Estelle, serf was not a slave or a servant. He had use of the land and paid a specified part of the fruit to the feudal lord who took care of the administration and defense. Some similarity to our tax payments.
Correct! Serfdom, labor system under which most European agricultural workers lived during the Middle Ages. Legally bound to reside and labor on the land owned by their lord. 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. On Apr 1, 2007, at 4:18 AM, Tat417761@cs.com wrote: Estelle, serf was not a slave or a servant. He had use of the land and paid a specified part of the fruit to the feudal lord who took care of the administration and defense. Some similarity to our tax payments. ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to CROATIA- request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message
Thank you Dr Former - that clarifies it somewhat for me. Am I right in assuming that the "feudal lord" would have owned the land? Regards Estelle >From: Tat417761@cs.com >Reply-To: croatia@rootsweb.com >To: croatia@rootsweb.com >Subject: Re: [CROATIA] Feudal system in Croatia >Date: Sun, 1 Apr 2007 04:18:52 EDT > >Estelle, >serf was not a slave or a servant. He had use of the land and paid a >specified part of the fruit to the feudal lord who took care of the >administration and >defense. >Some similarity to our tax payments. > >------------------------------- >To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to >CROATIA-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes >in the subject and the body of the message _________________________________________________________________ Advertisement: Chat with 1000s of Sexy Singles right now http://a.ninemsn.com.au/b.aspx?URL=http%3A%2F%2Flavalife9%2Eninemsn%2Ecom%2Eau%2Fclickthru%2Fclickthru%2Eact%3Fid%3Dninemsn%26context%3Dan99%26locale%3Den%5FAU%26a%3D25447&_t=754951090&_r=chat&_m=EXT