The theme of warfare as a collective enterprise investigated in the theatres of both land and sea.

This is the third collection of articles by Bruce Campbell to appear in the Variorum series. Late medieval England was an overwhelmingly rural society. Never since has such a large proportion of the population lived in the countryside or relied so directly for its livelihood upon agriculture. The lot of a majority of that population was always a hard one - and never more so than during the first half of the 14th century, when peasants competed with each other for ever-scarcer land and work and a succession of major harvest failures jeopardised the survival of many. Nevertheless, experience varied considerably, both during this era of mounting population pressure and the century and more of population decline and stagnation that followed the demographic disaster of the Black Death. How well individual communities coped during these contrasting conditions of expansion and contraction owed much to the quality and composition of their natural-resource endowment, a good deal to their ability to take advantage of changing commercial opportunities, and sometimes almost everything to how exposed they were to military conflict. Always, however, much hinged upon how the twin feudal institutions of lordship and serfdom were mapped onto land and people via the manorial system. These are the themes variously explored by the eight essays assembled in this volume, which range from a case-study of a single crowded Norfolk manor to a consideration of the broad and, towards the end of the Middle Ages, widening contrasts that persisted between North and South.

New essays on chivalry, warfare, and treason and politics in the middle ages. Chivalric culture, soldiers and soldiering, and treason, politics and the court form the main themes of this volume - as is appropriate in a book which honours the distinguished medievalist Maurice Keen. The essays, all by eminentscholars in the field, cover such topics as nobility and mobility in Anglo-Saxon society; chivalry and courtliness; the crusade and chivalric ideas; chivalry and art; devotional literature; piety and chivalry; military strategy;the victualling of castles; Bertrand du Guesclin; soldiers' wives; military communities in fourteenth-century England; military and administrative service among the fifteenth-century gentry; treason, disinvestiture and the disgracing of arms; and treason in Lancastrian Normandy. Overall, they reflect the range of the honoree's interests, the depth of his scholarship, the international flavour of his work, and his unique contribution to historical scholarship. The volume includes appreciations from a former pupil and colleagues, and ends with a bibliography of his work. CONTRIBUTORS: LINNIE RAWLINSON, MARTIN CONWAY, SIMON SKINNER, JAMES CAMPBELL, DAVID CROUCH, CHRISTOPHERTYERMAN, CRAIG TAYLOR, ADRIAN AILES, NIGEL SAUL, JEREMY CATTO, ROWENA ARCHER, CHRISTOPHER ALLMAND, MICHAEL PRESTWICH, MICHAEL JONES, ANNE CURRY, ANDREW AYTON, SIMON PAYLING, PETER COSS, MATTHEW STRICKLAND, JULIET BARKER, MALCOLM VALE, GERALD HARRISS, MARY KEEN

First extended survey of the subject, looking at the knights' activities, roles, background and service.

The Hundred Years War was a struggle for control over the French throne, fought as a series of conflicts between England, France, and their respective allies. The Soldier in Later Medieval England is the outcome of a project which collects the names of every soldier known to have served the English Crown from 1369 to the loss of Gascony in 1453, the event which is traditionally accepted as the end-date of the Hundred Years War. The data gathered throughout the project has allowed the authors of this volume to compare different forms of war, such as the chevauchées of the late fourteenth century and the occupation of French territories in the fifteenth century, and thus to identify longer-term trends. It also highlights the significance of the change of dynasty in England in the early 1400s. The scope of the volume begins in 1369 because of the survival from that point of the 'muster roll', a type of documentary record in which soldiers names are systematically recorded. The muster roll is a rich resource for the historian, as it allows closer study to be made of the peerage, the knights, the men-at-arms (the esquires), and especially the lower ranks of the army, such as the archers, who contributed the largest proportion of troops to English royal service. The Soldier in Later Medieval England seeks to investigate the different types of soldier, their regional and national origins, and movement between ranks. This is a wide-ranging volume, which offers invaluable insights into a much-neglected subject, and presents many opportunities for future research.

An investigation into three of the best-known cases tried under the Court of Chivalry reveals much about gentry military society.