Horse power: the economic development of pre-industrial England

In his latest book Horse power in Medieval England: The equine economy c.1200 - c.1400, Jordan Claridge highlights the unexpected role of ordinary people in shaping economic transformation.

Horses drove (literally) economic growth in the preindustrial world. England’s early embrace of draught animals, and horses in particular, paved the way for its early industrialization. In the Middle Ages, horses were a driving force behind England's agricultural and economic expansion and, although lords and their estates relied heavily on horse power, they largely failed to produce agricultural horses themselves.

Instead, it was England's peasants who bred the workhorses that fuelled the economy, exploiting opportunities in seigniorial society and identifying conditions suited to horse breeding, over time coming to dominate the production and trade of working horses.

Meet our speaker and chair

Jordan Claridge is Associate Professor in the Department of Economic History. His research considers how individuals and societies, as well as markets and industries, adjusted to constantly, and often cataclysmically, changing economic and social circumstances in the Middle Ages.

Sara Horrell is Professor in the Department of Economic History. Her research interests are labour market participation, household structure, standards of living and expenditure in the British industrial revolution and late-nineteenth century.

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