Free The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century by Ian Mortimer Page A

villeins have the use of between a quarter and a whole yardland; very few have the use of more. 16 On days when they are not working on the lord’s land, or after they have finished work (about midafternoon), they can work on their own acres or tend to their gardens. But whatever they produce actually belongs—in law—to their lords, and he can take whatever he wants.
    Usually lords demand nothing of their peasants’ goods except a “heriot.” This is the customary fine of a villein’s best beast, or most valuable chattel, which his heirs must give up to the lord on the villein’s death. But as one old abbot better versed in law than in diplomacy will tell you, legally his villeins “own nothing but their own bellies.” 17 In fact, that abbot could rub even more salt into the wound of his tenants’ servitude by reminding them that they have no right to leave his manor for more than a day. If he sells his land, he sells them and their families with it. Nor do they have recourse to any legal judgment but his. They have no right of trial before the royal justices, only in his manorial court. In some manors, the lord has the power of life and death over those found guilty.
    There is worse. A lord has power over whom his villeins might marry. If a villein allows his daughter—who is, by implication, also unfree—to marry a man from another manor, then he must pay the lord a fine to compensate him for the loss of further generations of villeins. If a widow has not remarried within a few months of her first husband’s death, and the lord’s land is in danger of being neglected as a consequence, she will be ordered to choose a capable husband before the next court—normally within three weeks. If she does not, the bailiff or the reeve will select a suitable man for her. If the parties refuse to marry, they will be fined and, if they continue to refuse, imprisoned until they do consent. An arranged marriage, in which theparents choose the bride or bridegroom, is a blessing by comparison. It is not an exaggeration to say that there are aspects of a villein’s life which you will find repugnant.
    Villeins may escape from their servitude in one of two ways. One is to be made free by the lord. The other is to run away. If a man runs away to a town, and lives there for a year and a day, he is legally free. Of course he will forgo all his possessions in his original manor, and his nearest male relative will be fined. 18 If he is married then his wife and children will be turned out of the house and the family possessions confiscated—so married men do not often escape. If they try, their wives are likely to follow them and drag them home again. Also, it is worth remembering that a free man is not necessarily better off than his unfree cousins. Even if he has a craft or skill, he will not have the tools or money to start up in a trade. Most escapees have nothing to sell but their labor, and that is very cheap. In this way a town is regularly kept populated, mainly by younger sons seeking their fortune. As the poor men in the slums die off from malnutrition, injury, and disease, there is a regular stream of incoming young men ready to take their place, living in the cheap subdivided tenements while eking out a living by laboring in dangerous and unsavory occupations.
    Just as there is a great difference between the villeins on the manor—between those who have more than thirty acres and those who have just one or two—there is a considerable range of wealth and status among the franklins and yeomen (freemen). At the high end are those who have acquired enough freehold land to sustain their families comfortably and to employ others to help them farm their acres. They also have several servants. But even within this group there is a degree of variation. At the very top there are some who have undertaken to rent the entire manor from the lord, farming the whole estate, court and all, as if they themselves were the lords. This