Department of History
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Dr Evan Jones
Senior Lecturer in Economic and Social History
Office: G2, 26 St Michael's Park: Consultation hours
Tel: 0117 928 8971
Email: evan.jones@bristol.ac.uk
Research Interests
Specialises in late medieval -early modern maritime history, particularly in relation to Bristol. His current research interests lie in three main areas:
The illicit trade of early modern England. To this end he is working on a book entitled: Inside the Illicit Economy: Reconstructing the Smugglers' Trade of Sixteenth Century Bristol. His earlier work in this field was published in Economic History Review and has been the subject of feature-length programmes on BBC Radio 3 and 4.
Irish overseas trade and economic development in the sixteenth century. This research is connected to his former ESRC-funded project Ireland-Bristol Trade in the Sixteenth Century (2006-2008). He is currently preparing two articles, which are outputs of this project.
Bristol's fifteenth-sixteenth century voyages of discovery. He has written four articles in this field and is now running a small research project, entitled The Cabot Project, to push forward the research.
Research Supervision
He welcomes proposals on the social or economic aspects of Bristol's medieval or early modern past. He would also be happy to supervise work on the maritime history of these periods, or on other aspects of Britain's pre-modern transport history. He has supervised two research students to completion and is currently the lead or co-supervisor for six others:
- Susan Flavin, 'Consuming Ireland: A study of Irish consumption in the sixteenth century' (PhD)
- David Sivier, 'The development of Bridgwater in the medieval and early modern period' (PhD)
- Richard Stone, 'The trade of Bristol in the Civil War and Interregnum' (MLitt/PhD)
- John Reeks, 'Somerset during the Civil War' (MLitt/PhD)
- Rachel Granville, 'Channel counties and seabourne trade during England’s commercial expansion, 1660-80. A study of amateur journalists’ reports from the English Channel coastline' (MLitt/PhD)
- Chris Heal, 'The hatting industry of Bristol & South Gloucestershire 1570-1900' (MPhil)
Completed theses:
- David Jones, ‘John Whitson (c.1557-1629): ‘the best type of merchant’?’ (MPhil, 2006)
- Duncan Taylor, 'Sixteenth-century maritime trade of the smaller ports of the Bristol Channel' (PhD, 2010)
Teaching
He will be on research leave in 2010/11 and will not be running any units.
Selected Publications
'Henry VII and the Bristol expeditions to North America: the Condon documents', Historical Research, 83 (August, 2010), 444-455. First published in 'Early View', August 2009. Copies of this article are available for free from the journal.
Susan Flavin & Evan T. Jones (eds.), Bristol’s Trade with Ireland and the Continent: The Evidence of the Exchequer Customs Accounts (Dublin, 2009), c.1,106 pp.
'The Journal of the Voyage of the Marigold to Iceland, 1654' in S. Rose (ed.), The Naval Miscellany, Vol. VII, Navy Records Society, Vol. 153 (2008).
'Alwyn Ruddock: "John Cabot and the Discovery of America "', Historical Research, 81, (May, 2008), 224-254. Copies of this article are available for free from the journal. This article was first published online in April 2007.
'The Matthew of Bristol and the financiers of John Cabot's 1497 voyage to North America', English Historical Review, 121 (2006), 778-95. An Abstract, HTML version and PDF copy are all freely available from the journal.
'Charting the world of English fishermen in early modern Iceland', Mariner's Mirror, 90 (2004). An electronic pre-print of this preface is available on ROSE.
'Illicit business: accounting for smuggling in mid-sixteenth century Bristol', Economic History Review, 54 (2001). Winner of the Economic History Society's "T.S. Ashton Prize" in 2001. It is available as an E-Print on ROSE.
'River navigation in medieval England', Journal of Historical Geography, 26 (2000).
'England's Icelandic fishery in the early modern period' in D. J. Starkey et al. (eds.), England's Sea Fisheries: The Commercial Sea Fisheries of England and Wales since 1300 (Chatham Press, 2000). An E-Print of this chapter is available on ROSE.
'Bristol and Newfoundland, 1490-1570', Cabot and His World Symposium: June 1997 (Newfoundland Historical Society, 1999).
Electronic Publications
He has placed a number his own document transcriptions online, or in ROSE, for the use of both his students and other researchers. These include:
- John Esterfeld vs. William Weston of Bristol: Chancery petition transcript, c.1499
- Bristol 'particular' accounts / port books of the sixteenth century
- The Journal of the Marigold, 1654 (e-version). This is an E-Print available on ROSE. It replaces an earlier version of this journal, which was available from this website.
- Fr. Giovanni Antonio de Carbonariis vs. Sheriffs of London: Chancery petition transcript, c.1496 (2006)
- Robert Ricart's Chronicle of Bristol, 1480-1508
- Customs Account: The Matthew of Bristol, 1503/4
- Survey of Bristol Ships, 16 January 1513
- Bridgwater Port Survey, 14 May 1565
- Bristol Port Survey, 21 May 1565
- Survey of Smuggling in Bristol, 1565
- Petition reply re. Gloucester, 1584
His unpublished thesis is also available online:
- 'The Bristol shipping industry in the sixteenth century' (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Edinburgh, 1998)
Full Publications
Full list of Dr Jones's publications as held in the University's IRIS publications database
Note: some of the documents on this page are in PDF format. In order to view a PDF you will need Adobe Acrobat Reader