The fifteenth-century countryside experienced a demographic crisis, and the landscape and the social structure changed in consequence. Yet this cannot explain all of the characteristics and developments of the period. The agrarian history of the different regions depended on their farming traditions, social organisation and economic opportunities. Beside the trends consequent on the falling population must be set the influence of the market, the interactions of lords and peasants, and the decision making of peasants, farmers, lords, townsmen and state officials.