New Perspectives on the Medieval ‘Agricultural Revolution’: Crop, Stock and Furrow
New Perspectives on the Medieval ‘Agricultural Revolution’: Crop, Stock and Furrow
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中世纪“农业革命”的新视角：农作物、牲畜和犁沟
DOI：
10.1080/00766097.2023.2262919
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发表时间：
2023
影响因子：
0.6
通讯作者：
Christopher Dyer
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Christopher Dyer
引人注目的是，在这么长的时间里，粮食和其他经济作物的范围是如何保持相对稳定的。小麦、大麦、燕麦、冬大麦和一种大麦/小麦混合物（芒玉米）是主要的谷类作物，黑麦不太常见，而豌豆和豆类是额外的斯台普斯。耕地、牧场和草地靠近城墙，但农作物加工发生在城墙之外（在温彻斯特没有发现用稻草碎片和谷壳进行筛选、扬场和筛分的证据，这表明完全加工过的谷物被带到市场上销售）。然而，这种范围上的连续性有些欺骗性，因为不仅种植的小麦类型发生了重大变化--在罗马统治下的斯佩尔特小麦，而且从盎格鲁-撒克逊时期开始的面包小麦和燕麦成为一种更重要的作物，标志着作物耕作制度的重大变化--而且有证据表明中世纪时期土壤枯竭的加剧。事实上，温彻斯特地区土壤贫瘠和施肥不足的结合可能迫使农民种植更多的燕麦，这种作物对土壤养分的要求比面包小麦低。温彻斯特在黑死病中的死亡率很高，据估计损失了60%的人口，这可能是由于食物供应的恶化吗？该地区的农业资源，羊和可耕地的白垩，可能不足以使城市在中世纪后期繁荣。有充足的机会获得水果和坚果，无论是在野外采集的（黑莓，乌藨子，接骨木果，黑刺李，榛子）还是在花园和果园种植的（苹果，李子，樱桃）;苹果和樱桃也可能是从野生树木中采集的。葡萄、无花果和核桃在几个时期都有特色，而石松（松子）只在罗马时期出现（可能是进口），桑树在中世纪出现。葡萄园在城内和城外都有记载，花园在中世纪晚期的温彻斯特有记载。有趣的是，约有25棵本地树木的木材被用于建筑工程、家具、工具和燃料。卷的编辑强调，在英格兰的一个历史城镇的古环境的研究是第一次。虽然这可能是事实上正确的，过度拖延，在得到出版的材料（c 50年）已大大减少了影响的卷会有，如果它已经出版更快。广泛的环境工作在约克，大雅茅斯，南安普顿，都柏林和莱斯特，仅举几例，发生了很久以后，但出版较早。事实上，本卷的大部分贡献都是在20世纪70年代和80年代写的，并没有得到实质性的更新。各种代表哲学硕士论文简伦弗鲁的学生，这是一个真实的耻辱，这些不得不等到他们已经退休后，看到这项工作在印刷。幸运的是，彼得·墨菲、米克·蒙克和弗朗西斯绿色利用他们在温彻斯特的经验，为中世纪城市背景下的考古学沉积研究创造了基准，他们的工作最终导致了一套全国性的指导方针（G坎贝尔、L莫菲特和V斯特拉克
Striking is how the range of food and other economic plants exploited stays relatively stable over this long timespan. Wheat, barley, oats, winter barley and a barley/wheat mix (mancorn) are the main cereal crops, rye is less common, while peas and beans are additional staples. Arable fields, pasture and meadows lay close up to the city walls, but crop-processing happened beyond (evidence for threshing, winnowing and sieving in terms of straw fragments and chaff have not been found within Winchester, indicating that fully processed grain was brought in for sale at its markets). This continuity in range is somewhat deceptive, however, since not only was there a significant change in the type of wheat cultivated—spelt wheat under Rome, but bread wheat from the Anglo-Saxon period onwards and oats becoming a more significant crop, signalling a significant change in crop husbandry regimes—but there is evidence also for increasing soil exhaustion during the medieval period. Indeed, a combination of poor soils in the Winchester area and inadequate manuring perhaps forced farmers to grow more oats, a crop less demanding of soil nutrient status than bread wheat. Might a deteriorating food supply have played a role in the high mortality Winchester suffered at the Black Death, with an estimated loss of 60% of the population? The agricultural resources of the region, sheep and arable on chalkland, may not have been sufficient for the city to prosper during the Late Middle Ages. There was ample access to fruits and nuts both those collected in the wild (blackberries, raspberries, elderberry, sloes, hazelnuts) and those grown in gardens and orchards (apples, plums, cherries); apples and cherries may also have been collected from wild trees. Grapes, figs, and walnuts feature in several periods, while stone pine (pine nuts) comes exclusively in the Roman period (probably an import) and mulberry in the medieval. Vineyards are attested in and just outside the city, and gardens recorded within later medieval Winchester. Interestingly, the wood of some 25 native trees was used in construction work, furniture, tools and fuel. The volume editors emphasise that this study of the palaeoenvironment of a single historic town in England is a first. While this may be factually correct, the excessive delay in getting the material published (c 50 years) has significantly lessened the impact the volume would have had if it had been published more speedily. Extensive environmental work in York, Great Yarmouth, Southampton, Dublin and Leicester, to name but a few, took place much later but was published earlier. Indeed, most of this volume’s contributions were written in the 1970s and 1980s and have not been substantially updated. Various represent MPhil theses of Jane Renfrew’s students, and it is a real shame that these have had to wait till after they had retired to see this work in print. Fortunately, Peter Murphy, Mick Monk and Francis Green used their experience at Winchester to create benchmarks for the study of archaeological deposits in medieval urban contexts and their work ultimately led to a national set of guidelines (G Campbell, L Moffett and V Straker