This book is the culmination of twenty years of research by the author on milling in medieval England; the broad scope and thorough coverage marks it as a mature work that will be cited for some time to come. While the import of milling in medieval life may be clear, the history of the period under consideration is not. John Langdon has chosen what some historians call a “transitional period” containing significant economic, demographic, and political upheaval that together hinder any simple approach. He attempts to use milling to examine several common theories for this period: the development of new technology, an urban to rural shift in the cloth industry, the seignorial imposition of mills, but above all, the transition from “feudalism” to “capitalism” or “medieval” to “modern” that many historians see as occurring at this time.

The foundation for his approach is a database of 333 manors, covering the length and breadth of England and a variety of mill types and management styles. Langdon handles the material adeptly, analyzing the national trends in mills, their revenues, and their output, but also exploring regional variations. Thus, the aggregate picture of milling in England is juxtaposed with glimpses of what was going on in the various regions, which are sometimes more interesting and enlightening than the overall trends. This mix of approaches imbues the analysis with particular resilience and expands the appeal of the book. This is more than another collection of charts, graphs, and percentages, however. The quantitative data is supplemented regularly with anecdotes and analysis from the original documents, permitting the author to showcase the richness of the records he has used and to move beyond a purely quantitative approach. Despite this, Langdon frequently is constrained by his database. Although large and flexible, the sample is imperfect; it relies heavily on large estates and probably overrepresents “demesne sector” mills (22–23). The author's awareness of these and other limitations is sound, and many of the problems are unavoidable, yet it shapes the course of the study. Even when moving away from purely quantitative approaches, he falls back on certain well-preserved series (often Westminster Abbey or Durham Priory) to discuss changes in detail, constantly reminding the reader of the limits of the study.

Langdon succeeds in eliciting a number of conclusions from his data. One of his themes is the perseverance of those involved in the milling industry, from lords to the humble millers, basing his argument largely on the relative stability of the number of mills despite high and continuous capital requirements. Running a mill was not cheap; constant maintenance and repairs were required, and some lords insisted on importing expensive millstones to satisfy consumer demand for the supposedly finer flour these foreign stones produced (166–68). Two things become clear: the reasons that lords provided mills for their tenants were more complex than pure exploitation and control, and lords continued to be involved in the milling industry, even if over time they shifted from entrepreneurs and managers to financiers. While the elucidation of the data in a myriad of ways is remarkable in itself, Langdon ventures beyond the traditional bounds of economic history into the realms of social and cultural history, treating the people involved with mills alongside the economics of mills and milling. Chapter 3 is a prime example; what might have been an obligatory but dull chapter on the technology becomes a nuanced approach toward understanding the medieval mentality that shaped the history of milling. More mundane but equally valuable is the continuous integration of other topics and themes; take, for example, purveyance, when Langdon uses purveyors’ records to explore the quality of milling, and which in turn reflects back again on the corruption of the officials charged with collecting the grain (152–55).

The generally high quality renders certain sections disappointing. After the treatment of the mentality of milling and milling technology, subchapter 6.1 on millers is unfulfilling. Although Langdon explores the stereotypes of millers, far more could have been done with this topic; given the prominence of millers in literary studies thanks to Chaucer, perhaps more should have been done. In many of his lesser points, the author is far from definitive, perhaps too dependent on the limitations inherent in the data; one such instance is his discussion on the amount of grain milled in England circa 1300 as a means of estimating the population (136–46). A reader hoping for an insight or new perspective on this question will be disappointed, as Langdon discusses the minima and maxima so that every side can be supported. On the larger question of continuity or change, however, Langdon does come down firmly, on the side of continuity and stability. At least in regard to mills, he finds no significant structural changes in the years under consideration; in 1540, the technology had not changed substantially, most capital was still in the hand of landed aristocracy rather than early industrial entrepreneurs, and the operators of mills were as much an emergent proletariat as they had been in 1300. His arguments on wage labor and milling may require some rethinking of the origins of the proletariat, and his discussion of production and capacity will provide ample fodder for continued discussion of the changing population of England, but it remains unlikely that his conclusions alone will inaugurate a major revision of theories on this period. Nevertheless, he provides a salutary reminder that even if other factors indicate change, such change was not necessarily universal.

Even though the title and focus are fairly narrow, this book will appeal to a variety of audiences. The author displays considerable skill at weaving together his quantitative data and anecdotal evidence. However, what he does best is take a very technical subject and use it to explore broader questions, large and small, about life and lives in England during this period.