The Peasantries of Europe : From the Fourteenth to the Eighteenth Centuries

This study offers a parallel guide to the types of peasant economy and society throughout Europe from the late-medieval agrarian crisis to the dawn of industrialization.

The treatment is regional rather than "national" and it is as much concerned to explore the diversities of peasant society as to reveal general stereotypes.

Eleven regional chapters (flanked by introductory and concluding chapters) cross Europe from France to the Ottoman lands, and from Iberia to Scandinavia and Russia to investigate peasant economy, society, standards of living, patterns of lordship and dependancy, and the role of peasantry in politics.

The contributors include W.W. Hagen, Edgar Melton, Hermann Rebel, Thomas Robisheaux and Richard M.

Smith.