Feudal Hierarchy

The phrases "feudal system" and "feudalism" were not used in the Middle Ages. They were coined in the 1700s by scholars describing economic systems. The Medieval Latin feodum (whose precise origin is unknown), it was used to refer to a grant of land one xchange for a service. Documents originally used the Latin beneficium, but for some reason that term started being replaced with feodum by the year 1000.

As societies grew more populated and government became less centralized, the feudal system enabled better management of land by "outsourcing" to trusted people. The trustee, or vassal, would pledge to fight for the lord who granted the land, using revenue from the land to furnish military equipment. Feudal customs varied from country to country, but the pledge of military support was common.

The primary vassal didn't work the land himself. A hierarchy evolved over time. Here are several positions of the economic/social strata that existed in English feudalism.

Lord Paramount, or Territorial Lord: the highest role in feudalism; the person who had no loyalty to anyone higher. In England, the king.

Tenant-in-chief: the person who holds his land from the king.

Mesne lord: a person who had vassals under him, but was in turn a vassal of a higher lord but not of the king.

Landed gentry/Gentleman: someone whose grant of land was sufficient to support him in comfort; this person might use the term esquire, but that was a courtesy title and conferred no special status.

Franklins & Yeomen: free men (not tied to the land by contract); they might be thought of as a middle class. Yeomen often were guards for the mesne lord or tenant-in-chief.

Free tenant/Husbandman: peasant farmers who worked the land and paid rent (and a percentage of goods) to the landholder.

Serf/Villein: peasant farmers who were essentially indentured to the landowner and legally forbidden to seek employment elsewhere.

So, if you had a choice to be a free tenant or an unfree serf, which do you think you would choose? There are some records from medieval England that may just shed some light on that topic, which I'll share with you tomorrow.

Statutes of Laborers

Controlling the Workforce

After the Black Death (1348-49 in England), the workforce was radically reduced. In a culture where 90%+ of the workforce was involved in agriculture, and every bit of it done by manual labor, this was potentially disastrous for lords who relied on peasants to plant and tend and harvest crops. The obvious solution was to offer better wages if peasants would leave their homes and settle in the lords' villages that had been deserted by the Pestilence.

This competition for labor did not sit well with most of society, who saw it as a disruption of the way things had been for centuries. The first Ordinance of Laborers was established by Edward III in 1349 to try to prevent the disruption of society that a "free market" could create. It stated:

• Everyone under the age of 60 must be willing to work
• Employers must not hire more workers than they need
• Wages must remain at pre-Pestilence levels
• Food prices must not be increased

Did it work?

• 1350 saw the Stature of Laborers that fixed the wages of laborers and artisans.
• 1356 saw regulations placed on the trade of masons. (Freemasons use this as proof that Freemasonry has been fighting "the Man" for centuries.)
• 1368 saw the Statute of Laborers reaffirmed.
• 1377 saw an act restricting the freedom of serfs to move from domain to domain.

Clearly, the laws had to be re-enacted because no one was listening. The attempt to suppress the freedom of the lower classes continued for the next two centuries; however, we will only concern ourselves with these few decades, because they led to the first occupy movement. I'll tell you about it tomorrow.