Life in a Medieval Village
Francis and Joseph Gies (Harper & Row, 1990)

267 pp.  First reading.
Posted 17 May 2006.
 

It is easy to lose oneself in admiration for the great achievements of the medieval era: polyphonic music, Gothic architecture, illuminated manuscripts, courtly love, the Arthurian tales, the Summa Theologiae, La Divina Comedia, the universities, the monasteries. Yet these artifacts -- imposing, ambitious, endearing -- represent the best the era had to offer, and the study of them alone is unlikely to give one a rounded impression of what medieval culture was really like. I have often wondered what life in medieval Europe would have been like for an ordinary person. What was his home like? How did he live and work? What role did the law or government play in his life? What was his recreation?

When I saw this book, it seemed to be exactly what I was looking for.  The authors concentrate on the village of Elton, in Cambridgeshire, England, near the end of the thirteenth century. In that period England kept better records than other European countries, so we know a considerable amount about the texture of ordinary life, even in a village as small as Elton, which at the time was home to about 500 villagers. They discuss, among other things, the governance of the village, the tempos and texture of work, marriage and family life, the foods the villagers ate and the clothing they wore. Much of it is fascinating, but I have chosen my words carefully: they 'discuss', rather than 'portray'. If I was hoping for an account which brought the historical details to life, I was disappointed; the details are here, laid out in clear order, but the task of imaginative reconstruction falls very much to the reader.

Elton's economy was primarily agricultural, and the village was governed by the medieval manorial system.  The village land was the property of a lord (in this case, the abbot of Ramsey Abbey). In the manorial system, villagers paid fees to the lord in return for the right to seed, work, and harvest the land. In return, the lord provided officials to manage the village's affairs, both economic and judicial. The lord himself (or herself, as lords were frequently women) might never visit the village; normally he appointed a steward to manage the general affairs of a number of his villages. Responsibility for holding court in the village fell to the steward. The lord's resident representative was the bailiff, who lived in the manor house, typically the largest and most comfortably furnished house in the village. Appointed by the steward, and literate, he managed the day-to-day affairs of the village. A third official was the reeve, an elected official who was responsible for overseeing labour and keeping financial accounts (our word 'sheriff' is derived from 'shire reeve'). A number of other elected officials rounded out the municipal government of Elton: a hayward, whose special responsibility was the village grain, a woodward, who tended the woods, and, of course, the ale-tasters (all of whom were women).

The village court was itinerant; it would be held a few times each year when the steward made his visits. The court observed 'customary law', meaning that 'the way things have always been done' served as precedent.  Cases were deliberated by a jury, though, being a small village, it was difficult to find jurors unfamiliar with the cases. The court would levy fines for minor offences, though these were forgiven if the villager was too poor to pay. Cases involving serious crimes, like murder or adultery, were referred either to ecclesiastical or royal courts. The ecclesiastical courts were often preferred, as they did not permit capital punishment.

A manorial village was more than a political entity; it was an economic unity in a way quite different from modern towns. The geography of the village was almost the inverse of a modern city: in the village, the homes clustered together in the center of the village's cultivated land.  To go to work, people went out from the center and returned in the evening. Though the villagers held their own land, they worked the land communally. Some of the land was held by the lord himself, and villagers were obligated to cultivate this land as well.  The degree of their obligation was proportional to the size of their own holding, but did not normally exceed two days per week. They used a system of crop rotation to keep the soil productive. The hard physical labour in the fields was the men's responsibility; women's work included house-work, gardening, and animal-tending. Medieval people worked hard, but also had generous holidays: every Sunday, of course, plus two weeks at Christmas and one week at Easter, in addition to lesser holy days and village festivals.

A typical home in Elton had a thatched-roof, an earthen, straw-covered floor, and a central fire. Smaller homes had only one room; larger ones had a few. The villagers maintained a yard and garden, and slept at night on straw pallets. Their diet consisted mainly of porridge, bread, ale, fruit, and vegetables. Outside the manor house, meat was a rare treat. Being in England, residents of Elton didn't drink wine. The village maintained a communal well for water, and communal ovens for baking bread.

A person's status in the village was conditioned not only by their wealth, but also by whether they were free or unfree. I was very interested in what was meant by 'unfree' in this context. I have sometimes heard people allude to medieval serfdom as 'slavery', yet I have also seen it stated that, while slavery was widespread in the early medieval period (as a carry over from the Roman Empire) and again a problem in the Renaissance and after (under the influence of a renewed interest in all things Roman), slavery was slowly eradicated from Europe during the Middle Ages. What, then, were these 'serfs' or 'unfree' villagers?

It seems, then, to be a serious error to confound an unfree villager with a slave: the villager could have property, be elected to village offices, marry, inherit, and do all those things which a free man could do. True, he was subject to economic constraints not imposed on free men, and this may have been unjust, but there was no queston of his being a lower creature by nature, as with slavery. In fact, it was a charitable work of the Church to help those who were unfree make the transition to freedom.

In the end, I enjoyed this book very much. Though the tone is a little dusty dry, they do give many interesting details. One aspect which I wish they had addressed more directly was the spiritual climate of medieval life. They say much about the material texture of life, but little about the psychological. They had their joys and sorrows, of course, as in all times, but was the spirit of the times one that tended to produce happiness? Medieval literature seems to me innocent and conveying an uncomplicated joy in story-telling, medieval music sounds confident and celebratory, their manuscript illuminations are playful and delighted, their celebrities - the saints - competed to excell in goodness.  In fact, I cannot name one major work of medieval art that is not striving after goodness, or truth, or beauty. The contrast with our own times is stark. Am I misunderstanding them? To me, they seem to be psychologically and spiritually healthier than we are, despite their comparative material poverty. And if that is true, are we really better off? I'm not sure how I should answer that question. If I want some guidance, I'll have to find another book.

Incidentally, you can see the village of Elton today if the fancy strikes you.

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