Experiencing Famine in Fourteenth-Century Britain (Environmental Histories of the North Atlantic World) (English and Latin Edition) - Hardcover

Philip Slavin

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 250354780X ISBN 13: 9782503547800

Publisher: Brepols Publishers, 2019

Synopsis

The agrarian crisis of 1315-17, known to history as the Great Famine, was one of the most devastating environmental crises to hit Europe within the last two millennia. The almost biblical flooding of 1314-16 brought about a series of crop failures, triggering a widespread agricultural crisis that unfolded into a catastrophic famine, which hit both human and animal populations with unprecedented force. The impact of this crisis, and the major long-term environmental consequences that followed, thus mark a truly watershed moment in European history. This volume provides an in-depth study of the Great Famine as it affected the British Isles, but through this focused approach, it also offers new insights into the late-medieval North European economy and society at a time of political, socio-economic, and biological shocks and crises. Close analysis of contemporary archival sources reveals that the Great Famine was a highly complex phenomenon made by both Nature and man; and this is reflected in a highly interdisciplinary approach that studies climate, economy, demography, and health, as well as the way in which human behaviour further exacerbated the impact of famine.

Edition details

• Publisher: Brepols Publishers
• Publication date: 2019
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 250354780X
• ISBN 13: 9782503547800
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 442