Agricultural History Review, Volume 46 Part 1 (1998), pp. 1–14

Conventional time series analysis of the English wheat price series, 1450-1812, reveals a short wavelength (period 5-6 years) and a medium wavelength (period 13-16 years) cycle throughout this time, although they developed strongly only at the end of the sixteenth century. The comparable cycles revealed in the series of oats and barley prices are strongly coherent with wheat prices (p o.o), that is the different grain prices responded together. Multivariate analysis and time series analysis show that the medium wavelength oscillation in wheat prices correlates with weather conditions: low winter and summer temperatures are the most significant factors. Both may have a direct effect on the growth and harvesting of the crop, but cold winters may also have indirect effects by establishing a generally cold spring and summer. High winter rainfall is of secondary importance. However, the short wavelength (period 5-6 years) cycle in wheat prices is not significantly correlated with weather and it is suggested that it is driven by economic factors, the short-term effects of a good or bad harvest (autoregressive effects) and possibly by regular epidemics of fungal pathogens of grain. The significance of the 5-6 year oscillation in driving corresponding mortality cycles and of producing cycles of susceptibility which maintained the epidemics of lethal infectious diseases is discussed. 

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