the rise of a money economy began to weaken the bonds of serfdom that tied peasants to the land. Land was at first plentiful while labour to clear and work the land was scarce; lords who owned the land found new ways to attract and keep labour. Urban centres were able to attract serfs with the promise of freedom. As new regions were settled, both internally and externally, population naturally increased. Overall, the population of Europe is estimated to have reached a peak of as many as 75 million. England – The population of England, around 1.5 million or more in 1086, is estimated to have grown to somewhere between 3.7 million and 5–7 million, although the 14th-century estimates derive from sources after the first plague epidemics, and the estimates for pre-plague population depends on assumed plague mortality, the proportion of children and the rate of omissions in returns of taxable population. Italy – Italy’s population around 1300 has been variously estimated at between 10 and 13 million. France – In 1328, France is believed to have supported between 13.4 million people (in a smaller geographical area than today’s) and 18 to 20 million people (in the present-day area), the latter not reached again until the early modern period. Kievan Rus - the population of Kievan Rus is estimated to be between 4.5 million and 8 million, in the absence of historical sources these estimates are based on the assumed population density. Late Middle Ages By the 14th century, the frontiers of settled cultivation had ceased to expand and internal colonization was coming to an end, but population levels remained high. Then a series of events—sometimes called the Crisis of the Late Middle Ages—collectively killed millions. Starting with the Great Famine in 1315 and the Black Death from 1348, the population of Europe fell abruptly. The period between 1348 and 1420 saw the heaviest loss. In parts of Germany, about 40% of the named inhabitants disappeared. The population of Provence was reportedly halved and in some parts of Tuscany, 70% were lost during this period. Historians have struggled to explain why so many died. Some have questioned the long-standing theory that the decline in population was caused only by infectious disease (see further discussions at Black Death) and so historians have examined other social factors, as follows. A classic Malthusian argument has been put forward that Europe was overpopulated: even