ISBN : 9780197267301
In the later Middle Ages a European 'core' of culturally and administratively sophisticated societies with rapidly growing populations, on an axis from England to Italy, colonised the European 'periphery'. In northern Europe this periphery included Wales and Ireland, as colonised by the English, and Prussia and Livonia, as colonised (mainly) by Germanic and Nordic peoples. A key tool of colonisation was the chartered town, giving citizens distinguishing legal privileges and a degree of self-regulation. Towns on the Edge in Medieval Europe contends that while the chartered town, as a legal and social-political concept, was transferred to peripheral areas by colonisers, its implementation and adaptation in peripheral areas resulted in unique societies, not simply the replication of core urban forms and communities. In so doing, it compares the development of social and political institutions in the chartered towns of medieval Ireland, Wales, Prussia, and Livonia. Research themes include community formation, normalisation/social disciplining, and peace making/keeping.
1 Introduction
2 The place of native populations in the chartered towns of conquered regions: Wales and Prussia as a comparative case study
3 'Irishtowns' and 'Welsh Streets': ethnic enclaves within the towns of colonial Ireland and Wales in a northern-European colonial context
4 Women in the small-town economy of medieval Wales and Prussia
5 Urban legislation as an instrument for the formation and regulation of socio-economic life in 14th-century Prussian and Irish towns
6 The participation of craftsmen in municipal governance in late medieval Malbork and Stockholm
7 Shaping the public space of Gda?sk and Dublin, 14th-16th centuries.: tensions between the common good and private use
8 Military affairs and community in Prussian, Livonian and Irish towns, 13th-16th centuries
9 Quarters and quartermasters in Franconian and Prussian towns, 13th-16th centuries
10 Maintaining a 'special relationship'? Petitions to the crown from Irish and Welsh towns, 13th -16th centuries
11 Conclusion