John Heritage: An English Wool Merchant and his World, 1495-1520

The chance discovery of a unique wool merchant’s account book in the muniment room of Westminster Abbey gives us a detailed picture of the trading networks and business contacts of a wool monger who lived at Moreton-in-Marsh on the edge of the Cotswold Hills. Through him we gain an insight into a society of sheep farmers and traders and their involvement in the export trade in raw wool. The presentation will include some of the family history, landscape history, and social history of an important period, which stands between the late middle ages and Tudor expansion.
Professor Dyer is an eminent historian of daily life, economic history, and local history. His numerous publications include Standards of Living in the Later Middle Ages (1989); Everyday Life in Medieval England (2003); Making a Living in the Middle Ages (2003); An Age of Transition: Economy and Society in England in the Later Middle Ages (The Ford Lectures) (2007); ed. Social Relations and Ideas: Essay in Honour of R.H. Hilton (2009); William Dugdale, Historian, 1605-1689 (2009); and A Country Merchant, 1495-1520: Trading and Farming at the End of the Middle Ages (2012).

Sponsored by the UCSB Medieval Studies Program.

jwil 21.ii.2013