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The land agent played an important role in community relationships. His position was frequently one of mediator and liaison between landowner and tenant, although his role often extended to settlin...

This article explores the ways in which the Duke of Portland’s Welbeck Abbey estate in Nottinghamshire reacted to the caveats of The Education Act of 1870. The Duke had in the past taken little int...

This article explores how the Castleman/Anglesey archive forms a micro-study of an estate and its associated rural community at work. It will survey the type of data which can be found within the land agent’s estate vouchers and diurnal correspondence and why they are important. It will begin by examining the concepts and ideology of the rural community and seek to explain why it is so hard to define. The article will then investigate how a micro-study can assist in understanding the ways in which estates reacted to periods of economic difficulties. This will include: why landowners left rent arrears to accrue, the types of petition which the local populace presented, the reasoning behind improving landscapes and the ways an estate contributed to the relief of the labouring poor. The Castleman archive reveals the multi-layered, complex nature of the rural community and the diverse role of the land agent in balancing the relationships which existed within it. In effect it acts as an historical prism.

At one time, 19th century Wales was viewed as a battleground between landlord and tenant. This view, inherited from the struggle at the time between Nonconformist Liberals and Anglican Tories, has become modified as particular estates are studied in more detail. In particular, studies located in areas beyond the most intense conflict can widen our perspective. In this article, the case study of Simon Yorke, a landlord in the north-east of the country, is used to show how landlord and tenants could divide along the fault lines of religion and politics but still live for the most part without open disagreement. Examples of tenancies are used to show how the relationship between the two parties was managed. The location and the economy of this particular estate may have contributed to a relative absence of external pressures, but the comparative harmony of Simon Yorke and his tenants may also in the long run turn out to be as typical as the better-known cases of conflict and mistrust.

The family is the fundamental unit of society and was an important focus for identity, affection and sociability amongst landed elites. Historians of landed society have generally been reticent about studying the gentry family in any depth. This has been partly due to a general reliance on published biographical and genealogical sources as well as a focus on the estate rather than the family in archival material. A more fundamental understanding of gentry society will require greater levels and depths of knowledge relating to the structure and relationships of the family. In order to achieve this on a broad and representative scale new sources and methodologies will be required. This article provides an evaluation of the census enumerator's books as a source for studying landed society and suggests a number of avenues for future research.

The National Farm Survey that was undertaken between I94I and I943 documents in great detail the nature of the local land tenure and land use then prevailing across England and Wales. It ranks alongside other major sources that shed essential light on the character of agrarian economy and society at a particular point in time, such as the Tithe surveys or the I873 ‘New Domesday’. Although the National Farm Survey has much to offer the researcher, it has yet to feature in many published local historical studies. This paper draws attention to some of the uses of the Survey in local enquiry, as explored in a micro study of a landed estate centred on the Devon parish of Powderham. The estate, belonging to the Courtenay family, Earls of Devon, experienced many of the far-reaching changes affecting landownership, and rural economy and society more broadly, from the late I9th century to the late 20th.

The Arithmeticke Project comprised a series of micro-studies by Family and Community Historical Research Society members in England and Ireland designed to test the findings of Peter Wardley in respect of the diffusion of the use of Hindu-Arabic in place of Roman numerals, a spontaneous change on the part of individual scribes that occurred without official direction. Inventories for the period I540-I700 were the major primary source and attention was focussed on the monetary values recorded in the valuation column of these documents. Reflecting other work on this issue, the findings showed a significant transition in the numerals used in the valuation columns from the late I6th century to the mid-I7th, but with notable exceptions. The investigation was extended subsequently by examination of other documents, including wills, churchwardens’ accounts and estate papers. As the first such project undertaken by the Society, it has provided a blueprint for future ventures.