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Disaster Response And Ecclesiastical Privilege In The Late Middle Ages: The Liberty Of Durham After The Black Death, John K. Mennell

Major Papers

This paper examines the estate incomes of three large ecclesiastical corporations in medieval England to analyse the impact local autonomy has upon economic recovery following a medieval disaster scenario. It utilizes manorial records, assessments, and tax farms for the bishop of Durham, Durham Priory, and the archbishop of York to pursue this goal. Data is complied and presented, building off the methodology of a series of articles in the twentieth century on the changing distribution of wealth in medieval England to allow additional comparison with the wider kingdom. The character of the four truly autonomous bishops of Durham is analysed …