209] ^^^ FERTILITY OF THE COMMON FIELDS 53 



in productivity in these two centuries. Some indication of 

 the representativeness of the years 1300 and 1397 is given by 

 a comparison of prices for these years with the average prices 



TABLE III 

 Yield of Wheat on the Manors of the Bishopric of Winchester 1 



Area sown Produce Ratio produce 



Date Acres Bushels per acre to seed 



1208-1209 6838 4J^ 2^ 



1299- 1300 3353 9* 4 



^Z^i2&7 2366^ 6 3 



*Gras gives 1.35 quarters as the acre produce, or nearly 11 bushels. 

 This figure is incorrect, as it is derived by dividing the total produce 

 of 42 manors by the total acreage planted on only 36 manors. The 

 produce of the four manors on which the acreage planted is unknown 

 amounts to nearly 750 quarters, a large item in a total of only 4527 

 quiarters for the whole group of manors. The ratio of produce to seed, 

 however, is independent of the number of acres planted, and these four 

 manors are includ-ed in the computation of this figure. 



of the period in which they lie. The price in 1 300 was about 

 17 per cent below the average for the period 1291-1310,^ 

 an indication that the crop of nine bushels per acre reaped 

 in 1 299-1 300 was above the normal. The price of wheat in 

 1397 was very slightly above the average for the period; ^ 

 six bushels an acre or more, then, was probably a normal 

 crop at the end of the fourteenth century. This conclusion 

 is supported also by the fact that the yield in that year at 

 Witney was approximately the same as the average of the 

 eleven seasons between 1340 and 1354 noted in Table V. 

 The price of wheat in the year 1 209-1 210 is not ascertain- 

 able. Walter of Henley's statement that the price of corn 

 must be higher than the average to prevent loss when the 



1 Gras, Evol. of the Eng. Corn Market (Cambridge, 1915), appendix A. 



2 Rogers, History of Agriculture and Prices, vol. i, p. 228. 



3 Ibid., vol. i, p. 234 ; vol. iv, p. 282. 



