EMIGRATION FROM SWEDEN 19 



grain, is specially sensitive, and disastrous night frosts occur not infrequently even 

 during late summer, as early even as July. 



As causes of failure of the crops in earlier times the sources indicate some* 

 times hard drought during early summer, sometimes incessant rain during harvest* 

 time, sometimes, finally, severe night frosts. When the misfortune came, some or 

 all of these factors might cooperate. 



Were the Scandinavians of prehistoric times dependant to as great an extent 

 as during the historical period on the products of agriculture and cattle»rearing 

 for their sustenance? 



Only a generation ago it was still considered that our ancestors lived mainly 

 by hunting and fishing and moved from one place to another to seek their prey. 

 And this idea seems even now to be rather common. The investigations of the 

 last decades have shown, however, that at least from the beginning of the later 

 stone age the people of Scandinavia were settled and that their domestic economy 

 was based chiefly on agriculture, which gave them the vegetable nutrition, and 

 cattle«rearing, which gave them the fat necessary — butter, tallow, and pork. 



The species of grain cultivated in the North during the later stone age was 

 especially barley, but also wheat. In addition there was millet. During the bronze 

 age oats become known, at least in Denmark. During the period of migrations 

 we get rye* During the early middle ages, according to statements in the laws 

 of the counties, the cultivation of rye was of great importance in our country. 

 But barley was probably still the chief cereal. This was at any rate the case at 

 the beginning of the modern period, according to Hans Forssell.** In 1571 in the 

 Sweden of that time barley formed 65 % of the harvest, rye 33 %, oats and wheat 

 the rest, i. e. 2 % together. At the beginning of the 19th century the figures 

 are: barley 25 %, rye 29 %, oats 27 %, and wheat 3 %. Thus even more than a 

 century ago barley was no longer the most important species of grain. It had 

 been surpassed by both rye and oats, an alteration of the conditions to the pre* 

 judice of barley which has continued in the same direction during the latest gene* 

 rations, so that in 1880 barley formed only 13 % of the whole harvest. 



The most important cereal during the prehistoric times was thus probably 

 barley. But this fact exposed the harvest even more than now to the unfavou* 

 rable effects of our climate. Corn sown in spring is naturally even more exposed 

 to the ravages of the spring drought than winter corn, and also to the night frosts 

 of early summer. For this reason the risk of a bad harvest was greater when 

 barley, sown in spring, formed a very much greater part of the grain than it did 

 later on. In addition the soil was worked and manured much worse in earlier 

 than in later times. Lack of draining made it impossible to use a large part of 

 the land that now gives the best and most certain crops, and the art of ditching 

 ground attacked by frost, which spread destruction to the adjacent fields, was 

 unknown. 



All these circumstances together and others in addition justify us in assuming 

 that bad years and complete failure of the crops of grain and fodder were both more 

 common and more serious in earlier times than during the last couple of centuries. 



• See Hoops, Reallex. I, p. 30 f. 



*• Art. on Swedish agriculture (Proceeding of the Academy of Letters, 29), p. 17 S. 



