Peasants, merchants, and markets

by James Masschaele

Peasants, Merchants, and Markets deals with the development of regional networks of trade and social interaction in the two centuries before the Black Death, a period that saw dynamic changes in relations between towns and their rural hinterlands. By examining the economic interests of urban merchants and peasant traders, the commodities they exchanged, and the markets and transportation networks they used to engage in trade, the book explores how commerce helped to erode the localism of medieval society and to create enduring institutions and motivations for a more expansive social and economic life. The book offers original interpretations and original use of historical source material and will be of interest to scholars and students of medieval and English history, as well as historians dealing with commercial development in other periods and places.