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Medieval Society

The History of Western Civilization to 1500 Prof. Dr. George S. Vascik

Outline •  Feudalism

•  Manorialism

•  Peasant Life

•  Noble Life

•  Religious Life

Feudalism •  A set of interlocking social, economic and

political relations that grew up in Western Europe with the disintegration of the Roman world.

•  When did it start? –  Paucity of sources

•  Remember who is literate –  Some historians date its beginning to the period after

Charlemagne, other to before –  Vascik sees it as an outgrowth of Roman patron-client

relations

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Chedworth: from villa to stronghold

Feudalism •  Need for protection

–  Give up everything –  Homage

•  Lords & vassals –  Fiefs –  Hierarchical –  “every man has a lord”

•  Decentralized power –  Important relation-

ships are local

Manorialism Manor house

Serfs

Free peasants

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Manorialism Church

Market

Water pond and mill

Manorialism

A A B C

Commons Garden plots

Manorialism •  Agricultural methods

–  Open field system –  Two rotations –  Ploughing –  Crop yields of 3:1 or 5:1

•  Degrees of obligation –  Free peasants

•  Rent –  Serfs

•  Tied to land •  Service, dues

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Peasants

Peasant Life

•  Life expectancy of 25 years •  Household

– Size depended on place and time •  Before 1200, not extended families •  Early marriages •  All worked

– One room, windowless huts, earthen floors •  No chimney •  Little furniture •  Garden plots

Peasant Life •  Diet

–  Black bread, three times per day –  Vegetables from garden plot –  Meat - usually pork - only on holidays

•  No milk, cows were too expensive to feed •  Pigs allowed to feed in lord’s woods

–  Beer •  Brewed weekly

•  Entertainment –  Drink –  Market day –  Church festivals –  pilgrimages

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Nobles

The nobility

•  Who was noble –  Warriors –  Held land in fief –  Special legal privileges (libertas)

•  Noble lives –  Men need fief to marry –  Many noble men could never marry

•  Career in church or as mercenary

–  Unmarried noble women would enter a convent –  Older husbands (30s), younger wife (17-20)

Chivalry •  Tension within noble

households –  What if wife falls for her

brother-in-law? •  Code of chivalry

–  Men were allowed to profess their love for a married woman

–  A married woman could profess her love for a married man

–  They just couldn’t consummate their love

•  Stories of courtly love explain the dangers of transgressing social code

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Monasticism

Benedict of Nursia •  480-543 •  Desired to become a

philosopher, but was repelled by Rome

•  Lived as a hermit –  What he learned –  Becoming popular

•  Created place for communal religious experience –  Wrote a Rule to regulate

communal religious experience

Benedictine rule •  Prologue and 73 chapters detailing every aspect

of daily life •  Octaves

–  Communal prayer (3 1/2 hrs) –  Reading and meditation (4 hrs) –  Labor (7 hrs) –  Eating (1 hr) –  Sleep (8 1/2 hrs)

•  Learning •  Problems

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Monastic reform movement •  Monks from monastery at Cluny (founded in 909)

set out to bring other monks back to the Rule •  Cluniac monks set out to reform other abuses

–  Illiterate parish priests –  Simony –  Moral laxity

•  Monastic reformers and the papacy –  Investiture - papal independence –  Papal elections - College of Cardinals