Book-hoard

I mentioned the other day the lack of books about peasant life. Here are the few that I have found and read. When I start to run low on things to talk about, I’ll write up some reviews of these books.

Life in a Medieval Village by Frances Gies and Joseph Gies

Anglo-saxon Food & Drink by Ann Hagen

Lost Country Life - How English Country Folk Lived, Worked, Threshed, Thatched, Rolled Fleece... by Dorothy Hartley

Peasants and Landlords in Later Medieval England by E. B. Fryde

Medieval Technology and Social Change by Lynn White Jr.

Feudal Society: Vol 1: The Growth and Ties of Dependence by Marc Bloch

Feudal Society Vol. 2: Social Classes and Political Organization by Marc Bloch

The Medieval Economy & Society by M. M. Postan

A Medieval Home Companion: Housekeeping in the Fourteenth Century by Tania Bayard

To the King's Taste: Richard II's Book of Feasts and Recipes Adapted for Modern Cooking by Lorna Sass

A History of Food by Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat

Marc Bloch’s books are classics in the field and I haven’t read them since college. I think I’ll take them with me on the plane to Kalamazoo and give them a good re-read.

I haven’t read Peasants and Landlords, mostly because it’s later than my preference, but that really shouldn’t dissuade me. Lost Country Life is even later, stressing the conservative and cyclical nature of rural life before the 20th Century, but giving details about farming life on a month-by-month basis.

I almost forgot, I also have a copy of Hesiod's Works and Days that I often pick up, read a couple of pages and then put down again only to not come back to it for a month or so. It too is off-period and Mediterranean rather than Northern European, but is one of the earliest discussions of agriculture, dating to 700-600 BC. This edition is excellent as it has a tremendous amount of notes and comments accompanying the text.