Rural Growth and Crisis
1200 and 1500 the Latin West brought more land under cultivation
Nine out of ten people lived in rural areas
Suffered highly from famine and worked hard for meager wages
Epidemics, warefare, and social exploitation was caused in 1347-1351 by the plague known as the Black Death
Peasants, Population, and Plague
In 1200 most people were serfs, obliged to till the soil on large estates owned by the nobility and the church
Women and men worked the fields but there was no equality and among them women were viewed much higher than men
Thomas Aquinas (1227-1274) argued on the side of the church stating that women are lower than men
Rural poverty was bit simply the product of inefficient farming methods and social inequality but also resulted from rapid population growth.
Believe that economy supported this growth or warmer than usual temperatures raised more crops produced the raise in population
The three-field sustem was adopted rotational sustem, one field grew grain, one grew lagumes, and one lay fallow replaced the two field system
German migation to the Elbe River and into the eastern Baltic states
Knights belonging to Christian religion ordered native in habitants who had not yet adopted Christianity to be slaughtered. Such states included Prussia, Southern Europe, Celtic lands, British Isles, and also included Muslim and Byzantium land
Great famine occured between 1315-1317
Black death is also present during this time
Not until 1500 did the population grow larger than before the plague.
More coming soon.. subjects will be over social rebellion, mills and mines, learning, liturature, and the renaiisance, universities and scholarship, humanists and printers, Renaissance artists, political and military transofrmations, urban revival, civic life, monarchs, nobles, and the church, and the hundred year war.

