“Let us now pay a visit to a house inhabited by prosperous peasants...in about 1625…. Propped against the wall, or hanging from it, there are various agricultural tools…. There are shelves bearing dishes, jugs, and the Bible…. A spinning wheel dominates one corner of the room... [where] textiles are spun…. Urban growth was due predominantly to immigration, as the mortality rate in the city was higher than it was in the country. Such density of population encouraged the spread of illness…. Pots, pans, and cutlery were on the increase…. Many items cost less than they had in the past

To confront a famine situation, people began growing plants which previously had been little cultivated in Europe, such as rice

Maize was imported into Europe by Columbus in 1493….

War encouraged the spread of the potato….

In the sixteenth century [sugar] became a luxury seasoning…. Tea…became popular in England…. In the second half of the seventeenth century the first coffee shops appeared.”

Rafaella Sarti, historian, “Material Conditions of Family Life,” 2001
_ 1. Which of the following was an important cause in the decline of famine in Europe?
a. the importation and transplantation of agricultural products from the Americas,
which contributed to an increase in Europe’s food supply
b. the exchange of goods shifted Europe’s economic center of power from the
Mediterranean to the Atlantic states, bringing the latter a wider variety of foods
c. the persistence of subsistence agriculture with three-crop field rotation in the north and two-crop rotation in the Mediterranean
d. the increase in the price of agricultural commodities as the population recovered to pre-Great Plague levels