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The organization of society formed a crucial element in the
remarkable development of the countryside in the North Sea area in
the last 1500 years. Vital questions are: Who owned the land? Who
gained the profits from its exploitation? How was the use of rural
resources controlled and changed? These questions have no simple
answers, because the land has been subjected to competing claims,
varying from region to region. In early times peasants mostly
possessed and worked their holdings, but lords took much of the
produce, and had the ultimate control over the land. In more recent
times the occupiers and cultivatorsgained stronger rights over
their farms. Neither lords nor peasants were free agents because
communities governed the use of common lands. In the highly
urbanized North Sea region towns and townspeople had much and
increasing influence over the countryside. Change came from within
society, for example from the tension and negotiation between lords
and peasants, and the growing importance of the state and its
policies. The volume also looks at the interaction between society
and external changes, such as the rise and fall of the market,
trends in population, and European integration.
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