Fencing in historiography is the process of destruction of communal agricultural holdings in Europe. Most often this term is used in relation to modern England.
Agriculture in England in the 16th century
To understand what fencing is, you need to go back to the Tudor era. At this time, the cloth industry was rapidly developing in England. The price of wool rose, which, in turn, gave great economic importance to animal husbandry, in particular, great attention was paid to pastures for grazing. A serious struggle unfolded around this resource.
We althy landowning lords began to buy pastures from poor peasants. These domains were leased to farmers. Solitary farms fell into decay. Most of the English land was distributed among the nobility, church and state.
Freeholders
Then English peasants could be divided into two groups. The first are freeholders, or the so-called free owners. They didn't know what fencing was. Their relationship with the lords was as follows. The peasants paid a small rent for their land plots and could dispose of them as they wished. This groupstayed in the most comfortable conditions for the then agrarian class. At the same time, there were very few freeholders. They made up a very small part of the rural population of England.
Copyholders
Things were quite different for the second peasant stratum. Such plowmen were called copyholders. This class was formed in the XIV century, after serfdom was abolished in England. It is with them that the process of fencing is associated.
Copyholders owned their land only on a lifetime basis. This meant that the peasant had to negotiate with the lord lessor the terms of his inheritance to future generations. The same applied to any transactions with land. In fact, such peasants (and they were in the majority) became dependent on the lords. In addition, each copyholder paid a cash rent for his plot.
Since wool began to rise in price in the country, the lords began to massively inflate rental prices. This contributed to the mass impoverishment of the peasants. They got into debt and went bankrupt. The traditional system of coexistence in the village was soon broken. It happened in the 16th century.
Impoverishment of the peasantry
As payment for debts, the peasants were taken away their own plots. This process served as the beginning of capitalist restructuring in the countryside. The expropriated plots were fenced off from the previous owners (this is where the name of the concept we are considering came from).
Often a peasant could lose allland that he had before. Such people became hired workers for the same lords. What is fencing for most of them? This is a process of impoverishment. This phenomenon also has a popular synonym for "pauperization". The poor became beggars and vagabonds. This was the effect of the enclosure.
Also, this process was aggravated by the English reformation that happened. The royal power was in conflict with the Pope. Henry VIII announced that now his own Church will operate in his country. Simultaneously, there was a confiscation of land belonging to monasteries and other religious institutions. Allotments passed to the state. Many peasants lived on them. Most of them were left without land - here it was also fenced off. The conflict associated with these processes led to numerous peasant uprisings throughout the country.
Economic Development After Fencing
The inhabitants of the northern provinces were particularly poor. This border region had an underdeveloped infrastructure. Many peasants left to serve in the militia in exchange for paying the usual land tax. Capitalist changes and enclosures were the last to reach this region. The epicenter of these processes was Central and South-East England. Here the conflict between lords and peasants was especially clear.
In the southwest of the country, the traditional communal way of life lasted longer. There were woolen manufactories, manypastures. The copier farms in these provinces have been stable compared to other regions of the country.
What were the consequences for the peasants of the fences in the west? Here they were almost invisible. The lords tried to increase their allotments by raising the value of the rent. This method was covert and not as effective as outright expropriation.
What is fencing? It is also an impetus for the development of large-scale industry. This sector of the economy in England was less developed than in other rich countries. For example, in Holland, the number of factories, mills and other innovative farms was large compared to the neighboring island. When the great landowners of England had amassed great capital through enclosure, their money went to the development of industry. Thanks to this, the gap between England and Holland was successfully bridged in the 18th century.
