Serfdom

I

INTRODUCTION

Serfdom, labor system under which most European agricultural workers lived during the Middle Ages. These agricultural laborers were known as serfs and were legally bound to reside and labor on the land owned by their lord. The word serf comes from the Latin word servus, which means servant or slave.

Serfdom began in the 900s and was at its peak in the 1100s and 1200s. The system gradually ended in western Europe during the 1400s and 1500s, but it lasted much longer in eastern Europe, persisting until the mid-1800s in Russia.

The serfs comprised the vast majority of the population of medieval Europe and worked to feed themselves, their superiors, and the people of the towns and the church. Although the serfs were not slaves, they were not really free. They could not leave the manor—that is, the land owned by their lord. They were obligated to provide physical labor as well as to pay taxes and other obligations. Serfs were at the bottom of the European system of social, political, and economic relations known as Seignorialism.

All land on the manor was owned by its lord. Serfs and their families were allowed to farm some of the land on the manor to support themselves; this was sufficient for the more prosperous serfs to feed a family and make the various payments to their lord. Serfs were taxed on the produce and profits of their holdings. In addition, they had to devote a fair amount of time and labor to working the lord’s demesne land, the section of the manor kept directly under the lord’s control and not used by other tenants.

Though serfs’ bodies were not the lord’s property, their possessions and labor power were. Furthermore their social and legal status was hereditary. In addition, the serf’s freedom of action was limited in a number of ways. Serfs had to obtain permission from the lord of the manor to marry a partner from off the manor. They also had to pay fines for inheritance, for having children leave the manor, and for having a son leave the manor to become a priest or monk. Furthermore, serfs had to pay to use the lord’s grain mill and bread oven and were charged for miscellaneous services such as using the lord’s carts to haul their produce. Because their residence and labor were legally attached to the land, serfs were included when that land was transferred to someone else.

The lord, in turn, was obliged to protect his serfs from depredations, from outlaws or other lords, and he was expected to support them by charity in times of crop failure. The restraints of serfdom on personal and economic choice were enforced through the manorial court and the manorial administration. Freedom from servile status could come by formal emancipation (called manumission), flight to towns or newly settled land where few question were asked, or purchase. It was never automatic, however, and unless the serf escaped to a town, freedom was always controlled by the lord.

Although essentially the property of their lords, serfs, unlike slaves, did have some avenues of advancement. There are indications of economic and social mobility among the serfs, of an active land market among and between them, and of the existence of a formidable body of manorial custom that could protect and regulate serfs’ rights and obligations. Moreover, wealth and unfree status could go together; economic opportunity was often more important. Indeed, when prosperity and a shrinking population (after the Black Death of 1348-1349) gave serfs an economic advantage, they often chose to ask for relief of labor services for the lord, substituting a cash payment instead. For many serfs, this was a great step upwards in status and economic possibilities, though they remained essentially unfree.

II

ORIGINS OF SERFDOM

Social institutions similar to serfdom were known in ancient times. The status of the helots in the ancient Greek city-state of Sparta resembled that of the medieval serfs, as did the condition of the peasants working on government lands in ancient Rome. These Roman peasants, known as colini, or “tenant farmers,” are some of the possible precursors of the serfs. However, medieval serfdom really began with the breakup of the Carolingian Empire around the 10th century AD. The demise of this empire, which had ruled much of the western Europe for more than 200 years, was followed by a long period during which no strong central governments existed in most of Europe. During this period, powerful feudal lords (see Feudalism) encouraged the establishment of serfdom as a source of agricultural labor. Serfdom, indeed, was an institution that reflected a fairly common practice whereby great landlords are assured that others work to feed them and are held down, legally and economically, while doing so.

III

DECLINE OF SERFDOM IN WESTERN EUROPE

In western Europe the end of serfdom came in the 15th and 16th centuries, largely because of changes in the economy, population, and laws governing lord-tenant relations. The enclosure of manor fields for livestock grazing and for larger arable plots made the economy of serfs’ small strips of land in open fields less attractive to the lords. Also, the increasing use of money made tenant farming by serfs less profitable; for much less than it cost to support a serf, a lord could now hire workers who were more skilled and pay them in cash. Paid labor was also more flexible since workers could be hired only when they were needed. At the same time, increasing unrest and uprisings by serfs and peasants, including Tyler’s Rebellion in England in 1381, put pressure on the nobility and the clergy to reform the system. As a result, serf and peasant demands were accommodated to some extent by the gradual establishment of new forms of leasing the land, and increased personal liberties. Two other important factors in the decline of serfdom were industrial development and the higher wages that workers could earn in the towns.

IV

SERFDOM OUTSIDE OF WESTERN EUROPE

Despite its decline in the west, medieval serfdom persisted in central and eastern Europe and, in early modern times, became even more repressive. Despite vigorous uprisings and calls for reform that would effect legal manumission and bring a stronger peasant voice in the economic decisions, the world of great masters and large masses of the underprivileged lingered. Much of eastern Germany and Poland remained a world of serfdom for centuries. In Russia the serfs were freed by the 1861 edict of Tsar Alexander II, and even then the reform began because the landlords, especially in Lithuania, wanted the tsar to simplify the system, not to abolish it.