Fez 259when the aristocracy militarized itself and gave itself a
system of moral values based on war and the mutual sup-
port of fighting with men one personally knew. Feudal-
ism can be viewed as providing a framework and the
instruments for the rebirth of the notion of the state. This
is why it has proved to be a useful and durable concept
from the 17th century to the 20th.
In the 14th century monarchs were able to use
this alleged system and ideology of personal ties to
increase their own power and solidify their state. In the
later Middle Ages feudalism was folded into the new
state structures that it had once troubled. By the 14th
and 15th centuries, as a system it no longer played
a fundamental role in political authority as states
built their solidarity and effectiveness on mercenary
soldiers and paid administrators. However, by the 15th
century if not earlier, a “bastard feudalism” that pro-
duced dangerous local lords who could rival the
national state in terms of manpower tied to them and
not the Crown had evolved. Whether this old and tradi-
tional scheme reflected reality or was as all-pervasive in
society as assumed has been much questioned by recent
historians.
See alsoCHIVALRY; COINAGE AND CURRENCY; KNIGHTS
AND KNIGHTHOOD; PATRONAGE.
Further reading:David Herlihy, ed., The History of
Feudalism(New York: Harper & Row, 1970); Elizabeth A.
R. Brown, “The Tyranny of a Concept: Feudalism and
Historians of Medieval Europe.” The American Historical
Review79 (1974): 1063–1088; Marc Bloch, Feudal Society,
2 vols. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961);
Jean-Pierre Poly and Eric Bournazel, The Feudal Transfor-
mation, 900–1200, trans. Caroline Higgitt (New York:
Holmes & Meier, 1991); Susan Reynolds, Feifs and Vas-
sals: The Medieval Evidence Reinterpreted(Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1994).
feuds The faidaor “feud” was based on blood ties. It
was founded on vengeance, which was a sacred duty
passed from generation to generation within the context
of weak public authority. The feud appeared in EPIC
poetry, with its tangle of revenge stories, such as the
famous legend of The NIBELUNGENLIED.In an attempt to
end these perpetual conflicts and halt the chain of
revenge, the Germanic kings initiated the practice of
ordering a composition of blood money, WERGILD,to be
paid by the murderer to the victim’s family or a certain
sum assessed according to a very precise catalogue of
physical damage suffered.
This system for dealing with social conflict and
violence was supplemented by mutual oaths of surety
and truces. Despite these efforts the wergild was not
enough to stop the murderous serial reprisals since kin,
wounded in honor, might refuse to accept the money as a
result of reverence for the dead and damaged. Still, most
of the time, much continued to be regulated outside the
legal system. Calls for blood were incessant, so feuding
persisted throughout the early Middle Ages and even
beyond. State intervention was for a long time futile. In
ENGLAND, feuds still existed in the 11th century. In
Gaul, after the MEROVINGIANkings had imposed Wergild,
and even executed leaders of feuds, the CAROLINGIAN
emperors, continued a program of agreed composition
and reconciliation. It was only in the 11th century that
this began to change, helped by peace movements and
the religious ideas of truce.
See alsoCRUSADES;PEACE ANDTRUCE OFGOD.
Further reading:Wendy Davies and Paul Fouracre,
eds., The Settlement of Disputes in Early Medieval Europe
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986).Fez (Fes, Fas) Medieval Fez was a town in the north
of the far west AL-MAGHRIBin MOROCCOand situated on
a riverbed with the same name. Under the IDRISIDSand
the MERINIDS, Fez was a capital and residence of rulers.
MARRAKECHbecame the capital in the ALMORAVIDand
ALMOHADperiods, but Fez remained a great commercial
center of Arabic and ISLAMICculture in the West.TWO TOWNS
The origins of Fez were in the beginning of the Shiite
Idrisid dynasty. About 790, Idris I (r. 789–93) founded a
military camp on the right bank of the wadi, Madinat Fas.
In 809, his son, Idris II (r. 793–828), founded a new
town on the other bank, and populated it with ARABS.
The two towns grew together. Indeed, Madinat Fas
received 800 families from CÓRDOBAafter the revolt of
817, while others fleeing the AGHLABIDSwere welcomed
and soon joined by a Jewish community. Fez enjoyed a
favorable position on the Sudanese GOLDroute and the
town became a prosperous commercial center in the 10th
and early 11th centuries.UNION
Around 1070 and the time of the ALMORAVIDconquest,
the two towns were united. The establishment of the
Almoravid and then Almohad Empires incorporated the
far al-Maghrib and AL-ANDALUSinto an Iberian and Mus-
lim empire. In 1276, Fez became a capital again. Abu
Yaqub (r. 1259–86), the Marinid sultan, founded west of
the old town a new town surrounded by a double wall,
Fas al-Jadid, in which he built palaces, a MOSQUE, and
administrative buildings for his government. The
Marinids opposed the religious ideas of the Almohads,
considered the possibility of retaking Iberia, and
preached a strict return to orthodoxy. They made Fez a
center for the study of Malikism and built numerous
mosques and MADRASAS, which attracted masters and stu-
dents. These colleges, with buildings arranged around a
square courtyard, represent the apogee of Iberian and