Feudalism is a decentralized sociopolitical
structure in which a weak
monarchy attempts
to control the lands of the
realm through
reciprocal agreements with regional leaders. In its most classic
sense, feudalism refers to the
Medieval
European political system composed of a set of
reciprocal
legal and
military obligations among the
warrior nobility, revolving
around the three key concepts of
lords,
vassals, and
fiefs.
Although derived from the
Latin word
feodum (fief), then in use, the term
feudalism
and the system it describes were not conceived of as a formal
political system by the people living in the
Medieval Period.
There is no broadly accepted modern definition of feudalism. The
term, which was coined in the
early
modern period (17th century), was originally used in a
political context, but other definitions of feudalism exist. Since
at least the 1960s, many medieval historians have included a
broader social aspect, adding the peasantry bonds of
manorialism, sometimes referred to as a
"
feudal society". Still others since
the 1970s have re-examined the evidence and concluded that
feudalism is an unworkable term and should be removed entirely from
scholarly and educational discussion, or at least used only with
severe qualification and warning.
Outside of
a European context, the concept of feudalism is normally used only
by analogy (called
semi-feudal), most often in discussions of
Japan
under the shoguns, and
sometimes medieval and Gondarine
Ethiopia
.
However, some have taken the feudalism analogy further, seeing it
in places as diverse as
ancient Egypt,
the
Parthian empire, the
Indian subcontinent, and the
antebellum American South.
The term
feudal has also been applied—often
inappropriately or pejoratively—to non-Western societies where
institutions and attitudes similar to those of
medieval Europe are perceived to prevail.
Ultimately, the many ways the term
feudalism has been used
has deprived it of specific meaning, leading many historians and
political theorists to reject it as a useful concept for
understanding society.
Characteristics
Lords, vassals and fiefs
Three primary elements characterized feudalism:
lords,
vassals and
fiefs; the structure of feudalism can be seen in how
these three elements fit together. A
lord was a
noble who owned land, a
vassal was a person
who was granted possession of the land by the lord, and the land
was known as a fief. In exchange for the fief, the vassal would
provide military service to the lord. The obligations and relations
between lord, vassal and fief form the basis of feudalism.
Before a lord could grant land (a fief) to someone, he had to make
that person a vassal. This was done at a formal and symbolic
ceremony called a
commendation
ceremony composed of the two-part act of
homage and oath of
fealty. During homage, the lord and vassal entered a
contract in which the vassal promised to fight for the lord at his
command.
Fealty comes from the Latin
fidelitas and denotes
the
fidelity owed by a vassal to his feudal
lord. "Fealty" also refers to an oath that more explicitly
reinforces the commitments of the vassal made during homage. Such
an oath follows homage. Once the commendation was complete, the
lord and vassal were now in a feudal relationship with agreed-upon
mutual obligations to one another.
The vassal's principal obligation to the lord was to provide "aid,"
or military service. Using whatever equipment the vassal could
obtain by virtue of the revenues from the fief, the vassal was
responsible to answer to calls to military service on behalf of the
lord. This security of military help was the primary reason the
lord entered into the feudal relationship. In addition, the vassal
sometimes had to fulfill other obligations to the lord. One of
those obligations was to provide the lord with "counsel," so that
if the lord faced a major decision, such as whether or not to go to
war, he would summon all his vassals and hold a council. The vassal
may have been required to yield a certain amount of his farm's
output to his lord. The vassal was also sometimes required to grind
his own wheat and bake his own bread in the mills and ovens owned
and taxed by his lord.
The land-holding relationships of feudalism revolved around the
fief. Depending on the power of the granting lord, grants could
range in size from a small farm to a much larger area of land. The
size of fiefs was described in irregular terms quite different from
modern area terms (see
medieval land
terms). The lord-vassal relationship was not restricted to
members of the laity;
bishops and
abbots, for example, were also capable of acting as
lords.
There were thus different 'levels' of lordship and vassalage. The
King was a lord who loaned fiefs to aristocrats, who were his
vassals. The aristocrats, through
subinfeudation, were lords to their own
vassals, Knights who were in turn lords of the manor to the
peasants who worked on the land. Ultimately, the Emperor was a lord
who loaned fiefs to Kings, who were his vassals. This traditionally
formed the basis of a
'universal
monarchy' as an imperial alliance and a world order.
Historiography
Invention
The word
feudalism was not a medieval term but an
invention of 16th century French and English lawyers to describe
certain traditional obligations between members of the warrior
aristocracy. The earliest known use of the term
feudal was
in the 17th century (1614), when the system it purported to
describe was rapidly vanishing or gone entirely. No writers in the
period in which feudalism was supposed to have flourished are known
to have used the word itself.
It was often used as a
pejorative by
later commentators to describe any law or custom that they
perceived as unfair or out-dated. Most of these laws and customs
were related in some way to the medieval institution of the
fief (Latin:
feodum, a word which
first appears on a Frankish charter dated 884), and thus lumped
together under this single term. "Feudalism" comes from the French
féodalisme, a word coined during the
French Revolution.
Evolution of the term
Feudalism became a popular and widely used term in 1748,
thanks to
Montesquieu's
De L'Esprit des Lois (
The Spirit of the Laws). In the
18th century, writers of the Enlightenment wrote about feudalism to
denigrate the antiquated system of the
Ancien Régime, or French monarchy.
This was
the Age of
Enlightenment when writers valued
Reason
and the
Middle Ages were viewed as the
"
Dark Ages." Enlightenment authors
generally mocked and ridiculed anything from the "Dark Ages"
including feudalism, projecting its negative characteristics on the
current French monarchy as a means of political gain.
In the
late 19th and early 20th centuries, John Horace Round and Frederic William Maitland, both
historians of medieval Britain, arrived at different conclusions as
to the character of English
society
before the Norman conquest in
1066. Round argued that the Normans had imported feudalism,
while Maitland contended that its fundamentals were already in
place in Britain. The debate continues today.
In the 20th century, the historian
François-Louis Ganshof was very
influential on the topic of feudalism. Ganshof defined feudalism
from a narrow legal and military perspective, arguing that feudal
relationships existed only within the medieval nobility itself.
Ganshof articulated this concept in
Feudalism (1944). His
classic definition of feudalism is the most widely known today and
also the easiest to understand, simply put, when a lord granted a
fief to a vassal, the vassal provided military service in
return.
Bloch and sociological views
One of Ganshof's contemporaries, the French historian
Marc Bloch, was arguably the most influential
20th century medieval historian. Bloch approached feudalism not so
much from a legal and military point of view but from a
sociological one. He developed his ideas in
Feudal Society
(1939-40; English 1960). Bloch conceived of feudalism as a type of
society that was not limited solely to the nobility. Like Ganshof,
he recognized that there was a hierarchical relationship between
lords and vassals, but Bloch saw as well a similar relationship
obtaining between lords and
peasants.
It is this radical notion that peasants were part of the feudal
relationship that sets Bloch apart from his peers. While the vassal
performed military service in exchange for the fief, the peasant
performed physical labour in return for protection. Both are a form
of feudal relationship. According to Bloch, other elements of
society can be seen in feudal terms; all the aspects of life were
centered on "lordship," and so we can speak usefully of a feudal
church structure, a feudal courtly (and anti-courtly) literature,
and a feudal economy.
Marx
Karl Marx also used the term in political
analysis. In the 19th century, Marx described feudalism as the
economic situation coming before the inevitable rise of
capitalism. For Marx, what defined feudalism was
that the power of the ruling class (the
aristocracy) rested on their control of
arable land, leading to a
class society based upon the exploitation of
the peasants who farm these lands, typically under
serfdom. "The hand-mill gives you society with the
feudal lord; the steam-mill, society with the industrial
capitalist." Marx thus considered feudalism within a purely
economic model.
Revolt against the term
In 1974, U.S. historian
Elizabeth
A. R. Brown rejected the label
feudalism as an anachronism that imparts a false sense of
uniformity to the concept. Having noted the current use of
many—often contradictory—definitions of
feudalism, she
argued that the word is only a construct with no basis in medieval
reality, an invention of modern historians read back "tyrannically"
into the historical record. Supporters of Brown have suggested that
the term should be expunged from history textbooks and lectures on
medieval history entirely.
In
Fiefs and Vassals: The Medieval Evidence Reinterpreted
(1994),
Susan Reynolds expanded upon
Brown's original thesis. Although some contemporaries questioned
Reynolds's methodology, other historians have supported it and her
argument. Note that Reynolds does not object to the Marxist use of
feudalism.
The term
feudal has also been applied to non-Western
societies in which institutions and attitudes similar to those of
medieval Europe are perceived to have prevailed (See
Other feudal-like
systems). Ultimately, critics say, the many ways the term
feudalism has been used have deprived it of specific
meaning, leading many historians and political theorists to reject
it as a useful concept for understanding society.
Questioning feudalism
Use and definition of the term
Cleric, knight and peasant
The following are historical examples given by
Susan Reynolds that call into question the
traditional use of the term feudalism:
Extant sources reveal that the early
Carolingians had vassals, as did other leading
men in the kingdom. This relationship did become more and more
standardized over the next two centuries, but there were
differences in function and practice in different locations. For
example, in the German kingdoms that replaced the kingdom of
Eastern Francia, as well as in some
Slavic kingdoms, the feudal
relationship was arguably more closely tied to the rise of
Serfdom, a system that tied peasants to the
land.
Moreover, the evolution of the
Holy
Roman Empire greatly affected the history of the feudal
relationship in central Europe. Long-accepted feudalism models
could imply that there was a clear hierarchy from Emperor to lesser
rulers, be they kings, dukes, princes, or margraves. These models
are patently untrue: the
Holy Roman
Emperor was elected by a group of seven magnates, three of whom
were princes of the church, who in theory could not swear
allegiance to any secular lord.
The French kingdoms also seem to provide clear proof that the
models are accurate, until it is considered that, when
Rollo of Normandy knelt to pay homage to
Charles the Simple in return for
the Duchy of
Normandy, accounts tell that
he knocked the king down as he rose, demonstrating his view that
the bond was only as strong as the lord—in this case, not strong at
all. This reveals that it was possible for 'vassals' to openly
disparage feudal relationships.
The autonomy with which the Normans ruled their duchy supports the
view that, despite any legal "feudal" relationship, the Normans did
as they pleased. In the case of their own leadership, however, the
Normans utilized the feudal relationship to bind their followers to
them. It was the influence of the Norman invaders which
strengthened and to some extent institutionalized the feudal
relationship in England after the
Norman
Conquest.
In modern times, controversy has existed over the use of the term
feudalism. Though it is sometimes used indiscriminately to
encompass all reciprocal obligations of support and loyalty in the
place of unconditional tenure of position, jurisdiction or land,
the term is restricted by most historians to the exchange of
specifically voluntary and personal undertakings, to the exclusion
of involuntary obligations attached to tenure of "unfree" land: the
latter are considered to be rather an aspect of
Manorialism, an element of feudal society but
not of feudalism proper.
Cautions on use of feudalism
Owing to the range of meanings they have,
feudalism and
related terms should be approached and used with considerable care.
A circumspect historian like
Fernand
Braudel puts
feudalism in quotes when applying it in
wider social and economic contexts, such as "the seventeenth
century, when much of America was being 'feudalized' as the great
haciendas appeared" (
The
Perspective of the World, 1984, p. 403).
Medieval societies never described themselves as
feudal.
Popular parlance generally uses the term either for all voluntary
or customary bonds in medieval society or for a social order in
which civil and military power is exercised under private
contractual arrangements. However,
feudal is best used
only to denote the voluntary, personal undertakings binding lords
and free men to protection in return for support which
characterized the administrative and military order.
Other feudal-like systems
Other feudal-like land tenure systems have existed, and continue to
exist, in different parts of the world, including Medieval
Japan.
See also
Notes
- Concurrent with when Marc Bloch's Feudal Society (1939) was
first translated into English in 1960.
- Cf. for example:
- Cantor, Norman F. The Civilization of the
Middle Ages. Harper Perennial, 1994.
- feudal. (n.d.).Online Etymology Dictionary.
Retrieved September 16, 2007, from Dictionary.com website:[1]
- Robert Bartlett. "Perspectives
on the Medieval World" in Medieval Panorama, 2001, ISBN
0892366427
- Philip
Daileader, "Feudalism", The Hight Middle Ages
- Quote from The Poverty of Philosophy (1847),
chapter 2.
References
- Bloch, Marc, Feudal Society. Tr. L.A. Manyon. Two
volumes. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961 ISBN
0-226-05979-0
- Brown, Elizabeth, 'The Tyranny of a Construct: Feudalism and
Historians of Medieval Europe', American Historical
Review, 79 (1974), pp. 1063–8.
- Cantor, Normon E., Inventing the Middle Ages: The Lives,
Works, and Ideas of the Great Medievalists of the Twentieth
century. Quill, 1991.
- Guerreau, Alain, L'avenir d'un passé incertain. Paris:
Le Seuil, 2001. (complete history of the meaning of the term).
- Poly, Jean-Pierre and Bournazel, Eric , The Feudal
Transformation, 900-1200., Tr. Caroline Higgitt. New York and
London: Holmes and Meier, 1991.
- Reynolds, Susan, Fiefs and Vassals: The Medieval Evidence
Reinterpreted. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994 ISBN
0-19-820648-8
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