Even in 1485 much of the countryside was still untouched. There were
still great forests of oak trees, and unused land in between. There were still wild
animals, wild pigs, wild cattle, and even a few wolves. Scattered across this
countryside were "islands" of human settlement, villages and towns.
Few towns had more than 3,000 people, the size of a large village today. Most
towns, anyway, were no more than large villages, with their own fields and
farms. Even London, a large city of over 60,000 by 1500, had fields farmed by
its citizens.
In the sixteenth ce
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