volume 61 Part 1 (2013), p. 172

Recent years have been marked by the retirement of a number of senior scholars of medieval economic and social history, which, in turn, has resulted in the publication of some remarkable Festschriften celebrating their careers and scholarly contributions. These have included volumes for Munro (2007), Dyer (2010), Britnell (2011) and Hatcher (2012), the last of which is the subject of this review. As with the other volumes, Hatcher’s Festschrift, edited by Mark Bailey and Stephen Rigby, is an admirable collection of scholarly contributions offered by colleagues and former PhD students of John Hatcher to various status quaestionis related to medieval economic and social history. The volume consists of 12 contributions occupying, collectively, 472 pages and divided into three sections.

Section I of the collection, entitled ‘The medieval demographic system’, offers three contributions, all related to the question of post-Black Death demography, a subject so dear to Hatcher. Ole Benedictow, following Hatcher’s views on the post-Black death era, stresses the unhealthy environment of the late-medieval era, which was responsible for high mortality and depressed fertility levels. In addition, he reminds us of the importance of palaeo-pathological data, yet to be utilized by demographic historians. Richard Smith’s article provides an excellent historiographic and theoretical framework for late medieval and early modern demographic trends, deriving from contemporary statistical sources (including Inquisitions Post Mortem, wills, manorial court rolls and monastic accounts). Smith pays a special attention to the troublesome fifteenth century, marked by several major episodes of mortality, and encourages others to pursue this fascinating topic much further. Maryanne Kowaleski’s paper focuses on demographic and marital trends of late medieval maritime communities (mainly in the South West and East Anglia). This is an important contribution, highlighting distinctive patterns, marked by comparatively low age of first marriage (in contrast to rural and urban communities), yet with ‘normally’ small size of families (few children) due to socioeconomic circumstances of the post-Black Death era.

Section II, entitled ‘Landlords and peasants’ (another scholarly topic much cherished by Hatcher) opens with Bruce Campbell’s article on post-Black Death crop yields. Campbell takes a strictly exogenous (environmentalist) approach to the topic, showing the profound differences between the miserable climatic conditions of c.1348–75, the improved weather conditions of c.1376–95 (the ‘Chaucerian anomaly’, as he calls it), and the (mostly) depressed fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. In his usual meticulous manner, Campbell backs up his vast database of crop yields by a series of proxy data (such as ice-cores and tree-rings). Campbell’s article is followed by Martin Stephenson’s study of seigneurial investment strategies in late medieval England. He finds the roots of capitalist investment and carefully planned strategies by landlords in the pre-Black Death era, a period of various ecological and economic calamities. Despite obvious hazards, the lords were ready to take a chance. This view contradicts the widespread notion of ‘risk-averse feudal lords’. David Stone takes a macro-history approach, focusing on three Fenland manors belonging to the bishop of Ely, during the days of the Black Death pandemic. He utilizes local manorial accounts to map the precise path of the pestilence across these manors and shows how its spread affected economic activities on a local level. Also, Stone reminds us about the caveats related to manorial accounts and encourages us to juxtapose statistical sources against narrative accounts. Along the same lines, Erin McGibbon-Smith offers a highly detailed analysis of social life in a single Cambridgeshire village (Sutton-in-the-Isle) throughout the fourteenth century. Utilizing local court rolls, whose chronological survival is quite remarkable, McGibbon-Smith focuses particularly on crime patterns in that parish. The author concludes her article with an optimistic statement that ‘the prognosis for the future of court roll studies is good’. McGibbon-Smith’s study is followed by Phillipp Schofield’s article on the regional economy of Cornish estates of the Arundels in the fifteenth century (echoing the subject of Hatcher’s PhD thesis and, consequently, of his first monograph [1970]). As Schofield shows, the degree of success or failure varied from manor to manor, depending on the presence/absence of diversified industries (such as cloth production and maritime fishing) and the willingness of local lords and officials to invest in local infrastructure. Finally, John Munro’s article offers an altogether new perspective on the late medieval decline and disappearance of manorialism in England. According to Munro (and all evidence he presents throughout the article points to that direction), it was chiefly monetary and political factors (rising real wages and increasing royal interference in wool industry in the second half of the fourteenth century), rather than demographic ones that were responsible for disintegrating English demesne agriculture in the post-Black Death era. As such, it is a major contribution to the status quaestionis of late medieval manorialism and agriculture.

Part III, entitled ‘Trade and industry’ opens with James Davis’s engaging essay on marketing food and drink after the Black Death. Using an unusually long series of manorial court rolls from Clare (Suffolk), Davis shows that the rising living standards in the post-Black Death period are reflected in increasing per capita food and drink consumption, widespread professionalization within the food producing industry, as well as a proliferation of food retail shops, pubs and inns. Davis’s article is followed by John Lee’s contribution on the role of fairs in late medieval England. Here, Lee surveys the fortunes of fairs for various commodities (wool, cloth, livestock, fish, housewares, spices) after the Black Death. Fairs, both large and small, had a remarkable capacity to respond swiftly to the shifting patterns of late medieval trade. In addition, fairs provided social and religious space for late medieval consumers. The final essay, written by Richard Britnell, deals with the late medieval coal industry, a vitally important, yet still understudied topic (and another field in which Hatcher has made a major contribution, in 1993). As Britnell shows, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the bishops of Durham refrained from investing much capital in the development of their coastal coalmines, focusing instead on inland coal resources, leased to local tenants and entrepreneurs. Although an important form of enterprise, it was not until the 1540s that there was a real boom in the coal industry, deriving from a renewed economic prosperity and demographic growth.

Overall, this volume represents an important collection of substantive contributions to themes and debates in late medieval economic and social history. Each article is strongly innovative in its character, opening new and exciting avenues for research for years to come.