Preface

Summary

This book is the product of three major periods of writing. The opening chapter draws together threads from all the other work in the volume, old and new, and then presents some major new research findings on the summary courts as part of a broader project designed to provide fresh approaches to the analysis of law and justice in the period from the mid-eighteenth century to the 1840s. The first three major parts of the book – those on juvenile crime, gender, and non-lethal violence – then bring together four new chapters and three past essays, and are designed to explore a number of themes that have emerged from the research on these topics I have undertaken during the last ten years. The final part is the product of a longer project on gleaning and customary right. I am thankful to Past and Present for permission to republish chapters 2 and 10 – originally published in number 125 (1989), 116–50 and Number 160 (1998), 116–60; to The Journal of Interdisciplinary History for similar permission in relation to Chapter 7 originally published inVolume 27:1 (1996), 43–74; to UCL Press as it then was, for permission in relation to the reproduction of chapter 5 which was originally published in M. Arnot and C. Usborne (eds.), Gender and Crime in Modern Europe (London,1999), 44–74; to Law and History Review for permission to republish chapter 9, originally published in Volume 10:1 (1992), 1–31.