Planwork

Introduction……………………………………………………………………………3

Early feudalism (V - end of X centuries)…………………………………………….4

The period of developed feudalism (XI-XV centuries)…………………………………...7

The period of late feudalism (the end of the 15th - the middle of the 17th centuries)……………10

Conclusion…………………………………………………………………….14

Test……………………………………………………………………………...15

References……………………………………………………………..16

Introduction

The Middle Ages is the period of the birth, domination and decay of feudalism. The word "feudalism" comes from the Late Latin feodum - an estate (in the countries of Western Europe in the Middle Ages, this word denoted land ownership granted by the overlord to his vassal for hereditary use with the condition that he perform feudal service).

The main features of feudalism include the following: the dominance of subsistence farming; a combination of large-scale feudal landownership and small-scale (allotment) peasant land tenure; the personal dependence of the peasants on the feudal lord - hence non-economic coercion; extremely low and routine state of technology.

It is generally accepted that Western European feudalism, which was formed as a result of the interaction of two processes - the collapse of ancient society and the decomposition of the primitive communal system among the tribes surrounding the Roman Empire (Germans, Celts, Slavs, etc.) is considered a classic option.

In modern historiography there is no consensus on the nature of feudalism in the countries of the East. The socio-economic development of these peoples in the Middle Ages has its own characteristic features. The beginning of feudalism in Western Europe is considered to be the fall of the slave-owning Western Roman Empire (V century), and the end - the English bourgeois revolution (1642-1649).

The development of medieval society was accompanied by significant shifts in the economy, social and political system. Taking into account the totality of changes, three periods are distinguished:

Early Middle Ages - the time of the formation of the feudal mode of production (V-X centuries);

Classical Middle Ages - the period of development of feudalism (XI-XV centuries);

Late Middle Ages - the period of the decomposition of feudalism and the emergence of the capitalist mode of production (end of the 15th - mid-17th centuries)

Early feudalism (V- the endXcenturies)

This stage is characterized by a low level of development of productive forces, the absence of cities, crafts, and the agrarianization of the economy. The economy was natural, there were no cities, there was no money circulation.

During this period, the formation of feudal relations took place. Large-scale landed property is formed, free communal peasants become dependent on feudal lords. The main classes of feudal society are being formed - landowners and dependent peasants.

The economy combined different ways: slave-owning, patriarchal (free communal land tenure) and emerging feudal (various forms of land and personal dependence of peasants).

The early feudal states were relatively unified. Within the borders of these states, which united various ethnic communities, a process of ethnic integration and the formation of nationalities took place, and the legal and economic foundations of medieval society were laid.

The formation of feudal relations in the early Middle Ages is associated with the emergence and development of various forms of feudal land ownership.

The tribes of the barbarians, who seized the Roman territories and formed their states on them, were settled farmers, at the end of the 5th - beginning of the 6th centuries. they did not yet have private ownership of land. The land belonged to all the inhabitants of the village. The inhabitants of one village constituted a territorial (rural) community - a brand. The community allocated a land plot for arable land to each family, and sometimes even a part of the meadow. In autumn, when the harvest ended, meadows and all arable land became common pastures. Forests, rivers, wastelands, roads were also in communal use. The personal (private) property of a community member included only a house, a personal plot, and movable property.

At the end of VI - beginning of VII centuries. within the community there is a process of property stratification and distribution of communal land into private, freely alienable property - allod.

Ways of formation of large landownership were different. Most often these were grants from the king. In an effort to strengthen their power, the Frankish and other kings distribute the occupied lands to service people in full private ownership (allod).

The distribution of allods led to a reduction in land funds and a weakening of the power of the king. Therefore, in the eighth century Land ownership began to be transferred in the form of beneficiaries, that is, for use without the right to transfer by inheritance and subject to military service. Therefore, the beneficiary was private property and was granted for the duration of service. Gradually, the tenure became lifelong. Together with the land, service people received the right to carry out state functions - judicial, administrative, police, tax, and others in relation to the free holders living in this territory. Such an award was called immunity.

In the IX-X centuries. lifelong beneficiation gradually turns into hereditary land ownership, or actually into property (flax, or feud). From the word "feud" got the name of the feudal mode of production. Thus, the power of the feudal lords was strengthened, which irreversibly led to feudal fragmentation, the weakening of royal power.

Along with the creation of the feudal (fief) system of land ownership, the process of forming categories of dependent peasants was going on.

The formation of serfdom took place in different ways. In some cases, the feudal lord subjugated the peasants with the help of direct violence. In others, the peasants themselves asked for help and protection (patronage) from large landowners, who thus became their masters (seniors). Given under the protection of the master, the peasant fell into personal dependence, and, having lost his land, he also became land dependent and had to perform certain duties in favor of his lord.

The church and secular feudal lords often used the system of precarious agreements, when the peasant transferred to them the ownership of his allotment, while retaining the lifelong right to use this allotment and pledging to fulfill the established duties. This agreement was drawn up in writing, indicating the terms of land use and duties. The owner of the land gave the peasant a precarious letter, which contained an obligation not to violate his rights.

The main economic unit of medieval society becomes a large feudal economy, where the process of feudal production was carried out. In Russia, these were estates, and then - estates, in England - manors, in France and in a number of other European countries - seniors. In the estates, the labor of the smerds was exploited by the feudal lords, in the manors - the labor of personally dependent, not free peasants - villans, in the seigneuries of France - the labor of the serfs. Within their fiefdoms, the feudal lords had full administrative and judicial power.

Feudal production was carried out in two main forms: corvée economy and quitrent economy.

Under the corvee economy, the entire land of the feudal estate was divided into two parts. One part is the lord's land, on which the peasants, with their tools, carried out the production of agricultural products, completely appropriated by the feudal lord. The other part of the land is peasant land, called allotment. On this land, the peasants farmed for themselves. Under the conditions of the corvée system, on certain days of the week, the peasants worked in their field, on other days - in the master's.

Under the quitrent system of economy, almost all the land was transferred to the peasants as an allotment. All agricultural production was carried out in peasant farms, part of the created product in the form of dues was transferred to the feudal lord, and the other remained for the reproduction of the peasant's labor force, inventory, and the maintenance of the existence of his family members.

Corvee and dues were forms of feudal land rent - a combination of various duties that the peasants carried out in favor of the feudal lord. In addition to labor rent (corvée), food rent (in-kind quitrent), there was cash rent (monetary quitrent).

Feudalism as a whole is characterized by the predominance of agricultural production.

The period of developed feudalism (XI- XVcenturies)

The period is characterized by the completion of the formation of feudal relations and the flourishing of feudalism. The peasants were placed in land and personal dependence, and the representatives of the ruling class were in hierarchical subordination. This situation, together with the natural character of the economy, contributed to the disintegration of the early feudal state formations and the transition to feudal fragmentation.

There is an increase in productive forces. Thanks to the gradual improvement of the tools of labor and the increase in productivity, specialization of workers in different areas of production occurs - handicraft is separated from agriculture. Cities arise and grow, mainly as settlements of artisans, handicraft production develops. Growing specialization leads to the growth of exchange, the expansion of trade relations. Merchant guilds appear. The market economy is developing.

The development of the economy, the rise of cities, and the growth of commodity-money relations took place against the background of the intensification of the struggle of the masses against the feudal system (peasant and urban uprisings). Ultimately, this led to a change in the forms of feudal exploitation, a weakening of the personal dependence of the peasants, and the emergence of a free urban population. These processes radically changed the face of feudal society, contributed to the elimination of feudal fragmentation and the centralization of state power. At this stage, large centralized states are formed - France, England, Poland, Russia, etc.

The main form of ownership and organization of production in agriculture in this period remained the feudal estate. In the XI-XIII centuries. it was a closed subsistence economy that fully met its needs from its own resources: its characteristic feature was the close connection between the master's economy and the economy of the peasants, who had to work the land of the feudal lord with their tools and their livestock.

However, in the XIV-XV centuries. the disintegration of feudal relations begins, commutation of duties takes place (replacement of labor and natural rent by cash), the emancipation of the peasantry, which led to the concentration of land and the development of lease relations. Many nobles begin to use hired labor in the economy. Short-term leases are being developed (when changing tenants, it is possible to increase the rent).

From the end of the XIII to the XV centuries. in England, due to the development of sheep breeding, corvee is being replaced by quitrent, which was paid in sheep's wool.

The transition to the quitrent system expanded opportunities for the development of agriculture, increased the mobility of the peasants, reduced their dependence on the feudal lord, led to an increase in labor productivity, and increased the marketability of the agricultural sector. Gradually, dues in kind are replaced by monetary ones.

The development of commodity-money relations in the countryside and commutation of peasant duties led to property stratification among the peasantry. Wealthy peasants appeared who rented land and landlords and cultivated it with the help of hired labor from their own neighbors. On the other hand, land-poor and landless families stood out, who were exploited as agricultural laborers by landowners and wealthy peasants.

From the end of the XI century. in Western Europe there is a revival of cities. They acquire great economic importance, becoming centers of crafts and trade.

The main factor in the revival of ancient and the emergence of medieval cities was the separation of crafts from agriculture. Settlements of artisans, gradually growing, became cities.

The process of town formation in different countries was extremely uneven, which reflected the level of development of productive forces. The earliest cities as centers of crafts and trade rose in Italy (Venice, Genoa, Florence, Naples), then in the south of France (Marseille, Arles, Toulouse). This was facilitated by the trade relations of Italy and Southern France with Byzantium and the East, as well as the continuity of urban development since antiquity. From the 11th century cities appear on the territory of England, Germany and the Netherlands; they grow especially fast in Flanders (Bruges, Ghent, Lille, Arras).

The inhabitants of medieval cities were often engaged in agriculture in addition to the main occupations - crafts and trade.

Agriculture continued to be the leading branch of the feudal economy, but handicraft production received priority development.

Handicraft is separated from agriculture and becomes an independent industry.

The technique and technology of handicraft labor improved, and its productivity grew. Significant progress was observed in metallurgy, metal processing, blacksmithing and weapons. Cloth making is the most developed. This is due to the high demand for the industry's products, as well as the improvement of spinning and weaving techniques.

The increasing complexity of handicraft production made it impossible to combine it with agriculture. The handicraft becomes the main occupation of a certain part of the population, it stands out as a special form of labor activity. Craftsmen of the same specialty, as a rule, united in special corporations - workshops.

The legal registration of the workshop took place after receiving the appropriate charter from the king or lord.

Each workshop had its own charter and elected administration - foremen. A full member of the workshop was the master - a small commodity producer, who was the owner of the workshop and production tools. One or two apprentices and one or more students worked for him as assistants. In the XI-XII centuries. each student could, having passed the exam, receive the title of master and open his own workshop.

An important feature of the guild craft was the absence of a division of labor.

Workshop regulation ensured the high quality of products, and also prevented competition among craftsmen.

Having arisen with the formation of cities, workshops became the socio-economic basis of their development.

The growth of cities in the XI-XV centuries. contributed to the development of domestic and foreign trade. In the cities there were markets where urban artisans supplied the peasants with their products and bought agricultural products and raw materials from them. Thus, the village was drawn into trade, which contributed to the development of commodity-money relations.

Foreign trade was concentrated in two main areas of Europe: in the Mediterranean basin and in the Baltic and North Seas.

During the period of feudal fragmentation, there was no single monetary system. Money was minted not only by kings, but also by feudal lords, bishops, and large cities. This situation served as a serious obstacle to the development of domestic and especially international trade. Merchants were forced to use the services of money changers, who essentially performed banking operations. They were well versed in monetary systems and exchanged one money for another, took the free capital of merchants for preservation, and at the right time provided them with a loan. Exchange offices were called banks, and their owners were called bankers.

The period of late feudalism (endXV- middleXVIIcenturies)

In the depths of feudal society, capitalist relations are born and strengthened, clearly delineating the contradictions of the feudal system.

In the process of primitive accumulation of capital, the system of land and personal dependence of the peasantry was eliminated. Feudal ownership of land developed into capitalist. Under these conditions, the process of economic and political centralization of the state within the framework of absolutism ends.

In the XVI-XVII centuries. in the advanced countries of Europe there was a significant development of technology, scientific knowledge, great successes were achieved in production.

The growth of production, geographical discoveries lead to the expansion of trade relations, the growth of the domestic and foreign markets, and the emergence of a world market.

Both in industrial production and in agriculture, enterprises of a new type are emerging - capitalist manufactories using hired labor. The leaders of industrial development in this period are the Netherlands and England.

Agriculture in the 16th century capitalism spread much more slowly than in industry.

Landowners preferred to lease land, which brought them a large income. At first it was a share-cropping, when the landowner provided the tenants not only with a plot of land, but often with seed, implements and housing, receiving a share of the harvest.

A variation of sharecropping was sharecropping: both parties bore equal costs and shared the income equally. Ispolshchina and sharecropping were not yet capitalist rent in the full sense. This is the nature of farming. The farmer rented a large plot of land, cultivated it with the help of hired labor. In this case, the rent paid to the landowner represented only a part of the surplus value produced by the hired workers.

The development of industry and the increase in demand for agricultural products contributed to the growth of agricultural production and its marketability. At the same time, there was no noticeable progress in agricultural production. The technical base of agricultural production remained the same.

In the XVI-XVII centuries. significant development of technology and scientific knowledge in Western Europe was due to the influence of many factors.

The main types of energy that set the mechanisms in motion were human labor, the power of animals, water and wind. In industry, the water wheel was increasingly used as an energy force. Water and wind mechanisms were used in various industries - cloth making, mining, metallurgical and paper production.

The increased demand for ferrous metals led to an increase in the extraction of ore and the production of pig iron, iron and steel.

Already in the XIV-XV centuries. in cloth-making, vertical looms are giving way to more advanced and productive horizontal looms. In the XV century. a self-spinning wheel appeared, performing two operations - spinning and winding the thread.

In the middle of the XV century. printing was invented and a new branch of production, typography, was developed.

In connection with the complication of technology in production, specialization deepens, the technical qualifications of workers grow, and new professions appear.

Great strides have been made in shipbuilding and navigation. Caravels began to build. Maps became more detailed, navigation devices were improved. As a result, shipping has increased dramatically.

The liquidation of feudal relations and the formation of the capitalist mode of production were greatly accelerated in the process of the so-called primitive accumulation of capital.

Primitive accumulation is the historical process of forcible separation of the direct producer from the means of production. The basis of this process everywhere was the dispossession of the peasantry (in its most complete form it took place in England), as well as the ruin of small urban and rural artisans.

In parallel, the formation of capitalist entrepreneurs was going on: they were mainly merchants, buyers, usurers, craftsmen, the nobility, government officials.

Left without means of production and subsistence, a significant part of the population turned into hired workers.

The result of the initial accumulation of capital is, on the one hand, the creation of an army of hired workers, and on the other, the formation of capitalist entrepreneurs, in whose hands the material resources necessary for the organization of capitalist production were concentrated. Instead of feudal property, bourgeois property was created.

The main sources of initial accumulation of capital were:

colonial plunder and colonial trade, including the slave trade, that unfolded after the Great Geographical Discoveries;

trade wars, loans to crowned persons and public debts;

price revolution.

Of great importance in the process of formation of capitalist production was the policy of mercantilism pursued by the feudal state, the implementation of which was the system of protectionism. The feudal state needed the development of a number of industries (primarily related to the supply of the army), in addition, it received significant income in the form of customs duties. Therefore, in order to create favorable conditions for the development of national industry, many European states began to impose high duties on imported finished products, to provide merchants and entrepreneurs with all kinds of benefits.

At this stage of feudalism, a new form of organization of production appears - manufactory, which in Latin means "handmade product, manual production." Manufactory is a capitalist enterprise, where the same tools were used as in handicraft. But there was already a division of labor. Workers performed only individual operations, and this contributed to a significant increase in labor productivity. Wage labor was used in manufactories.

There were three main types of manufactories - centralized, scattered and mixed.

A centralized manufactory is a large capitalist enterprise that employed dozens or even hundreds of workers. This type of manufactory was distributed primarily in such industries where the technological process involved the joint work of a large number of workers performing various operations (textile, mining, metallurgical, printing enterprises, sugar refining, paper, porcelain and porcelain production, etc.). the owners of centralized manufactories were mostly wealthy merchants and much less often former guild masters.

Scattered manufactory was a type of enterprise where a merchant-entrepreneur used the labor of small homeworkers, supplying them with raw materials and selling the products they produced. This type of manufactory was most common in the textile business in those places where the guild restrictions did not apply. Often the first processing was carried out by homeworkers (for example, spinning), after which the most important operations were carried out in the manufactory type workshop, for example, dyeing and finishing of finished fabrics. It was a type of mixed manufactory.

Manufactories arose in Europe in the 14th-16th centuries, in the city-republics of Italy, and then in the Netherlands, England, France and other countries.

The factor that significantly accelerated the decomposition of feudalism was the Great geographical discoveries of the late XV - early XVI centuries. the most important of them were:

Discovery of America by H. Columbus in 1492;

Opening of the sea route to India - Bartolomeo Dias (1486-1487), Vasco da Gama (1497-1498);

Discovery of North America by J. Cabot (1497-1498);

The first circumnavigation of the world by F. Magellan (1519-1522).

The great geographical discoveries were prepared by the entire course of the economic development of Europe. As a result of the Great geographical discoveries, a system of colonialism developed.

One of the consequences of the Great Geographical Discoveries was the "price revolution" caused by the influx of gold and silver into Europe.

The "price revolution" had important socio-economic consequences. It had a profound impact on all European countries and the economic situation of the estates of feudal society. It became the most important source of primitive accumulation of capital.

At this time, theoretical reasoning began to be combined with the practical development of nature, which dramatically increased the cognitive capabilities of science. This profound transformation of science, which took place in the 16th-17th centuries, is considered the first scientific revolution. She gave the world such names as G. Galileo, J. Bruno, I. Kepler, W. Harvey, R. Descartes, H. Huygens, I. Newton, E. Torricelli and others.

The first scientific revolution laid the foundations of modern knowledge not only in the field of natural and exact sciences, but also in the field of humanitarian and political thought, and philosophical views. Science rebelled against religion, opening up vast expanses for humanity to study and explain the world.

The first scientific revolution became one of the factors that ensured the leadership of Western European civilization.

Conclusion

The Middle Ages is the period from the 5th to the 17th centuries. This period of time is much shorter than the primitive era and the ancient world, however, it is more progressive. First of all, this is manifested in the higher productivity of social labor, in the creation of prerequisites for the further economic development of mankind.

The countries of Western Europe developed especially intensively during this period. It was in the Middle Ages that the majority of modern European states were formed, and their borders were determined, many modern cities arose, and the languages ​​that the peoples of Europe speak today were formed.

Medieval Europe surpassed the eastern empires, which had an older history; this happened due to the development of productive forces. As a result of the Great geographical discoveries, the world market and the colonial system appeared. In the medieval feudal society, a new socio-economic system was born - capitalism.

The Middle Ages is the period of the birth, domination and decay of feudalism.

Test

Specify the sources of initial accumulation of capital:

Forced removal from the land and expropriation of peasants

Robbery and exploitation of the colonies

Capitals created by the manufacturing industry and intermediary trade

Domestic public debt

1. Trade and industrial monopoly of the state

   pyramid building

   Consequences of III NTR

Answer: 1, 2, 3, 5

The primitive accumulation of capital is the historical process of separating the small producer from the means of production, forcibly depriving him of his private property and turning him into propertyless sellers of his labor power.

Bibliography

History of the world economy: a textbook for universities / ed. ak. G. B. Polyakova and prof. A. N. Markova. - M.: UNITI, 2001. - 727 p.: ill.

Website: Bank of abstracts vzfeiinfo.ru. [electronic resource]. – access mode: http://www.vzfeiinfo.ru.

Website: Wikipedia. Free encyclopedia. [electronic resource]. – access mode: http://ru.wikipedia.org.

Website: Yandex dictionaries. [electronic resource]. – access mode: http://slovari.yandex.ru.

feudalism of feudalism, an important role was played by the transformation ... of society, which meant the transition to feudalism. Collectivism has largely passed into... LITERATURE Gurevich AL. "Problems of genesis feudalism in Western Europe". M.: 1970. ...

The feudal system existed, with certain features, in almost all countries.

The era of feudalism covers a long period. In China, the feudal system existed for over two thousand years. In the countries of Western Europe, feudalism covers a number of centuries - from the time of the fall of the Roman Empire (V century) to the bourgeois revolutions in England (XVII century) and France (XVIII century), in Russia - from the 9th century to the peasant reform of 1861, in Transcaucasia - from the 4th century to the 70s of the 19th century, among the peoples of Central Asia - from the 7th - 8th centuries until the victory of the proletarian revolution in Russia.

AT Western Europe feudalism arose on the basis of the collapse of the Roman slave-owning society, on the one hand, and the decomposition of the tribal system among the conquering tribes, on the other; it was formed as a result of the interaction of these two processes.

Elements of feudalism, as already mentioned, originated in the depths of the slave-owning society in the form of a colony. The columns were obliged to cultivate the land of their master - a large landowner, pay him a certain amount of money or give a significant share of the crop, and perform various kinds of duties. Nevertheless, the columns were more interested in labor than the slaves, since they had their own economy.

In this way, new relations of production were born, which were fully developed in the feudal era.

The Roman Empire was defeated by the tribes of the Germans, Gauls, Slavs and other peoples who lived in various parts of Europe. The power of slave owners was overthrown, slavery fell away. Large latifundia and craft workshops based on slave labor were divided into small ones. The population of the collapsed Roman Empire consisted of large landowners (former slave owners who switched to the colonat system), freed slaves, columns, small peasants and artisans.

At the time of the conquest of Rome, the conquering tribes had a communal system, which was in the process of decomposition. played an important role in the social life of these tribes. rural community, which the Germans called the brand. The land, with the exception of large land holdings of the tribal nobility, was in communal ownership. Forests, wastelands, pastures, ponds were used together. Fields and meadows after a few years were redistributed among the members of the community. But gradually, household land, and then arable land, began to pass into the hereditary use of individual families. The distribution of land, the consideration of cases relating to the community, and the settlement of disputes between its members were carried out by the community meeting, elders and judges chosen by it. At the head of the conquering tribes were military leaders who, together with their squads, owned large lands.

The tribes that conquered the Roman Empire took over most of its state lands and some of the lands of large private landowners. Forests, meadows and pastures remained in common use, and arable land was divided among individual farms. The divided lands later became the private property of the peasants. Thus, an extensive stratum of independent small peasantry was formed.

But the peasants could not maintain their independence for a long time. On the basis of private ownership of land and other means of production, property inequality between individual members of the rural community inevitably increased. Wealthy and poor families appeared among the peasants. The wealthy members of the community, with the growth of property inequality, began to acquire power over the community. The land was concentrated in the hands of wealthy families and became the subject of capture by the tribal nobility and military leaders. Peasants became personally dependent on large landowners.

In order to maintain and strengthen power over the dependent peasants, the big landowners had to strengthen the organs of state power. Military leaders, relying on the tribal nobility and warriors, began to concentrate power in their hands, turned into kings - monarchs.

On the ruins of the Roman Empire, a number of new states were formed, headed by kings. The kings generously distributed the land they seized for life, and then for hereditary possession, to their close associates, who had to carry out military service for this. The church, which served as an important pillar of royal power, received a lot of land. The land was cultivated by the peasants, who now had to perform a number of duties in favor of the new masters. Huge land holdings passed into the hands of royal warriors and servants, church authorities and monasteries. :

Lands distributed under such conditions were called fiefs. Hence the name of the new social system - feudalism.

The gradual transformation of peasant land into the property of the feudal lords and the enslavement of the peasant masses (the process of feudalization) took place in Europe over a number of centuries (from the 5th-6th to the 9th-10th centuries). The free peasantry was ruined by continuous military service, robberies and extortions. Turning for help to a large landowner, the peasants turned into people dependent on him. Often the peasants were forced to surrender themselves under the "protection" of the feudal lord: otherwise it would be impossible for a defenseless person to exist in the conditions of continuous wars and robber raids. In such cases, the ownership of a land plot passed to the feudal lord, and the peasant could cultivate this plot only if he performed various duties in favor of the feudal lord. In other cases, royal governors and officials, through deceit and violence, seized the lands of free peasants, forcing them to recognize their power.

In different countries, the process of feudalization proceeded differently, but the essence of the matter was the same everywhere: previously free peasants fell into personal dependence on the feudal lords who seized their land. This dependence was sometimes weaker, sometimes tougher. Over time, the differences in the position of former slaves, columns and free peasants were erased, and they all turned into a single mass. serf peasantry. Gradually, a situation developed that was characterized by a medieval saying: “There is no land without a seigneur” (that is, without a feudal lord). The kings were the supreme landowners.

Feudalism was a necessary step in the historical development of society. Slavery has outlived itself. Under these conditions, the further development of productive forces was possible only on the basis of the labor of a mass of dependent peasants who own their own farms, their own tools of production and have some interest in labor, necessary in order to cultivate the land and pay tribute in kind from their crops to the feudal lord.

AT Russia in the conditions of the decomposition of the communal system, patriarchal slavery arose. But the development of society went here basically not along the path of slavery, but along the path of feudalization. The Slavic tribes, even under the dominance of their tribal system, starting from the 3rd century AD, attacked the Roman slave-owning empire, fought for the liberation of the cities of the Northern Black Sea region under its rule, and played a large role in the collapse of the slave-owning system. The transition from the primitive communal system to feudalism in Russia took place at a time when the slave-owning system had long since fallen and feudal relations in European countries had become stronger.

As the history of mankind testifies, it is not obligatory that each people pass through all stages of social development. For many peoples, conditions arise under which they are able to pass through one or another stage of development and go directly to a higher stage.

The rural community among the Eastern Slavs was called "verv", "world". The community had meadows, forests, reservoirs in common use, and arable land began to pass into the possession of individual families. The head of the community was an elder. The development of private land ownership led to the gradual disintegration of the community. The land was seized by elders and tribal princes. Peasants - smerds - were at first free members of the community, and then became dependent on large landowners - boyars.

The church became the largest feudal owner. Grants from princes, contributions and spiritual testaments made her the owner of vast lands and the richest farms at that time.

During the formation of the centralized Russian state (XV - XVI centuries), the great princes and tsars began, as they said then, to “place” their close and service people on the land, that is, to give them land and peasants under the condition of military service. Hence the names - estate, landowners.

At that time, the peasants were not yet completely attached to the landowner and the land: they had the right to move from one landowner to another. At the end of the 16th century, the landowners, in order to increase the production of grain for sale, intensified the exploitation of the peasants. In this regard, in 1581 the state took away from the peasants the right to transfer from one landowner to another. The peasants were completely attached to the land that belonged to the landlords, and thus turned into serfs.

In the era of feudalism, agriculture played a predominant role, and of its branches - agriculture. Gradually, over the course of a number of centuries, the methods of arable farming were improved, horticulture, horticulture, winemaking, and buttermaking developed.

In the early period of feudalism, the dominant shifting, and in forest areas undercut farming system. A piece of land was sown for several years in a row with one crop until the soil was exhausted. Then they moved on to another area. Subsequently, there was a transition to three-field a system in which arable land is divided into three fields, with one field alternately used for winter crops, the other for spring crops, and the third is left fallow. The three-field system began to spread in Western Europe and Russia from the 11th-12th centuries. It remained dominant for many centuries, surviving until the 19th century, and in many countries to the present day.

Agricultural implements in the early period of feudalism were scarce. The tools of labor were a plow with an iron plowshare, a sickle, a scythe, a shovel. Later, an iron plow and a harrow began to be used. Grinding of grain for a long time was done by hand, until windmills and watermills became widespread.

Production relations of feudal society. Exploitation of peasants by feudal lords.

The basis of the production relations of feudal society was the feudal lord's ownership of the land and incomplete ownership of the serf. The serf was not a slave. He had his own business. The feudal lord could no longer kill him, but he could sell him. Along with the property of the feudal lords, there was the sole property of the peasants and artisans for the instruments of production and for their private economy, based on personal labor.

Large feudal landed property was the basis for the exploitation of the peasants by the landlords. The feudal lord's own household occupied part of his land. The feudal lord gave the other part of the land on enslaving terms for the use of the peasants. The peasant was forced to work for the feudal lord due to the fact that the most important means of production - land was the property of the feudal lord. The feudal lord "endowed" the peasants with land, hence the name "put on". The peasant land allotment was a condition for providing the landowner with labor. Using his allotment hereditarily, the peasant was obliged to work for the landowner, cultivate the landowner's land with the help of his tools and draft animals, or give the landowner his surplus product in kind or in cash.

Such a system of economy inevitably assumed the personal dependence of the peasant on the landowner - non-economic coercion. “If the landowner did not have direct power over the personality of the peasant, then he could not force a person who was endowed with land and who ran his own household to work for him.”

The working time of a serf was divided into necessary and surplus time. During the necessary time, the peasant created the product necessary for his own existence and the existence of his family. During the surplus time, he created a surplus product, which was appropriated by the feudal lord. The surplus labor of the peasants working on the feudal farm, or the surplus product created by the peasant on his own farm and appropriated by the feudal lord, form the feudal economy. land rent.

Feudal rent often absorbed not only the surplus labor of the peasant, but also part of his necessary labor. The basis of this rent was feudal ownership of land, associated with the direct domination of the feudal landowner over the peasants dependent on him.

Under feudalism, there were three forms of land rent: labor rent, product rent and cash rent. With all these forms of rent, the exploitation of the peasants by the landowners appeared in an undisguised form.

Labor rent prevailed in the early stages of the development of feudalism. She acted as corvee. Under corvée, a peasant worked for a certain part of the week - three days or more - with the help of his own tools of production (plow, working cattle, etc.) on the master's estate, and on the remaining days of the week he worked on his farm. Thus, under corvée, the necessary labor and the surplus labor of the peasant were clearly delineated in time and space. The circle of corvée works was very extensive. The peasant plowed, sowed and harvested, grazed cattle, carpenter, cut wood for the landowner, transported agricultural products and building materials on his horse.

Under corvée, the serf was interested in increasing labor productivity only while working on his farm. While working on the landowner's land, the peasant did not have such an interest. The feudal lords kept overseers who forced the peasants to work.

In the course of further development, labor rent is replaced by rent by products. The rent in products took the form natural quitrent. The peasant was obliged to regularly deliver to the landowner a certain amount of bread, livestock, poultry and other agricultural products. The quitrent was most often combined with certain remnants of corvee duties, that is, with the work of a peasant on a landowner's estate.

With the rent in products, the peasant spent all his labor - both necessary and surplus - at his own discretion. Necessary labor and surplus labor were no longer as tangibly separated as under labor-rent. The peasant became relatively more independent here. This created some incentives for a further increase in labor productivity.

At a later stage of feudalism, when exchange was relatively widely developed, money rent arose. She acted as cash rent. Monetary rent is characteristic of the period of the disintegration of feudalism and the emergence of capitalist relations. Various forms of feudal rent often existed simultaneously. “In all these forms of ground rent: labour-rent, rent in products, money rent (as simply a converted form of rent in products), the payer of the rent is always assumed to be the actual tiller and owner of the land, whose unpaid surplus-labour goes directly to the owner of the land.”

In an effort to increase their income, the feudal lords imposed all sorts of taxes on the peasants. In many cases, they had mills, forges and other enterprises in their monopoly. The peasant was forced to use them for an exorbitantly high payment in kind or in money. In addition to the quitrent in kind or money paid to the feudal lord, the peasant had to pay all kinds of taxes to the state, local fees, and in some countries - a tithe, that is, a tenth of the harvest, in favor of the church.

Thus, the basis of the existence of feudal society was the labor of serfs. Peasants produced not only agricultural products. They worked on the estates of feudal lords as artisans, erected castles and monasteries, laid roads. Cities were built by the hands of serfs.

The economy of the feudal lord, especially at the early stages of its development, was at its core natural farming. Each feudal estate, which consisted of a manor estate and villages belonging to the feudal lord, lived an isolated economic life, rarely resorting to exchange with the outside world. The needs of the feudal lord and his family, the needs of numerous servants, at first were satisfied with those products that were produced in the lord's household and delivered by quitrent peasants. More or less large estates had a sufficient number of artisans, mostly from among the household serfs. These artisans were engaged in the manufacture of clothing and footwear, the production and repair of weapons, hunting equipment and agricultural implements, and the construction of buildings.

Peasant farming was also subsistence. The peasants were engaged not only in agricultural labor, but also in domestic handicraft work, mainly processing raw materials produced on their farm: spinning, weaving, making shoes, and household equipment.

For a long time, feudalism was characterized by combination of farming as the main branch of the economy home business, having secondary significance. Those few imported products that could not be dispensed with, such as salt, iron products, were delivered at first by wandering merchants. Later, in connection with the growth of cities and handicraft production, the division of labor and the development of exchange between town and country took a big step forward.

The exploitation of dependent peasants by feudal lords was the main feature of feudalism among all peoples. However, in some countries the feudal system had its own characteristics. In the countries of the East, feudal relations were combined for a long time with relations of slavery. This was the case in China, India, Japan and a number of other countries. Feudal state ownership of land was of great importance in the East. For example, during the period of the Baghdad Caliphate under the rule of the Arabs (especially in the 8th-9th centuries AD), most of the communal peasants lived on the land of the Caliph and paid feudal rent directly to the state. Feudalism in the East is also characterized by the vitality of patriarchal-tribal relations, which were used by the feudal lords in order to intensify the exploitation of the peasants.

In the agricultural countries of the East, where irrigated agriculture is of decisive importance, the peasants found themselves in bondage to the feudal lords, because not only land, but also water resources and irrigation facilities were the property of the feudal state or individual feudal lords. The nomadic peoples used the land as a pasture. The size of feudal landownership was determined by the number of livestock. Large feudal cattle owners were in fact large owners of pastures. They kept the peasantry in bondage and exploited it.

Medieval city. Workshops of artisans. merchant guilds.

Cities arose during the slave system. Cities such as Rome, Florence, Venice, Genoa are in Italy; Paris, Lyon, Marseille - in France; London - in England; Samarkand is in Central Asia, and many others were inherited from the era of slavery in the Middle Ages. The slave system fell, but the cities remained. Large slave-owning workshops disintegrated; no craft continued to exist.

During the early Middle Ages, cities and crafts developed poorly. The urban artisans made products for sale, but they got most of the commodities they needed from their households. Many of them had small crops, orchards, and productive livestock. Women were engaged in yarn of flax, wool for making clothes. This indicated the limitations of markets and exchange.

In the countryside, the processing of agricultural raw materials was at first an auxiliary occupation of farmers. Then, artisans began to stand out from among the peasants, serving their village. The productivity of artisans increased. It became possible to produce more products than was necessary for the feudal lord or the peasants of one village. Artisans began to settle around feudal castles, near the walls of monasteries, in large villages and other trading centers. So gradually, usually on waterways, new cities grew up (in Russia, for example, Kyiv, Pskov, Novgorod, Vladimir). The isolation of the city from the village, which arose even during slavery, intensified.

Over time, crafts became more and more profitable business. The art of craftsmen improved. The feudal landowner switched to buying handicrafts from the townspeople, he was no longer satisfied with the products of his own serfs. The more developed handicraft finally separated itself from agriculture.

Cities, having arisen on the lands of secular and spiritual feudal lords, submitted to their authority. The townspeople carried a number of duties in favor of the feudal lord, paid him a quitrent in kind or money, and submitted to his administration and court. The urban population early began the struggle for liberation from feudal dependence. Partly by force, partly by ransoming the cities, they obtained for themselves the right to self-government, courts, minting coins, and collecting taxes.

The urban population consisted mainly of artisans and merchants. In many cities, serfs who fled from the landlords found shelter. The city acted as the carrier of commodity production, in contrast to the countryside, where subsistence farming dominated. The growth of competition from the fugitive serfs who flocked to the cities, the struggle against exploitation and oppression by the feudal lords forced the artisans to unite in workshops. The guild system existed in the era of feudalism in almost all countries.

Workshops arose in Byzantium in the 9th century, in Italy - in the 10th century, and later - throughout Western Europe and Russia. In the countries of the East (Egypt, China), in the cities of the Arab Caliphate, workshops arose even earlier than in European countries. Workshops united urban artisans of one specific craft or several close ones. Only craftsmen-masters were full members of the workshops. The craftsman-master had a small number of apprentices and apprentices. The guilds carefully protected the exclusive right of their members to engage in this craft and regulated the production process: they set the length of the working day, the number of apprentices and apprentices for each master, determined the quality of raw materials and the finished product, as well as its prices, they often bought raw materials together. The methods of work, fixed by a long tradition, were obligatory for all. Strict regulation was intended to ensure that no master did not rise above the rest. In addition, the workshops served as mutual aid organizations.

The guilds were a feudal form of craft organization. At the beginning of their existence, they played a certain positive role, contributing to the strengthening and development of urban crafts. However, with the growth of commodity production and the expansion of the market, the workshops more and more turned into a brake on the development of productive forces.

The excessive regulation of handicraft production by the guilds fettered the initiative of the artisans and hindered the development of technology. In order to limit competition, the workshops began to put up all sorts of obstacles to those wishing to obtain the rights of a master. Before students and apprentices, whose number has grown greatly, the opportunity to become independent masters was practically closed. They were forced to remain in the position of hired workers all their lives. Under these conditions, the relationship between the master and his subordinates lost their former, more or less patriarchal, character. Masters intensified the exploitation of their subordinates, forcing them to work 14 to 16 hours a day for negligible wages. Apprentices began to unite in secret unions - brotherhoods - to protect their interests. Guilds and city authorities in every possible way persecuted the brotherhoods of apprentices.

The richest part of the urban population were merchants. Trading activity unfolded both in cities inherited from the era of slavery, and in cities that arose under feudalism. Guild organization in the craft corresponded to the organization of guilds in trade. merchant guilds in the era of feudalism existed almost everywhere. In the East, they have been known since the 9th century, in Western Europe - from the 9th - 10th centuries, in Russia - from the 12th century. The main task of the guilds was to fight the competition of outside merchants, streamline measures and weights, and protect merchant rights from the encroachment of feudal lords.

In the 9th-10th centuries, there was already significant trade between the countries of the East and Western Europe. Kievan Rus took an active part in this trade. Crusades (XI-XIII centuries) played an important role in the expansion of trade, which opened Middle Eastern markets for Western European merchants. A flood of gold and silver poured into Europe from the East. Money began to appear in places where they had not been used before. The Italian cities, especially Genoa and Venice, took a direct part in the conquest of the eastern markets, transporting the crusaders to the East on their merchant ships and supplying them with provisions.

For a long time, the Mediterranean ports were the main centers of trade, linking Western Europe with the East. But at the same time, trade developed widely in the North German and Dutch cities located along the trade routes of the North and Baltic Seas. In the XIV century, a trade union of cities arose here - the German Hansa, which united about 80 cities in various European countries in the next two centuries. The Hanseatic League traded with England, Scandinavia, Poland and Russia. In exchange for products of Western European craft - Flanders and English cloths, linens, German metal products, French wines - furs, leather, lard, honey, bread, wood, resin, linen fabrics and some handicrafts were exported from the northeastern regions of Europe. From the countries of the East, merchants brought spices - pepper, cloves, nutmeg, incense, dyes, paper and silk fabrics, carpets and other goods.

In the 13th-14th centuries, the Russian cities of Novgorod, Pskov and Moscow carried on extensive trade with Asia and Western Europe. Novgorod merchants traded, on the one hand, with the peoples of the North (the coast of the Arctic Ocean and the Trans-Urals), and on the other hand, they traded regularly with Scandinavia and Germany.

The growth of cities and the development of trade had a strong influence on the feudal countryside. The economy of the feudal lords was drawn into the market. The feudal lords needed money to buy luxury items and urban handicrafts. In this regard, it was beneficial for the feudal lords to transfer peasants from corvée and quitrent in kind to quitrent in cash. Feudal exploitation intensified even more with the transition to cash rent.

Classes and estates of feudal society. feudal hierarchy.

Feudal society was divided into two main classes - feudal lords and peasants. “The feudal society represented such a division of classes, when the vast majority - the serfs - were completely dependent on an insignificant minority - the landlords, who owned the land.”

The feudal class was not a homogeneous whole. Small feudal lords paid tribute to large feudal lords, helped them in the war, but enjoyed their patronage. The patron was called senior, patronized - vassal. The seigneurs, in turn, were vassals of other, more powerful feudal lords.

As the ruling class, the feudal landlords stood at the head of the state. They were one class - nobility. The nobles occupied the honorary position of the first estate, enjoying broad political and economic privileges.

Clergy(church and monastery) was also the largest land owner. It owned vast lands with a numerous dependent and serf population and, along with the nobles, was the ruling class.

The broad base of the "feudal ladder" was peasantry. The peasants were subordinate to the landowner and were under the supreme authority of the largest feudal lord - the king. The peasantry was a politically disenfranchised estate. Landowners could sell their serfs and widely used this right. The serf-owners subjected the peasants to corporal punishment. Lenin called serfdom "serfdom". The exploitation of serfs was almost as cruel as the exploitation of slaves in the ancient world. But still, a serf could work part of the time on his plot, could to a certain extent belong to himself.

The main class contradiction of feudal society was the contradiction between feudal lords and serfs. The struggle of the exploited peasantry against the feudal landowners was waged throughout the entire epoch of feudalism and acquired particular acuteness at the last stage of its development, when feudal exploitation intensified to the extreme.

In cities freed from feudal dependence, power was in the hands of wealthy citizens - merchants, usurers, owners of urban lands and large homeowners. The guild artisans, who made up the bulk of the urban population, often opposed the urban nobility, seeking their participation in the management of cities along with the urban aristocracy. Small artisans and apprentices fought against the guild masters and merchants who exploited them.

By the end of the feudal era, the urban population was already highly stratified. On one side are rich merchants and guild masters, on the other are vast layers of artisan apprentices and apprentices, the urban poor. The urban lower classes entered the struggle against the combined forces of the urban nobility and feudal lords. This struggle was combined in one stream with the struggle of the serfs against feudal exploitation.

Kings were considered to be the bearers of supreme power (in Russia, grand dukes, and then tsars). But outside the realms of the kings, the importance of royalty in the period of early feudalism was negligible. Often this power remained nominal. All of Europe was divided into many large and small states. Large feudal lords were complete masters in their possessions. They issued laws, monitored their execution, performed court and reprisals, maintained their own army, raided neighbors, and did not hesitate to rob on high roads. Many of them minted their own coins. The smaller feudal lords also enjoyed very wide rights in relation to the people subject to them; they tried to equal the big seigneurs.

Over time, feudal relations formed an extremely tangled tangle of rights and obligations. Between the feudal lords there were endless disputes and strife. They were usually resolved by force of arms, through internecine wars.

The development of the productive forces of feudal society.

In the era of feudalism, a higher level of productive forces was achieved in comparison with the era of slavery.

In the field of agriculture, the technique of production improved, the iron plow and other iron tools of labor appeared and became widespread. New branches of field cultivation have emerged, viticulture, winemaking, and horticulture have received significant development. Animal husbandry grew, and especially horse breeding, which was associated with the military service of the feudal lords, butter-making developed. Sheep breeding has become widespread in a number of regions. Meadows and pastures were expanded and improved.

Gradually, the tools of labor of artisans and methods of processing raw materials were improved. Former crafts began to specialize. So, for example, before the blacksmith made all products from metal. In the course of time, weapons, nailing, knife-making, metalworking separated from blacksmithing, shoemaking and saddlery separated from leatherworking. In the 16th-17th centuries, the self-spinning wheel became widespread in Europe. In 1600, the ribbon loom was invented.

Improvement in the smelting and processing of iron was of decisive importance for the improvement of tools. In the beginning, iron was produced in a very primitive way. In the 14th century, waterwheels were used to power bellows for blowing and heavy hammers for crushing ore. With increased traction in furnaces, instead of forging mass, a fusible mass began to be obtained - cast iron. With the use of gunpowder in military affairs and the advent of firearms (in the 14th century), a lot of metal was required for the cannonballs; from the beginning of the 15th century they began to be cast from cast iron. More and more metal was needed for the manufacture of agricultural and other implements. The first blast furnaces appeared in the first half of the 15th century. The invention of the compass contributed to the further development of shipping and navigation. The invention and spread of printing was of great importance.

In China, the productive forces and culture achieved significant development already in the 6th-11th centuries, surpassing Europe of that time in many respects. The Chinese were the first to invent the compass, gunpowder, writing paper, and, in its simplest form, printing.

The development of the productive forces of feudal society more and more came up against the narrow limits of feudal production relations. The peasantry, being under the yoke of feudal exploitation, was not in a position to further increase the production of agricultural products. The productivity of forced peasant labor was extremely low. In the city, the growth of labor productivity of the craftsman ran into obstacles created by shop charters and rules. The feudal system was characterized by a slow pace of development of production, routine, and the power of tradition.

The productive forces that had grown up within the framework of feudal society demanded new production relations.

The origin of capitalist production in the bowels of the feudal system. The role of trading capital.

In the era of feudalism, commodity production gradually developed, urban handicrafts expanded, and peasant economy was more and more involved in the exchange.

The production of small artisans and peasants, based on private property and personal labor, which creates products for exchange, is called simple commodity production.

As already mentioned, a product produced for exchange is a commodity. Individual commodity producers spend unequal amounts of labor on the production of identical commodities. This depends on the different conditions under which they have to work: commodity producers who have more perfect tools spend less labor on the production of the same commodity than other commodity producers. Along with differences in the instruments of labor, differences in the strength, dexterity, skill of the worker, etc., are also important. But the market does not care about the conditions under which and with what tools this or that commodity is produced. The same amount of money is paid for the same goods on the market, regardless of the individual conditions of labor in which they are produced.

Therefore, commodity producers whose individual labor costs are higher than average as a result of the worst conditions of production, cover only a part of these costs in the sale of their goods and go bankrupt. On the other hand, commodity producers whose individual labor inputs are below average, thanks to better conditions of production, find themselves in an advantageous position in the sale of their commodities and grow richer. This intensifies competition. A stratification of small commodity producers is taking place: the majority of them are becoming increasingly poor, while an insignificant part are getting richer.

State fragmentation under feudalism served as a major obstacle to the development of commodity production. The feudal lords arbitrarily set duties on imported goods, levied tribute for passage through their possessions, and thus created serious obstacles to the development of trade. The needs of trade and the general economic development of society necessitated the destruction of feudal fragmentation. The growth of handicraft and agricultural production, the development of the social division of labor between town and country led to the strengthening of economic ties between different regions within the country, to the formation national market. The formation of a national market created the economic preconditions for the centralization of state power. The emerging urban bourgeoisie was interested in the elimination of feudal partitions and stood for the creation of a centralized state.

Relying on a broader stratum of ignoble landowning nobles, on the "vassals of their vassals", as well as on the rising cities, the kings dealt decisive blows to the feudal nobility and strengthened their position. They became not only nominal, but also actual rulers in the state. Large nation-states emerged in the form of absolutist monarchies. The overcoming of feudal fragmentation and the creation of centralized state power contributed to the emergence and development of capitalist relations.

Education was also of great importance for the emergence of the capitalist system. world market.

In the second half of the 15th century, the Turks captured Constantinople and the entire eastern Mediterranean. The most important artery along which the trade routes between Western Europe and the East passed was cut. In search of a sea route to India, Columbus discovered America in 1492, and in 1498 Vasco da Gama, having traveled around Africa, discovered a sea route to India.

As a result of these discoveries, the center of gravity of European trade moved from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic Ocean, the main role in trade passed to the Netherlands, England, and France. Russia played a prominent role in European trade.

With the emergence of world trade and the world market, handicraft was unable to meet the increased demand for goods. This accelerated the transition from small-scale handicraft production to large-scale capitalist production, based on the exploitation of hired workers.

The transition from the feudal mode of production to the capitalist one took place in two ways: on the one hand, the stratification of small commodity producers gave rise to capitalist entrepreneurs, on the other hand, commercial capital represented by merchants directly subordinated production to itself.

The guilds could limit competition and the stratification of artisans as long as commodity production was underdeveloped. With the development of exchange, competition became stronger. Craftsmen who worked for a wider market partly sought the abolition of shop restrictions, partly simply circumvented them. They lengthened the working day of apprentices and apprentices, increased their number, and applied more productive labor methods. The richest masters gradually turned into capitalists, and the poor masters, apprentices and apprentices into hired workers.

Merchant capital, by decomposing the natural economy, contributed to the emergence of capitalist production. Merchant capital initially acted as an intermediary in the exchange of goods of small producers - artisans and peasants - and in the sale by the feudal lords of a part of the surplus product appropriated by them. In the future, the merchant began to regularly buy goods made by them from small manufacturers and then resold them on a wider market. The merchant thereby became a buyer. With the growth of competition and the appearance of a buyer, the position of the mass of artisans changed significantly. Impoverished craftsmen were forced to seek help from a merchant-buyer, who lent them money, raw materials and materials, provided that finished products were sold to him at a predetermined, low price. So small producers fell into economic dependence on merchant capital.

Gradually, many impoverished craftsmen found themselves in such dependence on a rich buyer. The buyer gave them raw materials, such as yarn, for processing it into fabric for a certain fee, and thus turned into distributor.

The ruin of the craftsman led to the fact that the buyer supplied him not only with raw materials, but also with tools. Thus, the artisan was deprived of the last semblance of independent existence and finally turned into a hired worker, and the buyer became an industrial capitalist.

Yesterday's artisans, assembled in the capitalist's workshop, did the same work. Soon, however, it was discovered that some of them are better at certain operations, others at other operations. Because of this, it was more profitable to entrust to each exactly that part of the work in which he was most skillful. Thus, in workshops with a more or less significant number of workers, division of labor.

Capitalist enterprises employing wage laborers working by hand on the basis of the division of labor are called manufactories .

The first manufactories appeared in the XIV-XV centuries in Florence and some medieval cities-republics of Italy. Then, in the 16th-18th centuries, manufactories of various industries - cloth, linen, silk, watch, weapons, glass - spread to all European countries.

Manufactories began to appear in Russia in the 17th century. At the beginning of the 18th century, under Peter I, they began to develop at a faster pace. Among them were weapons, cloth, silk and other manufactories. In the Urals, ironworks, mines, salt works were created.

Unlike Western European manufactories, which were based on hired labor, at Russian enterprises in the 17th and 18th centuries, although freelance labor was used, the labor of serfs and attached workers prevailed. From the end of the 18th century, manufactories based on freelance labor began to spread widely. This process especially intensified in the last decades before the abolition of serfdom.

The process of disintegration of feudal relations was also taking place in the countryside. With the development of commodity production, the power of money increased. Feudal feudal serfs transferred dues and other duties from natural form to money. The peasants had to sell the products of their labor, and the proceeds were paid to the feudal lords. The peasants had a constant need for money. This was used by buyers and usurers to enslave the peasants. Feudal oppression intensified, the position of the serfs worsened.

The development of monetary relations gave a strong impetus differentiation of the peasantry, that is, its stratification into various social groups. The vast majority of the peasantry fell into poverty, suffocated from overwork and went bankrupt. Along with this, world-eaters kulaks began to appear in the village, exploiting their fellow villagers by means of enslaving loans, buying agricultural products, livestock, and implements from them for next to nothing.

Thus, in the depths of the feudal system, capitalist production was born.

initial accumulation of capital. Forced dispossession of peasants. Accumulation of wealth.

Capitalist production presupposes two main conditions: 1) the presence of a mass of poor people, personally free and at the same time deprived of the means of production and means of subsistence and, therefore, forced to hire themselves to work for the capitalists, and 2) the accumulation of monetary wealth necessary for the creation of large capitalist enterprises .

We have seen that capitalism was nourished by petty commodity production based on private property, with its competition bringing enrichment to the few and ruin to the majority of small producers. But the slowness of this process did not meet the needs of the new world market created by the great discoveries of the late 15th century. The emergence of the capitalist mode of production was accelerated by the use of the most brutal methods of violence on the part of the big landowners, the bourgeoisie and the state power, which was in the hands of the exploiting classes. Violence, in the words of Marx, played the role of a midwife who hastened the birth of a new, capitalist mode of production.

Bourgeois scholars idyllically depict the history of the rise of the capitalist class and the working class. In ancient times, they argue, there was a handful of diligent and frugal people who accumulated wealth through their work. On the other hand, there was a mass of lazy people, loafers, who squandered all their wealth and turned into propertyless proletarians.

These fables of the defenders of capitalism have nothing to do with reality. In fact, the formation of a mass of poor people - the proletarians - and the accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few took place through the forcible deprivation of the small producers of the means of production. The process of separating producers from the means of production (from the land, from the instruments of production, etc.) was accompanied by an endless series of robberies and cruelties. This process is called initial accumulation of capital, since it preceded the creation of large-scale capitalist production.

Capitalist production achieved significant development first of all in England. In this country, from the end of the 15th century, a painful process of forcible dispossession of peasants took place. The immediate impetus for this was the increased demand for wool from the large cloth factories that arose first in Flanders, and then in England itself. The landowners began to breed large herds of sheep. Pastures were needed for sheep breeding. The feudal lords drove the peasants from their homes in masses, seized the lands that were in their constant use, and turned arable land into pastures.

The expulsion of the peasants from the land was carried out in various ways, primarily through the open seizure of communal lands. The landlords fenced these lands, destroyed peasant houses, and the peasants were forcibly evicted. If the peasants tried to regain the land illegally seized from them, the armed forces of the state came to the aid of the feudal lord. In the 18th century, the state authorities began to issue laws on "enclosing the land", consecrating the robbery of the peasants.

Ruined and robbed peasants made up countless crowds of poor poor people who filled the cities, villages and roads of England. Having no means of subsistence, they were begging. The state power issued bloody laws against the expropriated. These laws were exceptionally cruel. So, in the reign of the English king Henry VIII (XVI century), 72 thousand people were executed for "vagrancy". In the 18th century, "tramps" and the homeless, instead of the death penalty, were imprisoned in "workhouses", which earned the fame of "houses of horror." So the bourgeoisie tried to accustom the rural population, deprived of land and turned into vagabonds, to the discipline of hired labor.

In the royal Russia, entered the path of capitalist development later than other European countries, the separation of the producer from the means of production was carried out in the same ways as in other countries. In 1861, under the influence of peasant uprisings, the tsarist government was forced to abolish serfdom.

This reform was a grand robbery of the peasants. The landowners seized two-thirds of the land, leaving only one-third in the use of the peasants. The most convenient lands, and also, in a number of cases, pastures, watering places, roads to the fields, etc., which were in the use of the peasants, were cut off by the landowners. In the hands of the landlords, the "cut-offs" became a means of enslaving the peasants, who were forced to rent these lands from the landowners on the most difficult terms. The law, declaring the personal freedom of the peasants, temporarily preserved corvée and dues. For the truncated plot of land received, the peasant was obliged to bear these duties in favor of the landowner until the land was redeemed. The size of the redemption payments was calculated at inflated prices for land and amounted to about two billion rubles.

Describing the peasant reform of 1861, Lenin wrote: “This is the first mass violence against the peasantry in the interests of emerging capitalism in agriculture. This is the landowner's "cleansing of the land" for capitalism.

By dispossessing the peasants, a double result was achieved. On the one hand, the land fell into the private ownership of a relatively small handful of landowners. Class feudal land ownership was transformed into bourgeois property. On the other hand, an abundant influx of free workers into industry, ready to be hired by the capitalists, was ensured.

For the emergence of capitalist production, it was necessary, in addition to the availability of cheap labor, the accumulation in a few hands of large wealth in the form of sums of money that could be turned into any means of production and used to hire workers.

In the Middle Ages, great monetary wealth was accumulated by merchants and usurers. These riches subsequently served as the basis for the organization of many capitalist enterprises.

The conquest of America, accompanied by massive robbery and extermination of the native population, brought the conquerors untold wealth, which began to grow even faster as a result of the exploitation of the richest mines of precious metals. The mines needed workers. The native population - the Indians - died in masses, unable to withstand hard labor conditions. European merchants organized a hunt for blacks in Africa, which was carried out according to all the rules of hunting for wild animals. The trade in blacks, taken out of Africa and turned into slaves, was extremely profitable. The profits of the slave traders reached fabulous proportions. Negro slave labor began to be widely used on the cotton plantations of America.

One of the most important sources of formation of large fortunes was also colonial trade. For trade with India, Dutch, English and French merchants organized East India companies. These companies enjoyed the support of their governments. They were granted a monopoly on the trade in colonial goods and the right to unlimited exploitation of the colonies with the use of any measures of violence. The profits of the East India companies amounted to hundreds of percent a year. In Russia, large profits were delivered to merchants by predatory trade with the population of Siberia and the predatory system of wine farming, which consisted in the fact that the state granted private entrepreneurs the right to produce and sell alcoholic beverages for a certain fee.

As a result, huge monetary wealth was concentrated in the hands of commercial and usurious capital.

Thus, at the cost of plundering and ruining a mass of small producers, the monetary wealth necessary for the creation of large capitalist enterprises was accumulated.

Describing this process, Marx wrote: "Newborn capital exudes blood and dirt from all its pores, from head to toe."

Revolts of serfs. bourgeois revolutions. The death of the feudal system.

The struggle of the peasantry against the feudal landowners took place throughout the entire epoch of feudalism, but it reached a particular acuteness towards the end of this epoch.

France in the XIV century it was engulfed in a peasant war, which went down in history under the name "Jacquerie". The emerging bourgeoisie of the cities at first supported this movement, but at the decisive moment moved away from it.

AT England At the end of the 14th century, a peasant uprising broke out that engulfed most of the country. Armed peasants, led by Wat Tyler, marched across the country, destroying the estates and monasteries of the landowners, and captured London. The feudal lords resorted to violence and deceit to put down the rebellion. Tyler was treacherously murdered. Believing the promises of the king and the feudal lords, the rebels dispersed to their homes. After that, punitive expeditions passed through the villages, inflicting cruel reprisals against the peasants.

Germany at the beginning of the 16th century, it was embraced by a peasant war, supported by the city's lower classes. The rebels were led by Thomas Müntzer. The peasants demanded the abolition of noble arbitrariness and violence.

AT Russia especially large were the peasant wars led by Stepan Razin in the 17th century and Emelyan Pugachev in the 18th century. The insurgent peasants sought the abolition of serfdom, the transfer of landlord and state lands to them, and the elimination of the rule of landowners. The aggravation of the crisis of the feudal-serf system of economy in the 50s of the XIX century was expressed in a wide wave of peasant uprisings on the eve of the reform of 1861.

Huge in scale, peasant wars and uprisings took place over hundreds of years in China. The uprising of the Taipings in the era of the Qing Dynasty (mid-19th century) engulfed the masses of the peasantry. The rebels occupied the ancient capital of China - Nanjing. The agrarian law of the Taipings proclaimed equality in the use of land and other property. The state organization of the Taipings uniquely combined monarchy with peasant democracy, which is characteristic of peasant movements in other countries as well.

The revolutionary significance of the peasant uprisings lay in the fact that they shook the foundations of feudalism and ultimately led to the abolition of serfdom.

The transition from feudalism to capitalism in the countries of Western Europe took place through bourgeois revolutions. The struggle of the peasants against the landowners was used by the rising bourgeoisie in order to hasten the destruction of the feudal system, to replace feudal exploitation with capitalist exploitation, and to seize power into their own hands. In the bourgeois revolutions, the peasants constituted the bulk of the fighters against feudalism. So it was in the first bourgeois revolution in the Netherlands (Holland and Belgium) in the 16th century. So it was in the English revolution of the seventeenth century. So it was in the bourgeois revolution in France at the end of the 18th century.

The bourgeoisie took advantage of the fruits of the revolutionary struggle of the peasantry, making its way to power on its shoulders. The peasants were strong in their hatred of the oppressors. But the peasant uprisings were spontaneous. The peasantry, as a class of small private proprietors, was fragmented and could not create a clear program and a strong, cohesive organization for the struggle. Peasant uprisings can only be successful if they are combined with a workers' movement and if the workers lead the peasant uprisings. But during the period of the bourgeois revolutions of the 17th and 18th centuries, the working class was still weak, small in number and unorganized.

In the depths of feudal society, more or less ready-made forms of the capitalist structure matured, a new exploiting class grew up - the class of capitalists - and along with this masses of people deprived of the means of production appeared - proletarians.

In the epoch of bourgeois revolutions, the bourgeoisie used against feudalism the economic law of the obligatory correspondence of production relations to the nature of the productive forces, overthrew feudal production relations, created new, bourgeois production relations, and brought production relations into line with the nature of the productive forces that had matured in the womb of feudalism.

Bourgeois revolutions put an end to the feudal system and established the dominance of capitalism.

Economic views of the era of feudalism

The economic views of the feudal era reflected the prevailing system of social relations at that time. In feudal society, all mental life was under the control of the clergy and proceeded in religious-scholastic form. Therefore, discussions about the economic life of that time constituted special sections in theological treatises.

The economic and other views of the era of feudalism in China for many centuries were influenced by the teachings of Confucius. Confucianism as a religious ideology arose as early as the 5th century BC. The socio-economic views of Confucianism boil down to the consecration of a single feudal state under the rule of a monarch, they require the strict preservation of the feudal estate hierarchy both in the state system and in family life. According to Confucius, “dark people should obey the aristocrats and sages. The disobedience of the commoner to the higher is the beginning of disorder. Confucius and his followers, defending the interests of the feudal exploiters, idealized the most backward, conservative forms of economy. They praised the "golden age" of patriarchal antiquity. Confucianism in its development became the official ideology of the feudal nobility.

One of the ideologists of feudalism in medieval Europe - Thomas Aquinas(XIII century) - tried to justify the need for a feudal society by divine law. Proclaiming feudal property necessary and reasonable and declaring serfs slaves, Thomas Aquinas, in contrast to the ancient slave owners, argued that “in his spirit, the slave is free” and therefore the master does not have the right to kill the slave. Labor was no longer considered unworthy of a free man. Thomas Aquinas considered physical labor as black labor, and mental labor as noble labor. In such a division, he saw the basis for the class division of society. In his views on wealth, the same feudal-estate approach was manifested. Each person must dispose of wealth in accordance with the position that he occupies on the feudal hierarchical ladder. From this point of view, the teaching of medieval theologians about the so-called "fair" price is characteristic. A "fair" price should reflect the amount of labor expended on the production of the commodity and the class position of the producer.

Medieval advocates of a "fair" price had no objection to merchant profits. They only sought to introduce profit into such a framework in which it would not threaten the economic existence of other classes. They condemned usury as a base and immoral occupation. However, with the development of commodity production and exchange, the clergy themselves began to take part in usurious operations; at the same time, the attitude of the church towards usury became more and more tolerant.

The class struggle of the oppressed and exploited masses against the ruling classes of feudal society unfolded for a number of centuries in a religious form. The demands of the exploited peasants and apprentices were often justified by quotations from the bible. All sorts of sects were widespread. The Catholic Church and the Inquisition brutally persecuted "heretics" and burned them at the stake.

With the development of the class struggle, the religious form of the movement of the oppressed masses receded into the background, and the revolutionary character of this movement became more and more distinct. The peasants demanded the abolition of serfdom, the abolition of feudal privileges, the establishment of equal rights, the abolition of estates, etc.

During the peasant wars in England, the Czech Republic, and Germany, the slogans of the rebels took on an increasingly radical character. The desire of the exploited masses of the countryside and the city for equality was expressed in the demand community of property. It was a desire for equality in consumption. Although the demand for common property was unrealizable, it had a revolutionary significance in that historical epoch, as it aroused the masses to fight against feudal oppression.

By the end of the feudal era, two outstanding early utopian socialists came forward - an Englishman Thomas More, who wrote the book "Utopia" (XVI century), and the Italian Tomaso Campanella, whose book is called "The City of the Sun" (XVII century). Seeing the growing inequality and contradictions of their contemporary society, these thinkers in a peculiar form outlined their views on the causes of social disasters: they gave a description of the ideal, in their opinion, social order in which these disasters would be eliminated.

The books of these utopians describe a social system free from private property and all the vices that go with it. Everyone in this society is engaged in both handicraft and agricultural labor. All the inhabitants work six or even four hours a day, and the fruits of their labor are sufficient to meet all needs. Products are distributed according to need. The upbringing of children is a public affair.

The works of More and Campanella played a progressive role in the development of social thought. They contained ideas that were far ahead of the development of society at that time. But More and Campanella did not know the laws of social development, their ideas were unrealizable, utopian. At that time it was impossible to abolish social inequality: the level of productive forces required a transition from feudal to capitalist exploitation.

The emergence of capitalism dates back to the 16th century. The first attempts to comprehend and explain a number of phenomena of capitalism belong to the same century. Thus, in the 16th-18th centuries, the direction of economic thought and policy, known as mercantilism.

Mercantilism originated in England, then it appeared in France, Italy and other countries. Mercantilists raised the question of the wealth of the country, the forms of wealth and the ways of its growth.

It was a time when capital - in the form of merchant and usurious capital - dominated trade and credit. In the field of production, he took only the first steps, founding manufactories. After the discovery and conquest of America, a flood of precious metals poured into Europe. Gold and silver were then continuously redistributed between individual European states, both through wars and through foreign trade.

In their understanding of the nature of wealth, the mercantilists proceeded from the superficial phenomena of circulation. They focused not on production, but on trade and money circulation, especially on the movement of gold and silver.

In the eyes of the mercantilists, the only true wealth was not social production and its products, but money - gold and silver. The mercantilists demanded that the state actively intervene in economic life, so that as much money as possible would flow into the country and as little as possible would go beyond its borders. The early mercantilists sought to achieve this through purely administrative measures to prohibit the export of money from the country. Later mercantilists considered it necessary to expand foreign trade for this purpose. Thus, the English representative of mercantilism Thomas Man(1571 - 1641) - a major merchant and director of the East India Company - wrote: “The usual means to increase our wealth and our treasures is foreign trade, in which we must always adhere to the rule that we annually sell our goods to foreigners for a large amount, than we consume their goods.

The mercantilists expressed the interests of the bourgeoisie emerging in the depths of feudalism, striving to accumulate wealth in the form of gold and silver through the development of foreign trade, colonial robberies and trade wars, and the enslavement of backward peoples. In connection with the development of capitalism, they began to demand that the state authorities patronize the development of industrial enterprises - manufactories. Were installed export premiums, which were paid to merchants selling goods on the foreign market. They soon gained even more importance. import duties. With the development of manufactories, and then factories, the imposition of duties on imported goods became the most common measure for protecting domestic industry from foreign competition.

This patronizing policy is called protectionism. In many countries it persisted long after the notions of mercantilism had been overcome.

AT England protective duties were of great importance in the 16th and 17th centuries, when they were threatened by competition from the more advanced manufactures of the Netherlands. Since the 18th century, England has been firmly gaining industrial superiority. Other, less developed countries could not compete with it. In this regard, the ideas of free trade are beginning to make their way in England.

A different situation arose in the countries that embarked on the capitalist path later than England. Yes, in France in the 17th century, the minister of Louis XIV Colbert, who actually ruled the country, created a widely branched system of state patronage of manufactories. His system included high import duties, a ban on the export of raw materials, the establishment of a number of new industries, the creation of companies for foreign trade, etc.

Mercantilism played a progressive role for its time. The protectionist policy, inspired by the ideas of mercantilism, contributed a lot to the spread of manufactories. But the views of the mercantilists on wealth reflected the then underdevelopment of capitalist production. The further development of capitalism more and more clearly revealed the inconsistency of the ideas of the mercantile system.

AT Russia in the XVII-XVIII centuries the feudal-serf system of economy dominated. The economy was basically natural. At the same time, trade and handicrafts developed significantly, a national market was formed, and manufactories began to appear. These economic changes in the country contributed to the strengthening of absolutism in Russia.

Reflecting the historical and economic features of the country, representatives of Russian economic thought developed some ideas of mercantilism. However, unlike many Western European mercantilists, they attached great importance not only to trade, but also to the development of industry and agriculture.

The economic views of that time found their expression in the works and activities of the statesman of Russia in the 17th century A.L. Ordyn-Nashchokin, in the economic policy of Peter I, in the works of the largest Russian economist of the early 18th century I.T. Pososhkov.

In his work "The Book of Poverty and Wealth" (1724) I. T. Pososhkov outlined an extensive program for the economic development of Russia and gave a detailed justification for this program. Pososhkov argued the need for a number of economic measures in Russia, pursuing the task of patronizing the development of domestic industry, trade, agriculture, and improving the country's financial system.

In the last third of the 18th century in Russia, there was a tendency towards the disintegration of feudal-serf relations, which sharply intensified in the first quarter of the 19th century, and later grew into a direct crisis of serfdom.

The founder of the revolutionary-democratic trend in the social thought of Russia A. N. R. adishchev(1749 - 1802) was an outstanding economist of his time. Resolutely speaking out against serfdom and in defense of the oppressed peasantry, Radishchev gave a devastating critique of the serf system, exposed the exploitative nature of the wealth of serf landlords, owners of manufactories and merchants, and justified the right of ownership of the land to those who cultivate it with their labor. Radishchev was firmly convinced that autocracy and serfdom could only be abolished by revolutionary means. He developed a progressive system of economic measures for his time, the implementation of which would ensure Russia's transition to a bourgeois-democratic system.

Decembrists, who spoke in the first half of the 19th century were revolutionary figures of that historical period in Russia, when the need to replace feudalism with capitalism was brewing. They directed the spearhead of their criticism against serfdom. Acting as ardent champions of the development of the productive forces of Russia, they considered the abolition of serfdom and the emancipation of the peasants to be the most important condition for this development. The Decembrists not only put forward the slogan of fighting serfdom and autocracy, but also organized an armed uprising against the absolutist monarchy. P. I. Pestel(1793 - 1826) developed an original project for solving the agrarian issue in Russia. A kind of draft constitution drawn up by Pestel, which he called Russkaya Pravda, provided for the immediate and complete liberation of the peasants from serfdom, as well as economic measures aimed at protecting the interests of the peasants in the future. For these purposes, Pestel considered it necessary to create a special public land fund, from which each peasant could receive free of charge for his use the land necessary for his existence. This fund should be formed at the expense of part of the land of the landowners and the treasury, and part of their land should be alienated from the largest landowners free of charge. The Decembrists, as revolutionaries who emerged from the midst of the nobility, were far from the people, but their ideas of struggle against serfdom contributed to the growth of the revolutionary movement in Russia.

Under the conditions of the disintegration of feudalism and the emergence of the capitalist way of life, the ideology of the bourgeoisie took shape, rising to its dominance. This ideology was directed against the feudal system and against religion as the ideological instrument of the feudal lords. Because of this, the worldview of the bourgeoisie fighting for power in a number of countries was of a progressive nature. Its most prominent representatives - economists and philosophers - subjected to resolute criticism all the foundations of feudal society: economic, political, religious, philosophical and moral. They played a major role in the ideological preparation of the bourgeois revolution, exerting a progressive influence on the development of science and art.

SUMMARY

1. Feudalism arose on the basis of the collapse of the slave-owning society and the decomposition of the rural community of the tribes that conquered the slave-owning states. In those countries where there was no slave system, feudalism arose on the basis of the disintegration of the primitive communal system. The clan nobility and the warlords of the tribes seized a large amount of land in their hands and distributed it to their close associates. There was a gradual enslavement of the peasants.

2. The basis of the production relations of the feudal society was the feudal lord's ownership of the land and incomplete ownership of the production worker – serf peasant. Along with feudal property, there was the sole property of the peasant and artisan, based on personal labor. The labor of serfs was the basis for the existence of feudal society. Serf exploitation was expressed in the fact that the peasants were forced to serve in favor of the feudal lord corvée or pay him natural and cash dues. Serfdom in its severity for the peasant often differed little from slavery. However, the serf system opened up some opportunities for the development of productive forces, since the peasant could work on his own farm for a certain part of the time and had some interest in labor.

4. Feudal society, especially in the early Middle Ages, was fragmented into small principalities and states. The ruling classes of feudal society were the nobility and the clergy. The peasant class had no political rights. Throughout the history of feudal society, there was a class struggle between peasants and feudal lords. The feudal state, expressing the interests of the nobility and clergy, was an active force that helped them to strengthen their right to feudal ownership of land and intensify the exploitation of the powerless and oppressed peasants.

5. In the era of feudalism, agriculture played a predominant role, and the economy was mainly subsistence. With the development of the social division of labor and exchange, the old cities that had survived after the fall of the slave system were revived, and new cities arose. Cities were centers of crafts and trade. The craft was organized into guilds that sought to prevent competition. Merchants united in merchant guilds.

6. The development of commodity production, decomposing natural economy, led to the differentiation of peasants and artisans. Merchant capital accelerated the decomposition of the craft and contributed to the emergence of capitalist enterprises – manufactories. Feudal restrictions and fragmentation hindered the growth of commodity production. In the course of further development, a national market was formed. A centralized feudal state arose in the form of absolutist monarchies.

7. The primitive accumulation of capital prepared the conditions for the rise of capitalism. Huge masses of small producers – peasants and artisans – lost the means of production. Large monetary wealth, concentrated in the hands of large landowners, merchants, usurers, was created through the forcible dispossession of the peasantry, colonial trade, taxes, and slave trade. This accelerated the formation of the main classes of capitalist society: wage workers and capitalists. In the depths of feudal society, more or less ready-made forms of the capitalist way of life grew and matured.

8. Production relations of feudalism, low productivity of forced labor of serfs, shop limits.nia hindered the further development of the productive forces. The uprisings of the serfs shook the feudal system and led to the abolition of serfdom. The bourgeoisie stood at the head of the struggle to overthrow feudalism. She used the revolutionary struggle of the peasants against the feudal lords in order to seize power in their own hands. Bourgeois revolutions put an end to the feudal system and established the dominance of capitalism, opening up space for the development of productive forces.

feudalism and feudal society) - a type of agrarian society in which land ownership is conditioned by military or other service, in which there is a hierarchy of political power based on contractual rights and obligations, usually with a monarch at the head, and unfree peasants cultivate the land as serfs. This term is widely debated, and its definition could be challenged by many participants in the debate. The main areas of debate are: (a) whether feudalism developed only in Europe and Japan or was it more widespread. According to most, much of Western Europe from the period 1000-1400. (that is, the Middle Ages) can be described as feudal, characteristic of later Eastern Europe. Japan during the Tokugawa dynasty (1603-1868) had key similarities with Europe and the term was widely used; (b) whether feudalism is valued as a form of society, or whether it is a collection of institutions that can be found in a range of societies. When evaluating feudalism in the latter sense, political or economic aspects are taken into account. The political ones include the dominance of a paramilitary group of landowners and the hierarchy of vassalage, that is, subordinates are required to be loyal and be in the military service of a superior, who in exchange provides protection and promotion to the vassal. In Europe, a chain of similar relationships has developed from the monarch down. In economic terms, this is a concentration around land ownership that produces products (in Europe - flax), and the peasants are not free serfs and, through various forms of rent, give the surplus product to the landowner. As a rule, production was not carried out for the market, although markets developed. If an institutional approach is adopted, then feudal land ownership can be identified in societies where feudal political relations did not exist (in particular, in the haciendas of colonial Spanish America). However, modern sociology (e.g. Mann 1986; Anderson 1974) prefers to define feudalism as a type of society that includes specific political, economic, social and, more problematically, ideological or cultural elements, although differences are recognized (e.g. Anderson) between Southern, Western and Eastern Europe. It is this social approach that leads to the identification of the few examples of feudalism in the world. Some Marxists, like Anderson, maintain a limited use of the term, while others, influenced by Maoist writings, identify feudalism with a range of agrarian societies. See also Feudal mode of production.

In the Middle Ages, people were divided into classes of praying, fighting and working. These estates differed in their rights and obligations, which were established by laws and customs.

The estate of the belligerents (feudal lords) included the descendants of noble people of barbarian tribes and noble inhabitants of the Western Roman Empire they conquered.

The situation of the belligerents was different. The richest owned entire regions, and some simple knights were sometimes very poor. However, only feudal lords had the right to own land and rule over other people.

Both the descendants of impoverished free people from among the barbarians and Roman citizens, as well as the descendants of slaves and columns, went to the working class. The vast majority of those who worked are peasants. They fell into two categories. Some peasants remained free people, but lived on the lands of feudal lords. The feud was divided into master's land and peasant allotments. It was believed that these allotments were provided to the peasants by the feudal lord. For this, the peasants worked on the master's land (corvée) and paid taxes to the feudal lord (tire). The feudal lord promised the population of his fief, levied fines for breaking the laws. Another category of peasants was called serfs. They were considered "attached" to their allotments and could not leave them. The duties of the serfs (corvee, dues) were more difficult than those of the free. They were personally dependent on the feudal lords, they were sold and bought together with the land. The property of the serfs was considered the property of the lord. Servants-serfs were in fact the position of slaves.

In addition to those who fought and worked, there was an estate of worshipers. He was considered the main and was called the first. It was believed that the feudal lord or peasant was not able to fully comprehend the full depth of the teachings of Christ and independently communicate with God. In addition, people are constantly tempted by the devil. Only the Christian church and its ministers - the clergy - could explain the divine laws to everyone, connect a person with God, protect him from the wiles of the devil and atone for his sins before God. The main duty of the class of worshipers was worship. The priests also baptized children, married the newlyweds, received confession from the penitents and remitted their sins, communed the dying.

Unlike those at war and working, the clergy were an open estate. People from two other classes could become priests. For the maintenance of the first estate, the workers were charged a tax in the amount of a tenth of the income (church tithe). Considerable land was in the direct possession of the church.

More on the topic Three estates of feudal society.:

1. TOPIC 12 The rise of the feudal system The city in the system of feudal society
2. The classes of feudal society. Dependent and serfs.
3. TOPIC 8 Formation of feudal structures (IX-X) Regional features of the process of formation of feudal structures Formation of the foundations of the culture of feudal times
4. Features of the social structure of Indian feudal society in the early Middle Ages. Caste system.
5. Forms of feudal ownership of land and feudal rent.
6. TOPIC 13 Church of the feudal period Processes of integration and disintegration in the socio-political life of Europe. Culture of the feudal era

a type of society, in Marxism, a socio-political formation based on private feudal ownership of land and the exploitation of peasants who are personally dependent on the feudal lord or the feudal state. The state under feudalism, as a rule, existed in the form of a monarchy. In Russia, the period of feudalism is dated to the IX-XIX (1861) centuries.

Great Definition

Incomplete definition ↓

FEUDALISM

German Feudalismus, French. f?odalit?, from Late Lat. feodum, feudum - feud) - in the world-historical process, the second class-antagonistic formation, representing - in the progressive development of society - a stage following the slave system in stages; F. represented the first class formation in the history of a number of regions. The definition of F. is associated with many others. difficulties caused by both the similarity of a number of features inherent in all pre-capitalist. formations in general and those that are not excluded. the specifics of feudalism (such as the predominance of the agrarian economy and natural economy, the routine state of technology, etc.), and the presence of many regional and stadial varieties of feuds. building. These are the differences: in the forms of zem. property (private, state, combination of both); in economic forms. realization of this property (seigneurial - rent, state - tax, their combinations); in the forms of constitution of the feud. the ruling class (private contractual hierarchically subordinated vassal-fief system, public service system, their combinations); in the form of political feudal organizations. domination (state-in - the sum of loosely connected territorial principalities, state-in centralized - class and absolute monarchy), etc. Bourges. Historiography, focusing on the features of the elements of the superstructure, defined F. from a legal, political, or ideological point of view. But thereby this or that "secondary" feature of the feud. system (the derivative of the economic basis) turned into its defining feature. Since the time of F. Guizot, who gave political and legal. definition of F., as a "classic. features" F. began to be considered the conditional nature of the earth. property, vassal system and feud. hierarchy. Historians who have studied Ph.D. one of these features, most often it was interpreted as fundamental. So, historians of the so-called. The vassalage treaty (in modern times, F. Ganshof, F. Stenton, K. Stephenson, and others) put forward a vassal-league agreement as a decisive feature of law school. Historians of the so-called. political school focused on the problem of "scattering sovereignty", ie, the weakening of the center. power and transition state. functions to votchinniki on the ground; as a result, F. for them is a synonym for political. fragmentation, any form of centralized monarchy, even nominally "based" on the institution of citizenship, is no longer in their eyes F. (G. Weitz, P. Roth; in modern times - R. Kulborn, I. Strayer). Developed not without the influence of Marxism, the so-called. social direction (in modern times - M. Blok and others) sees one of Ch. signs of F. in the patrimonial (seigneurial) system. Within the framework of this trend, a tendency has also emerged to elevate the natural-economic character of the economy to the absolute (P. G. Vinogradov, O. Khinze, and others). As a result, the development of commodity-den. relations, market exchange was identified with the decomposition of F. (the relapse of this approach to the essence of F. is represented by the modern concept of the “crisis of F.” already in the 14-15th centuries, which became widespread not only among bourgeois historians, but also among a certain part of Marxist or close to Marxist historians). For part of the modern bourgeois historians are characterized by skepticism. attitude to the possibility of giving a general definition of F., calls to abandon the very term "F." (in view of its "ambiguity" or vice versa - "extreme narrowness") or limit its application only to the territory between the Loire and the Rhine, where the legal. the institution that gave the name to the whole system - the feud took shape in its classic. form. With a different approach to the definition of F., the answer to the question of the world-historical or narrowly local nature of F. is connected. Historians who insist on strictly legal. interpretations of the term "F.", deny the presence of F. even in means. parts of European countries continent. Historians who are inclined towards a social interpretation of F. give this system a more universal character, believing that it existed not only in the countries of Europe, but also in Asia and the North. Africa. However, at the same time, in some directions, bourgeois. historiography revealed a tendency to turn the concept of "F." from the historical, associated with a certain ist. epoch, into the ideal-typical, timeless, with the help of which one can "ascend" in search of F. to any epoch (Stryer and others). The definition of F., based on Marxist methodology, allows for a variety of concrete historical. forms of F. to see its world-historical stadial essence. From the point of view of the Marxist concept, philosophy is not an institution or the sum of institutions, but a socio-economic formation that encompasses the functioning of all aspects of society (including forms of ideology, morality, etc.). With all the variety of specific historical, regional varieties of F. and its stadial features, there are two features that characterize production. the relations of this system are obligatory for the recognition of this society as feudal: firstly, the monopoly of the ruling class on land. property, ist. the originality of the swarm was that its "accessories" included (in one form or another legal form) the direct producer - the farmer; secondly, economic the realization of this property in the form of small-scale agriculture, i.e., the existence of independent peasants. x-va, conducted on land owned by a large owner (state or master) and therefore burdened with services and duties (feudal land rent) in favor of the owner. So, feud. production method is based on a combination of large land. property of the class of feudal lords and small individual farms of direct producers—peasants, exploited by methods of non-economic coercion (the latter is just as characteristic of F. as economic coercion is of capitalism). Without certain forms of direct power of the feudal lord over the farmer (relations of direct domination of one and subordination of another), the gratuitous appropriation by the feudal surplus product in the form of rent could not occur either regularly or in full. Non-economic coercion (which could vary from serfdom to simple class inequality) was a necessary condition for the implementation of feuds. "rights" to rent, but independent. peasant x-in - a necessary condition for its production. Such specific. the form of subordination and exploitation opened up the possibility of maintaining and functioning of an individual-family, parcel farm, which most corresponded to the level of production achieved by that time. forces as the basis of societies. production in general. And although the early period of the existence of F. was the time of the decline of households. life (compared with the period of antiquity), established in the era of F. well-known economic. the independence of the peasant gave, although limited, but still more scope for increasing labor productivity, which created the prerequisites for subsequent qualities. shift. This was the definition of ist. F.'s progressiveness in comparison with the slave-owner. system, although it paid off at the cost of heavy exploitation of the working majority of society. Finally, in the epoch of F. the expansion of the circle of peoples who were drawn into civilization for the first time was a tremendous progress (for many peoples F. was the first class formation). The fetishism of personal relationships characteristic of this era hides the economic. essence of feud. relations (just as commodity fetishism veils the exploitative nature of the capitalist system). Feud. the way of production (with varying degrees of mediation) determines the features: the social structure of the feud. society (corporatism, hierarchy, class, etc.); political and ideological. superstructures (public power as an attribute of land ownership, domination of theological worldview); socio-psychological. warehouse of the individual (communal connectedness of consciousness, etc.). Filling the content of the concept of the Middle Ages, F. as a world-historical era dates back to the end. 5 - ser. 17th century Although in a number of regions of the world feud. relations were not only preserved, but continued to be dominant in the subsequent era, its content (on a world-historical scale) was determined to an ever-increasing degree not by them, but by the emerging and ever stronger capitalist relations. F. went through three stages in its development: genesis, developed F., late F. The chronological framework of these stages is different for different regions and countries of the world. Genesis F. The process of formation F. is best studied on the material of the history of countries Zap. Europe, where F. developed on the ruins of Zap. Rome. the empire conquered by the barbarians (ch. arr. the Germans); the genesis of F. here covers the period from the end. 5th c. to 10-11 centuries. Burzh. historiography gives (with rare exceptions) an essentially alternative answer to the question of the path of formation of F. in Zap. Europe. Some historians believe that F. goes back to its core. features to the socio-legal and political. institutions later. empires (the so-called novelists), others - that F. was established as a result of the predominance of German (barbarian) institutions in societies. and political middle-century organizations. society (the so-called Germanists). In the beginning. 20th century A. Dopsh attempted a "third", "conciliatory" solution. According to his concept, the penetration of the Germans did not lead to a break, qualities. change in the history of the late Roman beginnings, but was their continuation, since societies. system invading the West. Rome. The barbarian empire was essentially no different from late Roman societies. building. However, the degree of modernization of barbarian societies was so excessive in this concept that the latter in the 20-30s. 20th century has been subject to serious criticism. However, most modern app. historians share the concept of continuity, that is, the slow evolution (without interruption) of Roman or Germanic, barbarian beginnings into feud. society; F. grows out of these principles, develops and distributes them, and builds them into a system. In Marxist historiography, the concept of revolution is universally recognized. the transition from pre-feudal formations (in one case - slave-owning, in the other - primitive communal) to F. This transition - in the world-historical. plan - was in the nature of a social revolution; its features still need to be studied (the simplistic idea that prevailed in the 30-50s of the 20th century about it as a "revolution of slaves" that overturned the slave-owners. system, now discarded as scientifically untenable). The problem is complicated by the fact that this coup did not immediately lead to the establishment of F. in the societies that have developed on the territory. Zap. Rome. empires; at the first stage, it only led to the creation of a fundamental prerequisite for F. - the predominance of the individual-family labor economy as the basis of societies. production (in the 60s, for the historical stage from the emergence of an individual family farm of a free community member to the beginning of the process of his feudal subordination, the concept of "pre-feudal period" was proposed - A. I. Neusykhin). Recognizing the presence of "proto-feudal" elements as in the structure of the late Roman. Marxist historiography, at the same time, denies the possibility of deriving F. directly from them as a formation. “Between the Roman column,” emphasized F. Engels, “and the new serf stood a free Frankish peasant” (K. Marx and F. Engels, Soch., 2nd ed., vol. 21, p. 154). For those European countries where the late Roman social orders were crushed by barbarian conquests, Marxist medieval studies, in explaining the genesis of F., adheres to the theory of synthesis of decaying slave-owning and primitive communal relations. At the same time, synthesis is understood not as a mechanical linkage of ancient and barbarian social relations, but as the birth of a qualitatively new system in the process of long-term interaction of "proto-feudal" elements that matured in one and another society. The success of local studies of the genesis of F. made it possible to outline its typology. There are several types of F.'s genesis in Europe. The first is the genesis of F. based on synthesis, but with a predominance of barbarian principles. The "classic" standard of this type is the Frankish state (especially Northern France). The second type is based on synthesis, but with a clear prevalence of antiquity. began (Mediterranean region - Italy, South Gaul, Visigothic Spain). The third type is non-synthetic or with very little. synthesis elements. F. here was born from the tribal system of barbarians, bypassing the stage of a developed slave owner. societies (regions that did not experience Roman domination - North-West Germany, Scandinavian countries, areas of the West and East Slavs, or those countries where this domination turned out to be fragile - South-West Germany, Britain). However, one can speak of a non-synthetic variant only in the sense of the absence of a direct influence of the Late Roman. began, because the regions of non-synthetic genesis F. were in interaction with the regions of the synthesis genesis of F. T. o., the problem of the genesis of F. and its typology is closely connected with the problem of the ist. interaction of various regions in the world-historical process. European society that emerged on the territory. Zap. Rome. empire after its conquest by the barbarians, was characterized by all the local features of certain common features. The conquering tribe (more precisely, the union of tribes), which established its military in this area. domination, acted as the founder of statehood - queens. authorities. Main the mass of the local subjugated population (usually much larger in number than the conquerors) found itself in the position of unequal, "hard" people. The social structure of the society of the barbarians themselves seems to be three-membered: free fellow tribesmen who settled (in communities) on the ground and retained the status of public full rights; semi-free; slaves. The latter personified the original exploitative (slave-owning) way of life in barbarian society. Its formation is explained not only by the fact that the barbarians brought with them a lot of slaves from their former homeland, but also by the large number of slaves that the conquerors took possession of in the occupied territory along with the villas of the possessors of Roman times that passed to them. But the determining factor development of these societies was not this way, but the evolution of villages. community of free farmers, based on the individual-family form of land ownership. This form, which was the result of development, produces. forces and the condition for their further progress, proved to be extremely unstable: property. differentiation of households that functioned on a developed allod - a freely alienable land. allotment, the ruin of the state gravitating over them. duties - judicial, tax, military, etc., the neighborhood of magnates who turned thanks to queens. land grants to large landowners and seekers at the expense of the cross. lands to expand the territory of their dominance, and many others. another made inevitable the ruin of the free community-farmers, who lost the right of ownership to their land. allotments. Under these conditions, the formation of large earth. ownership was a matter of time. This process proceeded in a specific feudal form. Since for large land. feudal owner. type, it was not the land itself that was of paramount importance, but the worker cultivating it (which was due to the place of labor among the elements of the productive forces of that time), in the process of forming a large feud. property, the decisive factor was not the expropriation of an independently managing farmer, but his subordination to a large land. to the owner and, moreover, in such a form, which meant the transfer to the latter of the right of supreme ownership of the arable allotment, which remained in the hands of the farmer (Engels called this form of subordination, directly opposite to capitalist subordination, appropriation of the peasant to the land); the peasant at the same time turned into a feudal dependent, exploited, indebted to the lord of the feud. rent. Historically, the process of feud. subordination and folding of the institute of feud. ownership proceeded in two forms: "private-contractual" and state, "donation". In the first case, it usually began either with the establishment of personal ties (relations of commendation), or with the recognition by the peasant of land dependence on the master (precaria), but there were no feudal productions in the proper sense. relations where both of these forms of dependence did not merge in one proportion or another. In the second case, queens. power, granting its service people the right to receive services due to the crown, thereby laying the foundations for the process of gradual transformation of this territory. to a private estate. The transformation of the allod - inheritances. put the commune farmer in holding, burdened with duties in favor of its nominal owner, and the free farmer in a personally dependent peasant, in the "man" of the master (patrimony, seigneur) was the basis of the feudalization process. The formed large estate became org. a form of appropriation by the feudal lord of the surplus labor of feudally dependent peasants. Thanks to immunity, they found themselves in the hands of the votchinnik. the levers of state coercion in the character of the population of the immune district, and it itself, recently still legally and politically equal in rights with the votchinnik (with all economic dependence), has now become its subjects. Such is the first, decisive side of the agr. coup (in the Frankish state-ve - in the 8th-9th centuries), which marked in the West. Europe, the transition from a barbarian society to an early feudal one. The second side of this coup is the appearance of a conditional (primarily military service) holding - beneficiation. Instead of donations of land in full and unlimited ownership (allod) to the practice of queens. power (and then magnates in the field) included a conditional donation - on the terms of carrying the military. service to the donor. Previously, beneficiation and then in parallel with it in the West. In Europe, the institution of vassalage spread, that is, relations of personal dependence, which assumed the honorary services of the vassal to the overlord and, therefore, are compatible with the belonging of both counterparties of the vassal agreement to the same class - the feudal lords. The gradual merging of these two forms of ties among the ruling class led to the fact that usually the beneficiary was the vassal, and the vassal received the land. award. Thus arises and develops the fragmentation of the title of ownership of the same piece of land between a number of hierarchically co-subordinate co-owners who constituted a single ruling class of feudal lords. Gradually (by the 10th century), the beneficiation becomes a hereditary holding (feud, fief), although it remains conditional and service. The result of the process of feudalization was thus. folding the main antagonistic feudal classes. society. On the one hand, the mass of simple (formerly free) community members, as well as slaves, columns, germ. the semi-free (litas) merged into the class of the feudal-dependent peasantry (see Art. Peasantry). On the other hand, there is a military feud. class and the restructuring of its structure on the principles of the vassal-fief system is being completed. In the process of feudalization, something happened. differentiation of societies. functions - the limitation of the farmer only by the sphere of production and the concentration of the military. affairs (as well as management, court, legislation) in the hands of the feudal lords, who established their military-political. dominance in society. The process of feudalization was accompanied by a sharp social struggle both between the dependent strata of the population and their masters, and between the free strata of the community members, on the one hand, and the feud that carried them. oppression of queens. administration and land. magnates - on the other hand (the largest performance of the last kind - Stellita uprising 841-843 in Saxony). The completion of the process of transforming allodial land ownership into feudal tenure was accompanied in the political sphere. superstructures by the transition from early feud. empire (Carolingians) to feud. fragmentation. In the field of ethnicity, this stage corresponded to the spread of the so-called. regional nationalities, i.e. ethnic. communities formed on the soil of regional territories. connections. In the ideological sphere, the process of feudalization was accompanied by the spread of Christianity, which everywhere replaced paganism. Christ. theology acted as a kind of completion of the feudal legal order in the field of ideology, i.e., its ideological sanction. These are the general processes of F.'s genesis in Zap. Europe. The most complete, classic. they received expression in the region of synthesis with a predominance of barbarian principles (that is, the Frankish state and especially the northern French region). For this area were characteristic: the maximum completeness of the process of feudalization, refers. a clear class-legal divide between the antagonistic. classes, almost complete absorption of the allod feud. forms of land tenure (the feud - on the one hand, the dependent holdings of the peasants - on the other), the presence of a developed and completed feud. hierarchies in the dominance environment. class, the gradual convergence of the social and legal status of holders-peasants on the basis of a common belonging to the class of the exploited, the spread of the classic. estates with extensive domains and dependent holdings, a large proportion of corvee among peasant duties, etc. This is a type of feudalization of countries with a pronounced predominance of subsistence farming, the village over the city; private law beginning over public law, estates - over the rural community. For the P. variant, which developed on the basis of synthesis, but with the prevalence of ancient principles (i.e., the Mediterranean region - Italy, South. France, Visigothic Spain) - in the presence of general patterns of folding F. - such features are characteristic as long. the preservation of the slave style, roman. forms of ownership, cities of ancient origin, elements of Rome. statehood, law; in the structure of estates - an insignificant role of the domain in general, the predominance of natures. and den. dues in the duties of the peasants, the important role of the feud. lease in the form of a feud. the subjugation of the impoverished community members (Italian libellaria) and the preservation of a vast stratum of small free allodists, among the dominions. class - the incompleteness of the feudal-hierarchical. building a feud. land ownership, the vassal system, etc. Byzantium also belonged to the same type of genesis F., where the old slave owner. the basis for the emergence of F. was expressed even more clearly, in particular, the eradication of antich. slave owner way of life, there was a gradual transformation of the slave-owner. state-va in the early feudal, were characterized by the stability of the Byzantine-Slavic community and the hypertrophy of centralized statehood as a form of class. the dominance and preponderance of centralized forms of exploitation (rent-tax) over its seignioral-patrimonial forms, the practical absence of feuds. hierarchies based on the vassal-fief system, instead of it - the service character of dominions. class. The genesis of F. had significant differences in the regions where it arose without synthesis - on a barbarian basis (North-West Germany, Scandinavian countries, regions of the Western and Eastern Slavs). Here, it is characterized by: an extremely slow and protracted process of feudalization (with the long-term preservation of communal forms of land ownership and land use, as well as patriarchal slavery), the weakness of large-scale land ownership, the vitality of patriarchal-communal ties; a significant role of the old tribal nobility in shaping the structure of dominance. class, patriarchal features of early feuds. monarchy, predominance in land ownership of the state. elements over private estates and hence the great importance of royal awards (feeding), the "truncated" nature of vassal-feudal ties, the long-term preservation of the leading role of public duties in the feudal system. exploitation of the peasantry, the long-term preservation by the peasantry of a certain share of public and private legal capacity, and by part of the peasants - and land independence (for example, in Norway). Thus, if in the region of the synthesis of Roman and barbarian elements with a predominance of barbarian principles, a certain synchronism of various aspects of the process of feudalization was observed, then in regions with other types of genesis F. at b. or m. a long and pronounced hypertrophy of the role of one of these factors, various aspects of this process turned out to be broken and the process as a whole dragged on for longer. time. The genesis of F. in the countries of the East has not yet been studied enough. Burzh. Oriental studies, based on the concept of F. as a purely superstructured phenomenon, determined by the degree of political. centralization and the structure of the ruling class, as a rule, denies the existence of F. in the countries of Asia and Africa (an exception is sometimes made for Japan, whose outward features of development in the Middle Ages are more reminiscent of Western Europe). Burzh. scientists write about the "traditional" east. society, in the development of which the decisive role allegedly belonged to non-economic. factors, but traditions, ideology, non-class "state" (M. Weber, J. K. Fairbank). Sometimes these factors, which supposedly constituted the exclusive specificity of the countries of the East, are vulgarly derived directly from the natural features of the "East" as a whole. Marxist ist. Science has put forward the concept of F. in the countries of the East (which does not deny the essential differences in the development of various Eastern countries from Western Europe and the differences between these countries themselves). It is accepted by the majority of Marxist authors; attempts to scientists (F. Tekei) to consider F. only as an internal stage in a single "Asian" formation were reduced in practice to the same recognition of the existence of a separate. feud. stages in the East. Observed up to the beginning. 60s some Marxist historians strive to date the beginning of the feud. stage in the history of India and China much earlier than in the history of the Mediterranean countries, does not find support in research. In the East, three basics can be distinguished. groups of countries that differed in the forms and rates of feudalization: the most ancient centers of civilization - Egypt, Mesopotamia, Iran, India, China; other farmers. civilizations that embarked on the path of the formation of classes and states from the first centuries AD. e., - Korea, Japan, the countries of the South-East. Asia, Ethiopia; retarded, preim. nomadic peoples who still lived in the conditions of the primitive communal system and only in the 2nd half. 1 - early 2nd millennium AD e. reached the class stage. societies (some Arab, Turkic, Mong. tribes). While in the countries of the first group of feuds. system has replaced the already developed class. society, among those peoples (agricultural and nomadic), to-rye entered the stage of the class. society relatively late, the slave owner. the trend of development in a fairly short time gave way to the feudal. Nevertheless, it is typical for the entire East to be long. existence within the framework of the feud. society of a strong slave owner. way of life. The genesis and forms of F. in such countries as China, India, and Iran are characterized by a relatively high level of commodity-den. relations, hypertrophy of the centralized state. machines, smaller than in Zap. Europe, the role of vassal relations, a slow process of feudalization extended over time. Apparently, the birth of feud. relations, primarily the formation of large land ownership, the distribution of land. lease, began in countries such as China, India, earlier than in Europe. However, the process of feudalization dragged on here for a long time. period - from about the first centuries AD. e. (sometimes even from the first centuries BC) to the end. 1 - early 2nd millennium AD e. It is no coincidence, apparently, changes in the economy, indicating a transition from slave-owning. formations to the feudal, were accompanied (both in China and in India) by waves of "barbarian" invasions, the largest ideological. shifts (spread of Buddhism, serious changes in traditional ideological systems - Hinduism, Confucianism, Taoism). The turning point, from which, obviously, the beginning of the feud should be dated. formations on Bl. East, is the time of the emergence of Islam and the Arab conquests (7-8 centuries). For early feud. period in the countries of the East, the existence of strong centralized monarchies is typical. While maintaining the community here, the ruling class in the early feud. empires of the East (Arab. Caliphate, Tang Empire in China, etc.) the first time is not yet strong enough to turn the main. part of the cultivated land in his inheritances. possession, to put the peasants in direct dependence on themselves. During this period, the role of the collective form of exploitation of the peasantry through the state was great. apparatus, by means of a rent-tax. The growth of private ownership of land and an acute class. wrestling in the early feudal east societies led to con. 1st thousand to the victory of a private feud. began and to the triumph (sometimes temporary - China of the 9th century, sometimes longer - the Bl. East, India) political. fragmentation over the early feud. centralization. In those countries of the East, to-rye moved from the primitive communal system directly to the feudal system, this transition was facilitated by economic, cultural, and especially religious-ideological. the influence of more developed countries. It is not necessary, however, to interpret the transition of these countries to the F. as an obligatory and equal for all complete exclusion from their development of all elements of slave ownership. formations. Despite the insufficient study of the problem, there is reason to believe that in some of these countries slaveholding relations developed and only after some time the slaveholding trend was replaced by a feudal one as the dominant one (Japan of the Nar period, early Aksum, some nomadic empires of Central Asia). Developed fiefdom The stage of developed fiefdom in Europe (11th-15th centuries) is characterized by the completion of the formation of feudalism. building in economic basis and in all elements of the superstructure. By this time, the main feudal institutions. society - a large feud. land property, the seigneurial (patrimonial) system, etc., have already been formed. As a formation F. in this period realized all the possibilities of progress inherent in it. The most important factor that ensured the flourishing of F. was the mean. lift produces. forces and on its basis - the growth of population, the emergence of feuds. cities as the center of crafts and trade, as the personification of the further development of societies. division of labor - the separation of crafts from agriculture. Established in the early Middle Ages relative economic. the independence of the peasant (protected by the very dominance of natural farming from the excessive encroachments of the feudal lord) led over time to the strengthening of the cross. x-in, which became the basis of the economic. the rise of Europe in the 11th-13th centuries. Growth produces. strength manifested itself primarily in progress with. x-va - the decisive industry of production of the F. era (expansion of the cultivated area - the so-called internal colonization, the spread of three-field land and the improvement of land cultivation, which resulted in an increase in productivity, the spread of horticulture, horticulture, etc.). The rise of cities as centers of trade and exchange brought about important changes in the structure of feudal lords. society. With the movement of crafts to the city, a sphere of production arose, in which property relations were fundamentally different from property relations in the village. x-ve - legally recognized property of a worker (artisan) on the basis. the condition of his production (tools, workshop) and the results of his labor. A new social stratum appeared - the townspeople, finally consolidated in the course of the liberation. fight against the mountains. seniors (see Communal movement). The system of senior exploitation of the mountains. crafts and trade was significantly undermined (in places it was completely eliminated). Thus conditions were provided for the more or less free development of commodity production. However, this freedom was relative, since in the very structure of the Middle Ages. crafts (workshops) had many restrictions, purely feudal in nature. But one way or another, the development of cities as centers of crafts and trade over time increasingly shattered the institution of feuds. property. Ever since movable property in the city has opposed itself to land. owner as a separate mountain. wealth, in the very center of the feud. production - in the patrimony there was also a discrepancy between the volume of fiefs. rent and the amount of surplus product produced in the cross. x-ve. As performance grows, cross. of labor, a surplus product arises here, economically personifying not only peasant ownership of movables, but also the strengthening of the peasant's property rights to his land. allotment. All this, under the conditions of the continued domination of feudalism, resulted in a radical restructuring of the feudal system. exploitation in order to turn all types of movable property (both in the city and in the countryside), out of the control of the feudal lord, into the object of the feud. exploitation - the source of some form of feud. rent. In the course of this restructuring, the domain system, and with it the corvée, was increasingly inferior in the West. In Europe, there was a place for the quitrent system, the servage gradually disappeared, personal dependence was weakened, and the land dependence of the peasantry came to the fore, the sphere of contractual, real relations in peasant-patrimonial relations expanded, and economic elements played an increasingly important role. coercion. The structure of the feud changed. rents: against the background of a generally sedentary quitrent (qualification, chinsha), the share of payments associated with senior jurisdiction, bann, market rights, etc., grew especially rapidly, to-rye acquired the value of the movable part of senior rent. The process of restructuring the entire feudal system. exploitation has ranked in a number of countries mean. part of the 14th c. and 15th c. and constitutes the content of the so-called. "crisis" dating back to these centuries. It was not the disintegration and crisis of fiefdom as a formation, but the disintegration and crisis of one of its stages—the seigneurial one—and the transition to a higher stage of development, when feuds were the universal center of production. rent becomes a peasant economy. 14th-15th centuries were also marked by a new stage in the class struggle of the peasantry, which reflected the patterns of the phasic crisis of F. - mass crosses. wars: Dolcino's uprising in Italy in 1304-07, Jacqueria in France in 1358, Wash Tyler's uprising in 1381 in England, Hussite wars (see Hussite revolutionary movement) in the Czech Republic in the 1st half. 15th c. and others. East. the meaning of the cross. antifeod. wrestling 14-15 centuries. - in victory cross. x-va over senior (in Western Europe), in the very fact of the formation of the cross. parcel form earth. property, regardless of the feuds that masked it. signage. During the period of developed F., there were changes in the internal. the structure of the main antagonistic classes - feudal lords and peasantry. In the conditions of distribution of den. forms of rent deepened the property differentiation of the peasantry. In the 11th-13th centuries. there are consolidation and legal. the formation of the ruling class in the privileged estates. Inheritances are being formed. and a privileged layer of chivalry, and then on its basis - the estate of the nobility. The higher and middle clergy (an integral part of the feudal class) are another ruling class. The third estate, which formally included all commoners, but actually represented in the class, will represent. institutions of the burghers, bore the stamp of lack of rights and oppression. The vast majority of this estate, the so-called. "people of the seigneury" (i.e., subject to the seigneurs), in fact, stood outside the publicly recognized estate system. dominant feud. the class, outwardly speaking as one (in relation to all commoners), was internally very heterogeneous. Nobles who were at various levels of the feud. hierarchy, possessed a different amount of "power and interest" in the total feud. property. The top - dukes, counts, as well as prelates of the church (bishops, abbots of large monasteries) were not only overlords in relation to a large number of vassals, not only lords of many tens, even hundreds of fiefdoms, but also sovereigns in relation to means. the population of their lands, who was neither in personal nor land dependence on them. At the other extreme of the feud. hierarchy was the mass of small and medium seniors, DOS. incomes to-rykh were limited to the rent of a small number of dependent peasants, and the territory of domination was limited to the boundaries of the patrimony. The earth in process of retraction of page - x. production in the market exchange became a commodity. This (along with family divisions, church contributions, etc.) led to the fragmentation of feuds, which resulted in, in addition to impoverishment, it means. parts of the petty and middle nobility, the destruction of the original system of vassal ties. Instead, new forms of intrafeuds arise. relations: there is a transfer of vassal service from land provision to monetary awards (the so-called rental fiefs). All this causes significant shifts in society. superstructure, especially the political one. Because the host communications during this period went far beyond the limits of not only otd. seniors, but also otd. provinces, began folding nat. markets, there were objective opportunities for political. feudal centralization. state-in. This was in the interests of the masses of small