Legal Definitions - servage

Servage refers to a historical legal obligation within the feudal system where a serf was required to perform specific services or labor for their lord. If the serf was unable to perform these duties, they were legally bound to provide an equivalent value in goods, produce, or money as compensation to the lord.

Here are some examples to illustrate the concept of servage:

• Imagine a serf living on a lord's estate in medieval Europe. This serf might be obligated under servage to spend three days each week working directly on the lord's personal fields, plowing, planting, and harvesting crops. This labor was a mandatory service owed to the lord, directly contributing to the lord's sustenance and wealth.

  This example demonstrates servage as a required service, specifically agricultural labor, that a serf had to perform for their lord.

• Consider a serf who was a skilled blacksmith. Their servage might require them to repair the lord's farming tools and armor for a certain number of hours each month. However, if the serf was ill or had a personal emergency preventing them from performing this work, their servage obligation might allow them to provide a specific quantity of iron ore or a set number of newly forged tools of equivalent value to the lord instead.

  This illustrates the flexibility within servage, where a specific service could be substituted with an equivalent value in kind (goods or produce) if the direct labor could not be performed.

• In some feudal arrangements, a serf might have been obligated to contribute to the maintenance of the lord's castle, perhaps by helping to clear ditches or repair walls for a few days a year. If a particular serf wished to be excused from this specific duty, they might be permitted to pay a small sum of money to the lord, which would then be used to hire someone else to perform the task or simply serve as direct compensation.

  This example highlights how servage could involve non-agricultural services and how monetary payment could be an alternative to direct labor, fulfilling the "equivalent value in money" aspect of the obligation.