Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of maps
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 States, liberties and communities in medieval Britain and Ireland (c.1100–1400)
- 2 Arbitration and Anglo-Scottish border law in the later middle ages
- 3 Peacekeepers and lawbreakers in medieval Northumberland, c.1200–c.1500
- 4 War, lordship, and community in the liberty of Norhamshire
- 5 The lordship of Richmond in the later middle ages
- 6 ‘Tam infra libertates quam extra’: Liberties and military recruitment
- 7 Neighbours from Hell? Living with Tynedale and Redesdale, 1489–1547
- 8 Striving for Marcher liberties: The Corbets of Caus in the thirteenth century
- 9 Franchises north of the border: Baronies and regalities in medieval Scotland
- 10 The liberties of Ireland in the reign of Edward I
- Index
4 - War, lordship, and community in the liberty of Norhamshire
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of maps
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 States, liberties and communities in medieval Britain and Ireland (c.1100–1400)
- 2 Arbitration and Anglo-Scottish border law in the later middle ages
- 3 Peacekeepers and lawbreakers in medieval Northumberland, c.1200–c.1500
- 4 War, lordship, and community in the liberty of Norhamshire
- 5 The lordship of Richmond in the later middle ages
- 6 ‘Tam infra libertates quam extra’: Liberties and military recruitment
- 7 Neighbours from Hell? Living with Tynedale and Redesdale, 1489–1547
- 8 Striving for Marcher liberties: The Corbets of Caus in the thirteenth century
- 9 Franchises north of the border: Baronies and regalities in medieval Scotland
- 10 The liberties of Ireland in the reign of Edward I
- Index
Summary
The liberty of Norhamshire, on the Scottish border, was only one of the so-called ‘royal liberties’ of north-eastern England where, in the middle ages, the king's writ did not run. Together with Bedlingtonshire, around ten miles north of Newcastle, it was part of the liberty of Durham, the main body of which extended, as contemporaries put it, between the rivers Tyne and Tees, encompassing pre-1974 County Durham. The other royal liberties of Tynedale and Hexhamshire collectively occupied a wide swathe of western and southern Northumberland; contiguous with these was the highly privileged franchise of Redesdale. In much of the region direct royal authority was largely excluded, and government was in ‘private’ hands.
This essay is part of a broader project which has investigated the changing impact of these liberties on local society over the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, with a particular focus on the very different ways in which the liberties were re-shaped by the pressures of Anglo-Scottish war from 1296. My focus here is on the impact of these same pressures in Norhamshire in the period before c.1350. In common with the other north-eastern liberties, Norhamshire had to come to terms with the crown's need for a co-ordinated military response to the Scottish threat, and with the demands of a growing ‘war state’ for manpower and resources. But the impact of war, and the social and political changes it brought, was particularly marked in Norhamshire simply by virtue of its position on the Scottish border.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Liberties and Identities in the Medieval British Isles , pp. 77 - 97Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2008