What Is Feudalism

Are you wondering what is feudalism? Feudalism is a common topic that one often comes across in history text books. The history of feudalism dates back to the 8^th century. It was during this time that a historic person known as Charles Martel got a lot of manpower in exchange for allowing land rights to the nobles under his power. This was almost like a barter system and the system was fixed with a pledge of loyalty. In fact it was because of this relationship or a type of bonding between the vassal embodied and the lord that a concept like feudalism was born.

In this type of bonding, both the parties benefited, the king gained the integrity of the vassal and the vassal was compensated with income, which is absolutely essential for sustenance. When searching for the answer to the question ‘what is feudalism?' one will often come across information about the evolution of feudalism. Feudalism evolved during the period of the decline of Charlemagne. At the same time the period also marked the ascent of the monarchies. It was during this period itself that there was a lot of serious transformation taking place in the social as well as political system in Western Europe.

In order to understand feudalism better, one can think of it as a pyramid because the system of feudalism is very much similar to a pyramid's structure. At the top or the apex of the pyramid was the papacy, who was the most powerful person around followed by the king. The king enjoyed tremendous power and he was answerable to only the pope while all the other people in the system was accountable to the king himself.

After the vassals had pledged their integrity, the king would reward them by granting land to them. However not everyone received the land, only some of the significant military personnel and some favorable nobles got to enjoy this gift by the king. In return for the land the nobles would happily pledge their service to the king and they would be willing to even fight for the king.

The base of the feudal pyramid is the largest portion of it, signifying that the people belonging to this group are large in number. This group consists of peasants, medieval serfs and others who held the lowest social rankings. These are the people who work and toil very hard on the land in order to produce good quality crops by cultivation.