Taylor Aucoin

Players fight over the ball at the Shrove Tuesday Sedgefield Ball Game 2025 Image Credit Sarah Caldecott

#ShroveTuesday football in County Durham has a #medieval pedigree. Thomas Marshall of Wolviston was injured playing on the day in 1380.

In 1492 the priory halmote allowed the illegal game to be played in Billingham during Shrovetide.

About 10 miles away, Sedgefield still hosts an annual game.

Is Walking Research? A Methodological Ramble Mark HailwoodI needed to try something to get me writing again. Blessed with a period of research leave to resume work on my book – Everyday Life in the Seventeenth Century English Village &#…

'I would set off, with some sense of what I might be looking for, and see what I stumbled across...'

Is going for a walk a valid methodology for a historian? And if so, how much theory do you need to read before you start?

Some thoughts in my latest blog post:
manyheadedmonster.com/2026/02/10/i...

A very detailed embroidering depicting men and women undertaking various work tasks. These include spinning, harvesting wheat, picking fruit, sheering sheep, carrying water and so on. Each task is labelled with the name of the month. Credit: The Labours of the Months, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

📢JOYCE YOUINGS MEMORIAL LECTURE📢

Prof. Jane Whittle: Work & gender, status & power: the surprising history of everyday chores in early modern England

🗓️ 28 January, 3pm
📍 Uni of Exeter & Zoom

All welcome at this public 🗃️ lecture, register for your place: www.eventbrite.com/e/the-joyce-...

A frosty churchyard

Kick started the new work year with another installment of my 'research walk', retracing the parish boundaries of 17thC Portishead for my book on 'Everyday Life in the 17thC Village'. Got a taste of the 'Little Ice Age' - a period of colder temperatures that impacted the 17thC - by going out in -1!

‘The Ploughman’s Feasting Days’: Festive Work Relations in Thomas Tusser Originally posted on the University of Exeter’s History of Economy Research Blog on 23 February 2021. This blog post explores the relationship between work and festivity (and play more genera…

Today is #PloughMonday. Thomas Tusser called it one of the feasts 'belonging to the plough' that employers in #earlymodern England should never forget.

Here I explore these holidays where work & play mingled: how the festive shaped #labour relations.

ludicrushistories.wordpress.com/2026/01/12/f...

Yesterday I resumed my 'perambulation' of the 17th century parish boundary of Portishead, the subject of my current research on 'Everyday Life in the Seventeenth Century English Village'. My 'research walk' started where the parishioners would have done, at the church...🧵

The Pudding Pinching Heifer Heisters New blogpost written for the Forms of Labour Project exploring everyday life and work in early modern England through the depositions of a Lancashire quarter sessions court case. Featuring an indus…

Pudding season approaches; #Thanksgiving is here.

Closing my seasonal series of posts marking the publication of our new book, I revisit a case where food takes the plate

Featuring industrious duckwives, wisemen & gossiping quarrymen
#earlymodern
ludicrushistories.wordpress.com/2025/11/27/t....

Late 17th-century English needlework showing typical labours of the month. Focus shows a woman picking apples in October, and a woman spinning in November.

Line graph titled Autumn Sectors shows an indexed monthly distribution of Commerce and Food Processing Tasks where 100 is the monthly average and both Commerce and Food Processing rise during the autumn quarter of October, November and December to an annual height of over 140 in December.

Cosy season is well upon us

Curl up w/ a warm drink & NEW post on CUP's blog:

The #Autumnal Experience of Work in #EarlyModern England

This seasonal celebration of our new book features apples & pears, cider & ale, meat & markets, & the #Christmas milling craze
cambridgeblog.org/2025/11/the-...

Should have said, it's 6-8pm on 27th November at @guildhalllibrary.bsky.social 🙄

@markhailwood.bsky.social has written about candlelight in the context of work and time in early modern England. Not so much about books but other forms of labour

🐏 👨‍👨 @nicolemaceira.bsky.social will join us this week to discuss contrasting depictions of animals and humans in post-Reformation thought, and their importance in the development of the Reformed faith in Scotland.

The Magiconomy of Early Modern England This post is part of a series marking the print and online Open Access (free) publication of The Experience of Work in Early Modern England. The book is co-authored by Jane Whittle, Mark Hailwood, …

To mark #Halloween & publication of 'The Experience of Work in #EarlyModern England', (now available in print & free online), this blogpost revisits the magiconomy.
🧙🎃
Highlights include a magical service paid for with bacon and pigeons.
🥓🪶
#history
ludicrushistories.wordpress.com/2025/10/30/t...

Bound Labour, Narratives of Nationhood, and the Rhetoric of Slavery: Liberty, Identity, and Scottish Coal-Miners in the Long Eighteenth Century

Very much looking forward to Polly Lowe @polly-lowe.bsky.social speaking this Wednesday on bound labour and Scottish miners in the 18th c. @long18thsem.bsky.social @ihrlibrary.bsky.social Everyone welcome - either in person or hybrid, but please register at www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

The Experience of Work in Early Modern England IV: Harvesters This post is part of a series that marks the publication of The Experience of Work in Early Modern England. The book is co-authored by monster head Mark Hailwood, along with Jane Whittle, Hannah Ro…

Final post in my series on 'The Experience of Work in Early Modern England'. It focuses on the heartbeat of the premodern economy.... the harvest.

manyheadedmonster.com/2025/10/16/t...

There must be a market for Academic Book ASMR? Ready the Impact Assessment

I believe you kids call this an ‘unboxing’…

Yes! Cora has already claimed a copy...

If you want to know more about our use of handwritten text recognition software (Transkribus) on the wills project, tune in on Zoom next week 👇

All welcome (not just postdocs!).

#EarlyModern 🗃️ #DigitalHumanities #HTR #CitizenScience

The Experience of Work in Early Modern England III: ‘Ploughmen go whistling to their toils’ This post is part of a series that marks the publication of The Experience of Work in Early Modern England. The book is co-authored by monster head Mark Hailwood, along with Jane Whittle, Hannah Ro…

As the agricultural cycle starts to wind down for the winter, my next post on 'The Experience of Work in Early Modern England' looks forward to its resumption in the new year, when...

‘Ploughmen go whistling to their toils’

manyheadedmonster.com/2025/10/14/t...

A woman’s place was not in the home: New book challenges assumptions about women’s work in early modern history New research has revealed that women played a fundamental role in the development of England’s national economy before 1700. Far from being the unpaid homemakers and housewives of traditional historic...

Many congratulations to my colleagues in the Forms of Labour project team on the publication of their new monograph! 🗃️👏🎉

Brilliantly, The Experience of Work in #EarlyModern England is available open access:

www.cambridge.org/core/books/e...

news.exeter.ac.uk/faculty-of-h...

The Experience of Work in Early Modern England II: Family Fortunes This post is part of a series that marks the publication of The Experience of Work in Early Modern England. The book is co-authored by monster head Mark Hailwood, along with Jane Whittle, Hannah Ro…

Another post on 'The Experience of Work in Early Modern England' - a reminder that work in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was very much a family affair...

manyheadedmonster.com/2025/10/09/t...

The Experience of Work in Early Modern England I: Winter is Coming This post is part of a series that marks the publication of The Experience of Work in Early Modern England. The book is co-authored by monster head Mark Hailwood, along with Jane Whittle, Hannah Ro…

As you dig out your chunky knitwear from the back of the draw, I know you are wondering: 'How did people prepare for winter 400 years ago?'

Read today's post to find out (and whet your appetite for our new book The Experience of Work in Early Modern England)

manyheadedmonster.com/2025/10/07/t...

Delighted to see our new book - The Experience of Work in Early Modern England - out now, and open access (free!)

doi-org.bris.idm.oclc.org/10.1017/9781...

This book applies the innovative work-task approach to the history of work, which captures the contribution of all workers and types of work to the early modern economy. Drawing on tens of thousands of court depositions, the authors analyse the individual tasks that made up everyday work for women and men, shedding new light on the gender division of labour, and the ways in which time, space, age and marital status shaped sixteenth and seventeenth-century working life. Combining qualitative and quantitative analysis, the book deepens our understanding of the preindustrial economy, and calls for us to rethink not only who did what, but also the implications of these findings for major debates about structural change, the nature and extent of paid work, and what has been lost as well as gained over the past three centuries of economic development. This title is also available as open access on Cambridge Core.

Cover of Whittle, Jane, Mark Hailwood, Hannah Robb, and Taylor Aucoin. The Experience of Work in Early Modern England. of Cambridge Studies in Economic History - Second Series. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2025.

Who did what in early modern England?

New #OpenAccess book, 'The Experience of Work in Early Modern England' by @jwhittle.bsky.social, @markhailwood.bsky.social, @hkrobb.bsky.social & @aucointaylor.bsky.social, based on thousands of #EarlyModern court depositions 🗃️

Read it: doi.org/10.1017/9781...

Dr Tabitha Stanmore, Historian of magic, witchcraft and environments

A woodcut showing a devil and a ship sinking.

Join @magicnotwitches.bsky.social in an exploration of practical magic in English history on 28th October at the Mary Rose Museum!

maryrose.org/events/cunni...

We've got a stellar set of speakers this term at @ihr.bsky.social. Come along an immerse yourself in the latest early modern history research! #EarlyModern 🗃️

Stories and Songs: Wills as Windows onto Past Lives A unique performance of history and original music inspired by Tudor, Stuart and Georgian wills.

🎺ANNOUNCEMENT!🎺

STORIES & SONGS: WILLS AS WINDOWS ONTO PAST LIVES

Join Chris Hoban and I at #Exeter Phoenix for a unique performance of history & original music inspired by #Tudor, #Stuart & Georgian wills! 🗃️

FREE! Claim your ticket: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1738865536...

Thanks, Cordelia! Congrats on the G&H news 😁

Now the contract is signed etc we're very pleased to share this news. Please do follow the below account to keep up to date with what we're doing. #GenderHistory

The leading international journal ‘Gender & History’ (@genderandhistory.bsky.social) has moved to the School of History, Classics and Archaeology, edin.ac/46z9jy5

#History #Classics #Archaeology #HCA #Edinburgh #Gender