An Introduction to the Controversy

Abstract

THE two centuries which followed the Black Death of 1348–9 constitute one of the most intriguing periods in the history of population. In common with other societies in which the great mass of people was employed in agriculture, and in which technical progress was limited, the size of the population of later medieval and early Tudor England was one of the major determinants not only of both aggregate and per capita output, but also of the distribution of wealth and the structure of society. Just as the abundance of people prior to 1348 played a major part in reducing the standards of life of the peasantry and strengthening the power of landlords, so the progressive shortage of people in the ensuing era played a major part in undermining demesne agriculture and in bringing about a fundamental redistribution of wealth. The later fourteenth and the fifteenth centuries saw the real wage-rates of craftsmen and labourers apparently reach levels not to be exceeded until the second half of the nineteenth century. These centuries also experienced one of the most decisive shifts ever in social structure and tenurial relationships, namely the decline of serfdom and customary land tenure. But more than this there occurred within these centuries the longest period of declining and stagnant population in recorded English history.