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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 462318" data-attributes="member: 177">Not as bad as you might think.For one thing, the peasants are not too likley to simply flee.  The typical pattern would be for them to do their planting in the spring, go be part of the army if there's a war going on in the summer, and come back to their homes and harvest in the fall.  There's not all that much they could do for their crops in summer anyway, so the farmers can largely leave the fields to themselves, if need be.Let's also remember that this isn't the modern world with supermarkets.  In a medieval economy, you don't have food shipped from all over the world (or even all over a large nation) coming in year round.  Food is grown pretty much locally, and you get new food stores only once a year around harvest time.  What happens in one place may not much change the food supply more than a few days travel away.  If the crops are threatened, it may not matter where the peasants go - the city is hosed when the harvest fails anyway.If the peasants leave the fields for the cities, they might eat the city out of house and home, or they might not.  It isn't like these guys have money for food.  They grew their own food, and generally wouldn't be prepared to purchase food in the city anyway.  They'd likely bring as much of their own stores if they could.</blockquote>