The Emergence and Formation of the Second Estate as the …

 

 

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The Emergence and Formation of the Second Estate as the Knightly Class in France,
814-1230

By Christopher Connor

The knight is one the most prominent archetypal figures of the medieval period; he not

only dominated warfare, but the political and cultural spheres of society as well. The knightly

class began to emerge in the splinter kingdoms of the Carolingian empire during the ninth

century. The general decline of central royal authority during the early middle ages led to

increasingly powerful local lords and endemic private warfare. Localized political authority and

private warfare continued to characterize medieval France in the following centuries and

allowed the knightly class to coalesce into a self-aware group within society. The knightly class

was defined by their function in war, their landed wealth, their titles, their lineage and in the high

middle ages chivlary. This self-awareness and sense of identity only became fully defined as

“chivalry” at the end of the eleventh century and grew more defined in the twelfth and thirteenth

centuries. A significant reason for chivalry developing when it did was the slow acceptance of

the second estate by the church. It was this gradual acceptance by the church that allowed the

knightly class to develop its culture and identity as a class, integrated within medieval culture as

In defining the second estate as a class it is important to understand what is meant by the

term “class” in medieval history. The knightly class was a group of people who shared a

common function, that is warfare, as well as a developing culture built around the concepts of

honor, service, loyalty, prowess, bravery and later courtesy and mercy. Economically they were

a heterogeneous group, although they were at least moderately well off within the standards of

medieval society. Even the poorer landless knights could expect to live much better than the

a whole.

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vast majority of medieval society. Similarly, they varied in their degree of political power;

though all knights were at some level involved in medieval lordship. A count or duke could not

rule without the authority and power that he gained from his followers. The sense in which the

knightly class was a class arises from their shared institutions, whether they were political,

military, cultural or economic.

The variety of nomenclature of the knightly class requires some explanation and

definition. The terms knight (from the old English knict meaning servant), the French chevalier,

vassal (from the Latin vassus meaning servant), and Latin miles (plural milites, meaning soldier)

were all used to describe members of the knightly class. For most purposes these words meant

the same thing, a member of the knightly class, however their use changed over time with some

becoming more common and others less common. These terms also had more specific meanings

that used to indicate certain relationships.

Miles is perhaps the oldest of these terms to describe knights. The original Latin term

simply meant soldier and denoted a rather low social status. During the ninth century however it

began to be adopted by the nobility as a title, used both describe themselves and their military

men. Latin documents used it to describe knightly service, as in servicium miltum. Miles

persisted in medieval Latin as a specifically knightly title. Chevalier and knight began to

become common titles in the later middle ages as French and English became more common

written languages. For all intents and purposes they mean the same thing as miles during the

medieval period in that they are titles denoting knightly status.

The term vassal had both a cultural definition as a title as well as a legal definition. A

vassal was someone who had sworn military service to someone, usually in exchange for land.

Like miles it dates back to at least the ninth century if not earlier. The term vassal could also be

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used to describe just about any member of the knightly class, from counts and dukes, who were

at least nominally vassals of the king, to the petty aristocracy such as landed knights who were

vassals of the counts and dukes. Another form of vassal, vavassor, meant specifically the vassal

of a vassal and was used irregularly, mainly for those knights who were vassals of wealthier

knights who could afford to give lands in order to obtain followers.

The terms nobility and aristocracy also require some clarification within the context of

this paper. The term nobility is particularly controversial in early medieval historiography and

will be elaborated on below. For the purposes of this paper however it will refer to the elite of

the knightly class, that is the counts, dukes and other important territorial lords. The term

aristocracy will be used synonymously with the knightly class, as the knightly class is the

aristocracy of early and high medieval France. Knights were the elite, and even the poorest

possessed a social status that elevated them within early and high medieval French society.

In discussing the emergence of the knightly class a number of issues that have

been controversial in the historiography of the early and high medieval periods. The first of

these issues is the origin and composition of the medieval aristocracy. Some have attempted to

define the the aristocracy along lines of social status and rank, others have viewed it as a more

functional class, inclusive of not only the aristocracy but also their armed retainers (Milites

Ordine). There is little doubt that these two groups lived together quite closely due to their

shared function. Some historians have claimed that they did not view themselves as a class until

the formalization of the title of knight and the common ethos of chivalry emerged. The conflict

is a divide between a cultural view of the second estate and a functional view of the second

estate. The key to reconciling these approaches is to understand that the culture of the knightly

class emerges from its function both in lordship and warfare. The historians cited below are

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representative of the general trends in the historiography of early medieval nobility and the

concept of chivalry. While by no means exhaustive, their methodology and conclusions

exemplify the various ways in which historians have approached these subjects.

The second major issue concerning the emergence of the knightly class is the emergence

of chivalry. Certain historians have claimed that there is a great distinction between the knight

of the high middle ages (generally considered to begin at the end of the eleventh century, around

the time of the first crusade) and the “proto-knight” of the early middle ages. This distinction

however is difficult to make because neither the constituents nor the function of the class in

question changed. This is not to say however that important developments concerning the

second estate did not take place during the high middle ages. The idea that there is something

essentially different between the fighting men of the early middle ages and those of the high

middle ages is a fallacy. A class of warrior elites emerged in the ninth and tenth centuries,

chivalry emerged as this class became increasingly formalized during the high middle ages.

The concept of a feudal revolution taking place in the eleventh century has fueled much

of the historiography concerning these two issues. This idea of a break in political and social

institutions from the early medieval to the high medieval period has helped fuel the idea that the

knight only truly emerged in the high medieval period. Recent scholarship however has

attempted to re-evaluate this particular thesis. A trend towards viewing the medieval period as a

continuous progression rather than a series of periods marked by contrasts. Furthermore many

of the issues concerning the knightly class have been addressed in a more nuanced view. The

integration of ideas like the new versus an old nobility into a more complete picture, as well as a

new focus on the functional role of chivalry as opposed to its purely cultural aspects has

characterized the modern historiography. This newer historiography based on continuity and

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integration of old theories allows for an approach to studying the knightly class that involves

both the early and high medieval periods and views the emergence of the knightly class as a

continuous progression.

There has been considerable discussion of the origins of the early medieval nobility and

whether it was comprised of a “new” nobility composed of the ancestors of humble milites

ordines or whether it was a continuation of an “old” nobility which consisted of the counts and

dukes of the eighth century. Both of these interpretations have difficulties in explaining the

exact nature of nobility, however this debate provides a base from which to discuss the class of

professional soldiers who did occasionally rise into the ranks of the nobility. While there is little

written on this group of men their occasional rise into the ranks of nobility provides some

information as to who they were. The primary difficulty here is that the feudal system had not

become as formalized as it would be in the later middle ages, and the status of the milites could

vary widely. However, during the ninth to eleventh centuries it is apparent there was a class of

men who were defined by their function in warfare, called milites.

Marc Bloch, the author of Feudal Society, states there was no clear nobility in the early

middle ages, and that it only began to arise in the ninth and tenth centuries, during which the title

was quite vague and ill-defined.1 This conclusion is supported mainly by Bloch’s narrow

definition of nobility: “First, it must have a legal status of its own … In the second place, this

status must be hereditary–“.2 The nobility of the early middle ages of course did not fall under

such a definition, as during the Carolingian era only the legal codes of the Saxons made such

distinctions. Bloch also views the poverty of genealogies and the shortness of those that exist as

1 Marc Bloch, Feudal Society (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1961), 283.
2 Bloch, Feudal Society, 283

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another sign of the lack of a nobility, as Bloch views these as necessary to a true nobility.

Furthermore, Bloch states that the short length of noble genealogies implies that during this

period the so-called ‘nobles’ were recently descended from men of humble origin.3

Bloch also discusses the various and different ways the word nobilis was used throughout

the early middle ages. Occasionally it was used to describe those who were not subject to feudal

obligations, holding only allodial lands, although these are used primarily in chronicles

describing the so-called noble entering into a feudal obligation, and this definition disappearing

by the eleventh century. The other definition that Bloch cites is a somewhat obscure Italian

chronicle stating that nobility is derived from having no slaves among their ancestors.4 Bloch

goes on to describe how the term nobility became connected to military vassalage and the

distinction between peasant levies and the professional well-equipped soldiers and lords, and

how combat came to define the nobility.

Much of this interpretation of the nobility is correct, but Bloch makes a mistake in

defining the term nobilis and the nobility so narrowly. The requirement for the nobility to

possess a unique legal status excludes a semi-cohesive class of wealthy and powerful people

who did consider their ancestry to bestow upon them a special status, even if it was not defined

in strict legal terms. Bloch, is however quite correct when he interprets the aristocracy’s military

status in the early middle ages. These men had either gained power through military

achievements or had held on to it by displays of the same ability. The problem remains however

that there is ample evidence of a self-aware nobility quite capable of drawing its ancestry back to

the early Carolingian era present throughout the ninth and tenth century. Furthermore this

3 Bloch, Feudal Society, 286.
4 Bloch, Feudal Society, 286.

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interpretation denies the continuity of a noble class, that existed during the Carolingian era and

would during the ninth and tenth centuries become the progenitors of the knightly class.

Jane Martindale’s article, “The French Aristocracy in the Early Middle Ages: A

Reappraisal”, advances the idea that there was a real nobility that was very aware of its

privileged status even if legal codes did not define it. She begins by citing the chronicler Thegan

who described the attacks on the royal serf Ebo who was made archbishop by Louis the Pious

and the nobility promptly rejected Ebo. While this evidence mainly provides the conclusion that

the lower classes (especially the servile) were unfit for the higher offices, Thegan does view

nobility as a matter of birth that no earthly authority could alter.5 Furthermore Martindale

asserts that the chroniclers of the Carolingian period used language very conscious of

hierarchical differences. The nobility where described in a variety of terms: primores, proceres,

and potentes, which makes it clear that power was the chief characteristic of the aristocracy in

the Carolingian era. However, Martindale then goes on to state that it is misleading to suppose

there was no value attached to “noble blood.”6 Martindale concludes contrary to Bloch that the

French aristocracy never derived their status from legal stratification but that birth was an

important element in attaining social and political rank and was distinguished from wealth and

Moreover, Martindale states that under the late Carolingians and early Capetians that

milites were often introduced into the nobility by means of inter-marriage, which in her

interpretation shows that the status of the old aristocracy was heavily involved in the status of a

5 Jane Martindale, “The French Aristocracy in the Early Middle Ages: A Reappraisal,” Past and Present, 75

6 Jane Martindale, “The French Aristocracy in the Early Middle Ages: A Reappraisal,” Past and Present, 75

power.

(1977): 5.

(1977): 15-16.

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woman, and that a wife to a less exalted soldier she brought that status with her. This of course

supports Martindale’s conception of a highly self-aware nobility, because women, who held no

title or power, could only be described in terms of their lineage.7

Martindale’s article is in many ways a reply to Bloch’s assertion of the lack of a coherent

definable nobility. Martindale overstates the case for social differentiation in terms of ancestry,

her evidence of social differentiation does not always entail status by birth, and that evidence

which does tends to describe it does so more as an honor than strict class-consciousness. The

ease with which some rather humble families climbed the social ladder in the early middle ages

implies a much more fluid class structure. While great jumps in social status may have been

viewed negatively, the lesser milites often joined the ranks of the upper aristocracy within one or

two generations. While the knightly class certainly placed importance on noble birth and

heredity it by no means was strictly separated along those lines.

Martindale’s primary disagreement with Bloch is based upon one of the difficulties in

defining feudalism itself, being whether feudal society was hierarchical, as Martindale asserts, or

whether it was merely unequal, as Bloch claims. Martindale deals primarily with ecclesiastical

cultural sources, which often attempted to describe stratification in terms of class, even when

such classes recalled the classical world much more than the medieval one. In many ways

however Martindale makes even greater interpretive leaps than Bloch, often insisting that when

texts make mention of someone’s social rank they are inherently being placed within a strict

stratification. More importantly, Martindale views the cultural materials as important because

they include the influence of noble women. This is quite clear when she interprets a letter

7 Jane Martindale, “The French Aristocracy in the Early Middle Ages: A Reappraisal,” Past and Present, 75

(1977): 43-45.