Villainage in England: Essays in English Mediaeval History

This volume gathers a series of essays that explore how England’s medieval countryside was organised and how those arrangements changed over centuries. Drawing on a wealth of legal records, manorial accounts and contemporary chronicles, the author examines the transition from labour‑based tenancy to a rent‑focused system, the role of communal institutions, and the shifting relationship between peasants and the landed gentry.

The writer’s outsider perspective—rooted in a Russian tradition of social‑economic history—offers fresh comparisons between Western agrarian developments and the challenges faced by societies undergoing land reforms. By linking the medieval experience to broader questions of law, economics and community life, the book invites listeners to consider how past structures still echo in today’s debates about land ownership and rural policy.