Agricultural History Review, Volume 65 Part 1 (2017), p. 151

The book forms part of the Hearth Tax Series, which intends to produce county volumes of Hearth Tax records. Since Yorkshire is such an expansive county, this volume focuses only on the East Riding, with the West Riding already having been published and a further volume planned for the North Riding. This book not only provides a detailed analysis of Hearth Tax records for the East Riding of Yorkshire (dating to 1662 and 1663), but also contributes towards a wider landscape and architectural history of the East Riding. As such, it will be useful for local historians, students and academics alike, who are interested in undertaking research on various aspects of the East Riding of Yorkshire’s early modern history.

The volume offers an interesting and accessible introduction to the Hearth Tax, including for those with a limited knowledge on the subject. The structure, I found, was refreshing. It begins with a comprehensive preface written by Catherine Ferguson, General Editor of the British Record Society Hearth Tax Series, which introduces the series and provides adequate justification for the extensive study of such documents. Next, Elizabeth Parkinson’s chapter on Hearth Tax administration offers detailed insights into how the collection of the returns were undertaken in the East Riding, examining different aspects of its administration including: the criteria for exemption from paying the Hearth Tax; how the tax was managed and collected at varying points between the tax’s introduction and abolition; the economic revenue that tax contributed to the East Riding; and also includes a section informing the reader how to access and understand the related documents.

The second and third chapters, written by David and Susan Neave, will be particularly useful to those studying the local history of the East Riding of Yorkshire. The authors introduced the history, topography, population, economy and architecture of the area, while simultaneously delving into how these specifically relate to the returns of 1662. Additionally, this background history will be especially valuable for those studying the wider implications of the Hearth Tax, who may know little about the East Riding of Yorkshire itself.

The remaining sections of the provide a review and assessment of the East Riding returns, a transcription, and statistical analyses of the data collected from the documents. These three sections constitute the main bulk of the volume and may upon initial observation seem daunting. Yet the maps at the end of the second chapter provide an excellent visual resource, displaying not only topography, wapentake and township boundaries but also the distribution and concentration of households, hearths, exemptions and hearths per household in each of the townships. My only thought is that more of this material might have been desirable: pie charts, percentage data and other numerical or graphical representations might have allowed readers to digest what the data as a whole suggests about number of hearths per household before delving into the realms of individual wapentakes and townships. But this is a minor quibble and, in general, the introduction to the data and the logical layout of the information from the returns resulted in a largely accessible presentation of a sizeable quantitative data set.

The summary maps show local variations within the East Riding. A particularly interesting finding represented in one of the maps is that only five of the townships – Howden town, Kingston upon Hull, Beverley town, Bridlington, and Hedon – had more than 144 hearths per 1000 acres. In David and Susan Neave’s chapter relating to the East Riding houses and the Hearth Tax, a sub-section on fuel suggests that the reasons for the dominance of the single-hearth household in the East Riding may be explained by the lack of fuel available in the area. The townships which had more than 144 hearths per 1000 acres were among the most densely populated in the East Riding.

To conclude, this book can be considered a useful addition to the literature relating to the Hearth Tax. Not only does the volume make significant findings relating to the distribution of hearths across the East Riding, and in which circumstances households may be exempt from the tax, but it also provides a valuable resource for further research and use of the tables as a secondary data source.