Economic and Industrial History: the 15th Century

[Young Knight]

Anyone know any good books on late medieval or specifically 15th century industrial/economic history? I'm interested in both technological changes and the economy as a whole, particularly in England.
-Wilhelm

[Josh W]

Do you already have...

Standards of Living in the later Middle Ages?

http://www.amazon.com/Standards-Living- ... 909&sr=8-1

English Society in the Later Middle Ages?

http://www.amazon.com/English-Society-M ... 942&sr=1-1

Cathedral, Forge, and Waterwheel?

http://www.amazon.com/Cathedral-Forge-W ... 980&sr=1-1

None of them focus solely on what you want, but between the three of them, I think they cover the subject very adequately.

[Thomas Powers]

How about:

The Mills of Medieval England (ISBN: 0631156925)
Richard Holt

Mills in the Medieval Economy: England 1300-1540 (ISBN: 0199265585)
Langdon, John

Remembering that mills are not only for grinding grain; but for processing a lot of other stuffs as well.

I would also look into the wool trade;

Thomas

[RandallMoffett]

Of interest to you perhaps.

http://www.le.ac.uk/hi/bon/ESFDB/frameset.html

An old one but very much still useful is the Fontana Economic history of Europe:The Middle Ages, Ed. Carlo M. Cipolla.

Came across this listing of trade and econ related books online some time ago.

http://www.geocities.com/elangoc/mediev ... raphy.html

If you look into most books on town life they focus in part on econ and industry. Look into Cambridge Urban History volumes for the medieval period it has a few related sections.

RPM

[Young Knight]

I have English Society in the Late Middle Ages. It's one of the first books I read dealing with social history, after the Ties That Bound by Barbara Hannawalt.
And it looks like both Mill books mentioned, the one by Holt and the one by Langdon, are rather expensive. Like Knight and the Blast Furnace expensive. But maybe I can find them at a library somewhere.
Thanks for the recomendations, folks.
-Wilhelm

[Mord]

For more general reading, you might want to take a good look at "The Cambridge Economic History." What, exactly, are you trying to do?

Mord.

[^]

I'd probably go with Standards of Living in the later Middle Ages. Or you could go with Hanawalt's Growing up in medieval London. One thing to do is to look in the back of English Society in the Late Middle Ages and find the more reading list for the chapters you found most interesting.

[Andrew Bodley]

Have you seen
English medieval industries edited by john blair and nigel ramsay.
Interesting as it deals with crafts, techniques and products looking at available evidence.
andrew

[Young Knight]

I'm just trying to expand my knowledge of the society I'm reenacting by looking at the economic aspects of it--beyond that I'm not trying to 'do' anything. So thanks for the recommendations.
-Wilhelm

[^]

Your one of Grey's right. Definitely go with the books I said next. Standards of Living is a broader time frame like Keen's and Hanawalt's books covering roughly 1250(1300?) to 1520. It is socio-economics so it covers wages, diet, housing stuff like that. Growing up in Medieval London is the book Hanawalt wrote after the Ties that Bound, which is one of my favorite books BTW. If you liked or enjoyed the Ties that Bound then you should like or enjoy Growing up. Your being very wise to stick to some of the broader books first instead of delving quickly into very specific stuff.

If you want some other ideas feel free to pm or e-mail me. either before or after you read those books.

[Thomas Powers]

Look into ILL at your local library. I'm in the middle of a lot of nowhere---they had the *first* nuclear bomb test closer to me than my Dr is and our little library can ILL books that can't even be found to buy much less afford!

Thomas

[Benedek]

Not particularly English.

But The Realm of St. Stephen had some interesting economic information pertaining to eastern europe in the latter part of the book.