XXV111 INTRODUCTION 



The most important difference from the text as printed 

 is that this MS. contains a passage on the respective cost 

 of ploughing on the two field and three field systems. It 

 is an interesting sentence, and has been printed as note 1 

 on p. 8. From this it appears that when the two field 

 system was in use the field under crop was partly used for 

 wheat or rye, and partly for barley or oats ; not entirely 

 devoted to wheat or rye, as one might have supposed. It 

 also shows that, although a much larger area was under 

 crop in each year when the three field system was used, the 

 expense of ploughing was the same on each system. If the 

 land was laid out in two fields of 80 acres each, there would 

 be 40 acres to plough before the wheat was sown, 40 more 

 before the barley was sown, and 80 to be ploughed twice 

 over in June, when the stubble of the second field was 

 broken up and it was left fallow, i.e. 40 + 40 + (80 x 2) = 240. 

 If the three field system were used, there would be 60 acres 

 to plough before the wheat sowing, 60 acres to plough 

 before the barley sowing, and 60 acres to plough twice over 

 when the stubble was broken up in June, i.e. 60 + 60 

 -f (60 x 2) = 240. This sentence occurs in most of the MSS. 

 of the Beading group, but not in the two copies written at 

 Eeading itself; it is also found in the Liber Horn, and in 

 the Canterbury MSS., but it does not occur in the Heralds' 

 College MS. It may perhaps be suggested that it occurred 

 in the original text, but that the sentence was omitted by 

 the copyists, for whom it had ceased to have a practical 

 interest. In so far as the three field system had been 

 thoroughly established on any set of estates, this comparison 

 of the cost of the two modes of cultivation would be of little 

 importance, and it may have been omitted on this account. 

 This suggestion might possibly be confirmed or disproved 

 by an examination of the evidence as to the manner in 

 which the Canterbury, Luffield, and Reading estates were 

 cultivated in the fourteenth century, if the necessary evi- 

 dence is available. 



(18) Dd. vii. 14 f. 228. This is a parchment folio 

 written in the fourteenth century, and containing Bracton, 



