On Friday 28th October (4pm CET), Dr. Stef Espeel (University of Antwerp) will speak on 'Falling into poverty. Living standards during the grain price crises of 14th-century Flanders'. This will be the 37th open digital lecture of the Research Network for Medieval History, founded by the Queen Mary University London and the Pirenne Institute at Ghent University.

Abstract

In the late Middle Ages, grain price crises instigated by exogenous shocks like warfare, epidemics or weather anomalies could quickly evolve into subsistence crises, as grain was the most important source of nutrition. This paper employs newly constructed detailed grain price series to assess the impact of the many price crises of the 14th-century Flemish cities on living standards of (un)skilled building labourers. Focusing on providing sufficient calories and looking at the coarse assessments of nutrition failure for an average household in each city, the length, severity and geographical differences of the crises are analyzed in detail.