< Back to previous page

Publication

No second lord. Agriculture and climatic variability in the Late medieval Low Countries

Book Contribution - Chapter

Agriculture is often considered the vital nexus between climate, climate variabilityand climate change on the one hand, and societal impact on the other. Afterall, pre-1850 societies were agrarian societies and the impact of weather condi‐tions is most immediately felt in agriculture. Farmers are particularly sensitiveto weather conditions, in the past as well as today. Both arable farming andanimal husbandry, and both production or output and productivity, are directlyaffected by the weather. And yet, surprisingly few efforts have been made tounravel the interaction between climate and agriculture in the past, at least for the Late Medieval Low Countries. This chapter aims to provide some new insights into the complex interaction between climate (or weather) andagriculture, focusing on its single most important product: cereals. It will do so by juxtaposing the new year-to-year reconstructions of summer weather conditionswith the available data on cereal yields and harvest volumes.
Book: Communities, environment and regulation in the premodern world: essays in honour of Peter Hoppenbrouwers / Weeda, C.[edit]; Stein, R. [edit], Sicking, L. [edit]
Pages: 71 - 98
ISBN:978-2-503-59446-0
Publication year:2022
Keywords:H1 Book chapter
Accessibility:Open