Popular politics are central to an understanding the politics of commodification and the project will connect the study of popular politics in the age of peasant revolt to that of organised lobbies and mass petitioning of the 19th century. Grain riots were a recurring feature of English life between the 14th and 18th centuries, and there is a rich historical literature on this aspect of popular politics. By the early 19th century new forms of popular pressure were available to shape the political economy of the trade—notably in large-scale subscription and lobbying organisations such as the Anti-Corn Law League. This is partly a matter of the development of the state—through the study of political economy and popular politics the project will make a contribution to the study of state formation.
In that very broad context however we are mainly concentrating on the politics of grain milling. There are studies of the organisation of the grain trade and its middlemen but little work (at least for the early modern period) on mills and the millers who were critical agents in production and distribution. Lords used legally-enforced monopolies to tie their tenants to use their mill in order to secure a return on investment. This was a significant grievance, for example, in the Peasants’ revolt of 1381 and in the Midlands Rising of 1607. It also prompted hundreds of suits in central and local courts long after that. Our project is examining around 800 separate disputes in English courts from the 16th to the 18th centuries. The form of much of this litigation encouraged witnesses to give depositions on general issues, and these records are a rich source for the study of perceptions of the trade and ethical behaviour within it, as well as for the organisation, technological and commercial history of milling. Working through this material we will be able to make a significant contribution to our understanding of the organisation and regulation of the trade in England.
Just as importantly the depositions reveal attitudes towards millers, a neglected subject for early modern period, complementing our work on the cultural history of the meanings attached to bread and grain.
The Politics of the English Grain Trade, 1314-1815 