Drawing together from a variety of disciplines, including law, economics, politics and art history, this book considers fundamental issues of property in the early modern period. This is a detailed study of the material lives of the middle classes in thepre-industrial era, a period which saw considerable growth in consumption. Lorna Weatherill has brought her highly important survey up-to-date in the light of new research. She provides a new introduction and bibliography, taking account of the latest academic writing and methodological advances, including computing, and offers further conclusions about her work and its place in current literature. Three main types of documentation are used to construct the overall picture: diaries, household accounts, and probate inventories. In investigating these sources she interprets the social meaning of
