The Enclosures in England: an Economic Reconstruction

Volume Lxxx] [number 2

Whole Number 186

THE ENCLOSURES IN ENGLAND AN ECONOMIC RECONSTRUCTION

BY HARRIETT BRADLEY, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Economics, Vassar College Sometime University Fellow in Economics

New York COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

LONGMANS, GREEN & CO., AGENTS LONDON: P.S. KING & SON, LTD. 1918

"It fareth with the earth as with other creatures that through continual labour grow faint and feeble-hearted." From speech made in the House of Commons, 1597

To EMILIE LOUISE WELLS

CONTENTS

PAGE

INTRODUCTION 11 The subject of inquiry--No attempt hitherto made to verify the different hypothetical explanations of the enclosures--Nature of the evidence.

CHAPTER I

THE PRICE OF WOOL 18 Accepted theory of enclosure movement based on price of wool--Enclosures began independently of Black Death and before expansion of woollen industry--Price of wool low as compared with that of wheat in enclosure period--Seventeenth-century conversions of pasture to arable--Of arable to pasture--Conversion not explained by change in prices or wages--Double conversion movement due to condition of soil--Summary.

CHAPTER II

THE FERTILITY OF THE COMMON FIELDS 51 Dr. Russell on soil fertility--Insufficient manure--Statistical indications of yield--Compulsory land-holding--Desertion of villains--Commutation of services on terms advantageous to serf--Low rent obtained when bond land was leased--Remission of services--Changes due to economic need, not desired for improved social status--Poverty of villains--Cultivation of demesne unprofitable.

CHAPTER III

THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE OPEN FIELDS 73 Growing irregularity of holdings--Consolidation of holdings--Turf boundaries plowed under--Lea land--Restoration of fertility--Enclosure by tenants--Land used alternately as pasture and arable--Summary of changes.

CHAPTER IV

ENCLOSURE FOR SHEEP PASTURE 86 Enclosure by small tenants difficult--Open-field tenants unprofitable--Low rents--Neglect of land--High cost of living--Enclosure even of demesne a hardship to small holders--Intermixture of holdings a reason for dispossessing tenants--Higher rents from enclosed land another reason--Poverty of tenants where no enclosures were made--Exhaustion of open fields recognised by Parliament--Restoration of fertility and reconversion to tillage--New forage crops in eighteenth century--Recapitulation and conclusion.

INDEX 109

INTRODUCTION

The enclosure movement--the process by which the common-field system was broken down and replaced by a system of unrestricted private use--involved economic and social changes which make it one of the important subjects in English economic history. When it began, the arable fields of a community lay divided in a multitude of strips separated from each other only by borders of unplowed turf. Each landholder was in possession of a number of these strips, widely separated from each other, and scattered all over the open fields, so that he had a share in each of the various grades of land. But his private use of the land was restricted to the period when it was being prepared for crop or was under crop. After harvest the land was grazed in common by the village flocks; and each year a half or a third of the land was not plowed at all, but lay fallow and formed part of the common pasture. Under this system there was no opportunity for individual initiative in varying the rotation of crops or the dates of plowing and seed time; the use of the land in common for a part of the time restricted its use even during the time when it was not in common. The process by which this system was replaced by modern private ownership with unrestricted individual use is called the enclosure movement, because it involved the rearrangement of holdings into separate, compact plots, divided from each other by enclosing hedges and ditches. The most notable feature of this process is the conversion of the open fields into sheep pasture. This involved the eviction of the tenants who had been engaged in cultivating these fields and the amalgamation of many holdings of arable to form a few large enclosures for sheep. The enclosure movement was not merely the displacement of one system of tillage by another system of tillage; it involved the temporary displacement of tillage itself in favor of grazing.

In this monograph two things are undertaken: first, an analysis of the usually accepted version of the enclosure movement in the light of contemporary evidence; and, secondly, the presentation of another account of the nature and causes of the movement, consistent with itself and with the available evidence. The popular account of the enclosure movement turns upon a supposed advance in the price of wool, due to the expansion of the woollen industry in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Landlords at this period (we are told) were increasingly eager for pecuniary gain and, because of the greater profit to be made from grazing, were willing to evict the tenants on their land and convert the arable fields to sheep pasture. About the end of the sixteenth century, it is said, this first enclosure movement came to an end, for there are evidences of the reconversion of pastures formerly laid to grass. An inquiry into the evidence shows that the price of wool fell during the fifteenth century and failed to rise as rapidly as that of wheat during the sixteenth century. Moreover, the conversion of arable land to pasture did not cease when the contrary process set in, but continued throughout the seventeenth century with apparently unabated vigor. These facts make it impossible to accept the current theory of the enclosure movement. There is, on the other hand, abundant evidence that the fertility of much of the common-field land had been exhausted by centuries of cultivation. Some of it was allowed to run to waste; some was laid to grass, enclosed, and used as pasture. Productivity was gradually restored after some years of rest, and it became possible to resume cultivation. The enclosure movement is explained not by a change in the price of wool, but by the gradual loss of productivity of common-field land.

This explanation is not made here for the first time. It is advanced in Denton's England in the Fifteenth Century and Gardiner, in his Student's History of England, accepts it. Prothero and Gonner give it some place in their works. Dr. Simkhovitch, at whose suggestion this inquiry was undertaken, has for some time been of the opinion that deterioration of the soil was the fundamental cause of the displacement of arable farming by grazing. This explanation, however, stands at the present time as an unverified hypothesis, which has been specifically rejected by Gibbins, in his widely used text-book, and by Hasbach, who objects that Denton does not prove his case. In this respect the theory is no more to be criticised than the theory which these authorities accept, for that does not rest upon proof, but upon the prestige gained through frequent repetition. But the matter need not rest here. It is unnecessary to accept any hypothetical account of events which are, after all, comparatively recent, and for which the evidence is available.

Of the various sources accessible for the study of the English enclosure movement, one type only has been extensively used by historians. The whole story of this movement as it is usually told is based upon tracts, sermons, verses, proclamations, etc. of the sixteenth century--upon the literature of protest called forth by the social distress caused by enclosure. Until very recently the similar literature of the seventeenth century has been neglected, although it destroys the basis of assumptions which are fundamental to the orthodox account of the movement. Much of significance even in the literature of the sixteenth century has been passed over--notably certain striking passages in statutes of the latter half of the century, and in books on husbandry of the first half. Details of manorial history derived from the account rolls of the manors themselves, and contemporary manorial maps and surveys, as well as the records of the actual market prices of grain and wool, have been ignored in the construction of an hypothetical account of the movement which breaks down whenever verification by contemporary evidence is attempted.

The evidence is in many respects imperfect. It would be of great value, for instance, to have access to records of grain production over an area extensive enough, and for a long enough period, to furnish reliable statistical indications of the trend of productivity. It would be helpful to have exact information about the amount of land converted from arable to pasture in each decade of the period under consideration, and to know to what extent and at what dates land was reconverted to tillage after having been laid to grass. There are no records to supply most of this information. It is possible that the materials for a statistical study of soil productivity are in existence, but up to the present time they have not been published, and it is doubtful if this deficiency will be supplied. It is even more doubtful whether more can be learned about the rate of conversion of arable land to pasture than is now known, and this is little. Professor Gay has made a careful study of the evidence on this question, and has analysed the reports of the government commissions for enforcing the husbandry statutes before 1600, and Miss Leonard has made the returns of the commission of 1630 for Leicestershire available. The conditions under which these commissions worked make the returns somewhat unreliable even for the years covered by their reports, and much interpolation is necessary, as there are serious gaps in the series of years for which returns are made. For dates outside of the period 1485-1630 we must rely entirely on literary references. Unsatisfactory as our statistical information is on this important question, it is far more complete than the evidence on the subject of the reconversion to tillage of arable land which had been turned into pasture.

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