Hello everyone and welcome to the History of England, Episode 1.8 Revival.

Before I pile ahead, some notices for you.

Remember to check out the Agora Podcast Network and the associated website intriguingly named

Agora Podcast Network.com.

And do check out this month's featured Agora Podcast, which is the wonderful Tom Daly's

American Biography.

I think you'll like Tom's Podcast, because it's about the history of the country through

its people, about the lives of people who shaped it and not necessarily the ones you

know was expect.

So give it a go, you can find it on iTunes or the website, AmericanBiographers.webs.com.

And to make it easy, there's a link on my website to boot.

So, this is I confess a bit of a bits and bobs episode, or at least one where we have

a couple of topics.

One of the things we've not covered for a while is the State of Towns in England, so

today we're going to put that right and I can hear the sigh of relief, as I say it.

Then, I thought we might talk about the Northumbrian literary renaissance just briefly.

The historical equivalent of eating ice cream.

Well, sort of anyway.

When we last talked about towns, it was basically to mark their passing and demise.

The big picture was that by 400 all the towns of Rome and Britain had basically ceased

to operate as towns, become more of a meeting place and playground of the very rich and

public administrators.

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