100 books like Medieval York 600-1540

By D. M. Palliser,

Here are 100 books that Medieval York 600-1540 fans have personally recommended if you like Medieval York 600-1540. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of York: The Making of a City 1068-1350

Candace Robb Author Of The Riverwoman's Dragon

From my list on medieval York.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been writing the Owen Archer mysteries, set in and around the city of York in the late 14th century, for 30 years, ever since falling in love with the city of York on a visit. As I studied medieval literature and culture in graduate school, with a special interest in Chaucer, I’ve focused my research on the period in which he lived. I’ve spent months walking the streets of the city, hiking through the countryside, and meeting with local historians. Besides the 13 Owen Archer mysteries I’ve also published 3 Kate Clifford mysteries covering Richard II’s downfall, both series grounded in the politics and culture of medieval York and Yorkshire. 

Candace's book list on medieval York

Candace Robb Why did Candace love this book?

This is a masterful work covering the period from the Norman conquest to the Black Death. Sarah Rees Jones is one of my go-to scholars for medieval York, as well as an engaging writer. I particularly appreciate her looking beyond the importance of the royal government in the city’s development to include the strong influence of the Minster and other ecclesiastical institutions in the city as well as the significance of the people of York—merchants and craftspeople.

Check here first if you want a feel for how the city grew, who were the makers and shakers, how the neighborhoods developed, where the influential people lived. Every time I dip into this book I learn something new. With 18 useful maps and an extensive bibliography.

By Sarah Rees Jones,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked York as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

York was one of the most important cities in medieval England. This original study traces the development of the city from the Norman Conquest to the Black Death. The twelfth and thirteenth centuries are a neglected period in the history of English towns, and this study argues that the period was absolutely fundamental to the development of urban society and that up to now we have misunderstood the reasons for the development of York and its significance within our
history because of that neglect.

Medieval York argues that the first Norman kings attempted to turn the city into a true…


Book cover of Medieval Merchants: York, Beverley and Hull in the Later Middle Ages

Candace Robb Author Of The Riverwoman's Dragon

From my list on medieval York.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been writing the Owen Archer mysteries, set in and around the city of York in the late 14th century, for 30 years, ever since falling in love with the city of York on a visit. As I studied medieval literature and culture in graduate school, with a special interest in Chaucer, I’ve focused my research on the period in which he lived. I’ve spent months walking the streets of the city, hiking through the countryside, and meeting with local historians. Besides the 13 Owen Archer mysteries I’ve also published 3 Kate Clifford mysteries covering Richard II’s downfall, both series grounded in the politics and culture of medieval York and Yorkshire. 

Candace's book list on medieval York

Candace Robb Why did Candace love this book?

Kermode focuses on the dynamics of northern urban society in the three major towns along the corridor on the lowland plain by the River Ouse—York, Beverley, and Hull. Merchants from the three towns joined partnerships and intermarried, creating dynasties, the most prominent mingling with the gentry and royal households of the region, and served in parliament as MP’s. The merchants tend to be wealthier than their craftsmen neighbors.

Chapters cover politics, the nuts, and bolts of their trade, how they accrued wealth, and how they used that wealth. Appendix B, Some Merchant Biographies, reads like the society pages, offering tantalizing glimpses into family connections.

By Jenny Kermode,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Medieval Merchants as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This book is based on some 1400 individuals who lived in three northern English towns during the later middle ages. It analyses the many aspects of merchant society visible to the historian: achievements in politics, attitudes towards religion, the family, wider circles of friends and business acquaintances, and the nature and conduct of trade at every level. Merchants were at the core of urban society, accumulating more wealth than most other townsfolk and developing a distinctive outlook and entrepreneurship in response to the opportunities and pressures of long-distance trade. They played a central role in the development of urban mentalite…


Book cover of Women, Work, and Life Cycle in a Medieval Economy: Women in York and Yorkshire C.1300-1520

Candace Robb Author Of The Riverwoman's Dragon

From my list on medieval York.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been writing the Owen Archer mysteries, set in and around the city of York in the late 14th century, for 30 years, ever since falling in love with the city of York on a visit. As I studied medieval literature and culture in graduate school, with a special interest in Chaucer, I’ve focused my research on the period in which he lived. I’ve spent months walking the streets of the city, hiking through the countryside, and meeting with local historians. Besides the 13 Owen Archer mysteries I’ve also published 3 Kate Clifford mysteries covering Richard II’s downfall, both series grounded in the politics and culture of medieval York and Yorkshire. 

Candace's book list on medieval York

Candace Robb Why did Candace love this book?

A classic cited in every title on my list, Goldberg’s book provides a glimpse into the lives of women in the area, both rural and urban. The book grew out of the question, How far was marriage a necessity for medieval women? His focus is on women in the north, with its unique labor issues. To answer the question he examines the economy and how women participated in it, with an emphasis on the changes brought on by the decline in population after the Black Death in the later 14th century.

He covers tradeswomen, servants, prostitutes, farm laborers, with glimpses into the lives they led and how the different groups made choices about marriage. Women in York and Yorkshire chose to enter the workforce, often delaying marriage until it offered a clear advantage, and their economic independence offered them an advantage in making decisions about their future. Gives a…

By P.J.P. Goldberg,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Women, Work, and Life Cycle in a Medieval Economy as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This is an innovative analysis of the relationship between women's economic opportunity and marriage in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. It is based on an intensive study of York and Yorkshire, but also utilizes evidence from other parts of England and continental Europe.

P. J. P. Goldberg explores the role of women in the economy and the part that marriage played in their lives. Importantly, he challenges the Wrigley and Schofield thesis of nuptiality: his analysis of the demography of marriage demonstrates that in late medieval Yorkshire, women participated strongly in the labour force, deferring marriage or avoiding it entirely.…


Book cover of War, Politics and Finance in Late Medieval English Towns: Bristol, York and the Crown, 1350-1400

Candace Robb Author Of The Riverwoman's Dragon

From my list on medieval York.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been writing the Owen Archer mysteries, set in and around the city of York in the late 14th century, for 30 years, ever since falling in love with the city of York on a visit. As I studied medieval literature and culture in graduate school, with a special interest in Chaucer, I’ve focused my research on the period in which he lived. I’ve spent months walking the streets of the city, hiking through the countryside, and meeting with local historians. Besides the 13 Owen Archer mysteries I’ve also published 3 Kate Clifford mysteries covering Richard II’s downfall, both series grounded in the politics and culture of medieval York and Yorkshire. 

Candace's book list on medieval York

Candace Robb Why did Candace love this book?

Why would this 50 year period be so interesting in these two cities? In these years Bristol and York were second only to London in influence and growth within the realm, and as the rising merchant class accrued wealth they used it to make agreements with the crown—to their advantage, of course. With King Edward III it was all about his war with France; with his grandson and successor King Richard II it was about gaining charters that made them more independent of royal interference as well as negotiating their way between the political factions within the nobility.

Richard’s reign was a dangerous time, especially at the end when York merchants chose to loan money to Henry Bolingbroke’s uprising against his cousin the king.  The stakes were high and the personalities larger than life.

By Christian D. Liddy,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked War, Politics and Finance in Late Medieval English Towns as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The strengthening of ties between crown and locality in the fourteenth century is epitomised by the relationships between York and Bristol (then amongst the largest and wealthiest urban communities in England) and the crown. Thisbook combines a detailed study of the individuals who ruled Bristol and York at the time with a close analysis of the texts which illustrate the relationship between the two cities and the king, thus offering a new perspective onrelations between town and crown in late medieval England.
Beginning with an analysis of the various demands, financial, political and commercial, made upon the towns by the…


Book cover of The Light Ages: The Surprising Story of Medieval Science

Eleanor Janega Author Of The Once and Future Sex: Going Medieval on Women's Roles in Society

From my list on illuminating the Middle Ages.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a medieval historian who specialises in social history, and more particularly on sexuality, propaganda, and apocalypticism. I fell in love with the period from my very first class during my BA, but even back then, I was struck by just how little we as a society pay attention to some thousand years of history. Even worse, we often tell lazy myths about the Middle Ages as a time of filth and ignorance that makes us feel good about ourselves. Since not everyone can get a Ph.D. like I did, I have dedicated my career to bringing the period to light. I hope this book list does just that.

Eleanor's book list on illuminating the Middle Ages

Eleanor Janega Why did Eleanor love this book?

If I hear someone who has never studied medieval history once in their life refer to the “Dark Ages” as a time when “Science” was banned by the Church one more time, I will actually die, and this book does an amazing job of explaining how ignorant those old myths are.

Falk laces this book with delicious tidbits of the weird and wonderful of medieval scientific (or, to be nerdy, what we would call natural philosophical) ideas. Goat fat enemas? Sure. But there is also the transcription of Persian manuscripts, the invention of mechanical clocks and eyeglasses, and the creation of the University.

The book brings to life a vibrant, interconnected intellectual world and is a testament to how clever medieval people were in circumstances that were much more difficult than our own.

By Seb Falk,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Light Ages as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Soaring Gothic cathedrals, violent crusades, the Black Death: these are the dramatic forces that shaped the medieval era. But the so-called Dark Ages also gave us the first universities, eyeglasses, and mechanical clocks. As medieval thinkers sought to understand the world around them, from the passing of the seasons to the stars in the sky, they came to develop a vibrant scientific culture.

In The Light Ages, Cambridge science historian Seb Falk takes us on a tour of medieval science through the eyes of one fourteenth-century monk, John of Westwyk. Born in a rural manor, educated in England's grandest monastery,…


Book cover of World Without End

E.L. Daniel Author Of All the Gold in Abbotsford

From my list on where the damsel is not always the one in distress.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a strong, independent woman (*snaps fingers through the air*), yet I adore a soul-sucking romance. Many might think this is a contradiction, but it’s not! A woman can be both loving and stubborn…both enamored by her partner yet still strong enough to speak up for herself. Sadly, I think historical fiction often defaults to portraying dependent and subjugated women, and this isn’t necessarily wrong—in fact, it’s probably more accurate. However, when I’m getting lost in the magic of a novel, I want to experience the all-consuming love without sacrificing the resiliency and independence of the women involved, and these books spin stories where both outcomes are possible!

E.L.'s book list on where the damsel is not always the one in distress

E.L. Daniel Why did E.L. love this book?

There is so much going on in this book in terms of plot, drama, and relationships, but why I especially love it is because Caris, one of the protagonists, breaks the mold of the typical powerless medieval woman. When the Black Plague comes to Kingsbridge, Caris is the only one who uses observation and common sense to realize that the disease spreads by contact. In a world that revolves around religion and superstition, this doesn’t go over well. Though forced to sacrifice the love of her life, and put on trial as a witch, Caris sticks to her guns and enacts the medical policies she knows will save lives. Eventually, she gains the townspeople’s trust, ultimately ascending into a position of power within the town. Get it, girl!

By Ken Follett,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked World Without End as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 14, 15, 16, and 17.

What is this book about?

On the day after Halloween, in the year 1327, four children slip away from the cathedral city of Kingsbridge. They are a thief, a bully, a boy genius and a girl who wants to be a doctor. In the forest they see two men killed. As adults, their lives will be braided together by ambition, love, greed and revenge. They will see prosperity and famine, plague and war. One boy will travel the world but come home in the end; the other will be a powerful, corrupt nobleman. One girl will defy the might of the medieval church; the other…


Book cover of Women in the Medieval English Countryside: Gender and Household in Brigstock before the Plague

Justine Firnhaber-Baker Author Of The Jacquerie of 1358: A French Peasants' Revolt

From my list on medieval peasants.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am professor of medieval history at the University of St Andrews in Scotland. As a PhD student, I was electrified by the historian E. P. Thompson’s call to rescue the masses ‘from the enormous condescension of posterity’, but it’s often only when peasants revolt, as they did outside Paris in 1358, that we get much evidence about the masses in the Middle Ages. I loved writing The Jacquerie of 1358 because it allowed me to get very close to the men (and a few women) who risked everything to make their society a more just and equal one. It was a privilege, and a pleasure, to tell their story.

Justine's book list on medieval peasants

Justine Firnhaber-Baker Why did Justine love this book?

It’s a real frustration of mine that so much historical writing pays little or no attention to women, even though they made up half the population.

However ‘important’ whatever the men were doing was, they couldn’t have done it without women. There’s more written on elite medieval women—queens, noblewomen, abbesses, etc.—than there used to be, but peasant women remain mostly neglected.

I like Bennett’s book not only because she pays attention to village women but also because it doesn’t sugarcoat the story. Peasant women could do many things in medieval England, like owning property, going to court, and running businesses, but their options were sharply curtailed by male domination.

As Bennett puts it, "Insofar as these women had choices about their lives, the choices were always poor ones." 

By Judith M. Bennett,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Women in the Medieval English Countryside as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In this book, Judith Bennett addresses the gap in our knowledge of medieval country women by examining how their lives differed from those of rural men. Drawing on her study of an English manor in the early-fourteenth century, she finds that rural women were severely restricted in their public roles and rights primarily because of their household status as dependents of their husbands, rather than because of a notion of female inferiority. Adolescent women and
widows, by virtue of their unmarried status, enjoyed greater legal and public freedom than did their married counterparts.


Book cover of Doomsday Book

Mike Waller Author Of Falcon's Call

From my list on scifi humanity’s future in space and time.

Why am I passionate about this?

As a child, I lived in a small valley sheltered from the night city lights. I could see the stars, and from that time, that is where my imagination dwelled. As a teenager, I read several of the books I have listed here, and from that point, I was inspired to read more and also to write myself. I sincerely believe that despite our current problems, humanity will outlive its troubled childhood and reach for the stars. We are destined for the stars, and only in the works of science fiction writers is that future explored. The books below helped me to become a successful author in my own right.

Mike's book list on scifi humanity’s future in space and time

Mike Waller Why did Mike love this book?

My all-time favorite time travel book, this story tells of a young student’s journey into the past for a university project. Things go awry, and she arrives at the wrong time, squarely in the path of the Black Death.  

As a history buff, I loved the historical perspective of the story imposed against modern university life, as the story tells of the gradual demise of a small English village and the university's attempts to get the student back.

I found the story most realistic, and the sheer urgency of the main character’s dire situation kept me fully engrossed to the last pages, where she is finally rescued. I recommend it to lovers of time travel stories and history buffs.

By Connie Willis,

Why should I read it?

9 authors picked Doomsday Book as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"A tour de force" - New York Times Book Review

"Ambitious, finely detailed and compulsively readable" - Locus

"It is a book that feels fundamentally true; it is a book to live in" - Washington Post

For Kivrin Engle, preparing an on-site study of one of the deadliest eras in humanity's history was as simple as receiving inoculations against the diseases of the fourteenth century and inventing a bullet-proof backstory. For her instructors in the twenty-first century, it meant painstaking calculations and careful monitoring of the rendezvous location where Kivrin would be received.

But a crisis strangely linking past and…


Book cover of Conquests, Catastrophe and Recovery: Britain and Ireland 1066–1485

Marc Morris Author Of The Anglo-Saxons: A History of the Beginnings of England

From my list on medieval Britain.

Why am I passionate about this?

I fell into medieval history from the moment I arrived at university, when I looked at a lecture list that included the Norman Conquest, King John and Magna Carta, Edward I – in short, the subjects of the books I have gone on to write. The attraction for me was that the medieval centuries were formative ones, shaping the countries of the British Isles and the identities of the people within them. After completing my doctorate on the thirteenth-century earls of Norfolk I was keen to broaden my horizons, and presented a TV series about castles, which was a great way to reconnect with the reality of the medieval past.

Marc's book list on medieval Britain

Marc Morris Why did Marc love this book?

This is a fantastic introduction to what was going on in the British Isles during the medieval period. The scholarship is up-to-the-minute, the writing is witty and engaging, and it is teeming with original ideas. It’s not a political history, plodding predictably from one reign to the next, but a sweeping overview, covering diverse topics such as the decline of slavery, the rise of parliament, kingship and queenship, religion, education, leisure, crime, and chivalry.

By John Gillingham,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Conquests, Catastrophe and Recovery as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Beginning with the Norman Conquest of England, these tumultuous centuries and their invasions shaped the languages and political geography of present-day Britain and Ireland.

The Irish, Scots and Welsh fought their battles against the English with varying success - struggles which, like the events of 1066 in England, produced spectacular upheavals and left enduring national memories. But there was still a common enemy: the Black Death - still the greatest catastrophe in their history.

There were significant advances, too. Hundreds of new towns were founded; slavery, still prevalent until the twelfth century, died out; magnificent cathedrals built, schools and universities…


Book cover of The Ties That Bound: Peasant Families in Medieval England

ffiona Perigrinor Author Of Reluctant Pilgrim: The Book of Margery Kempe's Maidservant

From my list on why you wouldn’t want to travel with Margery Kempe.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’d already published a scholarly book about the household of a medieval widow, who was just a decade older than Margery Kempe and lived sixty miles away, so the time, place, and mindset seemed very familiar. As a Jungian Psychoanalyst I’m interested in how individuals find the central meaning in their lives. Clearly for Margery it was the search for God, although she doesn’t appear to have been a kindly soul. When I read that she twice quarreled with her maidservant, I realised the maidservant could tell her own tale. And so she did, and sometimes it seemed she was dictating it to me! Characters really do speak for themselves... 

ffiona's book list on why you wouldn’t want to travel with Margery Kempe

ffiona Perigrinor Why did ffiona love this book?

I love this book  Hanawalt’s research is intriguing – using manorial court rolls, coroners’ reports, and wills she reveals the lives of ordinary folk and opened the doors for me to peasant homes in the later Middle Ages. I thoroughly enjoyed her description of everyday life from childhood to old age, the household economy, blood ties, wealth, homesteads, and surrogate parents and children. I discovered that family concerns were not so very different then to ours today and was reminded that the past is not a foreign country where they did things differently. It’s both scholarly and readable, a book to dip into or relish from cover to cover, another essential for writing historical fiction about the Middle Ages.

By Barbara A. Hanawalt,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Ties That Bound as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Barbara A. Hanawalt's richly detailed account offers an intimate view of everyday life in Medieval England that seems at once surprisingly familiar and yet at odds with what many experts have told us. She argues that the biological needs served by the family do not change and that the ways fourteenth- and fifteenth-century peasants coped with such problems as providing for the newborn and the aged, controlling premarital sex, and alleviating the harshness of their
material environment in many ways correspond with our twentieth-century solutions.Using a remarkable array of sources, including over 3,000 coroners' inquests into accidental
deaths, Hanawalt emphasizes…


Book cover of York: The Making of a City 1068-1350
Book cover of Medieval Merchants: York, Beverley and Hull in the Later Middle Ages
Book cover of Women, Work, and Life Cycle in a Medieval Economy: Women in York and Yorkshire C.1300-1520

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5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in the Middle Ages, Richard II, and the Black Death?

The Middle Ages 432 books
Richard II 7 books
The Black Death 37 books