The Domesday Economy of England , 1086 : Seminar University of Canterbury , NZ

Data collected in the Domesday Survey of 1086 can be used to reconstruct the eleventh century economy of England. The Survey contains high quality and detailed information on the inputs, outputs, and tax assessments of most English manors. In this seminar, I will describe the Survey, the contemporary institutional arrangements and the main features of Domesday agricultural production. I will show how frontier methods (DEA) can be used to assess the efficiency of production and measure the impact of the feudal and manorial systems on input productivities and output. The frontier analysis suggests that the average efficiency level of Domesday estates compares very favorably with that of more modern primary industry production. I also argue that input immobility, a consequence of the contemporary institutional fabric of feudalism and manorialism, resulted in wide variations in input productivities across estates, and led to a very significant reduction in overall output. More information on the Domesday Project can be found by going to my website http://business.flinders.edu.au/staff/mcdonald/. Current research on Domesday Wiltshire is forthcoming in Applied Economics and papers discussing econometric problems associated with second stage efficiency analyses are with journals. * Professor of Business, Flinders Business School, Flinders University, GPO Box 2100, Adelaide 5001, Australia. Email: [email protected]. I would like to thank Eva Aker for excellent research assistance, and the Australian Research Grants Council and Flinders University for financial support. This paper is dedicated to S. Snap