One of the 'Great Twelve' livery companies of the City of London, the Merchant Taylors' Company has been in existence for some seven hundred years. This new history will chart the remarkable story of the Company and its members from its origins until the 1950s, encompassing the lives and achievements of men such as Sir Thomas White (founder of St John's College, Oxford) and the celebrated chronicler, John Stow, as well as the roles played by the Company in the City and beyond in different periods. As well as looking in detail at the internal life of the Company, the book will also focus on a number of important themes in the wider history of London. These include trade and industry, apprenticeship, the impact of religious change, the foundation of schools and other charities, and the government and politics of the City. In doing so, the book will contribute to an understanding of the aims and activities of the livery companies over the centuries, their ability to adapt to changing circumstances and their relevance in a modern world far removed from that in which they were first established. The History of the Merchant Taylors' Company will appeal to a wide range of people interested in the history of London. It is fully illustrated with more than seventy-five black and white and thirty colour illustrations.

Britain has a rich heritage of school buildings dating from the later Middle Ages to the present day. While some of these schools have attracted the attention of architectural historians, they have not previously been considered from the educational viewpoint. Even schools of little or no architectural interest are important sociologically, since the changing architecture of schools reflects changing ideas about how children should be educated and organized for teaching purposes. Documentary material relating to education is often fragmentary, and buildings may thus constitute the only real source of knowledge about the development of particular schools and can also throw light on general educational history. Originally published in 1971 and 1977, these books are, therefore, not only a major contribution to architectural history but also a study in the development of educational ideas and practices from the fourteenth to the twentieth century.

Leach struggled to rid his countrymen of the persistent myth that the monks had been the schoolmasters of the pre-Reformation period in England. To accomplish his goal he embarked on a program of research and publication, based on a mass of hitherto unexplored documents, to establish the great antiquity of many of the nation's Latin schools and to show that they derived from clerical, but secular, colleges of Anglo-Saxon times. Showing this would, he hoped, eliminate the persistant belief that monks had been the school-masters of pre-Reformation England. Miner argues that previous readings of Leach, which suggest that his main concern is to take issue with the Reformation and argue that this great watershed in history was - at least with regard to education - a retrograde step rather than a great movement forward, have not taken into account the full range of his publications. The aim of the present study is thus to place both Leach's achievements and his more controversial theses in historical context. A separate chapter devoted to unpublished material from the Charity Commission reveals Leach's method of work and provides an analytic survey of opinions on his work by reviewers and historians. The author supplements Leach's lack of material on the school curriculum through descriptive analysis of grammatical manuscripts from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, showing the presence of an educational Christendom of which Leach was clearly unaware.

Covering both formal and informal education, this volume examines Renaissance education in England and Italy, set within the relevant social, political and historical context.

This lavishly illustrated book traces the history of this remarkable school from its founding from humble beginnings by Sir Stephen Jenyns, one of Wolverhampton?Ûas successful benefactors during the reign of Henry VIII, right up to the present day as WGS stands proud as one of the region?Ûas leading co-educational independent schools. Idiosyncratic characters of force and style cross the pages of WGS:A History of Wolverhampton?Ûas Grammar School: Thomas Beach, who readied the school for the 20th century, Watson Caldecott who always wore a tailcoat except when he went to see his beloved Wolves; Walter Booth who had boys dig out an open air theatre by hand; Warren Derry who saw the school through World War II and raised it to new scholastic heights and Patrick Hutton, a doughty advocate of independent schools; all are entwined in the fabric of this remarkable school and help to create a story of scholastic and social achievement. Written by Paul Cheesewright Specifications: hardback, 280 x 215 mm, 152 pages, ISBN:åÊ9781903942987, publication: November 2010, published price: å£35.00.

Thomas Attwood (1783-1856), a Birmingham banker, played a prominent role in many of the important controversies in England during the first half of the nineteenth century. He wrote and published extensively, appeared as a witness before three Parliamentary committees, held a seat in the House of Commons for seven years, and earned a reputation as one of the most accomplished out-door orators of the time. In 1830-32 his leadership of the middle and working classes in the provinces allowed him to negotiate directly with the government on the question of parliamentary reform. Attwood was representative and spokesman for the new industrial towns before they achieved political influence in keeping with their economic strength; the philosophy and technique he brought to bear on the major questions of the era came, almost exclusively, from this source. Although Attwood was not alone in speaking for his economic sector, more than anyone else he became its symbol.