Introduction to English Economic History and Theory, Volume 2

An Introduction to English Economic History and Theory Sir William Ashley Ph.D., M.A., M.Com. Professor of Commerce in the University of Birmingham; Late Professor of Economic History in Harvard University; Sometime Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford Part II: The End of the Middle Ages First Edition 1893. Second Edition 1893 Fourth Edition 1906 Contents Preface to the Fourth Edition ................................................................................................................5 Book 2: From the Fourteenth to the Sixteenth Century........................................................................7 Chapter 1: The Supremacy of the Towns..............................................................................................8 Chapter 2: The Crafts .........................................................................................................................38 Chapter 3: The Woollen Industry ........................................................................................................95 Chapter 4: The Agrarian Revolution.................................................................................................128 Chapter 5: The Relief of the Poor .....................................................................................................151 Chapter 6: The Canonist Doctrine ....................................................................................................185 Preface to the Fourth Edition It has not been possible in the present edition to do more than make a few slight verbal corrections here and there. The researches of scholars during the last thirteen years have not, indeed, substantially affected most of the conclusions here set forth; though they have served to carry on the story of English economic evolution, and, in particular, to bridge the gulf between the Middle Ages and the eighteenth century. Among them I may call attention especially to Dr. Lohmann’s Staatliche Regelung der englischen Wollindustrie vom xv bis zum xviii Jahrhundert (1900), to Miss Leonard’s Early History of English Poor Belief (1900), and to Mr. Unwin’s Industrial Organisation in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Cen- turies (1904). The two last-named books open new paths for further investigation; and they are pecu- liarly welcome as coming from English hands, considering how long we have been dependent upon the gifts of foreign scholars. On the course of Economic Thought in the seventeenth century I may provi- sionally refer to some papers of mine collected in my volume of Surveys, Historic and Economic (1900). It is with regard to the agrarian side, however, of English development that the ground is still most insecure. And though I am not at all ready to accept every one of their conclusions, I should like to be among the first to point out that the subject has been carried on to a new stage by the researches of two American scholars—Professor Page, in his End of Villainage in England (Amer. Econ. Assoc., 1900), and Professor Gay, in his article on Inclosures in England in the Sixteenth Century (Q. J. of Econ., Aug., 1903). Edgbaston, January, 1906. Preface The delay in the preparation of the second instalment of this work has been due, partly to the pressure of new and engrossing duties, partly to the difficulties of the task. The book was originally intended to be little more than a compilation; although in the course of writing even the first part some little fresh 6 / William J. Ashley investigation seemed advisable. But on attempting to put together material for a second part, it soon became apparent that the necessary foundations had not been laid, in the shape of satisfactory modern treatises on the several portions of the subject. I have therefore been obliged in large measure to do my own work of excavation; and not only to generalize from given facts, but also to collect the facts for myself. The first five chapters present what are in the main independent conclusions based upon the original authorities. I regret that I have not been able in every instance to draw my citations directly from the sources themselves. The conditions under which the book has been written,—a great part of it in a remote “summer resort” in the province of Quebec, several hundred miles away from any books save those laboriously carried thither,—must excuse the frequent reference to merely secondary collections. I cannot refrain from expressing my deep obligations to Mr. James Bain, the chief librarian, and to the trustees of the Toronto Public Library without whose liberal aid it would have been impossible to set about the work. The sixth chapter is based upon a study and comparison of the conclusions of a number of modern German writers on the history of canon law and of commercial law. This literature is so entirely unknown to English scholars that a presentation of its results is probably the best introduction to the examination of the original material. The book was more than half finished when my removal to Harvard put it out of my power for an indefinite period to devote much further attention to it. I have thought it best, therefore, to restrict the scope of the chapter on agriculture to the presentation of work already done; and to defer to a later period the more complete treatment of the fifteenth century,—perhaps the most obscure in English history after the Norman Conquest. For the same reason I have postponed my intended chapter on foreign trade. This is the less to be regretted, since for its external history the reader of German already has the useful treatise of Schanz, which Mr. Williamson has compressed for the benefit of English readers in his Stanhope Essay. On the other side of the subject, however,—the internal history of the various merchant groups and their organization in the several English towns during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries,—there exists a mass of evidence which has as yet hardly been touched. There has of late been a marked increase in the attention paid to Economic History. Almost simultaneously the two universities of the older and the younger Cambridge have done something to stimulate its study; the former by giving it a larger place in its examination system, the latter by creating a chair devoted to its teaching. But no one who realizes how little English-speaking scholars have done in this direction, or how intimate is the relation between Economic History and many of those theories of social change which are now influencing men’s minds, can regard the attempts hitherto made at its investigation as more than poor beginnings. Of the daily life of the great body of the people during whole centuries we know well-nigh nothing; and yet the material is superabundant. We might well cry a truce to controversy as to economic method, if only a band of fit scholars could be attracted into a field which cries out for labourers. To my wife, and to my former colleague, Professor Alexander, of Toronto, I am indebted for much help in the correction of the proofs. Cambridge, Mass. December 3, 1892. Book 2: From the Fourteenth to the Sixteenth Century Chapter 1: The Supremacy of the Towns [Authorities.—The books of greatest value for the study of town life are those composed of, or contain- ing excerpts from, or translations of town reeords. Of these the following will be found most useful: Memorials of London (1868), composed of translations by H. T. Riley from the Letter Books of the city for the period 1276–1419; the Liber Albus (compiled 1419), and the Liber Custumarum of London, forming volumes I (1859) and II (1860) of the Munimenta Gildhallae Londoniensis, ed. Riley, in the Rolls’ Series, and the former especially easy to consult in the translation by Riley published in 1861; the Liber Custumarum of Northampton, in Northamptonshire Notes and Queries (1891); Drake’s Eboracum (1736, and several later editions); Cooper’s Annals of Cambridge (1842); Wodderspoon’s Memorials of Ipswich (1850); for Bristol, Ricart’s Kalendar (temp. Ed. IV.), ed. Lucy Toulmin Smith, Oamden Soc. (1872); Davies’ Southampton (1883); the Records of Nottingham, ed. with translations by W. H. Stevenson (1882–1889), a model publication, from which an intimate knowledge of the life of a borough of the second rank may be derived; the Records of Oxford (1509–1583), ed. Turner (1880); the Old Usages of Winchester, and the Ordinances of Worcester, in Toulmin Smith, English Gilds, E.B.T.S. (1870); Picton’s Liverpool Municipal Records (1883); the Court Leet Records of the Manor of Manchester from 1552 onward, of which there are two editions, a modernized abstract, ed. Harland, for Chetham Soc. (1864), and a textual reprint, ed. Earwaker (1884); Ferguson and Nauson, Records of the City of Carlisle, Publ. Cumb. and Westm. Antiq. Soc. Extra Series IV (1887); and Goulding, Louth Records (1891). It may be added that the above mentioned records of Nottingham, Oxford, and Manchester (ed. Earwaker) have been published at the expense of the respective corpora- tions, an example: which should certainly be followed by all other historic towns. Something may be gathered from the Reports of the Historical MSS. Commission, especially from vol. v. (1876), contain- ing abstracts of Cinque Port records. As useful special studies of town history may be mentioned—for a great city, Hudson’s Development of the Municipal Organisation in Norwich, in Archaeolog. Jour- nal, xlvi. (1889), and for a small town under a lord, Fuller’s Cirencester: the Manor and the Town, in Trans Bristol and Glouc. Archaeolog.

Load more