Why feudalism began

Student Activities. Table of Contents. Add a header to begin generating the table of contents. Origins and development of the feudal system Features of the feudal system Decline of feudalism. Key Facts And Information. Feudalism was a political, economic and social system that flourished in Western Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. It had its roots in Germanic and Roman traditions.

Its two principal institutions were vassalage and the fief. With the rise of towns and commerce and the decline of local organisation, feudalism gradually broke down in the continent. However, many of its remnants persist and still influence Western European institutions.

Origins and development of the feudal system Feudalism was a socio-political and economic system utilised in Western Europe during the medieval period. It developed as early as the 8th century and flourished between the 9th and 15th centuries. The bond of mutual loyalty between lord and vassal, which formed such an essential part of medieval feudalism, appears to have derived from the German comitatus described by Tacitus in 98 CE, the band of free fighting men associated with a prominent leader in an equal and honourable status.

The companions followed their chieftain into battle, having sworn to fight to the death in support of him. In return, the chieftain looked after their welfare, gave them leadership, provided food, shelter and entertainment in times of peace.

The Romans had long known a somewhat similar arrangement, in which clients commended themselves to a powerful patron, giving personal devotion in return for subsistence and protection. But this involved a definitely inferior status on the part of the client, and it was thus unlike the honourable relationship of vassalage which became a part of feudalism.

During the economic and political decay of the later Roman Empire, clientage was often linked with landholding. These relationships probably continued after the use of the Germanic kingdoms on the ruins of the Roman Empire in the West. In a predominantly agrarian economy, rights to land became the basis of wealth and power. The relations of personal dependency between lord and vassal, known as vassalage, was more and more associated with rights of land, termed the fief.

For the next years, great accumulations of power and landed wealth pass between a few favoured players as if in a vast board game. The rules are complex, and to an outside eye deeply mysterious. But certain actions and qualifications bring a distinct advantage.

The top players in feudal Europe come from a small group of people - an aristocracy, based on skill in battle, with a shared commitment to a form of Christianity at once power-hungry and idealistic in which the pope in Rome has special powers as God's representative on earth.

As a great feudal lord with moral pretensions, holding the ring between secular sovereigns, the pope can be seen as Europe's headmaster.

Bishops and abbots are part of the small feudal aristocracy, for they are mostly recruited from the noble families holding the great fiefs. Indeed bishops can often be found on the battlefield, fighting it out with with the best. As in any other context, the strongest argument in feudalism - transcending the niceties of loyalty - is naked force. The Normans in England or in Sicily rule by right of conquest, and feudal disputes are regularly resolved in battle.

But feudalism also provides many varieties of justification for force. And the possession of a good justification is almost as reassuring to a knight as a good suit of armour. One excellent excuse for warfare is the approval of the church. In the pope virtually commands the Normans to attack Sicily , by giving them feudal rights over territory not as yet theirs. Similarly Rome lets it be known that the Holy See is on the side of William when he invades England in Using whatever equipment the vassal could obtain by virtue of the revenues from the fief, he was responsible for answering 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. At the level of the manor this might be a fairly mundane matter of agricultural policy, but could also include sentencing by the lord for criminal offenses, including capital punishment in some cases. These are only examples; depending on the period of time and location in Europe, feudal customs and practices varied. Power in this period became more personal and decentralized.

Skip to main content. Search for:. Feudalism Learning Objective Recall the structure of the feudal state and the responsibilities and obligations of each level of society. Key Points Feudalism flourished in Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Feudalism in England determined the structure of society around relationships derived from the holding and leasing of land, or fiefs. In England, the feudal pyramid was made up of the king at the top with the nobles, knights, and vassals below him.

It also varied over time, as a lord took more land into his demesne, or divided demesne land amongst his serfs and free peasants. Costumes of slaves or serfs, from the sixth to the twelfth centuries collected by H. Manors usually attempted to be as self-sufficient as possible. The work of making and repairing equipment, for example, was carried out as far as practicable within the manor.

Towns were few and far between, and transporting goods to and from them was slow and expensive, so self-sufficiency was a sensible aim. It is common in school text books for feudalism to be depicted as a pyramid — and we have done the same here.

However, it should be borne in mind that feudalism could give rise to fiendish complexity; spaghetti might represent it better. We have seen how the original manors covered singe villages, but often came later to be scattered over several. As in this case, most complexities arose after fief-holding had become hereditary. For example, a vassal of one lord might marry the heiress of the vassal of another lord, thus acquiring obligations to a different lord.

What happened if these lords became enemies? This was not an unusual situation. The most famous case is probably that of the dukes of Burgundy, who in the 15th century held lands from both the king of France and the emperor of Germany , who were hereditary rivals. Things could get more complicated still. The counts of Anjou, vassals of the king of France , acquired by marriage, inheritance and a good bit of skulduggery several surrounding fiefs including of Aquitaine and Normandy.

They thus came to rule more of France than his nominal superior, the king — and this was before he inherited the throne of England as king Henry II reigned Fiefs and manors were essentially blocks of land from which income could be drawn, in the form of a share in the labor of the peasantry, or in the produce of the soil, or of money revenue from these.

It was a system for a rural economy. This made sense when, in the centuries after the fall of Rome, towns were few and far between, and those which did still exist were tiny.

The inhabitants of towns did not fit neatly into the feudal scheme of things. Many early towns were located in areas between manors. They formed no part of any fief and were answerable directly to the king. Other towns grew up within existing fiefs. In either case, it was quite impossible for a king to a great lord to deal with each individual within a town, so they dealt with towns as whole communities — which in practice meant dealing with the leaders of the towns.

It followed from this that, in internal matters, towns were able to run their own affair s with a comparatively free hand, and that townsmen, as individuals, were free of feudal obligations. Famously, if a serf arrived in a town and was able to stay there for a year and a day without being caught and sent back to his manor, he became a free citizen of that town.

If the medieval economy expanded and towns became wealthier, their leaders were able to bargain with their superiors, whether king or lords, for more autonomy. Large towns and cities thus came to run their own affairs with minimal interference from kings and other rulers. The revenue they contributed to the royal and feudal coffers effectively purchased their autonomy.

In England and France, the key cities of London and Paris were treated with great respect by their kings, while smaller cities enjoyed a high degree of freedom from royal or feudal interference. The cities of Spain gained the right to govern themselves, and those of central Italy which were part of the Papal States owed only loose obedience to the pope a duty which they frequently ignored.

In parts of Europe, many cities became effectively independent states in their own right. In Germany , even fairly minor towns gained a large measure of independence due to the problems the Holy Roman emperors had in imposing their will across their realms. In Flanders , the cities of Ghent, Bruges and Ypres became self-governing city-states, only nominally subject to the local count. In northern Italy, the wealth of leading towns such as Venice, Genoa, Milan and Florence made them amongst some of the most powerful states in Europe.

It can be seen from this description of the feudal system that at heart of it was a system of relationships between lords and their vassals, with rights and duties on both sides. It followed from this that medieval lords did not have dictatorial powers over their vassal. Indeed, embedded in the system of western European feudalism was the principle that a lord could not tax his subjects without their consent.

The key to rulers gaining the consent of their leading subjects was to seek their advice: to bring them in on his thinking, listen to their anxieties, and adapt his policies accordingly. Indeed, as we have seen, one of the duties of a vassal to his lord was to provide him with counsel; and vassals regarded this duty as one of their most cherished privileges, that their lord should consult with them on important matters.

Each lord had his council of vassals, which provided the forum for such consultation. One of the key principles that underlay this development was the idea that one person could speak for many.

This meant not only communicating their views but committing them to action such as paying a tax. Given the responsibility of this role, it was important that the representative should be someone who commanded the confidence of the majority of those whom he represented.