Manorialism

This article is about the medieval system. For the 17th-century system in Canada, see Seigneurial system of New France.

English feudalism
Manorialism
Feudal land tenure in England
Feudal duties
Feudalism

Manorialism, also known as seigneurialism, the manor system or manorial system,[1][2] was the method of land ownership (or "tenure") in parts of Europe, notably France and later England, during the Middle Ages.[3] Its defining features included a large, sometimes fortified manor house in which the lord of the manor and his dependants lived and administered a rural estate, and a population of labourers or serfs who worked the surrounding land to support themselves and the lord.[4] These labourers fulfilled their obligations with labour time or in-kind produce at first, and later by cash payment as commercial activity increased. Manorialism was part of the feudal system.[5]

Manorialism originated in the Roman villa system of the Late Roman Empire,[6] and was widely practised in medieval western Europe and parts of central Europe. An essential element of feudal society,[7][5] manorialism was slowly replaced by the advent of a money-based market economy and new forms of agrarian contract.

Manorialism faded away slowly and piecemeal, along with its most vivid feature in the landscape, the open field system. It outlasted serfdom in the sense that it continued with freehold labourers. As an economic system, it outlasted feudalism, according to Andrew Jones, because "it could maintain a warrior, but it could equally well maintain a capitalist landlord. It could be self-sufficient, yield produce for the market, or it could yield a money rent."[8] The last feudal dues in France were abolished at the French Revolution. In parts of eastern Germany, the Rittergut manors of Junkers remained until World War II.[9]

  1. ^ Students of History (2023). "The Manor System". Retrieved 3 October 2023.
  2. ^ Cartwright, Mark (29 November 2018). "Manorialism Definition". World History Encyclopedia. Retrieved 3 October 2023.
  3. ^ Ian John Ernest Keil (11 May 2018). "Manorial System". Encyclopedia. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 3 October 2023.
  4. ^ North, Douglass C.; Thomas, Robert Paul (1971). "The Rise and Fall of the Manorial System: A Theoretical Model". The Journal of Economic History. 31 (4): 777–803. doi:10.1017/S0022050700074623. ISSN 0022-0507. JSTOR 2117209.
  5. ^ a b Sait, E. M. (1908). "The Manorial System and the French Revolution". Political Science Quarterly. 23 (4): 690–711. doi:10.2307/2140868. ISSN 0032-3195. JSTOR 2140868.
  6. ^ Peter Sarris (April 2004). "The Origins of the Manorial Economy: New Insights from Late Antiquity". The English Historical Review. 119 (119): 279–311. doi:10.1093/ehr/119.481.279. JSTOR 3490231.
  7. ^ "Feudal Society", in its modern sense was coined in Marc Bloch's 1939–40 books of the same name. Bloch (Feudal Society tr. L.A. Masnyon, 1965, vol. II p. 442) emphasised the distinction between economic manorialism which preceded feudalism and survived it, and political and social feudalism, or seigneurialism.
  8. ^ Andrew Jones, "The Rise and Fall of the Manorial System: A Critical Comment" The Journal of Economic History 32.4 (December 1972:938–944) p. 938; a comment on D. North and R. Thomas, "The rise and fall of the manorial system: a theoretical model", The Journal of Economic History 31 (December 1971:777–803).
  9. ^ Hartwin Spenkuch, "Herrenhaus und Rittergut: Die Erste Kammer des Landtags und der preußische Adel von 1854 bis 1918 aus sozialgeschichtlicher Sicht" Geschichte und Gesellschaft, 25.3 (July – September 1999):375–403).