This article studies temporal variations in wealth levels and distribution in an Ottoman context during the eighteenth century. By analysing the probate estate inventories of the Muslim deceased in Kastamonu, located in north-central Anatolia, we demonstrate that real wealth levels generally declined over the course of the century. Our analysis also suggests that the economic conditions of poor men, if not women, deteriorated more so than those of the rich, fuelling growing inequality. The article explores the factors that contributed to these trends and discusses the relevance of our findings for long-term economic development patterns in the region from a comparative perspective.

This article explores the impact of parliamentary enclosure on the cultural life of English villages after 1750. It focuses on parish-sponsored vermin control, arguing that the popular ‘hunting’ sanctioned by parish vestries under Tudor legislation, and persisting into the early nineteenth century, created a highly participatory recreational culture which continued to exist under the radar of the game laws. Using a sample of parishes from the heavily enclosed county of Northamptonshire, the article demonstrates that this communal activity survived the reworking of the landscape by parliamentary enclosure, and that, by extension, the level of disruption to village cultural life was less than has been suggested.

The quality of the statistical archives of the Don Army Territory for the period 1867–1916 offers a unique opportunity to compare the denominations present (Orthodox, Old Believers and Coreligionists, Catholics, Lutherans, Jews, Armenian-Gregorians, Lamaist Buddhists and Muslims) in a context of urbanisation, secularisation and industrialisation. The observance of religious interdicts varied between and within denominations depending on levels of urbanisation and the district considered. These contrasts reveal the segmentation of Don society, the constraints imposed by agrarian imperatives and military obligations, the differences in the economy and between town and country, and the advance of secularisation or persistence of tradition.

Recently, several studies have cast new light on the relative roles of commerce and exchange in rural areas. This article examines the importance of extra-local trade in two contrasting regions of the nineteenth-century Flemish countryside, Oudenaarde and Saint-Nicolas. In the first region, the size distribution of holdings was such that market dependence was ‘mediated’; rural output circulated via reciprocal personal relationships. In the second region, market dependence was ‘unmediated’ and rural producers were more directly involved in the market. The article also highlights the complexity of the commercialisation of the countryside, and the need to move beyond the traditional opposing views that have long dominated the debate on the commercialisation of the countryside.

This article uses data from the 1833 Factory Inquiry to assess male and female occupations and earnings in factory textile production. These data are contrasted with evidence drawn from various sources on male and female employment in domestic industry. The period from 1760 to 1850 was a time of dramatic change in the nature and location of textile production, with important consequences for women's work. Whilst economic factors explain many of the changes we see, gender ideology had a powerful effect on how the labour market operated, and this was increasingly the case over this period as the organisation of work became more formalised and hierarchical.