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status of leading tenants is confirmed by the mansions built for them and by memorial plaques in local churches; the estate’s interest in experimenting with the latest ideas can be demonstrated by early examples of concrete farm buildings; and increasing mechan- ization and the change from arable to pastoral land use can be seen in the demise of the great Norfolk barn. The author is clearly personally familiar with every nook and cranny of every Holkham edifice and, a true enthusiast, is determined that the reader will ap- preciate every detail. This has the unfortunate effect of making her treatment of the more conventional documentary evidence seem comparatively skimpy. Doubts arise and from these, inevitably, more doubts. Was the misspelling of the names of two leading agri- cultural writers really just a printing error? Is it totally acceptable to claim that the needs of progressive farmers were the same throughout the country, or that there was little incentive to mechanize agriculture in Norfolk simply because wages were low? Should there not be some sort of reference to help substantiate the assertion that established landlords learned new techniques from businessmen joining their ranks? The book con- tains adequate reference to major works in agricultural history, but is oblivious of the many minor works which would have given as much substance to the documentary evidence as Martins has found in the architectural history. Agricultural history is not a discipline which progresses at breathless speed, but for a book published in 1980 to describe research completed before 1967 as “recent”, and with the exception of Parker’s scholarly book, to reference hardly any work published after 1973, is abnormal. Martins’ book might have been improved had she spent as much time reading as she has obviously spent pottering around the farmsteads of Norfolk.

That said, it is necessary partially to recant for the book is a decidedly useful addition to the literature on Holkham and to the methodological resources of historians studying rural activities. Students of industrial archaeology and of vernacular architecture have previously shown the value of evidence from physical structures though, as Martins has found, integration with documentary evidence is not easy. Martins’ book should be more widely read than it unfortunately will be. At g24.00 many libraries and most individuals will baulk at purchase. As the version of her thesis available on microfilm from the British Library is almost illegible, the economics and technology of publishing will surely conspire to restrict severely the diffusion of Martins’ work. It deserves a much better fate.

University of Queensland STUART MACDONALD

RENI~ PIJASSOU, Un grand vignoble de qualite’. Le Mkdoc (Paris: Tallandier, 1980. 2 vols Pp. xxiv +1475. 196.25 Fr)

The tht%e d’&at is a uniquely Gallic institution, deeply perplexing to those familiar with the more modest research projects of Anglo-American scholarship. It is easy to question the implied assumption that academic excellence can be equated with sheer bulk of work done or time expended, for many grandes th&es are only matched in their literally un- trammelled immense scale by their monumental unreadability. They can be excellent in parts but the sections of value and genuine originality tend to be smothered in layers of second-hand encyclopaedic stodge and served up with excessive helpings of corroborative references and indigestible diagrams. Occasionally, some thkses transcend the crippling conventions of the traditional format and achieve a consistent level of excellence to sustain a well-ordered and well-researched argument, without being side-tracked into tedious and prolix irrelevances. While Pijassou’s these is not entirely free of such vices, in the main it is a well-organized, thoughtful and highly original study in historical geography, deploying an impressive sweep of argument backed by meticulous archival research and field work.

Pijassou’s subject is the development of the vineyard of the MCdoc, that remarkable triangle of land between the left bank of the Gironde below Bordeaux and the Atlantic

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where the place-names-Pauillac, Saint-Estephe, Latour, Margaux, Ludon-are inter- national synonyms for the finest red wines. In a short review, it is impossible to convey adequately the content of this many-faceted study: suffice it to say that in 1,500 pages Pijassou details in a most satisfying and engaging fashion the physical background, ecology, economic history, agricultural development, landholding and financial structure and present-day problems of the region’s viticulture. For readers of this Journal the extensive and excellent use of English-language sources deserves special mention. This was of course partly dictated by the subject for, along with port and champagne, claret is very definitely an “English” wine. (The United Kingdom still imports over 20% of mkdocain production and commerce in claret is dominated even locally by English merchants.) But Pijassou, while making good use of the records of locally-based n&go- ciants like Johnston or Tastet-Lawton of Bordeaux, also extended his research to public and private archives in England to determine why and how claret became the favoured drink of the English upper and middle classes in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. His work on the Walpole papers, the Hervey diary and the archives of Hedges and Butler or Brook’s Club point interesting directions for research by colleagues on this side of the Channel.

I enjoyed Pijassou’s thPse immensely and those whose interests in historical geography do not extend to France but who do like claret are urged to read it: it will certainly add to their appreciation of that finest of wines. A work of this scale inevitably has a few minor imperfections, and the exhaustive referencing is perhaps excessive. Nevertheless, it is an impressive achievement and a real labour of love, which I wish I could salute with a raised glass of Chateau Latour, preferably 1955.

Bishop’s Stortford IAIN STEVENSON

TREVOR ROWLEY (Ed.), The Origins of Open-field Agriculture (London: Croom Helm, Historical Geography Series, 1981. Pp. 258. E14.95)

A seminar in Oxford during November 1978 provided the genesis of this book by bringing together scholars with a variety of backgrounds to discuss the origins of open-field agriculture in Britain. Most of the ten contributors are historical geographers, but their approaches and the precise questions tackled are remarkably diverse. This is therefore not a book for those seeking a simple account of open-field origins or a synthesis of existing knowledge. For devotees of field systems, however, it is essential reading; alternative ways of looking at familiar problems and sources will almost certainly be encountered, and many a reader will be stimulated to fresh evaluations of his own evidence. At least one essay is certain of a place among the classic works, and all are destined to be much quoted.

The book starts with two contributions from field archaeologists, a short cautionary assessment of the potential role of archaeology by C. C. Taylor, followed by an essay in which David Hall provides a brief glimpse of the meticulous fieldwork he has been undertaking in Northamptonshire and some of the conclusions to which this points. Della Hooke then examines the evidence provided by pre-Conquest charters in the West Midlands: an analysis of boundary clauses leads her to conclude that, along the north- eastern edge of the Cotswolds and in Feldon, arable fields had frequently expanded to the boundaries of estates, but that this was not the case in Worcestershire where boundary references to woodland and woodland pasture predominate. There follow three general surveys based largely on documentary evidence. The longest and widest-ranging is by H. S. A. Fox, whose elegant and carefully argued essay is the most convincing and most original in the book. Reviewing evidence for the existence of the Midland system at various early dates, he concludes that it was almost certainly known by the tenth century and then moves to a consideration of the circumstances that may have led to its adoption. Bruce Campbell provides a useful classification of field systems and argues cogently that