SC - period egg sizes

[Mark.S Harris]

We have debated how big period eggs were here before.

However, I just bought some eggs from a friend here
at work. His kids are raising 18 chickens. And since
that many eggs are a bit much for one family to consume
he is selling them for $1.25 (US) per dozen. So now I
get to try some real fresh eggs vs. the ones I've been
buying in the grocery. And I've never had brown-shelled
eggs before, although that probably doesn't change the
taste any.

Anyway, what he brought up is that the eggs are getting
bigger as the chickens get older. Now they should stabalize 
out to a particular size, but that might have taken much 
longer in the Middle Ages for each chicken due to nutrition
or breeding. Today's egg laying chickens in factory
environments may live a very compressed life. Grow up
quick, lay eggs for a while, and be killed as soon as the
egg production or egg size drops off.

Thus I wonder if the medieval chicken, even on an individual
basis might have laid a larger variety of egg sizes. Also,
we end up sorting eggs by size because we can in the quantities
we handle, even from one producer. Maybe a large manor getting
a large quantity of eggs might sort by size, but smaller,
poorer, outfits might not have had the quantity of eggs at
any one time to sort them by size. Plus if these were eggs
that came from your serfs and workers I imagine you would
still use all the eggs, whether large or small.

I wonder if we have any rent records that call for x number
of large eggs or somesuch as opposed to simply saying x
number of eggs. And if so, how is the size measured or
described? If you don't specify the size, I would expect the
lord to get the smallest of the available eggs.

Comments?

Lord Stefan li Rous (posting from work)
stefan at texas.net