The Writing of Urban Histories in Eighteenth-Century England [Hardcover]

This book uses the genre of urban histories to examine aspects of culture, society, and politics in eighteenth-century towns in England. Sweet looks particularly at questions of civic pride and the creation of urban identity. Urban history and antiquarian scholarship were popular pursuits among polite society, and their study offers an unique insight into the cultural history of the period.

Rosemary Sweet's fascinating study forms a useful overview of what are complex and intensely political texts....[T]his is an impressive piece of scholarship and a remarkably wide-ranging work....[T]his book does much to enhance our understanding of the nature of provincial urban communities and the mind-set of their residents in the eighteenth-century. That it does so in an engaging and eminently readable fashion is a bonus. --Albion