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A 'grass roots' cultural history of the English parish from the earliest times to Queen Victoria.
This book studies the evolution and destruction of a part of the English landscape, following the history of three peasant communities - Landbeach, Waterbeach and Cottenham - on the margin of the Fens. Here, lord and peasant together developed a society that derived its strength from the balance between arable and lush grassland. The fenman in his struggle against the unpredictable floods learned a wiliness that enabled him to outwit the new acquisitive landlords of the Tudor period and to control his own destiny. Thus the peasant community increased its power and kept the old ways of field and fell almost inviolate until commerce and industry created irresistible market forces.
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In late medieval England, cloistered nuns, like all substantial property owners, engaged in nearly constant litigation to defend their holdings. They did so using attorneys (proctors), advocates and other ""men of law"" who actually conducted that litigation in the courts of Church and Crown, following the increased professionalism of legal practitioners during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. However, although lawyers were as crucial to the economic vitality of the nunneries as the patrons who endowed them, their role in protecting, augmenting or depleting monastic assets has never been.