, 1916.

PREFACE

This text-book is intended for college and high-school classes. Most
of the facts stated in it have become, through the researches and
publications of recent years, such commonplace knowledge that a
reference to authority in each case has not seemed necessary.
Statements on more doubtful points, and such personal opinions as I
have had occasion to express, although not supported by references,
are based on a somewhat careful study of the sources. To each chapter
is subjoined a bibliographical paragraph with the titles of the most
important secondary authorities. These works will furnish a fuller
account of the matters that have been treated in outline in this book,
indicate the original sources, and give opportunity and suggestions
for further study. An introductory chapter and a series of narrative
paragraphs prefixed to other chapters are given with the object of
correlating matters of economic and social history with other aspects
of the life of the nation.

My obligation and gratitude are due, as are those of all later
students, to the group of scholars who have within our own time laid
the foundations of the study of economic history, and whose names and
books will be found referred to in the bibliographical paragraphs.

EDWARD P. CHEYNEY.

University of Pennsylvania,
January, 1901.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

Growth Of The Nation To The Middle Of The
Fourteenth Century Page

1. The Geography of England................................. 1

2. Prehistoric Britain...................................... 4

3. Roman Britain............................................ 5

4. Early Saxon England...................................... 8

5. Danish and Late Saxon England........................... 12

6. The Period following the Norman Conquest................ 15

7. The Period of the Early Angevin Kings, 1154-1338........ 22

CHAPTER II

Rural Life and Organization

8. The Mediaeval Village.................................... 31

9. The Vill as an Agricultural System...................... 33

10. Classes of People on the Manor.......................... 39

11. The Manor Courts........................................ 45

12. The Manor as an Estate of a Lord........................ 49

13. Bibliography.......................................