Medieval Suffolk: An Economic and Social History, 1200-1500 (History of Suffolk) [Hardcover]

Breaks new ground as well as offering an accessible synthesis for the general reader. (...) The book's great triumph, and the thing that will make it invaluable to teachers and students of medieval society generally, is the balancing of the regional against the national. THE LOCAL HISTORIAN A book that is both readable and of a high academic standard, full of insights gained by a very wide and detailed knowledge of the county's medieval documents. This will certainly be required reading for anyone interested in the medieval economic history of eastern England for some time to come and sets a high standard for the other volumes of this series. JOURNAL OF MEDIEVAL ARCHAEOLOGY This is not a book simply about Suffolk, it is one that has considerable implications for those who study social and economic history far beyond the Waveney or the Stour. Medieval Suffolk has set the scholarly bar for this series at a high level. (...) The first volume in the series is a model of its kind and a fine exemplar of how to tackle this most difficult of historical genres. Mark Bailey is to be congratulated on a book that will not only widely educate and inform, but also remain the most scholarly treatment of this particular topic for many years to come. CEAS NEWSLETTER A fascinating book. SUFFOLK LOCAL HISTORY NEWSLETTER Sets a very high standard for others to follow. SUFFOLK INSTITUTE OF ARCHAEOLOGY & HISTORY NEWSLETTER

A fascinating book.

A coherent, clear and, above all, very readable study of the county's medieval history.

Mark Bailey is to be congratulated on a book that will not only widely educate and inform, but also remain the most scholarly treatment of this particular topic for many years to come.

A book that is both readable and of a high academic standard [...] This will certainly be required reading for anyone interested in the medieval economic history of eastern England for some time to come and sets a high standard for the other volumes of this series.

Suffolk was one of the most important regions of England in the middle ages. Even by 1200 it was wealthy, densely populated, highly commercialised and urbanised; and it survived the impact of three of the most tumultuous events of the last millennium, the Great Famine (1315-22), the Black Death (1349) and the Peasants' Revolt (1381), to become by 1500 one of the richest and most industrialised regions of England, based on cloth manufacture, fishing and tanning. This first volume in a series which will become the definitive History of Suffolk describes, documents and analyses these events. It combines an accessible and readable summary of the current state of knowledge with fresh insights drawn from extensive investigations of primary sources. Overall, it offers a guide to and re-evaluation of the history of late medieval Suffolk. MARK BAILEY is Senior Visiting Lecturer at the University of Leeds and Headmaster of The Grammar School at Leeds.