Editing Manorialism

{{short description|Economic, political, and judicial institution during the Middle Ages in Europe}}
{{About|the medieval system|the 17th-century system in Canada|Seigneurial system of New France}}
{{More citations needed|date=December 2017}}
{{Use British English|date=March 2021}}

{{English Feudalism}}'''Manorialism''', also known as '''seigneurialism''', the '''manor system''' or '''manorial system''',<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.studentsofhistory.com/the-manor-system|last=Students of History|title=The Manor System|date=2023|accessdate=3 October 2023}}</ref><ref>{{cite encyclopedia|url=https://www.worldhistory.org/Manorialism/|last=Cartwright|first=Mark|title=Manorialism Definition|encyclopedia=World History Encyclopedia|date=29 November 2018|accessdate=3 October 2023}}</ref> was the method of land ownership (or "[[Land tenure|tenure]]") in parts of Europe, notably France and later England, during the [[Middle Ages]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/modern-europe/ancient-history-middle-ages-and-feudalism/manorial-system|title=Manorial System|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]|author=Ian John Ernest Keil|website=Encyclopedia|date=11 May 2018|accessdate=3 October 2023}}</ref> 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 [[Serfdom|serfs]] who worked the surrounding land to support themselves and the lord.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=North |first1=Douglass C. |last2=Thomas |first2=Robert Paul |date=1971 |title=The Rise and Fall of the Manorial System: A Theoretical Model |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2117209 |journal=The Journal of Economic History |volume=31 |issue=4 |pages=777–803 |doi=10.1017/S0022050700074623 |jstor=2117209 |issn=0022-0507}}</ref> 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 [[Feudalism|feudal system]].<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal |last=Sait |first=E. M. |date=1908 |title=The Manorial System and the French Revolution |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2140868 |journal=Political Science Quarterly |volume=23 |issue=4 |pages=690–711 |doi=10.2307/2140868 |jstor=2140868 |issn=0032-3195}}</ref>

Manorialism originated in the [[Roman villa]] system of the [[Late Roman Empire]],<ref>{{cite journal|author= Peter Sarris|title= The Origins of the Manorial Economy: New Insights from Late Antiquity|journal= The English Historical Review|number= 119|date= April 2004|volume= 119|pages= 279–311|doi= 10.1093/ehr/119.481.279|jstor= 3490231|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3490231}}</ref> and was widely practised in [[Middle Ages|medieval]] western Europe and parts of central Europe. An essential element of feudal society,<ref>"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''.</ref><ref name=":1" /> manorialism was slowly replaced by the advent of a money-based [[market economy]] and new forms of [[Agrarianism|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."<ref>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).</ref> The last feudal dues in France were abolished at the [[French Revolution]]. In parts of eastern Germany, the ''Rittergut'' manors of [[Junker]]s remained until [[World War II]].<ref name=":0">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&nbsp;– September 1999):375–403).</ref>

== Historical and geographical distribution ==
[[File:Les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry mars.jpg|thumb|Ploughing on a French ducal manor in March from the manuscript, {{lang|fr|[[Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry|Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry]]}}, {{circa|1410}}]]

The term is most often used with reference to medieval Western Europe. Antecedents of the system can be traced to the rural economy of the later [[Roman Empire]] ([[Dominate]]). Labour was the key [[factor of production]].<ref>Donald J. Herreld, (2016) An Economic History of the World Since 1400. The Great Courses. P. 20.</ref> Successive administrations tried to stabilise the imperial economy by freezing the social structure into place: sons were to succeed their fathers in their trade, councillors were forbidden to resign, and ''[[Colonus (person)|coloni]]'', the cultivators of land, were not to move from the land they were attached to. The workers of the land were on their way to becoming serfs.<ref>C.R. Whittaker, "Circe's pigs: from slavery to serfdom in the later Roman world", ''Slavery and Abolition'' '''8''' (1987) 87–122.</ref>

Several factors conspired to merge the status of former slaves and former free farmers into a dependent class of such ''coloni'': it was possible to be described as ''servus et colonus'', "both slave and ''colonus''".<ref>Averil Cameron, ''The Mediterranean World in Late Antiquity AD 395–600'', 1993:86.</ref> The Laws of [[Constantine I]] around 325 both reinforced the semi-servile status of the ''coloni'' and limited their rights to sue in the courts; the ''[[Codex Theodosianus]]'' promulgated under [[Theodosius II]] extended these restrictions. The legal status of ''adscripti'', "bound to the soil",<ref>Cameron 1993:86 instances ''[[Codex Justinianus]]'' XI. 48.21.1; 50,2.3; 52.1.1.</ref> contrasted with barbarian ''foederati'', who were permitted to settle within the imperial boundaries, remaining subject to their own traditional law.

As the [[Germanic peoples|Germanic]] kingdoms succeeded Roman authority in the west in the fifth century, Roman landlords were often simply replaced by Germanic ones, with little change to the underlying situation or displacement of populations.

The process of rural self-sufficiency was given an abrupt boost in the eighth century, when normal trade in the [[Mediterranean Sea]] was disrupted.

== Description ==
[[Image:The Hall at Penshurst Place from Ancestral Homes of Noted Americans by Anne Hollingsworth Wharton (1915).jpg|thumb|The great hall at [[Penshurst Place]], [[Kent]], built in the mid 14th century. A manor house hall was where the lord and his family ate, received guests, and conferred with dependents.]] 

The word derives from traditional inherited divisions of the countryside, reassigned as local jurisdictions known as '''manors''' or '''[[seigneuries]]'''; each manor being subject to a '''lord''' (French ''seigneur''), usually holding his position in return for undertakings offered to a higher lord (see [[Feudalism]]). The lord held a '''[[manorial court]]''', governed by public law and local custom. Not all territorial seigneurs were secular; [[bishops]] and [[abbots]] also held lands that entailed similar obligations.

By extension, the word ''manor'' is sometimes used in England as a slang term for any home area or territory in which authority is held, often in a police or criminal context.<ref>{{cite news| url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1559330/Terror-raids-on-homes-of-uranium-ex-employee.html | work=The Daily Telegraph | location=London | title=Terror raids on homes of uranium ex-employee | author=Stewart Payne | date=2007-08-03 | access-date=2010-05-12}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.londonslang.com/db/m/ |title=London Slang - M |access-date=2009-04-29 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090208090911/http://www.londonslang.com/db/m/ |archive-date=2009-02-08 }}</ref>

In the generic plan of a medieval manor<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/shepherd_1911/shepherd-c-104.jpg|title=Plan of Medieval Manor by William R. Shepherd|website=University of Texas Libraries|access-date=3 October 2023}}</ref> from ''Shepherd's Historical Atlas'',<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/history_shepherd_1911.html|title=Historical Atlas |publisher=Perry–Castañeda Map Collection&nbsp;– UT Library Online |author=William R. Shepherd}}</ref> the strips of individually worked land in the open field system are immediately apparent. In this plan, the manor house is set slightly apart from the village, but equally often the village grew up around the [[Courtyard|forecourt]] of the manor, formerly walled, while the manor lands stretched away outside, as still may be seen at [[Petworth House]]. As concerns for privacy{{dubious|date=March 2014}} increased in the 18th century,{{citation needed|date=March 2014}} manor houses were often located a farther distance from the village. For example, when a grand new house was required by the new owner of [[Harlaxton Manor]], Lincolnshire, in the 1830s, the site of the existing manor house at the edge of its village was abandoned for a new one, isolated in its park, with the village out of view.{{Citation needed|date=September 2009}}

In an agrarian society, the conditions of land tenure underlie all social or economic factors. There were two legal systems of pre-manorial landholding. One, the most common, was the system of holding land ''"[[allodial]]ly"'' in full outright ownership. The other was a use of ''precaria'' or [[benefice]]s, in which land was held conditionally (the root of the English word "precarious").

To these two systems, the Carolingian monarchs added a third, the ''aprisio'', which linked manorialism with [[feudalism]]. The ''aprisio'' made its first appearance in [[Charlemagne]]'s province of [[Septimania]] in the south of [[France]], when Charlemagne had to settle the [[Visigoths|Visigothic]] refugees who had fled with his retreating forces after the failure of his [[Zaragoza]] expedition of 778. He solved this problem by allotting "desert" tracts of uncultivated land belonging to the royal ''[[fisc]]'' under direct control of the emperor. These holdings ''aprisio'' entailed specific conditions. The earliest specific ''aprisio'' grant that has been identified was at [[Fontjoncouse]], near [[Narbonne]] (see Lewis, links). In former Roman settlements, a system of [[villa]]s, dating from Late Antiquity, was inherited by the medieval world.

=== The seigneur ===
[[File:Bachritterburg.jpg|thumb|Reconstruction of a medieval castle, Bachritterburg, Baden-Württemberg|260x260px]]

The possessor of a seigneurie bears the title of "[[Imperial, royal and noble ranks|Lord]]". He can be an individual, in the vast majority of cases a national of the [[nobility]] or of the [[Bourgeoisie]], but also a [[judicial person]] most often an ecclesiastical institution such as an [[abbey]], a [[cathedral]] or canonical chapter or a military order. The power of the lord was exercised through various intermediaries, the most important of which was the [[Bailiff (France)|bailiff]]. The sovereign can also be a lord; the seigneuries he owns form the royal domain.

The title of lord is also granted, especially in modern times, to individuals holding noble fiefdoms which are not for all that seigneuries. These "lords" are sometimes called sieurs, equivalent terms in medieval times.

=== The land lordship ===
The lord is the direct or prominent owner of the land assets of his lordship. The notion of absolute ownership over a common good cannot be applied, because there are also others than the main user who have rights over these goods. We{{who|date=March 2021}} distinguish in the land lordship two sets the reserves which is the set of goods of which the lord reserves the direct exploitation and [[tenant-in-chief]], property whose exploitation is entrusted to a tenant against payment of a royalty, most often called cens and services such as [[Corvée]]. The distribution between reserve and tenure varies depending on the period and region.<ref>[https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/corv%C3%A9e corvée noun]</ref>

==Common features==
{{unreferenced section|date=March 2021}}
[[Image:Plan mediaeval manor.jpg|thumb|Generic map of a medieval manor.<br>The mustard-coloured areas are part of the '''[[demesne]]''', the [[hatching|hatched]] areas part of the '''[[glebe]]'''. William R. Shepherd, ''Historical Atlas'', 1923.]]

Manors each consisted of up to three classes of land:
#'''[[Demesne]]''', the part directly controlled by the lord and used for the benefit of his household and dependents;
#'''Dependent''' ('''serf''' or '''[[villein]]''') holdings carrying the obligation that the peasant household supply the lord with specified labour services or a part of its output (or cash in lieu thereof), subject to the custom attached to the holding; and
#'''Free peasant land''', without such obligation but otherwise subject to manorial jurisdiction and custom, and owing money rent fixed at the time of the lease.

Additional sources of income for the lord included charges for use of his mill, bakery or wine-press, or for the right to hunt or to [[Grazing rights#Pigs|let pigs feed]] in his woodland, as well as court revenues and single payments on each change of tenant. On the other side of the account, manorial administration involved significant expenses, perhaps a reason why smaller manors tended to rely less on villein [[Land tenure|tenure]].{{original research inline|date=June 2016}}

Dependent holdings were held nominally by arrangement of lord and tenant, but tenure became in practice almost universally hereditary, with a payment made to the lord on each succession of another member of the family. Villein land could not be abandoned, at least until demographic and economic circumstances made flight a viable proposition; nor could they be passed to a third party without the lord's permission, and the customary payment.

Although not free, villeins were by no means in the same position as slaves: they enjoyed legal rights, subject to local custom, and had recourse to the law subject to court charges, which were an additional source of manorial income. Sub-letting of villein holdings was common, and labour on the demesne might be commuted into an additional money payment, as happened increasingly from the 13th century.

{{Anchor|Manorial waste|Lord's waste}}Land which was neither let to tenants nor formed part of [[demesne]] lands was known as "manorial waste"; typically, this included [[hedge]]s, [[Road verge|verges]], etc.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1966/jul/12/manorial-wastes|work=House of Lords Official Record|publisher=[[Hansard]]|title=Manorial Wastes|date=12 July 1966|author=[[John Cordle ]]}}</ref> Common land where all members of the community had right of passage was known as "lord's waste". Part of the [[Demesne|demesne land]] of the manor which being uncultivated was termed the Lord's Waste and served for public roads and for common pasture to the lord and his tenants.<ref>''Black’s Law Dictionary'', 6th ed., 1990, quoted at http://www.henleynews.co.uk/history/LordsWaste.pdf {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210926192536/http://www.henleynews.co.uk/history/LordsWaste.pdf |date=2021-09-26 }}.</ref><ref>{{cite book |author1=Jeffrey Lehman |author2=Shirelle Phelps |title=West's Encyclopedia of American Law, Vol. 6 | edition=2 |date=2005 |publisher=Thomson/Gale |location=Detroit |isbn=9780787663742 |page=420}}</ref> In many settlements during the [[Early modern Europe|early modern]] period, illegal building was carried out on lord's waste land by squatters who would then plead their case to remain with local support. An example of a lord's waste settlement, where the main centres grew up in this way, is the village of [[Bredfield]] in [[Suffolk]].<ref>See Bredfield Parish Plan 2006, p.9: {{cite web |url=http://www.bredfield.org.uk/material/Report.pdf |title=Archived copy |accessdate=2009-06-27 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20081209130638/http://www.bredfield.org.uk/material/Report.pdf |archivedate=2008-12-09 }}</ref> Lord's waste continues to be a source of rights and responsibilities issues in places such as [[Henley-in-Arden]], [[Warwickshire]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.henleynews.co.uk/history/LordsWaste.pdf|accessdate=12 March 2022|author=Jonathan Dovey|title=Lord's Waste|website=Henley News|archive-date=26 September 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210926192536/http://www.henleynews.co.uk/history/LordsWaste.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref>

In examining the origins of the monastic [[cloister]], [[Walter Horn]] found that "as a manorial entity the [[Carolingian]] [[monastery]]&nbsp;... differed little from the fabric of a feudal estate, save that the corporate community of men for whose sustenance this organisation was maintained consisted of monks who served God in chant and spent much of their time in reading and writing."<ref>Horn, "On the Origins of the Medieval Cloister" ''Gesta'' ''' 12'''.1/2 (1973:13–52), quote p. 41.</ref>

===Residents of a manor===
*[[Lord of the manor]] (who could be an [[Absentee landlord|absentee]])
*[[Serfdom|Serfs]]
*[[Villein]]s
*[[Cottar]]s
*[[Bordar]]s
*[[Freehold (law)|Freeholders]]
*[[Copyhold]]ers

===Tenants===
Tenants owned land on the manor under one of several legal agreements: [[Freehold (law)|freehold]], [[copyhold]], [[customary freehold]] and [[leasehold]].<ref>{{cite web|url= https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/fass/projects/manorialrecords/manors/whatis.htm|website=[[Lancaster University]]|title=What is a Manor?|author1=Angus Winchester|author2=Eleanor Straughton|accessdate=12 March 2022}}</ref>

==Variation among manors==
Like [[feudalism]] which, together with manorialism, formed the legal and organisational framework of feudal society, manorial structures were not uniform or coordinated. In the later Middle Ages, areas of incomplete or non-existent manorialisation persisted while the manorial economy underwent substantial development with changing economic conditions.

Not all manors contained all three classes of land.  Typically, [[demesne]] accounted for roughly a third of the arable area, and [[villein]] holdings rather more; but some manors consisted solely of demesne, others solely of peasant holdings. The proportion of unfree and free tenures could likewise vary greatly, with more or less reliance on wage labour for agricultural work on the demesne.

The proportion of the cultivated area in demesne tended to be greater in smaller manors, while the share of villein land was greater in large manors, providing the lord of the latter with a larger supply of obligatory labour for demesne work. The proportion of free tenements was generally less variable, but tended to be somewhat greater on the smaller manors.

Manors varied similarly in their geographical arrangement: most did not coincide with a single village, but rather consisted of parts of two or more villages, most of the latter containing also parts of at least one other manor. This situation sometimes led to replacement by cash payments or their equivalents in kind of the demesne labour obligations of those peasants living furthest from the lord's estate.

As with peasant plots, the demesne was not a single territorial unit, but consisted rather of a central house with neighbouring land and estate buildings, plus strips dispersed through the manor alongside free and villein ones: in addition, the lord might lease free tenements belonging to neighbouring manors, as well as holding other manors some distance away to provide a greater range of produce.

Nor were manors held necessarily by lay lords rendering military service (or again, cash in lieu) to their superior: a substantial share (estimated by value at 17% in [[Domesday Book|England in 1086]]) belonged directly to the king, and a greater proportion (rather more than a quarter) were held by [[Diocese|bishoprics]] and [[monastery|monasteries]]. [[Ecclesiastical]] manors tended to be larger, with a significantly greater villein area than neighbouring lay manors.{{Citation needed|date=September 2009}}

The effect of circumstances on manorial economy is complex and at times contradictory: upland conditions tended to preserve peasant freedoms (livestock husbandry in particular being less labour-intensive and therefore less demanding of villein services); on the other hand, some upland areas of Europe showed some of the most oppressive manorial conditions, while lowland eastern England is credited with an exceptionally large free peasantry, in part a legacy of Scandinavian settlement.

Similarly, the spread of [[money]] [[economy]] stimulated the replacement of labour services by money payments, but the growth of the money supply and resulting inflation after 1170 initially led nobles to take back leased estates and to re-impose labour dues as the value of fixed cash payments declined in real terms.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/money/topic/manorialism |title=Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "manorialism". Encyclopedia Britannica, 3 Oct. 2022 |access-date= 28 January 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |title=An Economic Explanation of English Agricultural Organization in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries |first1=Clyde G |last1=Reed |first2=Terry L |last2=Anderson |journal=The Economic History Review |issue=1 |date=1973 |volume=26 |pages=134–137 (4 pages) |doi=10.2307/2594763 |jstor=2594763 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2594763 |access-date= 28 January 2024 }}</ref>

== Abolition ==
The last feudal dues in France were abolished at the [[French Revolution]]. The last [[patroonship]] was abolished in [[New York (state)|New York]] in the 1840s as a result of the [[Anti-Rent War]]. In parts of eastern Germany, the ''Rittergut'' manors of [[Junker]]s remained until [[World War II]].<ref name=":0" /> In Quebec, the last feudal rents were paid in 1970 under the modified provisions of the ''[[Seigneurial system of New France#Abolition|Seigniorial Dues Abolition Act]]'' of 1935.

==See also==
{{Portal|Middle Ages|France|United Kingdom}}

=== General ===

*[[Allodial title]]
*[[Domesday Book]]
*[[Glebe]]
*[[Banal rights]]
*[[Gentry]]

=== Similar land tenure systems in other parts of the world ===
{{div col|colwidth=30em}}
*[[Maenor]], the Welsh system
*[[Heerlijkheid]], Dutch manorialism
*[[Junker]], [[Prussia]]n manorialism
*[[Folwark]], system in Poland/Lithuania
*[[Baltic nobility]], system in Estonia/Latvia
*[[Latifundium]], [[Ancient Rome]]
*[[Patroon]], 17th century [[New Netherland]]
*[[Property Law in Colonial New York]], 17th–18th century New York
*[[Seigneurial system of New France]], 17th century Canada
*[[Hacienda]], the Spanish system
*[[Fazenda]], the Brazilian system
*[[Mouza]], manor equivalent in the Indian Subcontinent
*[[Indian feudalism]], Indian feudalism
*[[Fengjian]], Chinese feudalism
*[[Shōen]] the Japanese system
*[[Particuliere landerij]], 17th-century [[Dutch East Indies]] (now Indonesia){{div col end}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
*{{cite book | edition = 2 | publisher = Routledge | isbn = 0-415-03916-9 | last = Bloch | first = Marc | title = Feudal Society: Vol 1: The Growth and Ties of Dependence | date = 1989-11-16 }}
*{{cite book | edition = 2 | publisher = Routledge | isbn = 0-415-03918-5 | last = Bloch | first = Marc | title = Feudal Society: Vol 2: Social Classes and Political Organisation | date = 1989-11-16 }}
*{{cite book | publisher = Harper & Row | last = Boissonnade | first = Prosper |author2 = Eileen Power |author3 = Lynn White | title = Life and work in medieval Europe : the evolution of medieval economy from the fifth to the fifteenth century | url = https://archive.org/details/lifeworkinmediev00bois | url-access = registration | location = New York, NY | series = Harper torchbook, 1141 | year = 1964 }}
*{{cite book | last = Pirenne | first = Henri | title = Economic and Social History of Medieval Europe | url = https://archive.org/details/economicsocialh00pire | url-access = registration | publisher = [[Harcourt Brace & Company]] |year = 1937 |isbn = 0-15-627533-3}}

==External links==
*[https://www.worldhistory.org/Manorialism/ World History Encyclopedia – Manorialism]
*[https://libro.uca.edu/lewis/sfc5.htm Archibald R. Lewis, ''The Development of Southern French and Catalan Society, 718–1050'']
*[https://www.mois.ee/english/ Estonian Manors Portal]&nbsp;– the English version gives the overview of 438 best preserved historical manors in Estonia
*[http://www.buildinghistory.org/manors.shtml Medieval manors and their records] Specific to the British Isles.

{{Middle Ages}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Feudalism]]
[[Category:Economic systems]]
[[Category:Social classes]]
[[Category:Land tenure]]