The Pattern of Landownership in England and Wales, 1660-1880

Datos Bibliográficos

ID3529599
AutoresJ V Beckett (0000-0001-9087-0998, University of Nottingham, autor de correspondencia)
Año1984
Volumen37
Número1
Páginas1
Fecha de publicación1984-02-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaThe Economic History Review (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0013-0117 • E-ISSN: 1468-0289
EditorialJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/2596828
OpenAlexW4253783017
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas29
Referencias citadas8

One of the most hotly debated issues in nineteenth-century England was the land question. An increasingly vociferous reform movement argued that the vast majority of the country's property was in the hands of a comparatively small elite; and this monopoly was regarded by observers both on the continent and in England as a root cause of many social problems.' Statistical evidence drawn from the I 86I census provided grist to the reformers' mill since it apparently implied that a total population of 30 million included only 30,000 landowners. If few people seriously doubted that some concentration of ownership had taken place, many were sceptical about the census figures, and one of the most substantial landowners, the Earl of Derby, campaigned for a general survey of ownership. The result was the Return of Owners of Land, compiled in i872-3, and widely known as the New Domesday since it was the first comprehensive analysis of the subject since io86. Even allowing for the inaccuracies with which the survey was riddled, it partially vindicated Derby's claim by showing that more than one million people owned some land; on the other hand, the figures could also be interpreted to show that four-fifths of the total acreage was in the possession of fewer than 7,000 proprietors.2

Geography · Political science · Historical Economic and Social Studies · History