Daily Life in the Late Middle Ages ed. by Richard Britnell (review)

Il8ARTHURIANA glossary), the edition seems aimed at scholars who read Middle French with little difficulty. Furthermore, many of the notes deal with descriptions ofthe manuscript: Altmann points out, for example, when a word is written above the line. Since the relevance of this information to literary scholars is unclear (this kind of note should have been separated from the substantive ones), this information will be of use principally to specialists in codicology. Yet the editor also gives information needed by nonspecialists, such as the explanation ofreferences to Ovid and to the phoenix. Christine's complicated syntax often makes these poems difficult to read; they would be accessible to a broader audience had the notes been more substantive, including help with syntax, and the glossary fuller (or if a translation had been included). While there is little of direct interest to Arthurian scholars in these three poems, Arthurians will profit from the many faceted images of courtly love that they offer. Scholars of late medieval literature generally will gain an increased awareness of the. debates on love that shape the work of so many important poets, including Alain Chartier and Geoffrey Chaucer. For example we see foreshadowing ofChartier's 'La Belle Dame sans Merci' in a lady's remark in the Débat de deux amans that she has never seen a Cemetery of Dead Lovers (see 11. 987-94). Prof. Altmann has done a service to students oflate medieval love poetry by bringing us Christine's witty, original debate poems. HEATHER ARDEN University of Cincinnati Richard britnell, ed., Daily Life in the Late Middle Ages. Thrupp, Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing, 1998, Pp. vi, 234, 13 colored plates, black and white photographs, illustrations, isbn: 0-7509-1587-0. $39.95. Instead of putting together a volume with general information about late-medieval culture, its social-economic, political, and religious life, Richard Britnell has invited a number of individual authors to write about concrete aspects of late-medieval England so as to avoid the danger ofgeneralizations and superficiality. Five chapters are based on papers delivered at a conference at the University ofKent at Canterbury in March of 1996; the others were written specifically for this volume. Consequently, a number of individual areas of daily life receive highly detailed attention, whereas many others have simply been left out. Anne Sutton examines the development offashion for men and women, focusing on the time around 1470. There are good and bad reasons for this narrow period, as the sources promise to reveal accurate information, but the overall history offashion in the fifteenth century is shortshrifted. Jennifer Ward discusses the life oftownswomen and their households, whereas Carole Rawcliffe examines hospitals, nurses, and their work. Gillian Pritchard uses the documents produced by members of the Paston family to illustrate the profound role of religion in private lives. Andrew Watkins introduces us to the life ofpeasants, taking the case ofArden where grain production was largely replaced by cattle raising and other farm industries in the fifteenth century. REVIEWS119 The economic and social structures ofa priory and its tenants are the topic ofRichard Lomas's study, whereas Matthew Davies introduces us to artisans, guilds, and the London government. The chapter written by Clive Burgess informs us about the development ofthe London parishes, and finally the editor himselfoutlines the history ofYork and its infrastructure, the diet of the citizens and the health system. Several particular observations, among many others, deserve to be highlighted. To date a painting by means ofstudying the fashion, one needs a depiction of both a woman and a man as the formers fashion changed much less radically than the latter's, as Anne Sutton emphasizes. Medieval illustrations prove to be extremely important sources of information about daily life, as this volume demonstrates, and this is the reason why the Institutfor Realienkunde des Mittelalters in Krems, Austria, here not mentioned, has established a highly important web-based database of such visuals. Considering how much we now know about late-medieval hospitals and medicine, there is much hope that other areas ofdaily life will also become accessible to future research. Even though many people in the fifteenth century displayed a fairly conventional form ofpiety, this does not mean...