358 
SOILS AND AGRICULTURE OP NORFOLK. 
the land recovered its fertility. Further experiment would 
also show that taking a different kind of crop had the same 
effect as leaving the land bare, and so the earliest two-year 
rotation of wheat and fallow was gradually replaced by the 
three-year one of wheat, pulse and fallow, which existed down 
to the introduction of root crops 200 years ago. Village 
communities or manors arose from settlements on the fertile 
alluvium along the river valleys. Neither roots or clover 
were known, and so it was impossible from lack of winter 
food to keep many cattle or sheep alive from summer to 
summer, just a few being retained for work and breeding. 
Without the means of making farmyard manure, only the 
more fertile land could be successfully cultivated, and much 
of Norfolk was heath and woodland. 
The villages were isolated, self-supporting communities, the 
cultivated land lying mainly in the valleys, and the land was 
farmed on the open field system. Every villager was a land- 
holder, having either 30 acres (villein holding) or 5 acres 
(border holding) not in one farm, but distributed in small 
strips over the three large common fields farmed by the 
village and with a share in the pasture and woodland where 
all the cattle and pigs were under the charge of the village 
neatherd and swineherd respectively. The holder, villein or 
border, paid no rent in money, and could not be evicted, but 
he had to give so many days labour — generally two a week 
with a third day in harvest time — to the lord of the manor who 
had the right of folding all the sheep on his land every night 
and of keeping pigeons. The large pigeon cots — “ Dow- 
pollars ” — now happily empty, are still a feature of many old 
Norfolk manor houses. The manure was of the utmost 
value to the owner, but the damage done to the tenants' 
crops was enormous and caused widespread discontent. 
The manorial system went on until the time of the 
Black Death. East Anglia was completely devastated, 
labour was scarce, and a serious struggle took place. 
