The organisation of medieval society
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Question
What were the three orders of medieval society?
Answer
Those who fight (bellatores/nobility), those who pray (oratores/clergy) and those who work (laboratores/peasants).
Question
Who wrote down the three orders model, and roughly when?
Answer
Bishop Adalbero of Laon set it out clearly around 1025, making the hierarchy seem God-given.
Question
Define bellatores, oratores and laboratores.
Answer
Bellatores = those who fight (nobility/knights); oratores = those who pray (clergy); laboratores = those who work (peasants).
Question
What did a knight owe in return for his land?
Answer
Military service, typically about 40 days of fighting a year, plus loyalty to his lord.
Question
What is the difference between a free peasant and a serf?
Answer
A free peasant rented land and could usually move; a serf (villein) was tied to the land, owed labour dues and could not leave without permission.
Question
Define serf (villein).
Answer
An unfree peasant tied to the land and to a lord, owing labour dues, but not owned as property and holding his own plot.
Question
What is chattel slavery, and where did it persist longest?
Answer
Owning a human being as property to buy and sell. It continued on a large scale in the Islamic world.
Question
Why did slavery decline in Western Europe (c.900–1100)?
Answer
Lords found serfs, who fed themselves and were tied to the land, more useful than slaves they had to feed. Slavery merged into serfdom.
Question
Define feudalism.
Answer
A system where a lord grants land (a fief) to a vassal in return for loyalty and military service — a two-way bond.
Question
What are the fief, homage and vassalage?
Answer
The fief is the granted land; homage is the ceremony of becoming a lord's man; vassalage is the resulting sworn service relationship.
Question
Define manorialism and the demesne.
Answer
Manorialism is the economic system of the manor binding lord and peasants. The demesne is the land the lord kept and had farmed for his own use.
Question
How was manorialism the base of the social order?
Answer
Peasant labour on the demesne produced the food that fed the fighting and praying orders, so those who worked carried everyone above them.
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Topic 6.1 hub
Social structures and governance
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