> feudalism was literally hey anon its your liege lord, i heard youre 16 now? heres your house, wife and a sack of seeds just toss them on the ground and give me a little bit of the stuff that pops up a few months later. you are completely and utterly wrong. that isn't what happened at all. serfs weren't just given a house or land, what typically happened was that some kind of war or financial or other difficulty forced them into pledging an oath of fealty to the lord to get his protection, and in return they would promise to fight in any wars for the lord, do work for him on the manor, plus give up a share of the crops they grew on the land they were allowed to farm subsistence crops for themselves. but frequently, the land and house they were allowed to use was already owned by the family before entering into fealty, they basically gave the lord ownership of it in return for being allowed to live and farm on it indefinitely. it was much closer to getting a reverse mortgage or heloc to pay off debts instead of ending up homeless. and the lord definitely did not just give a wife to anyone. arranged marriages were something aristocrats did, not peasants. two local families might try to work out a deal to marry their kids, but generally it worked the exact same way as it does today and men would be expected to go out and convince a woman to marry him. then he would need to get the blessing of the lord, but the lord wasn't wasting his time arranging peasant marriages. also, pre-marital sex and sex outside of marriage was extremely common and normal.
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