Food, Fuel and the Domesday Economy

This paper develops a theory where access to food and fuel energy is critical to the location, number, and size of human settlements. By combining our theory with a simple Malthusian mechanism, we generate predictions for the distribution of economic activity and population across geographic space. We evaluate the model using data drawn from the very first census undertaken in the English language - the Domesday census - commissioned by William the Conqueror in 1086 A.D. Using G.I.S. data and techniques we find strong evidence that Malthusian forces determined the population size and the number of settlements in Domesday England.