148Chapter 8
fragments of land scattered over several square miles.
Parcels of arable land might also be set aside for the
lord and for the priest if there was one. Most communi-
ties also possessed common land that was available for
allocation by the village elders.
Collection of the lord’s dues and the maintenance
of his property was typically in the hands of an ap-
pointed steward. The steward (reeve, maire,or Bauermeis-
ter) was originally a capable peasant who received lands,
exemptions, or special privileges for his work on the
lord’s behalf. Such men almost invariably became
wealthy, and in the later Middle Ages some of them
were able to transcend the limitations of peasant status
and acquire a coat of arms. Together with the ministeri-
ales,the household officials who served the immediate
needs of the lord and his castle, the stewards consti-
tuted an intermediate social class of some importance.
Few, however, were popular. Some were petty tyrants
who extorted goods and favors from the peasants while
embezzling from their lord. Even the best of them were
powerful figures who had to be placated at every turn.
In some regions they not only collected rents and dues,
but also served as judges in peasant courts and deter-
mined the boundaries of tenements in case of dispute.
In other, happier, places, these latter functions were as-
sumed by the villagers.
Manors that contained one or more entire villages
were the ideal because they were easier to administer
and defend. In practice a manor was often spread
through several villages with each village containing the
subjects of more than one lord. This situation arose in
Germany and parts of France because, in the beginning
at least, peasants could sometimes commend themselves
to the lord of their choice. In Italy and southern France
the situation was further complicated by the survival of
allodial holdings amidst the feudal and manorial tenures.
A villager might own some of his land outright and hold
the rest as a tenement from his lord. Only in England
was the village manor almost universal.
Manorialism, defined as any system in which the
tenants of an estate are the legal subjects of their lord,
could exist without feudalism. Where manorialism and
feudalism were combined, they produced a social and
political system that was highly resistant to change.
The knights had achieved a monopoly of both eco-
nomic and military power and thus could impose the
values of their class upon society as a whole.Social and Economic Structures
in Nonfeudal Europe
By the middle of the tenth century feudal institutions
were dominant in what had been the Carolingian Em-
pire. Another, nonfeudal Europe successfully resisted
the new social order. Scandinavia, untroubled by raids
or invasions, preserved the main features of its social
structure and system of land tenure until well into the
early modern period. Individual farmsteads, often lo-
cated at a distance from the nearest village and worked
by the owner’s family and its servants, continued to be
common. Slavery declined and eventually disappeared
under the influence of Christianity. The houses, built of
logs and connected to their outbuildings for protection
against the winter, retained the sturdy simplicity of
Viking days.
Until the Norman invasion of 1066 (see illustration
8.4) the Anglo-Saxons, too, were able to functionIllustration 8.3
Plan of a Medieval Manor.The drawing shows how a typi-
cal English manor might have been laid out. Not all manors were
single villages of this kind in which all the inhabitants were sub-
jects of the same lord.