Feudalism and The Manor System in the High Middle Ages

Feudalism applied only to the military and noble class, while the manorial system dealt with peasants.Under feudalism, the lords, the bigger landowning nobles, promised to protect their vassals, lesser nobles, and granted them fiefs of land in return for loyalty and military services. Under the manorial system, as in a village, a vassal to a bigger noble was still lord over his own subjects. The village and nearby farmlands were considered a manor, or the estate of the lord. During the eleventh century, the majority of the people on these manors were serfs, "bound to the soil" of their lord's estate. The lord-vassal relationship was one of a mutual contract. They each owed something to each other. For example, if a vassal ignored his due services, the lord had the right to enforce fulfillment. If the lord exceeded his lawful powers, his vassals could join together against him. The lord-serf relationship differed in that serfs could not leave the manor without their lord's permission and that instead of having to pay military dues, serfs had to work fields and give up part of their produce, or the food they harvested. They were alike in that feudal lords protected their vassals, and that manorial lords protected their serfs.

References

R. Palmer R., Joel Colton, and Lloyd Kramer. span class="auto-style1">A History of the Modern World. New York: Mcgraw-Hill, 2007.