The only lesson that mankind has learned from history is that mankind has not learned any lesson from history
Most of the dynastic changes in China began with peasant uprisings, and the reasons for the peasant uprisings were generally the following points: a serious land annexation, prominent class contradictions, heavy taxes and miscellaneous taxes, and peasants who could not maintain their livelihoods could only rise up and resist; the second rulers were cruel and unkind, the laws were harsh, and the expropriation was violent, causing the people to live in the depths of the waters, and they could only take risks in desperation; the three political corruptions, the corruption of officials, and the people were seriously exploited and squeezed, and could only resist. Compared with China, the rule of European countries has also experienced a period of feudal darkness, but there are few peasant uprisings.
The owner of the manor has the obligation to guarantee the basic livelihood of the peasants
Europe was dominated by a manor economy, with the owner of the estate leading the peasants, and the peasants could be subdivided into freedmen, liberated peasants, and serfs. The freedman has no lord's privileges, only the obligations of judgment, military service, and taxation, and his personality and land do not belong to the lord, and they can even change the lord freely, and the burden is light. However, such free people were in the minority, the largest were serfs, and according to European practice, the lords had the duty of protection to the peasants, responsible for defending against foreign enemies and rescuing disasters. That is to say, when encountering natural and man-made disasters, the lord of the manor was responsible for providing relief to the serfs and ensuring their basic living needs.
In this case, compared to the Chinese peasants who were bound to the land, once they lost their land, they lost their source of livelihood, the European serfs could meet their basic living needs even if they did not have land, and the serfs of various estates had little contact and were weak, and even if there was resistance, they would be quickly eliminated by powerful lords.
The manor court protects the rights and interests of farmers
In the feudal era of Europe, the size of the manor was different, and all the land in the manor belonged to the feudal lords, but most of the arable land was leased to the peasants, and only a small part was reserved for direct administration. The most important institution of the lord's mansion is the manor court, which can carry out independent political and economic adjudication according to the manor law, and is the judicial organ of the feudal lord ruling over the serfs, and the power to kill the serfs is seized. In essence, it was not only for the service of feudal lords, but also for the peasants to defend their own interests to a certain extent.
There is a large body of literature showing that if a lord violates the customary rules, he will also be punished by the manor court, and some manor court even makes a decision that is completely unfavorable to the lord. In one case in 1272, the entire court asked the lord to be called to answer one of his sharecroppers, and the next time the lord was seized for not attending the court. Therefore, the interests of the serfs were protected to a certain extent, and if there was a way to make representations, it was not easy for uprisings to occur.
Contractual relationships guarantee the rights of farmers
Serfdom in Western Europe was based on feudal land ownership and serfs' physical dependence on feudal masters, serfs were not legally free people, they were subordinate to lords for generations, serfs could have their own independent economy and means of production, lords had the right to guarantee their lives, could not be killed at will, and could buy and sell but in fact bought and sold serfs. The relationship between the lord and the peasant, though more arbitrary and arbitrary, still carried the spirit of contract.
Over time, the role of contracts between lords and peasants grew, and typical written contracts were called "charters". It fixed the various obligations of the peasant to the lord, restrained the lord from asking the peasant for more, and ensured that the peasant's rights were guaranteed, and this contractual relationship was an important condition for the continuous improvement of the peasant's status and the eventual attainment of freedom.
The taxes to be paid by the peasants in China are very flexible, mainly according to the nature of the ruler, and when they meet a benevolent and loving monarch and reduce the taxes, their lives will be more stable and harmonious; when they encounter an absurd monarch, increase the taxes, and then encounter a disaster year, the people will basically have no way to live. Under the influence of contractual relations, the burden of the European peasants is relatively stable, so the phenomenon of peasant uprisings will occur less often.
In general, the reason why peasant uprisings rarely occur in Europe is that the basic right to subsistence of the peasants in Europe is protected to a certain extent, so as not to have the extreme situation in China. However, as the persecution of serfs by manor owners deepened, especially the exploitation of black slaves, it eventually led to a large-scale revolt of serfs and the overthrow of the rule of feudal manor lords, which was the general trend of history.
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