With this assignment, we will move from the "big
questions" of the first two to a kind of "micro-analysis"
of one single, short (but complicated) primary source document. By way
of introduction: After the fall of the Roman Empire most of western Europe
fell under the rule of Germanic kings. Population drained away from the
great cities, and nearly all of the people of Europe came to live in small
self-sufficient villages, or in smaller walled towns with castles, like
Carcassone
in the south of France. The structure of international trade broke down.
Roman law was forgotten. The peace and order that had characterized the
Roman Empire in its best days gave way to incessant petty warfare. In the
chaotic conditions of the ninth and tenth centuries a new pattern of social
and political life emerged. Historians sometimes call it "the feudal
system" or "feudalism" (though in recent years the term
has been criticized because it creates the impression that there was some
sort of widespread system or uniform code. In reality feudalism was anything
but systematic. There were all kinds of national and local variations.
But most typically a feudal society displayed three main characteristics.
First, the major cohesive force was a relationship of mutual loyalty between
lords and their vassals - not a common loyalty of all citizens to the state.
Second, a vassal held from his lord an estate of land called a "fief"
(pronounced like "beef") or "benefice" and rendered
military service in exchange for it. Third, feudal tenure of land carried
rights of government over it. Sometimes these arrangements could become
quite complicated. In your book of sources, you have an account of the
legal obligations of a vassal named John of Toul, and the arrangements
he had with several lords. Here's the entire text in translation:
I, John of Toul, make known that I am the liege man of
the Lady Beatrice, countess of Troyes, and of her son, Theobald, count
of Champagne, against every person, living or dead, saving my allegiance
to lord Enjorand of Courcy, lord John of Arcis, and the count of Grandpre.
Should it happen that the count of Grandpre make war on the countess and
count of Champagne, on his own quarrel, I will aid the count of Grandpre
in my own person and I will send to the count and countess of Champagne
the number of knights I owe them for the fief I hold of them. But if the
the count of Grandpre shall make war on the countess of Champagne on his
friends' behalf and not in his own quarrel, I will aid the countess and
count of Champagne in my person, and send one knight to the count of Grandpre
for the service I owe him for the fief I hold of him, but I will not go
myself into the territory of the count of Grandpre to make war on him.
[From Roots, p. 86.]
Your task is to explain the meaning of this contract (which
is in fact what it is), and you might want to pay special attention to
certain specific terms. These include (but are not limited to) "liege
man," "saving my allegiance," "on his own quarrel,"
"in my own person," "knights I owe them," "fief,"
and "on his friends' behalf and not in his own quarrel." For
more on these terms, and many other documents which illustrate "feudalism,"
you may want to visit this
section of the Medieval Source Collection put together at Fordham
University.
====>> Responses are due NOT LATER THAN midnight
on 6 October.