The Agricultural Revolution of the 1700’s and the Enclosure Movement
Mr. Regan
Other Agricultural Revolutions
Neolithic Agricultural Revolution (10,000 B.C. – 3, 000 B.C.)
Other Agricultural Revolutions
• The Agricultural Revolution of the Middle Ages
• Two field system to a three field system (1/3 of the land remains fallow each year)• Use horses rather than oxen to pull plows• Iron plow replaces wooden plow
The Agricultural Revolution – 1700’s• Three field system still highly inefficient and acted as
a brake on European population growth.• Primitive agricultural techniques left little margin for
error, often plunging regions into famine (1690’s --“The Famine Decade”)• Begins in the Netherlands and England (as most
trends do) and involved the introduction of new crops and the application of new farming techniques.• “scientific agriculture” describes the bundle of
changes in crop and livestock farming.
Charles “Turnip” Townshend (1674 – 1738)
• Supports the use of nitrogen replenishing crops such as turnips, clover, and alfalfa.• These “fodder” crops proved useful
as feed for livestock, whose manure was in turn used to further increase the output of fields.
The Potato• Introduced from the
Americas• Easy to grow, rich in
vitamins and versatile• Became the staple of
the peasant diet in Ireland, Prussia, and Russia• A large family could
subsist on as little as one acre of potatoes
More Land Cleared for Use• Terracing allows the Dutch and the English to reclaim
swamps and bogs for crop growing.• Jethro Tull -- advocated the use of soil aeration
through the use of the hoe.• Also invented the seed drill, which pushed the seed safely
beneath the soil
Selective Breeding of Livestock
• Breed the healthiest animals of each gender with each other to produce healthier, larger animals.• English government
granted awards to those who could produce the fattest, meatiest cattle.
Agriculture• Scattered, open strips of land for farming are gradually
abandoned• Had been under way in England since the 16th century• 1700’s -- Parliament passes the Enclosure Acts• Allows wealthy landlords to buy up “common land” and enclose it
within larger manors which they controlled.• The destruction of the common lands produced an unequal system
of landholding in England• A few,. large landholders at the top, some independent yeoman farmers in
the middle and a mass of landless laborers at the bottom.• The loss of their common lands left the last group dependent on earning wages
and drove many of them eventually into new urban, industrial areas as an unskilled labor force
Agricultural Revolution to Industrial Revolution
• Britain’s advances in scientific agriculture represents an important cause of the Industrial Revolution, which we will discuss later.• Increased productivity “liberated” small farmers from
the land• Many of these small farmers saw themselves as victims of
the enclosure movement, “thrown from their land” into “hellish factories.”
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