Editing Serfdom (section)

===Class system===
The social class of the [[peasant]]ry can be differentiated into smaller categories. These distinctions were often less clear than suggested by their different names. Most often, there were two types of peasants:
# freemen, workers whose tenure within the manor was [[freehold (law)|freehold]]
# [[villein]]

Lower classes of peasants, known as [[cottar]]s or [[bordar]]s, generally comprising the younger sons of villeins;<ref>''Studies of field systems in the British Isles'', by Alan R. H. Baker, Robin Alan Butlin</ref><ref>''An Economic History of the British Isles'', by Arthur Birnie. p. 218 {{ISBN?}}</ref> vagabonds; and slaves, made up the lower class of workers.

====Coloni====
The {{Lang|la|[[Colonus (person)|colonus]]}} system of the late Roman Empire can be considered the predecessor of Western European [[feudal]] serfdom.<ref name="urlThe Pictorial History of England: Being a History of the People, as Well as ... – George Lillie Craik, Charles MacFarlane – Google Książki">{{cite web |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rxk5AQAAMAAJ&q=roman+colonus+feudalism&pg=PA545 |title=The Pictorial History of England: Being a History of the People, as Well as ... – George Lillie Craik, Charles MacFarlane –Google Książki |last1=Craik |first1=George Lillie |year=1846 |access-date=3 October 2020 |archive-date=12 May 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220512042725/https://books.google.com/books?id=rxk5AQAAMAAJ&q=roman+colonus+feudalism&pg=PA545 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="urlThe Edinburgh Review, Or Critical Journal: ... To Be Continued Quarterly - Google Książki">{{cite web |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DblZAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA449 |title=The Edinburgh Review, Or Critical Journal: ... To Be Continued Quarterly – Google Książki |year=1842 |access-date=3 October 2020 |archive-date=7 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407103336/https://books.google.com/books?id=DblZAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA449 |url-status=live}}</ref>

====Freemen====
Freemen, or [[free tenant]]s, held their land by one of a variety of contracts of [[feudal land tenure|feudal land-tenure]] and were essentially rent-paying tenant farmers who owed little or no service to the lord, and had a good degree of security of tenure and independence. In parts of 11th-century England freemen made up only 10% of the peasant population, and in most of the rest of Europe their numbers were also small.

====Ministeriales====
[[Ministerialis|Ministeriales]] were hereditary unfree knights tied to their lord, that formed the lowest rung of nobility in the [[Holy Roman Empire]].

====Villeins====
{{See also|Villein}}

In England, after the Norman conquest of 1066, an unfree tenant who held their land subject to providing agricultural and other services to their lord, was described as a villein. Villeins had limited rights and were tied to their lord. However they did have
more rights and were of a higher status than the lowest serf. They had to work on the demensne (their lords farm) in return for receiving small plots of land, to support their family.<ref name=friar458>{{Cite book|last=Friar|first=Stephen|title=The Sutton Companion to Local History|publisher=Sutton Publishing|year=2004|isbn=0-7509-2723-2|page=458}}</ref>

Villeins were not freemen, for example they and their daughters were not allowed to marry without their lords permission.
They could not move away without their lord's consent and the acceptance of the lord to whose manor they proposed to migrate to. Villeins were generally able to hold their own property, unlike slaves (serfs).<ref name=friar458/>Villeinage, as opposed to other forms of serfdom, was most common in Continental European feudalism, where land ownership had developed from roots in [[Roman law]].{{cn|date=July 2023}}

A variety of kinds of villeinage existed in Europe in the Middle Ages. Half-villeins received only half as many strips of land for their own use and owed a full complement of labour to the lord, often forcing them to rent out their services to other serfs to make up for this hardship. Villeinage was not a purely uni-directional exploitative relationship. In the Middle Ages, land within a lord's manor provided [[sustenance]] and survival, and being a villein guaranteed access to land, and crops secure from theft by marauding robbers. Landlords, even where they were legally entitled to do so, rarely evicted villeins because of the value of their labour. Villeinage was much preferable to being a vagabond, a slave, or an unlanded labourer.{{cn|date=July 2023}}

In many medieval countries, a villein could gain freedom by escaping from a [[Manorialism|manor]] to a city or [[borough]] and living there for more than a year; but this action involved the loss of land rights and agricultural livelihood, a prohibitive price unless the landlord was especially tyrannical or conditions in the village were unusually difficult.{{cn|date=July 2023}}

In medieval England, two types of villeins existed – ''villeins regardant'' that were tied to land and ''villeins in gross'' that could be traded separately from land.<ref name="urlThe Pictorial History of England: Being a History of the People, as Well as ... – George Lillie Craik, Charles MacFarlane – Google Książki" />

====Bordars and cottagers====
In England, the [[Domesday Book]], of 1086, uses {{Lang|ang|bordarii}} (bordar) and {{Lang|ang|cottarii}} ([[Cotter (farmer)|cottar]]) as interchangeable terms, ''cottar'' deriving from the native Anglo-Saxon tongue whereas ''bordar'' derived from the French.<ref>{{Cite book|editor-last=Hallam|editor-first= H.E.|editor2-last=Finberg|editor3-last=Thirsk |editor3-first=Joan |title=The Agrarian History of England and Wales: 1042–1350|publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1988 |location=Cambridge, England|isbn=0-521-20073-3|page=58}}</ref>

[[File:Supplice du Grand Knout.jpg|thumb|Punishment with a [[knout]]. Whipping was a common punishment for [[Serfdom in Russia|Russian serfs]].<ref>Chapman, Tim (2001). ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=EJCOl7S0UYgC&pg=PA83 Imperial Russia, 1801–1905] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160513021134/https://books.google.com/books?id=EJCOl7S0UYgC&pg=PA83&dq&hl=en |date=13 May 2016}}''. Routledge. p. 83. {{ISBN|0-415-23110-8}}</ref>]]

Status-wise, the bordar or cottar ranked below a villein in the social hierarchy of a manor, holding a [[cottage]], garden and just enough land to feed a family. In England, at the time of the Domesday Survey, this would have comprised between about {{convert|1|and|5|acre|ha|1|abbr=off}}.<ref name="mcgarry242">Daniel D. McGarry, ''Medieval History and Civilization'' (1976) p. 242</ref> Under an [[Elizabethan era|Elizabethan]] [[statute]], the [[Erection of Cottages Act 1588]], the cottage had to be built with at least {{convert|4|acre|km2 sqmi|2}} of land.<ref name="elmes178">{{Cite book|last=Elmes|first=James|title=On Architectural Jurisprudence; in which the Constitutions, Canons, Laws and Customs etc |publisher=W.Benning|location=London|year=1827|pages=178–179}}</ref> The later [[inclosure act]]s (1604 onwards) removed the cottars' right to any land: "before the Enclosures Act the cottager was a farm labourer with land and after the Enclosures Act the cottager was a farm labourer without land".<ref>{{Cite book|last=Hammond|first=J. L. |author-link1=John Lawrence Hammond|author2=Barbara Hammond |author-link2=Barbara Hammond|title=The Village Labourer 1760–1832|publisher=Longman Green & Co|location=London|year=1912|page=100}}</ref>{{better source|date=July 2023}}

The bordars and cottars did not own their draught oxen or horses. The Domesday Book showed that England comprised 12% freeholders, 35% serfs or villeins, 30% cotters and bordars, and 9% slaves.<ref name="mcgarry242" />

====Smerd====
[[Smerd]]y were a type of serfs above kholops in [[Medieval Poland]] and [[Kievan Rus']].

====Kholops====
[[Kholop]]s were the lowest class of serfs in the medieval and early modern Russia. They had status similar to slaves, and could be freely traded.

====Slaves====
The last type of serf was the slave.<ref>{{cite web |last1=McIntosh |first1=Matthew |title=A History of Serfdom |url=https://brewminate.com/a-history-of-serfdom/ |website=Brewminate |access-date=17 February 2020 |date=4 December 2018 |archive-date=17 February 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200217153144/https://brewminate.com/a-history-of-serfdom/ |url-status=live}}</ref> Slaves had the fewest rights and benefits from the manor. They owned no tenancy in land, worked for the lord exclusively and survived on donations from the landlord. It was always in the interest of the lord to prove that a servile arrangement existed, as this provided him with greater rights to fees and taxes. The status of a man was a primary issue in determining a person's rights and obligations in many of the [[manorial court]]-cases of the period. Also, runaway slaves could be beaten if caught.