I'm trying to study up on 11th Century Europe, in hopes of making my next dnd game more interesting for myself.

I'm trying to find out things like, how big were noble houses, how many servants did they have, did their servants live at the estate or did they return home to work on their land, were they free land owners at that time or serfs, if all the knights had for armor was chain, how did they train or compete in non-lethal jousting, how common were slaves.....

Long list, I know, but I wanted to set my game at the begining of good times, when the barbarians were being converted, the wars were far away, and the winters were warm.... not unlike now, but with less technology.

Poly & Bournazel, The Feudal Transformation was the biggie back when I was studying this stuff.

Here we go. Dig into these links. About a decade back I got involved in some research into what a peasant family could actually grow on a farm over the course of a year.

We needed to obtain some accurate stats on farming yields during the late Dark Ages -- early Renaissance era so we could accurately model the population variables for a medieval kingdom. We came across quite a bit of good material and resources, some of which (surprise) are actually still around

soc.history.medieval website
http://scholar.chem.nyu.edu/shm/shm.html

Construction & Building (GURPS, but good research)
http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Arcade/2574/archt.html

S. John Ross's web page on Medieval Demographics
http://www.io.com/~sjohn/demog.htm

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/alwalton.html

Many years ago a group of us in rec.games.frp.dnd discussed this topic. Here is a portion of what we came up with, based on historical research. For magic, adjust your figuring upward accordingly... a basic family of 2-12 would farm 20 acres, leaving 20-40 acres fallow, and this is a good rule of thumb for game play... Thank Bard, he came up with that after we kicked around quite a few numbers and spent quite a bit of time digging up records. As for historical records to give you a frame of reference to start from ...

-- Going back to the historical neolithic stats we used to estimate
yields of up to 12-14 Bushels per acre (of wheat), the little village of
Goljamo Delcevo had 39 acres under cultivation. 20 families lived
in the village. The archaelogists and researchers calculated that
the workload divided among the families, would have left sufficient
labor free for the building & maintenance of houses, lumbering, cattle
breeding, hunting, fishing, gathering, trading, and home and temple
crafts. The village produced both ceramics, and high quality tools as
well. So you are looking at about 2 acres per family under
cultivation. A family size of 2-12 individuals (My guess), sometimes
more, and work was from sunrise to sunset in the growing season.
for gaming purposes 1-4 persons per acre, with their animals during
the growing season would be required to care for the crop, and everyone pitched in at harvest time.

Now how about calculating grain yields based on population?
Medeival Grain Yields... Or Chinese or Egyptian Yields for that matter... Different grains produced quite a range of yields from as low as 5 bushels an acre (near a big city where one only had to worry about feeding ones own family), or less, to around 50 bushels an acre in the better times of the dark ages.

Many thanks to USDA for the human consumption statistics and also to
//www.horsepage.com and their links to the livestock library for the
following info...

Average daily intake for an adult human, approximately 3 lbs of
foodstuffs, broken down as follows: Grain 40%, Meat, Fish, Poultry
16%, and the remainder in various other categories. I picked the
oldest stats available for this from 1909. Rough estimate:
a little over a pound of grain a day... Humans were smaller in the
past, the average late egyptian/early roman being just 5'0" so
adjust your intake estimates accordingly... according to Bard your
average medeival peasant had a diet composed of 90% grain so
adjust your estimates accordingly for this as well.

For Animals, The National Research Center recommended the following
nutrient requirements (Grain & various forage mixes) be met for
healthy livestock... these are modern figures, so I would tend to
believe they are a bit on the high side of what was actually available
in ancient times, but the numbers at least give us a reference, or
starting point...

Horses - 8-10 lbs of grain + additional grasslands forage time.
Cattle - average 15 lbs of distilled grain. (pure seed grain)
Lambs/Sheep 15% of body weight (70 lbs (adult) or about 10-11 lbs
a day.
Swine - 2-7 lbs of grain/day average 3.6 lbs

Wintertime consumption numbers are higher of course...

In ancient times, the bulk of animal feed came from pastures, except
when a standing army was in the field, the army would live off the
land and forage, taking grain reserves, and such to supply the army.

Pigs and hogs eat more than sheep on a pound for pound because they cannot metabolize husks, stalks, or fibrous leaves.. So with of all the
different yields in agriculture, pigs are "expensive" in terms of what they
consume (processed grains).

More notes from the Bard...
>It appears that an Ox could plow 20 acres per year (including the 3
>times plowing of fallow land). It is reported that a horse could do
>better, but not by how much, just that they required better quality of
>feed.

>It looks like any model I use for averaged MA farm should be 3 field
>system.  1 field fall planting harvested in summer, early fall. Spring
>planting, harvested in fall. Fallow, plowed 3 times a year. I have not
>found if there was a set pattern of what was first planted in the
>field that had laid fallow..

>It should be noted (reminded?) there there was Rye bread as well, it
>was less liked.  To follow this the nobles would increase the price of
>wheat. Peasants still had Rye bread and some wheat bread.  Gruel still
>most likely was a meal for both, Nobles though flavored it better.

>As to barley, one of the main uses besides porridge was it's use in
>making something safe to drink.  A lot of barley was made into ale, as
>water most often was not fit to drink, from one of the many pages I
>looked at today an adult peasant drank about a gallon of ale per day,
>children drank less then a gallon,  Milk was rarely drunken made into
>butter or cheese instead for storage purposes.

And some historical links to get you started on your own path, should you choose to learn more for yourself.

The History of Gardening: A Timeline from Ancient Times
http://www.gardendigest.com/timegl.htm

Washington State University: World Civilizations I
Agricultural Revolution
http://www.wsu.edu:8001/vwsu/gened/learn-modules/top_agrev/agrev-index.html

UC Davis: The Evolution of Crop Plants
http://agronomy.ucdavis.edu/gepts/pb143/pb143.htm

The Development of Western Civilization: Prehistory Links Page
http://history.evansville.net/prehist.html#History

National Academy Press: Lost Crops of the Incas
http://books.nap.edu/books/030904264X/html/1.html#pagetop

University of Michigan: Classic Civ 452 - Food in the Ancient World
http://www.umich.edu/~classics/ca/452/

Minoterie Le Brume (A French Bakery/Mill?): Grain - Historical Notes
http://www.lesbrumes.com/histe.html

and finally some more recent research...

Ahrensburg Culture
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahrensburg_culture

The Norsemen
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norsemen

Galicia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galicia_(Spain)

The Goths (No kidding... the real ones)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goths

The Greuthungi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greuthungi

Eyfura (Scandianavian Nobles)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyfura

The Buri
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buri_(Germanic_tribe)

Hadingus, The Danish King
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadingus

Heruli (Dark Ages Germanic tribe)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heruli

Lombards
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lombards

Franks
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franks

Nerthus (Germanic Deity)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nerthus

Maniots (Ancient & Middle Ages Greece)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maniots

Silesia (Middle Ages Central European Kingsdom)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silesia

Snorri Sturluson (Icelandic Historian)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snorri

Suebian Knot
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suebian_knot

Svafrlami, Grandson of Odin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svafrlami

Thervingi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thervingi

Charlemagne
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne

Carolingian Dynasty
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolingia

Louis I
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_the_Pious

The Middle Ages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_ages

Hanseatic League
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanseatic_League

The Baltic Crusades
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Crusades

The Crusades
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusades

Reconqista
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconquista

Hundred Years War
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundred_Years'_War

Let me know if you need more, or for other parts of the world around the same time.

Opp. Double post. Danged BBBulletin choked on the links... here's one more for good luck, middle-ages castles:

http://www.middle-ages.org.uk/middle-ages-castles.htm

Game Daddy, holy crap. That's gold, thanks man. I also just bought a book called, "Life in the year 1000." It looks like it is going to be really helpful.

There's a few books tha will help.

Mythic Europe for Ars Magica
Lionheart by Columbia Games (England in 1190)
GURPS Middle Ages - again England

Ars Magica did a lot of stuff in France during this period.

Jousting that early wasn't non-lethal, people routinely died.  The whole courtly jousting thing is much later, at this stage it's closer to a free for all armed scrum - a practice war which is exactly what it was for.

Cumberland Games have a pdf called I think Medieval France, by Lisa Steele.  It's later, but it is spectacularly good and I recommend it without reservation.

It may seem odd to recommend a computer game, but Crusader Kings is very instructive in broadest terms (and fun, too). The game begins in 1066 with the player taking control of a dynasty of nobles from a particular part of Europe - and the bloodline could be as important as the de Normandies (Dukes of Normandy and Kings of England), as middling as the de Hautevilles (Dukes of Apulia) or as minor as the de Penthievres, Counts of the Northern part of the Amorican peninsula. Action then follows that family down the years until 1453.

It's a game, not a historical study, but it gives you a good idea of what politics was like in the 11th Century and onwards. Particularly, it shows how relatively weak Kings were at the time, and how important the Pope was.

Definitely chain armour only.  I believe 10th century France was all serfs not slaves, though the English had slaves until after the Norman conquest and the British Isles' Celtic fringe had slavery into the 15th century in areas outside Norman control.

Three excellent sources

Harn Manor
http://www.columbiagames.com/cgi-bin/query/cfg/zoom.cfg?product_id=4751

A Magical Medieval Society
http://xrp.yourgamesnow.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=2153

The Medieval Handbook
http://www.atlas-games.com/product_tables/AG1500.php

Quote from: noisms;274347It may seem odd to recommend a computer game, but Crusader Kings is very instructive in broadest terms (and fun, too). The game begins in 1066 with the player taking control of a dynasty of nobles from a particular part of Europe - and the bloodline could be as important as the de Normandies (Dukes of Normandy and Kings of England), as middling as the de Hautevilles (Dukes of Apulia) or as minor as the de Penthievres, Counts of the Northern part of the Amorican peninsula. Action then follows that family down the years until 1453.

It's a game, not a historical study, but it gives you a good idea of what politics was like in the 11th Century and onwards. Particularly, it shows how relatively weak Kings were at the time, and how important the Pope was.

I'd second that actually, good suggestion.  Have you played the expansion?

Quote from: Balbinus;274339Cumberland Games have a pdf called I think Medieval France, by Lisa Steele.  It's later, but it is spectacularly good and I recommend it without reservation.

I'm pretty sure you're referring to Fief, which is fantastic.  You know, the book itself, not that you're recommending it.

!i!

[Edit:  Wait -- she did write a book titled Medieval France, as listed on the Cumberland site, though I can't find a link to it off-hand.]

Quote from: S'mon;274372Definitely chain armour only.  I believe 10th century France was all serfs not slaves, though the English had slaves until after the Norman conquest and the British Isles' Celtic fringe had slavery into the 15th century in areas outside Norman control.

Arguably serf is a better situation than slave, but really it's not much of an improvement. Your lord would still dictate what you can do, like overseeing who a serf could marry and your kids would be considered serf too. The status of Villain was slightly better : more freedom though I don't think they could easily leave their liege's domain, renting of the farm and land they worked means they could technically make profit. Still both serf and villain had to perform services for their lord (building tasks, military tasks...). All in all it just plain sucked to be a farmer

It's a bit later, being set in the 14th century, but Barbara Tuchman's A Distant Mirror is about perfect to answer the original question. It concentrates on a single lord - Enguerrand de Coucy, the last Sieur de Coucy - but touches everything around him, and de Coucy seemed to be in the middle of everything.

-clash

thanks for the help everyone.

I just started reading a book called, "Life in the Year 1000." It is pretty helpful. A couple of things I can't wrap my head around:

Who owned slaves?
When a small lord had a feast, who came?
The Angelo Saxon army at the Battle of Hastings could perform phalanx style maneuvers. Were they all nobles or did common people train for war then?