Status Updates From Life in a Medieval Village

"It was a system that suited an age of low productivity and scarcity of markets, and one that hardly fostered the spirit of innovation. The lords were content to leave things as they were, the villeins had little power to change them. When change came, it came largely from outside..."

"Among the last guardians of the old communal traditions were the English colonists who settled in New England..."At least for a little while before that too became an archaic practice like in early 17th century England.

"The accumulation of tax levies (for the wars), the Statute of Laborers, and other burdens, afflictions, and irritants resulted in the Peasant Rebellion of 1381...the English revolt was part of a larger pattern. 'A chain of peasant uprising clearly directed against taxation exploded all over Europe.'" And there it is. When the ruling class presses too hard on the working class until there is nothing left to squeeze.

"Grain production on Ramsey manors was reduced by one half. In desperation, stewards and bailiffs strictly enforced work services on the surviving tenants, and sought to hold down the cost of labor...back by the threat of stocks. The main result they achieved was to stir resentment among both tenants and hired laborers." This sort of thing is done again and again and again when you demand more from less people.

"The Black Death, sweeping through England in the summer of 1349 via the rats that infested houses, barns, and sheds, left so many holdings vacant that it was impossible to collect rents or enforce services. The manorial accounts read like a dirge..." This would be common all throughout Europe during this period of the Black Death.

"Prison as punishment was virtually unknown to the Middle Ages. The Church courts dealt in penances and pilgrimages, the manor courts in fines, and the royal court in death penalties, abjuration, and outlawry. The outlaw could be captured or slain by anyone, and his goods confiscated." Interesting. Something to consider when watching period pieces or inspired works.

"Excluded were notorious offenders, traitors, heretics, sorcerers, clerics, perpetrators of felonies in church, criminals caught red-handed, and minor offenders in no danger of loss of life or limb." No Romani/gypsies, I see, like in Hunchback of Notre Dame, but I suppose like any law, it can be twisted by the accuser. Then again, this is English interpretation. We see other interpretations of this elsewhere.

"One popular technique for evading punishment was the claim of 'benefit of the clergy,' meaning that the accused was a cleric and could only be tried in Church court..." Ha! I think this is seen in some Hollywood productions.
"The same limitation applied to the other Church-related evasion of justice, the sanctuary. All consecrated buildings...were sanctuary, on a one-time basis, but not for everyone."

"Trial by combat was by now archaic, as was trial by ordeal (immersion in water or exposure to fire), condemned by the Church in 1215." Something to think about when you see historical pieces depicting this era (13th century), although I think that the latter would be lifted during the time of the Inquisition. They did a lot of that when it came to heretics and witches.

"In cases of accidental death, the object that caused the accident was adjudged the 'deodand' (gift to God) and was sold and the price given to the king—a Norman adaptation of an Anglo-Saxon custom of selling the deodand to buy prayers for the soul of the victim. The deodand might be a horse that threw its rider, the timber of a wall that collapsed,..." Royalty find all sorts of ways to get money from the peasants.

"As the clergy formed the main clientele of the Church courts, the free men of the kingdom form that of the royal courts, and the villeins...that of the manorial courts. But royal courts also held a monopoly on felony...and defined as homicide, rape, larceny, burglary, arson, and petty treason...The division of function was never as neat as theory suggested." It never is.

"Church courts dispensed canon law in cases either involving clergy or dealing with moral and marital problems of the laity. In England royal courts dispensed the 'common law,' created by William the Conqueror out of Saxon, Danish, and Norman precedents and common to the whole kingdom." I'm curious, when did this separation between the different courts of law start? How far back does this idea go?

"The hallmote was the sole court with which most villeins ever had contact. It belonged to one of the three great medieval systems of justice, the manorial, or seigneurial, courts the other two systems being the Church courts and the royal courts." Interesting to know that there is a distinction. Makes sense. Are we going to look at these other courts?

"Fundamental to the system of justice was the inequality between lord and villager. If the villager missed an autumn boonwork, neglected his demesne plowing, or defaulted on any of his other obligations, he was certain to being fined. The system was onerous and exploitative..."

Fining people for their poorly made ale? Ha! Hilarious!

"The Church also ruled on...penances for such delinquencies as departing from the traditional posture in intercourse." Only missionary! Nothing else creative! And no pulling out either!

A "hue-and-cry" was a method of collective hunt for a criminal. Basically, hollering and yelling to the neighborhood for assistance against violent crime. Since we have police in the modern day, this sort of thing doesn't happen in developed countries except if the police presence is really low or if there is a tight-knit, isolated community.

"The sense of [acquitance] was that several men who attested the truth of their statements on the holy relics would be unlikely to swear their souls away simultaneously." An interesting way to go about justice for the defendant.

With all of this talk of Hell, fire, brimstone, eternal damnation, and the Last Judgement, you would think this was a Protestant church, especially a Southern Baptist one. But this actually the Catholic Church.

"Devils were favorite descriptive subjects, with their faces 'burned and black.'" Little wonder why upper Europeans were racist against Africans for centuries if this was what was taught in church for just as long.

At least there is some measure of change with Franciscans and Dominican preachers giving sermons that are more lively and providing them with personal accounts of the faith. Still, it took the Protestant Reformation for this to change wholesale.

"The Mass was said in Latin, with little participation by the congregation, and communion was usually administered only at Easter. Moralists complained that the people chattered, gossiped, and flirted at Mass." DUH! If your participants can't understand what you're saying, how do you expect them to PAY ATTENTION? I have this trouble with foreign language students!

"Vanity sometimes caused women to be late for Mass, like the lady of Eynsham described by a fourteenth-century preacher, 'who took so long over adornment of her hair that she barely arrived at church before the end of Mass.'" LOL! Same thing, different century! It's happened a couple of times where my family was really late getting ready to go to church and arrived halfway through.

"Priests decried [the church yard's] use for such sacrilegious purposes as 'dances and vile and dishonorable games which lead to indecency,' and court trials, 'especially those involving bloodshed.'" Interesting. Did not know that but I guess that makes sense.

"Churches must have...a stone font that could be locked to prevent the use of baptismal water for witchcraft."
Lol, what? I've never heard that before. I would think that so-called witches would want to use their own water gathered. Is this in any witchcraft books?

"The Lanercost Chronicle relates a less cautionary story: a vicar's concubine, learning that the bishop was coming to order her lover to give her up, set out with a basket of cakes, chickens, and eggs, and intercepted the bishop, who asked her where she was going. She replied, 'I am taking these gifts to the bishop's mistress who has lately been brought to bed.' The bishop, mortified, continued on his way." Lol

"Clerical celibacy was a medieval ideal more often expressed than honored." It still is.

"Roger Bacon accused [parsons] of reciting 'the words of others without knowing in the least what they mean, like parrots and magpies which utter human sounds without understanding what they are saying'"Seems to be a consistent problem no matter the time period. Also I like how someone knew not only parrots but also magpies could imitate humans but not realize the meaning and didn't think it to be witchcraft.

"The landowner might be a wealthy layman, or a monastery, or a bishop. The church was the owner's personal property, to be sold or bequethed as he pleased. Its revenues went into his pocket. He appointed the priest, had him ordained, and paid him a salary." This methodology actually explains why King Henry VIII had a standing for separating the Church of England from the Catholic Church.

"The fabled land of Cockaigne" eh? Supposed to be the Medieval European equivalent to Atlantis and El Dorado.