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Re-estimating Crop Yields from Probate Inventories: A Comment

Robert C. Allen recently put forward some modifications and extensions to my method of estimating crop yields from probate inventories in early modern England, which was originally published in this JOURNAL some 11 years ago.' His developments represent a considerable improvement on my original method and have been incorporated in some re-estimates of grain yields for Norfolk and Suffolk from 1585 to 1735. While I have no quarrel with Allen's general argument, some aspects of his particular application of it to Oxfordshire inventories are open to question. Most importantly, his empirical findings of changes in Oxfordshire yields are based on such slender evidence as to fail to substantiate his conclusion that "most of the yield increase in early modern England occurred in the seventeenth century rather than the eighteenth. "2 The reworking of my material for East Anglia suggests the opposite. My initial assumption in calculating yields was that inventory appraisers valued standing grain according to its future price and expected yield. Thus