Medieval farmers sought first and foremost to ensure that their landholdings provided a
means of sustenance, and wherever possible, at least by the twelfth and thirteenth centuries …

Whilst manure and manuring have not been singled out for special study, for medieval
economic historians regular mentions in the financial and legal records of each estate have …

By MAVIS MATE the heyday of high farming several treatises were written giving advice on
husbandry, estate management and accounting. 1 While such manuals gave detailed …

Demesne mills in medieval England obtained their millstones from many sources on the
continent, in Wales, and in England. The most prized were French stones, usually fetched by …

Marling has usually been viewed by British historians either as a practice of no clearly
identifiable purpose, or as an exercise designed to add body to light soils. It has also been …

Increased storage capacity was an essential part of demesne farming in England, as many
surviving barns indicate. Their size facilitated their use also as winter workplaces for …

If peasant land had been only as productive as demesne land at the turn of the fourteenth
century, most English peasants would not have been able to make a living, since their …

A reappraisal of the evidence for hays in medieval England questions current explanations
of their nature and function and concludes that they were not always associated with …

The post-enclosure farms of the Chalk Wolds (Fig. l) of the East Riding of Yorkshire are
characterised by their large size and by the thinness and fragility of their soils. In 1788 the …

The discovery of agriculture marks the greatest advance in the history of mankind—
comparable only to that which has followed the discovery of electricity and the invention of …