Christopher Dyer's new book presents in published form the author's Ford Lectures delivered at Oxford University in the spring of 2001. Invitations to give the Ford Lectures are reserved for Britain's most eminent historians and provide a venerable and highly visible platform. Traditionally, the books that emerge from the Ford Lectures do three things well: they synthesize and summarize the leading secondary literature that has defined the contours of a particular field; they situate the author's own contributions within that field; and they present an overview that makes these contributions accessible to a wider historical audience. Dyer succeeds admirably in all three areas, and the result is a book that is sure to be of lasting value for specialists and non-specialists alike.

The book is animated by two general themes. The first is that the nature of late medieval society and the fortunes of its economy can be understood only by focusing attention on the lower orders of society, particularly peasants but also artisans, wage laborers, servants, and apprentices. Much of the argument in this regard is supported with evidence derived from the period's material culture and relies heavily on the author's deep and abiding interest in archeology. A good example of his approach occurs in a chapter dedicated to consumption and investment in the medieval economy. Dyer argues against the view that consumer goods constituted a negligible part of medieval economic activity and buttresses his argument with a bevy of archeological site reports documenting findings of belt buckles, combs, professionally produced pottery, metal ware, and various other inexpensive items acquired for household use and personal adornment. On the basis of these finds he challenges the now-orthodox view that a consumer-oriented economy emphasizing fashion and shopping as major components of economic life can be found only in later periods of history. His treatment of domestic architecture and related building activity takes a similar tack: contrary to those who consider medieval housing to have been cheap and ephemeral, Dyer shows that many medieval houses and farm buildings have survived into the present day, and argues that their design and quality indicate a greater concern with comfort and privacy than is generally attributed to the period. Dyer's point in emphasizing material culture is two-fold: to show that the lower orders in society were active participants in forming an economy based on consumption, and to emphasize the contributions of the carpenters, metalworkers, potters, and other craftsmen who produced most of the goods that circulated through the economy.

The second general theme is that the “long” fifteenth century, encompassing the last quarter of the fourteenth century and the first quarter of the sixteenth century, should be viewed as a period of considerable innovation and economic dynamism. In this respect Dyer opposes the traditional textbook view that presents the period as a kind of dead zone between the more vibrant worlds of the high Middle Ages and the early modern period. He readily concedes the devastating influence of plague and depopulation throughout the period and recognizes that political instability, civil unrest, and urban decay cannot be ignored as components of the period's history. But he suggests that too much emphasis has been placed on these negative attributes of the period and insufficient attention given to its positive accomplishments. In his view the period's dislocations were actually the key to its positive transformations, because they forced all levels of society to grapple with a fundamentally new set of economic realities. In this situation the biggest rewards were reaped by those who were most nimble and best able to adapt and innovate, and Dyer argues that adaptability and innovation were much more characteristic of those at the base rather than at the apex of society. A prime example of such adaptability can be found in the management of larger agricultural enterprises, which were revamped to emphasize pastoral production at the expense of cereal cultivation, a process that was directed largely by entrepreneurial peasants who flourished by taking on leases of lands formerly managed directly by lords and their agents.

Neither of the themes Dyer develops will come as much of a surprise to specialists familiar with the author's previous work. Indeed, in spite of Dyer's claim to be contributing to the creation of a “new” Middle Ages (a term that is pressed into service as the title of the book's first chapter), both of the positions he stakes out have long pedigrees. One can be traced back to Marc Bloch and the founders of the Annales movement (on the importance of writing history from below), the other to James Thorold Rogers who, more than a century ago, described the late medieval period as a “golden age” for workers. What is new and important in Dyer's book is the skillful bringing together of these themes in a relatively short and accessible work, one that ranges effortlessly over the country as a whole and situates the period's major changes in a framework that stretches from the tenth to the eighteenth century. Dyer devoted his Ford Lectures to bridging the gap between medieval and early modern economic history, and his own willingness to journey back and forth across that bridge attests to the solidity of the structure he designed.