Serfdom
Serfdom is the economic status of peasants under feudalism, specifically in the manorial economic system (also known as seigneurialism) and is a condition of bondage or modified slavery. Serfdom is the forced labour of serfs, on the fields of land owners, in return for protection and the right to work on their leased fields. Serfdom involved work not only on fields, but various agricultural-related works, like forestry, transportation (both land and river-based), work in craft and even in manufactures.
Serfs are laborers who are bound to the land; they formed the lowest social class of the feudal society. Serfs differed from slaves in that serfs were allowed property for themselves and could not be sold apart from the land which they worked. Serfs are also defined as people in whose labor landowners held property rights. In prerevolutionary Russia a landowner's estate was often measured by the number of "souls" he owned.
This feudal relationship evolved from agricultural slavery of late Roman Empire and spread through Europe around the 10th century; it flourished in Europe from the Middle Ages till the 19th century. After the Renaissance, serfdom became increasingly rare in most of Western Europe but was strong in the Central and Eastern Europe (this phenomenon was known as the second serfdom). In England, it lasted up to the 1600s and in France until 1789. In Eastern Europe the institution persisted until the mid 19th century. In Finland, Norway and Sweden feudalism was not established and therefore serfdom never existed either.
Etymology
The word "serf" originated from the Middle French "serf", and can be traced farther back to the Latin servus, meaning "slave". In Late Antiquity and most of the Middle Ages, what we now call serfs were usually designed in Latin as coloni (sing. colonus). As slavery gradually dissapeared and the legal status of these servi became nearly identical to that of coloni, the term changed meaning into our modern concept of "serf". This meaning fell out of use by the 1700s, but the current meaning was first used in 1611. The term "serfdom" was coined in 1850.
The system of serfdom
In medieval Europe, almost all land was owned by the nobility, the Church, or royalty. Serfs were allowed to work certain plots of land in exchange for a percentage of the product they produced. While most serfs were farmers, some serfs were craftsmen, such as blacksmiths or millers.
The serf's feudal contract
The serfs had a feudal contract much in the same fashion as a baron or a knight. A serf's feudal contract was that, in return for protection, he would reside upon and work a parcel of land held by his Lord.
The period rationale was that a serf "worked for all", while a knight or baron "fought for all" and a churchman "prayed for all." Thus everyone had his place and all was right with God's world. Obviously the serf was worked harder than all others, and was the worst fed, but at least he had his place and, unlike slavery, there was a degree of reciprocity in the feudal contract.
A manorial Lord could not sell his serfs as a Roman might sell his slaves. On the other hand, if his Lord chose to dispose of a parcel of land, the serf or serfs associated with that land went with it to serve their new Lord. Further, a serf could not abandon his lands without permission, nor could he sell them.
Becoming a serf
A free man became a serf usually through force or necessity. A few bad years of crop failure, a war or brigandage left him unable to fulfill his duties as a free man. In such a case a bargain is struck with his lord: protection and forgiveness of fees owed in exchange for service (not an unreasonable arrangement in a largely cashless society and an idea which is in accord with the prevailing feudal political ideology).
The downside was that serfdom was heritable. A man was binding not only himself, but all his heirs as well. This was not true of a free man.
The difference between freedom and serfdom
The line between freedom and serfdom was often indistinct. A man might own some lands under free tenancy (for instance: a "cottier" or "cotter" was a free man, tenant of a "cottage"); and to other lands he might owe serf-like duties.
It was always in the interest of the lords to prove that a servile arrangement existed, as this provided them with greater rights to fees and taxes. The legal status of a man was a primary issue in many of the manorial court cases of the period.
The serf's duties
The usual serf "paid" his fees and taxes in the form of seasonally appropriate labor, usually a couple of days a week plowing his lord's fields (demesne), harvesting crops, digging ditches, repairing fences, etc. The rest of his time was his own to tend to his own fields, crops and animals.
The tension of a serf's life derived from the fact that his work for his lord coincided and took precedence over the work he had to perform on his own lands. When the lord's crops were ready to be harvested, so were his own and so forth. On the other hand, the serf could look forward to being well fed during his service, and it was a poor lord who did not provide a substantial meal for his serfs during the harvest and planting times.
In addition to service, a serf was required to pay certain taxes and fees. Taxes were based on the assessed value of his lands and holdings (usually 1/3 of the value; the "third penny"), while fees were assessed for various reasons, the birth of a child, a marriage, war, etc. Both were usually paid in the form of foodstuffs rather than cash.
Often there were rather humorous tests - humorous at least in retrospect - to judge the worthiness of their tax payments. A chicken, for example, was required to be able to jump over a fence of a given height to be considered old enough or well enough to be valued for tax purposes.
The restraints of serfdom on personal and economic choice were enforced through various forms of manorial common law and the manorial administration and court.
Benefits of serfdom
Within his constraints, a serf had some freedom. Though the common wisdom was that a serf owned "only his belly" — even his clothes were the property, in law, of his lord — an industrious or lucky serf might still accumulate personal property and wealth, and some serfs became wealthier than their free neighbours, although this was rather an exception to the general rule. A well-to-do serf might even be able to buy his freedom.
Serfs could raise what they saw fit on their lands (within reason — a serf's taxes often had to be paid in wheat, a notoriously difficult crop), and sell the surplus at market. Their heirs were (usually) guaranteed an inheritance.
The landlord could not dispossess his serfs without cause and was supposed to protect them from the depredations of outlaws or other lords, and he was expected to support them by charity in times of famine.
Variations
Specifics of serfdom varied greatly through time and region. In some places, serfdom was merged with or exchanged for various forms of taxation.
The amount of serfdom required varied, for example in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the 13th century it was few days a year; in the 14th century, one day per week; 4 days per week in the 17th century and 6 days per week in the 18th century, and early serfdom was most limited on the royal territories (królewszczyzny).
Sometimes, serfs served as soldiers in the event of conflict and could earn freedom or even ennoblement for valour in combat. In other cases, serfs could also purchase their freedom, be manumitted by their enlightened or generous owners, or flee to towns or newly-settled land where few questions were asked. Laws varied from country to country: in England a serf who made his way to a chartered town and evaded recapture for a year and a day obtained his freedom.
In many cases, serfs had to obtain permission from their landlord to marry a partner from off the manor (merchet).
They could also be obliged to pay fines: on inheritance, on becoming a priest or monk or on having their children leave the manor and go to cities. Even upon their death a peasant paid a tax in the form of their best animal to their lord in exchange for confirming their heir's rights to the land.
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. This was a great bone of contention within the village.
Many peasants were fined for grinding their own grain and resented the fees paid to the miller (multure), usually 1/24 of the total grain milled. Millers were routinely accused of providing short measure or taking too great a portion for their fee. A period riddle runs, "What is the boldest thing on earth?" The answer is, "A miller's shirt for it clasps a thief by the throat every day."
Many manors also required the use of the lord's oven to bake their daily bread. Such petty fees and usuries were the basis of much class resentment among peasants.
Russian serfdom
The origins of serfdom in Russia are traced to Kievan Rus in the 11th century. Legal documents of the epoch, such as Russkaya Pravda, distinguished several degrees of feudal dependency of peasants. Traditionally, the term for a peasant of the epoch of feudalism in Imperial Russia, krepostnoi krestyanin (крепостной крестьянин), is translated as serf.
The legal code of Ivan III of Russia, Sudebnik (1497), strengthened the dependency of peasants, statewise, and restricted their mobility. The Russians persistently battled against the successor states of the Golden Horde, chiefly the Khanate of Crimea. Tens of thousand of noblemen protected the southern borderland—a heavy burden for the state—which slowed its social and economic development and expanded the taxation of peasantry.
After the passage of laws which further restricted the peasant's right to free movement, the vast majority of the Russian populace was finally bound in full serfdom. Serfs were given estates in the Sobornoye Ulozhenie (Соборное уложение, "Code of Law") of 1649; and flight was made a criminal offense in 1658. Russian landowners eventually gained almost unlimited ownership over Russian serfs. The landowner could transfer the serf without the land to another landowner while keeping the serf's personal property and family, however the landowner had no right to kill the serf. As a whole serfdom came to Russia much later than in other European countries.
There were numerous rebellions against this bondage, most often in conjunction with Cossack uprisings, such as the uprisings of Ivan Bolotnikov (1606-1607), Stenka Razin (1667-1671), Kondraty Bulavin (1707-1709), and Yemelyan Pugachev (1773-1775). While the Cossack uprisings benefited from disturbances among the peasants, and they in turn received an impetus from Cossack rebellion, none of the Cossack movements were directed against the institution of serfdom itself. Instead, peasants in Cossack-dominated areas became Cossacks, thus escaping from the peasantry rather than directly organizing peasants against the institution. Between the end of the Pugachev rebellion and the beginning of the nineteenth century, there were hundreds of outbreaks across Russia, and there was never a time when the peasantry was completely quiescent. By the mid-eighteenth century, the serfs composed a majority of the population, according to the census of 1857 the number of serfs was 23.1 million of the 62.5 million of Russians.
Russian serfdom depended entirely on the traditional and extensive technology of the peasantry. Yields remained low and stationary throughout most of the nineteenth century. Any increase in income drawn from agriculture was drawn largely through increasing land area and extensive grain raising by means of exploitation of the peasant labor, that is, by burdening the peasant household still further.
In Russian Baltic provinces (Courland, Estonia, Livonia) serfdom, however, was abolished at the beginning of 19th century.
In 1861 all serfs were freed in a major agrarian reform, stimulated by the fear voiced by Tsar Alexander II that "it is better to liberate the peasants from above" than to wait until they won their freedom by risings "from below." Serfdom was abolished in 1861, but its abolition was achieved on terms unfavorable to the peasants and served to increase revolutionary pressures.
The origins of serfdom in Russia (крепостничество, or krepostnichestvo) may be traced to the 11th century, however, the most complete form of feudal exploitation enveloped only certain categories of rural population. In the 12th century, the exploitation of the so-called zakups on arable lands (ролейные (пашенные) закупы, or roleyniye (pashenniye) zakupy) and corvee smerds (Russian term for corvee is барщина, or barschina) was the closest to what is now known as serfdom. According to the Russkaya Pravda, a princely smerd had limited property and personal rights. His escheat was given to the prince and his life was equated with that of the kholop, meaning his murder was punishable by 5 grivnas.
In the 13th-15th centuries, feudal dependency applied to a significant number of peasants, but serfdom as we know it was still not a widespread phenomenon. In the mid-15th century, the right of certain categories of peasants in some votchinas to leave their master was limited to a period of one week before and after the so-called Yuri's Day (November 26). The Sudebnik of 1497 officially confirmed this time limit as universal for everybody and also established the amount of the "break-away" fee called pozhiloye (пожилое). The Sudebnik of 1550 increased the amount of pozhiloye and introduced an additional tax called za povoz (за повоз , or transportation fee), in case a peasant refused to bring the harvest from the fields to his master. A temporary (Заповедные лета, or Prohibition years) and later an open-ended prohibition for peasants to leave their masters was introduced by the ukase of 1597, which also defined the so-called fixed years (Урочные лета, or urochniye leta), or the 5-year time frame for search of the runaway peasants. In 1607, a new ukase defined sanctions for hiding and keeping the runaways: the fine had to paid to the state and pozhiloye - to the previous owner of the peasant.
Most of the dvoryane were content with the long time frame for search of the runaway peasants. The major landowners of the country, however, together with the dvoryane of the south, were interested in a short-term persecution due to the fact that many runaways would usually flee to the southern parts of Russia. During the first half of the 17th century the dvoryane sent their collective petitions (челобитные, or chelobitniye) to the authorities, asking for the extension of the "fixed years". In 1642, the Russian government established a 10-year limit for search of the runaways and 15-year limit for search for peasants, taken away by their new owners.
The Sobornoye Ulozhenie (Соборное уложение, or Code of Law) of 1649 introduced an open-ended search for those on the run, meaning that all of the peasants who had fled from their masters after the census of 1626 or 1646-1647 had to be returned. The government would still introduce new time frames and grounds for search of the runaways after 1649, which applied to the peasants who had fled to the outlying districts of the country, such as regions along the border abatises called zasechniye linii (засечные линии) (ukases of 1653 and 1656), Siberia (ukases of 1671, 1683 and 1700), Don (1698) etc. The dvoryane constantly demanded that the search for the runaways be sponsored by the government. The legislation of the second half of the 17th century paid much attention to the means of punishment of the runaways.
The freeing of the serfs
In the end, the nature of serfdom began to change when the value of taxes paid in kind began to be less than the value of outright renting of the land. In such cases many Lords "freed" their serfs in exchange for cash rents rather than service.
In practice, little changed for the peasants. They still had to farm their lands to feed their families, and pay their taxes. The main difference was that they could be turned off their lands if they failed to pay or if their Lord decided he wanted to use their fields for raising sheep (for example) rather than wheat.
The change in status following the enclosure movements beginning in the later 18th century, in which various lords abandoned the open field farming of previous centuries in exchange for, essentially, taking all the best land for themselves and "freeing" their serfs, may well have made serfdom a lifestyle desperately to be wished for by many peasant families.
The feudal relationship of serfdom gave way over centuries to private property and free labor. Being liberated from serfdom meant being able to sell ones land and work wherever one desired. Taxes levied by the state took the place of labor dues levied by the lord.
Dates of emancipation from serfdom in various countries
- Wallachia: 1746
- Moldavia: 1749
- Savoy: 19 December 1771
- Baden: 23 July 1783
- Denmark: 20 June 1788
- France: 3 November 1789
- Switzerland: 4 May 1798
- Schleswig-Holstein: 19 December 1804
- Grand Duchy of Warsaw (Poland): 22 July 1807
- Prussia: 9 October 1807 (effectively 1811-1823)
- Mecklenberg: October 1807 (effectively 1820)
- Bavaria: 31 August 1808
- Nassau: 1 September 1812
- Estonia (Russian Empire): 23 March 1816
- Courland (Russian Empire): 25 August 1817
- Württemberg: 18 November 1817
- Livonia (Russian Empire): 26 March 1819
- Hannover: 1831
- Saxony: 17 March 1832
- Austria: 1 November 1781
- Hungary: 2 March 1853
- Bulgaria: 1858 (when feudalism was definitely abolished in the Ottoman Empire; practically in 1880)
- Russia: 19 February 1861
- Tonga: 1862
- Bosnia and Herzegovina: 1918
- Afghanistan: 1923
External links
- Photo-story on modern-day slavery in Brazil by photographer Eduardo Martino
- An extraction from the book "Serfdom to Self-Government: Memoirs of a Polish Village Mayor, 1842–1927"
- The Granary of Europe — serfdom in Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
- The Causes of Slavery or Serfdom: A Hypothesis, discussion and full online text of Evsey Domar (1970), "The Causes of Slavery or Serfdom: A Hypothesis," Economic History Review 30:1 (March), pp. 18–32
- The Estabilishment of Serfdom in Eastern Europe and Russia, Richard Trethewey, American Economist, Spring 1974, Vol. 18 Issue 1
- Serfdom
- Serfs Up!
- The Causes of Slavery or Serfdom: A Hypothesis
- Крепостная правда in Kommersant-Money.
ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
- War Communism to the NEP: The Road from Serfdom
- Gorbachev's BBC Interview
- Hayek, Friedrich A. von, The Road to Serfdom, London: Routledge, 2001. ISBN 0-415-25543-0
- Dhont, Jan, La Alta Edad Media (Das früche Mittlelatter), Madrid: Siglo XXI. ISBN 84-323-0049-7
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