Townspeople and Nation: English Urban Experiences, 1540-1640 - Softcover

Tittler, Robert

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0804738696 ISBN 13: 9780804738699

Publisher: Stanford University Press, 2002

Synopsis

The century bounded by the Henrician Reformation and the Civil Wars marked an important stage in the development of urban institutions, culture, and society in England. At the outset of this period, England was still very much an agrarian society; by its end, it was well on the way to becoming an urban one as well. The complexity and subtlety of those developments become especially vivid when we experience them through the lives of more or less ordinary townspeople, which Tittler allows us to do here.

These biographical studies not only have much to tell us about the time and milieu, but also provide an array of interesting and varied characters: Henry Manship, the historian of his native Yarmouth; Henry Hardware, who removed “the giant, the naked boys and the devil in feathers” from Chester’s Midsummer Show; Robert Swaddon the swindler and John Pulman the “thief-taker” of London; Joyce Jeffries, the spinster money-lender of Hereford; John Brown, the speculator in dissolved monastic lands in Boston; John Pitt, the overseer of guildhall construction in Blandford Forum; John and Joan Cooke, the Mayor and Mayoress of Gloucester, the subjects of a most revealing posthumous portrait; and Sir Thomas White of London, the philanthropist and “merchant hero.” Tittler introduces these studies with a comprehensive but succinct description of English towns and cities of the time.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

“We know much more about the court and the country in early modern England than we do about urban society and life. What Tittler . . . does successfully in this fine and innovative book is to tell us about this relatively hidden England and to give it a human face by discussing specific individual lives.”—Paul S. Seaver, Stanford University
“This brief book will enhance Robert Tittler’s reputation as a sensitive interpreter of the early modern English urban experience. . . . All of the stories are interesting and well told. . . . Robert Tittler has written a short, but fascinating book on English urban life from about 1540 to 1640. Everyone interested in early modern England will profit from reading it.”—Renaissance Quarterly

About the Author:

Robert Tittler is Professor of History at Concordia University, Montreal. His most recent book is The Reformation and the Towns in England: Politics and Political Culture, c. 1540-1640.

About this edition

• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0804738696
• ISBN 13: 9780804738699
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 272