Agricultural History Review, Volume 51 Part 2 (2003), p. 228

It is the harvest of the sea rather than the harvest of the land that is the principal focus of this welcome and scholarly volume. Professor Kowaleski has drawn selectively on the first seventy years of the copious records of the earldom and, then, duchy of Cornwall to assemble this remarkable collection of accounts. They document the pioneering attempts made by successive earls and dukes to regulate and profit from an array of maritime activities and resources over the critical and controversial period punctuated by the agrarian crisis of 1315–22, outbreak of the Hundred Years War in 1337, and Black Death of 1348–9. The ‘havener’ of the title was the official responsible for administering the earldom/duchy’s maritime properties. This unique position first appeared in the mid-thirteenth century and is a clear indication of the importance of the sea to this most maritime of English earldoms. Wrecks, royal fish (whales, sturgeon, and porpoises), prisage from cargoes of wine, port farms, fines levied in maritime courts, trantery (a toll paid by those who purchased fish for re-sale elsewhere), fines history review paid by forestallers of fish, customs duties on a range of imported and exported goods, and an assortment of other perquisites were all potentially lucrative sources of revenue for which the havener was required to account.

This comprehensive edition of the havener’s accounts – translated into English and reproduced verbatim (including insertions and deletions) – therefore makes interesting and revealing reading. Here are the materials that make it possible to document the relative importance of Cornwall’s many ports, the volume and composition of the trade that they handled, the ships and shipmasters responsible for carrying that trade and the voyages that they took, trade links between Cornwall and the rest of England, Wales, Ireland, Flanders, France, and Spain, the activities of Cornish fishermen and the nature of their catches, the risks and hazards of navigation, and the relationships between those who worked the sea for their livelihoods and the officials of the earldom/duchy. Much of this information is repetitive, cryptic, and formulaic but it is leavened by a wealth of anecdotal detail which ensures that these accounts are anything but a dull read. They record, for instance, the intriguing case of a ship captured in 1338/9 with a valuable cargo of wine and salt but entirely deserted by its crew and even its cat, the costs involved in transporting a carcass of venison from Lostwithiel to Bristol in 1339/40, and a tragic case in 1348/9 when a crew of fishermen were drowned even though their boat was saved. A substantial and first-rate introduction by the editor, detailed and thorough index, and glossary of the many unusual and archaic terms establish this as a volume that is as easy as it is interesting to use. It will become an indispensable work of reference for anyone interested in the south-west, in the earldom/ duchy of Cornwall, in medieval fishing, trade, and shipping, and in the many trials and tribulations of the early fourteenth century.

Plainly, no account of the agrarian economy of the south-west can afford to ignore the food, employment, wealth and commercial opportunities that were supplied by the sea (the same, of course, applies to the national economy). Moreover, because so much of what Cornwall produced and needed left and entered the county by sea the character and composition of its economy are more transparent than would have been the case had the county been more land-locked. The Cornish economy at this high point of medieval economic development was overwhelmingly geared towards primary production. Tin, sought after throughout Europe, was its most valuable export (and, by implication, a major employer), followed by unprocessed hides, and fish. At this peak in the national wool trade Cornwall was not a significant producer and exporter of wool, for Cornish wool was coarse in quality and low in value and of little use, therefore, to Flemish cloth producers who were increasingly specializing in high-quality woollens. In return came salt, required in quantity by the fishing industry, wine, and grain, the poor harvests of 1352–53 eliciting a noticeable increase in grain shipments. Significantly, the ships that carried this trade were as yet mostly built and owned elsewhere.

To an economy so dependent upon maritime trade the outbreak of hostilities between England and France proved to be a major set-back. Not only were established patterns of supply and demand disrupted, but piracy and privateering made plying the high seas a great deal more dangerous. The 1330s and 1340s were therefore a very difficult time for the Cornish economy and these problems were greatly compounded by the massive impact upon the county of the Black Death, to which the havener’s accounts bear abundant witness. In the long run, however, as Professor Kowaleski is at pains to emphasize, adversity served as a spur to enterprise, stimulating investment in ships, mariners, naval supplies, and administrative experience. To war rather than peace, Cornwall ultimately owed the increased supply of ships and mariners that underpinned its remarkable late medieval efflorescence. Professor Kowaleski is therefore to be congratulated for having produced a volume that will please the small band of those interested in the general problems of the medieval economy as much as the host of potential readers hungry for information about the history of this much loved and distinctive English county.