This work is the first comprehensive historical and archaeological investigation into the maritime organization of the port of Faversham, Kent, SE England. The period examined is 1580-1780. Faversham, a multi-functional town, was well placed to take advantage of its maritime position in the Swale, its closeness to Canterbury, and the need to ship grain to London from this fertile crescent of North Kent. An examination of the original and early development of the port is complemented by an analysis of the ships and port administration. Unique methods of ship operation and manning are investigated, and a comprehensive survey of the shipping fleets of Kent during their formative years undertaken. This study is also concerned with analyzing the variety of mercantile responses to marketing opportunities. Apart from providing London with ever-increasing agricultural cargoes (and return cargoes of manufactured goods), Faversham developed a very healthy trade in wool, oysters, fishing, and the manufacture of gunpowder. This movement of commodities is investigated, and the inter-play between changes in production patterns assessed, while the significance of the maritime development of the port provides ample scope for pioneering a study of port logistics and organization. An examination of the origins and early developments of Faversham's maritime industry is long overdue, and the uncovering of new evidence makes it possible to unravel the complexities of this mercantile activity during Faversham 's formative years.

This volume traces the impact of industrial development and decline on the valley and its people. It details changing patterns of work and society, the creation of new settlements and the pivotal role of the river in all aspects of village life reflecting two centuries of change and upheaval.

An engaging, encyclopedic account of the material world of early modern Britain as told through a unique collection of dated objects The period from 1500 to 1800 in England was one of extraordinary social transformations, many having to do with the way time itself was understood, measured, and recorded. Through a focused exploration of an extensive private collection of fine and decorative artworks, this beautifully designed volume explores that theme and the variety of ways that individual notions of time and mortality shifted. The feature uniting these more than 450 varied objects is that each one bears a specific date, which marks a significant moment—for reasons personal or professional, religious or secular, private or public. From paintings to porringers, teapots to tape measures, the objects—and the stories they tell—offer a vivid sense of the lived experience of time, while providing a sweeping survey of the material world of early modern Britain.

This ambitious undertaking is designed to acquaint students, teachers, and researchers with reference sources in any branch of English studies, which Marcuse defines as "all those subjects and lines of critical and scholarly inquiry presently pursued by members of university departments of English language and literature.'' Within each of 24 major sections, Marcuse lists and annotates bibliographies, guides, reviews of research, encyclopedias, dictionaries, journals, and reference histories. The annotations and various indexes are models of clarity and usefulness, and cross references are liberally supplied where appropriate. Although cost-conscious librarians will probably consider the several other excellent literary bibliographies in print, such as James L. Harner's Literary Research Guide (Modern Language Assn. of America, 1989), larger academic libraries will want Marcuse's volume.-- Jack Bales, Mary Washington Coll. Lib., Fredericksburg, Va. -Library Journal.

Contributing an original dimension to the significant body of published scholarship on women in 16th-century England, this study examines the largest corpus of women’s private writings available to historians: their wills. In these, female voices speak out, commenting on their daily lives, on identity, gender, status, familial relationships and social engagement. Wills show women to have been active participants in a civil society, well aware of their personal authority and potential influence, whose committed actions during life and charitable strategies after death could and did impact the health of that society. From an intensive analysis of more than 1200 wills, this pioneering work focuses on women from all parts of the country and all strata of society, revealing an entire population of articulate, opportunistic, and capable individuals who found the spaces between the lines of the law and used those spaces to achieve personal goals. Author Susan James demonstrates how wills describe strategies for end-of-life care, create platforms of remembrance, and offer insights into the myriad occupational endeavors in which women were engaged. James illuminates how these documents were not simply instruments of bequest and inheritance, but were statements of power and control, catalogues of material culture from which we are able to gauge a woman’s understanding of her own reality and the context that formed her environment. Wills were tools and the way in which women wielded these tools offers new ways to look at England in the 16th century and reveals the seminal role women played in its development.

Includes entries for maps and atlases.