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The History of Feudalism a Volume in the DOCUMENTARY HISTORY of WESTERN CIVILIZATION the HISTORY of FEUDALISM

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The History of Feudalism a Volume in the DOCUMENTARY HISTORY of WESTERN CIVILIZATION the HISTORY of FEUDALISM The History of Feudalism A volume in THE DOCUMENTARY HISTORY of WESTERN CIVILIZATION THE HISTORY OF FEUDALISM edited by DAVID HERLIHY Palgrave Macmillan THE HISTORY OF FEUDALISM © David Herlihy 1970 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1970 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission. First published in the United States 1970 First published in the United Kingdom by Macmillan and Co. Ltd.1971 Published by MACMILLAN AND CO LTD London and Basingstoke Associated companies in New York Tor onto Dublin Melbourne ] ohannesburg and Madras SBN 333 03756 1 (hard cover) ISBN 978-1-349-00255-9 ISBN 978-1-349-00253-5 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-00253-5 Contents Preface Xl General Introduction Xlll PART ONE: THE FEUDAL MILIEU INTRODUCTION I. THE FIRST FEUDAL AGE 1. The wandering relics of St. Philibert, described by the Monk Ermentarius 8 2. Saracen raids, in two charters from Provence 13 3· The savage environment, from the Life of St. Maieul of Cluny r6 4- Miracles and mental attitudes in the Histories of Raoul Glaber 19 II. THE SECOND FEUDAL AGE 5. The growth of Arras, according to the Monk Guimann 34 6. Monetary revenues and the bureaucratic spirit, in the Dialogue concerning the Exchequer 36 7. Consciousness of class, in Andreas Capellanus, The Art of Courtly Love 43 PART TWO: FEUDAL INSTITUTIONS INTRODUCTION 66 I. VASSALAGE 8. The Germanic Comitatus, described by Tacitus 8o 9· Dependency in late-Roman society, according to Salvian of Marseilles 8 1 viii CONTENTS I o. Merovingian dependency, illustrated by model charters 84 I 1. The earliest known oath of vassalage, from the Annates regni Francorum 86 12. Vassalage and dependency in the Carolingian capitularies 86 1 3· The Battle of Maldon 88 14. The obligations of vassals, according to Fulbert of Chartres 96 15. Homage, described by Galbert of Bruges 98 16. An oath of vassalage, from the Liber feudorum maior 99 17. Multiple vassalage, in the Liber feudorum maior 101 II. THE FIEF 18. A Merovingian precarial grant 103 19. The Precarium by order of the king 104 20. A benefice given by Charles the Bald 105 21. The capitulary of Quierzy-sur-Oise 106 2 2. The constitution of Emperor Conrad II concern- ing the fiefs of Italy 107 2 3· The granting of a .fief, from the Liber feudorum mazor 109 III. JUSTICE AND LORDSHIP 24. Selections from the Salic law I I I 25. Judgment by hot water I I4 26. Thoughts on the judicial duel, by Frederick II Hohenstaufen I 2 I 27. Justice for the poor, from the Life of St. Remi 122 28. A Merovingian charter of immunity I 2 5 29. A charter of immunity from Charles the Bald I 26 30. The coronation of Charles the Bald I 28 3 I. Fiefs, feuds, and justice in Raoul of Cambrai I 3 I 32. Lords, vassals, and tenants in the Norman Summa de legibus I77 33· Law, custom, and justice, according to Philippe de Beaumanoir I 87 CONTENTS ix PART THREE: THE FEUDAL PRINCIPALITY INTRODUCTION I 97 34- On the Governance of the Palace, by Hincmar of Rheims 208 35· A castle in Spain 228 36. A castle in the Lyonnais 2 30 37. Documents concerning the Domesday Inquest 2 33 38. Frederick Barbarossa's constitution concernmg fie& 237 39· The Assize of Clarendon 2 39 40. The accounts of the sheriff of Worcester 24 3 4I. Writs of Henry II Plantagenet 2 5 I 42. Form of proceeding on the judicial visitation in England 253 43· Magna Carta 258 44· The growth of royal interests: a law concerning air pollution 270 4 5. The imperial chancery under Frederick II 2 7 I 46. The writ Circumspecte Agatis 276 4 7. Writs of summons to Parliament 2 7 8 PART FOUR: CHIVALRY INTRODUCTION 28I 48. The peace and truce of God at the Council of T oulouges 2 86 49· In Praise of the New Chivalry, by Bernard of Clairvaux 288 50. The Legend of St. George, according to Jacobus de Voragine 298 5 I. The Book on the Order of Chivalry, by Ray- mond Lull 305 INDEX 345 Preface In the concluding books of his Spirit of the Laws ( 1748), Charles Louis de Secondat, sieur de Montesquieu, commented on the vast numbers of records which had survived to illustrate the feudal institutions of his native France. He compared them to "an im­ mense expanse, a boundless ocean," and applied to them a quota­ tion from Ovid: "There were also no shores to this sea." Rapidly shifting metaphors, he further affirmed that "all these frigid, dry, insipid and hard writings must be read and devoured in the same manner as Saturn is fabled to have devoured stones." In contrast to Montesquieu, the modern editor of feudal docu­ ments may well pretend to find some jewels among the stones. But there is no doubt that the sea is there. To keep this anthology within a reasonable length, we have concentrated upon that period which most historians consider to be the classic age of Western feudalism. This is the early and central Middle Ages, from roughly 7 so to about 1 3oo, and especially the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. We have not included documents from the long period between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries, during which feudal institutions declined or were transformed. To do so would have required illustrations of the complex social history of the late medieval and early modern age. This would be a formidable task for a single collection of sources, and these later changes are at all events already illustrated in other volumes of this series. So also, we have not included records directly bearing on the peasantry, the towns, or the clergy, for the reason that the design of the series gives abundant space to these groups in other volumes. In Part One the documents chosen are meant to illustrate the social and intellectual milieu of the feudal age or ages. Section II provides illustrations of the basic institutions of feudalism-vassal­ age, the fief, and what has traditionally been called "private jus­ tice." In Part Three, on the feudal principality, the documents xii PREFACE illustrate the uses made of these institutions in at least some of the states of Europe, again especially in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The fourth and final part examines the self-image and the values of the warrior class through documents showing the character of chivalry. In all these sections, the editor has attempted to give examples of the principal types of records which historians now use in their investigations of feudal society. He has therefore included not only laws and legal commentaries, private charters and administrative records, but also selections from chronicles, saints' lives, sermons, liturgical works, and imaginative literature. His hope is that they may together illustrate in concrete and human terms the relation­ ships between men and men, and men and governments, which were at the heart of the feudal system. Some of the documents will be familiar to readers already acquainted with medieval history; the excuse for presenting them here is that they are so important in themselves, or so concise and clear in illustrating certain aspects of feudal society, that their presence is indispensable in a fairly rounded anthology. Most documents, familiar or not, have been given fresh translations. Many of them, to this editor's knowledge, have not before been rendered into English. The editor would like to thank his wife, Patricia, who helped in many of the translations and generously gave him the benefit of her comments and criticisms concerning the selections and the introductory sections. Several of his former students-especially Stephen Weinberger, Jane Tibbits Schulenberg, and Jane Beitscher -pointed out to him some of the documents presented in this anthology. To them too he expresses his gratitude. Madison, Wisconsin August, 196 9 General Introduction Meanings "Feudal" is a word which, over the centuries, has borne many shades of meaning and has been used in many ways by different writers. The term, or its immediate ancestor, seems first to have appeared in Burgundian charters from about 881, in the form feos or feus. There it conveys the sense of a kind of movable property, probably cattle, in which payments could be made. Philologists are not agreed concerning its origins, but a reputable opinion sets as its root a Frankish word (fehu), signifying possession or property. Also according to reputable opinion, the word is cognate with the modern German Vieh, or cattle. The years in which the word first appeared, and still more the generations which followed, were for most areas of western Eu­ rope a time of profound disturbances. Northmen, Saracens, and Magyars struck at Europe from abroad, and at home lords great and small battled one another incessantly. It was also a period of flux, in which the terminology of the written sources, and the institutions and life they depicted, were subject to constant change. These shifts can be followed with particular detail in the abundant Latin charters of France and Spain. Feos, in the sense of movable property, disappears from the charters after the first decades of the tenth century. At the same time the term was acquiring different forms and a different meaning. The forms are fevum, fevo, feo, and others. The new meaning was a grant of land, still a form of payment but, as we shall see, much different from an unrestricted conveyance. It was used in this sense, in the form fevum, appar­ ently for the first time in a charter from Maguelone in southern France, in 899· But such usage remained rare for the next hundred years.
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