Peter Coss is Professor of Medieval History, School of History and Archaeology, Cardiff University.

'This book is in the very best tradition of British medieval scholarship. Its conclusions are based on scrupulous empirical reasoning, but they are also framed with a wide historiographical context … this is a great book.' History

• List of illustrations; Preface; 1. The formation of the English gentry; 2. The roots of the English gentry; 3. The Angevin legacy: knights as jurors and as agents of the state in the reign of Henry III; 4. The crisis of the knightly class revisited; 5. Knights in politics: minor landowners and the state in the reign of Henry III; 6. Knighthood, justice and the early Edwardian polity; 7. The explosion of commissions and its consequences; 8. Identity and the gentry; 9. Knights, esquires and the origins of social gradation in England; 10. Crystallisation: the emergence of the gentry; Appendices; Bibliography; Index.

Peter Coss is Professor of Medieval History, School of History and Archaeology, Cardiff University.

'This book is in the very best tradition of British medieval scholarship. Its conclusions are based on scrupulous empirical reasoning, but they are also framed with a wide historiographical context … this is a great book.' History

• List of illustrations; Preface; 1. The formation of the English gentry; 2. The roots of the English gentry; 3. The Angevin legacy: knights as jurors and as agents of the state in the reign of Henry III; 4. The crisis of the knightly class revisited; 5. Knights in politics: minor landowners and the state in the reign of Henry III; 6. Knighthood, justice and the early Edwardian polity; 7. The explosion of commissions and its consequences; 8. Identity and the gentry; 9. Knights, esquires and the origins of social gradation in England; 10. Crystallisation: the emergence of the gentry; Appendices; Bibliography; Index.