CENTRE FOR METROPOLITAN HISTORY
PROJECTS

The following is a list of the Centre's current and former research projects (in roughly chronological order). A brief introduction, a list of publications arising from the project and links to reports on each project are provided.

Current projects

London and the Tidal Thames 1250-1550: marine flooding, embankment and economic change

London women and the economy before and after the Black Death

People in Place: families, households and housing in early modern London

Housing environments and health in early modern London 1550-1750

Life in the Suburbs: health, domesticity and status in early modern London

Former projects

St Paul's History, 604-2004

Social and Economic Study of Medieval London, c. 1100-1666

Feeding the City (I): London's impact on the agrarian economy of southern England, c.1250-1350

Feeding the City (II): London's impact on the agrarian economy of southern England, c.1290-1400

Market Networks and the Metropolis: The Trade in Agrarian Produce, c.1400

Borough Market Privileges in Southern England, c. 1370-1430

Metropolitan Market Networks, 1300-1600

Markets and Fairs in Thirteenth-Century England

Markets and Fairs in England and Wales to 1540

Londoners and the Law: pleadings in the court of common pleas, 1399-1509

Views of Hosts: reporting the alien commodity trade, 1440-45

The Growth of the Skilled Workforce in London, 1500-1750

Optical Glass and the Scientific Instrument Trade in London before 1750

Image Database of the Skilled Workforce in Early Modern London

Epidemics and Mortality in the Pre-industrial city: Florence and London compared

English Merchant Culture: the Overseas Trader in State and Society, 1660-1720

Metropolitan London in the 1690s

London Cases in the Court of Exchequer, 1727-1841 - accessibility study

From Craft to Industry: London's Scientific Instrument Makers' Workshops, 1780-1820

From Counting-House to Office: The Evolution of London's Central Financial District, 1690-1870

The Textile Marketing District of the City of London, c. 1780-1914

Financial Headquarters in the City, 1850-1914

Mortality in the Metropolis, 1860-1920

Coventry and Dresden after 1940/45

The Jobbing System of the London Stock Exchange: An Oral History

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London and the Tidal Thames 1250-1550: marine flooding, embankment and economic change

Principal Investigator/Researcher: James Galloway M.A., Ph.D.
Funded by: ESRC (Ref: RES-000-22-2693) (1 March 2008-28 February 2010)
Amount Awarded: £83,254

The lands bordering the tidal river Thames and the Thames Estuary have historically been highly vulnerable to marine flooding. The most severe of these floods derive from North Sea storm surges, when wind and tide combine to drive huge quantities of water against the coast, as happened to devastating effect in 1953. This project seeks to understand the occurrence of storm flooding in the past, and to explore the ways in which people have responded to the threat.

The project will draw upon rich surviving documentary sources to study the impact of storm flooding upon the reclaimed marshlands bordering the tidal Thames and its estuary during the period c.1250-1550. Year-by-year accounts of the management of riverside properties will be examined and the degree to which reclaimed land was lost to the sea during the later Middle Ages assessed. The impact of population decline and agrarian recession upon the economics of coastal and river-side defence will be considered. The flood threat to medieval London’s low-lying suburbs will be investigated and the possibility that the long-term flooding of lands down-river spared the city the worst effects of North Sea storm surges explored. Parallels will be sought in the modern policy of managed retreat or realignment.

Publications: James A. Galloway and Jonathan S. Potts, 'Marine flooding in the Thames Estuary and tidal river c.1250-1450: impact and response', Area 39 (2007), 370-379, available to subscribers via Blackwell Synergy. Podcast of discussion between James Galloway and Dr Jan Oosthoek (University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne) arising from paper given at the "An End to History? Climate Change, the Past and the Future" conference (Birmingham and Midland Institute, Birmingham, 3 April 2008) on the impact of storm surges on the lands bordering the Thames Estuary during the fourteenth century: Exploring Environmental History podcast, No. 17 Archaeology, History and Climate Change, 11 April 2008 (Discussion begins at 8:00 mins)

Reports: James A. Galloway, Crown Estate-Caird Fellowship: Marine Flooding and Storm Events in the Thames Estuary c.1250-1450 (2006);

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Market Networks and the Metropolis: The Trade in Agrarian Produce, c.1400

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Borough Market Privileges in Southern England, c. 1370-1430

Supervisor: James Galloway, M.A., Ph.D.
Researcher: Hannes Kleineke, M.A.
Funded by: Aurelius Trust (8 July-8 October 1996)

This short project assembles information from printed sources on the operation of markets, tolls and trading connections in southern and eastern England over the period c.1380-1430. The results are in the form of a computer database, which is especially informative on Londoners' activities and on bridges and trade routes.

Report: 1996-7

Data: The data is now freely available via British History Online

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Metropolitan Market Networks, 1300-1600

Researchers: James Galloway, M.A., Ph.D., Margaret Murphy, B.A., Ph.D.
Funded by: ESRC (Ref: R000237253) (1 August 1997-31 July 2000)
Amount Awarded: £207,142

London exerted a major influence on the economy of England during the period of rapid population growth in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, promoting specialised forms of agriculture and trade. Recent work at the Centre has shown that medieval London played a similar role. This project aims to extend our understanding of the parallels between the two period, and to trace the development of trade networks between 1300 and 1600, using computer analysis and data mapping techniques to provide 'snapshots' of London's financial and trading markets around 1300, 1424, and 1600. In addition, the project examines provincial contacts and prices to establish the degree to which different parts of the country were united in a single economy and participated in regular trade with London at various dates. The work sheds fresh light on changes and continuities between the medieval and early modern periods, on the role of London as catalyst to economic development, and on the operation of markets as institutions within a changing urban system.

Publications: James A. Galloway, 'One market or many? London and the grain trade of England' and Derek Keene, 'Changes in London's economic hinterland as indicated by debt cases in the Court of Common Pleas', both in James A. Galloway (ed.) Trade, Urban Hinterlands and Market Integration c.1300-1600 (Centre for Metropolitan History Working Papers No. 3, 2000), 23-42 and 59-81; Derek Keene, 'Metropolitan values: migration, mobility and cultural norms, London 1100-1700', in Laura Wright (ed.) The Development of Standard English 1300-1800: Theories, Descriptions, Conflicts (Cambridge University Press, 2000); James A. Galloway, 'Town and Country in England, 1300-1570', in S.R. Epstein (ed.), Town and Country in Europe, 1300-1800 (Cambridge University Press, 2001), pp. 106-31.

Reports: 1996-7, 1997-8, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper, 1998-9, 1999-2000

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Markets and Fairs in Thirteenth-Century England

Researchers: Samantha Letters, B.A., Ph.D. (to 15 July 2002); Emilia Jamroziak, B.A., Ph.D. (from 1 September 2002)
Funded by: ESRC (Ref: R000239108) (1 November 2000-15 March 2004)
Amount Awarded: £138,739

The early development of markets and fairs is an issue of central significance in economic history and historical geography. The network of legally established markets and fairs in medieval England, almost all of them authorised by royal grant, was dense, highly developed and apparently originated earlier than in much of Europe. The already complex marketing network of England was supplemented during the thirteenth century by a great increase in the number of grants of markets and fairs.

Reports: 1997-8, 1998-9, 1999-2000, 2000-2

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London women and the economy before and after the Black Death

Researcher: Matthew Stevens, B.A., Ph.D.
Grant Holder: Matthew Davies, M.A., D.Phil.
Funded by: Economic and Social Research Council (Award Ref. RES-000-22-3343) (1 February 2009-31 January 2010)
Amount Awarded: £81,349

This project will shed light on the transformation of women's status and economic importance across the later Middle Ages. Rapid population growth in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries resulted in high population density, labour oversupply, and low wages, and as consequence most women enjoyed few personal freedoms and low status. In the mid fourteenth century successive outbreaks of epidemic disease reduced the English population by 30-50 per cent over the years 1348-9 and 1360-1. As a result, it has been suggested, acute labour shortages in urban and rural areas afforded women new opportunities as workers, increasing their social standing, particularly in the period 1380-1430. The abundant judicial and testamentary records of medieval London will be used to compare the status and roles of women in the city economy of the 1320s, a period of labour-oversupply and low wages, to the 1420s, a period of labour shortage and high wages. This will involve quantitative analysis of litigation in city and royal courts, as well as qualitative examination in the two sub-periods of the roles and status of women in the society and economy of London. The project will result in the production of articles, plus an online database of legal proceedings.

Publications:

Reports:

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Views of Hosts: reporting the alien commodity trade, 1440-45

Researcher: Helen Bradley, BSc. Soc. Sci., B.A., Ph.D.
Funded by: ESRC (Ref: RES-000-22-0628) (1 April 2004-30 September 2005)
Amount Awarded: £36,645

The 'Views of Hosts' were a series of English government records produced in response to a statute of 1439 which required that money made by non-English merchants from sales of imports must be entirely expended on English goods for export, thus preventing the country's wealth draining away in specie and bullion. The Statute compelled these merchants, known as 'aliens', to make full disclosure of their daily business activities to English hosts, who returned the information to the Exchequer. There are 70 surviving returns covering both itinerant and resident traders, each engaged in varying numbers of transactions, together with the names of all their business contacts and the details and prices of goods they traded. Sometimes their commercial costs and living expenses were also included. Their imports covered a wide variety of prestigious goods - spices, nuts and sugar, sweet wines, fabrics, jewels and furs - as well as practical items such as fish for consumption during periods of abstinence, raw materials for industrial use and military hardware. Their purchases for export feature many different types of English cloth, wool, tin, pewterware, and other small manufactures. They exhibited a wide divergence in trading practice. Some were engaged at subsistence level, with a few transactions that barely covered their costs, while others acted as representatives of multinational companies with huge turnovers and considerable capital at their disposal.

During the 15th century, the English governing authorities operated a system of socio-economic exclusion and control based upon neither race nor ethnicity, but upon political allegiance to the English crown. Central legislation specifically targeted aliens for economic restriction and differential taxation, and local avenues of advancement to which they had previously had free access were suddenly barred to them. Aliens found themselves progressively excluded both from municipal politics and from the urban socio-economic networks essential to the survival of medieval businesses. A deliberate policy of alien exclusion and control, given a theoretical basis in contemporary economic thought and openly practised by the upper strata of government and society, spawned further specific complaints and abuse against aliens at lower levels.

The project will widely disseminate the government data collected about the alien community during 1440-45. It will ensure its availability in three different formats, to suit the requirements and abilities of the broadest possible user base. It will result in a transcript made from the Anglo-Norman and Latin originals, together with a database derived from the information contained, both of which will be available on-line. It will further provide a modern English translation prefaced by an analysis of the social, political, economic and legislative context, for publication by the London Record Society.

Publication:

Reports: 2003–4; End of Award Report (pdf file 40K)

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Londoners and the Law: pleadings in the court of common pleas, 1399-1509

Researchers: Jonathan Mackman, B.A., D.Phil. and Matthew Stevens, B.A., Ph.D.
Directors: Matthew Davies, M.A., D.Phil. and Hannes Kleineke, M.A., Ph.D.
Funded by: Arts and Humanities Research Council (Award Ref. AR119247) (1 June 2006-30 November 2008)
Amount Awarded: £243,354

The aim of the project was to analyse and make available online information from the 'plea rolls' of the court of common pleas - the largest surviving body of medieval English common law records. These are held in The National Archives (class CP40). Litigation in the middle ages - as today - was a popular, if sometimes controversial, method of achieving results, whether in trade, local society or domestic life. The surviving records show that, despite being satirised by writers of the period, the law was becoming ever more important as a tool for individuals and groups. The project examined cases involving Londoners, many of which arose from disputes with commercial and other contacts in the English counties, sheding light on the nature of the links between the city and the regions in the later middle ages. The project also sought to enlarge our knowledge of how individuals and groups (such as guilds) understood and used the law in relation to their business, family or property interests. Many cases revolved around such matters as unpaid debts, runaway apprentices and servants, or disputes over land. The project not only opens up a major source of information about medieval Londoners and their activities, but also deepens our understanding of how the law interacted with everyday life, whether it be in the areas of work, domestic and family life or urban regulation.

Data was collected and analysed from the 433 plea rolls which survive for the fifteenth century, a period which saw the court of common pleas become ever more popular amongst litigants. The results of the project will be made available through published articles, which will explore several key themes relating to cases involving Londoners. It is intended that data from the project will be accessible via British History Online, the Institute of Historical Research's digital library of sources for British History.

Publications: Jonathan Mackman, '"Hidden gems" in the records of the common pleas: new evidence on the legacy of Lucy Visconti', in L. Clark (ed.), The Fifteenth Century VIII: Rule, Redemption and Representation in Late Medieval England and France (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 58-72.

Reports: CMH Annual Report 2005-6, CMH Annual Report 2006-7

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The Growth of the Skilled Workforce in London, 1500-1750

Researchers: Michael Berlin, B.A., Rob Iliffe, B.Sc., M.Phil., Ph.D., David Mitchell, B.Sc., M.I.C.E.
Postgraduate Student: Lien Bich Luu, B.A.
Funded by: Renaissance Trust (1 January 1992-31 December 1994)
Amount Awarded: £300,000

During this period London's population grew tenfold, but that increase was more than matched by an expansion in the range of skills practised by its inhabitants, in both manufacturing and services. London was transformed from a city where the highest quality products and the most up-to-date skills tended to be imported from overseas, to a metropolis whose inhabitants could make technical and luxury commodities to standards which enabled them to dominate the world market. The study aims to define this change, and to examine why Londoners came to behave in this way. How were the new skills acquired? What was the significance of immigration and of ethnic or religious affiliation? What part did formal systems of education and training, the guild structure, and government policy play in the process? What were the attitudes of craftsmen and intellectuals to these developments and to innovation in general? The study forms part of 'The Achievement Project: intellectual and material culture in modern Europe' which is funded by the Renaissance Trust.

Publications: Rob Iliffe, '"In the Warehouse": privacy, property and priority in the early Royal Society', History of Science, 30 (1992), 29-62; Rob Iliffe, '"Rhetorical Vices": outlines of a Feyerabendian History of Science', History of Science, 30 (1992), 199-219; Rob Iliffe, '"Author-mongering": the "Editor" between producer and consumer in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries', in A. Bermingham and H. Brewer (eds.), Consumption and Culture in the Eighteenth Century (University of California Press, 1992); Rob Iliffe, 'Max Weber and the Japanese work ethic', Achievement Project Newsletter, 2 no. 1 (1992), 2-7; Rob Iliffe, 'Mécanique célèste de Newton', Les Cahiers de Science et Vie (February 1993), 40-68; Rob Ilifee, '"Aplatisseur du monde et de Cassini": Maupertuis, precision measurement, and the shape of the Earth in the 1730s', History of Science xxxi(1993), 335-75; Rob Iliffe, '"Ce que Newton connut sans sorti de chez lui": la mesure de la figur e de la terre en France, 1700-1750', Histoire et Mesure, 4 (1994), 1-41; David Mitchell, 'Dressing plate by the "unknown" London silversmith "WF", The Burlington Magazine, 135, No. 1083 (June 1993), 386-400; David Mitchell, '"Mr Fowle pray pay the washwoman": the trade of a London goldsmith-banker, 1660-1692', Business and Economic History, 23 no. 1 (1994), 27-38; Rob Iliffe, '"Making a Shew": apocalyptic hermeneutics and anti-idolatry in the work of Isaac Newton and Henry More', in R. Popkin and J. Force (eds.), The Books of Nature and Scripture: Recent essays on Natural Philosophy, Theology and Biblical Criticism in the Netherlands of Spinoza's Time and the British Isles of Newton's Time (Dordrecht, 1994), 55-88; Rob Iliffe, '"Is he like other men?" The meaning of the Principia Mathematica and the author as idol', in G. Maclean (ed.), Culture and Society in the Stuart Restoration (Cambridge, 1995), 159-176; Michael Berlin and A. Werner, 'Developing an interdisciplinary approach: the skilled workforce project', Bulletin of the John Rylands Library (February 1995); Rob Iliffe, '"That puzleing Problem": Isaac Newton and the Political Physiology of Self', Medical History 39 (1995), 433-458; Rob Iliffe, 'Material doubts: Hooke, artisan culture and the exchange of information in 1670s London', British Journal of the History of Science, 28 (1995), 285-318; Rob Iliffe, '"Working bodies": Protestantism, the productive individual and the politics of idleness' in P. Gouk (ed), Wellsprings of Achievement (Scolar Press, 1995), 135-158; Lien Bich Luu, 'Aliens and their impact on the goldsmiths' craft in London in the sixteenth century' in D. Mitchell (ed), Goldsmiths, Silversmiths and Bankers (CMH, 1995), 43-52; Lien Bich Luu, 'Assimilation or segregation: colonies of alien craftsmen in Elizabethan London', in R. Vigne and G. Gibbs (eds), The Strangers' Progress: Integration and Disintegration of the Huguenot and Walloon Refugee Community, 1567-1889. Essays in memory of Irene Scouloudi (Proceedings of the Huguenot Society, 26 (2), 1995), 160-172; David Mitchell (ed.) Goldsmiths, Silversmiths and Bankers: Innovation and the Transfer of Skill, 1550 to 1750 (CMH, Working Papers Series, no. 2, 1995); David Mitchell, 'Innovation and the transfer of skill in the goldsmiths' trade in Restoration London' in D. Michell (ed.) Goldsmiths, Silversmiths and Bankers , 5-22; Lien Luu, 'Migration and change: religious refugees and the London economy, 1550-1600', Critical Survey, 8 (1996), 93-102; David Mitchell, '"Good hot pressing is the life of all cloth": dyeing, clothfinishing and related textile trades in London, 1650-1700', in H. Diederiks and M. Balkestein (eds), Occupational Titles and their Classification: the Case of the Textile Trade in Past Times (1995), 153-175; David Mitchell, '"It will be easy to make money", Merchant Stangers in London, 1580-1680', in C. Lesger and L. Noordegraaf (eds), Entrepreneurs and Entrepreneurship in Early Modern Times, Merchants and Industrialists within the Orbit of the Dutch Staple Market. (Hollandse Historische Reeks 24, The Hague, 1995), 119-145; Michael Berlin, '"Broken all in pieces": artisans and the regulation of workmanship in early modern London', in G. Cossick (ed.), The Artisan and the European Town, 1500-1900 (Scolar Press, 1997), 75-91.

Reports: 1991-2, 1992-3, 1993-4, 1994-5, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper

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People in Place: families, households and housing in early modern London

Researchers: Mark Merry, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.; Philip Baker, B.A., M.A. (based at CMH); Ros Davies, B.Sc., Gill Newton, B.A., M.A. (based in Cambridge)
Funded by: Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRB Ref: AR16429; award held by Birkbeck College) (1 October 2003-30 September 2006)
Amount Awarded: £309,486

This project examines the crucial role of family and household in the social and economic transformations that took place in London in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Population growth, immigration, urbanisation, and commercialisation produced new patterns of sociability, gender relations, employment, and domestic lifestyle. The project will combine the established methodologies of family reconstitution and associated nominative linkage with the reconstruction of London property-histories to reconstruct and analyse the dense matrix of families, households, properties, and buildings in three contrasting areas of London (Cheapside, Aldgate, Clerkenwell) in the period c.1540-1710. Led by Dr Vanessa Harding of Birkbeck, University of London, the project is co-supervised by Dr Richard Smith, Cambridge Group for the History of Population and Social Structure, University of Cambridge and the CMH's Director, Dr Matthew Davies.

Project webpages

Publications:

Reports: 2003-4. For earlier Cheapside property histories, see the Social and Economic Study of Medieval London project and the Historical Gazetteer of London before the Great Fire: Cheapside

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Optical Glass and the Scientific Instrument Trade in London before 1750

Researcher: Anita McConnell, B.Sc., Ph.D., F.R.S.A., F.R.G.S., F.R.Met.S.
Funded by: Renaissance Trust (1 January-31 December 1994)

Scientific instrument makers depended on specialised suppliers of optical glass for microscopes, telescopes and other technical instruments. This study investigates the spread of expertise in this field and the business and social relationships between glass-makers, lens-grinders and the instrument makers for whom they worked.

Publications:Anita McConnell, 'The aneroid barometer comes to London', Bulletin of the Scientific Instrument Society, No. 39 (September 1993), 20-22; Anita McConnell, 'L.F. Marsigli's visi t to London in 1721, and his report on the Royal Society', Notes and Records of the Royal Society 47 (1993), 179-204; Anita McConnell, 'Instruments for South America', in G. Draoni, A. McConnell and G. L'E. Turner (eds.), Proceedings of the Elev enth International Scientific Instrument Symposium (Bologna, 1994), 113-18; Anita McConnell, '"Thomas Cooke's Order Book": analysis of an optical business, 1856-68', in R. Anderson, J. Bennett and W. Ryan, Making Instruments Count (Variorum, 19 93), 431-42

Reports: 1993-4, 1994-5

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Image Database of the Skilled Workforce in Early Modern London

Researcher: Michael Berlin, B.A.
Funded by: Renaissance Trust. (1 April-30 November 1996)
Amount Awarded: £25,000

Intended as an experiment in developing and demonstrating the potential uses of image databases in university training and research, this project aims to provide an introduction to the skilled workforce in early modern London and is also intended to encourage the use of museum artefact collections in exploring historical questions. Using software developed by the 'Virtual Teaching Collection' consortium based at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge (funded by the Higher Education Funding Council under its 'Teaching and Technology in Further Education' programme), sets of images, with commentaries and captions are supplemented by datasets relating to the industries and crafts of the city. Among the images entered are artefacts, maps, archaeological site plans and contemporary illustrations, documents and text. The database is being tested in collaboration with Birkbeck College (University of London). The database, containing over 800 images, is available for consultation at the Centre.

Report: 1995-6

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Epidemics and Mortality in the Pre-industrial city: Florence and London compared

Associate Supervisor: John Henderson, B.A., Ph.D.
Researcher: Justin Champion, M.A., Ph.D.
Funded by: ESRC (Ref: R000231192) and The Wellcome Trust
Amount Awarded: £61,390 and £13,034

This is the first study to compare the effect of epidemic disease on two of the major cities of seventeenth-century Europe, using the outbreaks of 1630-3 in Florence and 1665 in London as case studies. The studies compare the 'normal' patterns of mortality in the two cities with those for the crisis years, paying special attention to the geographical spread of plague within the cities and its differential impact in areas of contrasting social and physical character.

Publications: John Henderson, 'Introduction' and 'The Parish and the Poor in Florence at the Time of the Black Death: the case of S. Frediano', in J. Henderson (ed.), Charity and the Poor in Medieval and Renaissance Europe, Continuity and Change, 3:2 (1988), 145-151 and 247-272; John Henderson, 'Religious Confraternities and Death in Early Renaissance Florence' , in P. Denley and C. Elam (eds.), Florence and Italy. Renaissance Studies in Honour of Nicolai Rubinstein (London, 1988), 383-394; John Henderson, 'The Hospitals of Late-medieval and Renaissance Florence: a preliminary survey ', in L. Granshaw and R. Porter (eds.), The Hospital in History (London, 1989), 63-92; John Henderson, 'Confraternities and Politics in Fifteenth- Century Florence', Collegium Medievale 2:1 (1989), 53-72; John Henderson, 'Plague in Renaissance Florence: medical theory and government response', in N. Bulst and R. Delort (eds.) Maladies et société xiie-xviiie siècle; (Paris , 1989); Justin Champion, 'Relational databases and the Great Plague in London, 1665', History and Computing, 5:1 (1993), 2-12; J.A.I. Champion (ed.), Epidemic Disease in London (Centre for Metropolitan History, Working Papers Series, No. 1, 1993); J.A.I. Champion, London's Dreaded Visitation: The Social Geography of the Great Plague in 1665 (Historical Geography Research Series, no. 31, 1995)

Reports: 1988-9, 1989-90, 1990-1, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper

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English Merchant Culture: the Overseas Trader in State and Society, 1660-1720

Researcher: Peregrine Gauci, B.A., M.Phil., D.Phil.
Funded by: The Leverhulme Trust (1 October 1995-30 September 1998)
Amount Awarded: £89,970

This project studies the influence of the merchant classes on the politics and society of late-Stuart England. Historians have for some time acknowledged the importance of economic developments in this age of financial and commercial revolution, which saw the nation transformed into a major international power. However, relatively little is known of mercantile opinion and its political and cultural impact. In order to emphasis the dynamic force of traders in this period, the project examines not only the activity of traders in the public sphere, but also their wider, personal associations, which fixed their place in state and society, and remain the key to understanding their distinctive culture.

The course of research has been structured to recreate the particular experience of the merchant classes, taking advantage of a wide array of largely untapped sources. Analysis will be undertaken of mercantile education, travel, material culture, and both personal and professional connections. The principal arenas of merchant activity will also be examined: the household, the workplace, leisure-time, religious observance and public service (from parish to Parliament). Research on London merchants dominate the project, but comparative study of the trading communities of provincial centres such as Newcastle, Liverpool, York and Norwich will also be undertaken in order to assess the influence of London merchant culture on the nation. Moreover, the project will seek comparisons with the development of the merchant sector in other European countries.

Publications: Perry Gauci, '"For want of smooth language": Parliament as a point of contact in the Augustan Age', Parliamentary History, XVII (1998), 12-22; Perry Gauci, The Politics of Trade: The Overseas Merchant in State and Society, 1660-1720 (Oxford University Press, 2001).

Reports: 1994-5, 1995-6, 1996-7, 1997-8, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper

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Metropolitan London in the 1690s

Associate Supervisor: Peter Earle, B.Sc. (Econ), Ph.D.
Researchers: Janet Barnes, B.Sc. (Soc.), B.Sc., M.A., Craig Spence, B.Sc., M.A., M.I.F.A.
Funded by: ESRC (Ref: R000232527)
Amount Awarded: £104,833

The uniquely comprehensive and detailed taxation records of these years will be used to explore the social and economic geography of London at a time when it emerged as a metropolis of world standing. The project will build on an existing study of the City, and extend its coverage to those large parts of the metropolis which lay in Middlesex and Surrey. Products will include a database of Londoners, and a 'social atlas' which will be a vital tool in comparative studies.

Publications: Craig Spence, 'Mapping London in the 1690s', in F. Bocchi and P. Denley (eds), Storia e Multimedia: Proceedings of the Seventh International Congress of the Association for History and Computing (Bologna, 1994), 746-56; Craig Spence, 'Computers, maps and metropolitan London in the 1690s', in M. Woollard (ed.), New Windows on London's Past: Information Technology and the Transformation of Metropolitan His tory (Association for History and Computing (UK), 2000), pp. 25-45; Craig Spence, London in the 1690s: A Social Atlas (Centre for Metropolitan History, 2000), 200 pp. The 4s. in the £ database is now available on the British History Online website

Reports: 1990-91, 1991-2, 1992-3, 1993-4.

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London Cases in the Court of Exchequer, 1727-1841 - accessibility study

Researcher: Tony Trowles, B.A., D.Phil.
Funded by: The Pilgrim Trust, The Worshipful Company of Scriveners, The Honourable Society of Gray's Inn, Clifford Chance, and Linklaters & Paines.

Eighteenth century legal records contain a wealth of information about London business and social history, but are little used because most of their existing indexes are to plaintiffs' names only, making a subject approach very difficult. This study provides an introduction to the contents of the Exchequer Court (equity side) London, Middlesex and Surrey files for the period 1727-1841, and to the ways in which they can most effectively be exploited given the limitations of the finding aids.

Publication: Tony Trowles, 'Eighteenth century Exchequer records as a genealogical source', Genealogists' Magazine, 25 no. 3 (September 1995), 93-98.

Reports: 1991-2, 1992-3

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From Craft to Industry: London's Scientific Instrument Makers' Workshops, 1780-1820

Researcher: Anita McConnell, B.Sc., Ph.D., F.R.S.A., F.R.G.S., F.R.Met.S.
Funded by: The Leverhulme Trust (1 January-31 December 1993)

Reports: 1992-3, 1993-4, 1994-5

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From Counting-House to Office: The Evolution of London's Central Financial District, 1690-1870

Associate Supervisor: Prof. Martin Daunton, B.A., Ph.D.
Researcher: Jon M. Lawrence, M.A., Ph.D.
Funded by: ESRC (Ref: R000231022) (1 October 1988-31 March 1990)
Amount Awarded: £30,394

During this period London emerged as the world centre for financial, insurance, and commodity markets. The project is concerned with the impact of this development on that central area of the city where financial and insurance services were housed. The traditional pattern, in which shop, counting-house, warehouse, and residence were intermixed was replaced by one in which new types of large-scale building, including exchanges and office blocks, were dominant. The city centre ceased to be a place where people dwelled. The project traces for the first time the emergence of this characteristic feature of the modern metropolis.

The evolution of the central financial district of the City of London between the 1690s and 1871 is traced primarily by constructing a series of 'snapshots' of the area, using local taxation records, census enumerators' books, and commercial directories, when they exist, for the years 1693, 1785, 1817, 1851 and 1871. Each takes the form of a computerized database in which it is possible to relate landlords, property values, residential occupants (by age, sex, and occupation), and businesses to every house, building or site in the area. The databases concern all properties in the 26 administrative precincts which cover approximately the triangle now bounded by King William Street/Princess Street in the West, Throgmorton Street in the North and Gracechurch Street in the East.

The early influence of the Bank of England in stimulating the reshaping of an existing financial district is apparent, as is the continuing influence of both the Bank and the Royal Exchange as focal points of business. After 1800, but not significantly before, many of the more substantial families of the area took up residence elsewhere, leaving their houses, often recently-built, to be converted into offices. The resident population was increasingly composed of messengers, caretakers, and small-scale householding tradesmen. Members of the last group were able to profit by letting out rooms for commercial use above their shops. Land values were driven up mainly by the demands of large institutions such as banks for headquarters buildings, especially after 1850. Their demand for imposing, street-frontage sites contributed to driving out the tradesmen, and caused speculative office blocks generally to be built on off-frontage land, where they replaced houses previously converted to commercial use or the crowded courts of poor dwellings which had persisted in some parts of the area. These secondary locations were characterized by dense, interdependent networks comprising the small-scale businesses of the brokers, agents, merchants and other specialists who composed the crucial financial and commercial service sector of the City. In this final stage, up to 1871, the modern financial district emerged.

Publications: Derek Keene, 'The financial district of the city of London: continuity and change, 1300-1871', in H.A. Diederiks and D. Reeder (eds), Cities of Finance (Amsterdam: Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1996), 279-302; Derek Keene, 'The setting of the Royal exchange: continuity and change in the financial district of the city of London, 1300-1871', in A. Saunders (ed.), The Royal Exchange (London Topographical Society, 1997), 253-71

Reports: 1988-9, 1989-90; End of Award Report

Other link: The Bubble Project An interdisciplinary and collaborative research initiative on the Financial Crisis of 1719-20 at the Department of English, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3H 3J5.

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The Textile Marketing District of the City of London, c.1780-1914

Associate Supervisor: Professor Martin Daunton
Researcher: Iain Black, B.A., Ph.D.
Funded by: The Pasold Research Fund (1 June 1991-31 December 1991)
Amount Awarded: £20,000

This is one of a series of studies of the specialised business districts which emerged within the City of London during the nineteenth century. They were characterised by a loss of the residential population and of the traditional intermixture of domestic and business life, and by the increasing dominance of large commercial buildings. Wood Street and its neighbourhood came to be taken over by the warehouses of textile manufacturers and dealers. The project examines the physical and economic transformation of the area and the distinctive way of life associated with the warehouses. It also undertakes a preliminary exploration of the relationship between provincial manufacturers and the warehousing system in London.

Publications:

Reports: 1990-1, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper

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Financial Headquarters in the City, 1850-1914

Researcher: Iain Black, B.A., Ph.D.
Funded by: Barclays Bank plc, National Westminster Bank plc, Sun Alliance Group, and The Guardian Royal Exchange Charitable Trust (1 January 1991-30 June 1991)
Amount Awarded: £12,750

The project investigates a sample of the first generation of large-scale headquarters erected for banks and other institutions in the financial district of the City of London. The following set of questions is asked of each building: How was each site assembled and what tenurial arrangements prevailed? Which architects were commissioned to design these new palatial head offices, and why were they chosen? What extent were particular conscious architectural elements incorporated into their designs? Who built the offices, what materials were chosen andhow much did each building cots? How were these property developments financed and to what extent were speculative elements, such as building extra lettable office space, incorporated into both financial and physical planning?

Publications: Iain S. Black, 'Symbolic Capital: the London and Westminster Bank headquarters, 1836-38', Landscape Research, 21 (1996), 55-72; Iain S. Black, 'Spaces of capital: bank office building in the City of London, 1830-1870', Journal of Historical Geography, 26 (2000), 351-75.

Reports: 1990-1, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper

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Mortality in the Metropolis, 1860-1920

Researchers: William Luckin, B.A., M.Sc., Graham Mooney, B.A., Ph.D., Andrea Tanner, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.
Research Assistant: Patsy Pinedo Tuck, B.A. (10 June-9 August 1996)
Funded by: The Wellcome Trust (1 July 1995-1999)
Amount Awarded: £177,081

The aim of the project is to investigate patterns of mortality in London during a period which witnessed major change in both the incidence and the causes of death.

The project will produce a cause-specific mortality database, using the Registrar-General's annual figures. The data will be used to illuminate processes underlying epidemiological change and its relationship to a series of broad indicators of the changing social and environmental character of the metropolis as a whole and each registration district within it. Micro-studies of two carefully-selected districts explore local conditions and epidemiological experiences in much more detail, and juxtapose that picture with the aggregate pattern. They assess the health status of individual localities in relation to the extent of medical provision, access to that provision, and the political or bureaucratic response to crisis.

Publications: Graham Mooney, 'Did London pass the "sanitary test"? Seasonal infant mortality in London, 1870-1914', Journal of Historical Geography, 20 no. 2 (1994), 158-74; Graham Mooney and N. Williams, 'Infant mortality in an "Age of Great Cities"; London and the provincial cities compared, c.1840-1910', Continuity and Change, 9 no.2 (1994), 185-212; Graham Mooney, 'Still-births and the measurement of urban infant mortality in England, 1890-1930', Local Population Studies, 53 (1994), 42-52; Graham Mooney 'The prevention and control of infectious childhood diseases in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century London: the case of diphtheria and measles', in M.L. Gentileschi and R. King (eds), Questioni di Popolazione in Europa: una Prospettiva Geografica (Associazione dei Geografi Italiani and Institute of British Geographers; Bologna, 1996), 255-271; Bill Luckin, 'Perspectives on the mortality decline in London, 1860-1920', The London Journal, 22 (1997), 123-41; Bill Luckin, 'Town, Country and Metropolis: the formation of an air pollution problem in London, 1800-1870', in D. Schott (ed), Energie und Stadt in Europa: Von der Vorindustriellen, Hollznot' bis zur Olkrise der 1970er Jahre (Stuttgart, 1997), 78-92; Bill Luckin and Graham Mooney, 'Urban history and historical epidemiology: the case of London, 1860-1920', Urban History, 24 (1997), 37-54; Graham Mooney, 'Professionalization in public health and the measurement of sanitary progress in nineteenth-century England and Wales', Social History of Medicine, 10 (1997), 53-78; Graham Mooney, '"A tissue of the most flagrant anomalies": smallpox and the centralisation of sanitary administration in late nineteenth-century London', Medical History, 41 (1997), 261-90; Graham Mooney and Simon Szreter, 'Urbanization, mortality, and the standard of living debate: new estimates of the expectation of life at birth in nineteenth-century British cities', Economic History Review LI (11998), 84-112; Andrea Tanner, 'Thomas Orme Dudfield: the model medical officer of health', Journal of Medical Biography, 6 (1998), 79-85; Andrea Tanner, 'A troublesome priest. A Victorian Workhouse Chaplain in the City of London', London Journal, XXIII (1998), 15-31; Andrea Tanner, 'The casual poor and the City of London Poor Law Union, 1837-1869', The Historical Journal, 42 (1999), 183-206; Bill Luckin, Graham Mooney and Andrea Tanner, 'Patient pathways: solving the problem of institutional deaths in late nineteenth-century London', Social History of Medicine, 12:2 (1999), 227-69; Graham Mooney, 'Public health versus private practice: the contested development of compulsory infectious disease notification in late nineteenth-century Britain', Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 73 (1999), 238-67; Andrea Tanner, 'Scarlatina and sewer smells, metropolitan public health records, 1860-1920', International Network for the History of Public Health Electronic Journal (October 1999); Graham Mooney, 'The epidemiological implications of reconstructing hospital catchment areas in Victorian London', in M. Woollard (ed.), New Windows on London's Past: Info rmation Technology and the Transformation of Metropolitan History (Association for History and Computing (UK), 2000), pp. 47-74; Graham Mooney and Andrea Tanner, 'Infant mortality, a spatial problem: Notting Dale special area in George Newman's London', in E. Garrett, C. Galley, N. Shelton and R. Woods (eds.), Infant Mortality: A Continuing Social Problem (Ashgate, 2007)

Reports: 1994-5, 1995-6, 1996-7, 1997-8, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper, 1998-9

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Coventry and Dresden after 1940/45

Researcher: Stefan Goebel, M.Phil., Ph.D. (Leverhulme Postdoctoral Fellow 1 October 2002-1 September 2004)

Reports: 2002-3, 2003-4

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The Jobbing System of the London Stock Exchange: An Oral History

Associate Supervisor: David Kynaston, B.A., Ph.D.
Researcher: Bernard Attard, B.A., M.A., D.Phil.
Funded by: International Stock Exchange, Barclays de Zoete Wedd, Warburg Securities (1989-1991)
Amount Awarded: £40,000

The jobbing system of the London Stock Exchange came to an end with the 'Big Bang' of October 1986. Jobbers left few written records. The purpose of the project is to compile a permanent record of the way of life of a group of market makers who embodied many of the distinctive qualities of London's historic culture as a trading centre.

Publications: Bernard Attard, 'The jobbers of the London Stock Exchange: an oral history', Oral History (Spring, 1994), 43-48; Bernard Attard, 'Making a market. The jobbers of the London Stock Exchange, 1800-1986', Financial History Review, 7 (2000), 5-24. The tapes and transcripts of the forty interviews with stockjobbers, etc made during the course of the project have been deposited at the British National Sound Archive, ref no. C463, where they may be consulted.

Reports: 1989-90, 1990-1, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper

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London's Past Online

General Editor: Heather Creaton, B.A., M.Phil., A.L.A.
Research Editor: David Tomkins, B.A., M.A.
Assistant Research Editor: Eileen Sanderson, B.A., M.A.
Funded by: Arts and Humanities Research Board (Ref: RE/AN8717/APN13604) (1 May 2002-30 September 2004)
Amount Awarded: £216,919

London's Past Online is a free, searchable online database of books, articles and other published material relating to the Greater London area from the Anglo-Saxon period to the present day. The core data has been taken from Heather Creaton's Bibliography of Printed Works on the History of London to 1939 (LAPL, 1994) and its unpublished supplement, and the Bibliography from her Sources for the History of London, 1939-45 (BRA, 1998). The research team is now adding relevant titles of books, articles, theses and conference papers that have appeared since these two works were published and bringing the historical coverage on from 1945 to the present day. In an experimental phase the project is also incorporating some archaeological references relating to Roman London. The database is now online at: www.history.ac.uk/cmh/lpol.

Reports: 2000-2, 2002-3, 2003-4

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Bibliography of Printed Works on London History to 1939 and Supplement

Editor: Heather Creaton, B.A., M.Phil., A.L.A.
Research Assistant: Tony Trowles, B.A., D.Phil.
Funded by: ESRC (Ref: R000231020 and R000232425), Corporation of London, English Heritage, Society of Antiquaries (1 October 1988-31 July 1992)
Amount Awarded: £79,160

The bibliography, undertaken in co-operation with the Guildhall Library, comprises selected works published to the end of 1990. The supplement continues the work of the volume published in 1994, adding material published since 1991. The project was superseded by London's Past Online in May 2002.

Publications: Heather Creaton with H. Hiramatsu, Igirisu ho shi shiryo [Guide to the study of English Legal History] (tokyo, 1989); Tony Trowles, 'List of periodical articles on London history, 1990', The London Journal, 16, no. 2 (1991), 180-191; Heather Creaton and Jeremy Gibson (eds.), Lists of Londoners (Federation of Family History Societies, 1992, 2nd edn. 1997); Heather Creaton, 'A local history database: the bibliography of printed works on London history', (Aslib Social Sciences Information Journal) XI no. 1 (1993), 22-4; Heather Creaton, Bibliography of Printed Works on London History to 1939 (Library Association Publishing, 1994); Heather Creaton, London (World Bibliographical Series, 189; Clio Press, 1996); Heather Creaton, 'Sources for London History: an Introductory Guide', in P. Garside (ed.), Capital Histories: a Bibliographical Study of London (Aldershot, 1998), 1-4.

Reports: 1988-9, 1989-90, 1990-1, 1991-2, 1992-3, 1993-4, 1994-5, 1995-6, 199 6-7, 1997-8, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper, 1998-9, 1999-2000

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Register of Research in Progess on the History of London

Editor: Heather Creaton, B.A., M.Phil., A.L.A.

A register of current work on the history of London is held at the Centre. It is also available on-line.

Publications: Heather Creaton, 'Register of Research in Progress on the History of London: A Supplement', London Journal 17 no. 1 (1992), 93-7; Heather Creaton, 'Register of research in progress on the history of London: a supplement', London Journal 18 no.2 (1993);

Reports: 1992-3, 1993-4, 1994-5, 1995-6, 1996-7, 1997-8, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper, 1998-9

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Sources for the History of London 1939-45: A Guide and Bibliography

Editor: Heather Creaton, B.A., M.Phil., A.L.A.

The CMH's published bibliography of London history stops at 1939; this compilation aims to cover the history of London from all aspects from 1939-1945 and includes a guide to primary sources and collections of illustrations. It was published in 1998 by the British Records Association.

Publications: Heather Creaton, Sources for the History of London, 1939-45: A Guide and Bibliography (Archives and the User series, 9. British Records Association, 1998).

Reports: 1994-5, 1995-6, 1996-7, 1997-8, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper

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A Checklist of Unpublished London Diaries

Editor: Heather Creaton, B.A., M.Phil., A.L.A.

Publications: Heather Creaton, 'Checklist of unpublished London diaries', London Topographical Society Newletter, No. 47 (1998), p. 8. Heather Creaton, Unpublished London Diaries. A Checklist of Unpublished Diaries by Londoners and Visitors with a Select Bibliography of Published Diaries (London Record Society Publications, Volume 37, 2003)

Reports: 1997-8, Tenth Anniversary Conference paper, 1998-9, 1999-2000, 2000-2, 2002-3

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