What is a “serf”?

The story behind the answer

A serf was legally bound to a lord’s manor: he owed labor services, rents in kind, and fees, and could not leave or sell his holding without permission. This distinguishes them from free tenants who could move and negotiate rents, from nobles who owned land, and from vassal soldiers who owed military service.

Serfdom underpinned medieval manorialism across Europe. Though unfree, many held customary rights to small plots and to the lord’s protection, and status was usually hereditary. The Black Death (1347–1351) thinned the labor force, boosting peasants’ bargaining power; labor services were increasingly commuted to cash rents, provoking resistance like England’s Peasants’ Revolt (1381). Serfdom waned in Western Europe by the 16th century but endured in parts of Eastern Europe until the 19th century.