Pastons: A Family in the Wars of the Roses

Description: Attractive selection conveys well their recurrent concerns with land, money, civil violence, flirtation, marriage, and the purchase of ginger and lace. MEDIUM AEVUM
Vivid first-hand accounts of life in England at the time ofthe Wars of the Roses, presented in their historical context. Essential reading on the English middle ages.

Within three generations (1426 to 1485), and through the dark anddangerous years of the Wars of the Roses, the Pastons establishedthemselves as a family of consequence, both in their native Norfolk andwithin court circles. Ambitious and highly mobile - womenfolk as wellas men - they kept in touch by correspondence, usually but notinvariably through the medium of a clerk. These letters, a raresurvival, break upon us across the centuries with the urgency, andsometimes the violence, of their preoccupations: defending property, fighting court cases, making the right alliances, and, on the domesticside, managing their estates, conducting their courtships, stockingtheir cupboards. Selected and presented here with Richard Barber'sinvaluable linking narrative, they bring the middle ages triumphantlyto life.

Brief description: RICHARD BARBER has had a huge influence on the study of medieval history and literature, as both a writer and a publisher. His first book on the Arthurian legend appeared in 1961, and his major works include The Knight and Chivalry (winner of the Somerset Maugham Award in 1971), Edward Prince of Wales and Aquitaine, The Penguin Guide to Medieval Europe and The Holy Grail: the History of a Legend which was widely praised and was translated into six languages.

Review Quotes: Richard Barber's attractive selection, originally published by the Folio Society, well deserves this more accessible reissue. The letters are presented in modernised form with spare but informative linking commentary, and the volume is ideal both for the `ordinary reader' and for medievalists for whom a friendly acquaintance with the Pastons is a sufficient substitute for linguistic or historical scholarship. The selection conveys well their recurrent concerns with land, money, civil violence, flirtation, marriage and the purchase of ginger and lace.-- "MEDIUM AEVUM"