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Growing Up in Medieval London: The Experience of Childhood in History Reprint Edition

by Barbara A. Hanawalt (Author)

4.4 24 ratings

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When Barbara Hanawalt's acclaimed history The Ties That Bound first appeared, it was hailed for its unprecedented research and vivid re-creation of medieval life. David Levine, writing in The New York Times Book Review, called Hanawalt's book "as stimulating for the questions it asks as for the answers it provides" and he concluded that "one comes away from this stimulating book with the same sense of wonder that Thomas Hardy's Angel Clare felt [:] 'The impressionable peasant leads a larger, fuller, more dramatic life than the pachydermatous king.'"
Now, in Growing Up in Medieval London, Hanawalt again reveals the larger, fuller, more dramatic life of the common people, in this instance, the lives of children in London. Bringing together a wealth of evidence drawn from court records, literary sources, and books of advice, Hanawalt weaves a rich tapestry of the life of London youth during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Much of what she finds is eye opening. She shows for instance that--contrary to the belief of some historians--medieval adults did recognize and pay close attention to the various stages of childhood and adolescence. For instance, manuals on childrearing, such as "Rhodes's Book of Nurture" or "Seager's School of Virtue," clearly reflect the value parents placed in laying the proper groundwork for a child's future. Likewise, wardship cases reveal that in fact London laws granted orphans greater protection than do our own courts.
Hanawalt also breaks ground with her innovative narrative style. To bring medieval childhood to life, she creates composite profiles, based on the experiences of real children, which provide a more vivid portrait than otherwise possible of the trials and tribulations of medieval youths at work and at play. We discover through these portraits that the road to adulthood was fraught with danger. We meet Alison the Bastard Heiress, whose guardians married her off to their apprentice in order to gain control of her inheritance. We learn how Joan Rawlyns of Aldenham thwarted an attempt to sell her into prostitution. And we hear the unfortunate story of William Raynold and Thomas Appleford, two mercer's apprentices who found themselves forgotten by their senile master, and abused by his wife. These composite portraits, and many more, enrich our understanding of the many stages of life in the Middle Ages.
Written by a leading historian of the Middle Ages, these pages evoke the color and drama of medieval life. Ranging from birth and baptism, to apprenticeship and adulthood, here is a myth-shattering, innovative work that illuminates the nature of childhood in the Middle Ages.

ISBN-10

9780195093841
ISBN-13

978-0195093841
Edition

Reprint
Publisher

Oxford University Press
Publication date

February 23, 1995
Language

English
Dimensions

7.99 x 5.33 x 0.68 inches
Print length

320 pages
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Well written. A very interesting topic. Excellent for Western 'Civ' instructors who want their students to consider the importance of social history to culture."--David L. Ferch, Sierra College

"A delightful view of the lives of children and adolescents in London in the Middle Ages....This study is important. It is highly inclusive, offering insights into all ages and social classes. The richness of its details gives the opportunity for much discussion. It would be an excellent social text for medieval history."--Kliatt

"The book contains a mass of extremely useful material on the demography, affective relations and household economy of the medieval London family."--History Today

"The most enjoyable parts of this very readable book are the 'narratives' or case studies that she permits herself to create. Throwing off the historian's usual constraint against experimentation, she molds some of her material into fictional form. Based as it is on her careful research, this practice works."--Church History

"[A] vivid portrayal of life in medieval London....With her creative use of original sources and clarity of stle, Hanawalt's study will appeal to scholars and students at every level. The paperback edition makes it a natural for classroom use."--American Historical Review

"She has made excellent use of a variety of primary sources, reminding us vividly of the links between medieval society and our own."--Journal of Interdisciplinary History

"This book comprises an enormously informative outlook on an unduly neglected area. It is a treasury of information and worthwhile questions for other historians to address."--Speculum--A Journal of Medieval Studies

"Professor Hanawalt has produced a very readable text on a lively and interesting topic. By blending traditional historical monograph with literary interpretation, Hanawalt has opened up a new approach for presenting history to both the academic and general reader."--Sixteenth Century Journal

"Barbara Hanawalt presents us with a vivid, imaginative glimpse of childhood and youth in an urban environment. Based on a treasure trove of sources, her book poses a direct challenge to Philippe Ariès' treatment of medieval childhood."--John R. Gillis, Rutgers University

"Excellent book for supplemental reading."--Paul Ton, Metropolitan State College

"Excellent and lucid exposition of the concept and realities of medieval childhood."--Pat Smith-Wasylin, Ithaca College

"Vintage Hanawalt--vigorous, challenging, persuasive, and humane."--Michael Altschul, Case Western Reserve University

"In a densely informative, fluid, and often charming study, Hanawalt dashes the widely accepted notions that medieval society lacked the concepts of childhood and adolescence as we understand them, and that it disallowed the cultural space for the expression of these states of development....Turning to the rich court documentation available in London (coroners' rolls; wills and bequests; records of orphans; business disputes, etc), and relying on a technique that includes 'fictional' portraits and scenarios to illustrate her more conventional expository narrative, Hanawalt paints a convincing picture of a 14th- and 15th-century London in which parents cherished their children no less than we do....The author conclusively demonstrates that then, as now, kids were allowed to be kids. Exemplary scholarship that blends traditional, painstaking research with contemporary approaches and understandings."--Kirkus Reviews

"Oh, how we have needed this work on the experience of growing up in past time! With Hanawalt's expert guidance, we discover what many analysts have claimed did not exist--the social institutions of medieval London that formed the boundaries and pathways of childhood and adolescence in a society with high mortality. They include the multiple worlds shaped by class and gender inequality, the systems of apprenticeship and domestic service, and the culture of matrimony. In data exploration, appraisal, and interpretation, the book sets a commendable standard for historical studies of the young and their paths to adulthood."--Glen H. Elder, Jr.

"This lively historical reconstruction, supported by a meticulous but unobtrusive stratum of documentation in wills, petitions, and other primary texts, should introduce an enlarged circle of readers to the rewards of archival research."--Paul Strohm, Indiana University

"No existing work explores the topic in greater depth or with a finer sense of time and place....[A]n engaging and often provocative book....[R]esonant and compelling ."--Albion

From the Back Cover

Bringing together a wealth of evidence drawn from court records, literary sources, and books of advice, Barbara Hanawalt weaves a rich tapestry of the lives of the common children of medieval London during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Much of what she finds is eye opening. She shows for example that contrary to the belief of some historians medieval adults recognized and paid close attention to the various stages of childhood and adolescence. For instance, wardship cases reveal that London laws granted orphans greater protection than do our own contemporary courts. And with her innovative narrative style, Hanawalt brings medieval childhood to life, creating composite profiles based on the experiences of real children, such as Alison the Bastard Heiress, whose guardians married her off to their apprentice in order to gain control of her inheritance.Ranging from birth and baptism to apprenticeship and adulthood, here is a myth-shattering, innovative work that illuminates the nature of childhood in the Middle Ages.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0195093844
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Oxford University Press; Reprint edition (February 23, 1995)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 320 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9780195093841
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0195093841
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 9.6 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.99 x 5.33 x 0.68 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #2,152,492 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #979 in Children's Studies Social Science (Books)
- #2,445 in History of Technology
- #3,727 in England History

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4.4 24 ratings

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Seth E Kolloen

Fascinating

Reviewed in the United States on September 12, 2019

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Exactly as it says in the title. A unique and thought-provoking book.

Reviewed in the United States on February 15, 2016

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arrived within the time frame, no complaints

Reviewed in the United States on August 3, 2015

Perfect buy.

Highly valuable and well-researched reference on urban medieval childhood

Reviewed in the United States on August 7, 2010

Barbara Hanawalt's Growing Up in Medieval London: The Experience of Childhood in History is a highly valuable reference work for anyone interested in the subject. Hanawalt's research was very rigorous and is reflected by the books extensive notes and bibliography, and she is careful at the beginning to note the difficulties and limitations on what can be determined, given the nature of the medieval source materials; more is known about girls than boys, more about children of the upper and middle classes than children of the poor, and so on.

There is a great deal to be learned from this book as to how medieval childhood differed from childhood as experienced in modern times. Some things were of course the same, and Hanawalt is quick to dismiss the mistaken belief that medieval parents were less attached to their children than modern parents are. She does, however, point out the differences that the high mortality rate of the period made in familial relationships. Not only could parents not count on all of their children making it to adulthood, children in turn frequently had to deal with the loss of one or even both parents before they themselves made it to adulthood. Some of the more interesting parts of the book are where Hanawalt covers how orphans and wards were dealt with, with laws and institutions in place to try and insure that they were cared for and that any inheritances they might have would be protected until they came of an age to inherit. Hanawalt notes interestingly that the definition what 'orphan' meant was quite different: a child who lost their father, i.e. the family provider, was considered to be orphaned, while a child who lost their mother was not.

A lot of the focus of Growing Up in Medieval London is on adolescence for a number of reasons, the primary one being then, as now, it was viewed as a distinct stage between childhood and adulthood. Hanawalt notes that even in medieval times, it was as perplexing and difficult a stage of life to adults as it is now:

"Moralists despaired of youths' behavior. Some were of the opinion that young people turned out so badly because they were not adequately beaten. Others opined that youth's rebelliousness was the result of too much beating and that young people became callous because of it. Still others felt that the home environment was so poisonous that young people lacked role models for how honorable people ought to behave. How could they be expected to behave better than their elders? The laws, customs, ceremonies, and contracts that marked the transition from childhood to adolescence likewise show a keen understanding of the disruptions that occur during adolescence. If adults seem as perplexed as modern moralists, psychologists, and parents about this stage of life, it is because they were fully cognizant that it existed and that it was different from childhood and adulthood. Medieval moralists came up with the same explanations that we moderns use because of the similarity between behavior then and now among adolescents and the expectations of those who had to deal with them."

Adolescence in medieval times was when children were prepared to be able to earn a living. In the case of those growing up in London, unless they happened to be among the nobility, for most children this meant either going into apprenticeship with one of the guilds to learn a craft or going into service with some household and becoming a servant. One of the more interesting things I learned from this book was that the English believed in having contracts for everything, and that included contracts between apprentices and masters and between servants and employers. The contracts would cover everything from wages and length of service to work conditions and behavioral requirements. Apprentices, for example, were forbidden to marry during their apprenticeships, and were also forbidden to frequent theaters or to dress in a manner inappropriate to their station. Disputes over contract terms and violations were handled by the guild to which apprentice and master belonged. Masters generally had the upper hand, but if a master was found to be abusive or failing to live up to his side of the contract, the guild could rule in favor of the apprentice and require the master to meet the contract's terms or release the apprentice from his contract.

Highly recommended for anyone with an interest in the subject of medieval childhood in an urban setting, and for anyone with a particular interest in how apprenticeships in medieval guilds were handled.

5 people found this helpful

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S Smith

Wonderfully Enjoyable

Reviewed in the United States on November 28, 2007

I noticed this on the shelves in the Library while looking for another one on some topic or another and thought it might make an interesting read over my lunch hour.

It did. I love the statistics, the stories, the perspective. My only complaint is the end seems a bit more abrupt then expected.

Definitely worth a look.

One person found this helpful

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sid1gen

Growing Up in Medieval London

Reviewed in the United States on March 12, 2014

Verified Purchase

From the Introduction Hanawalt declares war on Philippe Aries and his "Centuries of Childhood" (1960) for daring to write that the modern concept of childhood is, well, modern. Aries studied records, paintings, texts and songs from medieval France and England. Hanawalt concentrates on London in the 14th and mostly 15th centuries, and she concentrates mostly on adolescents (teenagers). Unacknowledged by her or those who praise her work, Aries's book makes clear that by the 15thy century things were changing in Western Europe and a more modern idea of childhood had started to emerge. Hanawalt offers details on apprenticeships for teens, something Aries had already mentioned at length in 1960. As a reader of Medieval history and texts, I have explored many books and poems from the time in question, from Arab Andalusia to cosmopolitan Toledo to Italy, France, the German-speaking lands, and the British Isles. I have yet to come upon one text that makes the absolute distinction between a child and an adult that we make today. Hanawalt explains that Aries's thesis regarding childhood stems from the desire of so many modern intellectuals to heap negatives on the Middle Ages, so her work is a way to set the record straight. What emerged for me from her book, however, was the very modern bias of a modern historian who seems to be bound by her world in ways that she can't even identify, forcing parallelisms that are just not there. Thus, in an effort to tell us that the Middle Ages were not that bad, she finds that in several ways children and orphans were better provided in medieval London than even today because a scrap of paper seems to confirm this; that's all her proof, all she needs. Peasant misery, overcrowded cities, 90% of the population poor, perhaps 1% literate, rampant abuse and sordidness at a time a seven year-old could be hanged for thievery together with his ADULT accomplices because all were considered equally guilty, all of that passed Hanawalt by. The poor had far more children than survived infancy and intentional exposure of children, as well as the sale of children, has been a known fact of the time for decades. This situation created a "market" for child-beggars, child-prostitutes, and 5 year-old criminals, none of which was seen any different by their confreres, by the Church, or by the Law, from any adult in the same circumstances because they were mostly seen as miniature adults. But Hanawalt decides that a scrap of paper is proof enough that children in late medieval London must have had it better that modern children in London, a proof so good it trumps all the other information available.

The author's use of data is certainly impressive, but unconvincing. After reading Andalusian Arab poems, jarchas, Sir Gawain, Christine de Pizan, Dante, Boccaccio, Christina Markyate, Chaucer, late medieval Spanish classics like La Celestina (or even 16th century classics like La Lozana Andaluza); after reading Lazarillo de Tormes, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, and after reading other historians, many of whom didn't write in English and didn't jump to conclusions based on selective data just from London, I have to disagree with Hanawalt. I see her effort as an attempt to transport her modern idea of childhood to the distant past because she can't simply accept the politically dangerous idea that childhood, as we know it, is a relatively recent creation. Maybe she's right, but her book does not prove her case at all.

9 people found this helpful

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Albert Larochelle

Three Stars

Reviewed in the United States on October 27, 2016

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High priced required reaging

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