Trade, debt and reputation in early modern Sussex

Thesis

This thesis addresses the question of the nature of the trading, lending and borrowing practices in early modern Sussex, focussing mainly on the ‘middling’ sort of people. It identifies the participants, discovers how and why they borrowed or lent, and discusses the role of reputation in the ability to participate successfully in a trading community. There is a specific focus on the city of Chichester, adding to the existing corpus of scholarship on similar smaller cities and larger towns; and another on the county’s substantial trade in grain and the influence of central government direction thereon.

Two distinct methodologies are adopted. The first is a quantitative analysis of financial transactions detailed in Sussex suits at the courts of Requests and Common Pleas. The second is largely qualitative, including several detailed case studies, and an analysis of three previously unpublished examples of reputation-threatening performative libel.

Trade in early modern Sussex depended significantly on credit; the obtaining of which generally needed established creditworthiness, good security, or a credible surety. Lending networks are demonstrated to be largely local, with a secondary dependency on finance from London, especially mercantile credit. Legal awareness is seen to be an important requirement for success, often obtained from favoured, typically local, legal counsel. This thesis also reveals, at a depth rarely previously observed, the lives of early modern smallcity merchants, and the challenges they faced, especially in the county’s grain trade. Finally, whilst strenuous efforts were made to defend public libels, it is shown that they did not necessarily affect long term financial and social prospects of their targets. These conclusions add to the historiography of early modern trade, finance and reputation, confirming the findings of Craig Muldrew, Alexandra Shepard and others in different periods or geographies, and also to the local historiography of trade in Sussex.

Authors: Kipling, MR

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-9ogyyj6b5
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: England; star chamber; debt; Elizabethan; grain; Court of Requests; Sussex; Chichester; Jacobean; trade; merchants; performative libel; local history; early modern
• Subjects: Elizabethan trade; History of Sussex; Economic history; English Local History; Mercantile history; English grain trade; Jacobean libel