Gentry Studies

Artykuł ma na celu sportretowanie szczególnej grupy nowych mieszkańców wsi: osób, które po 1989 roku kupiły dawny dwór lub pałac ziemiański i traktują go przede wszystkim jako dom prywatny. Bazując na 17 wywiadach z 19 osobami, autorka szuka cech wspólnych łączących rozmówców, analizując ich doświadczenie biograficzne i funkcjonowanie jako właścicieli obiektu zabytkowego. Przedstawia ich motywacje, styl życia, postawy wobec ziemiańskiego dziedzictwa oraz członkostwo w szerszych środowiskach związanych z etosem ich grupy. Teoretyczną podstawę tekstu stanowią badania biograficzne, studia nad stylem życia i etosem.
This article aims at sketching a collective portrait of a particular group of new countryside inhabitants: these are people who, after 1989, bought a mansion or a palace once belonging to the landed gentry with an intention to live there. The article’s theoretical
approach owes to biographical research as well as to the studies of lifestyles and group ethos. On the basis of the material from 17 interviews with 19 research participants, the author sets out to establish these persons’ shared traits and analyzes their biographical
experience and daily routines of being owners of the heritage sites. The analysis centers on their motivations, lifestyle, attitudes towards the gentry heritage and membership in the wider circles that relates to the ethos of the group.

A dissertação trata da compreensão de semelhanças e singularidades do processo de exclusão social na cidade do Rio de Janeiro, tendo a região da Lapa como estudo de caso. A abordagem faz o recorte temporal a partir do início do discurso de higienismo, datado de 1850, passando pelas demolições das décadas de 1960 e 1970, e o processo de gentrificação a partir da década de 2000. A crítica à produção de cidade e às desigualdades presentes no modo de produção capitalista é o ponto central desta dissertação, sabendo que desde a metade do século XIX, é que se operam as transformações urbanas na cidade do Rio de Janeiro. A análise do processo de exclusão social e de como o sistema capitalista se beneficia dele, se dá pela comparação entre os discursos institucionais e midiáticos, identificando as semelhanças e singularidades dos processos de transformações urbanas que aconteceram na região central do Rio de Janeiro, mais especificamente, na região da Lapa. O processo de produção das cidades está associado à forma e às condições de articulação dos modos de produção. Assim, para que haja a exclusão social, é necessário e fundamental que haja a desigualdade característica do modo de produção capitalista. Essas desigualdades estão expressas na paisagem urbana, onde o movimento de pessoas em situação de fragilidade econômica é fator crucial para este processo de caráter classista. Desta forma, o espaço urbano é objeto fundamental e, sob a mirada da acumulação capitalista, passa a ser reproduzido sob sua lógica excludente.

During the fifteenth century, England experienced turbulent times and good governance of the country was essential. Using a cadet branch of the Courtenay family who sat at Powderham in Devon, this thesis investigates the role of the gentry in the process of governing the counties. Through social mobility the gentry established vertical and horizontal networks which contributed to the administration of Devonshire. This thesis explores the methods of social mobility the Courtenays of Powderham used to integrate itself within this social stratum which allowed the family to become important administrators within the county. The Courtenays of Powderham allow the historian to research into a family that begins as part of an aristocratic family as it was established as an offshoot of the Courtenay Earls of Devon. However, as the fifteenth century wore on, we see that the family created their own reputation within Devonshire and contributed to the county society in their own right.

This chapter looks at the granting and confirming of coats of arms by the English kings of arms in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. It argues that the subject can scarcely be tackled without sensitive awareness of two aspects that are not always given full or equal weight. One relates to the theory of the Early Modern grant of arms. The best way of understanding the doggedness with which the kings of arms defended their activities, the irony or outright ridicule with which those activities were viewed by outsiders and the severity with which monarchs and Earls Marshal tried to govern them, is to take seriously the language of the time which represented a grant of arms as a grant of gentility. Later doctrine abandoned this position, but it is clear that contemporaries regarded the grant as more than a recognition of status; it was a conferment of status. But one should not forget that coats of arms were to be seen, and the way they looked mattered. There were visual and aesthetic questions which might affect their fitness for purpose. Indeed their design might make their newness all too apparent, in which case the newness of the armiger's gentility was on display. The two aspects, individually significant, are thus intertwined, and the historian of the gentry, as well as noting who was granted arms, needs to look at the design of those arms to stand a chance of understanding the phenomenon.

The purpose of this study is to
investigate the reading habits of the late fifteenth-century English gentry
as their preferences would help to envisage the process of shaping political
mentality and ultimately the identity of the future Tudor gentleman. There
are miscellaneous manuscripts that were read, owned, bought or
commissioned by members of the English gentry; their existence points
to the necessity of examining the political concepts contained in the
texts included, with a view to revealing the mentality of the gentry in
the period.

Se analizan las características de la nobleza del Reino Unido, tanto en Inglaterra, Gales como en Escocia, comparándola con la nobleza española. Se trata en primer del Peerage o alta nobleza, su presencia en la Cámara de los Lores, en sus diferentes rangos: Duke, Marquess, Earl, Viscount y Baron. Su origen, historia, número, privilegios y tratamientos. No solo del titular sino también de la esposa e hijos, mediante los títulos de cortesía. Creación de un título y normas para su sucesión. Seguidamente se estudian las Baroneties y el Knigtage u órdenes de caballería, detallando una por una su origen, características y tratamientos. Se trata sobre la Gentry inglesa y la Fine escocesa y por último sobre los Reyes de Armas y la cualificación de Armiger o titular de un blasón registrado, lo que allí supone nobleza.

The aim of this study is to outline the causes of a deep transformation of the Austrian aristocratic community and the steps which led to it. It focuses upon the background of the situation just described, which one should not seek in the socio-political changes of the second half of the 19th century but in the very Enlightenment reforms of Maria Theresa and in the creation of a meticulously executed hierarchy of state awards, i.e. the honours system. It, in its consequences, represented one of the most important factors of the so-called title inflation in the era of Franz Joseph I.
The loss of prestige experienced by the nobility as a hereditary privileged group, which was connected to the end of the era during which it was the intermediary between the monarch and his subjects, represented an important factor, also. During the upheaval years of 1848–1849, this group, which continued to enjoy considerable privileges at the administrative and political levels even after the Enlightenment reforms, became „ordinary citizens.“ They lost most of their privileges and thus the status, undisputed for generations, of the social and political elite. The project of the Kroměříž Constitution of 1849 even originally proposed the abolition of aristocratic titles. Although the Constitutional Committee then deleted this article from the definitive draft of the Constitution, the very parliamentary discussions speak out loudly about the prevalent atmosphere in contemporary society – and especially amongst the middle classes.
A significant role in the negative attitude of the majority population against the newly elevated nobility was also undoubtedly played by antisemitism as after 1848 the Jews came to appear amongst newly ennobled aristocrats on a large scale. Their social rise was not accepted without reservations by the majority of society, nor was the position of the Jewish ethnic group improved by their relatively frequent conversions to Christianity. In contrast, the significant disruption of the traditional balance between the economic and social capital, i.e. the aristocracy’s property and title, proved to be a more serious issue. Whereas society was able to tolerate relatively poor members of the lower nobility, to a certain degree, the increasing number of non-affluent barons was, indeed, a real problem. Prior to 1848 persons ennobled to the rank of the recognized nobility (Freiherr in German) usually had sizeable capital at their disposal, which allowed them to lead a life considered appropriate to their status.
The majority of society was willing to accept the bourgeois mentality and the style of life pertaining to it only in the case of the lower nobility, which was traditionally not too affluent in the hereditary Lands. Its members traditionally entered the civil service, the church or secured employment in rich aristocratic households. After 1848 the number of non-affluent barons rapidly increased. Within the framework of constant political struggle for the preservation of the Monarchy, nobilitations also became the way and means of power, providing the government with both direct supporters and essential finances. The selling of titles for cash did not represent a new approach. Merits, for which the ruler came to award aristocratic titles could be, in fact, of various kinds – and naturally, the provision of funding for public use, was one of them. However, the problem was that this policy continued even at a time when public opinion increasingly placed the actions of the rulers and governments under examination and critical scrutiny.
While the majority of society was still willing to tolerate nobilitations in recognition of service for the public good, i.e. giving money for humanitarian purposes, direct financial support for government interests did cross the limits of acceptability. However, as time went by, it became evident that the awarding of aristocratic titles would not lead to the desired aim, namely the creation of a broad pro-Austrian minded social majority whose elite would be rewarded for its loyalty through nobilitations. The failure of this effort, as well as the decline of the prestige and political respect for the hereditary aristocracy were the main reasons for the deep crisis of the institution of nobility, which utterly collapsed soon after the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.

Post-medieval crypts have been overlooked as resources worthy of study; their investigation has only recently been recognised as important within the wider context of funerary research and archaeology. This thesis examined the coffins and coronets within one of two Tufton dynastic crypts beneath St Margaret’s Church in Rainham, Kent.
Photographic analysis of 19 coffins which date between 1729-1849 and three associated funerary coronets was conducted. This evaluation was completed remotely due to the COVID-19 lockdown. Ten of the 19 coffins were highly decorated and represent the ‘Golden Age’ of coffin manufacture. Coffins and coronets were documented in detail and their condition evaluated. Decorative coffin fittings were identified by comparing them to previously published examples, and information from nameplates was utilised to identify coffin occupants.
This analysis resulted in the identification of the occupants of 11 of 19 coffins representing five generations of the Tufton family including three of the 11 Earls of Thanet. A partial order of interment was elucidated using archival data and dates of death from coffin breastplates. The three coronets were documented and found to be representations of Earl’s coronets created specifically for funeral ceremonies. The analysis of coffin fittings resulted in the identification of 13 newly recorded motifs, 6 new upholstery pin patterns, and refined the dating for three previously recorded fittings and five previously recorded upholstery pin patterns. The ongoing refinement of fitting and pin pattern date ranges will assist in future crypt recording projects and could eventually lead to a seriation of fittings and pin designs.

The ancestors of the Bunak family had been of Muscovite and Ruthenian origin and had served the Grand Princes of Moscow and Tsar Ivan IV. Three syny boiarskiie, the sons of an Ivan Bunak entered the service of the Polish King and the Grand Prince of Lithuania Sigismund II August in the early 1560s. In different periods they kept landholdings in Livonia, Volhynia. Eventually they settled in Samogitia where since then they and their descendants appeared in legal documents, mainly in the judicial books of the local gentry. This allows to reconstruct their kinship network, matrimonial choices, social mobility, patronage ties with local nobility.

This dissertation traces the failure of the late medieval English gentry to define themselves, and the moment of social opportunity that arose from this failure. Modern scholars have struggled to develop a comprehensive definition of the gentry as a social group because members of the gentry themselves had difficulty articulating their social position. The fourteenth-century English nobility's method of social closure through the hereditary summons to Parliament effectively divided the kingdom's aristocracy. Forced out of this elite group, the knights, esquires, and gentleman were left to develop their own separate group identity. In this they failed. Any sense of kinship among them, that together they formed a gentle community with its own culture, was disrupted by that culture's overlap into other groups. The continued use of the term " gentle " to refer to characteristics that were associated with all elite ranks of society made it impossible for the gentry ...

The article aims at presenting and analysing peasants’ experiences of the agricultural reform conducted in Poland by a decree issued by Polish Committee of National Liberationon the 6th of September 1944. The article is mostly based on the peasants’ personal sources: materials from diary competitions (including the original ones that have not been used before in studies on the agricultural reform) memories, interviews, letters. As an aid, official documents and memories by land gentry have also been used. Three dimensions of peasants’ experiences of the agricultural reform have been differentiated for the needs of the article. The first one is made by emotions and attitudes in the time of the reform implementation; the second one includes personal feelings connected with the reform, including long­term influences on biographies; the third one represents evaluations, thoughts, and memories of the reform from a time perspective. The analysis shows a significant diversification of peasants’ experiences, which depends on numerous factors: usually on social status, political involvement, being a beneficiary of the reform or not. However, some elements that undoubtedly are common may be identified: mostly a  generally  positive attitude towards  parcellation  of the  gentry’s land. Some  other common experiences include mixed feelings of insecurity, fear, and joy when accepting the lands, difficulties in developing the allotted plots, as well as conflicts and litigations
when parcelling the gentry’s land. The analysis of the peasants’ experiences reveals a very high conflict potential brought by the results of the reform.

In the article on the basis of study of archival materials of Halych zemsky and grodzki courts showed the history of noble family of Pertsovych Berezovski, traced its social and economical activity, ways of migration, and studied its genealogy during eight generations. Present research is one of the fragments of the whole history and genealogy of the Halych region gentry.
The first mention about Iwashko Perchich who lived in Vyzhniy Bereziv is in the court manuscript from 1589. Later on were known two brothers Wasko and Stepan, which perhaps were sons of Iwashko. The only son of Stepan named Ivan Pertsovych was caught by the tatars during one of their attacks of Halychyna. After that two his children – Semen and Anastasia were adopted by Wasko Pertsovych and later by his stepfather Iwan Gurbich Holynskyi. At that period in 1620th family moved from Bereziv to Grabovets where we can trace its members till the early 18th century. From the court documents we were not able to find out the exact time and place when and where Semen’s son Ivan moved from Grabovets and then how one branch of the family reappeared in their native nest in Bereziv in the 1730th. In the later documents several generations of Pertsovych Berezovski clan were mentioned, who were living in Vyzhniy Bereziv in the 18th century. They were Ivan’s son Olexandr Gertsyk Pertsovych, his sons Mykhailo, Semen and perhaps Fedir with Vasyl and quite a lot of Olexander’s grandchildren – at least 24 of them are known.
Research on the history of this family also gave an opportunity of better understanding of the economic and social activity of Precarpathian gentry during the studied period, more than 50 property transactions of Semen Pertsovych are available among court manuscripts and could be analyzed. In the late 18th century the family was also active in the trade of salt. As the other part of relationships we traced different conflicts in which members of this family were involved. It was a robbery, attacks on the road, beating, strife for the division of property left by the dead relatives, etc. These conflicts should be noted as very typical for that time.

The term landed gentry entered into widespread use in the 19th century in place of the defnition of nobility. The landed gentry was the social layer commonly known as heirs, a layer of larger landlords with farms of the grande type, farm owners, also often called landowners. For the landowners attached to noble values, the traditional attributes of their social position were of  particular importance. They belonged to the coat of arms of noble descent, a count or a princely title and, of course, a fortune with a manor and a park. The property management was associated with the modernization and economic growth of the capabilities of individual property and the economy as a whole, combined with a vision of a harmonious social structure. Landowners have played a significant role in initiating economic progress, turning to a new farming system that has had an impact on the development of agriculture and industry in the country.

This was my inaugral talk in the Athenry Arts and Heritage Centre I did in 2013.  I did this through the banner of the Athenry Tourism Group in assocaition with the Committee of Irish Famine Victims.
The talk is about Esker (now home of the Redemptorists but previously the Dominicans in the 19th Century) during the Great Famine. I discovered a letter written by Dr. Peter D. Smyth seeking relief from Sir Randolph Routh dated the 15th March 1847.

À partir de quelques traités imprimés consacrés à la noblesse et à son éducation en France et en Angleterre au XVII e siècle, cet article propose une étude de l'écriture de normes ou d'injonctions relatives à la petite enfance en milieu aristocratique, et en particulier à l'allaitement et aux toutes premières étapes de l'instruction. L'enjeu annoncé était la perpétuation de la distinction par la transmission des qualités nobiliaires, notamment la vertu. Si l'historiographie bénéficie déjà de nombreuses contributions relatives à l'éducation nobiliaire, bien plus rares sont les études interrogeant les liens entre noblesse et petite enfance. Plutôt qu'une comparaison entre ces deux sociétés que la Manche sépare, cette contribution met en parallèle une brève sélection d'auteurs : Marois, Grenaille et Fénelon pour la France, et Cleland, Brathwait, Locke et Penton dont les traités ont paru en Angleterre. L'article propose d'abord un parcours parmi des extraits choisis de ces livres sur cette question de la transmission des qualités nobiliaires par le lait et la prime éducation. Il se consacre ensuite aux actions d'écriture de ces traités, mises en parallèle avec d'autres activités de ces auteurs, avec d'autres livres et avec la société.

Milk and virtue: Defining the « nurture » of early childhood in French and English treatises of nobility and gentry in XVIIth century.

Based on printed treatises about nobility, gentry and their education in XVIIth century France and England, this article consists in a study of the writing of norms and injunctions regarding early childhood in nobiliary backgrounds, in particular breastfeeding and the very first steps of learning. The issue was the perpetuation of the distinction by the handover of nobiliary qualities, virtue especially. The historiography already gets many works about nobiliary education, but there are very few studies examining the links between nobility and early childhood. Rather than a comparison between those societies separated by the Channel, this contribution draws a parallel between a short selection of authors: Marois, Grenaille and Fénelon for France, Cleland, Brathwait, Locke and Penton whose treatises have been published in England. The article offers firstly a path among chosen extracts of these books about the transmission of the noble qualities by the milk or the early learning. Then it is dedicated to the actions of writing of these treatises, in contextual links with other activities of these authors, with other books and with society.

In the latter half of the fifteenth century there was a proliferation of conduct literature in Middle English directed at educating the young gentleman in proper bodily conduct. These texts likely originated in the treatises written for young boys serving as pages in noble households, to teach them how to behave themselves as they served their betters, but as they gained popularity such poems became useful across gentle society, even providing a guide by which common readers could imitate the bearing and manners of the gentle. More than a dozen such texts exist in a number of different versions, appearing in manuscript miscellanies alongside collections of recipes and medical advice, and treatises on hunting, hawking and other elite pursuits. Yet despite the popularity of texts for men, no comparable texts exist to instruct the young gentlewoman in manners. Since personal conduct was no less important to a gentle woman than to a man, this absence requires more serious scholarly consideration than has been given it thus far. This paper will examine this notable lacuna and consider a variety of alternative conduct texts which may have been used for the education of young gentlewomen, from the handful of similar poems written for bourgeois women, to conduct manuals produced in France during the fourteenth century, to custom designed manuscripts full of didactic material. There will also be a consideration of the differences in the educational experiences of gentle boys and girls which may have contributed to this absence.

The Tradition of Gentry-Republicanism from the Point of View of the History of Ideas
Abstract
What the analysis undertaken in this paper focuses on, is to redefine the political meaning of the Polish Tradition of Gentry-Republicanism in its broader, European context.  The aim of this paper is to point out the paradoxes of presenting the republicanism of the Polish gentry from the perspective of the history of ideas as a kind of traditionalist thought. The main object of criticism is here the widely accepted opposition between the republican (political) and liberal (individualist) idea of freedom, interpreted, respectively, as “conservative” and “modernist”. In this paper it will be argued against the interpretation, which allows to define the republican tradition of the Polish political thought of the 17th and 18th century in terms of “traditionalism” as well as to juxtapose it with the liberal tradition of the European political thought initiated among others by Hobbes and de ned in terms of democratic “radicalism”. According to the main thesis of this paper, the proper way to solve the paradoxes of interpreting of Polish Gentry-Republicanism as a “conservatism of freedom” is to set that current of the political thought in the European tradition of the “estate-radicalism”.

Southern History is a peer reviewed academic year book published by the Southern History Society covering the historic counties of Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, Gloucester, Wiltshire, Dorset, Hampshire, Oxford, Buckingham, Berkshire, Surrey, Sussex and Kent. It contains articles and reviews.
Some of the articles in this issue were initially delivered as papers at the Southern History Society's 'Anglicanism and Dissent in Southern England, c. 1662-1829' conference on 13 April 2013. As several other contributions were received relating to similar themes, it was decided to restrict this volume to articles on urban politics and religion in the late seventeenth- and early eighteenth centuries.

Prospective authors are requested to email the editor (aspicer@brookes.ac.uk) for copies of Notes for Contributors. Outlines of proposed submissions are welcome and articles should be submitted in electronic form.

In a well-known incident, James II responded to a lady who asked him to make her son a gentleman, saying "Madam, I could make him a nobleman, but God almighty himself could not make him a gentleman." This quip illustrates the perceived disconnect between gentility of status and of character that existed during late seventeenth century. Three hundred years earlier, this statement would not have been made; during the fourteenth century, gentility of conduct and character were seen as a direct consequence of gentility of birth. The late fifteenth century, however, marked a turning point in the conception of gentility: the idea that this was a quality that might be earned, rather than simply inherited, was beginning to surface. The grants of arms issued by heralds during this period illustrate the expansion of this category. Arms-bearing was an increasingly important symbol of gentility during this period, so the qualifications for such a grant can be looked upon more generally as criteria for gentility. While the heralds are quick to acknowledge (or forge) a gentle ancestry for newly armigerous individuals, they also frequently cite other qualifications that bolster their claim to gentility. This paper will examine the grants of arms issued between 1440 and 1530 to show how multiple paths to gentility were opening up during this important transitional period. By the early sixteenth century, not merely birth, but outstanding achievement (generally in military or political service) or even personal qualities like conduct and manners could qualify a man for a coat of arms and the gentle rank that went along with it, allowing the possibility of greater social mobility for accomplished and ambitious commoners.

Presented at the Harlaxton 2018 Symposium. The working title of my thesis is "The Distribution of Royal Patronage to the Gentry in the Minority of Henry VI, 1422-1437." It is an investigation into how - in a time so invested in personal monarchy - governance continued with an officially absent king, with the gentry and patronage serving as directive lenses into the politics of this period.

This poster shows just one small part of my ongoing research - using Social Network Analysis to explore the interpersonal relationships and socio-political networks which underpinned late-medieval government looking specifically at the 322 individuals specifically mentioned in parliamentary petitions by named members of the gentry seeking some form of royal patronage between 1422 and 1437.

The numerous surviving medical writings that have come down to us from late medieval England reflects a growing interest in medical lore at the time. A considerable number of these texts were copied in Middle English, therefore, were presumably addressed to a non-academic and secular audience. Both circumstances are exemplified by the Lincoln Thornton Manuscript (Lincoln, Lincoln Cathedral MS 91). This fifteenth-century miscellany was copied and compiled by a Yorkshire landowner named Robert Thornton and contains religious, romance and medical writings that would have been useful and valuable to a provincial household. The medical text, known as the Liber de Diversis Medicinis, is a collection of herbal recipes aimed at curing various diseases, and its codicological structure suggests that it was originally intended to be a single compilation. Undoubtedly, alongside other practical writings, any household would have benefitted from a herbal receptarium of this kind.
This paper will argue that, by means of medical writings like the Liber de Diversis Medicinis, the gentry gained enough herbal knowledge to recognise the contemporary medical remedies and practices described in romances. As a literary genre frequently addressed to said social class, I will examine a group of romances from two celebrated household miscellanies, the Lincoln Thornton manuscript and Cambridge University Library, MS Ff. 2. 38, with the intention of showing how this emerging group of secular individuals, which did not belong to the royalty or the nobility, had the means to commission and acquire medical texts and familiarise themselves with contemporary medical practices.

This dissertation traces the failure of the late medieval English gentry to define themselves, and the moment of social opportunity that arose from this failure. Modern scholars have struggled to develop a comprehensive definition of the gentry as a social group because members of the gentry themselves had difficulty articulating their social position. The fourteenth-century English nobility's method of social closure through the hereditary summons to Parliament effectively divided the kingdom's aristocracy. Forced out of this elite group, the knights, esquires, and gentleman were left to develop their own separate group identity. In this they failed. Any sense of kinship among them, that together they formed a gentle community with its own culture, was disrupted by that culture's overlap into other groups. The continued use of the term " gentle " to refer to characteristics that were associated with all elite ranks of society made it impossible for the gentry to achieve any positive distinctions as a social group. Unable to define themselves, the gentle ranks found it difficult to exclude newcomers, increasing the range and diversity of individuals who could claim to be part of the group.

Southern History is a peer reviewed academic year book published by the Southern History Society covering the historic counties of Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, Gloucester, Wiltshire, Dorset, Hampshire, Oxford, Buckingham, Berkshire, Surrey, Sussex and Kent. It contains articles and reviews.
Some of the articles in this issue were initially delivered as papers at the Southern History Society's 'Anglicanism and Dissent in Southern England, c. 1662-1829' conference on 13 April 2013. As several other contributions were received relating to similar themes, it was decided to restrict this volume to articles on urban politics and religion in the late seventeenth- and early eighteenth centuries.

Prospective authors are requested to email the editor (aspicer@brookes.ac.uk) for copies of Notes for Contributors. Outlines of proposed submissions are welcome and articles should be submitted in electronic form.

Of the twenty-two parliaments held between 1413 and 1437, sixteen were conducted in the official absence of the king. Whether through Henry V's campaigning in France, or the minority of Henry VI, responsibility for the governance of England repeatedly fell to members of the aristocracy. This paper will examine the invocation of the common good in those parliament rolls produced in the absence of the king between 1413 and 1437.

In the first instance, it will highlight the ways in which the crown utilised this theme of the common good to ensure the conformity of parliament to the will of the crown even in the absence of the person of the king, and the responses of the aristocracy to this pressure. Then, in a counter to the traditional teleological narrative, it will also highlight the use of the theme of the common good by contemporary parliamentary members in their attempts to subvert the pursuit of individual interests by powerful political figures and, in some instances, to challenge the will of the absent king. In doing so, this paper will also question the extent to which the theme of the common good, as used within this specific parliamentary context, was purely a rhetorical device or a true concern of the aristocracy.

In c.1494 two servants of Sir William Skeffington – William Barkby and Austin, a cowherd – put a herd of cattle to pasture in the small manor of Keythorpe, Leicestershire, at Skeffington’s command.  They were approached soon afterwards by Richard Neele, esquire and four of his father’s servants, allegedly armed with bows and arrows.  Neele demanded that Barkby and Austin drive the cattle out of the pasture. They refused. In response to their defiance, he ‘smote the said Austen w[i]t[h] his fyste on the cheke’.  He was prevented from going any further, and forced to depart, by the appearance of Sir William Skeffington on a nearby hill.
This encounter was detailed in a Star Chamber deposition given by William Barkby on the part of his master, Sir William Skeffington. It illustrates the role of the landscape – a geographical and a cultural composition – in gentry agriculture, estate management, and society. The composition of the land at Keythorpe made it an attractive site for economic profit, whilst Skeffington’s topographical knowledge assisted in the supervision of his estates. Here the gentry’s preoccupation with land entitlement and management had produced conflict and rivalry in the contested lands at Keythorpe. Skeffington brought the case to Star Chamber in 1496, against Christopher Neele, esquire, Richard Neele’s father, on the grounds of forcible entry and unlawful occupation of certain lands and tenements there.  Star Chamber cases are effective in the reconstruction of lost landscapes.  But the composition of the landscape is not merely a passive consequence of human interaction.  Rather, the natural environment has played a significant role in the construction of social identity throughout history, and this is particularly the case for the gentry. From estate management and consolidation to the navigation of county politics; from agricultural profit to recreation in parks and forests, their lives were dominated by their interaction with the landscape. An investigation into certain social behaviours is essential for the appreciation and comprehension of the social significance of past landscapes.  This article proposes that the landscape – and specifically gentry interaction with and within it – was at the foundation of the gentry hierarchy and, consequentially, gentry identity.

During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, significant social change took place in England as the seemingly secure position of the nobility was eroded in the face of challenge by increasingly wealthy and ambitious commoners. The gentry, the nobility's lower ranks, faced the greatest threat. The apprehension of gentlefolk concerning their social position is reflected in the obsession over status markers that intensified during this period. The high levels of social anxiety evinced by the fifteenth-century gentry have been noted by many scholars, but their works only offer scattered examples of actual mobility to support this trend. In this paper, I will argue that the aggregation of these examples suggests a higher rate of social mobility than originally suspected. Furthermore, an analysis of these documented cases of social mobility into the gentry help us to uncover the mechanisms by which individuals elevated themselves.