RHS News

On Wednesday 15 January the Society was delighted to take part in a day conference — ‘Humanities Now! Teaching and Research in Post-92 Universities’ — held at York St John University. The event was funded by an RHS Workshop Grant, for 2024-25, and brought together historians and other humanities scholars to share their experience of teaching, research and engagement in this distinctive and highly creative sector of UK higher education.

The Society also took part in the discussion, providing a survey of the current environment for historians at Post-92 institutions based on data from the recent RHS briefing, The Value of History in UK Higher Education and Society (October 2024).

Speakers addressed the many threats currently felt, with particular force, by humanities academics in the Post-92 sector. But greater attention was given to the distinctive achievements, contributions and value of Post-92 departments as a key element of UK higher education.

The day’s keynote lecture — ‘”No, I work at the other university”: Reflections on five years in Post-92 higher education’ — was given by the early modern historian, Professor Catherine Fletcher, of Manchester Metropolitan University.

Panels discussed innovative teaching, preparation for careers and life after graduation, new directions for history and humanities research, departments’ close relations with local employers, and the history PhD in Post-92 institutions.

Panellists included historians from Bath Spa, Birmingham Newman, Bournemouth, Manchester Metropolitan, Northampton, Teeside, West of England, and York St John.

Our great thanks to Dr Elizabeth Goodwin and Dr Anne-Marie Evans of York St John University for organising and hosting this event.

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Yesterday’s event was one of six projects funded by RHS Workshop Grants awarded in 2024:

• Arunima Datta (University of North Texas) for ‘Inter-community Dialogues in Britain’
• Helen Glew (University of Westminster) for ‘Pat Thane: Reflections on History, Policy and Action’
• Elizabeth Goodwin (York St John University) for a ‘Humanities Now! Network Building Symposium for Historians in Post 92 Institutions’
• Claire Kennan (King’s College, London) for ‘A Workshop in Ruins’
• Aparajita Mukhopadhyay (Kent) for ‘Mobilising Imperial History: Crime, Policing and Control in the British Empire’
• Jamie Wood and Graham Barrett (University of Lincoln) for ‘Present and Precedent in the Church Councils of Late Antique Iberia’

The current call for RHS Workshop Grants, 2025, is open and runs to Friday 24 January 2025.

 

The latest volume in the Royal Historical Society’s Camden Series is now available in online and print editions.

The Household Accounts of Robert and Katherine Greville, Lord and Lady Brooke, at Holborn and Warwick, 1640–1649 — edited by Stewart Beale, Andrew Hopper and Ann Hughes — makes available the richly detailed household accounts kept for Brooke and his widow, Katherine, on an annual basis between 1640 and 1649.

To accompany publication, the volume’s Introduction is free to read online while the editors provide a brief guide to the collection and its value in a new post for the Society’s blog.

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Robert Greville, 2nd Lord Brooke, was a prominent figure amongst the opposition to Charles I, a religious radical and intellectual who emerged as a successful popular leader in the early months of the English Civil War. Brooke was killed in action in 1643 and survived by his wife, Katherine. The Long Parliament exalted Brooke as a Godly martyr for their cause and were determined that their treatment of his bereaved widow should be seen to be generous and exemplary.

This new volume publishes the richly detailed household accounts kept for Brooke and his widow, Katherine, on an annual basis between 1640 and 1649. These texts have scarcely been studied by historians. They are an illuminating source for Brooke’s capacious intellectual, religious, and political networks, and for his mobilisation of support for Parliament in 1642. They also uncover the administration of his estates and households in London, Warwickshire, and the Midlands before and after his premature death.

The accounts are also crucial sources for political, economic, and military historians, and equally important for social and cultural historians interested in the history of the family, childhood, and widowhood, as well as consumption and material culture.

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The Household Accounts of Robert and Katherine Greville, Lord and Lady Brooke, at Holborn and Warwick, 1640–1649 are available online and in print from Cambridge University Press.

Fellows and Members of the Society receive full free access to the collection and to all 380 volumes of primary sources in the Camden Series. RHS members may also purchase print copies of the volume (605 pp) at the discounted rate of £16 per volume. To order a copy of the volume, please email administration@royalhistsoc.org, marking your email ‘Camden’.

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About the Camden Series of scholarly primary editions

The Royal Historical Society’s Camden Series is one of the most prestigious and important collections of primary source material relating to British History, including the British empire and Britons’ influence overseas.

The RHS (and its predecessor, the Camden Society) has since 1838 published scholarly editions of sources — making important, previously unpublished, texts available to researchers. Each volume is edited by a specialist historian who provides an expert introduction and commentary.

Today the Society publishes two new Camden volumes each year in association with Cambridge University Press. The complete Camden Series now comprises over 380 volumes of primary source material, ranging from the early medieval to late-twentieth century Britain.

The Society publishes new volumes in the Camden Series each year. Volumes in 2025 (from June) include Michael Taylor, ed., The Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral George Grey, 1809-1833; Helen Newsome, ed., Holograph Correspondence of Margaret Tudor Queen of Scots, 1489-1541; and Mark Philp, Aysuda Aykan and Curtis Leung eds. A Collector Collected: The Journals of William Upcott, 1803-1823.

 

 

The Royal Historical Society is very pleased to learn that the UK Ministry of Justice has abandoned a proposal, made by the previous government, to destroy print copies of post-1858 wills following their digitisation.

The decision is contained in a government response, published on 8 January 2025. This follows a consultation in Spring 2024 in which the Society — along with more than 100 organisations and 1,500 individuals — took part.

The original proposal (December 2023) concerned the future retention of wills as present-day and historical documents. Currently, HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) holds the original paper version of wills proved since 1858, following the Court of Probate Act (1857). The HMCTS also creates digital copies of wills granted probate in or after 2021.

The proposal would have seen: i. a timescale of 25 years for the retention of the paper copies of wills digitised since 2021; and ii. digitisation of all wills dating from 1858, and the corresponding destruction of the original paper versions of these documents upon digitisation. Exceptions to the wholesale destruction of the post-1858 archive were proposed for wills of selected ‘famous people’ (with Charles Darwin given as an example). The context for this proposal was the size and cost of the will storage service, estimated at £4.5 million per annum.

The Ministry’s report on the consultation, published on 8 January, notes ‘the large number of responses and the very heartfelt nature of those responses’ on an issue ‘which engaged high levels of public interest and concern. There was strong opposition to any destruction of original wills or other documents. This was for a variety of reasons in terms of both a national historical resource and also for individual legal challenges.’ As a result:

The Government accepts the compelling case that has been made by respondents … and has therefore determined not to proceed with any reforms that involve the destruction of original wills and supporting documents currently designated for permanent preservation.

The January document summarises responses to each of the questions raised, including the viability — or otherwise — of retaining paper copies of wills for ‘famous people’ of ‘historic interest’. This provoked extensive criticism, leading the Ministry to conclude that ‘the responses to this question illustrated the difficulties in any attempt to distinguish between people, and some strong points were made on recognising the historic record of all wills that the Government acknowledges.’

While yesterday’s response removes the threat of destruction of print copies of wills, the Ministry closes with a comment on the enduring costs of document storage. Future actions, it notes, may include a review of charges to access print copies of wills, and the inability to extend systematic digitisation to wills proved before 2021.

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Header Image: iStock, Credit: Nelli Okhrimenko

 

 

The Royal Historical Society is very pleased to announce its lecturers and lecture programme for 2025. The Society will host seven main lectures in the coming year, including several co-presented with partners.

Details of the Society’s 2025 lecture programme are available here.

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The Society begins 2025 with its annual lecture in global history, co-hosted with the German Historical Institute, London (GHIL). The event takes place at 5.30pm on Tuesday 21 January when Roland Wenzlhuemer (LMU Munich) will present ‘Raise, Reuse, Recycle: Global History and Marine Salvage in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century’.

This is followed, at 6.30pm on Friday 7 February, with the first RHS Lecture of the year: ‘Dangerous Journeys: Framing Women’s Movement in the Medieval World’, with Natasha Hodgson (Nottingham Trent University).

These opening lectures take place at the GHIL and Mary Ward House, London, respectively, and online attendance is available for both. Booking is now open for these first two lectures via the links above.

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New initiatives for the coming year include the RHS Anniversary Lecture, held in November, on or close to the anniversary of the Society’s foundation date (26 November 1868). Anniversary Lecturers are chosen by the Society’s President: the first lecturer in this new series is Jane Ohlmeyer (Trinity College Dublin) who will be speak on ‘The Lived Experiences of Non-Elite Women in Early Modern Ireland’ on Friday 21 November 2025.

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Other events in 2025 include the Society’s annual ‘History and Archives in Practice’ (HAP) day conference, organised jointly with The National Archives and Institute of Historical Research, University of London. This year’s event takes place at the IHR, on Wednesday 5 March, with the theme of ‘Working with Memory: History, Storytelling and Practices of Remembrance’.

The programme, and booking details, for HAP25 will be released early in the new year. Further Society events will be announced from the start of 2025.

We look forward to welcoming you to one or more of the Society’s lectures in 2025, either in-person or online.

If you would like to revisit any of our lectures from 2024 — given by, among others, Clare Anderson, Levi Roach, Corinne Fowler, Julia Laite, Caroline Dodds Pennock, Janina Ramirez, and the Society’s President Lucy Noakes — please see our Events Archive which provides video and audio recordings. The Events Archive also includes recordings from the Society’s other training workshops and panel discussions held in 2024.

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HEADER IMAGE: iStock, TheMountBirdStudio

 

This year’s volume of Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, the Society’s academic journal, is now available from Cambridge University Press.

The volume (Seventh Series, Volume 2) was published online on 6 December and is available to read Open Access online. The print edition of Transactions will be posted to Fellows and Members of the Society, who choose to receive hard copies, in January.* The volume opens with a Welcome by the editor, Jan Machielsen.

The 2024 volume contains fourteen Research Articles. These have been organised roughly chronologically, stretching from Krisztina Ilko’s study of the presence of non-elite Christian women in 14th-century China, to James Baker’s survey of the impact of computerisation for museology and museum working practices in the 1960s-80s.

Other articles demonstrate our field’s geographic and thematic diversity, ranging from late imperial Russia (Sarah Badcock) via early modern Wales (Sarah Ward Clavier) to 1930s India (Abhimanyu Arni), and from the history of sport (Ollie Randall) to that of internationalism (Su Lin Lewis).

We are also very pleased to publish eight contributions to the journal’s Common Room. As part of CUP’s transition of the journal to full Open Access, submissions to the Common Room accepted after January 2024 are labelled or introduced as Comments or Brief Comments (rather than ‘common room’).

This year’s discussions within the Common Room include John Sanders’ reflections on his experience as a ‘latecomer historian’, David Stack on the intersection of wellbeing and history teaching, and early career work in Black British history, from the late 18th to the mid-19th century, by Kristy Warren, Annabelle Gilmore and Montaz Marché.

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Submitting an article to Transactions 

The journal’s editor and editorial board welcome submission of research articles and commentaries for review. Transactions publishes new research on a wide range of historical subject areas, chronologies and geographies, and invites comment and opinion essays on approaches to historical study, within and beyond higher education.

We welcome submissions from historians at all career stages of academia and those working historically in related sectors, such as museums, heritage, archives and public history.

Since August 2024, all articles accepted for publication are published Open Access, with no charge to the author. and therefore accessible to the widest possible readership. TRHS editors offer a prompt, efficient and friendly review process, with all accepted content appearing initially online, via CUP’s FirstView, and then in annual online and print volumes.

For more on the Transactions, and how to submit an article for consideration, please see here. Articles for review may be submitted here to the editor and editorial board.

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*This year’s posting of the print edition of Transactions is delayed by 4-6 weeks following a significant cyber attack experienced by our publisher, Cambridge University Press, in 2024, which affected all journal publishing.

The Society is very grateful to CUP who have worked very hard and efficiently to restore their systems, with the final phase of this recovery being the despatch of journal print copies.

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The cover image for the 2024 volume of Transactions is ‘Angels transporting St Catherine’s body’, The Belles Heures of Jean de France, duc de Berry, 1405–1408/1409, Tempera, gold, and ink on vellum, 23.8 × 17 cm. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 54.1.1a, b, fo. 20r. (Photo: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Open Access.). This image is further discussed in Krisztina Ilko’s article ‘Yangzhou, 1342: Caterina Vilioni’s Passport to the Afterlife’.

 

Two current and one former member of the Society’s governing Council have been chosen for the History subject panel, to undertake a pilot study of proposals for the ‘People, Culture and Environment’ (PCE) element of the next Research Excellence Framework (REF 2029).

Panel members include Professor Barbara Bombi (University of Kent) who is the Society’s Secretary for Research and an Officer of the Council, and Professor Olwen Purdue (Queen’s University, Belfast) who is a member of the Council.

Co-chair for the History PCE panel is Professor Jonathan Morris (University of Hertfordshire) who was until late 2022 the Secretary’s Vice-President for Research Policy. Full membership of the History PCE panel is available here.

‘People, Culture and Environment’ develops the previous ‘Environment’ element of assessment, with a greater focus on research culture and more weighting (25%) in the final results.

The pilot seeks to identify those indicators of ‘People, Culture and Environment’ that should, on grounds of practicality and feasibility, be carried forward for this element of the REF assessment.

History is one of eight ‘Units of Assessment’ selected to take part in the PCE pilot, from a total of 34 subject areas that will submit to REF2029 across Medicine and the Life Sciences; Physical Sciences, Engineering and Mathematics; Social Sciences; and Arts and Humanities.

Further details of the terms of reference for the History and other subject panel are available here; REF has also provided an overview of the aims and purpose of the pilot.

In the pilot, 40 universities will produce submissions for assessment in a selection of REF Units of Assessment, including History. These submissions will in turn be assessed by the eight UoA-level pilot panels.

Assessment by the History PCE panel is expected to take place between May and August 2025, with panel reports and a statement on PCE Indicators for REF2029 currently scheduled for September 2025. REF2029’s timetable is also available.

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For more on the Royal Historical Society’s resources relating to REF2029, please see here.

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At its latest meeting on 22 November 2024, the RHS Council elected 47 Fellows, 35 Associate Fellows, 49 Members and 86 Postgraduate Members, a total of 217 people newly associated with the Society, from today.

The majority of the new Fellows hold academic appointments at universities, specialising in a wide range of fields; but also include curators, librarians, heritage specialists, independent researchers and writers. The Society is an international community of historians and our latest intake includes Fellows from seven countries: Canada, Fiji, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The new Associate Fellows include not only early career historians in higher education but also historians with professional and private research interests drawn from heritage, learned societies, libraries and archives, teaching, and public and community history.

The new Members have a similarly wide range of historical interests, and include individuals working in universities, culture and heritage, education, the civil service and broadcasting – together with independent and community historians and genealogists.

Our new Postgraduate Members are studying for higher degrees in History, or related subjects, at 52 different universities in the UK, Canada, China, France, Greece, Hong Kong, India, Italy, Portugal, Spain and the United States.

All those newly elected to the Fellowship and Membership bring a valuable range of expertise and experience to the Society.

New Fellows and Members are elected at regular intervals through the year. The current application round is open and runs to 13 December 2024 with dates for submissions in 2025 now available. Further details on RHS Fellowship and Membership categories (Fellow, Associate Fellow, Member and Postgraduate Member); benefits of membership; deadlines for applications; and how to apply, are available here.

New Fellows, elected November 2024

• Abigail Armstrong
• Sarah Ashbridge
• Malcolm Baker
• Richard Bates
• Paul Botley
• David Brydan
• Brian Casey
• N. W. Collins
• Daniel Cook
• Simon Coupland
• Ruth Davidson
• Stephen Davis
• Samuel DeCanio
• Andreas Demetriades
• Rachel Gillett
• Conor Patrick Heffernan
• Victoria Hoyle
• Erin Jessee
• James  Kirchick
• Simeon Koole
• Sakul Kundra
• Yajuan Liu
• Alice Marples
• Matthew Miller
• Martin Moore
• David Paulson
• Hans Pawlisch
• Madeleine Pelling
• Margarert Roberts
• Anna Marie Roos
• James  Ryan
• Florence Harriet Rose Scott
• William Spencer
• Teresa  Sutton
• Natalia Telepneva
• Robert (Robin) Thomas
• Claudia Tomlinson
• Adam Twycross
• David Vassallo
• Christian Velasco
• Lewis Wade
• Paul Webster
• Richard Wendorf
• William White
• Andrew Wild
• Daniel  Wilson
• Sharon Wright

New Associate Fellows, elected November 2024

• Deji Abdulsalami
• Arda Akıncı
• Francisco Amor Martín
• Jessica Betik
• Maxine Beuret
• Caroline Bourne
• Felicity Brown
• Diane Budden
• Ioannis Chountis de Fabbri
• Adam Culling
• Claire Day
• Victoria de lorenzo
• Simon Toby Campbell Ewin
• Xi Fang
• John Fisher
• Fabrice Flückiger
• Catherine Freeman
• Tim Galsworthy
• John Harrison
• Kate Jamieson
• Marc Adam Kolakowski
• Gabriel Lawson
• Benoit  Leridon
• Daniel  McKay
• Samantha Middleton
• Mohd Shazwan Mokhtar
• Anna Molnár
• Anna Parker
• Janet Remmington
• Thomas Sojka
• Katalin Straner
• Grace Waye-Harris
• Rujia Wen
• Alexander White
• Yang Yang

New Members, elected November 2024

• Paul Allen
• Jayaprakash Ankam
• Edmund Arnong
• Oluwanifemi Omolara Ayodele
• Fennec Bann
• David Bentley
• Michael Bobroff
• Timour Boudkeev
• Trudy Brown
• Elizabeth Burrell
• Gemma Campbell
• Thomas Cohrs
• Meera Dandekar
• Charlie Day
• Richard Deakin
• Patricia Delara
• Stuart Dennison
• Nicholas Grall
• Thomas Greenwood
• Thomas Grove
• Mary Haik
• Stephen Halloran
• Lawrence Hendra
• Laura Herrod
• Jamie Hooton
• Maggie Jessen
• Antony Jones
• Ravichandar K
• Raegan Kingett
• Anna Kirsch
• Olivia Kumar
• Sharon Lefroy
• Alexander Lehane
• Laura Leman
• John Little
• Kimberly Mack
• Matthew Marsh
• Karolina Motylinska
• Duncan Parnell
• Dee Radford
• Kashnar Rakhi Anjan
• Philip Rayman
• Emilia Rayner
• Prema S
• Cenker Sarıkaya
• Joseph Schneider
• Iurii Sergieiev
• Daniel Townend
• Oliver Wessex

New Postgraduate Members, elected November 2024

• Zachariah Addei-Thompson
• Mark Atherton
• Carlos Balula
• Maggie Blackburn
• Quinn Bouabsa Marriott
• Sarah Bremer
• Ellie-Mae Britton
• Katie Broomfield
• Minja Bujakovic
• Emily Calcraft
• Thomas Chambers
• Wang Ching Chan
• Huirong Cheng
• Carissa Chew
• Harriet Clark
• Suzie Cloves
• Peter Crellen
• Amy Crinnion
• Pratyusha Dasgupta
• Benjamin Davies
• Thomas Davies
• Katherine Delaney
• Kimmy Delsuc
• Razvan Dumitru
• Stephen Dunning
• Nimesha Ekanayake
• Simon Flynn
• Yat I Fung
• Julie Garner Rudman
• William George
• Susan  Greenwood
• Aayushi Gupta
• Michelle Gwynn
• Emma                   Hall
• Paul Hartjens
• Hannah Hassani
• Siobhán Hayes
• Laura Hesketh
• Zuzubee Huidrom
• Evgeniya Ivanova
• Rhys Jones
• Lisa Kinch
• Jenna King
• Lorenzo Maria Latella
• Andrew Lawler
• Deguang Li
• Kiegan Lloyd
• Lele Lu
• Joshua MacRae
• Filipe Marques Fernandes
• David Martin
• Elizabeth Martin
• Toma-Jin Morikawa-Fouquet
• Patricia Mulvey
• Issi Lucia Murillo Balderas
• Jacob Newbury
• Oluwatomisin (Tomi) Onabanjo
• Konstantinos  Pappas
• Arianna Parisi
• Michael Partington
• Nick Phillips
• Aine Poland
• Alison Price MBE
• John Pullin
• Matt Ryan
• Alexander Ryland
• Mrittika Shahita
• Harsh Vikram Singh
• Jake Stattel
• Rena Takiguchi
• Shehnaz Tharia
• Manya Trivedi
• Balint Urmos
• Sonia Latha Uthirapathy
• Blessing Uzairue
• Yue Wang
• Anjie Wang
• Michael Wang
• Caleb Ward
• Jennifer Worsh
• Chenye Xiao
• Jiajie Xu
• Jialin Zhang
• Wanqiang Zhang
• Zhen Zhang
• Xianglong Zhu

 

HEADER IMAGE: Quilt, c.1850, unknown, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Public Domain.

 

 

The Royal Historical Society invites applications for its First Book Prize, 2025 and Early Career Article Prize, 2025. The call for submissions opened on Monday 2 December 2024 and runs to Friday 31 January 2025. Applications for each of these prizes may be made via the Society’s application portal:

• RHS First Book Prize, 2025, for first history monographs published in 2024 by early career historians who received a PhD from a UK or Irish university.
• RHS Early Career Article Prize, 2025, for history articles / book chapters, published in 2024 by authors who are either current PhD students at, or within three years of having received their doctorate from, a UK or Irish university.

The Society looks to make two awards, in 2025, for the RHS First Book Prize (worth £1,000 per award) and a further two awards for the RHS Early Career Article Prize (each worth £250).

Further information on eligibility and how to submit an application for both prizes is available here: for first monographs and for early career articles.

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The 2025 prize round introduces several changes. For the RHS First Book Award:

• the Society moves to a single book prize for which two winning titles will be identified each year. All books submitted will be considered for this single book prize, with no distinction made (as in previous years) for books relating to ‘British and Irish’ and ‘non-British and Irish’ history.
• in 2025, we also move to a system of self-nomination by authors of first books published in the previous calendar year. This replaces the previous application process of submission by publisher. We hope these changes will encourage submission of the widest range of first monographs by early career historians which reflects the diversity of the historical profession and practice.

For the RHS Early Career Article Prize:

• the Society extends the eligibility period to authors within three years of completing a PhD in history at a UK or Irish university. This replaces the previous criterion for authors currently studying for a PhD or within two years of having completed their doctorate.

All other eligibility requirements remain as for 2024 and previous years. The Society expects to announce the recipients of this coming round of first book and early career article prizes in summer 2025.

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Details of changes to the 2025 RHS First Book and Early Career Article prizes were first circulated on 26 November 2024.

General enquiries about Society’s Prizes should be sent to: administration@royalhistsoc.org.

 

‘War and Peace: Mass Observation, Memory and the Ends of the Second World War in Britain’

 

About the event

Why does the Second World War continue to have such a hold over the popular imagination in early 21st century Britain? From Brexit to Covid, sporting competitions to environmental disasters, many public events are understood through reference to the Second World War and in particular the ‘signal events’ of 1940: Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain and the Blitz. Unlike the First World War, the memory of this second conflict is largely positive, focused on an imagined past in which people came together in adversity, overcoming the divisions of social class, political belief, and economics that had so divided 1930s Britain to defeat- against the odds – a powerful and ambitious enemy. In short, the Second World War is still widely remembered as Britain’s ‘finest hour’.

In this talk, entitled ‘War and Peace: Mass Observation, Memory and the Ends of the Second World War in Britain’, Lucy Noakes will outline the history of this memory and argue that it has a particular resonance in times of turmoil and instability. Looking back at the ways Mass Observers were beginning to construct a memory of the war as it came to an end, in similarly uncertain times, this talk explores the ways in which people make use of the past in order to understand their presents.

Audio and video recordings of the panel event are now available.

 

Watch the event

Listen to the event

 

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Coming soon and now available to book

Our first event of 2025 will be a joint lecture with the German Historical Institute London (GHIL) given by Roland Wenzlhuemer (LMU Munich) on ‘Raise, Reuse, Recycle: Global History and Marine Salvage in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century’. Attendance of Roland’s lecture is available in person at the GHIL and also online at 5:30pm GMT on 21 January.

Booking for this event is available by following the links below:

• In person: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/royal-historical-society-lecture-at-the-ghi-london-in-person-tickets-1099019098709?aff=oddtdtcreator
• Online: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/royal-historical-society-lecture-at-the-ghi-london-zoom-tickets-1099020703509?aff=oddtdtcreator

 

The Royal Historical Society is pleased to announce the publication of its latest two titles as part of the Camden and New Historical Perspectives book series.

Both titles are published, online and in print, by Cambridge University Press and University of London Press respectively.

 

Adulthood in Britain and the United States from 1350 to Generation Z, edited by Maria Cannon and Laura Tisdall (New Historical Perspectives, published by University of London Press, November 2024).

Adulthood has a history. This collection, edited by Maria Cannon and Laura Tisdall, explores how concepts of adulthood have changed over time in Britain and the United States with reference to eleven case studies. Expectations for adults have altered over time, just as other age-categories such as childhood, adolescence and old age have been shaped by their cultural and social context.

In historicising adulthood, this collection is the first to employ adulthood as a category of historical analysis, arguing that consideration of age is crucial for all scholarship that addresses power and inequality.

Collectively, the authors explore four key ideas: adulthood as both burden and benefit; adulthood as a relational category; collective versus individual definitions of adulthood; and adulthood as a static definition.

Adulthood in Britain and the United States from 1350 to Generation Z is the 20th volume in the Society’s New Historical Perspective series for early career historians within 10 years of completion of a PhD at a UK or Irish university.

All 20 titles are available for free Open Access download from University of London Press, as well as in paperback print. For more on this volume, please see Maria and Laura’s post for the RHS blog.

 

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The Household Accounts of Robert and Katherine Greville, Lord and Lady Brooke, at Holborn and Warwick, 1640-1649, edited by Stewart Beale, Andrew Hopper and Ann Hughes (RHS Camden Series, November 2024).

Robert Greville, 2nd Lord Brooke, was a prominent figure amongst the opposition to Charles I, a religious radical and intellectual who emerged as a successful popular leader in the early months of the English Civil War. This volume publishes the richly detailed household accounts kept for Brooke and his widow, Katherine, on an annual basis between 1640 and 1649.

These texts have scarcely been studied by historians. They are an illuminating source for Brooke’s capacious intellectual, religious, and political networks, and for his mobilisation of support for Parliament in 1642. They also uncover the administration of his estates and households in London, Warwickshire, and the Midlands before and after his premature death.

These accounts are crucial sources for political, economic, and military historians, and equally important for social and cultural historians interested in the history of the family, childhood, and widowhood, as well as consumption and material culture.

The Household Accounts of Robert and Katherine Greville, Lord and Lady Brooke is published online and in print by Cambridge University Press (November 2024). Fellows and members of the Society may purchase print copies of this, and other available Camden titles, for £16 per volume by emailing: administration@royalhistsoc.org.