1840 June 8,C[harles] Poulett Thomson, “An Ordinance to incorporate the Ecclesiastics of the Seminary of Saint Sulpice of Montreal[No. 164 of 1840]”, inCopy of Ordinances Passed by the Governor and Special Council of Lower Canada, in the Third and Fourth Years of the Reign of Her Majesty Queen Victoria (Accounts and Papers.United Kingdom. Parliament.House of Commons;1841, session 1), volume XV, published 3 February 1841,→OCLC,pages151–152:
And be it further ordained and enacted by the Authority aforesaid, That the Right and Title of the said Ecclesiastics of the Seminary of Saint Sulpice of Montreal, in and to all and singular the saidFiefs and Seigniories of the Island of Montreal, of the Lake of the Two Mountains, and of Saint Sulpice, and their several Dependencies, and in and to all Seigniorial and Feudal Rights, Privileges, Dues, and Duties arising out of and from the same, and in and to all and every the Domains, Lands, Reservations, Buildings, Messuages, Tenements, and Hereditaments within the said severalFiefs and Seigniories now held and possessed by them as Proprietors thereof,[…] shall be and they are hereby confirmed and declared good, valid, and effectual in the Law;[…]
The chief obligation of asipahi was to take up residence on hisfief and to be prepared at all times to rally, armed for battle, to his banner-holder's flag on the sultan's order. According to the income of hisfief, everysipahi had to raise a fixed number of armed horsemen (cebeli), who followed him on campaigns.
1995, Constance B. Bouchard, edited by William W. Kibleret al.,Medieval France: An Encyclopedia (Garland Reference Library of the Humanities;932), New York, N.Y., London:Garland Publishing,→ISBN, page660:
By the 14th century, however,fief holding was in decline, as salaries and retainer fees, rather thanfiefs, became standard for aristocrats in binding their knights to them, and as kings increasingly exercised royal power directly or through judges and bureaucrats, not through dukes and counts.Fief holding, which is what "feudalism" must be considered to mean if the term has any precise meaning at all—and what the term meant when it was coined in the 17th century—had become an insignificant part of social and governmental relations by the end of the Middle Ages.
2001, “Law IX. For What Offenses Committed Against His Lord a Vassal Loses His Fief, and Also How the Lord Loses the Ownership of It if He Commits an Offense Against His Vassal.”, inSamuel Parsons Scott, transl., edited by Robert I[gnatius] Burns,Las Siete Partidas: Volume 4: Family, Commerce, and the Sea: The Worlds of Women and Merchants (The Middle Ages Series), volumes IV (Partidas IV and V), Philadelphia, Pa.:University of Pennsylvania Press,→ISBN, page1001:
Where a vassal kills the brother, son, or grandson of his lord, he should lose hisfief on account of it.
2010, Gerard J. Brault, “The Death of Roland—Laisses 174–176 (verses 2355–2396)”, inThe Song of Roland: An Analytical Edition. Volume I. Introduction and Commentary, University Park, Pa., London:The Pennsylvania State University Press,→ISBN, page256:
Investiture was the conferring of afief by the lord to the vassal, and the rite consisted in the handing over by the lord of some symbolic object intended to represent the act of concession.
1989, Liliane Welch, “Grandparents: A Fragment”, in C. Dino Minni, editor,Ricordi, Things Remembered: An Anthology of Short Stories, Montreal:Guernica Editions,→ISBN, page59:
Through the years of my childhood my maternal grandmother remained the one unforgettable presence, the strong country woman ruling over her farm like a medieval lord. On herfief I first opened my eyes to poetry and to the land.[…] There was something of the ancient matriarch in her, who had given her life to the ground, who felt that on herfief in southern Luxembourg she stood in the right place.
