Feudalism , also known as the feudal system , was a combination of legal, economic, military, cultural, and political customs that flourished in medieval Europe from the 9th to 15th centuries.
Broadly defined, it was a way of structuring society around relationships derived from the holding of land in exchange for service or labour. Although it is derived from the Latin word feodum or feudum fief , [ 2 ] which was used during the Medieval period, the term feudalism and the system it describes were not conceived of as a formal political system by the people who lived during the Middle Ages.
Brown 's "The Tyranny of a Construct" and Susan Reynolds 's Fiefs and Vassals , there has been ongoing inconclusive discussion among medieval historians as to whether feudalism is a useful construct for understanding medieval society. A broader definition, as described in Marc Bloch 's Feudal Society , [ 11 ] includes not only the obligations of the warrior nobility but the obligations of all three estates of the realm : the nobility, the clergy , and those who lived off their labour, most directly the peasantry , which was bound by a system of manorialism.
This order is often referred to as a feudal society , echoing Bloch's usage. Outside its European context, [ 4 ] the concept of feudalism can be extended to analogous social structures in other regions, most often in discussions of feudal Japan under the shoguns , and sometimes in discussions of the Zagwe dynasty in medieval Ethiopia , [ 12 ] which had some feudal characteristics sometimes called "semifeudal". The term feudalism has also been appliedโoften pejorativelyโto non-Western societies where institutions and attitudes similar to those in medieval Europe are perceived to prevail.
The applicability of the term feudalism has also been questioned in the context of some Central and Eastern European countries, such as Poland and Lithuania, with scholars observing that the medieval political and economic structure of those countries bears some, but not all, resemblances to the Western European societies commonly described as feudal. One theory about the origin of fehu was proposed by Johan Hendrik Caspar Kern in , [ 21 ] [ 22 ] being supported by, amongst others, William Stubbs [ 23 ] [ 24 ] and Marc Bloch.
