Economic Organization and Policies in the Middle Ages
The publication of this volume completes, in its first edition, the medieval portion of the Cambridge Economic History, as projected some thirty years ago. Its appearance, therefore, adds to the debt which students of medieval economy already owe to the editors and writers of this distinguished series. How greatly the debt will be increased, no single reviewer can be expert enough to say. On the whole the new volume seems worthy to stand with its predecessors. A joint product, like them, of English, American, and continental scholars, it is, for most of its length, as notable an achievement, in many things original, in approach as well as substance, and on many subjects both comprehensive and authoritative. At the same time, compared with earlier volumes, it is distinctly more uneven, disjointed and incomplete, and to that extent more difficult to assess; opinions of it are bound to vary with the interests of readers and the use that they can make of it. The responsibility does not lie wholly with editorial policy. Indeed, as first conceived, this was to be a kind of residuary volume, bringing together a miscellany of topics, ranging from economic policy and policy-making institutions to coinage, prices, credit and finance, which in the past, it was felt, 'had unduly dominated the story of economic history' (III, p. v), and were accordingly left out from volumes I and II. This plan, the preface states, has now been 'consummated', thought not quite in the form intended or as fully as desired. In particular, for reasons beyond their control, the editors have had to abandon three cardinal chapters: that on the organization of transport (deferred from vol. II), that on the economic policies of east European states (Russia with Byzantium?), and, most important of all, that on currency and money, a 'cornerstone' chapter of the volume, for which the only practicable substitute has been a short appendix on coinage, compiled by P. Spufford, valuable as a table of reference, but less useful than the editors imply for calculating rates of exchange. In compensation certain chapters, first assigned to volume II, have, on grounds of general affinity, been incorporated in volume III. The final result is a volume, more uniform than originally planned, of which the dominant concern is with government and related institutions controlling economic life. As a vestige of variety, however, the work is still divided, rather uneasily, into two unequal parts: the first devoted to organization, with chapters on towns, business technique, markets and fairs (by H.