Ch. 17 Flashcards
open-field system
Middle Ages - 1600’s
Sustained fairly large numbers of people but did not produce a surplus
This leads to soil exhaustion
clover
Restored nitrogen directly to the soil through its roots
soil exhaustion
Wheat depletes nitrogen
Land recovers with a fallow period in which clover and other grasses spring up, restoring nutrients to the soil and providing food for the livestock
Early Middle Ages: year of crops, year of fallow
Three-year rotations
Year of wheat or rye -> year of oats or beans -> year of fallow
communal patterns of farming
Reinforced by traditional village rights
Open meadows for natural hay and pasture
Gleaning of grain: picking up single grains fallen during harvest
At the end of the 17th century, at least 80% of the people of Western Europe grew their livelihoods from agriculture (with the exception of the Dutch Republic and England - McKay’s “A History of Western Society”
Proof of agrarian society
Serfdom in Europe
Eastern Europe: serfdom
Western Europe: freedom; in France, western Germany, England, and the Low Countries peasants could own land and pass it on to their children.
By 1700 less than half the population of Britain and the Dutch Republic worked in agriculture and produced enough to feed the rest - McKay
Old agriculture methods were ineffective
New ways of rotating crops
*Maintain lands in continuous cultivation
Alternate grain with crops that restore nutrients to the soil like beans, peas, root crops (turnips and potatoes), clover, and other grasses.
more fodder -> more animals -> more manure and fertilizer to restore the soil; more meat and dairy products; more power to pull plows and carts
potatoes
Came to Europe through the Colombian Exchange
Easy to grow and very replenishing; common among peasants
methodical farming
New experiments fueled by developments in the Scientific revolution
enclosure
Fencing common fields into individual shares
This leads to new agricultural technologies and experimentation (PRO)
Leads to proletarianization (CON)
In France and Germany, open fields remain; in the Low Countries and England enclosure is adopted
This led to the rise of capitalist market-oriented estate agriculture
Dutch agriculture
One of the most densely populated areas in Europe -> demand for effective farming
Increase cultivated area through draining of marshes and swamps
Variety of crops
Enclosed fields
Manure as fertilizer
Continuous crop rotation
Adopted by the English
The pressure of population caused the growth of towns and cities. Amsterdam grew from 30,000 to 200,00 inhabitants in the 17th century - McKay
Proof of population growth = demand for farm products
Cornelius Vermyuden
Dutch engineer; conducts a drainage project in Yorkshire and another in Cambridgeshire
In the Cambridge fens, Vermyuden and his workers reclaimed 40,000 acres through drainage - McKay
Proof of Vermyuden’s work
Jethro Tull
English innovator and Enlightenment thinker
Empirical research to develop better methods
Use of horses over oxen
Sowing seeds with drilling equipment
Charles Townshed
English innovator
Continuous crop rotation using wheat, turnips, barley, and clover.
Robert Bakewell
Selective breeding of ordinary livestock
Before 1700 more than half of the farmland was enclosed through private initiatives. In 1760-1815 a series of acts of Parliament enclosed most of the remaining common land. - McKay
Prood of the extensive English acceptance of the enclosure movement
Arthur Young
English agricultural experimentalist
Large-scale enclosure is necessary to achieve progress
Political Arithmetic
Why enclosure is amazing
Young
proletarianization
Transformation of large numbers of small peasant farmers into landless rural wage earners
Improvements in technology = fewer laborers needed = unemployment = many move to the city and work in factories
By the mid 16th century much of Europe had returned to its pre-plague population levels.
Proof of population re-balancing
European price revolution
Period of inflation intensified by the inflow of America’s precious metals; substantially lowered living standards
*PUEDE SER COMPLEXITY
During the 17th century population grew modestly at a rate of 0.5% - 1% per year, or enough to double the population in 70-140 years
Proof birth and death return to a balance
Causes of demographic crisis
Famine: low crop yields and unpredictable weather conditions (in the 17th century much of Europe experienced unusually cold and wet weather)
Epidemic disease: typhus, smallpox, bubonic plague, syphilis, etc.
War (and its indirect effects): contagious diseases passed on by soldiers; farmlands, crops, and livestock are destroyed; soldiers appropriate food supplies and disrupt the agricultural cycle
In famine years the number of deaths soared above normal. 1/3 of the village’s population may disappear in a year or 2. - McKay
Proof of famine and population loss
During the Thirty Years’ War, the number of inhabitants in the German state declined by more than 2/3 in some large areas and by at least 1/3 almost everywhere else - McKay
Proof of war and population loss
Europe: 120M in 1700 to 190M in 1800
Spain: 7.6M in 1700 to 10.5M in 1800
France: 18M in 1715 to 26M in 1789
England: 6M in 1750 to 10M+ in 1800
- Crash Course AP European History by Larry Krieger
Proof of population explosion in Europe
From 1700 to 1835 the population doubled in size - McKay
Proof of population explosion in Europe
Women had more babies because new opportunities for employment in rural industry allowed them to marry at an earlier age (especially in England) - McKay
Why there were more births
Causes of growth in the 18th century
More babies and fewer deaths
Why was there less death
Unexplained disappearance of the bubonic plague, which killed up to 100,000 (it disappeared in 1722, the last time it fell on western and central Europe)
Vaccine against smallpox, a disease that killed about 400,000 people in Europe each year
Improvements in water supply and sewage: reduce diseases in urban areas
Drainage of swamps: reduces insect population (flies and mosquitos which spread disease)
Canal and roadbuilding in Western Europe: lessened the impact of local crop failure and famine, emergency supplies could be brought in faster
Wars become less destructive; monarchs try to avoid civil wars
Advances in agricultural production
Cottage industry
Industrial Revolution in the rural area; artisans
Putting-out system
In the 18th century, a rural work system where merchants lent raw materials to cottage workers existed. Workers processed the materials and returned finished products to merchants.
Pros included low wages, unregulated work, and more product experimentation.
Cons were slow labor, controversies between merchants and workers, and the lowest possible wages paid to workers by merchants with police powers.
By 1500 half of England’s textiles were being produced in the countryside. By 1700 English industry was generally more rural than urban and heavily reliant on the putting-out system. - McKay
Until the 19th century, the industry that employed the most people in Europe was textiles - McKay
Proof of successful development of the putting-out system in England and the textile industry
John Kay
Improved the loom with the flying shutter
All members of the family helped in the work, so that “every person from 7-80 (who retained sight and could move their hands) would earn their bread” - 18th century English observer
-McKay’s book
Handloom weaving was a family enterprise
Operating the loom was considered a man’s job and was done by the head of the family; women and children work at auxiliary tasks
In England’s Yorkshire wool industry, a male wool comber earned 12 or more while women earned 3 1/2 shillings. - McKay
Women’s wages were usually much lower than men’s because they were not considered the family’s primary wage owner
spinsters
Widows and single women who spun thread in their spare time
Usually struggle with poverty
Consumer economy
Families work to buy, not produce
Women and children are introduced to wage work
Women and children do wage work
Some say it’s exploitation; others say women choose to work to gain small economic independence.
guild system
Organization of artisanal production into trade-based associations
The growth of rural industry undermines these institutions since they accept anyone
Served as social and religious functions
Jean Baptiste Colbert
France’s finance minister during Louis XIV’s rule; revived urban guilds and used them to encourage high-quality production and collect taxes
The number of guilds in the city of Paris grew from 60 (1672) to 129 (1691) -McKay
Reviving urban guilds
Guilds restricted their membership to Christian men who had several years of work experience, paid membership fees, and completed a masterpiece -McKay
guild exclusivity
Guild’s importance in society
England: national regulations superseded guild rules
France: rely on guilds for taxes and enforcement of quality standards, yet allow non-guild production to flourish
Germany: The most powerful European guilds, the most conservative, protested the encroachment of non-guild workers
Adam Smith
Free competition gives all citizens equal rights to excel.
Self-interest in a competitive market is encouraged
Unregulated capitalism is not it: the government must intervene to raise living standards.
Division of labor is advocated for.
The government has three duties: defense, funding public works, and maintaining civil order.
Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
Smith
The idea of freedom of enterprise
Basis for modern economics
Economic liberalism
Belief in free trade and competition based on Smith’s argument that the invisible hand of free competition would benefit all individuals
Anne-Robert Jacques Turgot
French economics minister for Louis XV; made an edict that abolished all French guilds; his reforms were cancelled
*National Assembly definitively abolished guilds in 1791
mercantilism
Aimed at increasing state power and creating a favorable balance of foreign trade (in order to increase a country’s stock of gold)
Navigation Acts
English laws controlled imports to Britain and its colonies.
Colonists had to use British or American ships and buy almost all European goods from Britain.
This aimed to eliminate foreign competition and develop a skilled shipping industry.
Anglo-Dutch wars
Britain won; seize new Amsterdam in 1664 and renamed it New York
Britain vs. France
War of Spanish Succession: Ends in the Peace of Utrecht; Spain gives Britain control of its West African slave trade and lets Britain send one ship of merchandise into the Spanish colonies annually
War of Austrian Succession: nothing changes between France and Britain
Seven Years’ War: ends in Treaty of Paris; France gives Britain their Indian territory (except for Pondicherry)
triangle trade
European commodities to Africa -> enslaved Africans to colonies -> colonial goods to Europe
