Page 167 - Panjek, Aleksander, Jesper Larsson and Luca Mocarelli, eds. 2017. Integrated Peasant Economy in a Comparative Perspective: Alps, Scandinavia and Beyond. Koper: University of Primorska Press
P. 167
the equilibrium of the mountain economy in the apennines
The limited availability of land suitable for cultivation was offset by the
extended collective resources held by local communities, namely forests
and natural pastures, whose use was strictly regulated in order to preserve
their properties and sustainability. Livestock farming was originally fos-
tered by the presence of pastureland. Herding had a decisive impact on the
economy of the area for these mountain communities, providing stable em-
ployment and even substantial flows of money and assets not only through
the sale of wool, but also that of cattle, horses, sheep, cheese and skins. For-
est produce, namely chestnuts, firewood and timber, as well as pitch, res-
ins and bark contributed to the equilibrium, and not only the nutrition-
al needs, of mountain families in Abruzzo. Agriculture, livestock farming
and forestry all seem to have been integrated and, being the predominant
activities in the region, would appear to define the environment as wholly
agro-pastoral in nature. However, the reality is rather more complex.
Agriculture involved the vast majority of the working population driv-
en to this primary activity by subsistence needs. Even though it is not pos-
sible to estimate the percentage of the population working in this sector
during the Early Modern Age, an idea of the proportion immediately tran-
spires from a reading of the tax records (censuses, land registers, cadas-
tral estimations) where the householders themselves declared their activ-
ities (Bulgarelli Lukacs 1989, 102–5; Piccioni, 1989–90, 191–2). Despite the
prevalence of mountain agriculture, it did not yield enough for staple sup-
port, nor did it occupy the workers full time. As a result, they also engaged
in various activities in other fields, and did not always report these activi-
ties to the government authorities.
Contact with the market was necessary to meet the food supply re-
quirements of the population: the main wood’s products – first of all chest-
nuts but also firewood, timber, charcoal as well as pitch, wood rosin and
bark – were sold, but also the wheat itself, although insufficient, was sub-
tracted from the local food consumption and substituted with less valua-
ble foodstuffs. For centuries, and up to WWI, fair and local market circuit
were the cornerstone of the trade. There were more fairs than average in the
other provinces of the Kingdom, showing the need for mercantile expan-
sion in the mountain area (Salvemini and Visceglia 1991, 65–122). A typ-
ical product capable of raising the share of income from agriculture was
saffron, but it was grown in a well-defined area of the L’Aquila province,
located on the Navelli plateau (Marciani 1974, 47–72; Clementi 1994, 17–8;
Pierucci 1997, 25–44; and 1998, 161–224). Moreover, despite wheat yields be-
165
The limited availability of land suitable for cultivation was offset by the
extended collective resources held by local communities, namely forests
and natural pastures, whose use was strictly regulated in order to preserve
their properties and sustainability. Livestock farming was originally fos-
tered by the presence of pastureland. Herding had a decisive impact on the
economy of the area for these mountain communities, providing stable em-
ployment and even substantial flows of money and assets not only through
the sale of wool, but also that of cattle, horses, sheep, cheese and skins. For-
est produce, namely chestnuts, firewood and timber, as well as pitch, res-
ins and bark contributed to the equilibrium, and not only the nutrition-
al needs, of mountain families in Abruzzo. Agriculture, livestock farming
and forestry all seem to have been integrated and, being the predominant
activities in the region, would appear to define the environment as wholly
agro-pastoral in nature. However, the reality is rather more complex.
Agriculture involved the vast majority of the working population driv-
en to this primary activity by subsistence needs. Even though it is not pos-
sible to estimate the percentage of the population working in this sector
during the Early Modern Age, an idea of the proportion immediately tran-
spires from a reading of the tax records (censuses, land registers, cadas-
tral estimations) where the householders themselves declared their activ-
ities (Bulgarelli Lukacs 1989, 102–5; Piccioni, 1989–90, 191–2). Despite the
prevalence of mountain agriculture, it did not yield enough for staple sup-
port, nor did it occupy the workers full time. As a result, they also engaged
in various activities in other fields, and did not always report these activi-
ties to the government authorities.
Contact with the market was necessary to meet the food supply re-
quirements of the population: the main wood’s products – first of all chest-
nuts but also firewood, timber, charcoal as well as pitch, wood rosin and
bark – were sold, but also the wheat itself, although insufficient, was sub-
tracted from the local food consumption and substituted with less valua-
ble foodstuffs. For centuries, and up to WWI, fair and local market circuit
were the cornerstone of the trade. There were more fairs than average in the
other provinces of the Kingdom, showing the need for mercantile expan-
sion in the mountain area (Salvemini and Visceglia 1991, 65–122). A typ-
ical product capable of raising the share of income from agriculture was
saffron, but it was grown in a well-defined area of the L’Aquila province,
located on the Navelli plateau (Marciani 1974, 47–72; Clementi 1994, 17–8;
Pierucci 1997, 25–44; and 1998, 161–224). Moreover, despite wheat yields be-
165
