Agriculture in the Middle Ages describes the farming practices, crops, technology, and agricultural society and economy of Europe from the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 to approximately 1500. The Middle Ages are sometimes called the Medieval Age or Period. The Middle Ages are also divided into the Early, High, and Late Middle Ages. The early modern period followed the Middle Ages.

Epidemics and climatic cooling caused a large decrease in the European population in the 6th century. Compared to the Roman period, agriculture in the Middle Ages in Western Europe became more focused on self-sufficiency. The Feudal period began about 1000. The agricultural population under feudalism in Northern Europe was typically organized into manors consisting of several hundred or more acres of land presided over by a Lord of the manor, with a Roman Catholic church and priest. Most of the people living on the manor were peasant farmers or serfs who grew crops for themselves, and either labored for the lord and church or paid rent for their land. Barley and wheat were the most important crops in most European regions; oats and rye were also grown, along with a variety of vegetables and fruits. Oxen and horses were used as draft animals. Sheep were raised for wool and pigs were raised for meat.

Crop failures due to bad weather were frequent throughout the Middle Ages and famine was often the result.

The medieval system of agriculture began to break down in the 14th century with the development of more intensive agricultural methods in the Low Countries and after the population losses of the Black Death in 1347–1351 made more land available to a diminished number of farmers. Medieval farming practices, however, continued with little change in the Slavic regions and some other areas until the mid-19th century.

Background

Three events set the stage for medieval agriculture—and would influence agriculture for centuries—in Europe. First was the fall of the western Roman Empire which began to lose territory to foreign 'barbarian' invaders about the year 400. The last western Roman emperor abdicated in 476.Heather, Peter (2006), The Fall of the Roman Empire, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 193–199, 429–430 Thereafter, the lands and people of the former western Roman Empire would be divided among different ethnic groups, whose rule was often ephemeral and constantly in flux. Unifying factors of Europe included the gradual adoption of the Christian religion by most EuropeansCaltron, J.H Hayas (1953),Christianity and Western Civilization, Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, p. 2 and in western Europe the use of Latin as the common language of international communication, scholarship, and science.Dictionary of Medieval Latin," http://www.dmlbs.ox.ac.uk/british-medieval-latin/language/latin-in-the-middle-ages , accessed 24 July 2018 Greek had a similar status in the Eastern Roman Empire.Dawkins, R.M. 1916. Modern Greek in Asia Minor. A study of dialect of Silly, Cappadocia and Pharasa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Secondly was the Late Antique Little Ice Age, an era of global cooling which started in 536 and ended around 660. The cooling was caused by volcanic eruptions in 536, 540, and 547. The Byzantine historian Procopius wrote of the fallout that "the sun put forth its light without brightness." Summer temperatures in Europe dropped as much as 2.5 °C (4.5 °F) and the sky was dimmed from volcanic dust in the atmosphere for 18 months, sufficient to cause crop failures and famine. Temperatures remained lower than the preceding Roman period for more than one hundred years. The ice age preceded, and may have influenced, a number of disruptive events, including pandemics, human migration, and political turmoil.Zielinski, Sarah (2015), Smithsonian Magazine, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/sixth-century-misery-tied-not-one-two-volcanic-eruptions-180955858/, accessed 23 July 2018

Third, was the Plague of Justinian which began in 541, spread throughout Europe, and recurred periodically until 750. The plague may have killed up to 25 percent of the people of the eastern Roman or Byzantine Empire and a similar percentage in western and northern Europe. The combined impact on the population of climatic cooling and the plague led to reduced harvests of grain.Horgan, John, "Justinian's Plague," Ancient History Encyclopedia, https://www.worldhistory.org/article/782/justinians-plague-541-542-ce/, accessed 23 July 2018 John of Ephesus' account of travel through rural areas speaks of "crops of wheat...white and standing but there was no one to reap them and store the wheat" and "Vineyards, whose picking season came and went" with nobody to pick and press the grapes. John also speaks of the "severe winter", presumably caused by volcanic dust.Little, Lester K., ed. (2007), Plague and the End of Antiquity: The Pandemic of 541-750, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 7

The consequence of these factors was that the population of Europe was substantially less in 600 than it had been in 500. One scholar estimates that the population on the Italian peninsula decreased from 11 million in 500 to 8 million in 600 and remained at that level for nearly 300 years. The declines in the population of other parts of Europe were probably of similar magnitude.

The Early Middle Ages

The popular view is that the fall of the Western Roman Empire caused what Petrarch would later call "dark ages" in western Europe in which notionally "knowledge and civility", the "arts of elegance," and "many of the useful arts" were neglected or lost.Ward-Perkins, Bryan (2005), The Fall of Rome and the End of Civilization, Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 2 Conversely, however, the lot of the farmers who made at least 80 percent of the total population, may have improved in the aftermath of the Roman Empire. The fall of Rome saw the "shrinking of tax burdens, weakening of the aristocracy, and consequently greater freedom for peasants."Barbiera and Dall-Zuanna, p. 170 The countryside of the Roman Empire was dotted with "villas" or estates, characterized by Pliny the Elder as "the ruin of Italy." The estates were owned by wealthy aristocrats and worked in part by slaves.Pounds, N. J. G. (1990), An Historical Geography of Europe, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 63–64 More than 1,500 villas are known to have existed in England alone."The Emergency of Villa Landscapes," https://www2.rgzm.de/transformation/unitedKingdom/villas/VillaeLandscapes.htm , accessed 24 July 2018 With the fall of Rome, the villas were abandoned or transformed into utilitarian rather than elite uses. "In western Europe, then, we seem to see the effect of a release from the pressure of the Roman imperial market, army and taxation, and a return to farming based more on local needs."

The population declines of the 6th century, and, thus, a shortage of labor may have facilitated greater freedom among rural people who were either slaves or had been bound to the land under Roman law.Maugh II, Thomas H. (6 May 2002), "An Empire's Epidemic," Los Angeles Times,, http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/bioter/anempiresepidemic.html, accessed 24 July 2018

The Eastern Roman Empire. Early in the Middle Ages the agricultural history of the Eastern Roman Empire differed from that of western Europe. The 5th and 6th centuries saw an expansion of market-oriented and industrial farming, especially of olive oil and wine, and the adoption of new technology such as oil and wine presses. The settlement patterns in the east were also different than the west. Rather than the villas of the Roman Empire in the west, the farmers of the east lived in villages which continued to exist and even expand.Lewit, pp. 85–89

Iberian peninsula. The Iberian Peninsula seems to have had a different experience than eastern and western Europe. There is evidence of abandonment of farmland and reforestation due to depopulation, but also evidence of expanded grazing and market-oriented livestock raising of horses, mules, and donkeys. The economy of the Iberian peninsula seems to have become disconnected from the rest of Europe and, instead, it became a major trading partner of North Africa in the fifth century,Lewit, pp. 88–91 long before the Umayyad conquest of the peninsula in 711.

Agriculture in Iberia

In what historian Andrew Watson called the Arab Agricultural Revolution, the Arab Muslim rulers of much of Al Andalus (8th through the 15th centuries) introduced or popularized a large number of new crops and new agricultural technology into the Iberian peninsula (Spain and Portugal). The crops introduced by the Arabs included sugar cane, rice, hard wheat (durum), citrus, cotton, and figs. Many of these crops required sophisticated methods of irrigation, water management, and "agricultural technologies such as crop rotation, management of pests, and fertilizing crops by natural means.""Cities of Light: The Rise and fall of Islamic Spain," http://www.islamicspain.tv/Arts-and-Science/The-Culture-of-Al-Andalus/Agriculture.htm, accessed 28 August 2018 Some scholars have questioned how much of the Arab (or Muslim) Agricultural Revolution was unique, and how much was a revival and expansion of technology developed in the Middle East during the centuries of Roman rule. Whether credit of invention belongs mostly to the people of the Middle East during the Roman Empire or to the arrival of the Arabs, "the Iberian landscape changed profoundly" beginning in the 8th century.Ruggles, D. Fairchild (2000), Gardens, Landscape, and Vision in the Palaces of Islamic Spain. University Park, PA: Penn State Press. p. 32

Feudalism

Gradually, the Roman system of villas and agricultural estates using partly slave labor was replaced by manorialism and serfdom. Historian Peter Sarris has identified the characteristics of feudal society in sixth century Italy, and even earlier in the Byzantine Empire and Egypt. One of the differences between the villa and medieval manor was that the agriculture of the villa was commercially oriented and specialized while the manor was directed toward self-sufficiency.

Slavery was important for the agricultural labor force of the Roman Empire, and died out in western Europe by 1100. The slaves of the Roman Empire were property, like livestock, with no rights of personhood and could be sold or traded at the will of his owner. Similarly, the serf was tied to the land and could not leave his servitude, but his tenure on the land was secure. If the manor changed owners the serfs remained on the land. Serfs had limited rights to property, although their freedom of movement was limited and they owed labor or rent to their lord."Serfdom in Europe," Khan Academy, https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/world-history/medieval-times/european-middle-ages-and-serfdom/a/serfdom-in-europe, accessed 26 July 2018