1 6 MEDIEVAL AGRICULTURE. 



1 have never found any separate payment made for the 

 labour of sowing, and am disposed to believe that this duty 

 was performed by the bailiff himself. Fifty years ago it was 

 generally done by the small farmer in person. The receptacle 

 for the seed was known by the name of seedlep, or more 

 rarely seedcod. The rate sown was about two bushels to the 

 acre of wheat and rye, four bushels of barley, bere or drage, 

 and oats, two bushels of beans, peas, and vetches. Beans 

 were generally dibbled by women. Wheat and some kinds of 

 barley were sown in the winter, and called semen hyemale, 

 but most of the barley and other kinds of grain in the spring, 

 and called semen quadragesimale. 



1 find no trace of harrowing or rolling. But corn was 

 hoed, sometimes by customary service, occasionally by hired 

 labour. It is possible that the hoeing was used as much to 

 break the clods and cover the seed as to remove weeds. 

 The implements used are mattocks and hoes (hercise). 



Hay was mown partly by the regular servants of the farm, 

 partly by the customary tenants, partly by hired labour. This 

 labour was often obtained from a distance. It appears that 

 when the grass was mown the task of tedding and cocking 

 the hay was performed by persons on the spot, for it rarely 

 happens that this service is priced. The hay was gathered 

 into ricks, and, as at present, cut into trusses. It is hardly 

 needful to observe that the grass was all native. It was long 

 after the period before us that artificial or foreign grasses 

 were introduced. Hence the means for supporting winter 

 stock depended upon the supply of hay, and such straw as 

 was available for the animals kept on the farm. The bailiff 

 calculating his resources, killed down for salting, at about 

 St. Martin's day (November nth), as many sheep, oxen, and 

 calves as exceeded his means of sustenance. 



The business of harvest was the most important in the 

 year, and, as at present, occupied a month or six weeks, 

 according to the season. 



The corn appears to have been cut rather high on the stalk, 



