The availability of credit in the English countryside, 1400-1480

Agricultural History Review

Volumn 56, Issue 1, 2008, Pages 1-24

  Briggs, Chris ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE   (United Kingdom)

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EID: 52949115671     PISSN: 00021490     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Conference Paper

References (101)

1. On the general importance of credit, see, for example, P. Nightingale, 'Money and credit in the economy of late medieval England', in D. Wood (ed.), Medieval money matters (2004), pp. 51-71; on rural credit,
2. see P. R. Schofield, 'L'Endettement et le crédit dans la campagne anglaise au moyen âge', in M. Berthe (ed.), Endettement paysan et crédit rural dans l'Europe médiévale et moderne: actes des XVIIes journées internationales d'histoire de l'abbaye de Flaran, Septembre 1995 (1998), pp. 69-97;
3. C. Briggs, Credit and village society in fourteenth-century England (forthcoming).
4. P. Nightingale, 'Monetary contraction and mercantile credit in later medieval England', EcHR 43 (1990), pp. 567-74;
5. P. Nightingale, A medieval mercantile community. The Grocers' company and the politics and trade of London, 1000-1485 (1995), p. 572;
6. R. H. Britnell, Growth and decline in Colchester, 1300-1525 (1986), pp. 206-8.
7. C. Dyer, Lords and peasants in a changing society. The estates of the bishopric of Worcester, 680-1540 (1980), pp. 264-9;
8. E. Clark, 'Debt litigation in a late medieval English vill', in J. A. Raftis (ed.), Pathways to medieval peasants (1981), pp. 247-79 (Writtle, Essex);
9. M. K. McIntosh, Autonomy and community. The royal manor of Havering, 1200-1500 (1986), pp. 191-200.
10. J. Whittle, The development of agrarian capitalism. Land and labour in Norfolk, 1440-1580 (2000), p. 52, notes that debt pleas in the manor court of Hevingham Bishops (Norfolk) declined between 1485 and 1558.
11. For the possibility that reduced trade explains the contraction in credit, see J. Kermode, 'Money and credit in the fifteenth century: some lessons from Yorkshire', Business History Rev. 65 (1991), pp. 481, 500;
12. P. Nightingale, 'England and the European depression of the mid-fifteenth century', J. European Economic History 26 (1997). p. 639.
13. For mint output, see C. E. Challis (ed.), A new history of the Royal Mint (1992), pp. 680-5;
14. on the increasing ratio of gold to silver in the later medieval money supply, see M. Allen, 'The volume of the English currency, 1158-1470', EcHR 54 (2001), pp. 607-8,
15. and N. J. Mayhew, 'Coinage and money in England, 1086-c.1500', in D. Wood (ed.), Medieval money matters (2004), pp. 81-2.
16. See, most recently, Nightingale, Medieval mercantile community, pp. 482-3;
17. Nightingale, 'England and the European depression, pp. 631-51;
18. J. H. Munro, 'Wage-stickiness, monetary changes, and real incomes in late medieval England and the Low Countries, 1300-1500: did money matter?', Research in Economic History 21 (2003), pp. 214-16.
19. Older influential statements concerning the importance of monetary factors in the late medieval depression include H. A. Miskimin, 'Monetary movements and market structure - forces for contraction in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century England', JEcH 24 (1964), pp. 470-90;
20. J. Day, 'The great bullion famine of the fifteenth century', Past and Present 79 (1978), pp. 3-54;
21. M. Mate, 'The role of gold coinage in the English economy, 1338-1400', Numismatic Chronicle 18 (1978), pp. 126-41;
22. P. Spufford, Money and its uses in medieval Europe (1988), pp. 358-62.
23. On the 'great depression' of the later middle ages more generally, and its impact on the rural economy, see R. Britnell, 'The economic context', in A. J. Pollard (ed.), The Wars of the Roses (1995), pp. 41-64;
24. J. Hatcher, 'The great slump of the mid-fifteenth century', in R. Britnell and J. Hatcher (eds), Progress and problems in medieval England (1996), pp. 237-72;
25. B. Dodds, Peasants and production in the medieval north-east: the evidence from tithes, 1270-1536 (2007), pp. 103-10.
26. Nightingale, 'Monetary contraction and mercantile credit', pp. 560-75 and her 'Money and credit', pp. 59-62;
27. N. J. Mayhew, 'Money and prices in England from Henry III to Edward III', AgHR 35 (1987), p. 121;
28. id., 'Population, money supply, and the velocity of circulation in England, 1300-1700', EcHR 48 (1995), p. 254.
29. For the limited capacity of credit instruments to add to the effective money supply, see Munro, 'Wage-stickiness', pp. 216-17.
30. Nightingale, 'England and the European depression'.
31. Ibid., pp. 637-9; Nightingale, 'Money and credit', pp. 60-7.
32. Nightingale, 'Monetary contraction and mercantile credit', p. 574;
33. Nightingale, 'England and the European depression', pp. 639, 642-3;
34. Nightingale, Medieval mercantile community, pp. 364-5, 483.
35. On the monetization of the countryside, see C. Dyer, 'Peasants and coins: the uses of money in the middle ages', British Numismatic J. 67 (1997), pp. 30-47,
36. and N. Mayhew, 'Money in the late medieval countryside: Britain', in P. Delogu and S. Sorda (eds), La moneta in ambiente rurale nell'Italia tardomedioevale. Atti dell'incontro di studio Roma 21-22 Settembre 2000 (Instituto Italiano di Numismatica, 2002), pp. 5-26.
37. Mayhew, 'Population, money supply, and the velocity of circulation', p. 254, n. 61.
38. On the fifteenth-century decline in the manor courts, in terms of their authority, frequency, income and quantity of business, see J. S. Beckerman, 'Procedural innovation and institutional change in medieval English manorial courts', Law and History Rev. 10 Note 13 continued (1992), pp. 242-50;
39. C. Dyer, 'The political life of the fifteenth-century English village', The Fifteenth Century 4 (2004), pp. 146-7;
40. Whittle, Agrarian capitalism, 47-56, 83 (though Whittle notes that several important functions of the Hevingham manor court remained robust into the sixteenth century);
41. M. Tompkins, 'Peasant society in a Midlands manor, Great Horwood, 1400-1600' (unpublished PhD thesis, University of Leicester, 2006), pp. 206-7.
42. The phrases 'plaint', 'plea', 'case', and 'action' are used interchangeably here for 'civil lawsuit'.
43. Cambridgeshire Record Office [hereafter CRO], L1/177-9 (Willingham court rolls 1377-1458); Cambridgeshire University Library [hereafter CUL], Queens' College [hereafter Q] boxes 3-5, rolls 5-20, 24 (Oakington with Cottenham and Dry Drayton court rolls); CUL, EDC 7/13/5-6 (Swaffham Prior court rolls). There is a gap in the Swaffham rolls between 1377 and 1422.
44. For the economic characteristics of these villages, see VCH Cambs, IX, pp. 58-9 (Cottenham), 404-6 (Willingham); VCH Cambs, X, pp. 285-7 (Swaffham). For Cambridgeshire fen-edge communities, see J. R. Ravensdale, Liable to floods. Village landscape on the edge of the fens, AD 450-1850 (1974);
45. for a classic study of Willingham in a slightly later period, see M. Spufford, Contrasting communities. English villagers in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (1974).
46. CRO, L1/178 (11 Mar. 1409).
47. Allen, 'Volume of the English currency' estimates the size of the currency at particular dates in this period (1351, 1422, 1470) and earlier.
48. For methods to deal with this problem, see Briggs, Credit and village society, ch. 6.
49. Nightingale, 'England and the European depression', pp. 644-5.
50. N. J. Mayhew, 'The monetary background to the Yorkist recoinage of 1464-1471', British Numismatic J. 44 (1974), pp. 62-73;
51. C. E. Challis, 'Lord Hastings to the great silver recoinage, 1464-1699', in Challis (ed.), New history of the Royal Mint, p. 190.
52. For the Europe-wide end in the 1460s of the worst effects of the dearth of coin, see Spufford, Money and its uses, pp. 363-71.
53. See the proportions of Calais and London coins in the Fishpool (Nottinghamshire) and Reigate (Wray Lane) (Surrey) hoards, which closely matched their relative proportions in the mint output of 1422-31, M. M. Archibald, 'Fishpool, Blidworth (Notts.), 1966 hoard', Numismatic Chronicle seventh ser., 7 (1967), pp. 133-46;
54. ead., 'The Reigate hoard', British Numismatic J. 48 (1978), pp. 80-1;
55. I am grateful to Martin Allen for information on this point. See also P. Spufford, 'Calais and its mint: part one', in N. J. Mayhew (ed.), Coinage in the Low Countries (800-1500) (BAR International Ser. 54, 1979), pp. 171-83.
56. Allen, 'Volume of the English currency', pp. 607-8.
57. Mayhew, 'Money in the late medieval countryside', pp. 21-2;
58. see, however, Dyer, 'Peasants and coins', p. 40.
59. D. L. Farmer, 'Prices and wages, 1350-1400', in E. Miller (ed.), The agrarian history of England and Wales, III, 1348-1500 (1991), pp. 445, 504;
60. Dodds, Peasants and production, pp. 98-100.
61. Above, n. 3.
62. McIntosh, Autonomy and community, pp. 199-200.
63. M. K. McIntosh, A community transformed. The manor and liberty of Havering-Atte-Bower, 1500-1620 (1991), pp. 301-04.
64. CRO, L1/178, 5 Feb. 1411 (three cases), 2 Dec. 1415, 24 Sept. 1417 (two cases), 11 Jan. 1419 (three cases); CRO, L1/179, 15 Jan. 1425.
65. For the developments described in the remainder of this paragraph, see Beckerman, 'Procedural innovation', pp. 242-50; M. Bailey (ed.), The English manor, c.1200-c.1500 (2002), pp. 184-6.
66. See, for example, F. M. Page, The estates of Crowland Abbey: a study in manorial organisation (1934), p. 70;
67. C. Dyer, 'The social and economic background to the rural revolt of 1381', in Dyer, Everyday life in medieval England (1994), pp. 211-12.
68. In Durham, men elected as officials rarely refused to serve, but this did not necessarily mean that their duties were carried out properly: P. L. Larson, Conflict and compromise in the late medieval countryside. Lords and peasants in Durham, 1349-1400 (2006), pp. 137-9.
69. C. Briggs, 'Manor court procedures, debt litigation levels, and rural credit provision in England, c.1290-c.1380', Law and History Rev. 24 (2006), pp. 519-58.
70. CRO, L1/178 (27 Feb. 1402).
71. CRO, L1/178 (20 June 1407). The cases are Thomas Atte Persounes v. William Bolle, and Thomas Massy v. William Bolle. The hayward who failed to attach was named in the latter case as Thomas Syward.
72. CUL, Q roll 14, 25 Apr. 1415 (John Symond v. Simon Cole); 15 Feb. 1417 (Thomas Boydene v. Thomas Stanard smith); 29 July 1417 (Robert in the Field v. William Massanger); roll 16, 27 Nov. 1424 (John Symound v. Simon Cole); roll 15, 12 Feb. 1428 (Robert Aylewene v. Simon Sperner). For all cases, only the date of first appearance is given.
73. CUL, Q roll 16, 4 May 1431 (Robert Aylewene v. John Gleyve thresher); 13 Nov. 1431 (William Martyn v. John Roger); 15 Nov. 1435 (Simon Gylberd v. Henry Martyn); roll 17, 19 Nov. 1437 (Simon Wryghte v. Thomas Warlok); 11 Feb. 1438 (John Haldene v. John Smyth); 5 May 1438 (Richard Katellene v. John Bevere, John Cosyn junior v. John Botown junior); 20 Apr. 1439 (John Cole v. Richard Porter). Again, only the date of first appearance is given.
74. Briggs, 'Manor court procedures'.
75. CUL, Q roll 6, 9 Oct. 1364 (Robert Harger v. William Veysy); roll 8, 17 Sept. 1380 (Andrew Phipson v. Robert Cademan).
76. CUL, EDC 7/13/6 (31 Oct. 1459).
77. CUL, EDC 7/13/6 (5 July 1436).
78. For this possibility, see Dyer, 'Political life', p. 148.
79. No relevant fifteenth-century plea rolls relating to Cambridgeshire hundred or county courts appear to survive. For a discussion of debt and other personal actions in county courts, and an indication of the relatively sparse survival of records of their proceedings, see R. C. Palmer, The county courts of medieval England, 1150-1350 (1982), pp. 220-62.
80. Dyer, 'Political life', pp. 150-3. It is probable however, that gilds settled disputes and enforced judgements only among their members. For a discussion, albeit in an urban context, see B. R. McRee, 'Religious gilds and regulation of behaviour in late medieval towns', in J. Rosenthal and C. Richmond (eds), People, politics and community in the later middle ages (1987), pp. 108-22.
81. V. R. Bainbridge, Gilds in the medieval countryside. Social and religious change in Cambridgeshire, c.1350-1558 (1996), pp. 30-1. Gilds are recorded at Dry Drayton, Oakington and Willingham in the early sixteenth century: VCH Cambs, IX, pp. 86, 206, 409. None of the manorial court roll series studied mentions gilds.
82. No gild explicitly connected with Swaffham itself is recorded, but a gild of St John associated with a chapel in the hamlet of Reach (partly within Swaffham Prior parish) is known from a will to have existed c.1490-1525: VCH Cambs, X, pp. 228, 297, and references therein. (This, presumably, is the gild counted as belonging to Swaffham Prior in Bainbridge, Gilds, pp. 30-1.)
83. R. C. Palmer, 'England: law, society and the state', in S. H. Rigby (ed.), A companion to Britain in the later middle ages (2003), pp. 256-7 (in Trinity term 1465, plaintiffs were explicitly described as 'husbandmen' or 'yeomen' in one per cent of instances).
84. S. F. C. Milsom, Historical foundations of the common law (sec. edn., 1981), pp. 244-5;
85. J. A. Galloway, 'Urban hinterlands in later medieval England', in K. Giles and C. Dyer (eds), Town and country in the middle ages: contrasts, contacts and interconnections, 1100-1500 (2005), p. 121.
86. C. W. Brooks, 'Litigation and society in England, 1200-1996', in Brooks, Lawyers, litigation and English society since 1450 (1998), pp. 66-70.
87. McIntosh found that suits in Common Pleas involving Havering residents were extremely rare in the first half of the fifteenth century: Autonomy and community, pp. 69-70, 200.
88. R. H. Helmholz, The Oxford history of the laws of England, I, The canon law and ecclesiastical jurisdiction from 597 to the 1640s (2004), pp. 229-30, 359-60.
89. id, 'Assumpsit and fidei laesio', in Helmholz, Canon law and the law of England (1987), pp. 263-4.
90. B. L. Woodcock, Medieval ecclesiastical courts in the diocese of Canterbury (1952), pp. 90-1.
91. C. Briggs, 'Seigniorial control of villagers' litigation beyond the manor in later medieval England', Historical Research, forthcoming.
92. L. R. Poos (ed.), Lower ecclesiastical jurisdiction in late-medieval England. The courts of the Dean and Chapter of Lincoln, 1336-1349 and the Deanery of Wisbech, 1458-1484 (British Academy Records of Social and Economic History, new ser. 32, 2001).
93. Poos (ed.), Lower ecclesiastical jurisdiction, p. lvi.
94. K. Parkin, 'Courts and the community: reconstructing the fourteenth-century peasant society of Wisbech Hundred, Cambridgeshire, from manor court rolls' (unpublished PhD thesis, University of Leicester, 1998), pp. 49, 80-6.
95. Poos (ed.), Lower ecclesiastical jurisdiction, pp. xlv-l;
96. for 'instance' procedure, see Helmholz, Oxford history of the laws of England, I, pp. 312-43.
97. Woodcock, Medieval ecclesiastical courts, pp. 53, 89.
98. R. N. Swanson, Church and society in late medieval England (1989), pp. 179-80;
99. Helmholz, Oxford history of the laws of England, I, pp. 345-8.
100. I intend to publish a more detailed study of this issue.
101. Dyer, 'Political life', p. 154.