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.