Tudor Social Transformation and Legal Change

Abstract

The century 1540-1640 in England was a period of profound change, almost universally regarded as the dividing line between the old and the new. At a point half-way in that hundred-year span the educated Englishman's mind and world were still more than half medieval; at its end they were more than half modern. Recent work in fifteenth century agrarian history and investigations into fifteenth century commerce and trade have blurred the black and white of any abrupt transition from feudal to capitalist England by emphasizing the non-feudal elements already at work in medieval society and heralding its disintegration. In the same way, studies in eighteenth century social stratification and commercial and agricultural organization have made clear how distant the society of that age still was from the industrial and finance capitalism of our own day. Thus exaggerated and excessively sharp lines have been softened and the extravagant claims sometimes still made for the period sensibly reduced. Nevertheless, it remains true that in the years between 1540 and 1640 disruptive and creative forces accelerated the normal process of change to a degree that makes the century, unless we except our own, the most conspicuous example of rapid and many-sided transformation in English history.