Exciting fresh perspectives on Edward I as man, king and administrator. The reign of Edward I was one of the most important of medieval England, but the king's activities and achievements have not always received the full attention they deserve. The essays collected here offer fresh insights into Edward's own personality as well as developments in law, governance, war and culture. Edward the man emerges in chapters on his early life, his piety and his family, while the administrator king is discussed in evaluations of his twogreat ministers, his handling of the crucial issue of law and order and the way he managed the realm from abroad through his correspondence. Edward's nobles, both in England and Scotland, naturally appear as vital to understanding the reign, while his rule is set in a British and European context. Overall, the book aims to move the debate on the reign beyond K.B. McFarlane's hugely influential judgement that "Edward I preferred masterfulness to the arts of political management", by highlighting his skills -- and failings -- as a politician and manager.

The best new research on medieval clothing and textiles, drawing from a variety of angles and approaches. The essays here take us from the eleventh century, with an exploration of the Bayeux Tapestry, into an examination and reconstruction of an extant thirteenth-century sleeve in France which provides a rare and early example of medieval quilted armour, and finally on to late medieval Sweden and the reconstruction of gilt-leather intarsia coverlets. A study of construction techniques and the evolution of form of gable and French hoods in the late medieval and the early modern periods follows; and the volume also includes a study of the Great Wardrobe under Edward I of England, and what it can tell us about textiles at the time.