Essay On Serfdom

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Recommended: Social change in the 16th century

Brittany Cortés
History 269
The Gradual Decline of Serfdom in Medieval Europe

Serfdom played a fundamental role in the medieval European economy as well as its social structure. Throughout the medieval period as slavery began to slowly decline, a comparable mode of servitude began to emerge that provided free or cheap labor to the aristocratic land owners. Serfdom is a manner of bondage. Unlike the institution of slavery, where one would be considered property to be bought, traded and sold—leaving them with no legal rights, serfs were considered to some extent free because they could not be bought or sold. In the early middle ages, the transition from slavery to serfdom in rural Europe moved almost imperceptibly. Its consequence was one of the great landmarks in labor history and was undoubtedly a decisive factor in economic development. As serfdom and the peasantry class of the medieval period were important to both the development and decline of the economy so was the village that provided them a home as well as a place to work—it served as a community. The medieval village was the primary site in which they would contribute to the success of the local economy as well for providing a stable income for their local lord. If anything, the land, which literally provided their daily bread, was more truly the village. Both serfs and peasants were as much in their village tramping the furrowed strips as they were on the dusty streets and lanes of the village corner.
Medieval serfdom came in many different forms and their rights and obligations differed from one location to the next. Serfdom tied the person to the land, which restricted them from moving or in this ...

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... and labor of serfs and free peasants, not only would the economy suffer but the social class as well. The higher nobility needed the wealth the serfs provided them with in order to remain in their current positions or claim a higher one.
Many factors aided to the slow decline of the manorial system and the institution of serfdom, from the plague, to the peasant revolt, the rise of trade and development of cities—it all gave the peasantry class the motivation they needed to make a change in the social structure of the medieval period. Even though the Peasant Revolt and the effects of the Black Plague did not favor the peasants in the end, nonetheless, the events gave them the awareness of the impact they had on the economic market and the overall development and maintenance of the villages. It all depended on the continuous labor of both serfs and free peasants.

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