The European Christendom

[Julio]

(snip)

The European Christendom that the modern historians try to demonize by labelling it as Dark Age tried to restore the way of the early Christians through the feudal system by which the lords would receive share from the produce of the serfs. It was on the basis of voluntarism until such time that the heavy taxes were imposed by reason of huge demands by the monarchs to finance their wars, and certainly some of them were reasonable like those that was made for the Crusades.

(snip)

Feudalism is nothing more than a contract between two nobles, one in a superior position and the other in a lower position, by which the one in a superior position gives up the possession of land and the right to administer it in exchange for fidelity. Later there wasn't even possession, but the lordship was only jurisdictional.

Sometimes it wasn't even hereditary, For example the Asturian Feudalism was based on non-hereditary tenures. With the progressive autonomy of some Castilian counts  and the arrival of the French, a hereditary model is implanted and the French style is copied.

You confuse feudalism with the manioral system. That is, with the adaptation of slavery to the internal workings of fiefdoms with the exploitation of the land through peasants legally bound to the land. Serfs were slaves, a lighter slavery than Greco-Roman slavery, but slavery nonetheless. There were also free peasants.

Feudalism is the result of the weakness of the central authority of the Roman Empire. There was a progressive decentralization of central power before the Middle Ages to better defend the territories against the invasions, given the inability of the emperors to do so. Unrelated to religion.

Feudalism declined with the increase in power of monarchies in the 15th century. Again unrelated to religion.

This is a discussion from the other thread regarding the invasion in Ukraine and in view that the topic is an entirely different subject I deem it right to start a new thread about it. Feudalism as such is a form of government that is not dependent upon the religion of the people. I was referring to the way the relationship between the monarchs and the serfs in the Christendom. For sure there was feudal system that happened in Japan and it was not about Christianity. I was merely discussing the relationship of the people in the Christendom of the Christian Europe during that epoch in history.

[mikemac]

I think Feudalism worked differently in different countries.  During what was called the Davidian Revolution in Scotland many Norman knights ended up with a lot of the land.  Just a few years ago the Scottish parliament outlawed Feudalism.  Since then the question that has been asked is "who owns Scotland?"  And there have been native land claims submitted.  Obviously Feudalism didn't work in Scotland when you consider foreigners ended up owning much of the land.

On the other hand Feudalism seemed to work okay in Quebec.  It was called the Seigneurial System.  Long narrow farms stretched back from the St. Lawrence River.  At the heart of each Seigneur was a Catholic Church.  Many of the lords of these Seigneurs were bishops.  The Seigneurial System in Quebec lasted into the 20th century.

Canada's Forgotten Feudal Past
An ancient system that lingered into 20th century Quebec

https://historyofyesterday.com/canadas-forgotten-feudal-past-e9801f3e2dbf

...
An eventual end

Despite numerous pieces of legislation passed in the middle part of the 19th century, the collection of "rentcharges" by manorial lords from habitants continued well into the 20th century.

In 1928, a final push was made to end the manorial system with amendments made to the Seigniories Act. It put a hard limit on for how much longer rents and taxes could be collected from the old manorial estates at 41 years from signing.

There were lawsuits, court battles, and arguments over unpaid debts and fees that went on during the forty-one year period that the law stipulated. Finally, in 1970, the government mandated the final arbitration and end to the feudal system of Quebec which had lasted for three hundred and forty two years.

This manorial system proved almost impossible to kill. It had become so ingrained in the region and tied to a sense of unique national, regional, and religious pride that it survived the many attempts to alter or destroy it.

The semi-feudal seigneurial system had survived the fall of the French monarchy, the British conquest of Canada, Canadian independence, World War I, and World War II before finally being vanquished a mere fifty years ago. It shrewdly survived various legal attempts to disband it, in 1774, and again in 1845 and it even tried to shirk the modern world's distaste for the system in 1928 by surviving another four decades beyond that.

Today, the vestiges of the neo-feudal land system that dominated Quebec for centuries can still be seen and felt. Plots of land along the Saint Lawrence River still hold their elongated shape from the manorial years. References to old manor deeds and titles are still dredged up in Canadian court from time to time.

Yet, many forget that the oldest of Old World systems stubbornly lived in Canada for centuries after it had been abolished nearly everywhere else.

Louis Riel's Assiniboia along the Assiniboine River, in what became Manitoba and Saskatchewan was also set up with a Seigneurial System.  Although Assiniboia didn't last long.

[Julio]

^^That confirms the fact that feudalism in the Christendom worked differently much as all of which were under the monarchs. In the way I understood the Reconquista of Spain, although there were times that warriors like El Cid changes their loyalty that was from the Moors to the Christians and vice versa, it is evident that Christianity was very strong virtue in regard to the relationship between the monarchs and the serfs. The dedication of service of the serfs in relation to the protection that the monarchs provided must not only be understood in their economic or pragmatic perspectives. Faith or belief system during that time was an entirely different context when compared to the way this contemporary world regard them.

[mikemac]

Actually the Davidian Revolution happen in the Kingdom of Scotland during the reign of David I, which was from 1124 to 1153.  So both examples that I gave, in Quebec and Scotland were introduced within Catholic countries.  The reason it was bad for Scotland is because King David was carrying out the Normanisation of the Scottish government and introduced feudalism through immigrant Norman and Anglo-Norman knights.

[Julio]

Actually the Davidian Revolution happen in the Kingdom of Scotland during the reign of David I, which was from 1124 to 1153.  So both examples that I gave, in Quebec and Scotland were introduced within Catholic countries.  The reason it was bad for Scotland is because King David was carrying out the Normanisation of the Scottish government and introduced feudalism through immigrant Norman and Anglo-Norman knights.

I agree that the Normans were invaders and in fact those castles that they built was the strategy to create formidable military presence in each of the territories that they conquered. The construction of them was very expensive that was among the reasons the serfs charged with heavy taxes. That was a clear example that power corrupts much as the invading Normans were zealous of having  been converted to Catholicism being former pagans and were themselves Viking invaders but was allowed by the French King to settle in their territory.

The story of the Norman invaders in Sicily however was a different matter because it was provided that during its reign it was tolerant of other cultures like the Saracens and the Jews. Frederick II was the scion of this Kingdom who later became a Holy Roman Emperor.

Peculiar is the fact that before England converted to Protestantism it was a strong ally of the Spanish Kingdom against the Catholic France. While the Spaniards and the Portuguese were fighting against the Moors in order to totally eject those Saracens from Iberian peninsula, the result of Norman invasion in England caused the 100 Years War due to dispute over who must reign in the Throne of France. Eventually Catholic France fought against the Imperial League and England was an ally of Spain in that Italian Wars. These are just examples of struggles among the Catholic powers of its time, that degenerated the Christendom due to the power plays among the Catholic Kings. In this epoch of European History, Spain reached the Philippines in 1521 through a Portuguese sailor named Ferdinand Magellan by crossing the Pacific Ocean. The Portuguese however were slightly ahead of their Iberian rival because few years before that, they were already setting foothold in China and in Indonesia by travelling through the Cape of Good Hope in Africa and crossing the Indian Ocean. The Christendom was expanding and Spain was the champion of Catholicism.

[Prayerful]

Feudalism in Ireland was also an import associated solely with the English colony, the lordship of Ireland. Irish were mostly denied access to the English law of the lordship and almost never rose to the rank of burgesses or knights or abbots. The Justiciar who led war against the king's Irish and English enemies was often the Prior of St John of Jerusalem.

[Julio]

^^I understand that Ireland was ones a bastion of Catholicism. There was a point in time when the Catholics in continental Europe suffered both from the Germanic barbarians the moment that the Western Roman Empire fell and eventually the Gothic Kingdom of the Iberian Peninsula was occupied by the Saracens. Conversion towards Catholicism by the barbarians happened eventually but I know that at this point in time Ireland was where Catholicism in Europe was in its strongest and certainly the devotion to God by the feudal lords and their respective serfs was a factor of the same. Correct me if I am wrong, but I know also that it was at that moment in Western Civilization that certain important Catholic books and/or references were recorded and that was also in Ireland. May of which were destroyed by the Viking raids before they embraced Christianity the way the Normans did it.

The European Christendom was the only territory where the unrequited love by the knights was true. In other cultures, their warriors had different point of view about humanity and relationship to the divine, but the Christianity of these ancient warriors created an entirely different value system. Human rights is an invention of the Catholics. That was the reason bestiality and gladiatorial performances that was true in the pagan Roman Empire eventually diminished as was prohibited in the Christendom. It is so unfortunate that this accolade has been stolen by the leftist and the rest of the godless. The only way to make the Westerners proud of their history is to go back to God for racism is not true among the believers of Jesus for all are equal before the eyes of God. This kind of justice system was in view of the existence of the Christendom.

[diaduit]

^^I understand that Ireland was ones a bastion of Catholicism. There was a point in time when the Catholics in continental Europe suffered both from the Germanic barbarians the moment that the Western Roman Empire fell and eventually the Gothic Kingdom of the Iberian Peninsula was occupied by the Saracens. Conversion towards Catholicism by the barbarians happened eventually but I know that at this point in time Ireland was where Catholicism in Europe was in its strongest and certainly the devotion to God by the feudal lords and their respective serfs was a factor of the same. Correct me if I am wrong, but I know also that it was at that moment in Western Civilization that certain important Catholic books and/or references were recorded and that was also in Ireland. May of which were destroyed by the Viking raids before they embraced Christianity the way the Normans did it.

The European Christendom was the only territory where the unrequited love by the knights was true. In other cultures, their warriors had different point of view about humanity and relationship to the divine, but the Christianity of these ancient warriors created an entirely different value system. Human rights is an invention of the Catholics. That was the reason bestiality and gladiatorial performances that was true in the pagan Roman Empire eventually diminished as was prohibited in the Christendom. It is so unfortunate that this accolade has been stolen by the leftist and the rest of the godless. The only way to make the Westerners proud of their history is to go back to God for racism is not true among the believers of Jesus for all are equal before the eyes of God. This kind of justice system was in view of the existence of the Christendom.

Our Catholic history is constantly savaged by the media, politicians etc and now our society doesn't know truth from fiction.  I teach my children that if we didn't have Christianity we would be sacrificing our children to the Gods and we can see that now before our very eyes with abortion.  To me abortion and homosexuality is the final return to full paganism.

[GMC]

You confuse serfdom with feudalism. I insist, feudalism is exclusively a contract between nobles, there aren't serfs. The higher noble granted land to the lower noble in exchange for their fidelity, especially in times of war. Serfdom was a different institution that could be present or not.

For example: In Spain, serfdom was a minority, but feudalism was very present until its decline with the Catholic Kings Isabella and Ferdinand and their centralist policies.

It's the culmination of a decentralization process that began in the Late Roman Empire and culminated with the fall of the Carolingian Empire.

You have the Middle Ages quite idealized. It's some common among Catholics as a reaction to the enlightened demonization of the Middle Ages.

For example: Most of Visigothic Spain capitulated to the Moor Invasion after initial defeats. Only in Tarraconense and Septimania did the last two Visigothic kings fight: Achila II and Ardo. The rest all of Big cities capitulated. Only Merida endured a long siege before surrendering.

The vast majority of the nobility quickly capitulated.Tthe witizans (a faction of the civil war in which the Visigoths were at the arrival of the Moors) they were collaborators with the Moors.

During the first moment of the Muslim conquest, there was simply a change of masters, the local elites submitted and preserved their privileged position and autonomy. That was the "vocation of service" they had.

But later with the arrival of the vales. Authoritarianism, pacts broken, Arabization and Islamization began. And there began, for example, the rebellion of Pelagius.

Even if we talk about the crusades, we have the infamous fourth crusade, which ended with the sack of Constantinople and the acceleration of the destruction of Byzantium.

Remember that the first crusade began with Alexius I's call for help to the Pope. So, one of the objectives of the crusades was to help the Byzantine Empire, not to accelerate his fall.

For the rest. In the Middle Ages, technological improvements were introduced, such as water mills, wooden barrels, , glasses or ship rudders. Hundreds of cities were founded, trade expanded, and the modern banking and accounting system was created. Of course, there were free peasants, wage labor, merchants, landowners, Companies with legal personality, investment systems such as the commenda or the colleganza, etc.  There were even international banking megacorporations such as the Bardi or the Peruzzi.

So I don't buy the illustrated demonizing discourse, but neither the idealizing discourse, nor the Tolkian ruralist or distributist version of the Middle Ages, because they are also forgeries of that Age.

[Julio]

GMC, according to this definition:

The Oxford English Dictionary has as concise a definition for feudalism as anywhere while still including its various levels of application:

The dominant social system in medieval Europe, in which the nobility held lands from the Crown in exchange for military service, and vassals were in turn tenants of the nobles, while the peasants (villeins or serfs) were obliged to live on their lord's land and give him homage, labour, and a share of the produce, notionally in exchange for military protection. https://www.worldhistory.org/Feudalism/

Certainly there were agreements during those days between those parties that you mentioned. So as you stated in feudalism the agreement was between the nobles. Basic is the fact that the serfs must provide share in the produce under that system because even if the agreement was among the nobilities but there was also the contractual relationship between the serfs and the nobles for the former to be obliged to live in that land and must provide services and produce in exchange of the protection of the former. This feudal society or you may also call it manorialism community occurred but not limited during the Christendom.

I understand your position of not idealizing it but my take of the same as I provided it before was the volunteerism of providing the produce that are from the land juxtaposition with rendering services in exchange to the protection that was originally its concept before it was utilized in an abusive manner. In my perspective, not specifically the feudalist society itself but that feudal society that existed during the Christendom has some sort of communal system that was akin to the way the early Christian communities lived. I stated akin because certainly they were different.

During the Crusade that was really intended to help the Christians in the East and halt the advance of the Saracens. You have to note however of the schism between the Western and the Eastern Christians and we know that the pillage and raid by the Crusaders against Constantinople that happened in the 4rth Crusade was to get even against the maltreatment and abuses by its Monarch against the Catholics in that territory. Hence, they were treated like the rest of the heathens during that time and this is not to justify anything but to just shed some light how on earth that happened.

In regard to invasion by the Moors over Visigothic Spain, I believe that the rebellion was not because of any form of changes by the policies of Islamic conquerors because Astoria remained to be the bastion of Iberian Catholics. Also, the Saracens tried to cross the French border but we know that they were defeated in the Battle of the Tours. There was Spanish monarchs like Ramiro I of Astoria who fought against the Moors long before Arabization happened in the Iberian peninsula. In other words the objection against that invasion happened not because of any form of policy by the invaders but because they were simply seen as enemies being both as land grabbers and more importantly must be fought against in the name of faith.

I fully agree with you about those technological achievements during that epoch in history that you mentioned, and it was not really dark as many would label it.

[Julio]

^^I understand that Ireland was ones a bastion of Catholicism. There was a point in time when the Catholics in continental Europe suffered both from the Germanic barbarians the moment that the Western Roman Empire fell and eventually the Gothic Kingdom of the Iberian Peninsula was occupied by the Saracens. Conversion towards Catholicism by the barbarians happened eventually but I know that at this point in time Ireland was where Catholicism in Europe was in its strongest and certainly the devotion to God by the feudal lords and their respective serfs was a factor of the same. Correct me if I am wrong, but I know also that it was at that moment in Western Civilization that certain important Catholic books and/or references were recorded and that was also in Ireland. May of which were destroyed by the Viking raids before they embraced Christianity the way the Normans did it.

The European Christendom was the only territory where the unrequited love by the knights was true. In other cultures, their warriors had different point of view about humanity and relationship to the divine, but the Christianity of these ancient warriors created an entirely different value system. Human rights is an invention of the Catholics. That was the reason bestiality and gladiatorial performances that was true in the pagan Roman Empire eventually diminished as was prohibited in the Christendom. It is so unfortunate that this accolade has been stolen by the leftist and the rest of the godless. The only way to make the Westerners proud of their history is to go back to God for racism is not true among the believers of Jesus for all are equal before the eyes of God. This kind of justice system was in view of the existence of the Christendom.

Our Catholic history is constantly savaged by the media, politicians etc and now our society doesn't know truth from fiction.  I teach my children that if we didn't have Christianity we would be sacrificing our children to the Gods and we can see that now before our very eyes with abortion.  To me abortion and homosexuality is the final return to full paganism.

I am obviously not from Europe, but I always say the same thoughts to my children. I emphasize that the justice and legal system that we have today that the leftist human rights advocates claim to be theirs is actually from the Catholics. No culture in this world can claim any historical truth that they invented this legal and judicial system that operates worldwide without it, emanating from the Christendom by reason that Jesus taught about this truth as He died at the cross and resurrected from the dead. It is our history as Catholics.

The American invasion of the Philippines gave this Protestant perspective of demonizing the Spanish Catholic history of the nation. I tell my children that it was not true that all that were done by Spain was to abuse all the natives. Certainly, there were abuses but telling the people about the truth of Jesus and attending the Mass at the same time and in the same Church has been an emphasis that all are equal before the eyes of God. No Filipino shall build those large Catholic Churches and engrave their names on those stones had it not for the love of the faith and belief in the truth that Jesus is God.

[GMC]

I know that definition, the problem is that this may have been true in France, in England, where the majority of peasants were serfs and it is true that feudalism there generally developed in that way.  But, for example: How do you fit that definition of feudalism in the Concejo Abierto? A type of lordship institution in the North of Spain that was governed by the direct democracy of its neighbors by assembly

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concejo_abierto

If you know Spanish, I recommend you read this, which is much more complete and with more sources:

https://revistasonline.inap.es/index.php/REALA/article/view/8500/8549

https://diarium.usal.es/monsalvo/files/2012/07/Sociedad-pol%c3%adtica-concejil-en-los-concejos-castellanos.pdf

You can use a dictionary or online translator.

Anyway, this is also part of feudalism, Concejos Abiertos were Fief, but they didn't use the maniorial system. That is why I distinguish one from the other, because many times they were related, but not always.

In fact, this topic of the open council will surely interest you, because this was a kind of communal system. I also recommend you read these articles by Laurenao Manuel Rubio Perez on the subject, Professor of modern history at the University of León, he talks about the Modern Age, after the Middle Ages, but in reality he is talking about reality that emerged in the Middle Ages

They are only in Spanish, that's the bad thing

https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/autor?codigo=292735

I can translate something if you are interested. This is interesting because it shows another side of feudalism that isn't so well known and that doesn't fit with the manorial system of serfdom with which it's usually associated.

This interview is also interesting, it deals with other topics but they are related

[yt]
[/yt]
My point is that there were other feudal institutions that this definition doesn't take into account.In the current autonomous communities of Galicia-Asturias-León-Cantabria-Basque-Navarra, serfs were a minority of the population.



We are talking about the entire North of Spain except the Marca Hispánica of the Carolingians.



The Marca Hispánica, being part of the Carolingian empire, she adopted the same type of feudalism as France. That's why she had the strongest feudalism of Spain

Anyway, the maniorial system was far from heavenly and had many problems: Evil customs and abuse of the feudal lords, lawsuits that lasted for centuries, jurisdictional conflicts, unfair privileges, rates that continued to be paid centuries after the loan had been repaid, etc.

Nor was it a haven of peace and collaboration. There were many serf rebellions in the Middle Ages, in Spain the most famous was that of the Remences in Catalonia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_Remences

Which ended with the Guadalupe's Sentence (Yes, there is a place called Guadalupe in Spain. I'm not talking about Mexico)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentencia_Arbitral_de_Guadalupe

About the Catalonian serfdom, in English:

https://publicacions.iec.cat/repository/pdf/00000195/00000071.pdf

About the Moor invasion. You are talking about after what I am talking about. 

I mean the initial stage, with Musa

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musa_ibn_Nusayr

The betrayal of the rival Visigoth nobility to the king happened in the battle of Guadalete

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Guadalete

In video:

[yt]
[/yt]

The rival visigoth nobility, with their armies on the flanks, betrayed the King in battle and didn't fight. The result was the death of the King, the defeat and the fast collapse of Visigothic Hispania. Except for the Tarraconense and Septimania areas and the city of Mérida, the rest quickly capitulated after that initial defeat.

What you say about the Kingdom of Asturias was later, with the rebellion of Pelagius (Don Pelayo)

After the Battle of Covadonga he founded the Kingdom of Asturias, which was effectively the core of the Reconquista.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Covadonga

But it was AFTER the conquest and what I tell.

Compared to the betrayal of the Witizians, the Cid thing is a trifle.

[Julio]

GMC, first of all I am grateful for the discussions you made and I agree with you of the cited sequence of the conflict between the Kingdom of Astoria against the Moors.

On the Concejo Abierto (Open Council) that you mentioned, such form of governmental system was brought in the Philippines. In fact, when the Spaniards created their government in my country, they did not remove the barangay (village) as the basic political entity which happen to be existing already at that time. Rather they, created the office of the alcade (Mayor) of the municipality or city, also the office of the governor of the provinces and the governor general that runs the whole nation. They also created the office of the judiciary (Real de Audencia de Manila).

That however being a form of direct democracy, it can only be exercised by the nobles and not by the peasants and the serfs. I understand also that voting under this system as it was done was only limited to male nobles, and correct me if I am wrong on that aspect but that was the way this kind of system under Concejo Abierto occurred.

Even if this peculiar system was true in Spain but not in other European nations and seems would not fit in the feudal system that we are discussing in this thread, it is still evident that those serfs or peasantry who are under the royalty coming from the Spanish territories like Leon and Castile had to provide the same services to the aristocratic families or royalties to whom they owe the land they tilled. The adult male members of the aristocratic families are only those who can take part in the proceedings at the Concejo Abierto. It is like a club for them that is exclusive upon their kind only, but the serfs and peasants that tilled their property had to perform the same task akin to the services rendered by the same group of people to the monarchs or royalties of other nations in Europe at that time under Christendom. I have a source on the way the government was run by this aristocratic families in Leon and Castile. https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/9747/2/238697_VOL1.pdf

I also agree with you of the imperfection of the system more particularly as wars broke and powerplay among the monarchs occurred. I still maintain the fact that under that relationship, the original purpose of which was volunteerism of the shares of produce from the peasants/serfs to be given to the monarchs in exchange of the protection that was the kind of system in the Christendom in general.

[GMC]

Mmmm. I think it didn't work like that but I'll check the sources before replying.

[Julio]

Mmmm. I think it didn't work like that but I'll check the sources before replying.

Please check pages 112 to 131 0f the source that I submitted regarding the household structure of a nobility in Leon and Castile. It was provided that each nobility needed servants and workers in their respective household, and it specifically provided that settlers in their property were to pay an annual tax of wheat and barley. (page 116) That was a clear set up of feudalist society in Medieval Spain that was not at all different from France, England and the rest of Christendom in Europe at that time.