SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY 



The average value of wheat throughout England between 1590 and 1600 

 seems to have been about six times its amount a hundred years earlier, 185 

 while wool had about trebled in price. 126 This depreciation in the value of 

 money, added to the breakdown in customary rents already mentioned, natu- 

 rally increased the price of land to an unprecedented extent. Its full effect 

 appears towards the end of the reign of Elizabeth, when 3^. ^d. per acre seems 

 to have been a low price for arable, and 1 6s. was a common price for meadow. 187 



Although Nottingham appears to have shared with the rest of England 

 in the increase of prices already mentioned, yet as before those prices remained 

 somewhat below the average. As late as 1566 a cow is valued at only ^zs. 

 and a sheep at is. 6d. ; wool appears to have been only about $%d. per Ib. 

 in i577, 128 and between 1591 and 1601 Worksop wool averages only about 

 i8j. $%d. to the 'tod.' 189 On the other hand, when any record is found of the 

 price of corn it seems to have been about up to the average. In 1536 wheat 

 was u. j\.d. a bushel, dearer as usual when measured in small quantities ; rye 

 I4</., and peas jd. The last was cheap, an important fact for Nottingham 

 people, who are said to have lived to a considerable extent on pea bread. Oats 

 were dear, being 4J. 130 



On the other hand, in 1586, a year of general high prices, wheat seems 

 to have been lower than in many places. It averaged about 2.6s. 8d. per 

 quarter. In 1587, however, when general prices had gone down, those in 

 Nottinghamshire had risen. Barley, perhaps the most important grain, 

 seems on an average of twelve prices taken from seven different places 

 to have been about iqs. 4^. the quarter, 131 decidedly above the average 

 price (IQJ. 6f</.) throughout England. 132 That prices were not higher 

 still in Nottingham in this year of dearth was attributed by the magis- 

 trates to the action of the Earl of Rutland, 133 who brought corn from the 

 distant parts of England, such as Tiverton, and sold it to the poor at less 

 than the market price. Further, Nottinghamshire did not depend wholly on 

 her own supplies : when the price rose, corn came plentifully from other 

 counties up the Trent. 134 Supplies came also by other roads. Every 

 summer carts appeared from the neighbouring counties bringing grain, which 

 they exchanged for coal from the mines of Wollaton and Selston, to be con- 

 veyed back by the same carts. The coming of the coal carts, as they were 

 called, was the signal for the lowering of the price of food in Nottingham- 

 shire. Even in the time of dearth in 161923 the Nottinghamshire magi- 

 strates declared they had no fear of future scarcity, owing to this trade, which 

 made storehouses for corn unnecessary. 135 This commerce was obviously a 

 steady source of supply. It is alluded to again and again in the magistrates' 

 reports of this period, and that of 1630 i; 136 and its importance to the 

 general well-being of Nottinghamshire appears in the statement in 1631 that 



'"Thorold Rogers, Hist, of Agric. and Prices, iv, 292 ; v, 276. '"Ibid, iv, 328 ; v, 407. 



'"e.g. Kingston. Rentals and Surv. ptfo. I, no. 3. Similar prices appear to have existed during the 

 earlier part of the 1 7th century. At Dunham and Ragnall the rent for arable land varied from 3/. \d. to \s. \d. 

 per acre, and for meadow it remained at lot. to izs. from about 1619 to 1665, while pasture appears to have 

 been about l$s. \d. an acre. (Add. MSS. 36981. Particular of Ragnall, &c.) 



'* Rec. of Borough ofNott. iv, 168. '"Thorold Rogers, Hilt, of Agric. and Prices, v, 409. 



150 L. and P. Hen. fill, xi, 1155. "'S.P. Dom. Eliz. cxcviii, 57. 



'"Thorold Rogers, Hist, of Agie. and Prices, v, 268. 1M Cal. S.P. Dom. 1581-90, p. 333. 



'"S.P. Dom. Eliz. cxc, 14. '" Cal. S.P. Dom. 1619-23, p. 130. 



' M S P. Dom. Chas. I, clxxxix, 12 ; ibid. Jas. I, cxl, 10. 



283 



