Towns on the Edge in Medieval Europe

In the later Middle Ages a European 'core' of culturally and administratively sophisticated societies with rapidly growing populations on an axis from England to Italy colonised the European 'periphery'. In northern Europe this periphery included Wales and Ireland as colonised by the English and Prussia and Livonia as colonised (mainly) by Germanic and Nordic peoples. A key tool of colonisation was the chartered town giving citizens distinguishing legal privileges and a degree of self-regulation. <em>Towns on the Edge in Medieval Europe</em> contends that while the chartered town as a legal and social-political concept was transferred to peripheral areas by colonisers its implementation and adaptation in peripheral areas resulted in unique societies not simply the replication of core urban forms and communities. In so doing it compares the development of social and political institutions in the chartered towns of medieval Ireland Wales Prussia and Livonia. Research themes<br>include community formation normalisation/social disciplining and peace making/keeping.<br>