Settlement and Field Structures in continental North-West Europe from the Ninth to the Thirteenth Centuries
Since the eighties and increasingly during the nineties there has been a renewed interest on the continent in medieval rural settlement, mainly among archaeologists and geographers
A Distant World: Russian Relations with Europe Before Peter the Great
Despite their isolation and poverty, the Slavic plowmen succeeded in settling this unforgiving region, expanding their numbers, and, most importantly, creating the beginnings of a trading network along the many rivers of the region—the western Dvina, the Volkhov, the northern Dvina, and the Dniepr and its tributaries.
The Gallic Aristocracy and the Roman Imperial government in the fifth century A.D.
The recovery, however, proved to be too superficial for the continuing prosperity of either Gaul or the Western Roman Empire. The problems of the imperial government continued with little relief. The government still had to drive out and keep out the barbarians…
“A Swarm in July”: Beekeeping Perspectives on the Old English Wið Ymbe Charm
At the same time, however, their differing responses to the remedy attest both to the variation of beekeeping practices and the multivalence of Wið Ymbe itself. The fact that two beekeepers interviewed within two days and two hundred miles of each other can respond differently to the charm’s advice on swarms suggests that we reevaluate unilateral assertions regarding what the text might have meant across the hundreds of years that we now know as the Anglo-Saxon period.
How Great Was the Great Famine of 1314-22: Between Ecology and Institutions
The first aspect to be examined is the extent of harvest failures within different crop sectors. The second issue is to what degree was the Great Famine of 1314-22 a subsistence crisis…My project is based on over 3,000 manorial and monastic accounts compiled between c.1310 and 1350.
The Pennsylvania State University Medieval Garden: Using a Specialized Garden as an Alternative Teaching and Learning Environment
Since its installation, various colleges within the university as well as community groups have used the garden as an alternative classroom for learning activities, educational demonstrations, and events related to the medieval period.
Agricultural wage labour in fifteenth-century England
In the period when agriculture dominated almost every aspect of daily life, the lords and wealthy peasants relied on paid labourers for farming business, yardlanders hired labourers to work with them, whilst moderate and landless villagers worked for hire. Agrarian wage labour is a window on the economy as well as on agricultural society.
Labor Markets After the Black Death: Landlord Collusion and the Imposition of Serfdom in Eastern Europe and the Middle East
The differences in the imposition of serfdom led to different economic and political effects for the peasantry in Europe. In Western Europe, wages rose, grain prices fell, and the consumption of meat, dairy products, and beer increased. More and more peasants moved into a widening “middle class” that could afford to buy manufactured goods.
What work did Viking slaves do?
‘Slave work in general was heavy and dirty’ explains Janken Myrdal in his article ‘Milking and Grinding, Digging and Herding: Slaves and Farmwork 1000-1300’.
Modern nationalism and the medieval sagas
Nineteenth-century romanticism had a special interest in both the medieval world and primitive, untainted rural culture. As the nineteenth century progressed and turned into the early twentieth, the Danes fell more and more under the nostalgic spell, tending to look upon the Icelanders through increasingly romantic and patronizing eyes
Plague And Changes In Medieval European Society And Economy In The 14th And 15th Centuries
Standards of hygiene in the Middle Ages appeared high enough to prevent diseases as medieval Europeans, contrary to popular beliefs, bathed quite often. However, contact with domestic animals, which were frequently kept in the part of the house reserved for human activity, exposed people to animal-related diseases passed to humans via insects.
Religious Orders and Growth through Cultural Change in Pre-Industrial England
The central hypothesis advanced in the present study is that the cultural virtues emphasized by Weber had a pre-Reformation origin in the religious Order of the Cistercians, a Catholic order which spread across Europe as of the 11th century, and that this monastic order served to stimulate growth during the second millennium by encouraging cultural change in local populations.
The Decline of the Cow: Agricultural and Settlement Change in Early Medieval Ireland
This article considers cows and dairying as the basis of value system in early societies, particularly in Ireland.
Innse Gall: Culture and Environment on a Norse Frontier in the Scottish Western Isles
The title of this paper encapsulates a central problem to be faced when looking at the notion of a frontier zone in the islands which fringe western mainland Scotland. It asks if the region was a „Norse frontier‟, yet the territorial designation of the kingdom which encompassed most of the maritime zone from Lewis in the north to Man in the south is given in its medieval Gaelic form.
Famine and Pestilence in the Irish Sea Region, 500–800 AD
Michelle Ziegler examines the questions on why does plagues seemed so much worse in the Middle Ages. Why did medieval populations die so much more frequently? Was it because of malnutrition?
The useful plants of the city of Ferrara (Late Medieval/Renaissance) based on archaeobotanical records from middens and historical/culinary/ethnobotanical documentation
Today the well preserved Medieval centre of Ferrara still has numerous household and kitchen gardens. Nevertheless, a significant number of these plants also have alimentary/medicinal uses, documented both in contemporary historic-literarybotanic sources, and in Italian ethnobotanical sources
The Oldest Danish Book about Gardening
Our knowledge about which plants were cultivated in Denmark in the antiquity and in the Middle Ages is still improving, because of new excavations, studies of archives, better dating methods and macro- and micro- fossil analyses in old cultural layers.
The Plants used in a Viking Age Garden A.D. 800-1050
Overpopulation in the Scandinavian countries created the Viking society, whose tradesmen, settlers and sea warriors had a considerable influences on the European countries. In return, influenced by what they saw, they brought back goods of all kinds, probably also seeds and posssibly plants.
The Rabbit and the Medieval East Anglian Economy
The rabbit was a rare beast in medieval England, and much sought after for both its meat and its fur.
The North Italian Cotton Industry 1200-1800
The versatility of cotton and its adaptability to a wide range of climatic conditions ensured a steady demand among urban and rural consumers linked by extensive commercial networks.
Climate, environment and farming in Ireland during the last two millennia: insights from palaeoecology
Keynote presentation at ‘Study of Irish Historic Settlement, Climate, Environment, Settlement and Society: changing historic patterns in Ireland’ conference
A Quiet Revolution – The Horse in Agriculture, 1100-1500
The partnership of man and horse on the land goes back a long time, but, as John Langdon shows, it was not until after the Conquest that the horse really began to come into its own.
The cost of enclosure and the benefits of convertible husbandry among peasant holdings in medieval England
The present paper will attempt to address these issues and outline the attitudes of the peasantry in regard to the potential of enclosing land and adopting convertible husbandry.