Oxford History of England

The Oxford History of England is a modern history series of the British Isles, with each individual volume written by historians of that period.

The series was commissioned by Oxford University Press and edited by Sir George Clark, with the first volume (his own The Later Stuarts, 1660–1714) appearing in 1934. The original aim was to produce 14 volumes, taking the story up to 11:00 p.m. on 4 August 1914, the moment when Britain declared war on Germany. In 1965 a fifteenth volume, taking the story up to 1945 was added, and in the 1980s the first volume was superseded by two separate books. Several of the other volumes have been amended and released in new editions over the years.

Many of the volumes are now considered to be key classic works for their respective periods. In recent years some of the volumes have been released as stand-alone works.

A New Oxford History of England was commissioned in 1992 and has produced eleven volumes to date. At least six volumes are still forthcoming.^[1]

Volumes and authors

Oxford History of England

The volumes produced in the original series were as follows:

• Volume I: Roman Britain and the English Settlements – R. G. Collingwood and J. N. L. Myres (1936)
  • Later replaced by:
    • Volume I A: Roman Britain — Peter Salway (1981)
    • Volume I B: The English Settlements — J. N. L. Myres (1986)
• Volume II: Anglo-Saxon England, c550–1087 — Sir Frank Stenton (1943)
• Volume III: From Domesday Book to Magna Carta, 1087–1216 — Austin L. Poole (1951)
• Volume IV: The Thirteenth Century, 1216–1307 — Sir Maurice Powicke (1953)
• Volume V: The Fourteenth Century, 1307–1399 — May McKisack (1959)
• Volume VI: The Fifteenth Century, 1399–1485 — E. F. Jacob (1961)
• Volume VII: The Earlier Tudors, 1485–1558 — J. D. Mackie (1952)
• Volume VIII: The Reign of Elizabeth I, 1558–1603 — J. B. Black (1936)
• Volume IX: The Early Stuarts, 1603–1660 — Godfrey Davies (1937)
• Volume X: The Later Stuarts, 1660–1714 — Sir George Clark (1934)
• Volume XI: The Whig Supremacy — Basil Williams (1939)
  • 2nd revised edition — C. H. Stuart (1962)
• Volume XII: The Reign of George III, 1760–1815 — J. Steven Watson (1960)
• Volume XIII: The Age of Reform, 1815–1870 — Sir Llewellyn Woodward (1938)
• Volume XIV: England, 1870–1914 — Sir Robert Ensor (1936)
• Volume XV: English History, 1914–1945 — A. J. P. Taylor (1965)

Several volumes were subsequently revised by the authors to take into account later research.

New Oxford History of England

The volumes published or announced for the new series are (as of 2010) as follows:

• England under the Norman and Angevin Kings, 1075–1225 — Robert Bartlett (2002), ISBN 9780199251018
• Plantagenet England, 1225–1360 — Michael Prestwich (2005), ISBN 9780199226870
• Shaping the Nation: England, 1360–1461 — G. L. Harriss (2005), ISBN 9780199211197
• The Later Tudors: England, 1547–1603 — Penry Williams (1995), ISBN 9780192880444
• A Land of Liberty? England, 1689–1727 — Julian Hoppit (2002), Paperback: ISBN 9780199251001; Hardcover: ISBN 9780198228424
• A Polite and Commercial People: England, 1727–1783 — Paul Langford (1989), ISBN 9780192852533
• A Mad, Bad, and Dangerous People? England, 1783–1846 — Boyd Hilton (2006), ISBN 9780199218912
• The Mid-Victorian Generation, 1846–1886 — K. Theodore Hoppen (1998), ISBN 9780198731993
• A New England? Peace and War, 1886–1918 — G. R. Searle (2005), ISBN 9780199284405
• Seeking a Role: The United Kingdom, 1951–1970 — Brian Harrison (2009), ISBN 9780198204763
• Finding a Role? The United Kingdom, 1970–1990 — Brian Harrison (2010), Paperback: ISBN 9780199606122; Hardcover: ISBN 9780199548750

Forthcoming, volumes covering the periods:

• 400–850 — Not known (allocated to Nicholas Brooks but he died February 2014)
• 850–1075 — Simon Keynes (after 2020)
• 1461–1547 — John Watts (publication unknown, originally scheduled to go to press in 2014)^[2]
• 1603–1642 — Thomas Cogswell and Peter Lake
• 1642–1689 — Adam Fox and Steven Pincus
• 1918–1951 — Philip Williamson

Use of the term "England"

When the series was commissioned:

"England" was still an all-embracing word. It meant indiscriminately England and Wales; Great Britain; the United Kingdom; and even the British Empire. (A. J. P. Taylor, Volume XV: English History, 1914–1945, page v)

Since then there has been a trend in history to restrict the use of the term "England" to the state that existed pre-1707 and to the geographic area it covered and people it contained in the period thereafter. The different authors interpreted "English history" differently, with Taylor opting to write the history of the English people, including the people of Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Empire and Commonwealth where they shared a history with England, but ignoring them where they did not. Other authors opted to treat non-English matters within their remit.

References