The Rural Voice, 1979-12, Page 15Stepping back into
the middle ages
BY ADRIAN VOS
This time we will have a look at farming in the past somewhat
further back than we have done before. Let's go to to the Middle
Ages and see how the farmers of the 13th and 14th century
worked.
Of the three social classes in the medieval period, the peasant
farmer was the only one who worked. The nobility functioned as
police and army and had to be fed by the farmers. The Clergy
had a fulltime job looking after the spiritual needs of noble and
peasant alike.%and also had to be fed by the farmers.
The peasant in the areaof the Low Countries, comprising
Holland, Belgium, a good part of Northern France and the lower
Rhineland of Germany, was nominally a free man. Nevertheless,
he was so tied to his place of employment by poverty, having no
other place to go, that he was most often sold with the property if
it changed hands. His only chance to freedom was enlistment as
a mercenary in one of the many armies of the time.
Remaining on the farm meant protection by the castellain or
by the armed men from the Abbey, whoever owned the land.
The rent for the land was paid in labour plus the sum of three
silver shillings, in addition to the tithes of all he produced. This
was all organized by the Steward of the Abbey or Castle. He
decided when the peasant had to come to plow his acre a day.
Three days of every week the tenant had to be on the lands of the
estates with his oxen (if he had any) and with his young son who
Farming in the past
had the job of goading the oxen.
While the man was working on the field, his wife had to supply
her labour in the kitchens of the big house under the supervision
of the steward's wife.
This was not all the labour, for if the roof of the big house
needed repairs, additional labour was demanded.
If the tenant was ambitious enough to have a pig, he would let
it run free in the forests of the estate. However, he in turn had to
pay for this privilege by the use of his oxcart for hauling firewood
to the estate.
It was not that the peasant enjoyed pork in the fall and winter.
Far from it, for he would sell it to richer people in the towns for
some cash.
In the two and a half or three days left for his own farm he
produced barely enough for his own family, and when drought or
other calamities hit, he and his family would starve, to the
dismay of the steward who lost his labour that way.
Of the little that he produced he had to pay tithes to the
landlord. Once a year the steward would hold court in the huge
tithes barn to receive and record the tithes which were most of
the time paid in kind. One tenth of the rye, barley, wheat or
spelt. One tenth of the spun wool and woven cloth of the wife. Or
he could substitute with the pig, eggs or chickens.
Because of a diet devoid of animal protein, the peasants
usually died of old age when they were not yet forty years old.
The farmer of the twentieth century has come a long way, and
there will be few of them that would turn the poor away from the
door, just as there were few who would do so in the Middle Ages.
"Through the heavy ground
of ignorance"
BY SHEILA GUNBY
"To drive the plowshare of thought,
through the heavy ground of ignorance"
was the slogan used by the Patrons of
Husbandry, an early farm organization in
Ontario a century ago.
Farm organizations and co-operatives of
the past was ane of the topics presented
at the fourth annual Agricultural Seminar
held at the University of Guelph in
October.
Each year, they have a variety of topics
of interest to history buffs, museum
personnel and interested people.
This year the history of Co-operatives
was discussed by Leonard Harman,
retired general manager of U.C.O. He
outlined some of the earlier farm organiz-
ations -Patrons of Husbandry, Canadian
Council of Agriculture and the United
Farm Organization.
Some of the organizations lasted for
some length of time; "The Grange," an
organization started in the U.S. had 821
groups at one time in Ontario a century
ago, but the life span of some of them was
only two years.
Felicity Leung gave a detailed account of
flour and grist mills. She explained that
grist mills were the smaller mills, catering
to the needs of the farmer; flour mills were
used more for export and usually grdund
larger amounts of grain.
Women's farm organizations and their
contributions was presented by Margaret
McCready, retired Dean, MacDonald In-
stitute. She said women's organizations
were helpful in organizing fall suppers,
school fairs and quilting bees as well as
providing food at threshing bees and barn
raisings. The U.F.W.O. (United Farm
Womens Organization) often worked along
with the men in their organization and
was responsible for forming the United
Farm Young Peoples of Ontario, which laid
the ground, work for the Junior Institute,
Junior Farmers and 4-H clubs.
Margaret McCready said women's or-
ganizations were responsible for "political,
economic, social and familial change."
A joint paper presented by R. Gidney
and W. Miller from U.W.O. discussed the
role of the rural school. They stated that
the urban centres felt "rural schools
needed to be reformed or abolished - that
rural schools were not merely different but
bad!"
In the period between 1875-1900, rural
schools lost their insularity and control of
their own destiny. Before that time, control
was in local hands; there was no required
or uniform curriculum and everything
depended on local initiativeThe "inspector'
and universal standards of examinations
became turning points in the change in the
rural schools.
An overview of the history of women in
Wellington County, from the Iroquois to
the present was provided in slide form.
Katherine Brett, Textile Department
Royal Ontario Museum,concluded with a
pictorial display of costumes in the rural
community. She said the clothes were not
really distinctive but were definitely "sturdy
and hardwearing." She described the
clothing of both men and women. She
mentioned, locally, a Goderich priest dvho
had a typical long scarf - 55" wide and 31/2
yards long that he wrapped around his
neck and then around and around his chest
to keep him warm in the winter.
The women had to spin and sew their
garments at first or buy the material from
the store, she said, but in 1884, the Eaton's
mail order catalogue "became a godsend."
Once again, a well attended seminar
provided by the Office of Continuing
Education in Guelph.
THE RURAL VOICE/DECEMBER 1979 PG. 13