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Article: Feudalism
- Article from:
- Dictionary of American History
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FEUDALISM
FEUDALISM.
The origins of European feudalism are in eighth-century France, where estates were granted in exchange for military service. In England, feudalism evolved into the manorial system, in which a bound peasantry was subject to the rule of landlords. English feudalism was a system of rights and duties binding an upper class (nobility) in loyalty and responsibility to a king or lord in exchange for land (fiefs) worked by peasant labor (serfs). In exchange for their labor, peasants received the protection and rule of the landowner. This system benefited the nobility, as they essentially held public power privately, and the monarchy, to whom the nobles were bound in both ...