Laborares

Peasants

Peasant, serf, yeoman, freeholder -- here as elsewhere, we have to contend first with the words themselves. Medieval sources are not in the least bit consistent in how they use these terms, so my description here is necessarily an amalgamation and an abstraction of usages.

I use the word "peasant" to describe someone who lived in a village or some other rural setting and who was more or less free. A serf is one who lived in the same environment, but who to one degree or an other had his freedom restricted by someone else.

Most peasants were farmers, but the word applied also to the village blacksmith or cooper or miller. Serfs, likewise might be farmers but might also be craftsmen. The difference between the two was that the peasant owned his own land, while the serf did not. The serf owed labor duties to his lord, whereas a peasant owed nothing or, more usually, owed some sort of rent.