Richard M. Smith BA, MA, PhD, FBA

Emeritus Professor of Historical Geography and Demography and Fellow of Downing College

Historical Demographer and Historical Population Geographer, working on the history of marriage patterns in medieval and early modern Europe, peasant inheritance practices and social networks in medieval England. The long-term development of mortality patterns in England and Europe, the history of ageing and the impact of welfare practices on demographic behaviour in both past and contemporary societies have been more recent interests.

Biography

Career:

1973-1974 : Plymouth Polytechnic
1974-1983: University of Cambridge
1983-1994: University of Oxford
1994-present: University of Cambridge
- 2007-2010 Head of Department, Department of Geography

Qualifications

BA University College London
MA University of Oxford
PhD University of Cambridge

Research

Richard Smith's earliest research was on medieval English peasant inheritance practices and their impact on property exchanges and social and kinship networks. Subsequently his Interests extended to consider the problems of the use of manorial court rolls for the analysis of medieval marriage practices.

His research has moved in more recent years to the interface between historical demography and the social history of medicine. He has worked on the history of ageing, particularly on the social and economic position of the elderly comparatively in European and non-European societies. His research has been concerned in part with the structure of wealth flows within the family to and from the elderly as well as the significance of support systems for the elderly that are based on non-familial exchanges within communities.

In recent years he has worked extensively on the position of the elderly under medieval customary law and the English Old Poor Law. Theoretical issues that flow from this work concern the value of children in social systems where wealth flows within the family do not move from young to old. He has recently completed a monograph on the historical demography of Medieval England and is working collaboratively with Jim Oeppen and Ros Davies on research projects that attempt to measure the impact of life course shocks on adult longevity, with particular in testing the 'Barker thesis concerning the impact of in utero conditions on life expectation.

Another project concerns the patterns of inherited fertility and mortality. Both projects make use of family reconstitutions and genealogies relating to British, French and German populations c. 1600-1900. The English research on these projects also involves the linking of poor law data with demographic data on individuals in family reconstitutions. The work is being funded by grants from Leverhulme Trust and the Wellcome Trust.

He has recently completed a collaborative project assessing the impact of the English Poor Law on economic growth c. 1700-1840 in which comparisons are made with the economic impact of community-level welfare programmes in South Africa and Kerala. He has begun new research (funded by ESRC) on the links between cereal output as measured by tithe payments and demographic trends in England from c. 1300 and 1530.

The Demographic History of Medieval England

Research on issues to do with the measurement of marriage age and incidence, adult mortality and migration and the development of methodologies to exploit legal records for demographic purposes and to utilise incomplete historical records.

Correlated Demographic Behaviour in Families

This research investigates patterns of correlated demographic behaviour in families in historical populations. Project uses three existing historical databases to examine correlations of mortality and fertility patterns within and between family generations in the past. Changes in mortality and fertility can be the result of a shift in all families, or a change in the extremes of the distribution, and their relative contributions may change over time. This study adds familial variability to the usual period, age and sex-specific analyses of the historical changes in survival and fertility. (undertaken jointly with J. Oeppen and R. Davies)

Life course influences upon longevity and fertility

This research project attempts to contribute to an area of current debate in epidemiology and demography. The key question to be investigated is 'How in the past did events over the life-course of an individual affect their survival in adult and older years'? Use is made of historical life-time data that are linked across generations from England, France and Germany. Work is being undertaken in collaboration with a Swedish scholar. (Undertaken jointly with J. Oeppen and R. Davies)

Publications

Selected publications:

Smith, R.M and Solar, P. (2003) 'An Old Poor Law for the New Europe? Reconciling Local Solidarity with Labour Mobility in Early Modern England', in P.A. David and M. Thomas (eds) The Economic Future in Historic Perspective. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 463-477.
Smith, R.M. (2002), 'Social institutions and demographic regimes in non-industrial societies: a comparative approach', in: H. Macbeth and D. Collinson (eds.) Human Population Dynamics Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 112-131.
Smith, R.M. (2002), 'The Social Policy: Malthus, Welfare and Poverty', in Anmagritt Jensen (ed) Visiting Malthus. Trondheim, Paulson, pp 80-99
Smith, R.M. (2001), 'Welfare of the Individual and the Group: Malthus and Externalities', Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 145 , pp. 402-414
Smith, R.M. (2001), 'Plagues and Peoples: The long demographic cycle 1250-1670.' in: P. Slack (ed.) The Peopling of Britain. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 177-209
Smith, R.M. (2000), 'Simulating the past: SOCSIM and CAMSIM and their applications in family and demographic history', in: T.J. Coppock (ed.) Information Technology and the Scholarly Disciplines. Oxford, British Academy, 95-106
Smith, R.M. (2000), 'Relative prices, forms of agrarian labour and female marriage patterns in England, 1350-1800.' in: J. Devos and L. Kennedy (eds.) Marriage and rural economy: Westerm Europe since 1400. Brussels, Brepols, 19-48
Smith, R.M., Horden, P. (1998), 'Introduction,' in : R.M. Smith and P. Horden (eds.) The Locus of Care: Families, communities, institutions and the provision of welfare since antiquity London,. Routledge, 1-20
Smith, R.M., Horden, P. (1998) (eds) The Locus of care: Families, communities, institutions and the provision of welfare since antiquity. London, Routledge, pp. 287
Smith, R.M. (1998), 'The English Peasantry 1250-1650.'in : T. Scott (ed) The Peasantries of Europe from the Fourteenth to the Eighteenth Centuries. London, Longman, 339-371
Smith, R.M. (1998), 'Ageing and well-being in early modern England: pension trends and gender preferences under the English Old Poor Law c. 1650-1800.' in: P. Johnson and P. Thane (eds) Old Age from antiquity to post-modernity. London, Routledge, 64-95

Teaching

Geographical Tripos (Undergraduate Level—Historical Geography and Historical Demography)
MPhil in Geographical Research
MPhil in Economic and Social History
PhD supervision in Historical Demography, Agrarian History and Historical Geography

External activities

Co-editor, Economic History Review
Co-editor of Cambridge Studies in Population, Economy and Society in Past Time
Editorial board of Continuity and Change
Editorial board of The History of the Family