![]() ![]() ![]() Land went out of cultivation and that which was still tilled yielded less. At the same time, that is before the Black Death, indications of crisis and decline appear in the most important sector of the economy, agriculture. The European population, no doubt, increased considerably during the 12th and 13th centuries, but in the 14th century, before the Black Death, it was beginning to diminish. The general picture can be perceived, even though many details are obscure and although the sequence of cause and effect is by no means disentangled, especially as far as demography is concerned. From the 14th century onwards, this civilization was undermined by intellectual doubts, its political foundations were sapped and it seemed to have become socially and morally decrepit. And it is, in fact, one of the surprising features to us of the decay of medieval society that it should have lasted so long, accustomed as we are to much quicker cycles of growth and depression. Postan, in an article on the 15th century, characterises the subsequent period. Perroy, in his recent article in Annales on the crises of the 14th century, writes about some of the catastrophes which shook the social order of western Europe he characterises this society by the end of the century as afflicted by "mediocrity in stagnation," rather as M. It is quite natural, therefore, to ask oneself whether the feudal order was subject to accidental disintegration, to be gradually replaced by another social, economic and political order - capitalism or whether its disintegration was speeded up by several unrelated crises, which operated in different aspects of feudal society or whether there was, in fact, a general crisis of this society because of its inherent weaknesses - a general crisis of which the separate crises which historians examine were simply particular expressions.Į. Even medievalists cannot expect to be sheltered from the world in which they live. 1 There is nothing surprising in their efforts to understand why and how established social orders go through periods of crisis and in the end collapse. Economies, sociétés, civilisations in 1951.Ĭontemporary historians are showing considerable interest in the end of feudal society and in the economic, social, and political factors which brought the modern world into existence. The essay below was first published in French, appearing in Annales. This has been associated, of course, with an interest in the vexed problem of the medieval origins of capitalism. I have also (and particularly recently) attempted to investigate the nature of medieval urbanisation, a consequence of the development of both simple, local commodity production and long distance trade inespecially-luxury goods. From the outset, I have tried to understand and to explain the considerable variations in the size, composition and management of landed estates. I also think that the social and political crises of the late medieval feudal order cannot be understood if what Marc Bloch called "the crisis of seigneurial fortunes" is not seen as the consequence of a failure by the ruling aristocracies to keep up the level of appropriation. My view has been that conflict between landlords and peasants, however muted or however intense, over the appropriation of the surplus product of the peasant holding, was a prime mover in the evolution of medieval society. The title of this collection of articles reflects a theme in my historical research. First published by the Hambledon Press, Verso issued a revised edition in 1990. Class Conflict and the Crisis of Feudalism collects occasional essays by Rodney Hilton, the distinguished medievalist and scholar of the transition from feudalism to capitalism.
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