Note 218 — Chapter IV · AGRICULTURAL TRIBES.

In the Carolingian period the clearing of forests went on continually. Some land was still reclaimed by free peasants, but much more by the great proprietors who controlled abundant labour forces218. The lords were already beginning to claim much uncultivated land, the reclaiming of which they only allowed on condition of the cultivator subjecting himself to them. There was far less unappropriated land than in the foregoing period, and such as there was was claimed by the king219. Yet we cannot speak of an appropriation of the whole of the land; for we know that a claim of the king to large tracts of uninhabited land is practically of little consequence. Accordingly our informant states that land was still abundant. The free peasants were already in a difficult position, not, however, because land was scarce, but because they could not provide the labour necessary to convert woods and marshes into arable land220.