Murder in a Landscape: The Significance of the Death of Henry Flackett in the Staffordshire Moorlands in 1515

ABSTRACT The history of crime offers us insights into private vengeance, community cohesion, social tensions, the defence of honour and property disputes. Henry Flackett of Stanshope in Alstonefield, Staffordshire, was killed by three assailants known to him in 1515, provoked by a contested heap of manure. A combination of sources provides an unusually vivid and detailed picture of the crime, in which gentry honour played a part, provoking an attempt to enforce the law through the conventional channels of inquest, common law, and equity courts. The event is set in the context of the society, economy and landscape of the Staffordshire Moorlands in a period of agrarian change.