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Matthew Davies MA, DPhil (Oxon)

Director, Centre for Metropolitan History and Reader in London History

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Matthew's research interests focus on the history of medieval and early modern London. He is particularly interested in questions relating to the roles of the guilds, known as 'livery companies', in connection with trade and production, regulation (economic as well as moral) and religious culture. He has made a particular study of the Merchant Taylors' Company, one of the 'Great Twelve' city companies, which still occupies the site in Threadneedle Street it acquired in the mid 14th century. He is also interested in the government of London, and the way in which causes were promoted by the city's representatives and through corporate and individual lobbying. He is working more broadly on questions to do with London's links with other towns and cities, and with the Crown. He is current writing a history of the city between 1300 and 1550, which will form part of a multi-volume history of London. Other plans include work on investment and property management by the city companies before the Reformation. He directs and co-directs a number of research projects on the history of London, and teaches on the IHR's MA programmes.

Matthew has been Director of the Centre for Metropolitan History since 2002. For more about the activities of the Centre visit the CMH website.

Other positions held

Research Projects

Current Research Projects

Previous Research Projects

Graduate Students supervised

  • Helen Draper, 'Mary Beale and her "paynting room" in London 1655 to 1699'
  • Miguel Garcia Sanchez, 'Inequality, poverty and social networks in two European metropolises. A comparison between Madrid and London, 1550-1700'
  • Sam Harper, 'London and the Crown in the reign of Henry VII'
  • Jordan Landes, 'The role of London in the creation of a transatlantic Quaker community in the late 17th and early 18th centuries'
  • Laurie Lindey, 'The London furniture trade 1640-1720'
  • Pat Ostler (Birkbeck), 'The London livery companies in the 18th Century'
  • Dean Rowland, 'The reception and implementation of local and parliamentary legislation in England', 1422-c.1485
  • Catherine Wright, 'Social and Cultural Connections between the English and Dutch, 1660-1720'

Select publications

Books

  • London and the Kingdom: Essays in Honour of Caroline M. Barron (ed. with Andrew Prescott) (Donington, 2008)
  • People in Place: Families, Households and Housing in Early Modern London (with V. Harding, P. Baker, M. Merry, O. Myhill, G. Newton and R. Smith) (London, 2008)
  • The Religious Houses of London and Middlesex (ed. with Caroline M. Barron) (London, 2007)
  • The History of the Merchant Taylors' Company (with Ann Saunders) (Leeds: Maney, 2004)
  • The Merchant Taylors' Company of London: Court Minutes 1486-1493 (Stamford, 2000)

Articles and Chapters in Books

  • 'Lobbying Parliament: the London livery companies in the fifteenth century', Parliamentary History, XXIII (2004)
  • 'Ellen Langwith, silkwoman of London' (with C.M. Barron), The Ricardian, XIII (2003)
  • 'Governors and Governed: the Practice of Power in the Merchant Taylors' Company', in Guilds, Society and Economy in London, 1450-1800, ed. I.A. Gadd and P. Wallis (CMH, London, 2001)
  • 'Artisans, Guilds and Government in London', in Daily Life in the Late Middle Ages, ed. R.H. Britnell (Stroud, 1998)
  • 'The Tailors of London: Corporate Charity in the Late-Medieval Town', in Crown, Government and People in the Fifteenth Century, ed. R.E. Archer (Stroud, 1995)

He has also written the biographies of more than 150 medieval Members of Parliament, as well as a number of constituency surveys, for The History of Parliament: The Commons 1422-1504 (forthcoming)

Contact