Peasant Life In The Middle Ages - The Finer Times - 1 views
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Peasant life in the Middle Ages was noticeably difficult. Families and entire villages were exposed to disease, war and generally a life of poverty.
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very little known about the detailed life of peasants in Europe because the lords and the clergy did not keep records of the peasants
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Majority of the peasants worked three days a week in their lord’s land but they would work longer during the harvest and plantation periods
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Those who were full time servants would work every day of the week and would get a break to attend Mass on Sundays. Peasants were forbidden from leaving the lord’s manor without seeking permission. The condition of serfdom was hereditary and one would be tied to his master unless he saved enough to purchase some land or if he married a free person. At the end of the twelfth century, the ties that bound peasants to their masters began to loosen.
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he peasants would receive a larger piece of land as long as they adhered to the condition that they work on the lord’s land before working on their own.
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The plows and horses were so few and the peasants themselves spent the entire day working in the “demense”.
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houses were basic shacks with benches, stools, wooden cups, bowls and spoons. Most households had a chest of drawers where the family would keep their valuable items. Peasants hardly slept on beds; they slept on straw mattresses on the floor. Given that they had few possessions even in terms of personal attires, they typically slept with their work apparels and covered themselves with animal skin.
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Church was also a source of education mainly for the peasant’s children who attended the local school that was part of the church. The peasants looked to the priests for baptism, marriage, and performance of last rites for the dying. Christianity guided the moral decisions that peasant men and women made in their day-to-day life.
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young girls helped with chores in the house and they were married off as soon as they attained maturity; this was usually at the young age of thirteen or sixteen years.
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Societal and economic development saw the rapid rise of cities and towns. As the ties between serfs and their masters became lose, the peasants were able to rent land and some even migrated to the towns. Catastrophes such as the Black Death, a plague that killed thousands of peasants made it difficult for lords to find peasants to work in their farms.