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Circled with Stone is the most comprehensive study to date of the fortifications of an early modern English city. The culmination of some twenty years of archaeological and documentary research, it provides a richly detailed portrait of the ancient system of walls, towers and gates which ringed the city of Exeter during the Tudor and early Stuart periods. The book traces the development of the fortifications over time, explores the many purposes which they served, and shows how they were defended against a series of major attacks: most notably during the Prayer Book rebellion of 1549 and the English Civil War. The text is accompanied by a series of extensive transcripts from Exeters matchless civic archives, including two newly-discovered documents relating to the Prayer Book rebellion. The book includes a wealth of illustrations and brings together, for the very first time, colour reproductions of all the early maps of Exeter, as well as a series of specially commissioned photographs of the city walls today. Designed to be accessible to the general reader, as well as to the specialist, Circled with Stone paints a uniquely vivid picture of the role which urban fortifications played in everyday life in one of early modern Englands greatest cities.
List of contents
Part 1: The nature of the city defences; Purpose and function; Maintenance and repair; The city defences under the Tudors; The city defences under the early Stuarts; Epilogue. Part 2: Extracts from the city receivers' accounts, 1485-1660; Expenses in repelling Perkin Warbeck, 1497; Extracts from the Chamber Act Book, 1511-45; Purchase of ordnance for the city, 1545; Expenses in the 'Commotion', 1549; List of the city ordnance, 1556; Instructions for the defence of the city, 1643; List of the city ordnance, 1643; Table - Annual expenditure on the city defences, 1485-1660.
About the author
Mark Stoyle is senior lecturer in early modern history at the University of Southampton. He specialises in early modern British history, with particular research interests in the 'British crisis' of the 1640s; cultural, ethnic and religious identity in Wales and Cornwall between 1450 and 1700; and popular memory of the English Civil War from 1660 to the present day
Summary
This is the most comprehensive study to date of the fortifications of an early modern English city. The culmination of some twenty years of archaeological and documentary research, it provides a richly detailed portrait of the ancient system of walls, towers and gates which ringed the city of Exeter during the Tudor and early Stuart periods.
