Abstract

DAVID REEDER, editor, Urban History Yearbook 1984. discusses the findings of the Cheapside study although Leicester University Press, 1984. 227 pages. £16.95. unfortunately it does not reproduce any part of the maps showing the property layouts that have been The yearbook of a field of academic enquiry should prepared at ten successive dates from c1200 onwards. keep its practitioners informed of current develop- This reservation apart, the paper provides an ments, review progress to date, stimulate interest and excellent and stimulating account of pre-Fire Cheap- debate in major problems and issues, and evaluate side and raises a whole crop of interesting issues and potentially productive methods and sources of evi- speculations. The author comments on the limitations dence. It should also give outsiders some idea of its of the data for the city as a whole, but the sample size of central theses and demonstrate the vigour and rigour 7,400 property holders and 2,750 residents who can be with which they are being pursued. This is especially identified in Cheapside argues for the validity of the true in a field such as urban history which, being conclusions drawn. The data provide information on . concerned with the totality of