中世纪英国城市人口估算

Estimation on Urban Population in Medieval England

英国中世纪城市人口的数量及其在全国人口中的比例,是一个争议颇大的问题。在中世纪中期的人口城市化水平和中世纪晚期人口城市化是否出现逆转等问题上,经济史与经济社会史、社会经济史之间存在着较大的分歧。研究范式的差异是导致不同结论的主要原因。经济史学家所主张的英国中世纪中期城市人口不足10%以及在中世纪晚期城市变化性质方面的悲观论和乐观论都是片面的。而经济社会史和社会经济史所主张的同时关注小城市,并在此基础上所揭示的中世纪中晚期的城市人口比例以及对中世纪晚期城市持有的综合辨证的态度,是近几十年来英国城市史研究中最有价值的成果之一,更值得我们认真对待。

Urban population and its proportion in medieval England is an issue with much controversy. There are big differences among the opinions of economic history, economic and social history and social and economic history on population urbanizing level in High Middle Ages and population urbanization in late Middle Ages. This article shows that the differences between research paradigms are the main reason to produce various conclusions. It is one - sided that economic historians think that urban population in high Middle Ages was less than 10 percent in England and those pessimistic and optimistic opinions on medieval town changing nature are unilateral, too. Historians of economic and social history and social and economic history insist that attentions should be paid to small towns and urban population＇s proportion in high and late Middle Ages should be revealed on this basis. They also have an integrated and dialectic attitude toward late medieval English towns. All these are one of the most valuable achievements of researches on English urban history in recent decades and are worthy of our serious treatment.