This book studies English agriculture in the 18th and 19th centuries, based on the records of the farmers themselves. Traditionally the period was seen as one of ‘agricultural revolution’, but generations of historians have found it remarkably difficult to measure its salient characteristics or to locate it precisely in time. By bringing together a range of qualitative as well as quantitative data found in farmers' accounts, memoranda books, and diaries, this book is able to throw important new light on the way farmers worked, and it also produces new estimates of the output of wheat, barley, ... More

This book studies English agriculture in the 18th and 19th centuries, based on the records of the farmers themselves. Traditionally the period was seen as one of ‘agricultural revolution’, but generations of historians have found it remarkably difficult to measure its salient characteristics or to locate it precisely in time. By bringing together a range of qualitative as well as quantitative data found in farmers' accounts, memoranda books, and diaries, this book is able to throw important new light on the way farmers worked, and it also produces new estimates of the output of wheat, barley, oats, and other arable crops, and also of livestock production. The evidence of the farmers' own records has enabled the book to approach the agricultural history of the period in an entirely different light. It shows conclusively that the main impact of the agricultural revolution can be located firmly in the first half of the 19th century as the English farmer successfully fed a growing, and predominantly urban population. This new approach places that revolution later than was formerly thought to be the case, and concurrently with the mainsprings of urban and industrial demand.