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IIRC, there's actually some serious discussion about precisely that. Basically people often assumed (wrongly) that medieval peasants lived like russian serfs in the 19th century, more information seems to indicate this is not neccessarily the case.
I'd disagree with you on the exact numbers (I'd say in western europe the first small changes started in the 15th century and were quite far along in the 18th, the agricultural revolution ahd lead to quite significant increases in yields already before industrialization. And this can be seen in better lifespans, increased population growth, etc. (not to mention stuff like better ovens and chimneys and such, an 18th century cottage is a different beast than a 10th century longhouse)
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There are church records partial from the 16th century, pretty exhaustive from the 18th (where we also get stuff like actual censuses and other statistics) They're not perfect of course, no statistics are, but there's a gross difference from the medieval era (where we have very little)
There are, of course, gaps (fire is the big destroyer of archives alas)
EDIT: Church records of course only record baptisms/burials, but the 18th century statistics actually do real death/birth statistics, including gender, cause of death, estate, etc. They're online if you want 'em, though you need to be able to read 18th century swedish handwriting.
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In fact, population roughly doubled in Sweden (-Finland in this case) in the 18th century (and IIRC, the fiAgures are similar elsewhere) which was a pretty massive difference, for the first time population gets beyond the high medieval maximum (which, remember, was straining the carrying capacity to the extent that it caused a population decline even before the Black Death) And it only accelerates in the 19th century, but a big chunk of the growth was already done by then.
There's also other stuff that indiciates the same thing, while the 19th century kept accelerating the trend, a lot of the groundwork had been liad in the 18th and even 17th century. (though population growth was slow in the 1600's, the fact that it actually grew despite horrible weather, several disease outbreaks, and near constant war is in itself remarkable)
There's also other stuff that indiciates the same thing, while the 19th century kept accelerating the trend, a lot of the groundwork had been liad in the 18th and even 17th century. (though population growth was slow in the 1600's, the fact that it actually grew despite horrible weather, several disease outbreaks, and near constant war is in itself remarkable)
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What I found about improvements from two-field-system:
Given 600 acres of land in 2-f system one have to plough 900 acres (fallow land has to be plough twice). With 3-f system one needs only plough 800 acres. The area of cultivated land is increased from 300 to 450. The work during the year is more evenly distributed, crops are more diverse.
Additionally you can plant more oat (and other spring cereals), what combined with horse collar and horseshoe*, enables you to use horses in agriculture. Before that the ox was the most widespread draught animal (comparable to the horse in terms of power but significantly slower and cannot work as long).
Another great invention was a scythe*. Tool that greatly improved productivity and enabled hay* harvesting (I don't even wat to imagine cutting grass with a sickle, scythe is already troublesome) . This increased the quantity of animals as you can store hay to fed them. You don't need to reduce the livestock before winter that badly. This in turn increases the quantity of manure (natural fertilizer). The ability to fertilize land is crucial. Nowadays it is solved by nitrogenous fertilizers but then there was no other possibility.
*Apparently Chinese didn't know it. (if Wikipedia page doesn't have any paragraph about Chinese, that means they didn't know it)
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It's a Wikipedia page. It's almost entirely unreliable when it comes to discussion of anything non-Western beyond the superficial.
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I agree. My intention was to mock many Wikipedia articles with 'Chinese' sections ("Look, we were first!"). Obviously lack of this part indicates that they didn't know about something.
Besides, Wikipedia was quoted here many times. Who's got all the time to read the books (or has access to them)?
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It should be noted that the one two or three field systems weren't universally useful: It depends on the soil and the type of crop and a bunch of other factors. They weren't universally adopted even long after they were known.
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The living standards of peasants prior to the 18th century varied significantly depending on place and time. From what I have seen there is not a great deal of change in their living standards over the medieval period. Where various technological improvements increased yields or productivity these were generally eroded by population growth within a generation or two. The only time in which we see a significant increase in the standard of living of ordinary people is during the labour shortages after the black death. The labour shortage led to a permanent change in the conditions of serfdom/tenancy which reduced the ability of the nobility to extract surplus.
There is, however, a noticeable decrease in the standards of living during the early modern period as centralised taxation supported by effective bureaucracies pushed peasants back to bare subsistence levels. Even the introduction of new and more efficient crops, such as potatoes, failed to offset the massive increase in central taxation needed to pay for the massive increase in military expenditure required by states.
As such, I would argue that the living standards of peasants in Europe is more closely related to relative power levels across the societies, and hence the tax burden, than the technology level of the time.
Russian serfs of the 19th century are perhaps the best example of a nearly powerless class taxed to within a whisker of starvation, in spite of a relative increase in the overall affluence of their society. Few people would argue that overall Russia was not wealthier in the 19th century than the 9th century, yet the standard of living seems to have stayed level or even decreased for the poorest sections of society over that time period.
The combination of societies that require the consent of the governed with an increase in efficiency and yield that has outstripped population growth has led to the massive improvement in the standard of living of the lower classes over the last two centuries. This growth cannot be assumed into the past.
There is, however, a noticeable decrease in the standards of living during the early modern period as centralised taxation supported by effective bureaucracies pushed peasants back to bare subsistence levels. Even the introduction of new and more efficient crops, such as potatoes, failed to offset the massive increase in central taxation needed to pay for the massive increase in military expenditure required by states.
As such, I would argue that the living standards of peasants in Europe is more closely related to relative power levels across the societies, and hence the tax burden, than the technology level of the time.
Russian serfs of the 19th century are perhaps the best example of a nearly powerless class taxed to within a whisker of starvation, in spite of a relative increase in the overall affluence of their society. Few people would argue that overall Russia was not wealthier in the 19th century than the 9th century, yet the standard of living seems to have stayed level or even decreased for the poorest sections of society over that time period.
The combination of societies that require the consent of the governed with an increase in efficiency and yield that has outstripped population growth has led to the massive improvement in the standard of living of the lower classes over the last two centuries. This growth cannot be assumed into the past.
Some improvements made "quality of life" changes that may/do not show up in the economic numbers.
The sudden appearance of change in the 16th century <imo> was a result of many small improvements over the previous centuries and the mindset changing with them.
Others have disputed that those changes happened or that they happened only in the 16th century.
The Chimney was first seem in the 11th century, yet only became ubiquitous in the 16th century. I find the idea that it was ignored for 400 years, then, poof, everyone had one, to be difficult. Similarly with many other ideas. They did not <imo> burst forth from nothing in the 16th century.
The sudden appearance of change in the 16th century <imo> was a result of many small improvements over the previous centuries and the mindset changing with them.
Others have disputed that those changes happened or that they happened only in the 16th century.
The Chimney was first seem in the 11th century, yet only became ubiquitous in the 16th century. I find the idea that it was ignored for 400 years, then, poof, everyone had one, to be difficult. Similarly with many other ideas. They did not <imo> burst forth from nothing in the 16th century.
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That's overstating it. You're almost a whole century off. The use of steam-powered machines in industry is a phenomenon that appears at the beginning of the 19th Century. The first industrial application in England was only in the 1785, and it only really began to spread after Watt's patent ran out in 1800.
Previous versions were only used to pump a few mine-shafts.
I haven't seen any aggregate estimates, just piecemeal ones. Watermills were certainly all over the place in China and Middle East.
But I would be wary with numbers. There has been a tendency to exaggerate their diffusion and importance.
In Europe, even by the most generous estimates, only a very small percentage of watermills (something between 1% and 3%) were ever used to power any manufacturing. It was primarily conventional use, i.e. grinding grain.
I would suggest taking a look at the work of Adam Lucas (2005, 2006), probably the foremost expert on the historical use of waterpower. He pretty much strips down the exaggerated claims for the importance of watermill power in Medieval Europe that had been pushed by Bloch, Mumford and other enthusiasts back in the 1930s. Besides knocking out the idea that the Romans didn't have watermill power (they did), and reminding of the widespread use of industrial watermills in China and the Middle East, he actually takes a careful look at the numbers and sources forwarded for the Middle Ages Euro-enthusiasts.
For instance, Lucas notes that no more than 400 industrial watermills (i.e. everything except grinding grain) can be attested in all of Europe, between the years 800 and 1600. That's a tiny number for a whole continent spread out over eight centuries.
Of course, not everything is documented, and it safe to assume there were, in fact, considerably more. Sources are pretty bad at providing numbers. As a rule, you usually you don't hear about stuff until it goes wrong, is seized or is destroyed. (Few writers bother to record that "There are ten watermills operational here at present. Everything is fine" and more "Woe betide us! Ten watermills were destroyed yesterday by the marauding army!").
Still, even that small number (400) is not really corroborated. 70% of these alleged mills were forwarded by just three social historians. Technological historians have only been able to identify about 100 of those 400 mills (and even so, 90% of that identification was by one researcher). That's a very thin layer of scholarship to back up the rhetoric.
Also keep in mind that they are regionally very concentrated and not very diffused. The great majority are from concentrated regions in France and England alone. Specifically, of the attested 400, France (186), England (145), Germany (28), Italy (15), all other European countries (15). So this is not a widespread thing.
(Admittedly, a lot of this depends on sources, and sources are regionally biased. English monks write a lot, but they don't write about Polish mills. And Polish monks are rather taciturn.)
Finally, functionally they were also varied in function. For all the English talk, there was little variety. 95% of English industrial watermills were cloth-fulleries. France had a much greater variety (fulleries, tanneries, hemp-mills, forge-mills, etc.) Low countries only had malt mills. Curiously, forge-mills, bellows, sawmills, sugar mills and paper mills - practically absent in England - are found early in Spain and Italy, areas of with greater contact with Islamic world and China, as well as a deeper Roman heritage. We know Romans had forge-mills, China had the entire range, and we know the first industrial watermills in Spain were set up in al-Andalus.
As for China & the Muslim world I'd love to give you numbers. Lucas gives plenty of anecdotal evidence from sources of widespread use - including two separate Chinese ministeries dedicated specifically to different types of industrial watermills, but no overall numbers. As under-researched, biased and unreliable as the numbers for Europe are, it is even less researched overseas.
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So you excluded them form the category industry. Ok. Based on unreliable source, which Wikipedia certainly is, the number of engines build was not that small : 1712 first, "By 1733 about 125", "By 1775 about 600 ", 1750 for the whole 18th century.
The engine was used not only in England. The Newcomen-type engine was build at Banská Štiavnica (modern day Slovakia, then in Habsburg empire) in 1722. On Polish soil it appears in 1788.
The engine was successfully applied to build a steam powered ship for the first time in 1783. There were few unsuccessful attempts before that date.
Ok. As usual they were very advanced (more than Europe) but there is no data.
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I guess the chinese bureaucracy was not very good at record keeping, or they should have used clay tablets I guess.
The first non-mining application I've found dates from the 1740s (although I've seen a passing mention of an engine dating from 1731). Abraham Darby II's Coalbrookdale Company installed a Newcomen engine in 1742/3 to pump water back into the mill pond to ensure a constant supply for the water wheels that provided the furnace blast. The Warmley Brass Works, near Bristol, had a steam engine by 1749 and Josiah Wedgwood bought a steam engine for similar purposes in 1782 for his pottery.
That said, I completely agree with the sentiment that steam power didn't really take off until the nineteenth century. Kanefsky estimated that steam engines provided 35,000hp by 1800 out of a total of 170,000 (i.e. 20.6 per cent of the total, see here p.18), and this is very probably an over-estimate (see here for some discussion of Kanefsky and a reassessment of his work).
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I trust Wikipedia as much as I trust my ex.
Mines aren't manufacturing, they're extractive.
That said, 1785 is the first instance I have of a steam engine used by an industry directly for its power, i.e. attaching its rotative motion to power a wheel (Robinson's Cotton Mill in Papplewick, Nottinghamshire).
The first use I know of a Newcomen engine in a manufacturing industry is 1782, by Richard Arkwright himself at the Shudehill mill. But he used the engine to recirculate water to a water-wheel, so it is really only a half-example.
Can't attest for your 600 number. Seems excessively high. I got a list (by name and location) for 18th C. steam engines, as well as numbers for all uses, albeit only for the British isles. There were a grand total of around 60 in all of Britain and Ireland in 1785, almost all pumping water in mines, canals and waterworks, with a handful in ironworks and a total of 4 in manufacturing (Wedgewood's pottery is one, and the aforementioned two mills - Papplewick and Shudehill). By 1800, there are 300 - about a third of which are powering manufacturing, principally cotton mills in Lancashire, almost all set up by Boulton & Watt. About 30 in iron forges, about 20 in breweries, another 20 in assorted industries (distillleries, tanneries, potteries, rolling mills). Bulk the rest are still in mines, waterworks & canals. Don't have notice of any on ships.
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Scandinavia is actually a little out of synch with the rest of Europe.
The general population pattern in Europe (Scandinavia excluded) was slight increase from 1000 up to 1300, massive decline with Black Death, then static through 1500, then rapid increase to 1550, then slow increase after 1550, then slow decline after 1600 through 1750, then increase again after 1750. Scandinavia was a little behind the pattern, e.g. kept up the 16th C. pace for longer, and didn't begin declining again until 1650. But it did synchronize after 1750.
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Sorry, that is such a semantic quibble of an argument. Steam power was used, from the time cited by Okcydent on, to increase overall output. And that increase in output had to go somewhere.
Your example is as ridiculous as saying that steel emerges fully formed from a steel mill without any input bar energy.
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That seems too low. The Kanefsky and Robey dataset identifies 2191 engines built by 1800 (likely an overestimate for installed engines, but not to such a degree as suggested above). Of this, 97 were built before 1733, and 539 before 1774 (all Newcomen-Savery types). See footnote 5 on p.4 of this article for revised Kanfesky-Robey count of 2279 by 1800 and p.7 for chronological count of engines built.
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Chimneys are a thing of interest to the cold north, where wood-powered hearths were a thing. In warm southern Europe, the Middle East and China, (smokeless) charcoal braziers were the norm for millennia and had little reason to change. Only industrial ovens had a incentive to install them.
IMO, charcoal braziers still make the yummiest food.
That said, "bursting forth" of technology, implementing an idea centuries after the it was invented, is not anomalous. It actually has to be affordable first.
Before the 18th Century? Were potatoes a thing anywhere outside of Latin America then?
Extractive industries are usually classed with agriculture and fishing as primary production. It is a significant difference, since we're not talking industry throughput. The inputs are God-given and limited by nature. You can't "sow" coal, no matter how much capital you have at hand.
"Increase overall output" is not a necessary corollary. Mines do deplete. You pump out water to reach deeper shafts, after the old shafts are used up. That doesn't necessarily increase total output, just keeps from falling. It could easily decrease if you get less out from the second than you got out of the first.
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