The English cottage is an icon for our times. Whether a harmonious blend of timber-frame and thatch or golden Cotswold stone, it symbolizes country life at its most seductive - a chance to return to the rural Eden that was lost to most of us with the Industrial Revolution.

The picture of cottage life is an attractive and enduring one that has fascinated writers and artists for the last two hundred years. But this book shows that life in the English country cottage was far from being the idyll that many of us suppose. From the medieval village right through to the twentieth century, the author traces the history of the cottage, exploring how cottages came to be built, and how their appearance was affected by social forces and changing trends.

But the focus is firmly on people: how cottage dwellers spent their time, how they were treated by their social superiors, what they ate and where they slept, and how they decorated and furnished their homes. Life in the English Country Cottage is a history of both the myth and the reality of life for the majority of the population over the last seven centuries.