Liverpool in the sixteenth century: a small Tudor town
Janet HollinsheadClick HERE to download some sample pages, including the Contents page.
Review in Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire
'a superb book about Tudor Liverpool ... accessible at many levels and which many local histories could learn from ... The excellent illustrations ... are an essential part of the mix, and the publishers deserve high praise for including so many. Indeed [the book] is produced well in every respect and the price makes it affordable. There is only one possible conclusion to this review - go and buy it ...'
Review in Northern History
'Overall ... Dr Hollinshead has succeeded impressively in presenting a convincing portrait of this "small town", and at the same time showing how the foundations were laid for seventeenth-century expansion.'
Even by Tudor standards, Liverpool during the sixteenth century was a small town, with a population of not more than 1,000 inhabitants. The seven streets which had been laid out shortly after its foundation by King John in 1207 had survived, and economic development had not been sufficient to generate urban expansion. Liverpool’s west-coast location – away from the influence of London and the royal government and away from easy trade contacts with Europe – led to a dependence instead on Irish Sea communication. Liverpool then as now tended to look outwards rather than inland.
The town books and customs’ port books come into existence during the sixteenth century; probate records begin to provide details of some individuals, their possessions and their occupations; personal records and deeds such as those generated by the More and Molyneux families allow gentry influence and interest in the town to be perceived more clearly; and national archives especially those kept by the Crown for their Duchy of Lancaster possessions contribute to a new, much more comprehensive view of Liverpool. Documents now housed in Liverpool, Merseyside, Lancashire, Cheshire, London and even Spain can be brought together to create a detailed picture of many aspects of Tudor Liverpool.
In particular, the style of economy, trade and shipping activities in the town are quite well documented. The local marketing arrangements and range of occupations become evident. Town society with its merchants, craftsmen, shipowners, retailers, farmers, labourers and servants comes into some focus. Town administration and civic concerns emerge with all of their detail and, at times, disputes. Local concerns and issues, for example, with other Lancashire and especially Chester traders, and national events and royal policy, such as religious changes introduced by the Tudor reformation and military involvement in Ireland, all impacted on the small town in north-west England.
For the first time a real sense of Liverpool town itself is possible in the Tudor period. Alongside the considerable inheritance from, and a continuity with, the medieval period it becomes apparent that there were new trends in Liverpool’s development which would have big consequences in later centuries: an expansion of shipping from the Irish Sea into the Atlantic Ocean, religious change which created real divisions in society, greater sophistication of civic activity. Tudor Liverpool may have been small but modest size meant that few of the population escaped the attention and recording by local tax officials and, with surviving records, by later historians.