Historisk Tidsskrift
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SUMMARY: 

NILS HYBEL 

Climate, years of bad crops and famine in Denmark 1311-1319

(97:1, 40)

The second decade of the fourteenth century was marked by several years of bad weather, failure of crops, high prices and famine. The great famine in the years 1315-1317 is the best documented European famine in the Middle Ages. lt swept most of Europe north of the Alps and the Pyrenees. In the years around 1310 the weather was also critical. While constant heavy rainfall was the cause of famine, epidemics and high mortality in the middle of the decade Northern Europe suffered from draught in the years 1309-1311. 

Both incidents are recorded by Danish chroniclers but there are two different traditions. On one hand concordant evidence of draught, failure of crops and high prices in 1311 can be found in the Chronicle of Sealand and the Annals of Ryd and Ribe. On the other the Essenbaek Chronicle laconically rapports "pluvia cotidiana" (daily rainfall) for the year 1315, and that famine ravaged Denmark in 1319. Only the latter information is confirmed by other annals. In the Scania Chronicle which begins in 1316 high prices are mentioned in 1319. 

Even though some of the dating compared with the chronology in the neighbouring countries probably are slightly inaccurate and the fact that no other Danish source directly informs about similar abnormal conditions it seems reasonable to conclude that Denmark suffered like any other country in Northern Europe. Still, the scanty Danish sources leave us very few signs of the consequences. Desertions are accounted for in the earliest Danish manorial survey. lt dates from the period between 1313 and 1321 but some if not all the desertions listed in the survey might very well have taken place earlier. Thus the survey provides not unambiguous evidence of rising mortality. But perhaps the fact that the survey was never finished is a reflection of a critical situation in Denmark caused by the rapid succession of bad years. 

The shimmering entries in the Danish chronicles do not in themselves prove that the country in the second decade of the fourteenth century suffered repeatedly from bad weather, failure of crops, high prices and famine but brought into connection with the plentiful information from other countries they must be believed. In spite of the mentioned slighdy inaccurate dates the Danish evidence fits too well into the overall European picture to be rejected out of hand.