Agricultural History Review, Volume 46 Part 1 (1998), pp. 35–46

The last decade has seen a growth of interest in historic farm buildings, but they have usually been seen as individual structures, and in isolation from other aspects of rural history. On the basis of a systematic survey of entire farmsteads in part of Lincolnshire, it is here suggested that the physical remains may contribute to understanding agrarian conditions. It is tentatively concluded that, if studied on a regional basis, farmsteads may provide evidence for the local realities which lie behind national agricultural trends and, more especially, that systematic examination of farmsteads can provide valuable evidence for a way of life soon to be lost to living memory. 

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