The Enclosures of the 18th Century
In Our Time1 Mai 2008

The Enclosures of the 18th Century

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the enclosure movement of the 18th and 19th centuries. In the early 19th century, the Northamptonshire poet John Clare took a good look at the countryside and didn’t like what he saw. He wrote: "Fence meeting fence in owners little boundsOf field and meadow, large as garden-grounds,In little parcels little minds to please,With men and flocks imprisoned, ill at ease."Enclosure means literally enclosing a field with a fence or a hedge to prevent others using it. This seemingly innocuous act triggered a revolution in land holding that dispossessed many, enriched a few but helped make the agricultural and industrial revolutions possible. It saw the dominance of private property as the model of ownership, as against the collective rights of previous generations. For some Enclosure underpinned the economic and agricultural development of Modern Britain. But it has also been a cause celebre for the political left ever since Karl Marx argued that enclosures created the industrialised working class and ushered in the capitalist society. What really happened during the era of 18th and 19th century enclosures? Who gained, who lost and what role did Enclosures play in the agricultural and industrial transformation of this country? With Rosemary Sweet, Director of the Centre for Urban History at the University of Leicester; Murray Pittock, Bradley Professor of English Literature at the University of Glasgow; Mark Overton, Professor of Economic and Social History at the University of Exeter.

Episoder(1084)

Archaea

Archaea

Misha Glenny and guests discuss one of the most remarkable scientific discoveries of the 20th century: the archaea microorganisms. In the 1970s the American microbiologist Carl Woese (1928-2012) reali...

9 Apr 53min

Margaret Beaufort

Margaret Beaufort

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the woman who, as a child bride, became mother to the boy who would eventually become the first king in the Tudor dynasty. Lady Margaret Beaufort (c1443-1509) was twelv...

2 Apr 54min

The Columbian Exchange

The Columbian Exchange

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the exchange of cultures and biology across the Atlantic and Pacific after 1492. That was when Columbus reached the Bahamas, a time when Europe had no potatoes, tomatoe...

26 Mar 52min

John Keats

John Keats

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the short life and lasting works of Keats (1795-1821), who in one year wrote some of the most loved poems in English. Among these are Ode to a Nightingale, Ode on a Gre...

19 Mar 48min

The Code of Hammurabi

The Code of Hammurabi

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the laws that Hammurabi (c1810 - c1750 BC), King of Babylon, had carved into a black basalt pillar in present day Iraq and which, since its rediscovery in 1901 in prese...

12 Mar 49min

Henry IV Part 1

Henry IV Part 1

Misha Glenny and guests discuss one of the most successful of Shakespeare's plays in his own time. Written with no Part 2 in mind as 'Henry the Fourth', the play explores ideas about who can be a legi...

5 Mar 51min

The Roman Arena

The Roman Arena

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the countless venues across the Roman Empire which for over five hundred years drew the biggest crowds both in the Republic and under the Emperors. The shows there deli...

26 Feb 50min

The Mariana Trench

The Mariana Trench

Misha Glenny and guests discuss one of the wonders of the natural world. In 1875 in the western Pacific, the crew of HMS Challenger discovered the Mariana Trench which turned out to be deeper than Ev...

19 Feb 58min

Populært innen Historie

rss-dette-ma-aldri-skje-igjen
rss-katastrofe
historier-som-endret-norge
rss-benadet
historier-som-endret-verden
rss-historiske-romanser-svik-drap-og-kjarlighet
aftenposten-historie
henrettelsespodden
rss-frontkjemperne
rss-strid-de-norske-borgerkrigene
rss-nadelose-nordmenn-gestapo
sektledere
med-egne-oyne
taakeprat
lille-helvete
rss-gamle-greier
liberal-halvtime
rss-bisarr-historie
historiepodden
rss-historier-fra-gudbrandsdalen