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The Madman and the Churchrobber: Law and Conflict in Early Modern England

Peacey, Jason; (2022) The Madman and the Churchrobber: Law and Conflict in Early Modern England. Oxford Scholarship Online. Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK. Green open access

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Abstract

This microhistory reconstructs and analyses a protracted legal dispute over a small parcel of land called Warrens Court in Nibley, Gloucestershire, which was contested between successive generations of two families from the mid-sixteenth century to the early eighteenth century. Employing a rich cache of archival material, it traces legal contestation over time, and through a range of different courts, as well as in Parliament and the public domain, and it contends that a microhistorical approach makes it possible to shed valuable light upon the legal and political culture of early modern England, not least by comprehending how certain disputes became protracted and increasingly bitter, and why they might fascinate contemporaries. This involves recognising the dynamic of litigation, in terms of how disputes changed over time, and how those involved in myriad lawsuits found legal reasons for prolonging contestation. It also involves exploring litigants’ strategies and practices, as well as competing claims about the way in which adversaries behaved, and incompatible expectations of the legal system. Finally, it involves teasing out the structural issues in play, in terms of the social, cultural and ideological identities of successive generations. Ultimately, this dispute is employed to address important historiographical debates surrounding the nature of civil litigation in early modern England, and to provide new ways of appreciating the nature, severity, and visibility of political and religious conflict in the decades before and after the English Revolution.

Type: Book
Title: The Madman and the Churchrobber: Law and Conflict in Early Modern England
ISBN: 0192897136
ISBN-13: 9780192897138
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192897138.001.0001
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780192897138.001.0001
Language: English
Additional information: This version is the author-accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions.
Keywords: Litigation, disputation, ideological conflict, strategies, microhistory, early modern, English revolution
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS > Dept of History
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10178281
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