145-568: The Pictish Beast (sometimes Pictish Dragon or Pictish Elephant ) is an artistic representation of an animal, distinct to the early medieval culture of the Picts of Scotland. The great majority of surviving examples are on Pictish stones . The Pictish Beast accounts for about 40% of all Pictish animal depictions, and so was likely of great importance. The Pictish Beast is thought to have been an important figure in Pictish mythology, and possibly even
290-677: A "feudal society". Although it is derived from the Latin word feodum or feudum (fief), which was used during the Medieval period, the term feudalism and the system it describes were not conceived of as a formal political system by the people who lived during the Middle Ages. Since the publication of Elizabeth A. R. Brown 's "The Tyranny of a Construct" (1974) and Susan Reynolds 's Fiefs and Vassals (1994), there has been ongoing inconclusive discussion among medieval historians as to whether feudalism
435-400: A brilliant warrior who secularized church lands for the purpose of providing precarias (or leases) for his followers, in return for their military service. Martel's military ambitions were becoming more expensive as it changed into a cavalry force, thus the need to maintain his followers through the despoiling of church lands. Responding to Brunner's thesis, Paul Fouracre theorizes that
580-543: A clan or political symbol. A comprehensive collection of depictions of the Pictish Beast was given by Stuart as Plate 22 in Sculptured Stones of Scotland Volume 2, 1867. Depictions are shown at a consistent scale and oriented as they were on the stones. The sequence in which they appear is described as indicating their development from the outline form in which they first appear on the rude pillars, to that in which
725-523: A consensus viewpoint is that England before the Conquest had commendation (which embodied some of the personal elements in feudalism) while William the Conqueror introduced a modified and stricter northern French feudalism to England incorporating (1086) oaths of loyalty to the king by all who held by feudal tenure, even the vassals of his principal vassals (holding by feudal tenure meant that vassals must provide
870-573: A decline of trade, a small rise in average temperatures in the North Atlantic region and increased migration . In the 19th century the Early Middle Ages were often labelled the Dark Ages , a characterization based on the relative scarcity of literary and cultural output from this time. The term is rarely used by academics today. The Eastern Roman Empire, or Byzantine Empire , survived, though in
1015-418: A feudal order not limited solely to the nobility. It is his 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
1160-415: A feudal relationship with agreed 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 had to answer calls to military service by the lord. This security of military help was the primary reason the lord entered into the feudal relationship. In addition,
1305-465: A land grant in exchange for service was called a beneficium (Latin). Later, the term feudum , or feodum , began to replace beneficium in the documents. The first attested instance of this is from 984, although more primitive forms were seen up to one-hundred years earlier. The origin of the feudum and why it replaced beneficium has not been well established, but there are multiple theories, described below. The term "féodal"
1450-751: A lasting Norse heritage in northernmost Scotland, and it led to the combination of the Picts and Gaels under the House of Alpin , which became the Kingdom of Alba , the predecessor of the Kingdom of Scotland . The Vikings combined with the Gaels of the Hebrides to become the Gall-Gaidel and establish the Kingdom of the Isles . The Merovingians established themselves in the power vacuum of
1595-535: A means of political gain. For them "feudalism" meant seigneurial privileges and prerogatives. When the French Constituent Assembly abolished the "feudal regime" in August 1789, this is what was meant. Adam Smith used the term "feudal system" to describe a social and economic system defined by inherited social ranks, each of which possessed inherent social and economic privileges and obligations. In such
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#17328456294421740-417: A mouldboard, or curved metal ploughshare, and a coulter, a vertical blade in front of the ploughshare. The Romans had used light, wheel-less ploughs with flat iron shares that often proved unequal to the heavy soils of northern Europe. The return to systemic agriculture coincided with the introduction of a new social system called feudalism . This system featured a hierarchy of reciprocal obligations. Each man
1885-608: A period of Frankish rule was initiated. The Frankish king Pepin the Short had, by the Donation of Pepin , given the pope the " Papal States " and the territory north of that swath of papally-governed land was ruled primarily by Lombard and Frankish vassals of the Holy Roman Emperor until the rise of the city-states in the 11th and 12th centuries. In the south, a period of chaos began. The Duchy of Benevento maintained its sovereignty in
2030-506: A provision that was later extended to various parts of Italian kingdom following the invasion by French troops. In the Kingdom of Naples , Joachim Murat abolished feudalism with the law of 2 August 1806, then implemented with a law of 1 September 1806 and a royal decree of 3 December 1808. In the Kingdom of Sicily the abolishing law was issued by the Sicilian Parliament on 10 August 1812. In Piedmont feudalism ceased by virtue of
2175-577: A quarter of the farmland in France and provided most of the income of the large landowners. The majority refused to pay and in 1793 the obligation was cancelled. Thus the peasants got their land free, and also no longer paid the tithe to the church. In the Kingdom of France , following the French Revolution, feudalism was abolished with a decree of 11 August 1789 by the Constituent Assembly ,
2320-466: A retreat of agriculture centred around 500. The Romans had practiced two-field agriculture , with a crop grown in one field and the other left fallow and ploughed under to eliminate weeds. Systematic agriculture largely disappeared and yields declined. It is estimated that the Plague of Justinian which began in 541 and recurred periodically for 150 years thereafter killed as many as 100 million people across
2465-573: A set of reciprocal legal and military obligations of the warrior nobility based on the key concepts of lords, vassals, and fiefs. In broad terms a lord was a noble who held land, a vassal was a person granted possession of the land by the lord, and the land was known as a fief. In exchange for the use of the fief and protection by the lord, the vassal provided some sort of service to the lord. There were many varieties of feudal land tenure , consisting of military and non-military service. The obligations and corresponding rights between lord and vassal concerning
2610-510: A system, wealth derived from agriculture, which was arranged not according to market forces but on the basis of customary labour services owed by serfs to landowning nobles. Heinrich Brunner , in his The Equestrian Service and the Beginnings of the Feudal System (1887), maintained that Charles Martel laid the foundation for feudalism during the 8th century. Brunner believed Martel to be
2755-639: A unified cultural and educational milieu of far-ranging connections. As this was lost, it was replaced by the rule of local potentates, sometimes members of the established Romanized ruling elite, sometimes new lords of alien culture. In Aquitania , Gallia Narbonensis , southern Italy and Sicily, Baetica or southern Spain , and the Iberian Mediterranean coast, Roman culture lasted until the 6th or 7th centuries. The gradual breakdown and transformation of economic and social linkages and infrastructure resulted in increasingly localized outlooks. This breakdown
2900-460: Is a useful construct for understanding medieval society. The adjective feudal was in use by at least 1405, and the noun feudalism was in use by the end of the 18th century, paralleling the French féodalité . According to a classic definition by François Louis Ganshof (1944), feudalism describes a set of reciprocal legal and military obligations of the warrior nobility that revolved around
3045-500: Is feudalism?", 1944; translated in English as Feudalism ). His classic definition of feudalism is widely accepted today among medieval scholars, though questioned both by those who view the concept in wider terms and by those who find insufficient uniformity in noble exchanges to support such a model. Although Georges Duby was never formally a student in the circle of scholars around Marc Bloch and Lucien Febvre , that came to be known as
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#17328456294423190-555: Is that early forms of 'fief' include feo , feu , feuz , feuum and others, the plurality of forms strongly suggesting origins from a loanword . The first use of these terms is in Languedoc , one of the least Germanic areas of Europe and bordering Al-Andalus (Muslim Spain). Further, the earliest use of feuum (as a replacement for beneficium ) can be dated to 899, the same year a Muslim base at Fraxinetum ( La Garde-Freinet ) in Provence
3335-561: Is the position of Chalcedonian Christianity . Arianism found some favour in the Roman Empire before being eclipsed by the Chalcedonian position and then suppressed as heretical. During the migrations, or Völkerwanderung (wandering of the peoples), the earlier settled populations were sometimes left intact though usually partially or entirely displaced. Roman culture north of the Po River
3480-543: Is the presence on the Mortlach 2 stone of a symbol very similar to such a brooch, next to and in the same alignment as a Pictish Beast. Early medieval The Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period ), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages , is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th to the 10th century. They marked the start of the Middle Ages of European history , following
3625-524: The Führerprinzip . In 1974, the American 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
3770-639: The Annales school , Duby was an exponent of the Annaliste tradition. In a published version of his 1952 doctoral thesis entitled La société aux XIe et XIIe siècles dans la région mâconnaise ( Society in the 11th and 12th centuries in the Mâconnais region ), and working from the extensive documentary sources surviving from the Burgundian monastery of Cluny , as well as the dioceses of Mâcon and Dijon , Duby excavated
3915-620: The Black Sea , creating formidable confederations which opposed the local Sarmatians . In Dacia (present-day Romania) and on the steppes north of the Black Sea the Goths , a Germanic people, established at least two kingdoms: Therving and Greuthung . The arrival of the Huns in 372–375 ended the history of these kingdoms. The Huns, a confederation of central Asian tribes, founded an empire. They had mastered
4060-676: The Burgundians and bands of the Alamanni . In the fit of anti-barbarian hysteria which followed, the Western Roman Emperor Honorius had Stilicho summarily beheaded (408). Stilicho submitted his neck, "with a firmness not unworthy of the last of the Roman generals ", wrote Gibbon. Honorius was left with only worthless courtiers to advise him. In 410, the Visigoths led by Alaric I captured
4205-570: The Dnieper . By the 9th century, the Slavs had expanded into sparsely inhabited territories to the south and east from these natural frontiers, peacefully assimilating the indigenous Illyrian and Finnic populations. From the 7th century, Byzantine history was greatly affected by the rise of Islam and the Caliphates . Muslim Arabs first invaded historically Roman territory under Abū Bakr , first Caliph of
4350-656: The Frankish leader Charles Martel at the Battle of Poitiers in 732. The Umayyads were overthrown in 750 by the Abbāsids and most of the Umayyad clan were massacred. A surviving Umayyad prince, Abd-ar-rahman I , escaped to Spain and founded a new Umayyad dynasty in the Emirate of Cordoba in 756. Charles Martel's son Pippin the Short retook Narbonne , and his grandson Charlemagne established
4495-552: The Gothic War (376–382) , the Goths revolted and confronted the main Roman army in the Battle of Adrianople (378). By this time, the distinction in the Roman army between Roman regulars and barbarian auxiliaries had broken down, and the Roman army was composed mainly of barbarians and soldiers recruited for a single campaign. The general decline in discipline also led to the use of smaller shields and lighter weaponry. Not wanting to share
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4640-579: The Greek-speaking successor to the classical Roman Empire. The inhabitants continued to regard themselves as Romans, or Romaioi , until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453. Despite this, to distinguish it from its predominantly Latin-speaking predecessor, historians began referring to the empire as "Byzantine", after the original name of Constantinople, Byzantium The Eastern Roman or "Byzantine" Empire aimed to retain control of
4785-740: The Inca Empire , in the pre-Columbian era , as 'tributary' societies . In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, J. Horace Round and Frederic William Maitland , both historians of medieval Britain, arrived at different conclusions about the character of Anglo-Saxon English society before the Norman Conquest in 1066. Round argued that the Normans had brought feudalism with them to England, while Maitland contended that its fundamentals were already in place in Britain before 1066. The debate continues today, but
4930-703: The Macedonian dynasty in 867 marked the end of the period of political and religious turmoil and introduced a new golden age of the empire. While the talented generals such as Nicephorus Phocas expanded the frontiers, the Macedonian emperors (such as Leo the Wise and Constantine VII ) presided over the cultural flowering in Constantinople, known as the Macedonian Renaissance . The enlightened Macedonian rulers scorned
5075-847: The Marca Hispanica across the Pyrenees in part of what today is Catalonia , reconquering Girona in 785 and Barcelona in 801. The Umayyads in Hispania proclaimed themselves caliphs in 929. Climatic conditions in Western Europe began to improve after 700. In that year, the two major powers in western Europe were the Franks in Gaul and the Lombards in Italy. The Lombards had been thoroughly Romanized, and their kingdom
5220-608: The Moors (mostly Berbers and some Arabs ) invaded the Christian Visigothic Kingdom in the year 711, under their Berber leader Tariq ibn Ziyad . They landed at Gibraltar on 30 April and worked their way northward. Tariq's forces were joined the next year by those of his superior, Musa ibn Nusair . During the eight-year campaign most of the Iberian Peninsula was brought under Muslim rule—except for small areas in
5365-597: The Plague of Justinian . The Emperor himself was afflicted, and within the span of less than a year, an estimated 200,000 Constantinopolites—two out of every five city residents—had died of the disease. Justinian's successors Maurice and Heraclius confronted invasions by the Avar and Slavic tribes. After the devastations by the Slavs and the Avars, large areas of the Balkans became depopulated. In 626 Constantinople, by far
5510-627: The Po River had been wiped out in the years after the end of the Western Roman Empire, between the 5th and 8th centuries, new political and social infrastructure began to develop. Much of this was initially Germanic and pagan. Arian Christian missionaries had been spreading Arian Christianity throughout northern Europe, though by 700 the religion of northern Europeans was largely a mix of Germanic paganism , Christianized paganism, and Arian Christianity. Chalcedonian Christianity had barely started to spread in northern Europe by this time. Through
5655-591: The Rashidun Caliphate , who entered Roman Syria and Roman Mesopotamia . The Byzantines and neighbouring Persian Sasanids had been severely weakened by a long succession of Byzantine–Sasanian wars , especially the climactic Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628 . Under Umar , the second Caliph, the Muslims decisively conquered Syria and Mesopotamia , as well as Roman Palestine , Roman Egypt , parts of Asia Minor and Roman North Africa , while they entirely toppled
5800-585: The arrival of Christian missionaries in 597 . The Lombards, who first entered Italy in 568 under Alboin , carved out a state in the north, with its capital at Pavia . At first, they were unable to conquer the Exarchate of Ravenna , the Ducatus Romanus , and Calabria and Apulia . The next two hundred years were occupied in trying to conquer these territories from the Byzantine Empire. The Lombard state
5945-674: The decline of the Western Roman Empire , and preceding the High Middle Ages ( c. 11th to 14th centuries). The alternative term late antiquity , for the early part of the period, emphasizes elements of continuity with the Roman Empire , while Early Middle Ages is used to emphasize developments characteristic of the earlier medieval period. The period saw a continuation of trends evident since late classical antiquity , including population decline , especially in urban centres,
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6090-441: The feudal system , was a combination of legal, economic, military, cultural, and political customs that flourished in medieval Europe from the 9th to 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a way of structuring society around relationships derived from the holding of land in exchange for service or labour. The classic definition, by François Louis Ganshof (1944), describes a set of reciprocal legal and military obligations of
6235-498: The peasantry , which was bound by a system of manorialism . This order is often referred to as a feudal society , echoing Bloch's usage. Outside its European context, the concept of feudalism can be extended to analogous social structures in other regions, most often in discussions of feudal Japan under the shoguns , and sometimes in discussions of the Zagwe dynasty in medieval Ethiopia , which had some feudal characteristics (sometimes called "semifeudal"). Some have taken
6380-526: The territorial state . This form of statehood, identified with the Holy Roman Empire , is described as the most complete form of medieval rule, completing conventional feudal structure of lordship and vassalage with the personal association among the nobility. But the applicability of this concept to cases outside of the Holy Roman Empire has been questioned, as by Susan Reynolds. The concept has also been questioned and superseded in German historiography because of its bias and reductionism towards legitimating
6525-459: The 10th century it was common to value land in monetary terms but to pay for it with objects of equivalent value, such as arms, clothing, horses or food. This was known as feos , a term that took on the general meaning of paying for something in lieu of money. This meaning was then applied to land itself, in which land was used to pay for fealty, such as to a vassal. Thus the old word feos meaning movable property would have changed to feus , meaning
6670-679: The 16th-century basis or incorporate what, in a Marxist view, must surely be superficial or irrelevant features from it. Even when one restricts oneself to Europe and to feudalism in its narrow sense it is extremely doubtful whether feudo-vassalic institutions formed a coherent bundle of institutions or concepts that were structurally separate from other institutions and concepts of the time. 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 Examples of feudalism ). Japan has been extensively studied in this regard. Karl Friday notes that in
6815-433: The 1850s. Slavery in Romania was abolished in 1856. Russia finally abolished serfdom in 1861. More recently in Scotland, on 28 November 2004, the Abolition of Feudal Tenure etc. (Scotland) Act 2000 entered into full force putting an end to what was left of the Scottish feudal system. The last feudal regime, that of the island of Sark , was abolished in December 2008, when the first democratic elections were held for
6960-515: The 21st century historians of Japan rarely invoke feudalism; instead of looking at similarities, specialists attempting comparative analysis concentrate on fundamental differences. Ultimately, critics say, the many ways the term feudalism has been used have deprived it of specific meaning, leading some historians and political theorists to reject it as a useful concept for understanding society. Historian Richard Abels notes that "Western civilization and world civilization textbooks now shy away from
7105-453: The 3rd century as from the first. Estimates of the population of the Roman Empire during the period from 150 to 400 suggest a fall from 65 million to 50 million, a decline of more than 20 percent. Some scholars have connected this de-population to the Dark Ages Cold Period (300–700), when a decrease in global temperatures impaired agricultural yields. Early in the 3rd century Germanic peoples migrated south from Scandinavia and reached
7250-450: The 6th century, but then lost their trading links. Administrative, educational and military infrastructure quickly vanished, and the loss of the established cursus honorum led to the collapse of the schools and to a rise of illiteracy even among the leadership. The careers of Cassiodorus (died c. 585 ) at the beginning of this period and of Alcuin of York (died 804) at its close were founded alike on their valued literacy. For
7395-407: The 7th century the Rashidun Caliphate and the Umayyad Caliphate conquered the southern part of the Roman territory. Many of the listed trends reversed later in the period. In 800, the title of Emperor was revived in Western Europe with Charlemagne , whose Carolingian Empire greatly affected later European social structure and history. Europe experienced a return to systematic agriculture in
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#17328456294427540-422: The 8th century was out, the Farmer's Law signalled the resurrection of agricultural technologies in the Roman Empire. As the 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica noted, "the technological base of Byzantine society was more advanced than that of contemporary western Europe: iron tools could be found in the villages; water mills dotted the landscape; and field-sown beans provided a diet rich in protein". The ascension of
7685-406: The 9th and 10th centuries receded and gave way to a new feudal order wherein independent aristocratic knights wielded power over peasant communities through strong-arm tactics and threats of violence. In 1939, the Austrian historian Theodor Mayer subordinated the feudal state as secondary to his concept of a Personenverbandsstaat (personal interdependency state), understanding it in contrast to
7830-408: The Anglo-Saxons in the sixth century, with 597 given as the traditional date for its large-scale adoption. Western Britain ( Wales ), eastern and northern Scotland ( Pictland ) and the Scottish highlands and isles continued their separate evolution. The Irish descended and Irish-influenced people of western Scotland were Christian from the fifth century onward, the Picts adopted Christianity in
7975-409: The Early Middle Ages, reducing the sprawling city to groups of inhabited buildings interspersed among large areas of ruins and vegetation. The death of Theodosius I in 395 was followed by the division of the empire between his two sons. The Western Roman Empire disintegrated into a mosaic of warring Germanic kingdoms in the 5th century, effectively making the Eastern Roman Empire in Constantinople
8120-419: 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
8265-461: The French Revolution, on just one night of 4 August 1789, France abolished the long-lasting remnants of the feudal order. It announced, "The National Assembly abolishes the feudal system entirely." Lefebvre explains: Without debate the Assembly enthusiastically adopted equality of taxation and redemption of all manorial rights except for those involving personal servitude—which were to be abolished without indemnification. Other proposals followed with
8410-490: The German church, with the result that, within a century, the German church was the strongest church in western Europe. Yet despite this, Charles Martel refused to overthrow the Frankish king. His son, Pepin the Short, inherited his power, and used it to further expand Frankish influence. Unlike his father, however, Pepin decided to seize the Frankish kingship. Given how strongly Frankish culture held to its principle of inheritance, few would support him if he attempted to overthrow
8555-406: The Latin of the Frankish laws. One theory about the origin of fehu was proposed by Johan Hendrik Caspar Kern in 1870, being supported by, amongst others, William Stubbs and Marc Bloch . Kern derived the word from a putative Frankish term *fehu-ôd , in which *fehu means "cattle" and -ôd means "goods", implying "a movable object of value". Bloch explains that by the beginning of
8700-428: The Roman Empire, including Rome and the Italian peninsula itself, but he also codified Roman law (with his codification remaining in force in many areas of Europe until the 19th century) and commissioned the building of the largest and most architecturally advanced edifice of the Early Middle Ages, the Hagia Sophia . However, his reign also saw the outbreak of a bubonic plague pandemic , now known retroactively as
8845-428: The Roman empire were a mixture of Roman Christian , Arian Christian , Nestorian Christian , and pagan . The Germanic peoples knew little of cities, money, or writing, and were mostly pagan, though they were increasingly converting to Arianism , a non-trinitarian form of Christianity that considers God the Son to have been created by, and thus inferior to, God the Father, rather than the two being co-eternal , which
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#17328456294428990-439: The Roman military writer Ammianus Marcellinus . The core army of the Eastern Roman Empire was destroyed, Valens was killed, and the Goths were freed to lay waste to the Balkans , including the armories along the Danube. As Edward Gibbon comments, "The Romans, who so coolly and so concisely mention the acts of justice which were exercised by the legions, reserve their compassion and their eloquence for their own sufferings, when
9135-600: The Sasanids. In the mid 7th century, following the Muslim conquest of Persia , Islam penetrated into the Caucasus region, of which parts would later permanently become part of Russia . This expansion of Islam continued under Umar's successors and then the Umayyad Caliphate , which conquered the rest of Mediterranean North Africa and most of the Iberian Peninsula . Over the next centuries Muslim forces were able to take further European territory, including Cyprus , Malta , Septimania , Crete , and Sicily and parts of southern Italy . The Muslim conquest of Hispania began when
9280-507: The Western European societies commonly described as feudal. The word feudal comes from the medieval Latin feudālis , the adjectival form of feudum 'fee, feud', first attested in a charter of Charles the Fat in 884, which is related to Old French fé, fié, Provençal feo, feu, fieu, and Italian fio . The ultimate origin of feudālis is unclear. It may come from a Germanic word, perhaps fehu or *fehôd , but these words are not attested in this meaning in Germanic sources, or even in
9425-478: The aspects of life were centred on "lordship", and so we can speak usefully of a feudal church structure, a feudal courtly (and anti-courtly) literature, and a feudal economy. In contradistinction to Bloch, the Belgian historian François Louis 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 Qu'est-ce que la féodalité? ("What
9570-440: The authority and powers held by feudal lords , overlords , and nobles , and preferred the idea of autocratic rule where a king and one royal court held almost all the power. Feudal nobles regardless of ethnicity generally thought of themselves as arbiters of a politically free system, so this often puzzled them before the fall of most feudal laws. Most of the military aspects of feudalism effectively ended by about 1500. This
9715-477: The best sites in Britain for viewing bottlenose dolphins from the land. Recent thinking is that the Pictish Beast might be related to the design of dragonesque brooches , which are S-shaped pieces of jewellery, made from the mid-1st to the 2nd century CE, that depict double-headed animals with swirled snouts and distinctive ears. A few of these have been found in Scotland, though the great majority have been found in northern England. The strongest evidence for this
9860-409: The characteristic findings of smallpox. Waves of epidemics wiped out large rural populations. Most of the details about the epidemics are lost, probably due to the scarcity of surviving written records. For almost a thousand years, Rome was the most politically important, richest and largest city in Europe. Around 100 AD, it had a population of about 450,000, and declined to a mere 20,000 during
10005-437: The church itself held power over the land with its own precarias . The most commonly utilized precarias was the gifting of land to the church, done for various spiritual and legal purposes. Although Charles Martel did indeed utilize precaria for his own purposes, and even drove some of the bishops out of the church and placed his own laymen in their seats, Fouracre discounts Martel's role in creating political change, that it
10150-418: The city of Rome and for three days fire and slaughter ensued as bodies filled the streets, palaces were stripped of their valuables, and the invaders interrogated and tortured those citizens thought to have hidden wealth. As newly converted Christians, the Goths respected church property, but those who found sanctuary in the Vatican and in other churches were the fortunate few. The Goths and Vandals were only
10295-405: The complex social and economic relationships among the individuals and institutions of the Mâconnais region and charted a profound shift in the social structures of medieval society around the year 1000. He argued that in early 11th century, governing institutions—particularly comital courts established under the Carolingian monarchy—that had represented public justice and order in Burgundy during
10440-681: The culture and the imperial traditions of the Eastern Roman Empire attracted its northern neighbours—Slavs, Bulgars, and Khazars—to Constantinople , in search of either pillage or enlightenment. The movement of the Germanic tribes to the south triggered the great migration of the Slavs , who occupied the vacated territories. In the 7th century, they moved westward to the Elbe , southward to the Danube and eastward to
10585-538: The culture of the newcomers, their warband loyalties, the remnants of classical culture, and Christian influences, produced a new model for society, based in part on feudal obligations . The centralized administrative systems of the Romans did not withstand the changes, and the institutional support for chattel slavery largely disappeared. The Anglo-Saxons in England had also started to convert from Anglo-Saxon polytheism after
10730-495: The death of its author Thomas Madox , in 1727. In 1771, in his book The History of Manchester , John Whitaker first introduced the word "feudalism" and the notion of the feudal pyramid. Another theory by Alauddin Samarrai suggests an Arabic origin, from fuyū (the plural of fay , which literally means "the returned", and was used especially for 'land that has been conquered from enemies that did not fight'). Samarrai's theory
10875-711: The decisive victory at Ongala in 680 the armies of the Bulgars and Slavs advanced to the south of the Balkan mountains, defeating again the Byzantines who were then forced to sign a humiliating peace treaty which acknowledged the establishment of the First Bulgarian Empire on the borders of the Empire. To counter these threats a new system of administration was introduced. The regional civil and military administration were combined in
11020-480: The difficult art of shooting composite recurve bows from horseback. The Goths sought refuge in Roman territory (376), agreeing to enter the Empire as unarmed settlers. However many bribed the Danube border-guards into allowing them to bring their weapons. The discipline and organization of a Roman legion made it a superb fighting unit. The Romans preferred infantry to cavalry because infantry could be trained to retain
11165-424: The edicts of 7 March, and 19 July 1797 issued by Charles Emmanuel IV , although in the Kingdom of Sardinia , specifically on the island of Sardinia , feudalism was abolished only with an edict of 5 August 1848. In the Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia , feudalism was abolished with the law of 5 December 1861 n.º 342 were all feudal bonds abolished. The system lingered on in parts of Central and Eastern Europe as late as
11310-418: The effect of weakening the power of the king as his kingdom grew, since the result was that the land became controlled not just by more princes and vassals, but by multiple layers of vassals. This also allowed his nobles to attempt to build their own power base, though given the strict salic tradition of hereditary kingship, few would ever consider overthrowing the king. This increasingly fragmented arrangement
11455-500: The election of a local parliament and the appointment of a government. The "revolution" is a consequence of the juridical intervention of the European Parliament , which declared the local constitutional system as contrary to human rights , and, following a series of legal battles, imposed parliamentary democracy . The phrase "feudal society" as defined by Marc Bloch offers a wider definition than Ganshof's and includes within
11600-537: The end of the century. Roman Britain was in a state of political and economic collapse at the time of the Roman departure c. 400. A series of settlements (traditionally referred to as an invasion) by Germanic peoples began in the early fifth century, and by the sixth century the island would consist of many small kingdoms engaged in ongoing warfare with each other. The Germanic kingdoms are now collectively referred to as Anglo-Saxons . Christianity began to take hold among
11745-661: The exact opposite: landed property. Archibald Ross Lewis proposes that the origin of 'fief' is not feudum (or feodum ), but rather foderum , the earliest attested use being in Vita Hludovici (840) by Astronomus. In that text is a passage about Louis the Pious that says annona militaris quas vulgo foderum vocant , which can be translated as "Louis forbade that military provender (which they popularly call "fodder") be furnished." Initially in medieval Latin European documents,
11890-605: The face of the pretensions of both the Western and Eastern Empires. In the 9th century, the Muslims conquered Sicily . The cities on the Tyrrhenian Sea departed from Byzantine allegiance. Various states owing various nominal allegiances fought constantly over territory until events came to a head in the early 11th century with the coming of the Normans , who conquered the whole of the south by
12035-452: The feudal structure not only the warrior aristocracy bound by vassalage, but also the peasantry bound by manorialism, and the estates of the Church. Thus the feudal order embraces society from top to bottom, though the "powerful and well-differentiated social group of the urban classes" came to occupy a distinct position to some extent outside the classic feudal hierarchy. The idea of feudalism
12180-729: The feudalism analogy further, seeing feudalism (or traces of it) in places as diverse as Spring and Autumn period China, ancient Egypt , the Parthian Empire , India until the Mughal dynasty and the Antebellum South and Jim Crow laws in the American South . The term feudalism has also been applied—often pejoratively—to non-Western societies where institutions and attitudes similar to those in medieval Europe are perceived to prevail. Some historians and political theorists believe that
12325-401: The fief form the basis of the feudal relationship. 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 , which was composed of the two-part act of homage and oath of fealty . During homage, the lord and vassal entered into a contract in which the vassal promised to fight for
12470-500: The first of many bands of peoples that flooded Western Europe in the absence of administrative governance. Some lived only for war and pillage and disdained Roman ways. Other peoples had been in prolonged contact with the Roman civilization, and were, to a certain degree, romanized. "A poor Roman plays the Goth, a rich Goth the Roman," said King Theoderic of the Ostrogoths. The subjects of
12615-521: The form of the feudal system , which adopted such innovations as three-field planting and the heavy plough. Barbarian migration stabilized in much of Europe , although the Viking expansion greatly affected Northern Europe . Starting in the 2nd century, various indicators of Roman civilization began to decline, including urbanization , seaborne commerce, and population. Archaeologists have identified only 40 percent as many Mediterranean shipwrecks from
12760-471: The formation in combat, while cavalry tended to scatter when faced with opposition. While a barbarian army could be raised and inspired by the promise of plunder, the legions required a central government and taxation to pay for salaries, constant training, equipment, and food. The decline in agricultural and economic activity reduced the empire's taxable income and thus its ability to maintain a professional army to defend itself from external threats. In
12905-591: The former Roman provinces in Gaul, and Clovis I converted to Christianity following his victory over the Alemanni at the Battle of Tolbiac (496), laying the foundation of the Frankish Empire , the dominant state of early medieval Western Christendom . The Frankish kingdom grew through a complex development of conquest, patronage, and alliance building. Due to salic custom , inheritance rights were absolute, and all land
13050-419: The formerly Roman area, there was another 20 per cent decline in population between 400 and 600, or a one-third decline for 150–600. In the 8th century, the volume of trade reached its lowest level. The very small number of shipwrecks found that dated from the 8th century supports this (which represents less than 2 per cent of the number of shipwrecks dated from the 1st century). There was also reforestation and
13195-532: The glory, Eastern Emperor Valens ordered an attack on the Therving infantry under Fritigern without waiting for Western Emperor Gratian , who was on the way with reinforcements. While the Romans were fully engaged, the Greuthung cavalry arrived. Only one-third of the Roman army managed to escape. This represented the most shattering defeat that the Romans had suffered since the Battle of Cannae (216 BC), according to
13340-468: The hands of a general, or strategos. A theme , which formerly denoted a subdivision of the Byzantine army, came to refer to a region governed by a strategos. The reform led to the emergence of great landed families which controlled the regional military and often pressed their claims to the throne (see Bardas Phocas and Bardas Sklerus for characteristic examples). By the early 8th century, notwithstanding
13485-461: The highly profitable rights of justice, etc. (what Georges Duby called collectively the " seigneurie banale " ). Power in this period became more personal. This "fragmentation of powers" was not, however, systematic throughout France, and in certain counties (such as Flanders , Normandy , Anjou , Toulouse ), counts were able to maintain control of their lands into the 12th century or later. Thus, in some regions (like Normandy and Flanders ),
13630-520: 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. Reynolds argues: Too many models of feudalism used for comparisons, even by Marxists, are still either constructed on
13775-498: The key concepts of lords , vassals and fiefs , though Ganshof himself noted that his treatment was only related to the "narrow, technical, legal sense of the word." A broader definition, as described in Marc Bloch 's Feudal Society (1939), includes not only the obligations of the warrior nobility but the obligations of all three estates of the realm : the nobility, the clergy , and those who lived off their labour, most directly
13920-644: The king. Instead, he sought the assistance of Pope Zachary , who was himself newly vulnerable due to fallout with the Byzantine Emperor over the Iconoclastic Controversy . Pepin agreed to support the pope and to give him land (the Donation of Pepin , which created the Papal States ) in exchange for being consecrated as the new Frankish king. Given that Pepin's claim to the kingship was now based on an authority higher than Frankish custom, no resistance
14065-552: The largest city of early medieval Europe, withstood a combined siege by Avars and Persians. Within several decades, Heraclius completed a holy war against the Persians, taking their capital and having a Sassanid monarch assassinated. Yet Heraclius lived to see his spectacular success undone by the Muslim conquests of Syria , three Palaestina provinces , Egypt , and North Africa which was considerably facilitated by religious disunity and
14210-707: The last king of a united empire, Charles the Fat , died in 887, which resulted in a permanent split of the empire into West Francia and East Francia . West Francia would be ruled by Carolingians until 987 and East Francia until 911, after which time the partition of the empire into France and Germany was complete. Around 800 there was a return to systematic agriculture in the form of the open field , or strip, system. A manor would have several fields, each subdivided into 1-acre (4,000 m ) strips of land. An acre measured one "furlong" of 220 yards by one "chain" of 22 yards (that is, about 200 m by 20 m). A furlong (from "furrow long")
14355-574: The leadership of Alfred the Great and his descendants, Wessex would at first survive, then coexist with, and eventually conquer the Danes. It would then establish the Kingdom of England and rule until the establishment of an Anglo-Danish kingdom under Cnut , and then again until the Norman Invasion of 1066. Viking raids and invasion were no less dramatic for the north. Their defeat of the Picts in 839 led to
14500-416: The lord at his command, whilst the lord agreed to protect the vassal from external forces. 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 ceremony was complete, the lord and vassal were in
14645-478: The lord for criminal offences, including capital punishment in some cases. Concerning the king's feudal court, such deliberation could include the question of declaring war. These are examples of feudalism ; depending on the period of time and location in Europe, feudal customs and practices varied. In its origin, the feudal grant of land had been seen in terms of a personal bond between lord and vassal, but with time and
14790-515: The middle of the 18th century, as a result of works such as Montesquieu 's De L'Esprit des Lois (1748; published in English as The Spirit of Law ), and Henri de Boulainvilliers 's Histoire des anciens Parlements de France (1737; published in English as An Historical Account of the Ancient Parliaments of France or States-General of the Kingdom , 1739). In the 18th century, writers of
14935-604: The ninth century under the descendants of Merfyn Frych of Gwynedd , establishing a hierarchy that would last until the Norman invasion of Wales in 1081. The first Viking raids on Britain began before 800, increasing in scope and destructiveness over time. In 865 a large, well-organized Danish Viking army (called the Great Heathen Army ) attempted a conquest, breaking or diminishing Anglo-Saxon power everywhere but in Wessex. Under
15080-557: The north-northwest ( Asturias ) and largely Basque regions in the Pyrenees . This territory, under the Arab name Al-Andalus , became part of the expanding Umayyad empire. The unsuccessful second siege of Constantinople (717) weakened the Umayyad dynasty and reduced their prestige. After their success in overrunning Iberia, the conquerors moved northeast across the Pyrenees. They were defeated by
15225-782: The oppression of feudal subjects with a holistic integration of political and economic life of the sort lacking under industrial capitalism. He also took it as a paradigm for understanding the power-relationships between capitalists and wage-labourers in his own time: "in pre-capitalist systems it was obvious that most people did not control their own destiny—under feudalism, for instance, serfs had to work for their lords. Capitalism seems different because people are in theory free to work for themselves or for others as they choose. Yet most workers have as little control over their lives as feudal serfs." Some later Marxist theorists (e.g. Eric Wolf ) have applied this label to include non-European societies, grouping feudalism together with imperial China and
15370-400: The order coming before capitalism . For Marx, what defined feudalism was the power of the ruling class (the aristocracy ) in their control of arable land, leading to a class society based upon the exploitation of the peasants who farm these lands, typically under serfdom and principally by means of labour, produce and money rents. He deemed feudalism a 'democracy of unfreedom', juxtaposing
15515-593: The outline is filled up with the ornamental devices of the cross-slabs The Pictish Beast is not easily identifiable with any real animal, but resembles a seahorse , especially when depicted upright. Suggestions have included a dolphin , an anteater , an elephant , a kelpie (or each uisge ), and even the Loch Ness Monster . Chanonry Point and the Sutors of Cromarty lie close to the Pictish monasteries at Portmahomack and Rosemarkie and are recognised as some of
15660-445: The ox by the horse after the introduction of the padded horse collar in the 12th century. Because the system required a major rearrangement of real estate and of the social order, it took until the 11th century before it came into general use. The heavy wheeled plough was introduced in the late 10th century. It required greater animal power and promoted the use of teams of oxen. Illuminated manuscripts depict two-wheeled ploughs with both
15805-665: The period roughly between the late 8th and mid-11th centuries in Scandinavia and Britain , following the Germanic Iron Age (and the Vendel Age in Sweden). During this period, the Vikings , Scandinavian warriors and traders raided and explored most parts of Europe , south-western Asia , northern Africa , and north-eastern North America . Feudal system Feudalism , also known as
15950-664: The practice of simony , local princes typically auctioned off ecclesiastical offices, causing priests and bishops to function as though they were yet another noble under the patronage of the prince. In contrast, a network of monasteries had sprung up as monks sought separation from the world. These monasteries remained independent from local princes, and as such constituted the "church" for most northern Europeans during this time. Being independent from local princes, they increasingly stood out as centres of learning, of scholarship, and as religious centres where individuals could receive spiritual or monetary assistance. The interaction between
16095-516: The proliferation of heretical movements (notably Monophysitism and Nestorianism ) in the areas converted to Islam. Although Heraclius's successors managed to salvage Constantinople from two Arab sieges (in 674–77 and 717), the empire of the 8th and early 9th century was rocked by the great Iconoclastic Controversy , punctuated by dynastic struggles between various factions at court. The Bulgar and Slavic tribes profited from these disorders and invaded Illyria , Thrace and even Greece . After
16240-402: The provinces were invaded and desolated by the arms of the successful Barbarians." The empire lacked the resources, and perhaps the will, to reconstruct the professional mobile army destroyed at Adrianople, so it had to rely on barbarian armies to fight for it. The Eastern Roman Empire succeeded in buying off the Goths with tribute. The Western Roman Empire proved less fortunate. Stilicho ,
16385-489: The quota of knights required by the king or a money payment in substitution). In the 20th century, two outstanding historians offered still more widely differing perspectives. The French historian Marc Bloch , arguably the most influential 20th-century medieval historian, approached feudalism not so much from a legal and military point of view but from a sociological one, presenting in Feudal Society (1939; English 1961)
16530-526: The rulers of Western Europe as illiterate barbarians and maintained a nominal claim to rule over the West. Although this fiction had been exploded with the coronation of Charlemagne in Rome (800), the Byzantine rulers did not treat their Western counterparts as equals. Generally, they had little interest in political and economic developments in the barbarian (from their point of view) West. Against this economic background
16675-412: The same period or later: Counties and duchies began to break down into smaller holdings as castellans and lesser seigneurs took control of local lands, and (as comital families had done before them) lesser lords usurped/privatized a wide range of prerogatives and rights of the state, including travel dues, market dues, fees for using woodlands, obligations, use the lord's mill and, most importantly,
16820-434: The same success: the equality of legal punishment, admission of all to public office, abolition of venality in office, conversion of the tithe into payments subject to redemption, freedom of worship, prohibition of plural holding of benefices ... Privileges of provinces and towns were offered as a last sacrifice. Originally the peasants were supposed to pay for the release of seigneurial dues; these dues affected more than
16965-423: The shrinking territory of the empire, Constantinople remained the largest and the wealthiest city west of China , comparable only to Sassanid Ctesiphon , and later Abbasid Baghdad . The population of the imperial capital fluctuated between 300,000 and 400,000 as the emperors undertook measures to restrain its growth. The only other large Christian cities were Rome (50,000) and Thessalonica (30,000). Even before
17110-485: The sixth century under the influence of Columba , and the Welsh had been Christian since the Roman era. The Kingdom of Northumbria was the pre-eminent power c. 600–700, absorbing several weaker Anglo-Saxon and Brythonic kingdoms, while Mercia held a similar status c. 700–800. Wessex would absorb all of the kingdoms in the south, both Anglo-Saxon and Briton. In Wales consolidation of power would not begin until
17255-465: The term feudalism has been deprived of specific meaning by the many ways it has been used, leading them to reject it as a useful concept for understanding society. The applicability of the term feudalism has also been questioned in the context of some Central and Eastern European countries, such as Poland and Lithuania, with scholars observing that the medieval political and economic structure of those countries bears some, but not all, resemblances to
17400-433: The territory came to encompass the social, political, judicial, and economic spheres. These acquired powers significantly diminished unitary power in these empires. However, once the infrastructure to maintain unitary power was re-established—as with the European monarchies—feudalism began to yield to this new power structure and eventually disappeared. The classic François Louis Ganshof version of feudalism describes
17545-412: The third was fallow. Compared to the earlier two-field system, a three-field system allowed for significantly more land to be put under cultivation. Even more important, the system allowed for two harvests a year, reducing the risk that a single crop failure will lead to famine. Three-field agriculture created a surplus of oats that could be used to feed horses. This surplus allowed for the replacement of
17690-528: The trade routes between Europe and the Orient, which made the Empire the richest polity in Medieval Europe. Making use of their sophisticated warfare and superior diplomacy, the Byzantines managed to fend off assaults by the migrating barbarians. Their dreams of subduing the Western potentates briefly materialized during the reign of Justinian I in 527–565. Not only did Justinian restore some western territories to
17835-458: The transformation of fiefs into hereditary holdings, the nature of the system came to be seen as a form of "politics of land" (an expression used by the historian Marc Bloch ). The 11th century in France saw what has been called by historians a " feudal revolution " or "mutation" and a "fragmentation of powers" (Bloch) that was unlike the development of feudalism in England or Italy or in Germany in
17980-440: The vassal could have other obligations to his lord, such as attendance at his court, whether manorial , baronial, both termed court baron , or at the king's court. It could also involve the vassal providing "counsel", so that if the lord faced a major decision he would summon all his vassals and hold a council. At the level of the manor this might be a fairly mundane matter of agricultural policy, but also included sentencing by
18125-472: The vassal/feudal system was an effective tool for ducal and comital control, linking vassals to their lords; but in other regions, the system led to significant confusion, all the more so as vassals could and frequently did pledge themselves to two or more lords. In response to this, the idea of a "liege lord" was developed (where the obligations to one lord are regarded as superior) in the 12th century. Around this time, rich, "middle-class" commoners chafed at
18270-405: The warrior nobility and revolved around the key concepts of lords , vassals , and fiefs . A broader definition, as described by Marc Bloch (1939), includes not only the obligations of the warrior nobility but the obligations of all three estates of the realm : the nobility, the clergy , and the peasantry , all of whom were bound by a system of manorialism ; this is sometimes referred to as
18415-571: The western empire's half-Vandal military commander, stripped the Rhine frontier of troops to fend off invasions of Italy by the Visigoths in 402–03 and by other Goths in 406–07. Fleeing before the advance of the Huns , the Vandals , Suebi , and Alans launched an attack across the frozen Rhine near Mainz ; on 31 December 406, the frontier gave way and these tribes surged into Roman Gaul . There soon followed
18560-533: The world. Some historians such as Josiah C. Russell (1958) have suggested a total European population loss of 50 to 60 per cent between 541 and 700. After the year 750, major epidemic diseases did not appear again in Europe until the Black Death of the 14th century. The disease smallpox , which was eradicated in the late 20th century, did not definitively enter Western Europe until about 581 when Bishop Gregory of Tours provided an eyewitness account that describes
18705-402: Was divided equally among the sons of a dead land holder. This meant that, when the king granted a prince land in reward for service, that prince and all of his descendants had an irrevocable right to that land that no future king could undo. Likewise, those princes (and their sons) could sublet their land to their own vassals, who could in turn sublet the land to lower sub-vassals. This all had
18850-789: Was almost entirely displaced by the migrations. Whereas the peoples of France, Italy, Spain and Portugal continued to speak the dialects of Vulgar Latin that today constitute the Romance languages , the language of the smaller Roman-era population of what is now England disappeared with barely a trace in the territories settled by the Anglo-Saxons, although the Brittanic kingdoms of the west remained Brythonic speakers. The new peoples greatly altered established society, including law, culture, religion, and patterns of property ownership. The pax Romana had provided safe conditions for trade and manufacture, and
18995-627: Was bound to serve his superior in return for the latter's protection. This made for confusion of territorial sovereignty since allegiances were subject to change over time and were sometimes mutually contradictory. Feudalism allowed the state to provide a degree of public safety despite the continued absence of bureaucracy and written records. Manors became largely self-sufficient, and the volume of trade along long-distance routes and in market towns declined during this period, though never ceased entirely. Roman roads decayed and long-distance trade depended more heavily on water transport. The Viking Age spans
19140-482: Was composed in poor Latin in 643: the Edictum Rothari . It was primarily the codification of the oral legal tradition of the people. The Lombard state was well-organized and stabilized by the end of the long reign of Liutprand (717–744), but its collapse was sudden. Unsupported by the dukes, King Desiderius was defeated and forced to surrender his kingdom to Charlemagne in 774. The Lombard kingdom ended and
19285-421: Was considered to be the distance an ox could plough before taking a rest; the strip shape of the acre field also reflected the difficulty in turning early heavy ploughs. In the idealized form of the system, each family got thirty such strips of land. The three-field system of crop rotation was first developed in the 9th century: wheat or rye was planted in one field, the second field had a nitrogen-fixing crop, and
19430-418: Was crowned "Roman Emperor" by Pope Leo III on Christmas Day, 800. Upon Charlemagne's death, his empire had united much of modern-day France, western Germany and northern Italy. The years after his death illustrated how Germanic his empire remained. Rather than an orderly succession, his empire was divided in accordance with Frankish inheritance custom, which resulted in instability that plagued his empire until
19575-633: Was established. It is possible, Samarrai says, that French scribes, writing in Latin, attempted to transliterate the Arabic word fuyū (the plural of fay ), which was used by the Muslim invaders and occupiers at the time, resulting in a plurality of forms – feo, feu, feuz, feuum and others—from which eventually feudum derived. Samarrai, however, also advises to handle this theory with care, as Medieval and Early Modern Muslim scribes often used etymologically "fanciful roots" to support outlandish claims that something
19720-494: Was first used in 17th-century French legal treatises (1614) and translated into English legal treatises as an adjective, such as "feodal government". In the 18th century, Adam Smith , seeking to describe economic systems, effectively coined the forms "feudal government" and "feudal system" in his book The Wealth of Nations (1776). The phrase "feudal system" appeared in 1736, in Baronia Anglica , published nine years after
19865-522: Was highlighted by Charles Martel , who as Mayor of the Palace was effectively the strongest prince in the kingdom. His accomplishments were highlighted, not just by his famous defeat of invading Muslims at the Battle of Tours , which is typically considered the battle that saved Europe from Muslim conquest, but by the fact that he greatly expanded Frankish influence. It was under his patronage that Boniface expanded Frankish influence into Germany by rebuilding
20010-489: Was of Arabian or Muslim origin. Feudalism, in its various forms, usually emerged as a result of the decentralization of an empire: such as in the Carolingian Empire in the 9th century AD, which lacked the bureaucratic infrastructure necessary to support cavalry without allocating land to these mounted troops. Mounted soldiers began to secure a system of hereditary rule over their allocated land and their power over
20155-655: Was offered to Pepin. With this, the Merovingian line of kings ended, and the Carolingian line began. Pepin's son Charlemagne continued in the footsteps of his father and grandfather. He further expanded and consolidated the Frankish kingdom (now commonly called the Carolingian Empire ). His reign also saw a cultural rebirth, commonly called the Carolingian Renaissance . Though the exact reasons are unclear, Charlemagne
20300-469: Was often fast and dramatic as it became unsafe to travel or carry goods over any distance; there was a consequent collapse in trade and manufacture for export. Major industries that depended on trade, such as large-scale pottery manufacture, vanished almost overnight in places like Britain. Tintagel in Cornwall , as well as several other centres, managed to obtain supplies of Mediterranean luxury goods well into
20445-575: Was partly since the military shifted from armies consisting of the nobility to professional fighters thus reducing the nobility's claim on power, but also because the Black Death reduced the nobility's hold over the lower classes. Vestiges of the feudal system hung on in France until the French Revolution of the 1790s. Even when the original feudal relationships had disappeared, there were many institutional remnants of feudalism left in place. Historian Georges Lefebvre explains how at an early stage of
20590-583: Was relatively Romanized, at least when compared to the Germanic kingdoms in northern Europe. It was highly decentralized at first, with the territorial dukes having practical sovereignty in their duchies, especially in the southern duchies of Spoleto and Benevento . For a decade following the death of Cleph in 575, the Lombards did not even elect a king; this period is called the Rule of the Dukes . The first written legal code
20735-417: Was simply a military move in order to have control in the region by hording land through tenancies, and expelling the bishops who he did not agree with, but it did not specifically create feudalism. Karl Marx also uses the term in the 19th century in his analysis of society's economic and political development, describing feudalism (or more usually feudal society or the feudal mode of production ) as
20880-507: Was stable and well developed. The Franks, in contrast, were barely any different from their barbarian Germanic ancestors. The Kingdom of the Franks was weak and divided. Impossible to guess at the time, but by the end of the century, the Lombardic kingdom would be extinct, while the Frankish kingdom would have nearly reassembled the Western Roman Empire. Though much of Roman civilization north of
21025-491: Was unknown and the system it describes was not conceived of as a formal political system by the people living in the medieval period. This section describes the history of the idea of feudalism, how the concept originated among scholars and thinkers, how it changed over time, and modern debates about its use. The concept of a feudal state or period, in the sense of either a regime or a period dominated by lords who possess financial or social power and prestige, became widely held in
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