Books to Look Out for in December 2019

As the year draws to a close and December is upon us, you will find new releases from Boydell & Brewer! From newly discovered maps in Exeter to the liberty and wapentake of Howdenshire, from the exploration of how end-times were envisioned in medieval Germany to the distinctiveness of Cornwall in medieval England and the wide-ranging connections between the Gaelic world and the Northumbrian Kingdom, our year draws to a close with new, fascinating and thought-provoking publications.

Enjoy this list of books to look out for in December, and don’t forget: you can get 35% off all of our titles featured in the post with promo code BB685.

Until next time!

Cornwall, Connectivity and Identity in the Fourteenth Century

by S.J. Drake

Drawing on a wide range of published and archival material, this book seeks to show how Cornwall remained strikingly distinctive while still forming part of the kingdom. It argues that myths, saints, government, and lordship all endowed the name and notion of Cornwall with authority in the minds of its inhabitants, forging these people into a commonalty. At the same time, the earldom-duchy and the Crown together helped to link the county into the politics of England at large.

The End-Times in Medieval German Literature

Sin, Evil, and the Apocalypse

Edited by Ernst Ralf Hintz & Scott E. Pincikowski

The contemporary fascination with the end of the world and of life as we know it would not have surprised our counterparts a millennium ago; only the fact that such an end has not yet occurred. This book explores how end-times were envisioned in medieval Germany. Drawing upon methodologies including adaptation theory, gender analysis, space and place studies, reception studies, and memory studies, the essays in this book uncover the rhetorical, didactic, narratological, mnemonic, thematic, cultural, and political functions of end-times in medieval German texts.

William Birchynshaw’s Map of Exeter, 1743

Edited by Richard Oliver, Roger Kain & Todd Gray

A newly discovered Georgian map by William Birchynshaw (a man not known to have produced any other), is reproduced in facsimile, along with nearly two dozen other maps from 1587 through to 1949. They are prefaced by an introduction which places the new discovery within the context of four centuries of map-making, demonstrating how Birchynshaw owed a debt both to John Hooker’s map of 1587 and to that by Ichabod Fairlove of 1709; and provides an overview of Exeter in 1743, showing that, although was city was basking in economic prosperity due to its cloth trade, it was also still largely confined within its ancient walls. The volume as a whole represents a significant reassessment of Exeter’s history.

A History of the County of York: East Riding

Volume X: Part 1: Howdenshire: the Townships

Edited by David Crouch

This is the first part to be published of a two-part volume on the East Riding liberty and wapentake of Howdenshire. It deals with the nineteen civil parishes and townships which made up the liberty outside the town of Howden itself. Its special nature, which is mostly ancient wetland reclaimed in the twelfth century, is explored via in-depth sections on drainage and river defence, with a reconstruction of the unique medieval and early modern scheme developed to contain the River Ouse and empty the drainage dykes.

Gaelic Influence in the Northumbrian Kingdom

The Golden Age and the Viking Age

By Fiona Edmonds

Northumbria was the most northerly Anglo-Saxon kingdom, with an impressive landscape featuring two sweeping coastlines, which opened the area to a variety of cultural connections. This book explores influences that emanated from the Gaelic-speaking world, including Ireland, the Isle of Man, Argyll and the kingdom of Alba (the nascent Scottish kingdom), during Northumbria’s “Golden Age”, the political and scholarly high-point of the seventh and early eighth centuries.


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