Pages

Sunday, June 26, 2011

Question from Mary R - Outlawing of serfdom in England

Does anyone know when the practice of holding serfs was outlawed in England? I know that during the Wat Tyler rebellion, Richard II agreed to free them; but I think he reneged on this.

2 comments:

  1. According to this article, serfdom in England pretty much died out without special legislation; it was effectively recognized as dead by 1574:

    http://www.1902encyclopedia.com/S/SLA/slavery-12.html

    ReplyDelete
  2. Worth keeping an eye on enclosures of common land, which accelerated in the Tudor period.

    Wikipedia has a decent section on it:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enclosure#Tudor_enclosures

    No more serfs, but the common people still screwed.

    ReplyDelete

All comments are moderated so your replies may not show up immediately. Please be patient. Thanks!