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The 14th century in Europe has
often been called the Calamitous Century and rightly so. The primary
disruption of that century was obviously the appearance of the Black Death .As
we've seen, the Black Death was ultimately responsible for the gruesome death
of more than 25 million people, a figure which represented at least 30
percent of Europe's total population. Whole villages
and towns simply ceased to exist as the plague raged across Europe
at mid-century. To make matters worse, Europe suffered
a series of crop failures and famines which, while less deadly than the
plague, persisted for several years. There were three such famines which
occurred just before and after the plague. These famines were usually result of poor climatic conditions. Regardless of the
cause, times were indeed difficult for 14th century men and women.
Perhaps Europe was over-populated in at the start
of the 14th century -- perhaps there were simply too many mouths to feed
given the status of medieval agricultural techniques. And even in years of
good harvest, most people had to survive on the slim margin of existence. The
14th century was not an age of plenty.
The declining population at the end of the 14th century had a number of
important effects. Many people touched by the plague moved away from medieval
cities and towns to unaffected areas. This was the negative impact. On the
positive side, some landlords began to concentrate on improving the fertility
of the soil. And back in the cities, the declining population of workers
meant that masters sought out new ways to produce which required less
manpower. That is, they began to construct labor saving machinery. In other
words, an act of God produced a greater need for technological innovation.
Meanwhile, the prices of agricultural products increased. This inflation
of prices stayed high until the end of the century when prices began to fall.
But because agricultural laborers were scarce, having been wiped out by
famine or by the plague, they began to demand higher wages which were
necessary because of the high price of goods. Landlords sought new ways to
increase their incomes. One way was to increase rents, which they did.
Another way was to find a crop which would yield higher returns and they
found this crop in the raising of sheep. So landlords in England
began to convert land which was traditionally held by the peasants in common
into enclosed property upon which sheep would be raised. And the raising of
sheep, though lucrative, is not a labor-intensive proposition.
One reason why the number of farm laborers decreased was the plague. But
another, equally important reason, was that many serfs now chose to commute
their labor services by money payments, to abandon the farm altogether, and
to pursue more interesting in rewarding jobs in the skilled craft industries
in the cities. This new vocational option was made possible by the Black
Death.
Agricultural prices fell because of lowered demand, and the price of
luxury and manufactured goods -- the work of skilled artisans -- rose. The
nobility suffered the greatest decline in power from this new state of
affairs. They were forced to pay more for finished products and for farm labor
and they received a smaller return on agricultural produce. Everywhere their
rents were in steady decline after the plague.
Masters and merchants petitioned their governments to
intervene and around 1350, the governments of England,
France and Spain
began to fix prices and wages which, of course, was
favorable to employers and not to workers. For instance, in 1351, Edward III
of England
instituted the STATUTE OF LABOURERS which forbade employers to pay
more than customary wages and require that all laborers accept those wages.
The Statute ordained that:
Every man and woman of our realm of England, of what condition he be,
free or bond, able in body, and within the age of sixty years, not living in
merchandize, nor exercising any craft, nor having all his own whereof he may
live, nor land of his own about whose tillage he may occupy himself, and not
serving any other; if he'd be required to serve in suitable service, his
estate considered, he shall be bound to serve him which shall so require him;
and take only the wages, livery, meed, or salary
which were accustomed to be given in the places where he oweth
to serve.
The bottom line is that the English government had
given into the demands of the landlords by fixing wages. As a result of the Statute
of Labourers, English inflation began to
subside. The Statute was not a success, however, and the labor
shortage hastened the end of serfdom and paved the way for the disorders that
followed under Edward's successor. The cause of the peasants was defended
effectively in a vernacular verse satire of Edward's reign, THE VISION CONCERNING PIERS PLOWMAN, which
denounced the corruption of officials and of the clergy.
The decline in populations and inflation deeply disturbed 14th century Europe.
The previous two or three centuries had been remarkably stable on the part of
the laboring classes but the 14th century began to witness numerous peasant
and urban revolts against the oppression of the propertied classes. This was
something completely new and developed from local circumstances made worse by
famine and the plague.
 In 1323, the landlord's attempt to impose old manorial
rights and obligations infuriated the now free peasants of Flanders.
As a result, the peasants revolted, a revolt lasting five bloody years. In
1358, French peasants took up arms in protest against the blundering of the
countryside by French soldiers during the 100 Years' War. Perhaps 20,000
peasants died in this uprising known as the JACQUERIE.
The most spectacular of all the 14th century peasants was the English
Peasants' War. In 1381, the English peasants revolted, angered over
legislation like the Statute of Labourers,
which tied them to the land and imposed new taxes. One of these taxes, the
poll tax, was particularly troublesome. A whole or head tax is a tax levied
on individual simply because he exists. In 1380, the English government
issued a new poll tax, the third in just four years. Meanwhile, landlords
were constantly increasing rents on their land, lay and to which the peasants
was now tied by the Statute of Labourers.
 In 1381, and under the leadership of heroes such as WAT TYLER
and Jack Straw, the peasants marched to London
in order to present a petition to the king. 60,000 strong, the petitioned
called for the abolition of serfdom, tithes and the game laws as well as the
right to freely use the forests. The peasants also demanded that the poll tax
be abolished. John Ball, a priest who spoke regularly to the people gathered
in the marketplace, expressed the sentiments of the revolt in the following
way:
My good friends, things cannot go on well in England,
nor ever will until everything shall be in common; when there shall neither
be vassal nor lord, and all distinctions leveled; when the lords shall be no
more masters than ourselves. But ill have they used
us! And for what reason do they hold us in bondage? Are we not all descended
from the same parents, Adam and Eve? And what can they show, or what reasons
give, why they should be more the masters than ourselves?
Except, perhaps, in making us labor and work, for them to spend. . . . They had
handsome manors, when we must brave the wind and rain in our labors in the
field; but it is from our labor they have wherewith to support their pomp. We
are called slaves, and if we do not perform our service we are beaten, and we
have no sovereign to whom we can complain or who would be willing to hear us.
Let us go to the King and speak with him; he is young, and from him we may
obtain a favorable answer, and if not we must ourselves seek to amend our
condition.
Workers in the cities, especially London,
rose in support of the peasants and their demands. Richard II, then only
fourteen years of age, offered to meet the peasant demands. Under the command
of Wat Tyler, the rebels camped at Blackheath where they waited for word from Richard II.
The king agreed to meet with the rebels but the crowds that had assembled
made it difficult for him to land at Greenwich.
The frustrated rebels attacked the prison at Marshalsea
and Richard returned to his mother at the Tower. The rebels plundered Lambeth Palace,
burned books and furniture, crossed London
Bridge and joined the London
mob. They made their way to Fleet Street, opened the Fleet prison and,
according to Froissart's Chronicles:
fell on the food and drink that was
found. In the hope of appeasing them, nothing was refused them. . . . They
destroyed several fine houses, saying they would burn all the suburbs, take London
by force, and burn and destroy everything.
The Savoy Palace,
home of the King's uncle, was burned to the ground. The Tower was under
siege. On June 14, Richard looked down upon the mob from his room in the
Tower and managed to arrange an interview with the rebels at Mile End where,
among other concessions, he granted their requests for the abolition of
feudal services and their right to rent land at an agreed price. Some of the
rebels returned home. But for those who remained near the Tower, violence was
about to escalate.
The king had advised Simon of Sudbury, Archbishop of Canterbury and
Chancellor, to seize the opportunity to escape. But as the plan unfolded Sudbury
was recognized by the rebels and the London
mob smashed their way into the Tower. One historian has described the event
in the following way:
In the Chapel of St John the shouting rabble came upon the Archbishop,
Sir Robert Hales, the Lord Treasurer, John of Graunt's
physician, and John Legge who had devised the poll
tax. They were all at prayer before the altar. Dragged away from the chapel,
down the steps and out of the gates onto Tower Hill, where traitors were
executed, they were beheaded one after the other. Their heads were stuck on
pikes and carried in triumph around the city.
The next day (June 15), Richard II again met with the rebels. At the Smithfield
conference further concessions were granted the rebels: the estates of the
church would be confiscated, all lordships except the kings would be
abolished, and all the rebels would be pardoned. Wat
Tyler rode up to the king, his "horse's tail under the every nose of the
king's horse," made the mayor of London
lose his temper. He knocked Wat Tyler off his horse
with a broadsword and as Wat lay on the ground one
of the king's squires stabbed him in the stomach, killing him. The English
Peasants' War was over. Wat Tyler's head was cut
from his corpse and displayed on London
Bridge. John Ball was hanged,
drawn and quartered in the presence of Richard II and his quarters were
displayed in four other towns as a warning to other rebel. Jack Straw was
executed and his head displayed on London
Bridge. The promises made to the
rebels by Richard II were quickly withdrawn although the poll tax was
abolished.
Social unrest afflicted workers in towns and cities as well as the
peasants in the countryside. Governments, controlled as they were by the
wealthiest nobility, made every attempt to fix prices and wages as well as
regulate the movement of workers in their country. The most typical and most
significant of these urban revolts was the Ciompi
rebellion of 1378.
Florence was the wool
manufacturing center of Europe. Perhaps one-third of
the city's population was engaged in a trade directly related to the
manufacture of wool. Florence was
also one city hit hard by the Black Death and it was because of this that
manufacturers cut back on production thus putting workers out of a job. The
poorest workers were denied entry into guilds and when connected with price
and wage fixing, the situation for these poor souls grew intolerable. The
name Ciompi was given to those skilled
workers who were engaged in the carding of wool (carding is that process in
which were raw wool is cleaned and straightened prior to twisting into yarn
and was at this time, a hand process). As skilled workers, the carders
demanded various reforms of their masters. For instance, they demanded that
employers had to insure them work, that they would not do anything injurious
to the workers and finally, that employers would permit workers their right
to enter a guild. By 1382, the wealthy manufacturing families of Florence
put down this rebellion of skilled workers by force and the Ciompi or forced to accept all previous arrangements.
The primary issue of these revolts, both those of the countryside and the
city, was not misery, hunger or poverty. Instead, the primary motivation for
these revolts was specifically moral -- peasants and skilled workers were
routinely denied certain rights. What we are beginning to see in these
episodes is the emergence of the worker's right to enter into a collective
bargaining agreement with their employers, a right which we perhaps take for
granted today.
There is one final event which marks the 14th century as a Calamitous
Century. If plague and famine weren't enough, 14th century Europeans also
suffered from numerous wars, lengthy wars which destroyed both town and
countryside. To deprive an invading army of food, it was not at all unusual
for the peasants to burn their fields. The invading armies also destroyed
farms in order to destroy the morale of the peasants. Plunder by discharged
soldiers was also common.
 In
earlier centuries, wars have been generally short and small in scale. In the
14th century, a new trend developed. The most destructive war was a series of
conflicts between the English and the French known as the HUNDRED YEARS' WAR,
a war which raged off and on from 1337 to 1453.
Because of increasingly complex feudal contracts, English kings and ruled
parts of France
and conflict between the two monarchies was common. The arrival of feudalism
in the eighth and 9th centuries had been a major step toward European
stability after the fall of Rome.
But feudalism, based as it was on a legal contract, rested on a delicate
balance. The personal relationship between lord and vassal would only succeed
if all members of the partnership remained faithful to their obligations. By
the 14th century, there were a number of forces which upset this delicate
balance.
In 1328, the Capetian dynasty in France
came to an end with the death of Charles IV, the son of Philip the Fair. An
assembly of French barons gave the crown to Philip VI of Valois,
the nephew of Philip the Fair. Of course, Edward III, king of England,
asserted that he in fact had a superior claimed to the throne because his
mother was Philip the Fair's daughter. This, then, was one of the primary
causes of the Hundred Years' War. Imagine -- an English king the king of France
as well!
Another cause of the Hundred Years' War was clearly economic conflict. The
French monarchy tried to squeeze new taxes from towns in northern Europe
which had grown wealthy as trade and cloth-making centers. Dependent as they
were on English wool, these towns through their support behind English and
Edward III.
To make matters worse, war had become a more expensive proposition in the
14th century. Larger, healthier and better-trained armies were needed. Most
governments began to rely on paid mercenaries to do their fighting for them.
The problem with mercenaries is that they were expensive to obtain an even
more expensive to retain. More often than not, the mercenary had no
allegiance to anyone king and fought for the highest bidder. Furthermore,
mercenaries were a competitive and quarrelsome lot. To counteract the high
price of war, European monarchs imposed even more taxes upon the people. The
French were most adept at this: there were taxes on salt, bread, and wine as
well as taxes on the rights to use wine presses, grindstones and mills. And
of course, there was the poll tax.
The last cause of the Hundred Years' War was factional conflict. By the
14th century the European nobility had become diluted with men who had
entered the nobility not because they had a claim by virtue of birth but
because of their wealth. Meanwhile, the older nobility was losing income due
to declining rents. Many older nobles joined forces with mercenaries in order
to maintain their position and status. Other nobles married into wealthy
families while still others tried to improve their situation by the buying
and selling of royal offices. What all this boiled down to was conflict.
Nobles tended to join factions united against other factions. These
factions included a great family, their knights, servants and even workers
and peasants on the manorial estate. They had their own small armies,
loyalties and even symbols of allegiance. The bottom line is that these
factions were beginning to form small states within a state and contributed
not only to the overall violence of the 14th century but also to the need of
monarchs to keep their nobility under constant surveillance. This explains
why Louis XIV, the Sun King, housed his nobility at Versailles
-- it was so he could keep an eye on them.
The most pressing issue during the Hundred Years' War was the status of Aquitaine,
a large province in southwestern France.
According to feudal law, Edward III held Aquitaine
as part of his fiefdom. Philip attacked this territory, claiming it was
rightfully his. Edward's response was to join forces with the Flemish in 1337
and this was the principal cause of the war.
The war, fought entirely on French soil, raged off and on for more than
100 years. English victories were followed by French victories, then a period of stalemate would ensue, until the
conflicts again rose to the surface. During periods of truce, English and
French soldiers -- most of whom were mercenaries -- would roam the French
countryside killing and stealing.
 After
the battle of Agincourt
in 1415, won by the English under Henry V, the English controlled most of
northern France.
It appeared that England
would shortly conquer France
and unite the two countries under one crown. At this crucial moment in French
history, a young and illiterate peasant girl, JOAN OF ARC (c.1412-1431),
helped to rescue France. At the age of 13 she believed she had heard the
voices of St. Michael, St. Catherine and St. Margaret bidding her to rescue
the French people. Believing that God had commanded heard to drive the
English out of France,
Joan rallied the demoralized French troops, leading them in battle. Clad in a
suit of white armor and flying her own standard she liberated France
from the English at the battle of Orleans.
Ultimately captured and imprisoned by the English, Joan of Arc was condemned
as a heretic and a witch and stood trial before the Inquisition in
1431. Joan was found guilty and was to be burnt at the stake but at the last
moment she broke down and recanted everything. She eventually broke down
again and faithful to her "voices," decided to become a martyr and
was then burnt at the stake and became a national hero.
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