RE: Carls, half carls and Gardeners

From: david.boatright_at_...
Date: Mon, 11 Mar 2002 16:37:55 -0000


I thought I was getting a handle on this but I am becoming more confused instead. First below is all the relevant information I could find in Thunder rebels.
Pg 10	Stead is a heortling farm
Pg 18     Example Stead has 70 adults
Pg 22     Clan has 500 to 2000 people
Pg 25	Outer ring contains household heads.  Bloodline head is a thane
Pg 26 	A blooodline has from 30/40 people up to several hundred
Pg 27	Household is 20 – 40 individuals (also called hearth or 
longhouse)
Pg 29     Example   Bloodline has 200 people split into 15 hearths spread 
over 3 large steads
Pg 30 Longhouse or hearth . Most stead’s have a small blood based or cult longhouse
Pg 32 Defines stead as having several households containing 13 – 120

    adults in 1 to 10 hearths (also called households and lodges) Pg 40 Heortling carls are famers

    A carl’s Stead has 120 acres and 40 cattle and 16 people. A     Stead is 15-25 people.
Pg 162 Farmer equipment farmstead
Pg 162 Gardener. Few people are full time gardeners Pg 164 Herder equipment lists a small house in upper pastures or small

    stead
Pg 165 Hunter equipment list a small stead or hunting camp.   

  Is a stead a single dwelling plus out buildings or is it all the buildings in a hamlet and those that are further out that want to be part of the settlement?

Pg 40 states farmers are carls and each has a stead containing 16 people. I would guess 8 would be children and steadwives. Out of the others I would assume, 1 is the carl himself and the rest would be unmarried sons as half carls and maybe a retired parent. The larger figure on pg 40 states that the stead could have up to 25 people. Who make up the other 17-25 as pg 162 states that there are few garderners?

 I suppose the rest could be hunters and/or herders without their own dwellings but this does not gel with most of the clan being farmers. How does is this expanded up to the 20-40 figure given for a household on pg 27? Who would make up the difference between 26 and 40 ?

  I know that heortling steads can vary greatly but we do need some sort     of base figure.   

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