The Impact of Plague Outbreaks on Local Courts in England and Wales in the Later Fourteenth Century.

This research focuses on the impact of pandemics, in this case the Black Death (Bubonic Plague), and the resulting severe depopulation, on pre-industrial institutions, particularly manorial and borough courts, in England and Wales. It explores the intersection between legal, social and economic histories within the context of contemporary concerns over the effect of pandemics upon institutions in the modern world. The Black Death struck England in 1348, swept away between a third and a half of England's population, and epidemics continued to strike throughout Britain for the remainder of the fourteenth century and beyond. This research analyses the quantitative and qualitative evidence of records from local courts. These court records chart the economic activities of the generally non-elite inhabitants of these communities. The project studies the social and economic impacts of the Black Death pandemic. Local courts resolved disputes relating to debt, broken agreements and trespass, and through examining these disputes, the project considers the wider impact of plague outbreaks on commerce and local economies. Although the impact of plague outbreaks on English law has interested scholars for over a century, this has largely focussed on the new labour laws and on impacts to royal courts. The impact of fourteenth century plague outbreaks on local courts has seldom been addressed, and those studies that have addressed this are limited to a single court or a small sample of courts. This is the first work to systematically address the impact of plague on local courts from across medieval Britain.