By looking at the definition, prosecution and punishment of crime, historians can learn a great deal about how a society comprehends itself.  The records of crime are records of social breakdown, personal moral failure, and economic or political desperation. They provide a negative image of shared values relating to public order, morality, and good citizenship.  The world of medieval crime and punishment bears some comparison with our own – much in our systems of law and morality was born in this period – but there are also striking differences, such as the frequent use of capital punishment, the heavy involvement of local communities in defining and dealing with crime, and the class, gender and ethnic disparities underlying medieval thinking about morality and crime.  This course will allow students to research individual crimes or groups of crimes including: homicide, infanticide, theft, prostitution, rape, abduction, heresy, treason, defamation, noble disorder, criminal gangs, and economic crimes such as piracy and poaching.  Case studies in these crimes can be linked to thematic studies on the role of the local community, the influence of class and gender, the aims of punishment, crime in literature, concepts of public order, and the use of legal records to study social relations.  The prescribed texts include an exciting mixture of legal records (from royal, urban, church and manorial courts), outlaw and prison literature (including the Robin Hood ballads), letters and chronicles.  This is a major topic in current historical research, with a vibrant and developing secondary literature.