Published in association with the internationally renowned Centre for Urban History at Leicester University, this series focuses on the towns and cities of Britain to provide a wide ranging introduction to recent research in this field. Between 1820 and 1914 the economy and society of Britain became more heavily urbanised that ever before. Not only did the shift of population to ever-larger towns intensify, but fundamental changes took place within towns themselves and in the relationship of urban places to British society as a whole. The Victorian City brings together 12 recent key articles, prefaced by a substantial general Introduction, to analyse how and why these changes occurred and what problems and opportunities they created. The final title to appear in this four-volume series and the one with much the largest potential readership, Deals with the British urban experience of the period: previous volumes were exclusively English. Not merely a rich survey of The Victorian City: the contributors and the contributions add up to a cross-section of the best writing, and most modern approaches, in urban history as a discipline today. Not just for urban historians: for the first time in its history Britain became progressively an industrial society in the 19th century, with the city at the heart of it, so this is a book of mainstream importance for social, economic and political historians as well. Each article is prefaced by a headnote, and the entire collection is set in context by the editors' Introduction, which is a major contribution to Victorian urban historiography in its own right.