Table Of ContentThe Eighteenth-Century Town
1688-1820
Readers in Urban History
General Editors:
Peter Clark and David Reeder
The Centre for Urban History, Leicester University
THE MEDIEVAL TOWN
A Reader in English Urban History, 1200-1540
Edited by Richard Holt and Gervase Rosser
THE TUDOR AND STUART TOWN
A Reader in English Urban History, 1530-1688
Edited by Jonathan Barry
THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY TOWN
A Reader in English Urban History, 1688-1820
Edited by Peter Borsay
THE VICTORIAN CITY
A Reader in British Urban History, 1820-1914
Edited by R. J. Morris and R. Rodger
The Eighteenth-Century Town
A Reader in English Urban History
1688-1820
Edited by
Peter Borsay
1
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~ ~ Taylor & Francis Group
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First published 1990 by Longman Group Limited
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ISBN 13: 978-0-582-05l34-8 (pbk)
BRITISH LIBRARY CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION DATA
The Eighteenth-century town: a reader in English urban
history 1688-1820. - (Readers in urban history).
1. England. Towns, history
I. Borsay, Peter II. Series
942' .009'732
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
The eighteenth-century town: a reader in English urban history,
1688-1820!edited by Peter Borsay.
p. em.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 0-582-05135-5. - ISBN 0-582-05134-7
1. Cities and towns - England - History - 18th century. 2. England -
Social conditions - 18th century. I. Borsay, Peter.
HTl33.E36 1990 89-29172
307.76'0942'09034 - dc20 CIP
CONTENTS
Preface vii
Acknowledgements viii
l. Introduction 1
Peter Borsay
2. Urban growth and agricultural change: England and
the Continent in the early modern period 39
E. Anthony Wrigley
3. Country, county and town: patterns of regional
evolution in England 83
Alan Everitt
4. Urban improvement and the English economy in
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries 116
E. L. Jones and M. E. Falkus
5. The English urban renaissance: the development of
provincial urban culture c . 1680-c.1760 159
Peter Borsay
6. The London 'mob' in the early eighteenth century 188
Robert B. Shoemaker
7. Bath: ideology and utopia 1700-1760 223
R. S. Neale
8. Science, provincial culture and public opinion in
Enlightenment England 243
R. Porter
v
Contents
9. Money, land and lineage: the big bourgeoisie of
Hanoverian London 268
Nicholas Rogers
10. Birmingham and the West Midlands 1760-1793:
politics and regional identity in the English
provinces in the later eighteenth century 292
J. Money
11. Social class and social geography: the middle classes
in London at the end of the eighteenth century 315
L. D. Schwarz
12. Voluntary societies and British urban elites
1780-1850: an analysis 338
R. J. Morris
Select reading list 367
Index 373
PREFACE
The aim of this reader - one of a series of four volumes on urban
history covering the late twelfth to early twentieth centuries - is to
gather together in an easily accessible form, and place in a clear and
comprehensible context, a number of key contributions to the study
of the eighteenth-century town. In choosing the items for inclusion
I have avoided the contents of readily available urban history col
lections. In general, weight has been given to more recent
publications and an attempt has been made to provide a reasonably
broad coverage of the various aspects of town life. Though I am
conscious that in practice the pieces selected are concentrated in cer
tain fields, this reflects the way the subject has developed and the
need in a collection like this to allow for some common ground be
tween the contributions. The reader opens with a specially written
Introduction (Chapter 1), surveying the results of recent research on
the history of the English town between 1688 and 1820, and locating
the later essays in a broad contextual framework. Each piece (chap
ter) itself is prefaced by a brief editorial introduction, highlighting
its central features, indicating other published work (occasionally of
a critical nature) relevant to it, and sometimes raising questions
about its methodology or conclusions. A select list of further reading
is provided, which is supported by more detailed bibliographical ref
erences in the footnotes to the Introduction. In editing this volume
I am grateful to the authors and publishers who have permitted me
to reproduce their work, to Peter Clark and Anne Borsay for their
valuable comments on my text, and to the trustees of the Pantyfed
wen Fund at Saint David's University College, Lampeter, for their
financial assistance in preparirig the book.
VII
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We are grateful to the following for permission to reproduce
copyright material:
the editors for the extract 'Bath: ideology and utopia 1700-1760' by
R S Neale in Studies in the Eighteenth Century III edited by R F
Brissenden and J C Eade (Australian National University Press,
1976); Cambridge University Press and the author, R J Morris for
the article 'Voluntary societies and British urban elites 1780-1850:
an analysis' in Historical Journal, 26 (1983); Jai Press Inc for the
chapter 'Urban Improvement and the English economy in the seven
teenth and eighteenth centuries' by E L Jones and ME Falkus in
Research in Economic History: Vol 4 (1979); the editors of The Jour
nal of Interdisciplinary History and The MIT Press, Cambridge,
Massachusetts, for the article 'Urban Growth and Agricultural
Change: England and the Continent in the Early Modern Period'
by E A Wrigley in The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, XV
(1985), (c) 1985 by The Massachusetts Institute of Technology and
the editors; the editor of Midland History and the author, J Money
for the article 'Birmingham and the West Midlands 1760-1793:
politics & regional identity in the English provinces in the later
eighteenth century' in Midland History, Vol 1, No 1 (1971); The
Royal Historical Society for the article 'Country, county and town:
patterns of regional evolution in England' by A M Everitt in Trans
actions of the Royal Historical Society, 5th series, 29 (1979); the
editors of Social History and the authors for the articles 'The English
urban renaissance: the development of provincial urban culture c.
1680-c. 1760' by P Borsay in Social History, 2 (1977), 'Money, land,
and lineage: the big bourgeoisie of Hanoverian London' by N
Rogers in Social History, 4 (1979) and 'Social class and social geog
raphy: the middle classes in London at the end of the eighteenth
century' by L D Schwarz in Social History, 7 (1982); The University
of Chicago Press and the authm, R B Shoemaker for the article 'The
London "mob" in the early eighteenth century' in Journal of British
Studies, Vol 26 (1987); The Voltaire Foundation and the author, R
Porter for the article 'Science, provincial culture & public opinion
in Enlightenment England' in British Journal for Eighteenth-Century
Studies, 3 (1980).
viii
Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
Peter Borsay
The study of English urban history between 1688 and 1820, what
may conveniently be called the long eighteenth century, was, until
the last decade or so, relatively neglected. Attention focused on the
more overtly 'eventful' periods before the Civil War and after the
inception of the Industrial Revolution. This pattern of research had
the effect of accentuating the differences between the pre-industrial
and industrial town, and encouraged the view that the transform
ation of the one into the other was a dramatic, even revolutionary,
event. However, notions of this type have now come under critical
scrutiny. At a general level, the nature and significance of the Civil
Warl and the Industrial Revolution,2 two of the corner-stones of
post-war British historiography, are being reappraised. In the field
of urban history pioneering volumes, such as Penelope Corfield's
(1982) The Impact of English Towns 1700-1800 and the collection
of essays edited by Peter Clark, (1984) The Transformation of
English Towns 1600-1800, have redirected attention to the long
eighteenth century and emphasized the deep roots of economic and
social change. In Britain and across the Atlantic, evolution rather
than revolution is coming to seem the more appropriate concept to
describe the transition from pre-industrial to industrial urban
society,3 and with this change in approach the stereotyped images
I. See, for example, J. C. D. Clark, Revolution and Rebellion: State and Society
in England in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (Cambridge, 1986), pas
sim; P. Jenkins, The Making of a Ruling Class: the Glamorgan Gentry 1640-1790
(Cambridge, 1983), pp. 132-3.
2. D. Cannadine, The present and the past in the English Industrial Revolution
1880-1980', Past and Present, 103 (1984), pp. 159-67; N. F. R. Crafts, British
Economic Growth during the Industrial Revolution (Oxford, 1985); J. V. Beckett
and J. E. Heath, 'When was the Industrial Revolution in the East Midlands?',
Midland History, 13 (1988), pp. 77-94.
3. G. B. Nash, 'The social evolution of pre-industrial American cities 1700-1820',
Journal of Urban History, 13, no. 2 (1987), pp. 115-45.
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