Struggle and Enterprise: The Experience of Servile Peasants in Wellingborough, 1258–1322: Midland History Prize Essay 2009

Abstract Recent studies of peasant welfare during the high point of medieval agriculture have largely overturned the idea that peasants were the constant victims of brutal seigniorial oppression. Using a variety of manorial sources, this study investigates the successes and struggles of servile peasants in the Northamptonshire manor of Wellingborough between 1258 and 1322. A growing community is revealed, whose economic survival is firmly tied to the harvest, but, crucially, is not always wholly dependent on the demesne performance. Despite evidence of some struggle, the emergence of a small group of entrepreneurial tenants suggests a 'hidden' peasant hierarchy that a brief glance at the manorial sources does not reveal. The findings suggest that peasant welfare cannot be considered in general terms, that lordly oppression was not always as harsh as previously believed, and that the combination of a supportive manorial infrastructure alongside a good harvest performance provided the foundations for nascen...