Crime and Conflict in English Communities, 1300–1348

Crime and Conflict in English Communities, 1300–1348
Author: Barbara Hanawalt
Publisher:
Total Pages: 384
Release: 1979-10
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN:

As this account of crime patterns in medieval England shows, crime can perhaps tell us more about a society's dynamics, tensions, and values than any other single social phenomenon. And Barbara Hanawalt's approach is particularly enlightening because it looks at the subject not from the heights of the era's learned opinion, but from the viewpoint of the people participating in the criminal dramas and manipulating the law for their own benefit. Hanawalt's sources are those of the new social historian—village and judicial records supplemented by the literature of the time. She examined approximately 20,000 criminal court cases as well as coroners' and manorial court rolls. Her analysis of these data produces striking results. Medieval England, the author reveals, was a society in which all classes readily sought violent solutions to conflicts. The tensions of village life were severe. The struggle for food and for profits caused numerous homicides and property crimes. These felonies were committed in seasonal patterns, with homicides occurring most frequently during the difficult times of planting and harvesting, and burglaries reaching a peak in winter when goods were stored in houses and barns. Moreover, organized crime was widespread and varied. It ranged from simple associations of local people to professional bands led by members of the nobility. One of Hanawalt's most interesting findings explodes the Robin Hood myth of robbers who stole from the rich and gave to the poor. Almost always, she shows, the robbers stole from the poor and kept for themselves. Throughout, Hanawalt carefully places the crimes and their participants within the context of village life in the later middle ages. Along with a description of the social and legal setting of criminal acts, she includes a discussion of the influence of war, politics, and economic, social, and demographic changes on the patterns of crime.

Crime and Conflict in English Communities, 1300–1348

Crime and Conflict in English Communities, 1300–1348
Author: Barbara Hanawalt
Publisher:
Total Pages: 384
Release: 1979-10
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN:

As this account of crime patterns in medieval England shows, crime can perhaps tell us more about a society's dynamics, tensions, and values than any other single social phenomenon. And Barbara Hanawalt's approach is particularly enlightening because it looks at the subject not from the heights of the era's learned opinion, but from the viewpoint of the people participating in the criminal dramas and manipulating the law for their own benefit. Hanawalt's sources are those of the new social historian—village and judicial records supplemented by the literature of the time. She examined approximately 20,000 criminal court cases as well as coroners' and manorial court rolls. Her analysis of these data produces striking results. Medieval England, the author reveals, was a society in which all classes readily sought violent solutions to conflicts. The tensions of village life were severe. The struggle for food and for profits caused numerous homicides and property crimes. These felonies were committed in seasonal patterns, with homicides occurring most frequently during the difficult times of planting and harvesting, and burglaries reaching a peak in winter when goods were stored in houses and barns. Moreover, organized crime was widespread and varied. It ranged from simple associations of local people to professional bands led by members of the nobility. One of Hanawalt's most interesting findings explodes the Robin Hood myth of robbers who stole from the rich and gave to the poor. Almost always, she shows, the robbers stole from the poor and kept for themselves. Throughout, Hanawalt carefully places the crimes and their participants within the context of village life in the later middle ages. Along with a description of the social and legal setting of criminal acts, she includes a discussion of the influence of war, politics, and economic, social, and demographic changes on the patterns of crime.

Crime and Modernity

Crime and Modernity
Author: John Lea
Publisher: SAGE
Total Pages: 223
Release: 2002-07-25
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 141293270X

′Lea has produced a serious and scholarly contribution of great interest to criminologists (whether "critical "or not), to post graduates, as well as the more advanced undergraduate. This is a book that is well written, absorbing, thoughtful and thought provoking′ - The British Journal of Criminology Crime control is in crisis. Not only have levels of crime risen but, more important, crime is increasingly regarded as a normal aspect of the social and economic system rather than disruption or deviance. The blurring boundaries between the criminal and the normal are evident in a number of areas from the activities of multinational corporations to the life of the inner city. In this book, John Lea develops a broad historical and sociological overview relating the rise and fall of effective crime control to different types of social structures. It traces the process of modernisation and industrialisation from the eighteenth to the mid twentieth centuries which established the social preconditions for effective control and management of criminality. In the early years of the present century it is clear that these preconditions are now being progressively undermined as industrial society undergoes profound changes in its direction of development. The result is traced through a variety of types of criminality and the progressive debilitation of existing institutions and processes of crime control. A major feature of this book is its wide scope and imaginative application of historical and theoretical perspectives on modernisation and capitalist social development to the contemporary problems of controlling a wide variety of crime. It represents a significant contribution to the ability of criminology and the sociology of crime to confront the dilemmas and controversies of the twenty first century.

The Common Peace

The Common Peace
Author: Cynthia B. Herrup
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 256
Release: 1987
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780521375870

The Common Peace traces the attitudes behind the enforcement of the criminal law in early modern England. Focusing on five stages in prosecution (arrest, bail, indictment, conviction and sentencing), the book uses a variety of types of sources - court records, biographical information, state papers, legal commentaries, popular and didactic literature - to reconstruct who actually enforced the criminal law and what values they brought to its enforcement. A close study of the courts in eastern Sussex between 1592 and 1640 allows Dr Herrup to show that an amorphous collection of modest property holders participated actively in the legal process. These yeomen and husbandmen who appeared as victims, constables, witnesses and jurors were as important to the credibility of the law as were the justices and judges. The uses of the law embodied the ideas of these middling men about not only law and order but also religion and good government. By arguing that legal administration was part of the routine agenda of obligation for middling property holders, Dr Herrup shows how the expectations produced by legal activities are important for understanding the decades immediately before the outbreak of the English Civil War. As the first book to use early seventeenth-century legal records outside of Essex, The Common Peace adopts an explicitly comparative framework, attempting to trace the ways that social conditions influenced legal process as well as law enforcement in various counties. By blending social history, legal history and political history, this volume offers a complement to more conventional studies of legal records and of local government.

Maintenance, Meed, and Marriage in Medieval English Literature

Maintenance, Meed, and Marriage in Medieval English Literature
Author: K. Kennedy
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 191
Release: 2009-05-25
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 0230621627

Maintenance, Meed, and Marriage in Medieval English Literature deftly interrogates the relationship between lord and man in medieval England. Employing the study of medieval analogies this book is the first to explore how the relationship between lords and retainers was depicted in literature by Chaucer, Gower, Langland, and Lydgate. Kennedy uses close readings and medieval letter collections to provide a documentary look at how lords and men communicated information about their relationships and reveals surprising information about both medieval law and society.

Biosocial Theories of Crime

Biosocial Theories of Crime
Author: KevinM. Beaver
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 522
Release: 2017-07-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 1351573616

Biosocial criminology is an emerging perspective that highlights the interdependence between genetic and environmental factors in the etiology of antisocial behaviors. However, given that biosocial criminology has only recently gained traction among criminologists, there has not been any attempt to compile some of the "classic" articles on this topic. Beaver and Walsh's edited volume addresses this gap in the literature by identifying some of the most influential biosocial criminological articles and including them in a single resource. The articles covered in this volume examine the connection between genetics and crime, evolutionary psychology and crime, and neuroscience and crime. This volume will be a valuable resource for anyone interested in understanding the causes of crime from a biosocial criminological perspective.

Routine Activity and Rational Choice

Routine Activity and Rational Choice
Author: Ronald V. Clarke
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 432
Release: 2017-10-23
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1351492543

Two new criminological approaches are defined and applied to categories of crime in Routine Activity and Rational Choice, now available in paperback. Routine activity analyzes the criminal event, and avoids motivations and psychology as topics for discussion, whereas rational choice approaches crime as purposive behavior designed to meet the offender's commonplace needs, such as money, status, sex, and excitement. These conceptual models are both employed to analyze such crimes as drunk driving, gun use, kidnapping, and political violence. This volume discusses the relationship of these theories to more traditional approaches to crime studies.The Advances in Criminological Theory series encourages theory construction and validation in the articles and themes selected for publication. It also furthers the free exchange of ideas, propositions, and postulates. Following publication of the first volume, Michael J. Lynch of Florida State University asserted that "Advances in Criminological Theory is to be applauded as an attempt to revive criminological theory by providing an accessible outlet." Contributions to this volume include: Pierre Tremblay, "Searching for Suitable Co-offenders"; Raymond Paternoster and Sally Simpson, "A Rational Choice Theory of Corporate Crime"; Richard B. Felson, "Predatory and Dispute-related Violence"; Gordon Trasler, "Conscience, Opportunity, Rational Choice, and Crime"; Ezzat A. Fattah, "The Rational Choice/Opportunity Perspectives as a Vehicle for Integrating Criminological and Victimological Theories"; Patricia L. Brantingham and Paul J. Brantingham, "Environment, Routine, and Situation"; Maurice Cusson, "A Strategic Analysis of Crime"; Richard W. Harding, "Gun Use in Crime, Rational Choice, and Social Learning Theory."

A Punishment for Each Criminal

A Punishment for Each Criminal
Author: Christine Ekholst
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 246
Release: 2014-04-10
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004271627

A Punishment for Each Criminal is the first in-depth analysis of how gender influenced Swedish medieval law. Christine Ekholst demonstrates how the law codes gradually and unevenly introduced women as possible perpetrators for all serious crimes. The laws reveal that legislators not only expected men and women to commit different types of crimes; they also punished men and women in different ways if they were convicted. The laws consistently stipulated different methods of executions for men and women; while men were hanged or broken on the wheel, women were buried alive, stoned, or burned at the stake. A Punishment for Each Criminal explores the background to the important legislative changes that took place when women were made personally responsible for their own crimes.

Jury, State, and Society in Medieval England

Jury, State, and Society in Medieval England
Author: J. Masschaele
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 272
Release: 2008-10-27
Genre: History
ISBN: 023061616X

This book portrays the great variety of work that medieval English juries carried out while highlighting the dramatic increase in demands for jury service that occurred during this period.