Feudal system definition. The contrast between city and countryside

K.V. Islanders
Lecture given at the Higher Party School of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, 1945.

1. The emergence of the feudal system

The era of feudalism in Western Europe covers a long period, approximately 13 centuries, starting from the 5th century. n. e. until the 18th century

The first stage - the emergence of feudalism - begins in the 5th century. and ends in the middle of the 11th century.

Feudalism arose from the ruins of the Roman slave empire. Some scientists explain its occurrence by the fact of the conquest of the Roman Empire by barbarians. This point of view is fundamentally wrong.

Conquest itself cannot create a new mode of production if conditions in material production and, above all, in the field of productive forces are not ripe for it.

Engels, criticizing the theory of violence, pointed out that the banker's fortune, consisting of papers, cannot be captured at all if the invader does not submit to the conditions of production and circulation of the conquered country.

Regarding the causes of the emergence of feudalism, Marx and Engels wrote:

“Feudalism was not at all transferred ready-made from Germany; its origin is rooted in the organization of military affairs among the barbarians at the time of the conquest itself, and this organization only after the conquest, thanks to the influence of the productive forces found in the conquered countries, developed into real feudalism.

Feudalism arose through the interaction between the new productive forces and elements of the new feudal relations that originated in the form of the colonate in the Roman Empire, and the military organization of the barbarian tribes that conquered it.

Slavery has outlived its usefulness, and the historical conditions for wage labor have not yet developed. A further step forward in the development of productive forces could be made in these conditions only on the basis of the economy of a small dependent producer, to a certain extent interested in his work.

At the end of the Roman Empire, the process of enslavement of the colons developed rapidly.

The colones were obliged to cultivate the landowner's land, pay him a significant share of the harvest they collected and, in addition, perform a number of duties: build and repair roads and bridges, serve with their horses and carts for the transportation of both people and goods, work in bakeries, etc. d. Colon became more and more attached to the earth, becoming, as the ancients put it, “a slave of the earth.” It was allowed to sell and buy land only together with colonies.

At the same time, the process of enslavement of artisans also took place.

With the cessation of the influx of slaves, enterprises engaged in the mining of iron ore, the production of all kinds of fabrics and luxury goods, as well as enterprises associated with supplying the population of cities, began to experience an acute shortage of labor.

A number of decrees were issued prohibiting artisans from leaving enterprises and changing their profession. The gunsmiths even had a special mark burned onto their hands to make it easier to catch them in case of escape.

There were other draconian measures aimed at enslaving artisans.

This is how the process of feudalization took place in the depths of the decaying Roman slave empire.

The collapse of the slave system was accompanied by a huge destruction of the productive forces. “The last centuries of the declining Roman Empire and its very conquest by the barbarians,” wrote Marx and Engels in “The German Ideology,” “destroyed a mass of productive forces; agriculture fell into decline, industry, due to lack of sales, withered away, trade froze or was forcibly interrupted, the rural and urban population declined.”

Agriculture became almost the only occupation of the population.

Thus, the Germanic tribes that conquered the Roman Empire found the germs of feudal relations there. These tribes themselves had a military organization. They were experiencing the stage of decomposition of the primitive communal system and the development of patriarchal slavery - that stage in the development of society when, according to Engels, war and military organization become normal functions of people's life, when war begins to be waged, “for the sake of robbery it becomes a constant trade.” The strengthening and development of the military organization of the barbarian tribes was facilitated by their immediate proximity to the Romans, with whom they waged constant wars. These wars, as we know, eventually led to the conquest of the Roman Empire by the barbarians.

On the ruins of the once mighty Roman Empire, many small states arose. The very fact of conquest greatly accelerated the decomposition of the tribal system, which was still preserved among the barbarians. The clan system was incompatible with the new relations established as a result of the barbarian conquest of the Roman Empire; “... it was impossible,” says Engels, “neither to accept the masses of the Romans into clan associations, nor to dominate them through the latter... The organs of the clan system had therefore to turn into organs of the state, and, moreover, under the pressure of circumstances, very quickly. But the closest representative of the conquering people was the military leader. Protecting the conquered region from internal and external danger required strengthening his power. The moment has come for the transformation of the power of a military leader into royal power, and this transformation has been accomplished.”

The military organization of the barbarian tribes made it easier for them to assimilate the new feudal relations developing in the territory of the former Roman Empire.

“The existing relations and the method of conquest determined by them,” say Marx and Engels, “developed, under the influence of the military system of the Germans, feudal property.”

The Germans, Huns and other tribes that conquered the Ancient Roman Empire appropriated and divided among themselves approximately 2/3 of the entire occupied land.

Part of the conquered lands remained in the common possession of individual tribes and clans. The kings appropriated these lands for themselves and began to distribute them to their warriors, confidants, etc.

“So,” says Engels, “the basis of a new nobility was created at the expense of the people.”

Royal power was still weak. Each large landowner had his own army, tried to be independent of royal power and sought to seize neighboring lands. Hence the constant wars and civil strife between individual states, as well as between individual feudal lords. The free peasantry suffered especially greatly from these civil strifes. By the beginning of the 9th century, free farmers were completely ruined. The feudal lords robbed them and seized their lands. The weak royal power could not protect them. On the other hand, the peasants themselves, driven to despair by robberies and extortions, were often forced to resort to the protection of noble feudal lords and the church. But they got this protection at an extremely high price - the price of renouncing their land ownership rights and surrendering themselves into bondage to noble and powerful patrons.

One of the enslavement letters relating to the history of the Frankish state of the 9th century says: “Mr. brother so-and-so... Everyone knows that extreme poverty and heavy worries have befallen me, and I have absolutely no way to live and dress. Therefore, at my request, you did not refuse, in my greatest poverty, to give me so many solids from your money, but I have absolutely nothing to pay these solids with. And so I asked you to complete and approve the enslavement of my free personality to you, so that from now on you will have complete freedom to do with me everything that you are authorized to do with your born slaves, namely: sell, barter, punish.”

So the peasants gradually lost not only their land, but also their personal freedom and turned into serfs.

A huge amount of land and serfs were concentrated in the hands of the church and monasteries. The Church was an authoritative ideological and political force that each feudal lord sought to have on his side in the fight against other feudal lords. The authority of the church was also necessary for the feudal lords in order to keep the serf peasantry in check. Because of this, kings and large feudal lords gave lands and estates to the church.

Many peasants were also forced into servitude to monasteries for the same reasons that pushed them into servitude to the feudal lords, with the only difference being that in this case enslavement took on a religious guise.

Thus, in one of the letters dating back to France in the 11th century, it speaks of a certain Rogers, descended from a free family, who, driven by the fear of God, having nothing more valuable to offer to the almighty God, gave himself up as a personal serfdom to St. Martin.

As a result, the church in feudal society grew into a huge, not only ideological, but also economic and political force.

This is how the feudal mode of production developed in Western Europe.

The process of feudalization in Russia began in the 11th century. Before this, the land was at the disposal of peasant agricultural communities.

The community was a collection of several large patriarchal families. Some families numbered 50 or more people. This number of families was dictated by the low level of development of productive forces. The system of shifting and shifting agriculture, which required colossal labor, prevailed.

Until the XV-XVI centuries. Rus' was a collection of separate independent principalities. There were constant civil strife and wars between the princes.

Under these conditions, life was extremely difficult for the peasantry. It was completely defenseless, was subjected to numerous exactions, suffered from endless violence and wars that took place between the princes. This forced the peasants to go under the “high hand” of some prince or monastery. As a result, the “patron” - a prince, boyar or monastery - took the peasants’ land and turned the peasants into dependent people, serfs, obliged to work for him.

Usury was also a means of enslaving the peasants.

As a result, the princes and boyars became the owners of huge estates, numbering thousands of acres, and the monasteries turned into huge economic enterprises, possessing colossal land wealth and owning a huge number of serfs.

In the 16th century in many principalities of ancient Rus', from 60 to 95% of the entire territory was in the local ownership of princes, boyars, and monasteries.

Until the middle of the 15th century. the peasants were not yet attached to the land. They had the right to move from one landowner to another. In 1447, Ivan III issued a law according to which a peasant could move from one landowner to another only in the fall, after completing field work, on the so-called St. George’s Day. During the reign of Ivan IV, at the end of the 16th century, this right was taken away from the peasants - they were completely attached to the land and turned into serfs.

2. The essence of feudal exploitation

Under the feudal system basis of industrial relations is the feudal lord's ownership of the means of production and incomplete ownership of the production worker - the serf, whom the feudal lord cannot kill, but whom he can sell or buy. Along with feudal property, there is the sole ownership of the peasant and artisan in the instruments of production and in his private economy, based on personal labor.

The difference between feudal exploitation and slave exploitation, therefore, lay, firstly, in the incomplete ownership of the feudal lord over the production worker - the serf peasant and, secondly, in the fact that the serf peasant was the sole owner of the tools of production and his private economy, based on personal labor

Thus, the enslaved individual peasant economy formed an organic part of the feudal mode of production, in contrast to the slaveholding one, where it was a special way of life.

The main means of production under feudalism was land. The land was the property of the feudal lords. It split into two parts: the land of the lord and the land of the peasants. The feudal lord's estate with all services was located on the lord's land. Not far from the manor's estate there was peasant land, that is, land that the feudal lord provided for the use of the peasants.

Gibbins in his “Industrial History of England” draws the following features of an English estate of the 11th-13th centuries.

The land around the manor house (castle) absolutely belonged to the lord and was worked by slaves or obliged villagers under his personal supervision or under the supervision of the headman. All other lands that were in the use of obligated villagers were called quitrent lands.

The arable land, which was in common use by the obligated villagers, was divided into many strips located in different fields.

The peasants used the pastures together.

The forest and floodplains belonged to the lord. The lord charged a special fee for their use.

In addition to stripes in a common field, some peasants could use separate plots in a specially fenced field, which the manor lord always reserved for himself and rented out in parts for a high fee.

On heathland (uncultivated land), peasants enjoyed the right of pasture, and could also dig peat and cut down bushes.

The fortress village was organized like an agricultural community. The feudal lord had a decisive influence on the affairs of the community.

“When a feudal lord, spiritual or secular,” says Engels, “acquired a peasant estate, he at the same time acquired the rights in the mark associated with this ownership. Thus, the new landowners became members of the mark and initially enjoyed only equal rights within the mark along with other free and dependent members of the community, even if they were their own serfs. But soon, despite the stubborn resistance of the peasants, they acquired privileges in the mark in many places, and often they even managed to subordinate it to their master’s power. And yet the old community-mark continued to exist, albeit under the lord’s tutelage.”

The feudal lord appropriated the surplus labor of the serf peasant in the form of feudal rent. A distinctive feature of feudal rent is that it includes all the surplus labor of the serf, and often a significant part of the necessary labor.

Feudal rent went through three stages in its development - labor rent, product rent and money rent. The first two forms of rent are characteristic of early feudalism; money rent becomes dominant at the stage of decomposition of feudalism. Let us first focus on working rent.

As working rent, or corvée, the feudal lord directly appropriated the surplus labor of the serf peasant.

A serf peasant, for example, worked half the time for himself on allotment land, and the other half on the lordly land for the benefit of the landowner. The land allotment in this case was, as Lenin put it, a form of wages in kind. The feudal lord, providing a plot of land for the use of the serf peasant, gave him the opportunity to reproduce his labor force, necessary to create a surplus product in favor of the feudal lord.

Thus, the labor of the serf peasant for the feudal lord and for himself was strictly divided in space and time.

The type of work that a serf peasant was supposed to do was extremely diverse: plowing, harrowing and other agricultural work - transporting agricultural products, logs, firewood, hay, straw, bricks, sawing timber, clearing barnyards, repairing buildings, making ice, etc.

Since the work of a serf peasant for a landowner was forced labor, here, as in a slave-owning society, one of the acute problems was the problem of organizing the peasant’s labor.

The peasants had no internal motivation to increase the productivity of their labor when cultivating the landowner's land. Therefore, the feudal lord resorted to means based on intimidation, such as: the overseer's stick, a fine, assignment to work overtime. “The feudal organization of social labor,” says Lenin, “was maintained by the discipline of the stick, in the extreme darkness and downtroddenness of the working people, who were robbed and abused by a handful of landowners.”

Hence, one of the central figures of the feudal estate was the clerk - the immediate superior of the courtyard people and peasants.

Labor rent, or corvee, corresponds to the earliest stage in the development of feudalism. With the growth of productive forces, labor rent was replaced food rent or quitrent.

What is the essence of quitrent and how it differs from corvee?

If under corvée the landowner appropriated the surplus labor of the serf peasant, then under quitrent he directly appropriates the surplus product, i.e. the peasant is obliged to annually deliver to the landowner a certain amount of food in kind for free. Corvée required the most vigilant supervision of the landowner or his manager over the labor of the serfs and was associated with a whole system of measures based on intimidation. During quitrent, the landowner demanded that the peasant supply a certain amount of products, giving him the discretion to distribute his working time. Replacing corvee with quitrent was a progressive phenomenon for that time.

However, the quitrent reached such enormous proportions that it often absorbed not only the entire surplus product of the serf peasant, but also a significant part of the necessary product. To pay the quitrent, the peasant had to lead a half-starved existence. The landowner used the most cruel measures to extort quitrent from the serf peasant.

Already under the corvee system, there was property inequality between individual peasant families. It stemmed from the individual ownership of the instruments of production by serfs. Those who had the best tools and had more workers in the family were in a better financial situation. This inequality intensified with the transition to the quitrent system.

For the more prosperous peasantry, the quitrent opened up certain opportunities for enriching and expanding their economy. Therefore, with the transition from corvee to quitrent, property stratification increases in the feudal village.

The development of commodity-money relations leads to the fact that corvée and quitrent are replaced cash rent. Money rent, as we will see later, already marks the period of the disintegration of feudalism and the development in its depths of the capitalist mode of production.

The indicated forms of feudal rent did not exhaust the ways in which feudal lords appropriated the surplus product of the serf peasant.

The feudal lord, taking advantage of the monopoly on some means of production, such as mills, forges, etc., imposed an additional tax on the serfs in his favor.

He obliged the peasants dependent on him to use the services only of his enterprises, for example, to grind bread only at his mill. He took a significant portion of the bread for grinding. In case of violation of this rule, the peasant was obliged to pay a fine to the feudal lord. The feudal lord could confiscate all the ground grain and even the horse that transported this grain.

Particularly difficult and humiliating for the serfs were such privileges of the feudal lord as the right of the “first night,” according to which every girl getting married had to be given first of all to the landowner; the right of the “dead hand”, which granted the landowner the right to inherit part of the property remaining after the death of the serf; the right of trial and punishment: imposition of fines and corporal punishment.

The serf peasant was obliged to give part of his product to the church. “The peasant,” says Engels, “bears the weight of the entire social pyramid: princes, officials, nobility, priests, patricians and burghers. Whether he belonged to a prince, an imperial baron, a bishop, a monastery or a city, he was treated everywhere as a thing or a beast of burden, or worse... Most of his time he had to work on his master's estate; and from what he managed to work out during the few free hours for himself, he had to pay tithes, cessions, levies, taxes... local and imperial taxes.”

Feudal exploitation, like slave-owning, was based on direct relations non-economic domination and submission.

This non-economic coercion was expressed in the fact that the serf did not have the right to dispose of his labor force, was attached to the landowner's land and was obliged to work for the landowner. The landowner had the right to force the serf peasant to work by violent means, to carry out trials and reprisals against him.

Marx pointed out that under feudalism, personal dependence characterizes the social relations of material production to the same extent as other spheres of life built on this basis.

The feudal economy in its overwhelming part, especially in the initial period of its development, was an economy natural type. It satisfied its needs mainly with its own production.

The craft was an auxiliary production for agriculture. There were serf craftsmen on the estates: potters, coopers, turners, blacksmiths, tanners, carpenters, etc.

Those few jobs that could not be done by the serfs' own forces were carried out by itinerant artisans who moved from one feudal estate to another.

Only a small part of the product went on sale. Trade was extremely poorly developed and was predominantly foreign. She had not yet penetrated deep inside the feudal estate. The main objects of trade were luxury goods: rare fabrics, weapons, jewelry, spices, etc., which were brought mainly from the East and bought by feudal lords. Trade was carried out only by traveling merchants. In those days it was often associated with enormous difficulties. The caravan had to travel with armed guards to protect against attacks from bandits and knights.

The essentially subsistence economy of the feudal estate was based on low production technology. Agricultural implements were primitive: plow, harrow, hoe, sickle, flail, etc. were the main tools of production. Shifting and two-field farming systems prevailed.

Due to poor farming technology, there were constant crop failures, accompanied by famine and epidemics that claimed a huge number of lives.

Lenin characterizes the feudal mode of production with the following features: “... firstly, the dominance of natural economy. The serf estate was supposed to be a self-sufficient, closed whole, in a very weak connection with the rest of the world... Secondly, for such an economy it is necessary that the direct producer be endowed with the means of production in general and land in particular; not only that it should be attached to the land, since otherwise the landowner is not guaranteed labor... Thirdly, the condition for such an economic system is the personal dependence of the peasant on the landowner. If the landowner did not have direct power over the personality of the peasant, then he could not force a person endowed with land and running his own farm to work for himself. Therefore, “non-economic coercion” is necessary... Finally, fourthly, the condition and consequence of the economic system described was the extremely low and routine state of technology, because farming was in the hands of small peasants, oppressed by need, humiliated by personal dependence and mental darkness.”

The feudal mode of production was more progressive than the slave mode and opened up more scope for the development of productive forces.

Advantage of the feudal system economy before the slave system was that it contained some incentive that pushed the serf peasant towards the development of his production, while the slave system killed any incentive for the slave to increase the intensity and productivity of his labor.

Some interest of the serf peasant in labor stemmed from the fact that part of the time he worked for himself and was the owner of the tools of labor and his private individual farm. He tried to use that part of the time that the serf peasant worked for himself on allotment land with the greatest intensity and productivity.

Radishchev in “Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow” cites a typical conversation with a peasant whom he met on a hot holiday day in a field plowing the land with “great care” and turning a plow with amazing ease. Radishchev immediately drew the conclusion from this that this was not the master’s land, and asked the peasant whether this was how he worked for his master. The peasant answered him that it would be a sin to work for the master like that, since the landowner on the arable land has “a hundred hands for one mouth,” and he, the peasant, has “two for seven mouths.” “Even if you stretch yourself out at a gentleman’s job,” he concluded, “they won’t say thank you.”

This opportunity to work part of the time on allotment land for one’s own benefit was the advantage of the feudal mode of production over the slave method.

Marx says: “... the productivity of the remaining days of the week, which the direct producer himself may have at his disposal, is a variable quantity that necessarily develops with the growth of his experience - just like the new needs that arise in him, just like the expansion market for his product, the increasing security of using this part of his labor power will encourage him to increase the tension of his labor power, and it should not be forgotten that the use of this labor power is by no means limited to agriculture, but also includes rural home industry. Here the opportunity for a certain economic development is given, of course, depending on more or less favorable circumstances...”

Economic interest forced landowners to take this factor into account. Landowners, like slave owners, were guided in their economic activities by the desire to extract as much surplus product as possible from the labor of serfs. But in order to satisfy this desire, the landowners were forced, along with the development of the feudal economy, to transfer the serf peasant from corvee to quitrent, from quitrent to cash rent, and to use his personal interest in increasing the intensity and productivity of his labor.

The landowner appropriated the results of the more intensive and productive labor of the serf peasant for his own benefit, intensifying his exploitation in every possible way.

The feudal economic system, in addition to some interest of the serf in his labor, had other advantages arising from large land ownership.

Large landed property, which was the basis for the exploitation of large masses of the serf peasantry, opened up the possibility of a significant division of labor within the feudal estate, both in agriculture and crafts.

This is evidenced by the instructions of the Frankish king Charles, sent by him to the managers of the royal estates.

This instruction says:

"1. We wish that our estates, which we have designated to serve our own needs, will entirely serve us, and not other people...

20. Let every steward ensure that food flows in abundance to the [lord’s] court throughout the year...

35. We wish that lard be made from fat sheep, as well as from pigs; in addition, let them keep at least two fattened bulls on each estate, [so that] either they can be used for lard on the spot, or brought to us...

38. So that we always have enough fattened geese and fattened chickens for our needs...

44. From Lenten... annually send for our table, namely: vegetables, fish, cheese, butter, honey, mustard, vinegar, millet, millet, dried and fresh herbs, radishes and turnips, wax, soap and other small things...

45. So that every manager has under his authority good craftsmen, namely: blacksmiths, silversmiths and goldsmiths... bird catchers, soap makers, brewers... bakers... people who are good at weaving snares for hunting and nets for fishing and catching birds, as well as other employees..."

From the instructions it is clear what an extensive system of various specialties was available on Charles’s estates. This system pursued the task of comprehensively satisfying the needs of the feudal lord. The possibility of division of labor within the feudal estate was the advantage of the feudal economic system over the individual peasant farm.

Such were the possibilities for the development of the productive forces inherent in the feudal mode of production.

At the same time, feudalism, which replaced the slave system, was unable to immediately develop its advantages over the slave system and, consequently, the possibilities for developing the productive forces that were inherent in it.

This is explained by the fact that feudalism was based on non-economic coercion, on small enslaved peasant farming with its extremely low technology.

Nevertheless, although slowly, the growth of productive forces still occurred under the influence of feudal production relations. The advantages of feudalism over slavery were gradually revealed.

Based on the incentives for the development of productive forces that were inherent in the feudal mode of production, around the 8th and 9th centuries, in the so-called Carolingian era, a significant step forward was already taken in the development of agriculture.

If before this the dominant farming systems were fallow and two-field, now it is emerging in many places transition to three-field. Changes are also taking place in production techniques. Among these changes, especially important were the appearance of a plow with an iron share and knives and a harrow with iron teeth instead of wooden ones. Wheat, all kinds of horticultural crops and viticulture are widespread. Livestock farming, and especially horse breeding, was developing, which was associated with the military service of the feudal lords. The development of livestock farming leads to the expansion of meadow farming. At the same time, sheep breeding is developing in a number of areas due to the growth of wool production. All these are indicators of the growth of productive forces in agriculture.

Marx, speaking about the possibilities for the development of productive forces inherent in the feudal mode of production, pointed out that the peasant had the opportunity to engage in domestic industry in the form of various crafts. Indeed, the growth of the productive forces of feudal society in the countryside occurred not only through raising the level of technology and developing the division of labor between various branches of agriculture, but also through the development of a number of crafts.

The development of the productive forces of feudal society took place in an antagonistic form. The feudal lord, as we have seen, used some of the interest of the serf in his labor to intensify his exploitation. This led to more and more aggravation of the contradictions between landowners and serfs, to numerous peasant uprisings with which the history of feudalism was full. As feudalism developed, the contradiction between feudal property and craft became more and more acute. This is a contradiction around the 10th and 11th centuries. develops into an opposition between city and countryside, and all further development of feudalism proceeds on the basis of this opposition.

Marx pointed out that in the Middle Ages the village is the starting point of history, the further development of which then takes place in the form of the opposition between city and countryside.

3. The growth of the social division of labor, the development of trade, the formation of cities

In the 11th century The process of establishing the feudal mode of production in the most important countries of Western Europe was basically completed. Feudalism entered its period of greatest prosperity. This period lasts from the 11th to the 15th centuries. The development of productive forces both in the field of agriculture and crafts, achieved at the previous stage, created the preconditions for the growth of the social division of labor and the formation of the internal market.

The process of separation of crafts from agriculture and the formation of cities began, which played a huge role in the development and decay of feudalism.

For the time being, the craft could develop within the boundaries of the feudal estate. Then the moment came when it outgrew the boundaries of the feudal estate. These frameworks became too tight for him. Further development of the craft required the distribution of its products beyond the feudal estate and the development of the domestic market.

It began with the fact that some of the artisans, with the permission of the feudal lord, went to waste trade. Moving from one estate to another, artisans felt felt boots on the spot, painted canvases, etc., and after a while they returned to their landowner and paid him a certain amount of money. The further growth of productive forces led to the emergence of crafts working for the market. Markets formed around the estates of the largest feudal lords and monasteries. Cities began to be created here. The old cities, which had fallen into complete decline and desolation after the collapse of the Roman Empire, also began to revive. The medieval city was a fortified place with a fortress wall, rampart and moat. Usually, during hostilities, the surrounding population found refuge behind the fortress walls. On the other hand, the city was a craft and trade center. Craftsmen and traders flocked here. Cities willingly accepted fugitive serf artisans. No wonder they said in the Middle Ages that “city air makes people free.”

Engels says: “...new cities were created; always surrounded by protective walls and ditches, they were fortresses much more powerful than noble castles, since they could only be taken with the help of a significant army. Behind these walls and ditches, medieval craft developed, although quite imbued with the burgher-guild spirit and limitations, the first capital was accumulated, and the need arose for trade relations between cities and the rest of the world...”

The population of medieval cities was dominated by artisans and traders.

The economic basis of the medieval city was crafts and trade.

However, the urban population did not completely break ties with agriculture. Within the city there were fields and vegetable gardens, livestock were kept, etc. The internal organization of the craft bore a feudal imprint.

The industrial population of cities was organized into workshops. The workshop was a union that included all artisans of one or more related crafts living in the same city. Persons outside the workshop could not engage in this craft. Each workshop had its own elected board and its own charter.

The workshop regulated craft production in the most detailed way: it established the number of workers in each workshop, the price and quality of the goods, wages and working hours.

To illustrate, here are excerpts from the French statute of wool weavers dating back to the 13th-14th centuries:

"1. No one can be a wool weaver in Paris unless he buys the craft from the king...,

8. Each wool weaver in his house can have no more than one apprentice, but he cannot have him for less than 4 years of service and for 4 Parisian livres...

32. All cloth must be entirely made of wool and as good at the beginning as in the middle; if they are not, the one to whom they belong is subject to a fine of 5 sous for each piece of cloth...

35. No weaver, no dyer, no fuller can set prices in his workshops thanks to any community. ..

47. ...No one from the above-mentioned workshop should begin work before sunrise under threat of a fine...

51. Journeyman weavers must leave work as soon as the first bell rings for Vespers...”

The workshop took over the supply of raw materials to craft enterprises and organized general warehouses.

City administrations provided the guilds with a monopoly on the production of trade in the cities.

Unusually developed regulation of production and monopoly - these were the main features of the urban craft system in the Middle Ages. In addition, the workshop was a mutual aid organization and a religious corporation.

Each workshop during the war was a separate combat detachment.

The structure of the urban craft class bore the imprint of the feudal hierarchy.

Within this class, a system of journeymen and apprentices developed, creating a hierarchy in the cities similar to that of the rural population.

The members of the workshop were divided into categories: masters, apprentices, apprentices. The guild master had his own workshop and worked mainly to order for a certain small circle of buyers or for the local market. He was the owner of the means of production: a workshop, craft tools, raw materials, as well as the owner of handicraft products. This resulted from the nature of craft tools, which were designed for individual use.

“Means of labor - land, agricultural tools, workshops, craft tools - were means of labor for individuals, designed only for individual use, and, therefore, the necessities remained small, dwarf, limited. But that’s why they, as a rule, belonged to the manufacturer himself.”

The nature of the tools of labor determined the very size of the craft enterprise. It included from two to five workers: members of the master’s family, students and journeymen. Due to the small scale of production, the master was forced to participate in production with personal labor.

Thus, his ownership of handicraft products was based on personal labor. True, the master derived a certain income from the labor of apprentices and apprentices.

He usually gave his apprentice a table and an apartment in his house and also paid him a little extra money. The labor of journeymen and apprentices created more value than what it cost the master to maintain them.

However, the superior position of the master in relation to apprentices and apprentices was based not so much on ownership of the means of production as on his skill.

Marx notes that the relationship of a master to his students and apprentices is not that of a capitalist, but that of a master of a craft. His superior position in the corporation, and at the same time in relation to journeymen and apprentices, rests on his own mastery of the craft.

This was again explained by the nature of the craft technique. Manual labor dominated. The division of labor within the workshop was extremely poorly developed due to the small scale of production. The artisan typically produced the entire product from start to finish. Hence, the personal skill of the artisan, the ability to wield a tool, and professional training were of particular importance.

The craftsman, as Lafargue puts it, “had his craft in his fingers and his brain”; “...every craft was a mystery, the secrets of which were revealed to initiates only gradually.” The craftsman was a true master of his craft. Many works of artisans are still wonderful examples of genuine folk art.

Therefore, the craft required a long apprenticeship.

Thus, although the exploitation of journeymen and apprentices took place in the medieval craft, it played a relatively minor role.

The purpose of craft production, the purpose of the master’s economic activity was not so much the pursuit of money, enrichment, but rather “an existence befitting his position.”

“The limitation of production within the framework of a given consumption as a whole,” says Marx, “is the law here.”

For apprentices and apprentices, working for a master was a temporary condition. After working for several years with a master, the student took the apprentice exam. Then, as an apprentice, he was obliged to serve as a hired master for a certain number of years. After this, the apprentice passed the exam to become a master and received the right to independently conduct business. Thus, every student and apprentice expected to subsequently become a master.

Therefore, in the first stages of the development of the guild craft, despite the exploitation of journeymen and apprentices by masters, the contradiction of their interests did not receive much development. However, as commodity production grew, apprentices and apprentices increasingly turned into workers, and the contradictions between masters, on the one hand, and apprentices and apprentices, on the other, became increasingly aggravated.

What caused the guild organization of urban crafts?

On the one hand, the guild system and corporate ownership in cities reflected the impact of the feudal structure of land ownership.

Marx and Engels write in The German Ideology that “... the feudal structure of land ownership corresponded in the cities to corporate ownership and the feudal organization of crafts.”

On the other hand, the guild organization of crafts was caused by the development of commodity production in the depths of feudalism.

The development of commercial farming gave rise to competition between artisans. By creating guild organizations, the city's artisans primarily sought in this way to protect themselves from the competition of their fellow craftsmen, as well as from the competition of serfs who ran away from their masters and sought refuge in the cities. This competition was felt especially strongly due to the limited trade relations and the narrowness of the market.

By this, the guilds actually sought to prevent the process of differentiation of artisans, inevitably generated by the development of commodity production and competition between artisans. In conditions of relatively weak development of the commercial economy and the narrowness of the local market, the workshops managed to limit competition for the time being. But as soon as the development of commodity production moved beyond the local market and began to work on a wider market, a wider field for competition opened up and the process of increased differentiation among artisans began, despite guild restrictions.

Thus, we can come to the conclusion that one of the reasons that gave rise to guilds was the development of commodity production, but, on the other hand, they could exist and limit competition due to the insufficient development of commodity production.

A number of other additional reasons pushed artisans towards the organization of guilds, such as: general conditions for the production and exchange of manufactured goods, the need for common warehouses, trade buildings, and joint protection of the interests of a given craft from the encroachments of other crafts.

Among the factors that contributed to the organization of guilds, a significant role was played by the continuous wars that cities had to wage with feudal lords.

Subsequently, one of the most important tasks of the guilds was the struggle of masters against journeymen and apprentices.

Marx and Engels in The German Ideology give the following explanation of the reasons that gave rise to the guild organization of crafts in a medieval city. “Competition of fugitive serfs constantly arriving in the city; the continuous war of the countryside against the city, and consequently the need to organize an urban military force; bonds of common ownership of a particular specialty; the need for common buildings for the sale of their goods - artisans at that time were also traders - and the associated exclusion of outsiders from these buildings; the opposition of interests of individual crafts to each other; the need to protect a hard-won craft; feudal organization of the entire country - these were the reasons for the unification of workers of each individual craft into workshops.”

In conditions of limited production relations - the dominance of craft technology, a poorly developed division of labor and a narrow market - guilds played a progressive role.

By protecting guild crafts from the competition of fugitive serfs, organizing the supply of artisans with raw materials, and taking care of the production of high-quality products, the guilds thereby contributed to the strengthening and development of urban crafts and the improvement of their technology.

The situation changed dramatically as soon as the development of commodity production put on the order of the day the question of the transition from craft first to manufacture, and then to factory. The workshops then turned into a brake on the development of productive forces.

The cities were not only craft centers, but also trading centers. The trading population was grouped into guilds similar to craft guilds.

Thus, Engels writes about Venetian and Genoese merchants that they were organized into trading communities. They agreed among themselves on prices for goods, on the quality of goods, which was certified by imposing a mark. Those merchants who violated the established prices were fined, or they were subject to a boycott, which in those conditions threatened complete ruin.

In foreign harbors, for example in Alexandria, Constantinople and others, the trading community had its own courtyard, consisting of living quarters, restaurants, a warehouse, exhibition space and a store.

Merchant capital under feudalism acted as an intermediary in the exchange of surplus product appropriated by the feudal lord for all kinds of luxury goods, exported largely from eastern countries; on the other hand, it acted as an intermediary in the exchange of products of the feudal peasant and the guild artisan.

Trade profits were made through unequal exchange, that is, buying goods below cost or selling at prices exceeding cost, or both.

“Pure independent commercial profit seems prima facie impossible,” says Marx, “if products are sold at their value. Buy cheap in order to sell dearly - this is the law of trade."

Since feudalism was mainly a subsistence type of economy, the sale of products at their cost was of secondary importance.

Ultimately, the source of trade profit was the labor of small producers - artisans and peasants.

Merchants, moneylenders, wealthy homeowners and owners of urban land, and the most prosperous craftsmen made up the urban elite, the so-called patriciate. Their strength lay in wealth. Even the richest master represented only small-scale craft production, where the possibilities for accumulating wealth were very limited due to the small scale of production. On the contrary, commercial capital, being an intermediary in exchange between city and countryside, had the opportunity to accumulate large amounts of money through the exploitation of the mass of small producers in both city and countryside. The same applies to usurious capital.

The following data dating back to the 14th-15th centuries can give an idea of ​​the accumulation of wealth among merchants and moneylenders in the medieval cities of Germany and Switzerland:

From these data it is clear that merchants and moneylenders, making up a relatively very small percentage of the urban population, concentrated in their hands from 50 to 75% of all urban property.

It is not surprising that this wealthy elite also had political power. In her hands were city government, finances, courts, and military power. This gave her the opportunity to shift the entire burden of the tax burden and other duties onto artisans.

So, the growth of productive forces, the growth of the social division of labor led to the fact that the feudal world split into an agricultural fortress village and a craft and trading city.

With the formation of cities in feudal society, a new economic force arose, the force commodity production. Cities assumed the leading role in the development of the productive forces of the feudal mode of production. The relatively rapid development of cities, the growth of crafts and trade contrasted with the immobility and routine that dominated the feudal countryside.

The urban population grew relatively quickly at the expense of the rural population. Thus, in England, the urban population grew from 75,000 in 1086 to 168,720 in 1377, and the percentage of the urban population to the total population of England over the same period increased from 5 to 12. Nevertheless, even by the end of the Middle Ages, urban residents made up a relatively small percentage of the entire population.

4. The contrast between city and countryside under feudalism

The peculiarity of the relationship between city and village under feudalism is that politically the village dominates the city, and economically the city exploits the village represented by the mass of the serf peasantry. “If in the Middle Ages,” says Marx, “the village exploits the city politically everywhere where feudalism was not broken by the exclusive development of cities, as in Italy, then the city everywhere and without exception exploits the village economically with its monopoly prices, its tax system, its guild system , with his direct merchant deception and his usury."

What is the political dominance of the countryside over the city under feudalism?

First of all, cities arise on the land of the feudal lord and at first are his property. The feudal lord collects taxes from the population of the city, obliges them to bear all kinds of duties, and carries out trials and reprisals against them. Moreover, the feudal lord has the right to inherit, sell and mortgage the city that belonged to him.

For example, the city of Arles in the 12th century. was divided into four parts, separated by a fence and belonging to four owners: one part belonged to the local archbishop, the other part belonged to the same archbishop, together with the Count of Provence. The city market belonged to the Viscount of Marseilles, part of the city belonged to the city judges. One can imagine what complex relationships there were in this city, which in parts belonged to different owners.

Cities arise and develop in a fierce struggle with the feudal lords. The power of the feudal lords hindered the development of crafts and trade in the cities. Cities tried in every possible way to free themselves from this heavy feudal dependence. They fought to give them self-government rights- for the right to court, mint coins, for exemption from numerous taxes, customs duties, etc. In a number of feudal states (France, Italy), cities that acquired independence from the feudal lords or a certain autonomy were then called communes.

“It’s funny,” Marx writes in a letter to Engels, “that the word “communio” often caused the same abuse as communism in our days. So, for example, priest Guibert Nozhaisky writes: “Commune is a new and disgusting word.”

From time to time, bloody wars were fought between the city and the feudal lords. Often cities bought off the feudal lords with money and in this way acquired independence. As the economic and military strength of the cities grew, they more and more threw off the burden of heavy political dependence on the feudal lords and became independent. At the same time, the struggle of cities against feudal lords increasingly turned into a struggle against the feudal mode of production itself.

Thus, the opposition between city and countryside was primarily expressed in the antagonism between the feudal lords, who sought to maintain their political dominance over the city and use it for all kinds of extortions, and the cities, which sought to achieve independence from the feudal lords.

The scattered feudal peasantry in the market was opposed by merchants and artisans, organized into merchant guilds and craft guilds.

Thanks to the union in a workshop, artisans had the opportunity to act as a united front in the city market against the fragmented and unorganized village and raise prices for handicraft products.

At the same time, in order to strengthen their monopoly position, the guilds fought in every possible way against the development of crafts in the countryside, sometimes not stopping at the violent destruction of village craft workshops. To an even greater extent than the guilds, representatives of merchant capital had the opportunity to inflate prices for urban production items. Merchant capital developed primarily through the brutal exploitation of the small producer - the feudal peasant. The merchant bought products from the peasant at low prices and sold him handicraft products at high prices.

In this way, commercial capital appropriated a significant part of the peasant’s labor, taking advantage of his economic dependence, ignorance of the market, and inability to directly communicate with the consumers of his products. But not only this, merchant capital supplied the feudal lords mainly with luxury goods, which the feudal lords had to pay at a very high price. In this way, merchant capital appropriated a significant share of their rent, which ultimately led to increased exploitation of the serfs.

The medieval city also exploited the countryside through usury.

“...The characteristic forms of existence of usurious capital in the times preceding the capitalist mode of production,” says Marx, “were two. ...These two forms are as follows: Firstly, usury by providing money loans to spendthrift nobles, mainly landowners; Secondly, usury by providing cash loans to small producers who own the conditions of their work, including the artisan, but especially the peasant ... ".

The more the village was drawn into commodity-money relations, the more the peasant fell into the net of the moneylender, who sucked all the life juice out of him.

Merchant and usury capital also exploited village crafts.

Medium and small feudal lords and knights also fell into the networks of trade and usury capital. However, even in this case, the same serfs had to pay off their debts.

The usurious interest reached monstrous proportions.

Cities were centers of feudal power and, moreover, not only secular, but also spiritual. As centers of concentration of the apparatus of secular and spiritual power, the cities exploited the countryside with the help of countless taxes, duties and all other levies paid by the peasants in favor of the secular and spiritual feudal lords.

These were the forms of economic exploitation of the countryside by the city under the feudal system.

The development trend was that cities, as they grew and strengthened their economic and military power, increasingly freed themselves from feudal dependence and subjugated the countryside.

“The struggle of the bourgeoisie against the feudal nobility,” says Engels, “is a struggle of the city against the countryside, of industry against land ownership, of the money economy against the natural economy, and the decisive weapon of the bourgeoisie in this struggle was the means at its disposal economic power, which continuously increased due to the development of industry, first handicraft, and then turned into manufacture, and due to the expansion of trade."

5. Further growth of trade in feudal society. The Crusades and their influence on the development of the economy of feudalism

The separation of city from countryside, being an expression of the growth of productive forces, leads to a significant development of both internal and external trade in feudal society.

Internal trade was conducted between urban artisans, on the one hand, and peasants and feudal lords, on the other. The centers of this trade were cities. Craftsmen brought their industrial products there, and feudal lords and serfs brought agricultural products there. This internal local market covered through barter connections estates and villages located at approximately such a distance that if you leave them for the city in the morning, you can return back in the evening.

The further growth of productive forces and the social division of labor also caused a revival of foreign trade. This revival of trade begins primarily on the old exchange routes, which were laid out during the era of the dominance of the slave system. Italy lay on a large trade route from East to West. Therefore, cities such as Venice and Genoa became the largest centers of trade.

Until the 11th century. An active role in foreign trade belonged mainly to Arabs and Byzantine merchants, who brought oriental spices and luxury goods to Western Europe, and took away raw materials, grain, and slaves.

In the 11th century The situation in the field of foreign trade has changed greatly. An active role in foreign trade began to increasingly shift to European merchants. In this regard, interest in eastern countries has greatly increased. Travel to the East began.

These trips to the East, which are based on economic and trade interests, are at the same time covered by religious motives - a pilgrimage to the “Holy Sepulcher,” which, according to legend, was supposedly located in Palestine.

Thus, the growth of productive forces, the development of crafts and agriculture necessitated the revival of trade relations between Western Europe and the East. Meanwhile, a very serious obstacle arose in the development of these relations.

The Turks captured the Baghdad Caliphate and a significant part of the Byzantine possessions. This seizure slowed down trade between East and West and made pilgrimage to Jerusalem extremely difficult, which was the external reason for the emergence of the idea of ​​​​the Crusades.

The crusades were primarily interested in Western European trading capital, and in particular the cities of Venice and Genoa, through which trade with the East was conducted.

In addition, large feudal lords and numerous knights pinned their hope of capturing new lands on the crusades. A major role was played by the so-called primordium, i.e., such an order of inheritance in which property passes after the death of the feudal lord to the eldest son, and the remaining children are deprived of the right to inherit. Thanks to this, a layer of knights is created, deprived of land, warlike, eager to seize lands, greedy for all sorts of adventures.

The Catholic Church gave this entire movement a religious shell, declaring its goal to be the fight against infidels for the liberation of the “Holy Sepulcher.”

As the ideological leader, the ruler of the souls of the feudal world, the Catholic Church sought to expand its spiritual power by subordinating the Mohammedan world to its influence. As a large landowner, she hoped to expand her land holdings with the help of the Crusades, and as a large merchant, she was interested in developing trade with the East.

The growth of the domestic and foreign markets in another way contributed to the popularity of the idea of ​​​​crusades. The development of commodity relations and the growing opportunities for selling surplus products on the market led to increased exploitation of the peasantry by feudal lords. If we add to this the constant hunger strikes and epidemics, which were the result of low technology and inhumane exploitation of the peasantry, then the desire of the peasants to take part in the crusades in order to escape from the unbearable grip of feudal exploitation becomes understandable.

All these reasons, ultimately rooted in the economy of the feudal society of that era, led to the Crusades.

The Crusades began in 1096 and ended in 1270. There were eight Crusades. In 1099, the Crusaders captured Jerusalem and significant territory that belonged to the Turks. On the occupied territory they founded a number of cities and principalities. Quite a lively trade began between Western Europe and the East, from which Genoa and Venice primarily benefited, having allocated large funds for the crusades.

However, happiness soon changed for the crusaders. They began to suffer defeats. The last, eighth campaign, which took place in 1270, ended in the defeat and death of the crusaders.

The Crusades had a huge impact on the further economic development of Western Europe. Firstly, the crusaders became acquainted with the achievements of eastern technology, borrowed a lot from the eastern peoples and thereby contributed to the more rapid development of productive forces.

Secondly, familiarization with Eastern culture contributed to the expansion of the demands and needs of the ruling classes of feudal society. And this increase in needs, in turn, gave impetus to the development of the corresponding branches of production and trade.

Thirdly, the Crusades caused a revival of trade with the countries of the East, from where spices, dyes, all kinds of incense, medicines, etc. were brought. The centers of this trade on the Mediterranean Sea were Venice, Genoa, Florence and other cities. Other centers of foreign trade were the cities of Hamburg, Lubeck, Bremen, Cologne, Magdeburg, Frankfurt, etc. Trade on the Baltic and North Seas was concentrated in these cities. They formed the so-called Hanseatic League.

Hanseatic-Venetian companies at the end of the 14th century. and at the beginning of the 15th century. the following percentages of profit relative to the purchase price were made from the spice trade: pepper - 70-100, ginger - 25-237, cinnamon - 87-287, cloves - 100, nutmeg - 87-237, etc. Robbery of foreign countries and a huge trade profits also led to the expansion of the domestic market. Trade in textile and metal goods in particular has picked up.

Usury capital, as well as credit, have achieved significant development. At first, merchants were engaged in credit and usury operations, later bankers emerged from their midst.

The growth of commodity-money relations caused profound changes in the feudal countryside. The transfer of natural duties into cash began. The exploitation of the peasantry by landowners intensified. The process of differentiation of the peasantry, the process of the emergence of capitalist relations in the depths of feudalism, also began to develop much faster.

6. The political system of feudalism. Role of the Church

The feudal system had hierarchical structure, which was based on the hierarchy of land ownership. Those who owned the most land stood at the top of the hierarchy. Its top was occupied by the king, the largest landowner-feudal lord.

Larger feudal lords - lords - made smaller feudal lords, who were called vassals, dependent on themselves. The foundation of this entire hierarchical ladder was the exploitation of serfs.

The political system of feudalism was characterized by extreme fragmentation. All of Europe was divided into many small and large estates - states. At the head of each estate was a large feudal lord - at the same time the sovereign. Within his domain, he had full power, maintained his own army and minted coins.

Small feudal lords, as we have already indicated, were usually under the patronage and protection of stronger feudal lords - overlords. For this protection they were obliged to pay tribute and help their patrons in the war. But overlords who had vassals could, in turn, be vassals of even larger feudal lords. The largest overlord was the king.

The feudal lords had the right to independently conclude treaties among themselves, wage wars, etc.

This political fragmentation of the feudal world was determined by the economics of feudalism, the weak development of the social division of labor, and, consequently, commodity production and exchange. Under the dominance of subsistence farming, economic ties between individual feudal estates were very limited. Each feudal estate was basically a closed natural economy, existing mainly on the products of its own production.

In the conditions of economic and political fragmentation of feudal society, the Catholic Church played a large role. It was essentially a political organization that united the fragmented feudal world. The Catholic Church itself was built on the same hierarchical type that underlay feudal society. It was headed by the pope, who had unlimited personal power. This organization of the Catholic Church was best suited both for the fight against feudal lords and the subordination of their spiritual power, and for the enslavement of the serf peasantry.

At least a third of all land was concentrated in the hands of the church. All this made her the most powerful of the feudal lords. The influence of the church was thus based not only on religious intoxication, but also on its enormous economic power.

Huge church estates provided large quantities of food that the clergy could not consume. Under the dominance of subsistence farming, excess production could not be completely converted into money. On this basis, the charitable activities of the church arose, which helped it strengthen its ideological power over the working masses. In turn, ideological power was used to further increase the economic power and wealth of the church. The Church established in its favor a kind of tax on land ownership in the form of church tithes and organized many various levies for pious purposes.

Further growth of productive forces, separation of city from countryside and the development of trade relations lead to strengthening economic ties between individual regions and states. There is a need to destroy the political fragmentation of the feudal world. The formation of large national states in the form of absolute monarchies begins.

The centralization of state power was carried out by royal power in the fight against feudal lords who did not want to give up their independence. In this struggle, royal power relied on the growing urban bourgeoisie. This was a period when, according to Engels, “... the royal power, in its struggle with the nobility, used the bourgeoisie to restrain one class with the help of another...”.

7. Decomposition and death of feudalism. Simple commodity economy as the basis for the development of capitalist relations

Feudalism advanced the development of productive forces. This was expressed in the strengthening of the social division of labor within the feudal village, in the improvement of agricultural technology, in the emergence of new industries both in the field of field cultivation and horticultural crops. Even greater progress has been made in the field of handicraft production.

Progress in the field of productive forces manifested itself especially strongly in the second half of the Middle Ages. The Crusades played a significant role, as we have already indicated, in this regard. The Crusades gave Europeans the opportunity to become acquainted with a number of technical improvements in the field of gardening, horticulture, engineering, and technical chemistry.

At the end of the Middle Ages, the progress of labor productivity proceeds at an accelerated pace and is manifested in many inventions and discoveries of great practical importance: new industries are created that have a huge impact on further economic life, blast furnaces appear and iron foundries emerge; navigation techniques are being improved, especially thanks to the invention of the compass; paper, gunpowder, and watches are invented.

The growth of productive forces was accompanied by the expansion of the market.

The expanding market presented an ever-increasing demand for handicraft products, and small-scale handicraft production was less and less able to satisfy it. There is a need for a transition from small handicraft production to large-scale capitalist production, to manufacturing, and then to machine production.

The production relations of feudal society with their serf labor, guild isolation and limitations became a brake on the further growth of the productive forces.

Feudalism has entered the stage of its decomposition and the development of capitalist relations. This stage covered the period from the 16th to the 18th centuries.

The basis for the development of capitalist relations, the capitalist way of life in the depths of feudalism was a simple commodity economy in the form of guild crafts in the city and peasant farming in the countryside, which was increasingly drawn into exchange.

A simple commercial enterprise produces products for sale on the market. In this way it fundamentally differs from subsistence farming.

A peasant who lived in a subsistence economy ate food of his own production, burned a torch in the evenings, wore clothes made of canvas woven from his own flax and hemp, in winter he wore a sheepskin coat and sheepskin coat made from sheepskins from his own sheep, etc. The craft was connected with agriculture. The social division of labor was not developed.

It’s different in a commercial economy. The basis of a commodity economy is the social division of labor. Because of this, every commodity producer produces only one commodity and, selling this commodity on the market, buys the goods necessary for it, produced by other commodity producers.

The peasant, drawn into the exchange, is forced to buy a significant and increasing part of the goods on the market: sew clothes from calico made in a factory, illuminate the hut in the evenings with a kerosene lamp bought in a store, wear shoes made at a tannery, etc. .

Nevertheless, peasant farming, even in the period of developed commodity relations, to a very large extent retains its natural character.

The most typical representative of a simple commodity economy is an artisan who produces products for sale and consumes only an insignificant part of the products of his own production.

The second main feature of a commodity economy is the private ownership of the means of production by the commodity producer, based on personal labor. This follows from the nature of handicraft tools.

Simple commercial farming is based on primitive manual technology. A spinning wheel, a hand loom, a hammer, a plow, etc. - these are the tools of labor characteristic of this economy. These tools are designed for individual use, which leads to the fact that a simple commodity economy is dominated by small craft workshops or small agricultural farms scattered on miserable patches of land.

Being the owner of the means of production and personally working on his small farm, the small commodity producer is naturally the owner of the products of his labor. The appropriation of manufactured products by a small commodity producer is based in this way: 1) on his personal labor and 2) on private ownership of the means of production.

Simple commodity farming is fraught with deep internal contradictions. On the one hand, it is based on the social division of labor. Thanks to the social division of labor, small commodity producers are connected with each other and work for each other. Consequently, their labor is of a social nature, although the latter is not directly manifested in the production process and remains hidden.

On the other hand, the basis of a simple commodity economy is the private ownership of the means of production by the commodity producer. Thanks to private ownership of the means of production, small commodity producers find themselves fragmented, working in isolation from each other, outside of any general plan, each solely at their own peril and risk. Thanks to this, the labor of the commodity producer is directly private labor. Consequently, the labor of a commodity producer is at the same time public and private.

This contradiction between public and private labor is main contradiction simple commercial farming. It generates anarchy commodity production and fierce competition between commodity producers.

And this, in turn, leads to the decomposition of a simple commodity economy and to the development of capitalist relations. “No,” wrote Lenin, “there is not a single economic phenomenon in the peasantry... which would not express struggle and discord of interests, which would not mean a plus for some and a minus for others.” Because of this, a simple commodity economy, according to Lenin, “... gives birth to capitalism and the bourgeoisie constantly, daily, hourly, spontaneously and on a mass scale.”

What internal laws underlie the development of capitalist relations on the basis of commodity production?

To answer this, we must look at the relationships behind the exchange of goods.

A product produced for the purpose of sale is goods. Every product has, first of all, a use value.

Use value a product lies in its ability to satisfy any human need. A product that does not have use value cannot become a commodity, since no one will buy it.

In exchange, one good is equated with another good. Let's say 1 ax is equal to 50 kg of bread.

The question arises: what underlies the equality of two goods?

This equality cannot be based on the use value of the commodity, since the condition of exchange is difference use values ​​of the two goods being exchanged. No one will exchange an ax for an ax or bread for bread.

It is obvious that the basis for the equality of two goods is their value.

Goods of the same value are exchanged. By exchanging 1 ax for 50 kg of bread, we thereby say that one ax costs the same as 50 kg of bread. Therefore, in addition to use value, a product must have value.

What determines the cost of a product?

Cost of goods determined by the labor expended on its production.

In fact, small commodity producers - artisans and peasants - exchange the products of their labor. “What did they spend in making these items? Labor - and only labor: they spent only their own labor power to replace the tools of labor, to produce raw materials, to process them; Could they therefore exchange these products of theirs for the products of other producers otherwise than in proportion to the labor expended? The labor time spent on these products was not only their only suitable measure for the quantitative determination of quantities subject to exchange, but any other measure was completely unthinkable.”

If in this way the exchange was carried out according to the amount of labor expended, then how was the amount of labor itself determined?

“Obviously, only through a long process of approaching in zigzags, often in the dark, by groping, and, as always, only bitter experience taught people. The need for everyone, in general, to recoup their costs contributed in each individual case to finding the right path, while the limited number of types of objects that came in exchange, along with the unchanged - often over many centuries - nature of their production, facilitated this task.

Consequently, only in the process of exchange do exchange relations spontaneously develop between goods that generally correspond to their value, determined by the amount of labor expended on them.

The amount of labor expended is measured by time. The more labor time spent on the production of a product, the higher its cost, and vice versa.

But the fact is that with regard to the amount of time spent on the production of goods, there are large differences between individual commodity producers. Some work with good tools, others with bad ones, some work with good materials, others with bad ones, some more intensively, others less intensively, some are more skilled in their craft, others less skilled.

Consequently, the individual amounts of labor time spent by individual commodity producers on the production of goods are extremely diverse. How long will it take to determine the price of a product?

The cost of a product will be determined not by the individual time spent on the production of the product by an individual commodity producer, but socially necessary time, spent by the majority of commodity producers. “Socially necessary labor time,” says Marx, “is that labor time that is required for the production of any use value under the existing socially normal conditions of production and at the average level of skill and intensity of labor in a given society.”

Commodity producers who work in better than average conditions, using better tools, with greater skill and intensity, spend less individual labor time on the production of a given product, and on the market they sell this product at a price determined not by the individual, but by the socially necessary time. Consequently, they are in more favorable conditions than other commodity producers.

On the contrary, those commodity producers who work in conditions below average, with worse means of production, with less skill and intensity, are in less favorable conditions compared to others.

Thus, the basis for the differentiation of small commodity producers and the development of capitalist relations is the contradiction between private and social labor, between individual and socially necessary time. Due to this contradiction, the competition that plays out between commodity producers leads to the enrichment of some and the ruin of others, to the development of capitalist relations.

8. Decomposition of the guild craft

The emergence of guild organizations in the city was the result of the development of commodity production. But at the same time, the guilds could hold on and limit competition only as long as commodity production was not yet sufficiently developed, while the craft worked for the local narrow market, when the artisan was at the same time the seller of his goods.

The growth of commodity relations radically changed the situation. If previously a craftsman worked to order or for the local market and dealt directly with the consumer, now he was forced to move to work on a wider market unknown to him.

This created the need for an intermediary - a buyer-trader. The buyer grows from among the artisans themselves. At first, he combines trading operations with crafts, and then devotes himself entirely to trade.

This process of allocation and growth of commercial capital proceeded intensively in the guild craft at the end of the Middle Ages.

On the other hand, the expanding market placed ever greater demands on handicraft products.

The growth of productive forces came into irreconcilable contradiction with the guild system, with its isolation, routine, hostility to all technical innovations, and demanded its elimination.

It is enough to refer to the fact that the workshops did not allow the use of a self-spinning wheel, prohibited the use of a fulling mill in cloth production, etc.

The guild spirit and the desire to hide technical inventions from their competitors also could not help but slow down the further growth of the productive forces.

Lenin, in his work “The Development of Capitalism in Russia,” gives a vivid example of the secrecy of production by handicraftsmen.

“The founders of a new trade or those who have introduced any improvements into the old trade,” says Lenin, “do their best to hide profitable activities from fellow villagers, use various tricks for this (for example, to divert attention, they keep old devices in the establishment), do not allow no one in their workshops, they work on the ceiling, they don’t even inform their own children about production... About the village of Bezvodny, famous for its metal craft, Nizhny Novgorod province, we read: “The remarkable thing is that the residents of Bezvodny still... carefully hide their skills from neighboring peasants... they do not they marry off their daughters to grooms from neighboring villages and, as far as possible, do not marry girls from there.”

The petty regulation that existed in guild craft production, the prohibition of having apprentices and apprentices beyond a certain number - all this contradicted the needs of economic development, the needs of the growing capitalist structure. Therefore, despite all the slingshots that the guild system imposed on the development of competition, it penetrated within the confines of guild production. Differentiation began among the guild masters. More prosperous craftsmen began to emerge, who expanded production, regardless of the guild rules.

To avoid guild slingshots and restrictions, some wealthier craftsmen and traders moved the organization of production to the village and distributed home orders there.

This undermined the monopoly position of the workshops.

Trade capital penetrated into workshop organizations. More prosperous craftsmen became buyers and moneylenders. The thirst for accumulation encouraged such craftsmen to circumvent and violate those rules of the charters that prevented them from expanding their own production and finally subjugating the farms of poorer craftsmen. Thus, when producing for export, craftsmen who had a direct connection with the market were constrained by those regulations of the workshops that set the price of products and prevented them from buying them cheaply. Often those articles of the charters that limited the number of hired workers for an individual master and, therefore, did not allow the expansion of enterprises were also not implemented in practice.

The process of differentiation among artisans began, the process of decomposition of the guild craft.

Along with this, the contradictions between masters, on the one hand, and journeymen and students, on the other, are intensifying.

The masters, who became more and more dependent on commercial capital, in order to somehow support their vacillating position, intensified the exploitation of journeymen and apprentices, demanded from them longer and more intensive work, paid them less, and provided them with worse support.

Guild organizations increasingly turned into organizations of struggle between masters and apprentices. The most energetic measures were taken to make it difficult for apprentices to enter the ranks of masters, because the increasing number of masters increased competition. Longer periods of apprenticeship and hired service were established for journeymen. When an apprentice passed the master's exam, particularly strict requirements were imposed. They demanded the presentation of “exemplary works” in which the apprentice had to demonstrate his skill, for example, to make horseshoes without any measurements, by eye, for a horse galloping past, etc. High deposits were established for joining the workshop.

Thus, in France, persons applying for the title of guild master had to pay in the first half of the 14th century. 20 solidi, in the second half of the 14th century. - 40-50 solidi, in the 15th century. - 200 solids.

In addition, an apprentice who wanted to become a master had to give gifts to the foremen of the workshop. According to the regulations of the Lübeck goldsmiths dating back to 1492: “whoever wishes to accept the position of an independent craftsman in the workshop must (in addition to fulfilling many other requirements) make the following items: a gold ring of openwork work, an English wrist, given upon betrothal, engraved and blackened, and ring for the handle of a dagger. He must present these jewels to the foremen and oldest members of the workshop.”

Changes in the guild structure occurred with considerable speed starting from the 14th century.

The new rules of the workshops were implemented with extreme passion. All sorts of exceptions were made for the sons of masters, thanks to which all trials and difficulties often turned into an empty formality, while for people of other origins, joining the guild became almost impossible. Guild privileges acquired a narrow class character and were no longer associated so much with art and knowledge as with origin.

All these innovations provoked energetic resistance from the apprentices, who began to create their own organizations - at first simply religious corporations or unions of material mutual aid, which then turned into associations to fight for common interests against the masters.

The apprentices often managed to force the masters to make various concessions. Masters tried in every possible way to destroy the unions of apprentices and often sought laws prohibiting these unions. But this only achieved that the unions of apprentices turned into secret ones, but did not cease to exist. The main weapon in the struggle of apprentices against masters was strikes and boycotts of entrepreneurs.

Thus, under the influence of the growth of commodity-capitalist relations, the process of disintegration of the guild craft took place.

9. Decomposition of the feudal village. Revolt of serfs.Death of feudalism

The same process of decomposition of feudal and development of capitalist relations took place in the countryside.

When the feudal lord's economy began to turn from subsistence into barter, the nature of his relationship with the serf peasant began to change rapidly. Previously, in a subsistence economy, the size of corvée and quitrents found its limit in the size of the needs of the feudal lord; now this border has disappeared. If in a natural economy it did not make sense to accumulate too large reserves of grain, then in a money economy their value could be saved in the form of money. The consequence of this was the transition from corvee and quitrent to cash rent. Needing money, the feudal lord demanded that his peasants pay quitrent in cash. Numerous duties in kind were converted into cash. Now the serf peasant had to not only create a surplus product with his labor, but also sell it on the market in order to then pay cash rent to the feudal lord.

The serf village was thereby drawn more and more into the exchange. A rapid process of stratification within the serf peasantry began. On the one hand, the kulak grew, which gradually bought off serfdom and, along with the feudal lord, became an exploiter of the peasantry.

Among the serf peasants of Count Sheremetev (village of Ivanovo, Vladimir province):

a) there were merchants, factory owners, owners of huge capital, whose daughters, when marrying non-count’s peasants, paid a ransom of 10 thousand rubles. and more;

b) before the reform of 1861, 50 Ivanovo peasants were bought out. The average buyout price was 20 thousand rubles.

On the other hand, the exploitation of the peasantry by the feudal lords intensified and the ruin of the bulk of the peasantry proceeded at a rapid pace.

Under the influence of the growth of market relations, the feudal lord tried in every possible way to increase the amount of cash rent collected from the peasantry. Thus, cash payments from peasants in France, according to one estate in Brittany, increased from 200 livres in 1778 to 400 livres in 1786. The feudal lord also tried to expand the size of his own farm and for this purpose usually appropriated the lands that were in his possession. common use with the peasants. Enterprises that constituted the monopoly of the feudal lord, such as mills, bakeries, bridges, now became a means for increased extortion and extortion.

Along with the intensification of economic oppression, legal forms of dependence also became more severe. “The robbery of the peasants by the nobility,” says Engels, “became more and more sophisticated every year. The last drop of blood was sucked out of the serfs, and dependent people were subjected to new taxes and duties under all sorts of pretexts and names. Corvée, chinshi, taxes, duties upon change of ownership, posthumous taxes, security money, etc. were arbitrarily increased, despite all the ancient agreements.”

Under the influence of the same growth in commodity production and exchange, the exploitation of the peasants by the clergy intensifies. It is not content with church tithes and seeks new sources of income, organizes the trade in indulgences (“absolution of sins”), and organizes new armies of mendicant monks. The clergy treats their own serfs no better than other feudal lords.

The unbearable living conditions of serfs caused peasant indignation and riots. At first, while the social division of labor was poorly developed, while exchange ties remained relatively narrow and each region lived its own separate life, peasant uprisings had a local character and were suppressed relatively easily. The development of commodity relations created the ground for broader peasant uprisings covering entire countries. On the other hand, the sharp increase in the exploitation of the serf peasantry by the feudal lords gave these uprisings a particularly deep and persistent character. In Italy in the 13th century, in England and France at the end of the 14th century, in Bohemia in the 15th century, in Germany at the beginning of the 16th century. real peasant wars took place, the suppression of which required enormous effort on the part of government agencies.

Thus, in 1358, an uprising of French peasants, known as the Jacquerie, broke out. This uprising was the result of an extraordinary increase in the exploitation of the peasantry, devastated by wars and numerous extortions. The uprising was suppressed with unprecedented cruelty. More than 20 thousand rebel serfs were physically destroyed. Entire villages were destroyed and demolished and much land and property were confiscated.

In England in 1381, an uprising of English peasants broke out, led by Wat Tyler. It was preceded by a plague epidemic, which killed a large number of people. As a result, the landowners experienced a particularly acute need for labor and intensified the exploitation of the surviving serfs. The peasantry responded to this with an uprising. Apprentices and apprentices joined the rebels. The rebels argued that the nobility was a temporary phenomenon and should disappear. Therefore, sermons on the topic were especially popular among peasants: “When Adam plowed and Eve spun, who was the nobleman then?”

The peasants demanded liberation from all kinds of personal dependence and slavery. The rebellious peasants and artisans headed to London, burning landowners' estates along the way and destroying the castles of the highest nobility. The frightened king agreed to satisfy the demands of the rebels. The peasants, reassured by his promise, went home. Then the king’s 40,000-strong army easily destroyed the remnants of the rebel armed forces. Nevertheless, as a result of the uprising, the emancipation of the peasantry intensified, and in the 15th century. In England, serfdom was abolished.

In Spain, after a series of uprisings of serfs, which were also joined by the most exploited elements of the urban population, serfdom was swept away in 1486.

In 1525, an uprising of serfs broke out in Germany, which turned into a real war of peasants against the feudal lords.

The history of pre-revolutionary Russia also gives us vivid examples of grandiose peasant uprisings that shook the foundations of the tsarist empire and made the ruling classes tremble. The most famous of them are the uprisings of Stepan Razin and Emelyan Pugachev.

The enormous revolutionary significance of these uprisings lay in the fact that they shook the foundations of feudalism and were the decisive force that ultimately led to the abolition of serfdom and the death of the feudal system of exploitation.

The decomposition of feudalism and the development of capitalist relations was accompanied, on the one hand, by the growth of the bourgeoisie, and on the other, by the formation of the proletariat from among the bankrupt small producers - peasants and artisans. Here it is appropriate to compare the historical fate of the feudal mode of production with the slave mode of production. In both places there was a process of ruin of small producers. However, under the conditions of the slave system, the bankrupt small producer could not find productive employment for himself. The slave system was unable to embark on the path of technological development, since slavery, as it spread, increasingly turned labor into a shameful task, unworthy of a free person. Therefore, bankrupt small producers under the slave system faced the fate of the lumpen proletarians.

On the contrary, feudalism, based on small-scale production of serfs and urban artisans, as it developed, created conditions for the growth of productive forces, the rise of technology based on the development of the capitalist structure that originated in its depths. Under these conditions, bankrupt artisans and peasants formed the cadre of proletarians needed by the developing large-scale capitalist industry.

The capitalist mode of production originated as a structure in the depths of feudal society. But his birth cost his mother's life. The development of the capitalist structure in the bowels of feudal society took place with such speed and intensity that a complete discrepancy was soon revealed, on the one hand, between the new productive forces and, on the other, the economic and political system of feudalism.

Marx and Engels wrote in the Communist Manifesto that the conditions “...in which the production and exchange of feudal society, the feudal organization of agriculture and industry, in a word, feudal property relations took place, no longer corresponded to the developed productive forces. They slowed down production instead of developing it. They became his shackles. They had to be broken, and they were broken.

Their place was taken by free competition, with a corresponding social and political system...”

This coup was carried out by the bourgeoisie through a revolution in which the peasants played the role of ordinary fighters against feudalism. The bourgeoisie took advantage of the fruits of the revolutionary struggle of the peasantry. The working class was still weak and unorganized. He could not yet lead the peasantry. As a result, one system of exploitation was replaced by another. Feudal exploitation gave way to capitalist exploitation.

While in England and other European countries the development of capitalism led to the rapid elimination of feudal relations, in Germany, Romania, and Russia they still existed. For a number of reasons, and primarily due to the economic backwardness of these countries, they experienced a “relapse” of feudal exploitation in its most brutal form. The opening of the world market for agricultural products pushed landowners to expand their own production of these products, which was still based on feudal exploitation and serf labor. Under these conditions, the expansion of landowner agriculture meant an expansion of the use of serf labor and increased exploitation of serfs. The landowners, in need of labor, began to switch to corvee labor and rent in kind and finally enslaved the peasants in order to squeeze out as much surplus product as possible to sell it on the market. The exploitation of the serf peasantry assumed monstrous proportions, bordering on slavery.

Marx says: “... as soon as peoples, whose production is still carried out in relatively low forms of slave labor, corvee labor, etc., are drawn into the world market, which is dominated by the capitalist mode of production and which makes the sale of the products of this production abroad the predominant interest “So the civilized horror of excessive labor is added to the barbaric horrors of slavery, serfdom, etc.”

Serfdom is not some special method of exploitation, fundamentally different from feudalism. The essence of exploitation is the same here. Serfdom- this is a stage in the development of feudalism, associated with the aggravation and intensification of the exploitation of peasants by landowners in backward countries drawn into the world market.

For example, Germany, after the peasant uprising, had to endure, as Engels put it, the “second edition” of serfdom in its most brutal form. Only the revolution of 1848 abolished serfdom in Germany. However, his vestiges remained even after this.

They left a huge imprint on the subsequent development of Germany, which Lenin characterized as the Prussian path of development of capitalism. Remnants of serfdom existed in Germany during the period of developed capitalism. The Nazis' rise to power led to a sharp increase in reactionary, feudal-serf tendencies in Germany. The fascists, trying to turn back the wheel of history, vigorously enforced the slave-serf system throughout the entire territory they temporarily captured, and huge masses of the population were forcibly driven to Germany and actually turned into slaves and serfs.

In Russia in the 17th, 18th and partly 19th centuries. Serfdom took on the most brutal forms of violence and personal dependence. No wonder Lenin called it “serf slavery.”

Landowners, like slave owners, sold serfs, exchanged them for dogs, women were often forced to breastfeed puppies, lost serfs at cards, etc.

In newspapers of that time one could often find advertisements for the sale of, along with diamonds, racing droshky, cows and dogs, courtyard girls, tailors, watchmakers, etc.

The best progressive Russian people - Radishchev, the Decembrists, Herzen and Chernyshevsky waged an irreconcilable struggle against serfdom.

The Russian people, represented primarily by the many millions of peasants, fought for their liberation with the help of revolutionary uprisings. This revolutionary struggle was the decisive factor leading to the abolition of serfdom in 1861. However, remnants of serfdom existed even after the abolition of serfdom and were finally swept away by the Great October Socialist Revolution, which at one blow destroyed landownership with all its enslaving feudal-serf methods of exploitation .

10. Economic views of the era of feudalism

The enormous power and strength of the church both in the field of economics and politics, as well as ideology, was expressed in the fact that the literature of that time, disputes, discussions, and argumentation were of a theological nature. The most convincing argument was that of divine scripture.

The only thing that the Middle Ages “...borrowed from the lost ancient world was Christianity... As a result, as happens at all early stages of development, the monopoly on intellectual education went to the priests, and education itself thereby took on a predominantly theological character... And this is the supreme dominance of theology in all areas of mental activity was at the same time a necessary consequence of the position occupied by the church as the most general synthesis and the most general sanction of the existing feudal system."

Therefore, the economic views of that time were reflected mainly in religious and philosophical works. Among these works, the works of Thomas Aquinas dating back to the 13th century deserve to be noted. They are of interest to us insofar as they reflect the economy of feudal society, just as statements about labor by philosophers, historians and writers of the ancient world reflected the situation of labor in a slave society.

The basis of the slave system was the exploitation of slave labor. Hence the view of work as a shameful occupation, unworthy of a free person. The feudal system was based on small-scale production of serfs in the countryside and guild small-scale handicraft production in the city, based on private property and the personal labor of the producer. Moreover, the ruling class - the feudal lords, striving to extract the maximum surplus product, were forced, in order to stimulate the labor of the serf peasant, to move to such forms of rent that gave the latter greater economic independence, developed his initiative, and kindled the interest of the private owner in him. Hence a different view of labor in feudal society compared to the view of slave owners.

Thomas Aquinas considers labor to be the only legitimate source of wealth and income. Only labor, in his opinion, imparts value to other objects.

However, the views of Thomas Aquinas differ to a certain extent from the views of the early Christians. If Augustine considered all work worthy of respect, then Thomas Aquinas approaches this issue differently. He makes a distinction between physical and spiritual labor. He views physical labor as simple, menial labor, and mental labor as noble labor.

In this division of labor, Thomas Aquinas sees the basis for the class division of society, which is a characteristic feature of the feudal system.

Just as bees build wax cells and collect honey, and their queens are exempt from this labor, so in human society some must engage in physical labor, others in spiritual labor.

Thomas Aquinas had a different attitude towards wealth compared to the ancient Christians. The first Christians condemned private property and wealth.

Thomas Aquinas has a different attitude towards private property and wealth. He considers private property to be as necessary an institution of human life as clothing.

In Thomas Aquinas' views on wealth, the same feudal-class approach prevails. Each person should have wealth in accordance with the position he occupies on the feudal hierarchical ladder.

Of great interest is the teaching of Thomas Aquinas about the “just price.”

A “fair price” must reflect two factors: 1) the amount of labor expended on the production of a product, and 2) the class position of the producer - it must provide the producer with an “existence decent for his position.”

Thomas Aquinas and other medieval writers, while condemning income from trade, still allowed for the receipt of trade profit, since it rewards the labor of transportation and provides the merchant with an existence decent for his position.

Medieval Christian writers treated usury with even greater condemnation. This attitude towards trade and usury reflects the fact that the ideologists of feudalism viewed wealth from a consumer point of view.

However, with the development of commodity production and exchange, the attitude towards trade and usury became more and more tolerant.

A common thread running through the entire history of feudalism is the revolutionary struggle of serfs against feudal exploitation, as well as the struggle between cities and feudal lords. This revolutionary struggle against feudalism was also reflected in the field of ideology, taking on a religious form. Revolutionary economic and political teachings appeared in the form of theological heresies.

“Revolutionary opposition to feudalism runs through the entire Middle Ages. It appears, according to the conditions of the time, sometimes in the form of mysticism, sometimes in the form of open heresy, sometimes in the form of an armed uprising.”

Since various class groupings were hidden behind the struggle against the rule of the feudal lords, it was waged under different slogans. The programs put forward in this struggle reflected the interests of these groups.

The movement of peasants and plebeians represented the most radical, most revolutionary wing of the feudal opposition.

The peasant-plebeian movement against feudalism also took the form of church heresy. Peasants and plebeians, as well as the burghers and lower nobility, demanded a return to the early Christian church system. Their programs were far from exhausted by this.

They wanted the same equality that existed in early Christian communities. They justified this requirement by the equality of all people as sons of God. Based on this, they demanded the abolition of serfdom, taxes and privileges, and the equalization of nobles with peasants.

Thus, during the period of Wat Tyler's rebellion in 1381 in England, the speeches of the famous preacher John Ball on the topic “When Adam plowed, Eve spun, who was the nobleman then?” enjoyed enormous success among the peasants. John Ball sought to emphasize the original natural equality of people who did not know the division into classes.

The leader of the rebellious peasants in Russia, Pugachev, put forward the idea of ​​​​abolishing the rule of the nobles, eliminating serfdom and demanded that all peasants be given land, as well as the liberation of peasants from taxes, duties and bribe-taking judges.

Along with the equalization of nobles with peasants, the peasant-plebeian movement put forward a demand for the equalization of privileged townspeople with plebeians.

In the peasant-plebeian movement, in its slogans and programs, the tendency towards the elimination of property inequality and the establishment of consumer communism of the first Christian communities was quite clearly evident.

The most radically minded part of the peasantry in the Czech Republic during the uprising of 1419, represented by the Taborites, demanded a return to original Christianity: the elimination of private property, the introduction of community property and equality of all before the law. The Taborites tried to put their ideals into practice. Thus, they organized, following the example of the first Christians, communities that had a common treasury into which surplus earnings were deposited.

The leader of the revolutionary uprising of peasants and plebeians in Germany, Thomas Münzer, propagated the idea of ​​​​the thousand-year kingdom of Christ, in which there will be neither rich nor poor, universal equality and a blessed life will reign, and property will belong to the whole society. Here we see how the movement of the most oppressed layers of feudal society sought to go beyond the limits of the struggle against feudalism and privileged townspeople, beyond the boundaries of the bourgeois society that was emerging at that time in the depths of feudalism.

However, under the conditions of feudalism there was no real basis for the realization of such dreams, because the economic need for the transition from a feudal society to a capitalist one was only maturing.

Therefore, “... the desire to go beyond the limits of not only the present, but also the future,” says Engels, “could only be fantastic, only violence against reality, and the very first attempt to implement it in practice should have thrown the movement back into the narrow framework that only allowed by the conditions of that time. The attacks on private property and the demand for community of property were inevitably bound to degenerate into a primitive organization of charity; vague Christian equality could, at most, result in bourgeois “equality before the law”; the abolition of all authorities ultimately turned into the establishment of republican governments elected by the people. The anticipation of communism in fantasy became in reality the anticipation of modern bourgeois relations."

The revolutionary, progressive role of peasant uprisings consisted in demands for the elimination of serfdom, which had become a brake on social development, in real revolutionary actions aimed at its destruction. The revolution of the serfs, being the decisive factor in the overthrow of feudalism, thereby cleared the way for a more advanced - capitalist mode of production.

11. Fascists falsify the history of the feudal system

The fascists explain the fall of the slave system by the decline of the Aryan race, which began to interbreed with “lower races.” As a result of this loss of purity of the northern race, the Roman Empire perished.

The world was saved, according to the fascist falsifiers, by the Germans, who preserved the purity of the Aryan blood intact and who conquered the Roman Empire.

Fascists claim that the ancient Germans sacredly observed the purity of their Nordic race, as evidenced by the custom of killing weak children.

Thanks to the purity of the race, the Germans allegedly created a truly Nordic medieval culture.

Thus, the fascists explain the emergence of medieval culture, as well as ancient culture, by the same unchanging all-saving factor - the factor of the Aryan life-giving blood.

It is not clear why in some cases the same unchanging Aryan blood leads to a slave system, and in other cases to a feudal system. The fascist obscurantists are powerless to give any intelligible answer to this question.

The German tribes, which at that time were passing through the highest stage of barbarism, certainly played a certain role in the replacement of the slave-owning system by the feudal one. But this role has nothing to do with their Aryan blood.

Feudalism arose as a result of the fact that slavery had become obsolete, and the historical conditions for wage labor had not yet developed. Under these conditions, a further step forward in the development of productive forces could be made only on the basis of the economy of a small dependent producer, to a certain extent interested in his work.

Contrary to the assurances of the fascists, the ancient Germans were barbarians who stood at a lower level of cultural development.

The collapse of the Roman Empire was accompanied by a huge destruction of the productive forces. In this destruction of the productive forces, a significant role belongs to the Germans who conquered the Roman Empire.

It took a long time for feudalism to prove its superiority over slavery and advance the development of productive forces. But this happened not due to some miraculous properties of Aryan blood, but due to the greater interest of the serf in his work compared to the slave.

Finally, among the Germans themselves - this, according to the fascists, a race of masters - in the process of feudalization, master feudal lords and subordinate serfs arise. Thus, the majority of carriers of Aryan blood become serfs, which, according to the fascists, is the lot of “lower races.”

Consequently, the conquerors themselves are subject to the same economic laws of development as the “inferior races” they supposedly conquered. All this suggests that there is not a grain of science in the racial theory of the fascists.

Fascists glorify the class organization of feudal society. The closed nature of the classes contributes, according to the fascists, to preserving the purity of the Aryan race.

The fascists date the dominance of the Aryan race in Europe to the 5th-6th centuries, and in Germany to the 10th-11th centuries. And then comes the decline. This decline, according to the fascists, is again explained by the loss of purity of the Aryan race. Brave and enterprising Germans are allegedly dying in the Crusades, and the isolation of the upper classes is decreasing. Chivalry is mixed with people of the “lower races.” In fact, the loss of the purity of Aryan blood had just as little to do with the death of feudalism as its preservation had to do with the emergence of feudalism.

The productive forces of feudal society outgrew the framework of feudal production relations. As a result of this, feudalism entered the stage of its decomposition, which was at the same time a stage of development of capitalist relations.

The decisive role in the abolition of serfdom belongs to the revolution of the serfs.

Fascist falsifiers, in the interests of their insane policy of conquering the world and enslaving the working people, falsify the history of pre-capitalist formations. They dream of returning the world to the worst times of slavery and serfdom. But slavery and serfdom, which at one time were necessary stages of social development, are forever a thing of the past.

A policy built on a return to long-passed stages of historical development is in blatant contradiction with economic laws and the needs of social development and is doomed to inevitable failure, as evidenced very clearly and convincingly by the brilliant victories of the Red Army.

K. Marx and F. Engels. Works, vol. 25, part II, p. 143.

I. The essence of the feudal system

78. The essence of Western feudalism

84. Feudal society

The feudal ladder of lords and vassals rested below on the rest of the population. Feudalism sharply divided the country's population into class gentlemen And commoner class. The first was the nobility or noble class, the class of well-born people (gentiles homines, whence the French gentilhomme), from which the later came nobility. It was first of all military class, which should have protect the rest of the population. The higher clergy also belonged to the class of masters, who also owned fiefs and fielded warriors from their lands (the real calling of the clergy was considered prayer). The rest of the masses, i.e. farmers, artisans and traders, were dependent on the feudal lords and owed their labor feed the lords and clergy. Thus, feudal society was divided into three classes, of which one prayed, another fought, and the third worked.

The mutual relations between overlords and vassals were determined many customs and rituals. The establishment of a vassal relationship was accompanied by the following ritual: the vassal knelt before the overlord and put his hands in his hands; this was tantamount to declaring oneself a “man” (homo) of the lord, hence the name of the oath Hommagium(or homage). The lord kissed his vassal and gave him some gift that symbolized the feud (ring, glove, etc.). After this, the vassal sealed his loyalty with an oath of allegiance (foi). Feudal law developed a whole code of mutual duties of lord and vassal. For example, a vassal had to help the lord in war for at least forty days a year, ransom him from captivity, appear at the curia to give advice at least three times a year, etc.

85. Military life of the feudal era

Western feudal lords were generally class of privileged warriors. One of the reasons for the development of their power over the population of certain areas was that they protected them from various kinds of attacks and invasions. For this reason, the population itself helped them build fortified castles, where one could hide if necessary. However, these same castles allowed the lords, in addition, to defend their independence from the state and strengthen their power over the surrounding residents. Having become sovereigns, feudal lords became wage war among themselves, attack each other and plunder the possessions of their enemies. In reasons for private wars (fedam) there was no shortage; even feudal relations themselves often caused them when, for example, one side violated a vassal agreement. Feudal strife was a real scourge for the civilian population. However, the church came to his aid, which, after unsuccessful attempts to establish a general peace, limited itself to the establishment truce of God(treuga Dei), which consisted in the prohibition of attacking opponents and generally fighting on the days of the week dedicated to the memory of the suffering, death and resurrection of the Savior.

Carcassonne Castle, France

The feudal militia consisted mainly of cavalry, and the very name rider, or knight(German Ritter, i.e. Reiter) began to mean lower ranks of the feudal nobility. But the knighthood also acquired another meaning. Knights were made over time honorary military class, entry into which was accomplished through a special rite dedication and belonging to which imposed an obligation obey known moral requirements. Sons of Knights (damoiso, i.e. gentlemen, barchuks) were brought up at the courts of their future lords as privileged servants (pages) And squires, until they received knighthood in compliance with rather complex rituals that were of a religious nature. The initiate gave at the same time knightly vows - defend the church, widows and orphans, in general all innocent oppressed, always speak the truth, keep your word, avoid unclean ways of getting rich, etc. Life has even developed a whole series of special customs knightly honor And politeness in relation even to opponents. Particularly developed in chivalry was polite treatment of ladies, i.e., mistresses (dame - from the Latin domina), which even developed into a special cult of the lady. Further, each knight had the right to coat of arms, as its emblem and distinctive sign. However, knights who fully corresponded to their ideal were more common in the then poetry, than in reality. The knights spent their time in wars, hunting and in exemplary battles, called tournaments Their mental culture was very weak, and their attitude towards their subordinates was far from fulfilling their vow to protect the weak and oppressed.

Knight Tournament. Miniature from the 14th century

86. Rural population of the feudal lordship

Establishment of seigneurial power equalized the position of all the class and rural population of the seigneury. The peasantry of the feudal era was formed in the West from the descendants of both slaves and colones even from Roman times, and from landless or land-poor free barbarian era. From the very beginning, slaves and colonists did not enjoy civil freedom, but free people they themselves became enslaved by comment. The lord, who was both a sovereign and a landowner, and the master of unfree people, equalized everyone under his authority. The rural population of individual seigneuries became serfs. Villans, as they were now called, were in a better position than slaves, but still their situation was difficult. The lords farmed only a small part of their lands, while most of them consisted of small peasant farms. Villans paid from their plots quitrents and left corvée, that is, they worked on the land of the lord, and although the amount of rent or work was mostly determined custom, nevertheless, the lords often demanded one or the other at their own discretion. On the other hand, peasants living in the same village formed themselves rural communities, who jointly owned various lands and even managed their own internal affairs.

87. Feudal land tenure and peasant duties

The peculiarity of Western feudal land tenure was that every“kept” the land from someone higher. Vacant property disappeared and was replaced conditional property. The former free owners converted their lands (the so-called allods) in benefices, placing themselves under the guardianship of strong people, and large landowners also distributed benefices to small people. For his fief, everyone had to perform a certain service. The peasants also held the land under the same conditions, but only they did not serve, but paid or worked. They paid their dues for the most part not in money, but in kind(bread, livestock, etc.). Corvée consisted not only of field work for the lord, but also of work on building or repairing castles, etc. While the holder of the land fulfilled his duties, the land remained with him and passed on by inheritance from father to son. Thus, if the peasant was attached to the land, then the land was attached to it. The rights of the lord in relation to the peasant were not limited to their connection over the land. The lord was also the sovereign of his domain, and in relation to some classes of the rural population his power even had the character of the power of a slave owner. As a sovereign, the lord could set whatever taxes he wanted and subjugate the peasants by any orders, in kind, for example, the obligation to grind grain at the seigneurial mill and bake bread in the seigneurial oven (platitudes) or at night prevent the frogs from disturbing the sleep of the castle's inhabitants with their croaking. As a sovereign, the lord enjoyed various duties, fines, etc. Those in the worst position were those peasants who were, as it were, in a slave position (servas). The lord was for them not only a landowner-sovereign, but also a master. Such peasants in France were called menmortables(dead hands), since their “hand was dead”, in order to pass on the inheritance to their children. They could not enter into marriages without the consent of their masters, and when the servant of one lord married the serf of another, the children from such a marriage were divided equally between both masters.

88. Feudal power in cities

Western cities also became part of the general feudal system. In general, urban life fell into decline back in the era of the barbarian kingdoms, and rural life took precedence over urban life. Feudal lords lived in castles among their estates with their squads and servants. Constant unrest and wars caused terrible blow to trade. Industry also fell Moreover, the feudal owners, among their servants, also had artisans who worked for themselves and for all their household. As a result, the population of cities decreased. With the fragmentation of the country into feudal estates, the cities found themselves under the rule of individual graphs, in many cities power was established bishops. The situation of the townspeople therefore worsened, since often counts and bishops sought to reduce the urban population to the level of villans.

Feudal system

A habit, ingrained even among historians, tends to confuse in the most annoying way two expressions: “feudal system” and “seigneurial system.” This is an entirely arbitrary assimilation of a complex of relationships characteristic of the rule of the military aristocracy, with a type of dependence of the peasants, which is completely different in nature and, in addition, developed much earlier, lasted longer and was much more widespread throughout the world.

The word "feudalism" (originally a judicial term) was used by English jurists in the 17th century to designate a type of property; as a socio-political term it is used by Boulainvilliers and, following him, by Montesquieu. The idea of ​​feudalism as a stage in the socio-economic history of mankind, corresponding in Europe to the Middle Ages, develops in French historiography of the early 19th century, primarily in Guizot.

In relation to Rus', the concept of feudalism was first applied by N. A. Polevoy in his “History of the Russian People” (vol. 1-6, -)

Feudalism in Western Europe, according to a number of concepts, began to be established as early as the 5th century AD in the late Roman Empire. The distinctive features of feudalism in Western Europe were a high degree of political decentralization, the dualism of secular and spiritual authorities, the specificity of the European city as a center of craft and trade, the early development of horizontal social structures, and public private law. Then, in the Middle Ages, it began to dominate Europe until the bourgeois revolutions. The feudal system was replaced by a capitalist one.

There are different opinions about whether feudal relations (in the classical sense) existed in other parts of the world. A. Ya. Gurevich considered feudalism primarily, if not exclusively, a Western European phenomenon that developed as a result of specific historical conditions. The main aspects of criticism of the concept of feudalism as a universal stage of development of society are that in most societies of the non-European area there were no such systemically important elements as large private land ownership, serfdom, and the immunities of the service class.

In the ancient world, the system most similar to feudalism was the Persian Empire, in which a heavily armed horseman was given an allotment similar to a feudal fief.

Modern feudalism

Until April 2008, the form of government in the crown domain of Sark was feudalism. It was the "last stronghold of feudalism" in Europe.

Notes

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FEUDALAL SYSTEM AS A TYPE OF SOCIAL ORGANIZATION