Medieval Britain (Very Short Introductions)

Description: First published as part of the best-selling The Oxford Illustrated History of Britain, John Gillingham and Ralph A. Griffiths' Very Short Introduction to Medieval Britain covers the establishment of the Anglo-Norman monarchy in the early Middle Ages, through to England's failure to dominate the British Isles and France in the later Middle Ages. Out of the turbulence came stronger senses of identity in Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. Yet this was an age, too, of growing definition of Englishness and of a distinctive English cultural tradition. Table of Contents: 1. The Norman kings; 2. The Plantagenet kings; 3. Politics, law, and religion in the early Middle Ages; 4. The economy in the early Middle Ages; 5. England at war, 12901390; 6. Wealth, population, and social change in the later Middle Ages; 7. Still at war, 1390-1490; 8. Towards a nation; Further reading; Chronology; Genealogies of royal lines; Index