{"product_id":"bailiffs-minute-book-of-dunwich-1404-1430-book-mark-bailey-9780851153063","title":"The Bailiffs' Minute Book of Dunwich, 1404-1430","description":"In 1200 the Suffolk town of Dunwich was one of medieval England's wealthiest ports. However, a succession of marine inundations in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries drastically reduced its size and importance. Evocative descriptions of Dunwich's long struggle against the sea abound, but little has been written about the medieval town itself. The Bailiffs' Minute Book of 1404-30 is the single most substantial and informative document to have survived from the borough's medieval archive. It provides new insights into Dunwich's bitter legal dispute with neighbouring Walberswick, its system of government, the election and payment of its MPs, and the men who administered and financed the town. Of greater importance are the many references to the fortunes and organisation of the fishing industry. The Minute Book also contains a number of detailed tax assessments, revealing how Dunwich, like all local communities, shared the burden of royal lay subsidies. These assessments are among the first of their kind to be published. Mark Bailey introduces the Minute Book, and brings it to a wider audience than that permitted by the medieval Latin of the original - translated here for the present-day reader. The daily life and business of one important Suffolk town in the Middle Ages, revealed in absorbing detail in this book, will be of interest not only to inhabitants of Suffolk and the county's historians, but to a wider readership as well.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49521881678097,"sku":"GOR004170025","price":11.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0851153062.jpg?v=1751107835","url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/products\/bailiffs-minute-book-of-dunwich-1404-1430-book-mark-bailey-9780851153063","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}