GROWTH OF THE MANOR 17 



In May it was time to set up the temporary fences round the 

 meadows and arable fields, and to begin fallowing the third 

 field. 



A valuable document, describing the duties of a reeve, gives 

 many interesting details of eleventh-century farming ^ : — 



'In May, June, and July one may harrow, carry out 

 manure, set up sheep hurdles, shear sheep, do repairs, hedge, 

 cut wood, weed, and make folds. In harvest one may reap ; in 

 August, September, and in October one may mow, set woad 

 with a dibble, gather home many crops, thatch them and cover 

 them over, cleanse the folds, prepare cattle sheds and shelters 

 ere too severe a winter come to the farm, and also diligently 

 prepare the soil. In winter one should plough and in severe 

 frosts cleave timber, make an orchard, and do many affairs 

 indoors, thresh, cleave wood, put the cattle in stalls and the 

 swine in pigstyes, and provide a hen roost. In spring one 

 should plough and graft, sow beans, set a vineyard, make 

 ditches, hew wood for a wild deer fence ; and soon after that, 

 if the weather permit, set madder, sow flax seed and woad 

 seed, plant a garden and do many things which I cannot fully 

 enumerate that a good steward ought to provide.' 



The methods of cultivation were simple. The plough, if 

 we may judge by contemporary illustrations, had in the 

 eleventh century a large wheel and very short handles.^ 

 In the twelfth century Neckham describes its parts : a beam, 

 handles, tongue, mouldboard, coulter, and share.^ Breaking 

 up the clods was done by the mattock or beetle, and harrow- 

 ing was done by hand with what looks like a large rake ; the 

 scythes of the haymakers and the sickles of the reapers were 

 very like those that still linger on in some districts to-day. 



Here is a list of tools and implements for the home- 

 stead : an axe, adze, bill, awl, plane, saw, spokeshave, tie 

 hook, auger, mattock, lever, share, coulter, goad-iron, scythe, 



^ Cunningham, Growth of English Industry and Commerce, i. 570. 

 "^ See the excellent reproductions of the Calendar of the Cott. MSS. in 

 Green's Short History of the English People, illustrated edition, i. 155. 

 ^ De Natura Rerum, Rolls Series, p. 280. 



