the.com/feudal
the social pyramid scheme where everyone owed someone, and the someone at top owed God.
means Relating to the medieval European system in which land was held in exchange for service and loyalty, binding lords and vassals in a chain of mutual obligation.
from From Medieval Latin feudalis, from feudum or feodum, meaning a fief or estate held in tenure. That noun is widely thought to trace back to a Frankish word related to Old High German fihu, 'cattle, property' — a cousin of the same Germanic root behind 'fee.' So buried in 'feudal' is the old idea that wealth meant livestock, and that holding land was just another way of owing for the herd.
- latin root
- comes from feudum, meaning cattle or property
- loyalty tax
- vassals paid in military service, not coins
- slow death
- the Black Death gutted it by killing the labor force
- land ladder
- kings rented land to lords who subrented to knights
- made-up word
- feudalism coined centuries later, never used at the time
holy roman empire — complex feudal system across central europe 962-1806 with emperor, princes, and local lords in overlapping hierarchies
tokugawa shogunate japan — daimyo (feudal lords) controlled regions under shogun 1603-1868, samurai served in strict hierarchical bonds