Information About ™Vassal |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT VASSAL | |
| feudalism | |
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A vassal or ''liege'', in the terminology that both preceded and accompanied the Feudalism of Medieval Europe , is one who enters into mutual obligations with a Lord , usually of military support and mutual protection, in exchange for certain guarantees, which came to include the terrain held as a Fief . By analogy it is applied to similar systems in other feudal societies. WESTERN VASSALAGE In fully-developed vassalage, a 's brief description, the ''commendatio'' made to Pippin in 757 by Tassilo, duke of Bavaria, involved the relics of saint Denis, saint Rusticus and saint Éleuthère, saint Martin and saint Germain, which had apparently been assembled at Compiègne for the event {Link without Title} . At the ''commendatio'', "the vassal thereupon fell under the charismatic power, pagan in origin, of the lord: his ''mundeburdium'' or ''mainbour,'' true power, at once possessive and protective" (Rouche 1987, p 429). Under the influence of the "mainbour" all previous social differentiations fell away, in a restructuring of social obligations that was radically new (Rouche 1987 p 429ff). The development of the ''vassal'', in a society that was increasingly organized around the concept of "lordship"— in French the '' or Aëtius give examples of a ''patricius'' of the 5th century. By contrast, an apparent comparable example from the East, like the general Belisarius , still bore the aura of imperial legitimacy that the Western warlords could afford to ignore. As the system developed in the seventh century, the vassals were gangs of freemen who voluntarily subjected themselves, in some varying degree of formality, to the authority of a leader, from whose distribution of loot they could expect to be fed, clothed and armed. The quality of a vassal was only in his fighting ability and the strength of his loyalty. The etymology of "vassal" is from a Celtic word ''gwas'' "boy" that designated a young male slave, with a Latinized form, ''vassus'' that appeared in Salic Law (Rouche 1987 p 429), not unlike the derivation of " Knight " from Old English ''cniht'' and cognates in Frisian and Dutch, all meaning "lad" {Link without Title} . All later connotations, of kings of the 7th century dignified their personal retainers as ''antrustiones'' (Cantor 1993, p.198). In an earlier age, Alexander 's bodyguard of generals were similarly singled out as his "companions." The various meanings of '' Peer '' (French ''paire'') still retain some sense of this original parity among equals who followed the charismatic leader. Charlemagne 's later developments connected vassals with the rewards of land, the only form of generating wealth, in a slow process, connected with the unfolding of the agricultural institutions called " Manorialism " and the social and legal structures labelled— but only since the 18th century— " Feudalism ". It was a slow process that unfolded at different natural rhythms in various regions. In Merovingian times, only the greatest and most trusted vassals would be rewarded with lands. Even at the most extreme devolution of any remnants of central power, in 10th century France, the majority of vassals still had no fixed estate (Ganshof 1964). The stratification of a fighting band of vassals into an upper group composed of great territorial magnates, strong enough to ensure the inheritance of their ''benefice'' to the heirs of their family, and a lower group of landless knights attached to a " Count " or " Duke " might roughly be correlated with the new term " Fief " that was superseding "benefice" in the 9th century. The social settling out process also received impetus in fundamental changes in conducting warfare. As the example of the Huns demonstrated to the Romanized world that cavalry superseded a melee of fighting men on foot in determining the outcome of battles, the cost of maintenance of a mounted and increasingly armored fighting force was inflated. A mounted vassal needed wealth to equip the band of mounted fighters he was under obligation to contribute to his lord's frequent disputes, and wealth, where a money economy had disappeared, was only to be found in land and its productions, which included Peasant s, as much a resource of the land as wood and water. SEE ALSO COMPARE
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