Book I, Chapter XI, 6

In 1350, the 25th year of Edward III, the measure known as the Statute of Laborers was enacted. Its preamble complains bitterly of the insolence of servants who tried to raise their wages at their masters' expense. It accordingly orders all servants and laborers henceforth to accept the same wages and liveries (at that time liveries meant provisions as well as clothing) that they had customarily received in the king's 20th year and the four preceding years. Wheat supplied as part of their livery was therefore nowhere to be valued above tenpence a bushel; the master was always free to supply either the wheat or the money. In the 25th year of Edward III, then, tenpence a bushel must have been considered a very moderate price for wheat, since a special statute was needed to compel servants to accept it in place of their customary provision of food. It must also have been regarded as a reasonable price ten years earlier, in the king's 16th year, the period to which the statute refers. But in the 16th year of Edward III, tenpence contained about half an ounce of silver, Tower weight, and was nearly equal to half-a-crown in our present money. Four ounces of silver, Tower weight, therefore, equal to six shillings and eightpence in the money of that time and to nearly twenty shillings in present money, must have been considered a moderate price for a quarter of eight bushels.

This statute surely offers better evidence of what was considered a moderate price of grain at that time than do the prices of particular years, generally recorded by historians and other writers precisely because they were exceptionally high or low, and therefore hard to use in judging the ordinary price. There are other grounds, too, for believing that at the beginning of the fourteenth century, and for some time before, the usual price of wheat was no less than four ounces of silver per quarter, with other grain priced proportionately.

In 1309, Ralph de Born, prior of St Augustine's, Canterbury, held a feast on the day of his installation. William Thorn preserved not just the menu but the prices of many of its items. The feast consumed, first, fifty-three quarters of wheat costing nineteen pounds, or seven shillings and twopence a quarter, equal to about one-and-twenty shillings and sixpence in our present money; second, fifty-eight quarters of malt costing seventeen pounds ten shillings, or six shillings a quarter, equal to about eighteen shillings in our present money; and third, twenty quarters of oats costing four pounds, or four shillings a quarter, equal to about twelve shillings in our present money. Here malt and oats seem unusually expensive in proportion to wheat.

These prices were not recorded for being unusually high or low. They are mentioned incidentally as the actual prices paid for large quantities of grain consumed at a feast renowned for its magnificence.

In 1262, the 51st year of Henry III, an old statute called the assize of bread and ale was revived. In its preamble the king says that it had been enacted under his forebears, former kings of England. It is thus probably at least as old as the reign of his grandfather Henry II, and may date back to the Conquest. It fixes the price of bread according to the price of wheat, from one shilling to twenty shillings a quarter in the money of that time. Statutes of this kind, however, are generally presumed to make equally careful provision for deviations on either side of the middle price, below it as well as above. On that assumption, ten shillings, containing six ounces of silver, Tower weight, and equal to about thirty shillings in our present money, must have been considered the middle price of a quarter of wheat when the statute was first enacted, and must still have been so in the 51st year of Henry III. We can scarcely be far wrong, then, in supposing that the middle price was at least one-third of the highest price at which the statute regulates bread, namely six shillings and eightpence in the money of that time, containing four ounces of silver, Tower weight.

These several facts therefore give us reason to conclude that, around the middle of the fourteenth century and for a considerable time before, the average or ordinary price of a quarter of wheat was not thought to be less than four ounces of silver, Tower weight.

Between about the middle of the fourteenth century and the beginning of the sixteenth, the price considered reasonable and moderate—that is, the ordinary or average price of wheat—seems to have gradually fallen by about half. Eventually it reached about two ounces of silver, Tower weight, equal to about ten shillings in our present money. It continued to be valued at this level until about 1570.

In the household book of Henry, the fifth earl of Northumberland, drawn up in 1512, wheat is valued in two different ways: at six shillings and eightpence a quarter in one reckoning, and only five shillings and eightpence in the other. In 1512, six shillings and eightpence contained just two ounces of silver, Tower weight, and equaled about ten shillings in our present money.

From the 25th year of Edward III to the beginning of Elizabeth's reign, a span of more than two hundred years, several statutes show that six shillings and eightpence continued to be regarded as the so-called moderate and reasonable price of wheat—in other words, its ordinary or average price. The amount of silver contained in that nominal sum was, however, steadily declining throughout the period because of changes to the coinage. The rise in silver's value seems to have compensated so far for the decrease in its quantity within that sum that the legislature thought the difference unworthy of attention.

Thus, in 1436, it was enacted that wheat could be exported without a license when its price was as low as six shillings and eightpence; and in 1463, it was enacted that wheat could not be imported unless its price exceeded six shillings and eightpence a quarter. The legislature supposed that exports posed no inconvenience when the price was so low, but that when it rose higher, allowing imports was prudent. Six shillings and eightpence, containing about as much silver as thirteen shillings and fourpence in our present money (one-third less than that nominal sum contained under Edward III), was therefore considered the moderate and reasonable price of wheat at that time.

In 1554, under the 1st and 2nd of Philip and Mary, and in 1558, under the 1st of Elizabeth, exports of wheat were likewise forbidden whenever the price per quarter exceeded six shillings and eightpence. That sum then contained no more than two penny worth more silver than the same nominal sum contains today. It was soon found, however, that restricting wheat exports until the price fell so low amounted in practice to forbidding them altogether. In 1562, therefore, under the 5th of Elizabeth, wheat exports from certain ports were permitted whenever the price per quarter did not exceed ten shillings, containing almost the same amount of silver as the identical nominal sum today. At that time, then, this was regarded as the moderate and reasonable price of wheat. It closely agrees with the valuation in the Northumberland book of 1512.

Both Mr Dupré de St Maur and the elegant author of the Essay on the Policy of Grain have observed that in France, likewise, the average price of grain was much lower at the end of the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth century than in the preceding two centuries. Its price probably fell in much the same way across most of Europe during that period.

This rise in the value of silver relative to corn might have resulted entirely from greater demand for the metal as cultivation and improvement advanced, while supply remained unchanged. Or it might, with demand unchanged, have resulted entirely from a gradual decline in supply, as most mines then known in the world became badly depleted and consequently much more expensive to work. Or both circumstances might have played a part. By the end of the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth century, most of Europe was moving toward more stable government than it had enjoyed for several ages. Increased security would naturally foster industry and improvement; demand for precious metals, like demand for every other luxury and ornament, would naturally grow with wealth. A larger annual output would need more coin to circulate it, and more wealthy people would want more silverware and other silver ornaments. It is natural to suppose, too, that many of the mines supplying the European silver market had been substantially depleted and had become more expensive to work. Many had been worked since Roman times.

Most writers on the prices of commodities in antiquity, however, have believed that silver's value declined continuously from the Conquest, perhaps even from Julius Caesar's invasion, until the discovery of the American mines. They seem to have reached this conclusion partly from their observations of the prices of corn and other unprocessed products of the land, and partly from the popular belief that as a country's wealth grows, its quantity of silver naturally grows, and its value therefore falls as its quantity rises.

Three distinct circumstances seem often to have misled them in their observations of corn prices.

First, in ancient times almost all rent was paid in kind—in specified amounts of corn, cattle, poultry, and so forth. Sometimes, however, the landlord stipulated that he could choose between receiving the annual payment in kind and receiving a specified sum of money instead. The price at which a payment in kind could thus be exchanged for a sum of money is called the conversion price in Scotland. Since the landlord always has the choice between the goods and their money value, protecting the tenant requires the conversion price to be set below, rather than above, the average market price. Accordingly, in many places it is scarcely more than half that market price. The custom persists throughout most of Scotland for poultry and in some places for cattle. It might well have persisted for corn too had it not been ended by the establishment of the public fiars. These are annual valuations, made by an assize, of the average price of every kind of grain and every grade of each, based on actual market prices in each county. They made it safe enough for the tenant, and much more convenient for the landlord, to convert the corn rent, as they call it, at each year's fiars price instead of a fixed price. Yet writers collecting ancient corn prices have often apparently mistaken the Scottish conversion price for the actual market price. Fleetwood admits on one occasion to having made this error. Because he wrote his book for a particular purpose, however, he does not see fit to admit it until after he has copied the conversion price fifteen times. That price is eight shillings a quarter for wheat. In 1423, the year with which he begins using it, this sum contained as much silver as sixteen shillings in our present money. In 1562, the year with which he ends, it contained no more than the same nominal sum does today.

Second, they have been misled by the careless way some ancient assize statutes were transcribed by idle copyists, or sometimes perhaps drafted by the legislature itself.

The ancient assize statutes seem invariably to have begun by setting the prices of bread and ale for wheat and barley at their lowest prices, and then to have specified gradually what bread and ale should cost as the prices of those two grains rose above that level. The copyists, however, often seem to have thought it sufficient to copy the rule only as far as the first three or four, lowest prices. They thus saved themselves labor and, I suppose, judged that enough had been copied to show the proportion to be maintained at all higher prices.

Thus, in the assize of bread and ale from the 51st year of Henry III, the price of bread was regulated for wheat prices ranging from one shilling to twenty shillings a quarter in the money of that time. But in the manuscripts from which all editions of the statutes before Mr Ruffhead's were printed, copyists had never carried the regulation beyond a price of twelve shillings. Several writers, misled by this defective transcription, therefore quite naturally conclude that the middle price—six shillings a quarter, equal to about eighteen shillings in our present money—was the ordinary or average price of wheat at the time.

In the statute of Tumbrel and Pillory, enacted at nearly the same time, the price of ale is regulated for each sixpence rise in the price of barley, from two shillings to four shillings a quarter. Yet we can infer from the statute's last words that four shillings was not considered the highest price barley could commonly reach, and that these prices were given merely as examples of the proportion to observe at every other price, higher or lower: “Et sic deinceps crescetur vel diminuetur per sex denarios.” The expression is careless, but its meaning is clear enough: “the price of ale is thus to be raised or lowered with every sixpence rise or fall in the price of barley.” The legislature itself seems to have been as careless in drafting this statute as the copyists were in transcribing the other one.

An ancient manuscript of the Regiam Majestatem, an old Scottish law book, contains an assize statute that regulates the price of bread for every price of wheat from tenpence to three shillings a Scottish boll, approximately half an English quarter. At the time this assize is believed to have been enacted, three Scottish shillings equaled about nine shillings sterling in our present money. Mr Ruddiman seems [See his Preface to Anderson's Diplomata Scotiae.] to conclude that three shillings was the highest price wheat ever reached in those days, while tenpence, a shilling, or at most two shillings were ordinary prices. On examining the manuscript, however, it becomes plain that all these prices are merely examples of the proportion to maintain between the respective prices of wheat and bread. The statute ends with the words “reliqua judicabis secundum praescripta, habendo respectum ad pretium bladi.”—“You shall judge the remaining cases according to what is written above, taking account of the price of corn.”

In 1350, the 25th year of Edward III, the law called the Statute of Laborers was passed. Its opening complained strongly about servants who tried to raise their wages at their masters' expense. It therefore ordered all servants and laborers to accept the same wages and liveries they had received in the king's 20th year and the four years before that. At the time, liveries meant food as well as clothes. Their allowance of wheat was to be valued nowhere above tenpence a bushel, and the master could choose whether to give them wheat or money. So in the 25th year of Edward III, tenpence a bushel was considered a very moderate wheat price. A special law was needed to make servants accept it in place of their customary food allowance. It had also counted as a reasonable price ten years before, in the king's 16th year, which the law refers to. But in the 16th year of Edward III, tenpence contained about half an ounce of silver, Tower weight, and was worth nearly half-a-crown in our present money. Four ounces of silver, Tower weight, equaled six shillings and eightpence in the money of that time, or nearly twenty shillings in today's money. That must have counted as a moderate price for a quarter of eight bushels.

This law is surely better evidence of what people then regarded as a moderate grain price than prices recorded for particular years. Historians and other writers usually recorded those years because they were unusually expensive or cheap. We cannot easily judge an ordinary price from them. Other evidence also suggests that at the start of the fourteenth century, and for some time earlier, wheat normally cost no less than four ounces of silver per quarter, with other grains priced in proportion.

In 1309, Ralph de Born, prior of St Augustine's, Canterbury, held a feast on the day he took office. William Thorn preserved both the menu and prices of many items. The feast used, first, fifty-three quarters of wheat costing nineteen pounds, or seven shillings and twopence a quarter, equal to about one-and-twenty shillings and sixpence in our present money. Second, it used fifty-eight quarters of malt costing seventeen pounds ten shillings, or six shillings a quarter, equal to about eighteen shillings in our present money. Third, it used twenty quarters of oats costing four pounds, or four shillings a quarter, equal to about twelve shillings in our present money. Here malt and oats appear more expensive relative to wheat than usual.

These prices were not recorded because they were unusually high or low. They appear incidentally as the prices actually paid for large quantities of grain at a feast famous for its splendor.

In 1262, the 51st year of Henry III, an old law called the assize of bread and ale was revived. Its opening says it had been made under the king's ancestors, former kings of England. It was probably at least as old as his grandfather Henry II and may date back to the Conquest. It sets the price of bread for wheat prices from one shilling to twenty shillings a quarter in the money of that time. Laws like this are usually assumed to provide equally for departures above and below the middle price. On that assumption, ten shillings, containing six ounces of silver, Tower weight, and equal to about thirty shillings in our present money, must have been considered the middle price for a quarter of wheat when the law was first passed. It must still have been so in the 51st year of Henry III. It is therefore reasonable to assume that the middle price was at least one-third of the highest wheat price covered by this law's bread-price rules. That is six shillings and eightpence in the money of that time, containing four ounces of silver, Tower weight.

Taken together, these facts give us reason to conclude that around the middle of the fourteenth century, and for a considerable time earlier, the usual or average price of a quarter of wheat was thought to be no less than four ounces of silver, Tower weight.

From about the middle of the fourteenth century to the beginning of the sixteenth, what was regarded as the reasonable and moderate price of wheat—its usual or average price—seems gradually to have fallen by half. Eventually it was about two ounces of silver, Tower weight, equal to about ten shillings in our present money. It was still estimated at that price until about 1570.

The household book of Henry, the fifth earl of Northumberland, prepared in 1512, gives two different valuations of wheat. One puts it at six shillings and eightpence a quarter; the other puts it at only five shillings and eightpence. In 1512, six shillings and eightpence contained only two ounces of silver, Tower weight, and equaled about ten shillings in our present money.

Several laws show that from the 25th year of Edward III to the start of Elizabeth's reign, a period of more than two hundred years, six shillings and eightpence remained what people called the moderate and reasonable price of wheat. That meant its usual or average price. Yet during this period changes to the coinage continually reduced the silver contained in that stated sum of money. The rise in silver's value seems to have made up enough for this loss that lawmakers did not think it necessary to account for it.

For example, in 1436 a law allowed wheat exports without a license when the price was as low as six shillings and eightpence. In 1463 another law banned wheat imports unless the price exceeded six shillings and eightpence a quarter. Lawmakers thought exports would do no harm when the price was that low, but that imports should be allowed when it rose higher. So at that time six shillings and eightpence was considered a moderate and reasonable wheat price. It contained about as much silver as thirteen shillings and fourpence in our present money, one-third less than the same stated sum had contained under Edward III.

In 1554, under the 1st and 2nd of Philip and Mary, and in 1558, under the 1st of Elizabeth, exports of wheat were likewise banned whenever a quarter cost more than six shillings and eightpence. That sum then contained no more than two penny worth more silver than the same stated sum contains now. But lawmakers soon found that restricting exports until wheat was so cheap effectively banned exports altogether. So in 1562, under the 5th of Elizabeth, exports from certain ports were allowed whenever a quarter cost no more than ten shillings. That sum contained nearly as much silver as the same stated sum does now. Thus ten shillings was then regarded as the moderate and reasonable wheat price. It is close to the valuation in the Northumberland book of 1512.

Mr Dupré de St Maur and the accomplished author of the Essay on the Policy of Grain have both noted that France's average grain price was much lower at the end of the fifteenth century and the beginning of the sixteenth than during the two centuries before. Grain prices probably fell similarly across most of Europe during that period.

Silver's rise in value relative to corn could have come entirely from growing demand for the metal as land was developed and cultivated, while supply remained unchanged. Or it could have come entirely from falling supply while demand remained unchanged. Most known mines might have become badly depleted, making them much more expensive to work. Or both causes might have played a part. By the end of the fifteenth century and the beginning of the sixteenth, most of Europe was approaching a more stable form of government than it had known for several centuries. Greater security would naturally encourage industry and improvement. Growing wealth would naturally raise demand for precious metals and for every other luxury and ornament. Greater annual output would need more coins to circulate it. More rich people would want more silver plate and other decorations. It is also natural to suppose that most mines then supplying silver to the European market had become somewhat depleted and more costly to work. Many had been worked since Roman times.

Nevertheless, most writers on the prices of goods in ancient times have believed that silver steadily lost value from the Conquest, perhaps even from Julius Caesar's invasion, until the discovery of the American mines. They seem to have reached this view partly from their observations of corn prices and prices of other raw land products. Another influence was the common assumption that as wealth grows, the amount of silver in a country naturally grows, and its value falls as its amount grows.

Three things seem often to have led these writers astray when they examined corn prices.

First, in ancient times almost all rent was paid in goods: a specified quantity of corn, cattle, poultry, and so forth. Sometimes, however, the landlord reserved the right to demand either the annual payment in goods or a fixed sum of money instead. In Scotland, the price at which that payment in goods is replaced by money is called the conversion price. Since the landlord may choose between the goods and the money, the tenant needs protection. The conversion price should therefore be below, not above, the average market price. In many places it is little more than half that price. This practice still applies to poultry across most of Scotland, and to cattle in some places. It might also have survived for corn if the public fiars had not put an end to it. These are yearly assessments, made by an assize, of the average price of each kind and quality of grain based on actual market prices in each county. They made it safe enough for tenants, and much more convenient for landlords, to convert the corn rent at each year's fiars price rather than at a fixed price. But collectors of ancient corn prices seem often to have mistaken what the Scots call the conversion price for the actual market price. Fleetwood admits that he once made this mistake. Since he wrote his book for a particular purpose, however, he does not admit it until after copying the conversion price fifteen times. It was eight shillings a quarter of wheat. In 1423, the first year for which he uses it, that sum contained as much silver as sixteen shillings in our present money. But by 1562, the last year for which he uses it, it contained no more than the same stated sum does now.

Second, they have been misled by the careless way some old price-regulation laws were copied by lazy scribes, and sometimes perhaps even written by lawmakers.

The old assize laws appear always to have started by setting bread and ale prices when wheat and barley were at their cheapest. They then set the prices as those grains became progressively more expensive. But scribes often seem to have thought it enough to copy only the rules for the first three or four lowest prices. This saved them work; they presumably thought it showed the proper relationship for all higher prices.

For instance, in the assize of bread and ale from the 51st year of Henry III, the bread price was set for wheat prices ranging from one shilling to twenty shillings a quarter in the money of that time. But in the manuscripts used to print every edition of the laws before Mr Ruffhead's, the scribes stopped copying the rule at twelve shillings. Misled by that incomplete copy, several writers naturally concluded that the middle price, six shillings a quarter—equal to about eighteen shillings in our present money—was then the usual or average wheat price.

The statute of Tumbrel and Pillory, passed at about the same time, sets ale prices for each sixpence rise in barley prices from two shillings to four shillings a quarter. But four shillings was not considered the highest price barley would commonly reach. The stated prices merely show the relationship to apply at other prices, higher or lower. We can tell this from the law's last words: “Et sic deinceps crescetur vel diminuetur per sex denarios.” The wording is very careless, but its meaning is clear enough: “the price of ale is in this manner to be increased or diminished according to every sixpence rise or fall in the price of barley.” The lawmakers seem to have drafted this statute as carelessly as the scribes copied the other one.

An old manuscript of the Regiam Majestatem, an old Scottish law book, contains an assize law setting bread prices for wheat prices from tenpence to three shillings per Scotch boll, about half an English quarter. When this assize is thought to have been passed, three shillings Scotch equaled about nine shillings sterling in our present money. Mr Ruddiman seems [See his Preface to Anderson's Diplomata Scotiae.] to conclude that three shillings was the highest wheat price of the time, while tenpence, a shilling, or at most two shillings were the usual prices. But the manuscript clearly shows that all these prices are just examples of the relationship between wheat and bread prices. The law ends: “reliqua judicabis secundum praescripta, habendo respectum ad pretium bladi.”—“You shall judge of the remaining cases, according to what is above written, having respect to the price of corn.”