They had 2-3 months of religious holiday where they were not working. Also every Sunday, no work.
I can only speak for myself, but I don’t work on Saturdays and Sundays. And I don’t have any religious obligations on those days, so I’ve got them all to myself.
So that’s almost two months worth of Saturdays and on top of that I’ve got a month of paid leave and 7 holiday days.
Work-wise I’m not going to day we have it better or that we aren’t being exploited, but I sure know I wouldn’t want to trade places with a medieval peasant.
Additionally, in times when the crops required less care (so not planting or harvesting) peasants were required by their lords to do various amounts of labor. Like “build X feet of fences per year, mend Y feet of fences, serve Z days of conscripted labor”, etc.
So on the one hand, peasants weren’t ruled by the tyranny of the clock like we are, but on the other: work still had to get done, was much less efficient than today (bc technology), and was often unpaid
At the other hand, the lord did have obligations to the peasantry as well. Providing protection is a fairly well known one, but it could also be stuff like providing their people with meat at least once a week. An example that we know of is a case where a complaint was raised by peasants (and won!) because their lord had only provided fish (or maybe duck, as that was considered fish as well) for too long a period.
I’m not sure how adding a bit of nuance to the suggestion that medieval peasants might have less working hours than we do is “simping for inequality”.
I don’t endorse inequality, on the contrary. Hell, the party I vote for in my country is so left it makes Bernie Sanders look like a rightwinger in comparison.
But only one decontextualized fact that supports my position and not a more robust understanding or anything that would be be genuinely complicated. Not too much.
If anyone is promoting decontextualized facts, it’s those claiming midevial peasants only worked X days (with the implication being they had way more leisure time than modern workers). Not only is that claim contested, it does not account for unpaid work, and it only started being true at all after the black death, when economic activity ground to a halt and there were huge labor imbalances. It was not a good time to be alive.
The argument isn’t that it was a good time to be alive. The argument is that they did it and with no tools no modern machinery no fossil fuels no electricity they still had a world and food and shelter.
Friendly reminder that medieval peasants only spent 20-30 hours per week working the land.
But that doesn’t mean the other hours were just leisure time, maintenance of tools, clothing, house, etc also took up quite some time.
This is not historically accurate. They had 2-3 months of religious holiday where they were not working. Also every Sunday, no work.
Don’t be an ignorant wage slave. It’s cringe.
I can only speak for myself, but I don’t work on Saturdays and Sundays. And I don’t have any religious obligations on those days, so I’ve got them all to myself.
So that’s almost two months worth of Saturdays and on top of that I’ve got a month of paid leave and 7 holiday days.
Work-wise I’m not going to day we have it better or that we aren’t being exploited, but I sure know I wouldn’t want to trade places with a medieval peasant.
Additionally, in times when the crops required less care (so not planting or harvesting) peasants were required by their lords to do various amounts of labor. Like “build X feet of fences per year, mend Y feet of fences, serve Z days of conscripted labor”, etc.
So on the one hand, peasants weren’t ruled by the tyranny of the clock like we are, but on the other: work still had to get done, was much less efficient than today (bc technology), and was often unpaid
At the other hand, the lord did have obligations to the peasantry as well. Providing protection is a fairly well known one, but it could also be stuff like providing their people with meat at least once a week. An example that we know of is a case where a complaint was raised by peasants (and won!) because their lord had only provided fish (or maybe duck, as that was considered fish as well) for too long a period.
Go find some billionaire’s balls to lick.
Simping for inequalityand theft of automation-gains, .world, name a more iconic duo
I’m not sure how adding a bit of nuance to the suggestion that medieval peasants might have less working hours than we do is “simping for inequality”.
I don’t endorse inequality, on the contrary. Hell, the party I vote for in my country is so left it makes Bernie Sanders look like a rightwinger in comparison.
But only one decontextualized fact that supports my position and not a more robust understanding or anything that would be be genuinely complicated. Not too much.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/medieval-peasants-worked-150-days/
If anyone is promoting decontextualized facts, it’s those claiming midevial peasants only worked X days (with the implication being they had way more leisure time than modern workers). Not only is that claim contested, it does not account for unpaid work, and it only started being true at all after the black death, when economic activity ground to a halt and there were huge labor imbalances. It was not a good time to be alive.
The argument isn’t that it was a good time to be alive. The argument is that they did it and with no tools no modern machinery no fossil fuels no electricity they still had a world and food and shelter.
they also died by 30 and 50% of children died by age 5.
had horrible nutrition, health, and zero education. oh and if you get a minor cut or injury? death.
That’s not entirely true. The mortality numbers were skewed by high infant mortality which… I don’t know why I’m bothering to argue with you.
What is this statistic precisely? I assume that it’s on “average” AKA including people who only do housework.
On average, because it was little labor in winter and more than 12-hour work in spring/summer/early autumn.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/medieval-peasants-worked-150-days/
Here’s some more context, and yes it doesn’t include housework.