Overview

The farms, villages, estates and the people that characterized the English countryside were once the mainspring of both the government and the economy. They supported and responded to the needs of the nation. Yet rural England has always been threatened: from epidemics and the famine to the ravages of the industrial revolution. From the end of the eighteenth century, weakened by enclosure and depopulation, the countryside battled with a rising industrial estate and inevitably succumbed. The village had become a relic, the symbol of a past age visited by those in search of Olde Englande'. A fundamental change had occurred. G.E. Mingay traces the rise and fall of the rural England from the Middle Ages to the Second World War and the development of the countryside as a whole. He examines the people who owned and farmed the land, often regarded as a law unto themselves. The rural population was a centre of rebellion and discontent; riddled with class distinctions and social divisions; a threat to the society it supported in so many ways. The English countryside has changed: Mingay shows how and why this has occurred and the way it has affected the evolution of society in the twentieth century.

Full Product Details

9780415034081

Table of Contents

Reviews

`In all, this is another entertaining and informative book from Gorgon Mingay. His skill as narrator gives form to an extended period of history and to a rich diversity of topics.' - Social History Society Newsletter `Anyone who wishes to understand the true nature of our rural history will find Professor Mingay a rewarding guide, in small matters and in large.' - Literary Review

Anyone who wishes to understand the true nature of our rural history will find Professor Mingay a rewarding guide, in small matters and in large. - Literary Review

Anyone who wishes to understand the true nature of our rural history will find Professor Mingay a rewarding guide, in small matters and in large. <br>- Literary Review <br>

`In all, this is another entertaining and informative book from Gorgon Mingay. His skill as narrator gives form to an extended period of history and to a rich diversity of topics.' - Social History Society Newsletter `Anyone who wishes to understand the true nature of our rural history will find Professor Mingay a rewarding guide, in small matters and in large.' - Literary Review

Author Information

G. E. Mingay

Tab Content 6

Countries Available