Professor David Crouch
Professor of Medieval History
Phone: 01482 465613
Email: d.crouch@hull.ac.uk
DAVID CROUCH'S research interests are focused on the social and
political history of the period 1000-1300. He works particularly on
the medieval aristocracy, looking at class formation, lineage,
consumption and elite culture, as explored in The Birth of
Nobility: Constructing Aristocracy in England and France,
1000-1300 (Longman, 2005). His book
Tournament (Continuum, 2005) reconstructed and
explained the lost medieval sport of the middle ages for the first
time. He has written extensively on the history of the Norman
and Angevin royal dynasties, and his 2000 study of the reign of
King Stephen of England (1135-1154) is the definitive work on the
subject. His latest book, The
English Aristocracy, 1070-1272: A Social Transformation
(Yale UP, 2011) is the first study to look at the subject in such a
long perspective. It presents an entirely original view
of medieval society unconstrained by feudal theories.
Professor Crouch also works on a variety of
other enthusiasms. Amongst these are lay piety and death
culture in the high middle ages. He has published on Welsh
and English regional history in the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries including such subjects as the charters of Leicester
abbey, racial tensions in England, France and Normandy, medieval
correspondence and the earliest charter of a Welsh king. He
is most closely identified with the career and contemporary
biography of Earl William Marshal of Pembroke
(c.1146-1219), protector of England for the boy-king Henry
III. His William Marshal: War, Knighthood, War and
Chivalry (2nd edn, Longman, 2005) was the
inspiration for Elizabeth Chadwick’s prize-winning novels on the
earl.
Teaching
Professor Crouch currently offers the
following undergraduate modules:
· 20628 : Dying and Death in
Western Europe: From Rome to the Renaissance
· 20894 : Ruling England,
1066-1217
· 20579 : Being Human:
Family, Friendship and Sexuality, 1000-1600
He will be offering a new special subject for
2012-13 : King John and the Reinvention of England,
1191-1217.
He heads the MA programme in medieval history
and offers these modules:
· 20732 : Medieval Life and
Society (core module)
· 20643 : Military Society of
the Middle Ages
Current Projects
Professor Crouch is about to publish (with
Professor Martha Carlin) a collection of thirteenth-century letters
in a volume for Pennsylvania University Press which will appear
early in 2012. He has contracted with Cambridge University
Press for the second volume (1000-1500) of The Cambridge
History of Britain. His edition of The Acts
and Letters of the Marshal Family, 1156-1248, is to be
published in the Camden Society Series of the Royal Historical
Society. He is editing with Dr Hugh Doherty a volume of
essays entitled The Earl in Medieval Britain following a
successful colloquium on the subject at Jesus College, Oxford, in
September 2011.
Recent
Publications
English Society, 1200-1250:
Letters from a Lost World (Pennsylvania University Press,
2012), edited with Martha Carlin.
‘La spiritualité de Philippe de
Remy, bailli capétien, poète et seigneur de Beaumanoir’ in,
Chevalerie et spiritualité, ed. M. Aurell (Presses
Universitaires de Rennes, 2011), 123-35.
‘The Warenne Family and its Status
in the Kingdom of England’ in, Rang im spätmittelalterlichen
Europa. Stand und Perspektiven der Forschung, ed. Jörg
Peltzer (Vandenhoek und Ruprecht, 2011)
Normandy and its Neighbours, 900-1250 :
Essays for David Bates, edited with K. Thompson (Brepols,
2011) 310pp.
‘The Roman des Franceis of Andrew de
Coutances : Text, Translation and Significance’ in,
Normandy and its Neighbours, 900-1250 : Essays for David
Bates ed. D. Crouch and K. Thompson (Brepols, 2011),
175-98.
The English Aristocracy, 1070-1272: A Social
Transformation (Yale UP, 2011) 328pp
‘Baronial Paranoia in King John’s
reign’ in, The England of King John and Magna Carta, ed.
J. Loengard (Boydell, 2010), 45-62.
‘The Complaint of King John against
William de Briouze (c.September 1210)’ in, The England
of King John and Magna Carta, ed. J. Loengard (Boydell, 2010),
168-79.
‘The Court of Henry II of England in
the 1180s, and the Office of King of Arms,’ The Coat of Arms:
the Journal of the Heraldry Society, 3rd ser., 5
(2010), pt 2.
‘La cour seigneuriale en Angleterre,
xiie-xiiie siècles’ in, Seigneuries dans
l'espace Plantagenêt: Actes du colloque de
Bordeaux-Saint-Emilion (3-5 mai 2007), ed. F. Boutoulle
(Ausonius, 2009), 31-40.
‘Courtliness and Chivalry: Colliding
Constructs’ in, Soldiers, Nobles and Gentlemen: Essays in
Honour of Maurice Keen, ed. P.R. Coss and C. Tyerman (Boydell,
2009), 32-48.
‘Between Three Realms: the acts of
Waleran II, count of Meulan and Worcester’ in, Records,
Administration and Aristocratic Society in the Anglo-Norman
Realm, ed. D. Crook and N. Vincent (Boydell, 2009), 75-90.
‘The Transformation of Medieval
Gwent‘ in, Gwent County History ii, The Age of the
Marcher Lords, c. 1075-1536, ed. R.A. Griffiths, A.
Hopkins and R. Howell (Cardiff, 2008), 1-45.
‘William Marshal and the
Mercenariat,’ in, Mercenaries and Paid Men: the Mercenary
Identity in the Middle Ages, ed. J. France (Brill, 2008),
15-32.
‘Stephen and Northern France’ in,
King Stephen: New Interpretations, ed. P. Dalton and G.
White (Boydell & Brewer, 2008), 44-57.
History of William Marshal,
edited with A. Holden and S. Gregory (3 vols, Anglo-Norman Text
Society, Occasional Publications Series, 6, 2007) vol. 3,
237pp
Translation of, M. Aurell, The
Plantagenet Empire, 1154-1224 (Longman, 2007), 359pp.
‘Robert of Beaumont, Count of Meulan
and Leicester: his lands, his acts and his self-image,’ in,
Henry I and the Anglo-Norman World: Studies in Memory of C.
Warren Hollister, ed. D.F. Fleming and J.M. Pope (Haskins
Society Journal, 17), 91-116.
‘Biography as Propaganda in the
“History of William Marshal”’ in, Convaincre et Persuader:
communication et propagande aux xiie et xiiie
siècles, ed. M. Aurell (Poitiers, CESCM, 2007), 503-12.
‘The Pragmatic Origins of British
Social History,’ in, Die Deutung der mittelalterlichen
Gesellschaft in der Moderne, ed. N. Fryde, P. Monnet, O.G.
Oexle and L. Zygner (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2006),
123-145.
‘Humour and Identity in the Twelfth
Century,’ in, Grant risee ? The Medieval Comic
Presence : Essays in Memory of Brian J. Levy, ed. A.P.
Tudor and A. Hindley (Brepols, 2006), 213-224.
‘Early Charters and Patrons of
Leicester Abbey,’ in, Leicester Abbey : Medieval History,
Archaeology and Manuscript Studies, ed. J. Story, J. Bourne
and R. Buckley (Leicester Archaeological and Historical Society,
2006), 225-287.
‘Writing a Biography in the
Thirteenth Century: the Construction and Composition of the
“History of William Marshal”’ in, Writing Medieval Biography:
Essays in Honour of Frank Barlow, ed. D. Bates, J. Crick and
S. Hamilton (Boydell & Brewer, 2006), 221-235.
‘Cardiff before 1300,’ in,
Cardiff: Architecture and Archaeology in the Medieval Diocese
of Llandaff, ed. J.R. Kenyon and D.M. Williams (British
Archaeological Association Conference Transactions, xxix, 2006),
34-41.
‘Chepstow under the Marshals,’ in,
Chepstow Castle : its History and Buildings, ed. R. Turner
and A. Johnson (Logaston, 2006), 43-50.
The Birth of Nobility:
Constructing Aristocracy in England and France, 950-1300
(Longman, 2005) 392pp
Tournament (Continuum,
2005) 248pp