ess of the years 1300 and 1397 is
given by a comparison of prices for these years with the average
prices of the period in which they lie. The price in 1300 was about 17
per cent below the average for the period 1291-1310,[50] an indication
that the crop of nine bushels per acre reaped in 1299-1300 was above
the normal. The price of wheat in 1397 was very slightly above the
average for the period;[51] six bushels an acre or more, then, was
probably a normal crop at the end of the fourteenth century. This
conclusion is supported also by the fact that the yield in that year
at Witney was approximately the same as the average of the eleven
seasons between 1340 and 1354 noted in Table V. The price of wheat in
the year 1209-1210 is not ascertainable. Walter of Henley's statement
that the price of corn must be higher than the average to prevent loss
when the return for seed sown was only three-fold[52] is an
indication that the normal yield must have been at this time at least
three-fold, or six bushels, so that the extremely low yield of the
year 1208-1209 can hardly be considered typical. This examination of
the yield in the three seasons shown in the table gives these results:
at the beginning of the thirteenth century the average yield was
probably about six bushels and certainly not more than ten; at the
beginning of the fourteenth century the average was less than nine
bushels--how much less, whether more or less than six bushels, is not
known--at the end of the fourteenth century the yield was about six
bushels.

TABLE III

YIELD OF WHEAT ON THE MANORS OF THE BISHIPRIC OF WINCHESTER[53]

_Area sown_ _Produce_ _Ratio produce_
_Date_ _Acres_ _Bushels per acre_ _to seed_

1208-1209 6838 4-1/3 2-1/3
1299-1300 3353 9[54] 4
1396-1397 2366-1/2 6 3

TABLE IV

ACERAGE PLANTED WITH GRAINS ON THE MANOR OF THE BISHOPRIC OF
WINCHESTER[55]

_Wheat_ _Mancorn and Rye_ _Barley_
1208-1209 5108 492 1500
1299-1300 2410 175 800

TABLE V

YIELD OF WHEAT AT WITNEY[56]

_Date_ _Bushels per acre_ _Acres sown_
1209 3-2/3 417
1277 8