serfdom

Examples of serfdom in the following topics:

• Catherine's Domestic Policies

  • Catherine the Great enthusiastically supported the ideals of the Enlightenment, thus earning the status of an enlightened despot, although her reforms benefited a small number of her subjects and did not change the oppressive system of Russian serfdom.
  • However, military conscription and economy continued to depend on serfdom and the increasing demands of the state and private landowners led to increased levels of reliance on serfs.
  • In the 18th century, the peasantry in Russia were no longer bound to the land, but tied to their owner, which made Russian serfdom more similar to slavery than any other system of forced labor that existed at the time in Europe.
  • An admirer of Peter the Great, she continued to modernize Russia along Western European lines although her reforms did not benefit the masses and military conscription and economy continued to depend on serfdom.

• Joseph II and Domestic Reform

  • In 1781, Joseph issued the Serfdom Patent, which aimed to abolish aspects of the traditional serfdom system of the Habsburg lands through the establishment of basic civil liberties for the serfs.
  • The Patent granted the serfs some legal rights in the Habsburg monarchy, but it did not affect the financial dues and the physical corvée (unpaid labor) that the serfs legally owed to their landlords, which it practice meant that it did not abolish serfdom but rather expanded selected rights of serfs.
  • Despite the attempts to improve the fate of the peasantry, Joseph's land reforms met with the resistance of the landed nobility and serfdom was not abolished in the Empire until 1848.

• Enlightened Despotism

  • However, military conscription and economy continued to depend on serfdom, and the increasing demands of the state and private landowners led to increased levels of reliance on serfs.
  • Joseph II was one of the first rulers in Central Europe, who attempted to abolish serfdom but his plans met with resistance from the landholders.
  • His Imperial Patent of 1785 abolished serfdom on some territories of the Empire but, under the pressure of the landlords, did not give the peasants ownership of the land or freedom from dues owed to the landowning nobles.

• The Manor System

  • Serfdom was the status of peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to manorialism.

• The Black Death

  • Land was plentiful, wages high, and serfdom had all but disappeared.
  • Plague brought an eventual end of Serfdom in Western Europe.

• Feudalism

  • Each of these territories developed feudalism in unique ways and the way we understand feudalism as a unified concept today is in large part due to its critiques after its dissolution, such as Karl Marx, who theorized feudalism as a pre-capitalist society, characterized by the power of the ruling class (the aristocracy) in their control of arable land, leading to a class society based upon the exploitation of the peasants who farm these lands, typically under serfdom and principally by means of labour, produce and money rents.

• Peter the Great

  • With the state now fully sanctioning serfdom, peasant rebellions  were endemic.

• Crises of the Roman Empire

  • This provided an early model for serfdom, the origins of medieval feudal society and of the medieval peasantry.

• The Investiture Controversy

• The Westernization of Russia

  • Evidence suggests that Peter's advisers recommended the abolition of serfdom and the creation of a form of "limited freedom" but the gap between slaves and serfs shrank considerably under Peter.