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A fief (; la, feudum) was a central element in medieval contracts based on
feudal Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was the combination of the legal, economic, military, cultural and political customs that flourished in medieval Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a way of structur ...
law. It consisted of a form of property holding or other rights granted by an
overlord An overlord in the English feudal system was a lord of a manor who had subinfeudated a particular manor, estate or fee, to a tenant. The tenant thenceforth owed to the overlord one of a variety of services, usually military service or ser ...
to a
vassal A vassal or liege subject is a person regarded as having a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch, in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. While the subordinate party is called a vassal, the dominant party is called a suzerai ...
, who held it in
fealty An oath of fealty, from the Latin ''fidelitas'' (faithfulness), is a pledge of allegiance of one person to another. Definition In medieval Europe, the swearing of fealty took the form of an oath made by a vassal, or subordinate, to his lord. "Fea ...
or "in fee" in return for a form of feudal allegiance, services and/or payments. The fees were often lands, land revenue or revenue-producing real property like a
watermill A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower. It is a structure that uses a water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as milling (grinding), rolling, or hammering. Such processes are needed in the production ...
, held in feudal
land tenure In common law systems, land tenure, from the French verb "tenir" means "to hold", is the legal regime in which land owned by an individual is possessed by someone else who is said to "hold" the land, based on an agreement between both individual ...
: these are typically known as fiefs or fiefdoms. However, not only land but anything of value could be held in fee, including governmental office, rights of exploitation such as hunting, fishing or felling trees, monopolies in trade, money rents and tax farms. There never did exist one feudal system, nor did there exist one type of fief. Over the ages, depending on the region, there was a broad variety of customs using the same basic legal principles in many variations.


Terminology

In ancient Rome, a "
benefice A benefice () or living is a reward received in exchange for services rendered and as a retainer for future services. The Roman Empire used the Latin term as a benefit to an individual from the Empire for services rendered. Its use was adopted by ...
" (from the Latin noun , meaning "benefit") was a gift of land () for life as a reward for services rendered, originally, to the state. In medieval Latin European documents, a land grant in exchange for service continued to be called a (Latin).Meir Lubetski (ed.). ''Boundaries of the ancient Near Eastern world: a tribute to Cyrus H. Gordon''. "Notices on Pe'ah, Fay' and Feudum" by Alauddin Samarrai
Pg. 248-250
, Continuum International Publishing Group, 1998.
Later, the term , or , began to replace in the documents. The first attested instance of this is from 984, although more primitive forms were seen up to one hundred years earlier. The origin of the and why it replaced has not been well established, but there are multiple theories, described below. The most widely held theory is put forth by
Marc Bloch Marc Léopold Benjamin Bloch (; ; 6 July 1886 – 16 June 1944) was a French historian. He was a founding member of the Annales School of French social history. Bloch specialised in medieval history and published widely on Medieval France ...
Marc Bloch. ''Feudal Society'', Vol. 1, 1964. pp. 165–166.Marc Bloch. ''Feudalism'', 1961, p. 106. that it is related to the Frankish term ''*fehu-ôd'', in which ''*fehu'' means "cattle" and ''-ôd'' means "goods", implying "a moveable object of value". When land replaced currency as the primary store of value, the Germanic word ''*fehu-ôd'' replaced the Latin word . This Germanic origin theory was also shared by William Stubbs in the 19th century. A theory put forward by
Archibald R. Lewis Archibald Ross Lewis (1914–1990) was a historian, World War II Veteran, professor, and author. He wrote 14 books, and more than 100 articles. As a professor he taught at the University of South Carolina, University of Texas, and University of ...
is that the origin of 'fief' is not (or ), but rather , the earliest attested use being in Astronomus's (840).
Archibald R. Lewis Archibald Ross Lewis (1914–1990) was a historian, World War II Veteran, professor, and author. He wrote 14 books, and more than 100 articles. As a professor he taught at the University of South Carolina, University of Texas, and University of ...
. ''The Development of Southern French and Catalan Society 718–1050'', 1965, pp. 76–77.
In that text is a passage about
Louis the Pious Louis the Pious (german: Ludwig der Fromme; french: Louis le Pieux; 16 April 778 – 20 June 840), also called the Fair, and the Debonaire, was King of the Franks and co-emperor with his father, Charlemagne, from 813. He was also King of Aqu ...
which says , which can be translated as "(Louis forbade that) military provender which they popularly call 'fodder' (be furnished)." A theory by
Alauddin Samarrai Alauddin (Arabic: علاء الدين) is a Muslim male given name and, in modern usage, also a surname. This name derives from the Arabic ''“ʻAlāʼ ad-Dīn”'', meaning “servant of Allah, nobility of faith, nobility of religion, nobility of ...
suggests an Arabic origin, from (the plural of , which literally means "the returned", and was used especially for 'land that has been conquered from enemies that did not fight').
Alauddin Samarrai Alauddin (Arabic: علاء الدين) is a Muslim male given name and, in modern usage, also a surname. This name derives from the Arabic ''“ʻAlāʼ ad-Dīn”'', meaning “servant of Allah, nobility of faith, nobility of religion, nobility of ...
. "The term 'fief': A possible Arabic origin", ''Studies in Medieval Culture'', 4.1 (1973), pp. 78–82.
Samarrai's theory is that early forms of 'fief' include , , , and others, the plurality of forms strongly suggesting origins from a
loanword A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because ...
. The first use of these terms was in
Languedoc The Province of Languedoc (; , ; oc, Lengadòc ) is a former province of France. Most of its territory is now contained in the modern-day region of Occitanie in Southern France. Its capital city was Toulouse. It had an area of approximately ...
, one of the least-Germanized areas of Europe, and bordering
Muslim Spain Al-Andalus DIN 31635, translit. ; an, al-Andalus; ast, al-Ándalus; eu, al-Andalus; ber, ⴰⵏⴷⴰⵍⵓⵙ, label=Berber languages, Berber, translit=Andalus; ca, al-Àndalus; gl, al-Andalus; oc, Al Andalús; pt, al-Ândalus; es, ...
, where the earliest use of as a replacement for can be dated to 899, the same year a Muslim base at Fraxinetum ( La Garde-Freinet) in
Provence Provence (, , , , ; oc, Provença or ''Prouvènço'' , ) is a geographical region and historical province of southeastern France, which extends from the left bank of the lower Rhône to the west to the Italian border to the east; it is bo ...
was established. It is possible, Samarrai says, that French scribes, writing in Latin, attempted to transliterate the Arabic word (the plural of ), which was being used by the Muslims at the time, resulting in a plurality of forms ( and others), from which eventually derived. Samarrai, however, also advises that medieval and early modern Muslim scribes often used etymologically "fanciful roots" in order to claim the most outlandish things to be of Arabian or Muslim origin. In the 10th and 11th centuries the Latin terms for 'fee' could be used either to describe dependent tenure held by a man from his lord, as the term is used now by historians, or it could mean simply "property" (the manor was, in effect, a small fief). It lacked a precise meaning until the middle of the 12th century, when it received formal definition from land lawyers. In English usage, the word "fee" is first attested around 1250–1300 (Middle English); the word "fief" from around 1605–1615. In French, the term is found from the middle of the 13th century (Old French), derived from the 11th-century terms , . The odd appearance of the second ''f'' in the form may be due to influence from the verb 'to grant in fee'. In French, one also finds (land and rights possessed by a or "lord", 12th century), which gives rise to the expression "seigneurial system" to describe feudalism.


Early feudal grants

Originally,
vassal A vassal or liege subject is a person regarded as having a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch, in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. While the subordinate party is called a vassal, the dominant party is called a suzerai ...
age did not imply the giving or receiving of landholdings (which were granted only as a reward for loyalty), but by the 8th century the giving of a landholding was becoming standard.Cantor (1993), pp. 198-199. The granting of a landholding to a vassal did not relinquish the lord's property rights, but only the use of the lands and their income; the granting lord retained ultimate ownership of the fee and could, technically, recover the lands in case of disloyalty or death. In
Francia Francia, also called the Kingdom of the Franks ( la, Regnum Francorum), Frankish Kingdom, Frankland or Frankish Empire ( la, Imperium Francorum), was the largest post-Roman barbarian kingdom in Western Europe. It was ruled by the Franks du ...
,
Charles Martel Charles Martel ( – 22 October 741) was a Frankish political and military leader who, as Duke and Prince of the Franks and Mayor of the Palace, was the de facto ruler of Francia from 718 until his death. He was a son of the Frankish statesm ...
was the first to make large-scale and systematic use (the practice had remained sporadic until then) of the remuneration of vassals by the concession of the usufruct of lands (a ''beneficatium'' or "
benefice A benefice () or living is a reward received in exchange for services rendered and as a retainer for future services. The Roman Empire used the Latin term as a benefit to an individual from the Empire for services rendered. Its use was adopted by ...
" in the documents) for the life of the vassal, or, sometimes extending to the second or third generation.Lebecq, pp.196-197. By the middle of the 10th century, fee had largely become hereditary.Cantor (1993), p. 200. The eldest son of a deceased vassal would inherit, but first he had to do homage and fealty to the lord and pay a "
relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term '' relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that th ...
" for the land (a monetary recognition of the lord's continuing proprietary rights over the property). Historically, the fees of the 11th and the 12th century derived from two separate sources. The first was land carved out of the estates of the upper nobility. The second source was
allod In the law of the Middle Ages and early Modern Period and especially within the Holy Roman Empire, an allod ( Old Low Franconian ''allōd'' ‘fully owned estate’, from ''all'' ‘full, entire’ and ''ōd'' ‘estate’, Medieval Latin ''allodiu ...
ial land transformed into dependent tenures. During the 10th century in northern France and the 11th century in France south of the
Loire The Loire (, also ; ; oc, Léger, ; la, Liger) is the longest river in France and the 171st longest in the world. With a length of , it drains , more than a fifth of France's land, while its average discharge is only half that of the Rhôn ...
, local magnates either recruited or forced the owners of allodial holdings into dependent relationships and they were turned into fiefs. The process occurred later in Germany, and was still going on in the 13th century. In England, Henry II transformed them into important sources of royal income and patronage. The discontent of
baron Baron is a rank of nobility or title of honour, often hereditary, in various European countries, either current or historical. The female equivalent is baroness. Typically, the title denotes an aristocrat who ranks higher than a lord or kn ...
s with royal claims to arbitrarily assessed "reliefs" and other feudal payments under Henry's son King John resulted in
Magna Carta (Medieval Latin for "Great Charter of Freedoms"), commonly called (also ''Magna Charta''; "Great Charter"), is a royal charter of rights agreed to by King John of England at Runnymede, near Windsor, on 15 June 1215. First drafted by t ...
of 1215. Eventually, great feudal lords sought also to seize governmental and legal authority (the collection of taxes, the right of high justice, etc.) in their lands, and some passed these rights to their own vassals. The privilege of minting official coins developed into the concept of
seigniorage Seigniorage , also spelled seignorage or seigneurage (from the Old French ''seigneuriage'', "right of the lord (''seigneur'') to mint money"), is the difference between the value of money and the cost to produce and distribute it. The term can be ...
.


Later feudal grants and knightly service

In 13th-century Germany, Italy, England, France, and Spain the term "feodum" was used to describe a dependent tenure held from a lord by a vassal in return for a specified amount of
knight A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the Christian denomination, church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood ...
service and occasional financial payments (
feudal incidents Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was the combination of the legal, economic, military, cultural and political customs that flourished in medieval Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a way of structu ...
). However, knight service in war was far less common than: * castle-guard (called ''
Burghut From the 12th century in central Europe, a ''Burgmann'' (plural: ''Burgmannen'' or modern term ''Burgmänner'', Latin: ''oppidanus'', ''castrensus'') was a knight ministeriales or member of the nobility who was obliged to guard and defend castles. ...
'' in the Holy Roman Empire), the obligation of a vassal to serve in a
castle A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word ''castle'', but usually consider it to be the private fortified r ...
garrison A garrison (from the French ''garnison'', itself from the verb ''garnir'', "to equip") is any body of troops stationed in a particular location, originally to guard it. The term now often applies to certain facilities that constitute a mili ...
of the lord; * suit in court, the vassal's obligation to attend the lord's
court A court is any person or institution, often as a government institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in acco ...
, to give him counsel, and to help him judge disputes; * attendance in the lord's entourage, accompanying the lord when he travelled or attended the court of his lord so as to increase the social status of the lord; * hospitality to the lord or to his servants (accommodation). A lord in late 12th-century England and France could also claim the right of: * wardship and marriage – right to control descent of fee by choosing a husband for a female heir and a guardian for minors (preferably in consultation with the heir's closest male adult kinsmen); * "aids" – payments to aid the lord in times of need (customarily given to the lord to cover the cost of knighting the eldest son, marriage of the eldest daughter, and for
ransom Ransom is the practice of holding a prisoner or item to extort money or property to secure their release, or the sum of money involved in such a practice. When ransom means "payment", the word comes via Old French ''rançon'' from Latin ''re ...
ing the lord if required); *
escheat Escheat is a common law doctrine that transfers the real property of a person who has died without heirs to the crown or state. It serves to ensure that property is not left in "limbo" without recognized ownership. It originally applied to a ...
– the reversion of the fief to the lord in default of an heir. In northern France in the 12th and 13th centuries, military service for fiefs was limited for offensive campaigns to 40 days for a knight. By the 12th century, English and French kings and barons began to commute military service for cash payments (
scutage Scutage is a medieval English tax levied on holders of a knight's fee under the feudal land tenure of knight-service. Under feudalism the king, through his vassals, provided land to knights for their support. The knights owed the king military s ...
s), with which they could purchase the service of
mercenaries A mercenary, sometimes Pseudonym, also known as a soldier of fortune or hired gun, is a private individual, particularly a soldier, that joins a military conflict for personal profit, is otherwise an outsider to the conflict, and is not a memb ...
.


Feudal registers

A list of several hundred such fees held in chief between 1198 and 1292, along with their holders' names and form of tenure, was published in three volumes between 1920 and 1931 and is known as '' The Book of Fees''; it was developed from the 1302 ''
Testa de Nevill The ''Book of Fees'' is the colloquial title of a modern edition, transcript, rearrangement and enhancement of the medieval (Latin: 'Book of Fiefs'), being a listing of feudal landholdings or fief (Middle English ), compiled in about 1302, but f ...
''.


The Fiefs of Guernsey

Guernsey or the
Bailiwick of Guernsey The Bailiwick of Guernsey (french: Bailliage de Guernesey; Guernésiais: ''Bailliage dé Guernési'') is an island country off the coast of France as one of the three Crown Dependencies. Separated from the Duchy of Normandy by and under t ...
is one of the Channel Islands that is a Crown Dependency. Guernsey still has
feudal law Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was the combination of the legal, economic, military, cultural and political customs that flourished in medieval Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a way of structur ...
and legal fiefs in existence today. Each fief has a Seigneur and/or Dame that owns the fief. The Guernsey fiefs and seigneurs have long existed before baronies and are part of
Normandy Normandy (; french: link=no, Normandie ; nrf, Normaundie, Nouormandie ; from Old French , plural of ''Normant'', originally from the word for "northman" in several Scandinavian languages) is a geographical and cultural region in Northwestern ...
. While nobility has been outlawed in France and Germany, noble fiefs still exist by law in Guernsey. The owners of the fiefs actually convene each year at the Court of Chief Pleas under the supervision of His Majesty's Government. There are approximately 24 private fiefs in Guernsey that are registered directly with the Crown.


See also

*
Appanage An appanage, or apanage (; french: apanage ), is the grant of an estate, title, office or other thing of value to a younger child of a sovereign, who would otherwise have no inheritance under the system of primogeniture. It was common in much o ...
, part of the liege's domain granted to a junior relative * ''
Book of Fees The ''Book of Fees'' is the colloquial title of a modern edition, transcript, rearrangement and enhancement of the medieval (Latin: 'Book of Fiefs'), being a listing of feudal landholdings or fief (Middle English ), compiled in about 1302, but f ...
'', a scholarly collection of fiefs *
Brahmadeya Brahmadeya (Sanskrit for "given to Brahmana") was tax free land gift either in form of single plot or whole villages donated to Brahmanas in the early medieval India. It was initially practiced by the ruling dynasties and was soon followed up by th ...
, a royal fief given to a
Brahmin Brahmin (; sa, ब्राह्मण, brāhmaṇa) is a varna as well as a caste within Hindu society. The Brahmins are designated as the priestly class as they serve as priests ( purohit, pandit, or pujari) and religious teachers ( ...
for service to an Indian king. * Enfeoffment *
Fee simple In English law, a fee simple or fee simple absolute is an estate in land, a form of freehold ownership. A "fee" is a vested, inheritable, present possessory interest in land. A "fee simple" is real property held without limit of time (i.e., pe ...
*
Fee tail In English common law, fee tail or entail is a form of trust established by deed or settlement which restricts the sale or inheritance of an estate in real property and prevents the property from being sold, devised by will, or otherwise alien ...
*
Fengjian ''Fēngjiàn'' ( zh, c=封建, l=enfeoffment and establishment) was a political ideology and governance system in ancient China, whose social structure formed a decentralized system of confederation-like government based on the ruling class con ...
, the Chinese system often compared to European feudalism *
Feoffee Under the feudal system in England, a feoffee () is a trustee who holds a fief (or "fee"), that is to say an estate in land, for the use of a beneficial owner. The term is more fully stated as a feoffee to uses of the beneficial owner. The use ...
* Feudal land tenure in England *
Lehen Lehen may refer to: * The German word for fief, especially in context of the feudalism in the Holy Roman Empire. People * Ľudo Lehen (1925–2014), Slovak artist, sculptor and author Places Germany * , a village in the borough of Freiburg im ...
, the German equivalent *
Knight-service Knight-service was a form of feudal land tenure under which a knight held a fief or estate of land termed a knight's fee (''fee'' being synonymous with ''fief'') from an overlord conditional on him as tenant performing military service for his ov ...
*
Knight's fee In feudal Anglo-Norman England and Ireland, a knight's fee was a unit measure of land deemed sufficient to support a knight. Of necessity, it would not only provide sustenance for himself, his family, and servants, but also the means to furnish h ...
*
Lord of the manor Lord of the Manor is a title that, in Anglo-Saxon England, referred to the landholder of a rural estate. The lord enjoyed manorial rights (the rights to establish and occupy a residence, known as the manor house and demesne) as well as seig ...
*
Seigneurial system of New France The manorial system of New France, known as the seigneurial system (french: Régime seigneurial), was the semi- feudal system of land tenure used in the North American French colonial empire. Both in nominal and legal terms, all French ter ...
, a semifeudal system in France's American colonies *
Subinfeudation In English law, subinfeudation is the practice by which tenants, holding land under the king or other superior lord, carved out new and distinct tenures in their turn by sub-letting or alienating a part of their lands. The tenants were termed ...
* Urbarium, a medieval record of fees


Notes


References

*
Norman F. Cantor Norman Frank Cantor (November 19, 1929 – September 18, 2004) was a Canadian-American historian who specialized in the medieval period. Known for his accessible writing and engaging narrative style, Cantor's books were among the most widely rea ...
. ''The Civilization of the Middle Ages''. New York: HarperPerennial, 1993. * Stéphane Lebecq. ''Les origines franques: Ve-IXe siècles.'' Series: Nouvelle histoire de la France médiévale. Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1999. * * {{Authority control Feudalism Real property law Land tenure