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The adjective feudal was in use by at least 1405, and the noun feudalism was in use by the end of the 18th century, [4] paralleling the French féodalité.. According to a classic definition by Ganshof, [1] feudalism describes a set of reciprocal legal and military obligations of the warrior nobility that revolved around the key concepts of lords, vassals and fiefs, [1] though Ganshof himself ...
The term feoffment derives from a conflation of fee with off (meaning away), i.e. it expresses the concept of alienation of the fee, in the sense of a complete giving away of the ownership. The medieval English law of property was based on the concept of transferring ownership by delivery: easy to do with a horse, but impossible with land, i.e ...
In medieval Europe, an oath of fealty (German: Lehnseid) was a fundamental element of the feudal system in the Holy Roman Empire. It was sworn between two people, the feudal subject or liegeman (vassal) and his feudal superior (liege lord). The oath of allegiance was usually carried out as part of a traditional ceremony in which the liegeman or ...
The term fealty comes from the Latin fidelitas, meaning fidelity, and referred to the vassal's sworn loyalty to his feudal lord. The oath of fealty reinforced the commitments made during homage, formally establishing the mutual obligations between lord and vassal. The vassal’s primary duty was military service.
A fief (/ f iː f /; Latin: feudum) was a central element in medieval contracts based on feudal law. It consisted of a form of property holding or other rights granted by an overlord to a vassal, who held it in fealty or "in fee" in return for a form of feudal allegiance, services or payments.
The meaning of the word "franklin" evolved to mean a freeholder; that is, one who holds title to real property in fee simple. In the 14th and 15th centuries, franklin was "the designation of a class of landowners ranking next below the landed gentry". [1] With the definite end of feudalism, this social class disappeared as a distinct entity.
The term is more fully stated as a feoffee to uses of the beneficial owner. The use of such trustees developed towards the end of the era of feudalism in the Middle Ages and declined with the formal ending of that social and economic system in 1660. The development of feoffees to uses may have hastened the end of the feudal system, since their ...
Examples of feudalism are helpful to fully understand feudalism and feudal society. Feudalism was practiced in many different ways, depending on location and period, thus a high-level encompassing conceptual definition does not always provide a reader with the intimate understanding that detailed historical examples provide.