This is a comprehensive survey of medieval English mortmain legislation from both the point of view of the crown and that of the Church. It examines methods of enforcement and evaluates their success. It traces the emergence of licensing policies and the increasing exploitation of licences for fiscal purposes, while at the same time establishing that this was not their original purpose. The extent to which the Church was acquiring land on a threatening scale by the later thirteenth century is questioned, and the effects of the legislation on subsequent acquisition are assessed against the...

This study of the administrative 'revolution' of the thirteenth-century papacy investigates the background and career of Honorius III, who was deeply involved in the developing administration of Chamber and Chancery from the late twelfth century, and reveals a picture of evolution rather than revolution in the papal offices of state. Honorius's Chancery is subjected to a vigorous examination. Valuable appendices list all the known papal scribes and provide diplomatic commentaries. Tables indicate details about the registers and the registrative system. The central machinery is shown in...

This book traces the often complex relations between the three Stafford Dukes of Buckingham and the Crown.

A study of the consequences of a central problem in Aristotle's Metaphysics in the interpretation given to it by Islamic and Christian Aristotelian philosophers.

Walter Stapeldon, fifteenth bishop of Exeter, was the founder of Exeter College, Oxford, and the greatest of Edward II's treasurers of the Exchequer. As Edward's regime crumbled in 1326, he paid the price of his master's rapacious policies, of which he was the chief instrument. This study shows how the Plantagenet revolution in government, the most massive overhaul of the Exchequer ever undertaken in medieval England, was shaped with a clear financial purpose. On the basis of his extensive research in the Exchequer archives, Dr Buck reveals for the first time the extent and severity of the...