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BOOK REVIEWS 1087

the available data has been brought about by the use of metal detectors. For many years the
archaeological community was more or less hostile to the private use of metal detectors,
and they remain rightly banned from listed archaeological sites. However, their responsible
use by a host of amateur enthusiasts, who faithfully record and report their finds, has
transformed our understanding of the use of coin in medieval Britain. Finds are now
occurring every year in such numbers from the early middle ages that there now seems to
be no doubt that monetary exchanges were commonplace. The evidence grows year by
year, permitting ever more sophisticated analysis of dispersion and quantities.
However, some countries ban the use of metal detectors, closing their eyes to a huge
body of evidence. Paradoxically, in Britain there is not one but two overlapping schemes for
the recording and reporting of finds. Mark Blackburn was instrumental in establishing one
schemeEarly Medieval Coins, based at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, while a
nationwide scheme, the Portable Antiquities Scheme, has also been a huge success.
Although the relationship between these two schemes is not entirely straightforward, it is
clearly better to have two such schemes than none. Their contribution to historical
knowledge has been enormous.

Ashmolean Museum N. J. MAYHEW

Daniel R. Curtis, Coping with crisis: the resilience and vulnerability of pre-industrial settlements
(Farnham: Ashgate, 2014. Pp. xx + 381. 48 figs. 29 tabs. ISBN 9781472420046 Hbk. 80)

This books distinctive argument is that an understanding of settlements, facilitated by a

theoretical framework, is an important key to the reconstruction of pre-industrial rural
socio-economic change. The resilience and vulnerability of pre-industrial settlement of
the sub-title reflects a current concern in the social sciences and Curtiss intention is to
provide a historical depth to the discussion through the presentation of five extended case
studies. This ambitious study is indirectly influenced by historic landscape studies, most
obvious in the range of sources used, including archaeological and cartographic material.
However, that influence is not reflected in the theoretical approach. Landscape researchers
attempt to reconstruct both cultural and conceptual landscapes and examine their inter-
action over a long period. Curtiss methodology is more in the mainstream of economic
history, grounded in predominantly secondary and synthetic documentary works (some of
which are more controversial than is acknowledged), and copious use of primary sources
and archival research.
Curtiss approach is influenced by current disaster studies where, in the interaction
between exogenous (climate, disease, floods) and endogenous factors, the latter are
dominant in determining a settlements ability to survive or recover from crises. Resili-
ence and vulnerability are assessed in terms of three criteria: population trends; loss or
degradations of land; and the destruction of housing and capital goods. Furthermore,
property (in terms of both land users and owners) and power are the foundation of all
socio-economic developments and also, with patterns of resource management, deter-
mine the modes of exploitation. Rural societies can be grouped into four ideal types
according to the extent to which they were egalitarian or polarized, and also by the
character of their land-use strategies. So, it is argued, optimum resilience was achieved
where a societal structure included an institutional environment that allowed villagers to
respond to exogenous factors by adopting diverse measures to ensure survival or recov-
ery from any crises.
The five case studies range from the thirteenth to the nineteenth century and each covers
a period of 150 to 300 years. Four are presented as a comparison between two places
located within the same region (so in total nine different rural societies) and chosen to
Economic History Society 2015 Economic History Review, 68, 3 (2015)
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1088 BOOK REVIEWS

contrast the range of resilience. Each study can be seen in the context of one of the
exogenous factors discussed in the introduction: the effect of urbanization (urban expro-
priation) in the study of Florence and its hinterlands, 13301580; environmental impact
flooding in the case of the Dutch Betuwe, 13001600 (and partially at Oldambt,
Groningen, 17001900); the direct or indirect use of a burgeoning states powers as with
the Apulian region in the Kingdom of Naples, 16001900; and the demographic pressure
on the resources of Cambridgeshire, 12001340. The agrarian character of each region is
then compared to the four ideal theoretical types to estimate the predictive efficacy of the
framework. Six of the nine cases reflected the types in terms of property, power, and
resource management and seven matched the ideals in terms of resilience. The two/three
outliers were on the border of two types. One, the Oldambt, was an anomaly and the
mismatch is explained by the inability of the model to accommodate the complexity of the
societal structure, described as a society within a society which had a dual economy.
However, as Curtis no doubt realizes, he was able to present this complexity because the
study was based on his extended work in the Groningen archives; and may indicate that
levels of information determine the goodness of theoretical fit. In the Cambridgeshire
cases, a similarity was noted in manorial structure that, on more detailed investigation, was
found to be misleading.
Curtiss stimulating work provokes such concerns and a wish for further work. Within
the studies broad chronological range subsidiary trends are evident, such as the cycles of
growth and decline identified in the Betuwe. The scale, speed, and synchronicity of such
changes within regions need further investigation and could refine the character of resili-
ence. This matter may affect discussions about agency. Recognizing endogenous change
through property, power, and land use tends to identify the protagonists in terms of groups
or classes rather than individuals or families, and it is the latter that may account for any
variation in the speed and scale of agrarian change.
Concentrating on settlement as a means of understanding agrarian change offers impor-
tant new insights and should be pursued. A more nuanced appreciation of resilience may
be gained from considering the totality of settlement variation in an area: recent work
shows that most European regions have a variety of nucleated and dispersed settlement,
even those within a village belt: investigating the socio-economic implications of such
variation would inform the overall framework: the study of Apulia shows a significant
settlement shift, with trulli in the fields becoming a new form, but was this change common
and contemporaneous throughout the region or socially specific, reflecting peasant involve-
ment with viticulture?
Placing settlements and their capacity for survival at the forefront of rural research is to
be welcomed and raises the possibility of a greater and more integrated understanding of
pre-industrial societies.

University of Reading GRENVILLE ASTILL

Jeff Flynn-Paul, ed., War, entrepreneurs and the state in Europe and the Mediterranean
13001800 (Leiden: Brill, 2014. Pp. xii + 356. 4 figs. 9 tabs. ISBN 9789004243644 Hbk.
168)

For two reasons, this is an important but deceptively titled collection of essays. First, its
title might mislead economic and business historians into an expectation that a distin-
guished group of European and Ottoman historians are simply addressing themes, ques-
tions, and problems that fall within the familiar boundaries of traditional concerns dealing
with entrepreneurship as a factor of production. They do so only to the degree that they
expose the differences between the contexts within which businessmen organized the
Economic History Society 2015 Economic History Review, 68, 3 (2015)