552 AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS, TOOLS, ETC. 



one of these are before the Plague, and are worth on an average 

 nearly 6\d. One bought in 1383 is valued at 6d. The entries 

 of hammers and mallets are too scanty for purposes of in- 

 ference. Thus one hammer is valued at f d., the other at 6d, ; 

 one mallet at if;/., the other, which is further described as 

 made of iron, at lod. Wedges were known, though rarely 

 quoted. An entry will be found, however, under the year 1371, 

 when a do^en are valued at 6d. each. They probably contained 

 about 3 Ibs. of iron apiece. Lastly, I may add a billhook from 

 the year 1363, which cost is., and another from 1389, bought 

 for 6d. 



In the back yard of the farm-house, and, generally speaking, 

 close to the outer door, stood the well. My accounts give some 

 entries of iron-bound well-buckets, chiefly however from Wol- 

 ford, bought at an average of \\d. One from Apuldrum in the 

 year 1373 cost 8^. 



There are yet a few articles of a various character which 

 deserve a short comment. 1 find hog-rings bought on two occa- 

 sions, in 1360 and 1374, but at very different prices, at i\d. 

 the hundred in one case, and 6d. in the other. 



Knives were needed for kitchen use. Three of these before 

 the Plague are worth about 4!^. on an average ; one is bought 

 afterwards for yd. Again, five knives, called great kitchen 

 knives, are bought, in the first half of the fourteenth century, 

 at rather more than is. each. So also wooden pestles and 

 mortars were used. Four of these are purchased in the early 

 part of the period at an average of about $d.; one mortar, 

 described as stone, costs 6s. %d. in 1399, was bought by the 

 canons of Bicester, and was probably intended for the monastic 

 kitchen. 



It has been already observed that brass utensils, being rela- 

 tively cheap, were much used in manor-houses, and formed an 

 important item in the personal property of the lord or the 

 farmer. Nine brass pots ? called c ollse,' one of which is in all 

 likelihood a copper, are worth on an average 55-. io\d. ; and 

 probably also on an average contained each about five gallons. 



