 | This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Manorialism" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(December 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
| English feudalism |
|---|
 |
| Manorialism |
| Feudal land tenure in England |
| Feudal duties |
| Feudalism |
Manorialism, also known asseigneurialism, themanor system ormanorial system,[1][2] was the method of land ownership (or "tenure") in parts of Europe, notably France and later England, during theMiddle Ages.[3] Its defining features included a large, sometimes fortifiedmanor house orcastle in which thelord of the manor and his dependants lived and administered a rural estate, and a population of labourers orserfs who worked the surrounding land to support themselves and the lord.[4] These labourers fulfilled their obligations with labour time or in-kind produce at first, and later by cash payment as commercial activity increased. Manorialism was part of thefeudal system.[5]
Manorialism originated in theRoman villa system of theLate Roman Empire,[6] and was widely practised inmedieval western Europe and parts of central Europe. An essential element of feudal society,[7][5] manorialism was slowly replaced by the advent of a money-basedmarket economy and new forms ofagrarian contract.
Manorialism faded away slowly and piecemeal, along with its most vivid feature in the landscape, theopen field system. It outlastedserfdom in the sense that it continued with freehold labourers. As an economic system, it outlasted feudalism, according to Andrew Jones, because "it could maintain a warrior, but it could equally well maintain acapitalist landlord. It could be self-sufficient, yield produce for the market, or it could yield a money rent."[8] The last feudal dues in France were abolished at theFrench Revolution. In parts of eastern Germany, theRittergut manors ofJunkers remained untilWorld War II.[9]
The term is most often used with reference to medieval Western Europe. Antecedents of the system can be traced to the rural economy of the laterRoman Empire (Dominate). Labour was the keyfactor of production.[10] Successive administrations tried to stabilise the imperial economy by freezing the social structure into place: sons were to succeed their fathers in their trade, councillors were forbidden to resign, andcoloni, the cultivators of land, were not to move from the land they were attached to. The workers of the land were on their way to becoming serfs.[11]
Several factors conspired to merge the status of former slaves and former free farmers into a dependent class of suchcoloni: it was possible to be described asservus et colonus, "both slave andcolonus".[12] The Laws ofConstantine I around 325 both reinforced the semi-servile status of thecoloni and limited their rights to sue in the courts; theCodex Theodosianus promulgated underTheodosius II extended these restrictions. The legal status ofadscripti, "bound to the soil",[13] contrasted with barbarianfoederati, who were permitted to settle within the imperial boundaries, remaining subject to their own traditional law.
As theGermanic kingdoms succeeded Roman authority in the west in the fifth century, Roman landlords were often simply replaced by Germanic ones, with little change to the underlying situation or displacement of populations.
The process of rural self-sufficiency was given an abrupt boost in the eighth century, when normal trade in theMediterranean Sea was disrupted.
.jpg)
The word derives from traditional inherited divisions of the countryside, reassigned as local jurisdictions known asmanors orseigneuries; each manor being subject to alord (Frenchseigneur), usually holding his position in return for undertakings offered to a higher lord (seeFeudalism). The lord held amanorial court, governed by public law and local custom. Not all territorial seigneurs were secular;bishops andabbots also held lands that entailed similar obligations.
By extension, the wordmanor is sometimes used in England as a slang term for any home area or territory in which authority is held, often in a police or criminal context.[14][15]
In the generic plan of a medieval manor[16] fromShepherd's Historical Atlas,[17] the strips of individually worked land in the open field system are immediately apparent. In this plan, the manor house is set slightly apart from the village, but equally often the village grew up around theforecourt of the manor, formerly walled, while the manor lands stretched away outside, as still may be seen atPetworth House. As concerns for privacy[dubious –discuss] increased in the 18th century,[citation needed] manor houses were often located a farther distance from the village. For example, when a grand new house was required by the new owner ofHarlaxton Manor, Lincolnshire, in the 1830s, the site of the existing manor house at the edge of its village was abandoned for a new one, isolated in its park, with the village out of view.[citation needed]
In an agrarian society, the conditions of land tenure underlie all social or economic factors. There were two legal systems of pre-manorial landholding. One, the most common, was the system of holding land"allodially" in full outright ownership. The other was a use ofprecaria orbenefices, in which land was held conditionally (the root of the English word "precarious").
To these two systems, the Carolingian monarchs added a third, theaprisio, which linked manorialism withfeudalism. Theaprisio made its first appearance inCharlemagne's province ofSeptimania in the south ofFrance, when Charlemagne had to settle theVisigothic refugees who had fled with his retreating forces after the failure of hisZaragoza expedition of 778. He solved this problem by allotting "desert" tracts of uncultivated land belonging to the royalfisc under direct control of the emperor. These holdingsaprisio entailed specific conditions. The earliest specificaprisio grant that has been identified was atFontjoncouse, nearNarbonne (see Lewis, links). In former Roman settlements, a system ofvillas, dating from Late Antiquity, was inherited by the medieval world.
The possessor of a seigneurie bears the title of "Lord". He can be an individual, in the vast majority of cases a national of thenobility or of theBourgeoisie, but also ajudicial person most often an ecclesiastical institution such as anabbey, acathedral or canonical chapter or a military order. The power of the lord was exercised through various intermediaries, the most important of which was thebailiff. The sovereign can also be a lord; the seigneuries he owns form the royal domain.
The title of lord is also granted, especially in modern times, to individuals holding noble fiefdoms which are not for all that seigneuries. These "lords" are sometimes called sieurs, equivalent terms in medieval times.
The lord is the direct or prominent owner of the land assets of his lordship. The notion of absolute ownership over a common good cannot be applied, because there are also others than the main user who have rights over these goods. We[who?] distinguish in the land lordship two sets the reserves which is the set of goods of which the lord reserves the direct exploitation andtenant-in-chief, property whose exploitation is entrusted to a tenant against payment of a royalty, most often called cens and services such asCorvée. The distribution between reserve and tenure varies depending on the period and region.[18]
| This sectiondoes notcite anysources. Please helpimprove this section byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged andremoved.(March 2021) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Manors each consisted of up to three classes of land:
Additional sources of income for the lord included charges for use of his mill, bakery or wine-press, or for the right to hunt or tolet pigs feed in his woodland, as well as court revenues and single payments on each change of tenant. On the other side of the account, manorial administration involved significant expenses, perhaps a reason why smaller manors tended to rely less on villeintenure.[original research?]
Dependent holdings were held nominally by arrangement of lord and tenant, but tenure became in practice almost universally hereditary, with a payment made to the lord on each succession of another member of the family. Villein land could not be abandoned, at least until demographic and economic circumstances made flight a viable proposition; nor could they be passed to a third party without the lord's permission, and the customary payment.
Although not free, villeins were by no means in the same position as slaves: they enjoyed legal rights, subject to local custom, and had recourse to the law subject to court charges, which were an additional source of manorial income. Sub-letting of villein holdings was common, and labour on the demesne might be commuted into an additional money payment, as happened increasingly from the 13th century.
Land which was neither let to tenants nor formed part ofdemesne lands was known as "manorial waste"; typically, this includedhedges,verges, etc.[19] Common land where all members of the community had right of passage was known as "lord's waste". Part of thedemesne land of the manor which being uncultivated was termed the Lord's Waste and served for public roads and for common pasture to the lord and his tenants.[20][21] In many settlements during theearly modern period, illegal building was carried out on lord's waste land by squatters who would then plead their case to remain with local support. An example of a lord's waste settlement, where the main centres grew up in this way, is the village ofBredfield inSuffolk.[22] Lord's waste continues to be a source of rights and responsibilities issues in places such asHenley-in-Arden,Warwickshire.[23]
In examining the origins of the monasticcloister,Walter Horn found that "as a manorial entity theCarolingianmonastery ... differed little from the fabric of a feudal estate, save that the corporate community of men for whose sustenance this organisation was maintained consisted of monks who served God in chant and spent much of their time in reading and writing."[24]
Tenants owned land on the manor under one of several legal agreements:freehold,copyhold,customary freehold andleasehold.[25]
Likefeudalism which, together with manorialism, formed the legal and organisational framework of feudal society, manorial structures were not uniform or coordinated. In the later Middle Ages, areas of incomplete or non-existent manorialisation persisted while the manorial economy underwent substantial development with changing economic conditions.
Not all manors contained all three classes of land. Typically,demesne accounted for roughly a third of the arable area, andvillein holdings rather more; but some manors consisted solely of demesne, others solely of peasant holdings. The proportion of unfree and free tenures could likewise vary greatly, with more or less reliance on wage labour for agricultural work on the demesne.
The proportion of the cultivated area in demesne tended to be greater in smaller manors, while the share of villein land was greater in large manors, providing the lord of the latter with a larger supply of obligatory labour for demesne work. The proportion of free tenements was generally less variable, but tended to be somewhat greater on the smaller manors.
Manors varied similarly in their geographical arrangement: most did not coincide with a single village, but rather consisted of parts of two or more villages, most of the latter containing also parts of at least one other manor. This situation sometimes led to replacement by cash payments or their equivalents in kind of the demesne labour obligations of those peasants living furthest from the lord's estate.
As with peasant plots, the demesne was not a single territorial unit, but consisted rather of a central house with neighbouring land and estate buildings, plus strips dispersed through the manor alongside free and villein ones: in addition, the lord might lease free tenements belonging to neighbouring manors, as well as holding other manors some distance away to provide a greater range of produce.
Nor were manors held necessarily by lay lords rendering military service (or again, cash in lieu) to their superior: a substantial share (estimated by value at 17% inEngland in 1086) belonged directly to the king, and a greater proportion (rather more than a quarter) were held bybishoprics andmonasteries.Ecclesiastical manors tended to be larger, with a significantly greater villein area than neighbouring lay manors.[citation needed]
The effect of circumstances on manorial economy is complex and at times contradictory: upland conditions tended to preserve peasant freedoms (livestock husbandry in particular being less labour-intensive and therefore less demanding of villein services); on the other hand, some upland areas of Europe showed some of the most oppressive manorial conditions, while lowland eastern England is credited with an exceptionally large free peasantry, in part a legacy of Scandinavian settlement.
Similarly, the spread ofmoneyeconomy stimulated the replacement of labour services by money payments, but the growth of the money supply and resulting inflation after 1170 initially led nobles to take back leased estates and to re-impose labour dues as the value of fixed cash payments declined in real terms.[26][27]
The last feudal dues in France were abolished at theFrench Revolution. The lastpatroonship was abolished inNew York in the 1840s as a result of theAnti-Rent War. In parts of eastern Germany, theRittergut manors ofJunkers remained untilWorld War II.[9] In Quebec, the last feudal rents were paid in 1970 under the modified provisions of theSeigniorial Dues Abolition Act of 1935.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link){{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
