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This thesis considers some of the ways in which images of justice were used to express and in some cases promote certain aims and aspirations of those who commissioned them, in northern Italy between c.1250-1400, and whether and to what extent this impacted upon their depiction. It explores the question of a sacred/secular distinction in relation to the use and depiction of images of justice, and proposes that certain changes in such images can be read as responses to developments in the law and in the secular justice system. An introduction defines the essential elements of the subject and the main objectives of the thesis. As the thesis takes a social historical perspective, the first chapter provides details to establish the historical context for the following case studies. The main body of the thesis adopts a thematic approach. The second chapter examines the interrelationship of divine and secular justice through an analysis of images depicting the Last Judgment, or referencing its imagery. First it looks at several monumental representations of the Last Judgment, addressing developments in the artistic treatment of the torments of Hell in the context of changes in contemporary legal punishment practices. The chapter then explores further the relationship of earthly punishments and divine imageries, in a work not previously studied as an image of justice. The congruence in these artworks of sacred and secular elements allows a discussion of the interrelationship of these terms in relation to the contemporary conception and practices of justice. Further chapters examine how a new and increasing emphasis on the judge in the prosecution procedure from the early thirteenth century is mirrored in the artistic representation of secular and judicial authority after that period. This is first addressed by analysing images of the trials of Christ as examples of ‘secular’ justice in a religious or ‘sacred’ context, and exploring how contemporary issues relating to the administration of justice contribute to an understanding of changes in the iconography of these scenes. A fourth chapter addresses images more overtly associated with secular and judicial authority, offering a new perspective on these images as expressions of contemporary societal interests, many arising from the justice system, leading to their use as exemplars, to guide and inform. The thesis contributes to the debate on the distinction between the terms ‘sacred’ and ‘secular’ in the late medieval period, exploring how analysing artworks can lead to a better and more nuanced appreciation of the application of those terms in relation to the contemporary notion of justice. Further, my research has indicated that what could account most comprehensively for certain changes in the use and depiction of such images may be found in specific aspects of a justice system in transition.

The aim of this study of Up holland in Lancashire is to investigate the late-medieval and Tudor community, to understand the landscape in which this community operated and to assess the impact of marginality on society and economy. Upholland lay within the agricultural fringe in respect of its soils and straddled the geographical interface between lowland wetlands on the Lancashire plain and elevated land on the Billinge-Parbold ridge. It was a peripheral place, too, as regards its positions on the western edge of Wig an parish and on the eastern border of West Derby hundred. Despite its undoubted marginality, there are indications for great stability in its boundary, for ancient settlement patterns and for clearance levels remaining fairly constant between the Iron Age and the early-modern period. Because several tracts of ancient woodland survived into Tudor times and as most soils in this township were wet and/or infertile, farming life was based on the wood-pasture economy. Upholland farmers made the best possible use of their resources and diversified into rural crafts, such as tanning, carpentry, and the ferrous metal industry. There is a particularly early example of a water-powered bloomery in the demesne. Upholland was arguably part of a multiple estate in the pre-Conquest period. It was held in thegnage in 1066. Under the later manorial system the township had powerful lords in the de Holands, the Lords Lovell and the Earls of Derby. Only the former, however, were resident. Their status symbols included a castle, two large parks, a warren and a priory. Despite this emergence of power, tenants enjoyed autonomy and security of tenure. Their dispersed homesteads lay amidst enclosed fields and there was an absence of communal organisation in agriculture. Many copyhold families were long established by the sixteenth century and well aware of their ancient rights. When the second Earl of Derby tried to impose more-stringent tenurial conditions, several copyholders took their case to the Court of Star Chamber. Tenant independence is also seen in local government. Although this institution was presided over by the lord's steward, community regulation was effectively in the hands of a tenant elite. Tenant holdings tended to be small although disparkment and shrinkage of population after the Black Death made way for the creation of larger allotments. Population recovery by the mid-sixteenth century led to expansion by 1600, an increase largely due to the growth of leasehold properties in the former parks and in the waste. Upholland lay within a part of Lancashire that was relatively rich by the 1540s. Growing commercialisation is evident in the trading centre present by 1599. This study demonstrates how independence and skilful use of the environment can turn marginality into advantage. It shows, too, how the fringe can provide quality of life.

Freshwater loch settlements were a feature of society, indeed the societies, which inhabited what we now call Scotland during the prehistoric and historic periods. Considerable research has been carried out into the prehistoric and early historic origins and role of artificial islands, commonly known as crannogs. However archaeologists and historians have paid little attention to either artificial islands, or loch settlements more generally, in the Late Medieval or Early Modern periods. This thesis attempts to open up the field by examining some of the physical, chorographic and other textual evidence for the role of settled freshwater natural, artificial and modified islands during these periods. It principally concentrates on areas of central Scotland but also considers the rest of the mainland. It also places the evidence in a broader British, Irish and European context. The results indicate that islands fulfilled a wide range of functions as secular and religious settlements. They were adopted by groups from different cultural backgrounds and provided those exercising lordship with the opportunity to exercise a degree of social detachment while providing a highly visible means of declaring their authority. This thesis also argues that loch settlements were not a lingering hangover from the past, as some have suggested, but a vibrant part of contemporary culture which remained strong until the latter half of the seventeenth century before going into final decline and disappearing as a significant social phenomenon.

In his encyclopaedic work On the Properties of Things, John Trevisa describes water as 'able'. Water is an element which has no determinate properties of its own but which takes up properties from its surroundings and, at the same time, enacts change on those surroundings. This thesis argues that the inherent flexibility or 'ableness' of water, which Trevisa and other encyclopaedic writers identify, is crucial to late-medieval understanding of the element and, in turn, informs its use in a variety of religious writings. The multivalent potential of water enables devotional writers to use references to the element to symbolise and articulate access to God whilst they simultaneously deploy it as a metaphorical limiting agent that can regulate this access. Although there has been some critical attention paid to certain kinds of water in late medieval devotional prose, this thesis contains the first holistic study of various manifestations of water. It considers the material and historical realities of water in the Middle Ages as well as representations of water in different literary genres and demonstrates the 'ableness' of water within them. These findings are then used to shed light on a specific genre: spiritual guides authored by men and addressed to women, from the late-fourteenth and early-fifteenth centuries. The thesis identifies a literary language of water in late medieval devotional prose - a complex and recurrent set of images that authors draw upon to explicate Christian doctrine and portray different aspects of religious life. These images provide the organisational structure of the thesis. Three significant tropes of water are considered in light of its 'ableness': the imagined and encouraged relationship between water and the body in spiritual guidance, the importance of laundering the soul in such works, and the relationship between blood and water in Passion meditations.