About ...

*Early Modern Resources*
About...
Search \| HOME

The original version of this site came into existence in 2000, as part of a set of pages I created as a first-year PhD student. It expanded rapidly (if haphazardly), along with visitor numbers, until I decided in 2002 that it ought to have a permanent home of its own, and thus Early Modern Resources at www.earlymodernweb.org.uk came about. Visitor numbers continue to grow, and it's being linked to by a growing range of sites.

The site was conceived as a gateway site for any one interested in studying the early modern period (c.1500-1800), offering the widest possible range of (free-to-use) links arranged in a user-friendly manner (the basic principles are set out on the home page). That's still its primary purpose, though I add original material as and when I can (on the principle of quality over quantity). It's updated as regularly as a busy schedule will allow. If you find a broken link, please be patient; better still, let me know. If your own site, or one that you really like, is not included, send me the URL. If you feel that the site could be improved in some way, do write with suggestions. As with all these things, it's an ongoing project. By the way, I do not rigorously evaluate the sites listed and make no guarantees about their accuracy or value (although I do avoid complete rubbish) - that's for you to judge. Oh, and nor is the site ever going to be comprehensive (apart from anything else, I don't have the language skills to evaluate non-English-language sites).

As the site has grown, I cannot keep it updated as frequently as I would like. I add new links when I get the chance, and I aim to check the entire site for dead links about twice a year, using a very handy tool called Link Scan. I do not automatically remove apparently dead links on the first failure (although I add a note that the resource was found to be unavailable), because websites can disappear and return (eg, teaching resources for specific courses). They can also move: if you click on a link in this site and get a '404 Not Found' or similar result, it's always worth searching Google to see if that has happened.

I was born in 1967 in Suffolk, England. I left school at 17 and did a succession of dreary jobs, got married and divorced, and returned to full time education in 1994. Most of my higher education has taken place in Wales, at the wonderful seaside town of Aberystwyth (a few links). A foundation year at Coleg Harlech had already whetted my appetite for Welsh history, and it was at Aberystwyth that I was introduced to the mysteries and challenges of the early modern period by a truly inspirational teacher. The serious study of crime and the law followed the discovery, whilst doing my BA dissertation, of a rich set of Welsh legal records - and these became the core of my PhD research. I passed my PhD viva in June 2003, and was just getting used to being 'Dr Howard' when I heard the fantastic news that I'd been awarded a 3-year British Academy Post-doctoral Fellowship, to run from autumn 2003.

1999-2003: PhD, University of Wales Aberystwyth (thesis on 'Crime, community and authority in early modern Wales': thesis blurb)

'Riotous community: crowds, politics and society in Wales, c.1700-1840', Welsh History Review, 20 (2001)

'Imagining the pain and peril of seventeenth-century childbirth: danger and deliverance in the making of an early modern world', Social History of Medicine, 16 (2003)