Frisia is a cross-border cultural region in Northwestern Europe . Stretching along the Wadden Sea , it encompasses the north of the Netherlands and parts of northwestern Germany . Wider definitions of "Frisia" may include the island of Rem and the other Danish Wadden Sea Islands . The region is traditionally inhabited by the Frisians , a West Germanic ethnic group.
113-636: The contemporary name for the region stems from Latin Frisii , an ethnonym used for a group of ancient tribes in modern-day Northwestern Germany , possibly being a loanword of Proto-Germanic * frisaz , meaning "curly, crisp", presumably referring to the hair of the tribesmen. In some areas, the local translation of "Frisia" is used to refer to another subregion. On the North Frisian islands , for instance, "Frisia" and "Frisians" refer to (the inhabitants of) mainland North Frisia . In Saterland Frisian,
226-526: A faster pace. It is characterised by greater use of prepositions, and word order that is closer to modern Romance languages, for example, while grammatically retaining more or less the same formal rules as Classical Latin. Ultimately, Latin diverged into a distinct written form, where the commonly spoken form was perceived as a separate language, for instance early French or Italian dialects, that could be transcribed differently. It took some time for these to be viewed as wholly different from Latin however. After
339-451: A fee for the right to leave her lord, and in compensation for her lost labour. Often there were arbitrary tests to judge the worthiness of their tax payments. A chicken, for example, might be required to be able to jump over a fence of a given height to be considered old enough or well enough to be valued for tax purposes. The restraints of serfdom on personal and economic choice were enforced through various forms of manorial customary law and
452-743: A few in German , Dutch , Norwegian , Danish and Swedish . Latin is still spoken in Vatican City, a city-state situated in Rome that is the seat of the Catholic Church . The works of several hundred ancient authors who wrote in Latin have survived in whole or in part, in substantial works or in fragments to be analyzed in philology . They are in part the subject matter of the field of classics . Their works were published in manuscript form before
565-410: A few years of crop failure, a war, or brigandage might leave a person unable to make his own way. In such a case, he could strike a bargain with a lord of a manor. In exchange for gaining protection, his service was required: in labour, produce, or cash, or a combination of all. These bargains became formalised in a ceremony known as "bondage", in which a serf placed his head in the lord's hands, akin to
678-404: A few. Famous and well regarded writers included Petrarch, Erasmus, Salutati , Celtis , George Buchanan and Thomas More . Non fiction works were long produced in many subjects, including the sciences, law, philosophy, historiography and theology. Famous examples include Isaac Newton 's Principia . Latin was also used as a convenient medium for translations of important works first written in
791-525: A full complement of labour to the lord, often forcing them to rent out their services to other serfs to make up for this hardship. Villeinage was not a purely uni-directional exploitative relationship. In the Middle Ages, land within a lord's manor provided sustenance and survival, and being a villein guaranteed access to land, and crops secure from theft by marauding robbers. Landlords, even were legally entitled to do so, rarely evicted villeins because of
904-515: A knight or baron "fought for all" and a churchman "prayed for all"; thus everyone had a place (see Estates of the realm ). The serf was the worst fed and rewarded however, although unlike slaves had certain rights in land and property. A lord of the manor could not sell his serfs as a Roman might sell his slaves. On the other hand, if he chose to dispose of a parcel of land, the serfs associated with that land stayed with it to serve their new lord; simply speaking, they were implicitly sold in mass and as
1017-467: A man was a primary issue in determining a person's rights and obligations in many of the manorial court -cases of the period. Also, runaway slaves could be beaten if caught. The usual serf (not including slaves or cottars) paid his fees and taxes in the form of seasonally appropriate labour. Usually, a portion of the week was devoted to ploughing his lord's fields held in demesne , harvesting crops, digging ditches, repairing fences, and often working in
1130-560: A native language, Medieval Latin was used across Western and Catholic Europe during the Middle Ages as a working and literary language from the 9th century to the Renaissance , which then developed a classicizing form, called Renaissance Latin . This was the basis for Neo-Latin which evolved during the early modern period . In these periods Latin was used productively and generally taught to be written and spoken, at least until
1243-551: A number of legal restrictions that differentiated them from the freeman. Within his constraints, a serf had some freedoms. Though the common wisdom is that a serf owned "only his belly" – even his clothes were the property, in law, of his lord – a serf might still accumulate personal property and wealth, and some serfs became wealthier than their free neighbours, although this happened rarely. A well-to-do serf might even be able to buy his freedom. A serf could grow what crop he saw fit on his lands, although
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#17327719472151356-429: A part of a lot. This unified system preserved for the lord long-acquired knowledge of practices suited to the land. Further, a serf could not abandon his lands without permission, nor did he possess a saleable title in them. A freeman became a serf usually through force or necessity. Sometimes the greater physical and legal force of a local magnate intimidated freeholders or allodial owners into dependency. Often
1469-568: A patch of land. As part of the contract with the landlord , the lord of the manor, they were expected to spend some of their time working on the lord's fields. The rest of their time was spent farming their own land for their own profit. Villeins were tied to their lord's land and could not leave it without his permission. Their lord also often decided whom they could marry. Like other types of serfs, villeins had to provide other services, possibly in addition to paying rent of money or produce. Villeins could not move away without their lord's consent and
1582-567: A result, the list has variants, as well as alternative names. In addition to the historical phases, Ecclesiastical Latin refers to the styles used by the writers of the Roman Catholic Church from late antiquity onward, as well as by Protestant scholars. The earliest known form of Latin is Old Latin, also called Archaic or Early Latin, which was spoken from the Roman Kingdom , traditionally founded in 753 BC, through
1695-407: A separate language, existing more or less in parallel with the literary or educated Latin, but this is now widely dismissed. The term 'Vulgar Latin' remains difficult to define, referring both to informal speech at any time within the history of Latin, and the kind of informal Latin that had begun to move away from the written language significantly in the post-Imperial period, that led ultimately to
1808-455: A serf's taxes often had to be paid in wheat. The surplus he would sell at market . The landlord could not dispossess his serfs without legal cause and was supposed to protect them from the depredations of robbers or other lords, and he was expected to support them by charity in times of famine . Many such rights were enforceable by the serf in the manorial court. Forms of serfdom varied greatly through time and regions. In some places, serfdom
1921-747: A sizeable minority of the population, though Lower German is far more widespread. A half-million Frisians in the province of Friesland in the Netherlands speak West Frisian . Several thousand people in Nordfriesland and Heligoland in Germany speak a collection of North Frisian dialects. A small number of Saterland Frisian language speakers live in four villages in Lower Saxony , in the Saterland region of Cloppenburg county, just beyond
2034-709: A small number of Latin services held in the Anglican church. These include an annual service in Oxford, delivered with a Latin sermon; a relic from the period when Latin was the normal spoken language of the university. In the Western world, many organizations, governments and schools use Latin for their mottos due to its association with formality, tradition, and the roots of Western culture . Canada's motto A mari usque ad mare ("from sea to sea") and most provincial mottos are also in Latin. The Canadian Victoria Cross
2147-429: A sort of informal language academy dedicated to maintaining and perpetuating educated speech. Philological analysis of Archaic Latin works, such as those of Plautus , which contain fragments of everyday speech, gives evidence of an informal register of the language, Vulgar Latin (termed sermo vulgi , "the speech of the masses", by Cicero ). Some linguists, particularly in the nineteenth century, believed this to be
2260-405: A source of agricultural labour . Serfdom, indeed, was an institution that reflected a fairly common practice whereby great landlords were assured that others worked to feed them and were held down, legally and economically, while doing so. This arrangement provided most of the agricultural labour throughout the Middle Ages . Slavery persisted right through the Middle Ages, but it was rare. In
2373-572: A spoken and written language by the scholarship by the Renaissance humanists . Petrarch and others began to change their usage of Latin as they explored the texts of the Classical Latin world. Skills of textual criticism evolved to create much more accurate versions of extant texts through the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and some important texts were rediscovered. Comprehensive versions of authors' works were published by Isaac Casaubon , Joseph Scaliger and others. Nevertheless, despite
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#17327719472152486-432: A strictly left-to-right script. During the late republic and into the first years of the empire, from about 75 BC to AD 200, a new Classical Latin arose, a conscious creation of the orators, poets, historians and other literate men, who wrote the great works of classical literature , which were taught in grammar and rhetoric schools. Today's instructional grammars trace their roots to such schools , which served as
2599-479: A synonym of "English". The historian and sociologist George Homans has made a case for Frisian cultural domination in East Anglia since the 5th century, pointing to distinct land-holdings arrangements in carucates (these forming vills assembled in leets ), partible inheritance patterns of common lands held in by kin, resistance to manorialism and other social institutions. Some East Anglian sources called
2712-693: A vernacular, such as those of Descartes . Latin education underwent a process of reform to classicise written and spoken Latin. Schooling remained largely Latin medium until approximately 1700. Until the end of the 17th century, the majority of books and almost all diplomatic documents were written in Latin. Afterwards, most diplomatic documents were written in French (a Romance language ) and later native or other languages. Education methods gradually shifted towards written Latin, and eventually concentrating solely on reading skills. The decline of Latin education took several centuries and proceeded much more slowly than
2825-411: Is Veritas ("truth"). Veritas was the goddess of truth, a daughter of Saturn, and the mother of Virtue. Switzerland has adopted the country's Latin short name Helvetia on coins and stamps, since there is no room to use all of the nation's four official languages . For a similar reason, it adopted the international vehicle and internet code CH , which stands for Confoederatio Helvetica ,
2938-897: Is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages . Latin was originally spoken by the Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio ), the lower Tiber area around Rome , Italy. Through the expansion of the Roman Republic it became the dominant language in the Italian Peninsula and subsequently throughout the Roman Empire . By the late Roman Republic , Old Latin had evolved into standardized Classical Latin . Vulgar Latin refers to
3051-640: Is a reversal of the original phrase Non terrae plus ultra ("No land further beyond", "No further!"). According to legend , this phrase was inscribed as a warning on the Pillars of Hercules , the rocks on both sides of the Strait of Gibraltar and the western end of the known, Mediterranean world. Charles adopted the motto following the discovery of the New World by Columbus, and it also has metaphorical suggestions of taking risks and striving for excellence. In
3164-512: Is first recorded in English in the late 15th century, and came to its current definition in the 17th century. Serfdom was coined in 1850. Serfs had a specific place in feudal society, as did barons and knights : in return for protection, a serf would reside upon and work a parcel of land within the manor of his lord . Thus, the manorial system exhibited a degree of reciprocity. One rationale held that serfs and freemen "worked for all" while
3277-552: Is found in any widespread language, the languages of Spain, France, Portugal, and Italy have retained a remarkable unity in phonological forms and developments, bolstered by the stabilising influence of their common Christian (Roman Catholic) culture. It was not until the Muslim conquest of Spain in 711, cutting off communications between the major Romance regions, that the languages began to diverge seriously. The spoken Latin that would later become Romanian diverged somewhat more from
3390-634: Is modelled after the British Victoria Cross which has the inscription "For Valour". Because Canada is officially bilingual, the Canadian medal has replaced the English inscription with the Latin Pro Valore . Spain's motto Plus ultra , meaning "even further", or figuratively "Further!", is also Latin in origin. It is taken from the personal motto of Charles V , Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain (as Charles I), and
3503-956: Is taught at many high schools, especially in Europe and the Americas. It is most common in British public schools and grammar schools, the Italian liceo classico and liceo scientifico , the German Humanistisches Gymnasium and the Dutch gymnasium . Occasionally, some media outlets, targeting enthusiasts, broadcast in Latin. Notable examples include Radio Bremen in Germany, YLE radio in Finland (the Nuntii Latini broadcast from 1989 until it
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3616-543: The Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum (CIL). Authors and publishers vary, but the format is about the same: volumes detailing inscriptions with a critical apparatus stating the provenance and relevant information. The reading and interpretation of these inscriptions is the subject matter of the field of epigraphy . About 270,000 inscriptions are known. The Latin influence in English has been significant at all stages of its insular development. In
3729-583: The Holy See , the primary language of its public journal , the Acta Apostolicae Sedis , and the working language of the Roman Rota . Vatican City is also home to the world's only automatic teller machine that gives instructions in Latin. In the pontifical universities postgraduate courses of Canon law are taught in Latin, and papers are written in the same language. There are
3842-574: The Middle Ages , borrowing from Latin occurred from ecclesiastical usage established by Saint Augustine of Canterbury in the 6th century or indirectly after the Norman Conquest , through the Anglo-Norman language . From the 16th to the 18th centuries, English writers cobbled together huge numbers of new words from Latin and Greek words, dubbed " inkhorn terms ", as if they had spilled from a pot of ink. Many of these words were used once by
3955-518: The Middle French serf and was derived from the Latin servus ("slave"). In Late Antiquity and most of the Middle Ages, what are now called serfs were usually designated in Latin as coloni . As slavery gradually disappeared and the legal status of servi became nearly identical to that of the coloni , the term changed meaning into the modern concept of "serf". The word "serf"
4068-576: The Roman Rite of the Catholic Church at the Vatican City . The church continues to adapt concepts from modern languages to Ecclesiastical Latin of the Latin language. Contemporary Latin is more often studied to be read rather than spoken or actively used. Latin has greatly influenced the English language , along with a large number of others, and historically contributed many words to
4181-569: The Romance languages . During the Classical period, informal language was rarely written, so philologists have been left with only individual words and phrases cited by classical authors, inscriptions such as Curse tablets and those found as graffiti . In the Late Latin period, language changes reflecting spoken (non-classical) norms tend to be found in greater quantities in texts. As it
4294-636: The Western Roman Empire fell in 476 and Germanic kingdoms took its place, the Germanic people adopted Latin as a language more suitable for legal and other, more formal uses. While the written form of Latin was increasingly standardized into a fixed form, the spoken forms began to diverge more greatly. Currently, the five most widely spoken Romance languages by number of native speakers are Spanish , Portuguese , French , Italian , and Romanian . Despite dialectal variation, which
4407-406: The manor house . The remainder of the serf's time was spent tending his own fields, crops and animals in order to provide for his family. Most manorial work was segregated by gender during the regular times of the year. During the harvest , the whole family was expected to work the fields. A major difficulty of a serf's life was that his work for his lord coincided with, and took precedence over,
4520-458: The 840s, until these were expelled between 885 and 920. Recently, it has been suggested that the Vikings did not conquer Frisia, but settled peacefully in certain districts (such as the islands of Walcheren and Wieringen ), where they built simple forts and cooperated and traded with the native Frisians. One of their leaders was Rorik of Dorestad . During the 12th century Frisian noblemen and
4633-619: The Abolition of Slavery also prohibits serfdom as a practice similar to slavery. Social institutions similar to serfdom were known in ancient times . The status of the helots in the ancient Greek city-state of Sparta resembled that of the medieval serfs. By the 3rd century AD, the Roman Empire faced a labour shortage. Large Roman landowners increasingly relied on Roman freemen, acting as tenant farmers, instead of slaves to provide labour. These tenant farmers , eventually known as coloni , saw their condition steadily erode. Because
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4746-637: The British Crown. The motto is featured on all presently minted coinage and has been featured in most coinage throughout the nation's history. Several states of the United States have Latin mottos , such as: Many military organizations today have Latin mottos, such as: Some law governing bodies in the Philippines have Latin mottos, such as: Some colleges and universities have adopted Latin mottos, for example Harvard University 's motto
4859-665: The Chinese Qing dynasty (1644–1912) as also maintaining a form of serfdom. Melvyn Goldstein described Tibet as having had serfdom until 1959, but whether or not the Tibetan form of peasant tenancy that qualified as serfdom was widespread is contested by other scholars. Bhutan is described by Tashi Wangchuk, a Bhutanese civil servant, as having officially abolished serfdom by 1959, but he believes that less than or about 10% of poor peasants were in copyhold situations. The United Nations 1956 Supplementary Convention on
4972-808: The Elder , in Roman times, the Frisians (or rather their close neighbours, the Chauci ) lived on terps , man-made hills. According to other sources, the Frisians lived along a broader expanse of the North Sea (or "Frisian Sea") coast. At this time, Frisia comprised the present-day provinces of Friesland , Groningen , North Holland and parts of South Holland . Frisian presence during the Early Middle Ages has been documented from North-Western Flanders up to
5085-613: The English lexicon , particularly after the Christianization of the Anglo-Saxons and the Norman Conquest . Latin and Ancient Greek roots are heavily used in English vocabulary in theology , the sciences , medicine , and law . A number of phases of the language have been recognized, each distinguished by subtle differences in vocabulary, usage, spelling, and syntax. There are no hard and fast rules of classification; different scholars emphasize different features. As
5198-640: The French. Status-wise, the bordar or cottar ranked below a serf in the social hierarchy of a manor, holding a cottage , garden and just enough land to feed a family. In England, at the time of the Domesday Survey, this would have comprised between about 1 and 5 acres (0.4 and 2.0 hectares). Under an Elizabethan statute , the Erection of Cottages Act 1588 , the cottage had to be built with at least 4 acres (0.02 km ; 0.01 sq mi) of land. The later Enclosures Acts (1604 onwards) removed
5311-515: The Frisian trade network played a significant role in maintaining regional peace during the late Middle Ages . While interpersonal violence was on the rise almost everywhere else in Europe, Northern Europe and especially Frisia managed to maintain low levels of violence due in part to its well-developed society and established rule of law , which were results of extensive trade. The Frisian coastal areas were partly occupied by Danish Vikings in
5424-599: The Grinch Stole Christmas! , The Cat in the Hat , and a book of fairy tales, " fabulae mirabiles ", are intended to garner popular interest in the language. Additional resources include phrasebooks and resources for rendering everyday phrases and concepts into Latin, such as Meissner's Latin Phrasebook . Some inscriptions have been published in an internationally agreed, monumental, multivolume series,
5537-721: The Prussian States in 1792 and finally abolished it in October 1807, in the wake of the Prussian Reform Movement . In Finland, Norway, and Sweden, feudalism was never fully established, and serfdom did not exist; in Denmark, serfdom-like institutions did exist in both stavn s (the stavnsbånd , from 1733 to 1788) and its vassal Iceland (the more restrictive vistarband , from 1490 until 1894). According to medievalist historian Joseph R. Strayer ,
5650-531: The Saxon leader Widukind . The Carolingians laid Frisia under the rule of grewan , a title that has been loosely related to count in its early sense of "governor" rather than " feudal overlord ". During the 7th to 10th centuries, Frisian merchants and skippers played an important part in the international luxury trade, establishing commercial districts in distant cities as Sigtuna, Hedeby, Ribe, York, London, Duisburg, Cologne, Mainz, and Worms. The establishment of
5763-467: The United States the unofficial national motto until 1956 was E pluribus unum meaning "Out of many, one". The motto continues to be featured on the Great Seal . It also appears on the flags and seals of both houses of congress and the flags of the states of Michigan, North Dakota, New York, and Wisconsin. The motto's 13 letters symbolically represent the original Thirteen Colonies which revolted from
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#17327719472155876-563: The University of Kentucky, the University of Oxford and also Princeton University. There are many websites and forums maintained in Latin by enthusiasts. The Latin Misplaced Pages has more than 130,000 articles. Italian , French , Portuguese , Spanish , Romanian , Catalan , Romansh , Sardinian and other Romance languages are direct descendants of Latin. There are also many Latin borrowings in English and Albanian , as well as
5989-655: The Weser River Estuary. According to archaeological evidence, these Frisians were not the Frisians of Roman times, but the descendants of Anglo-Saxon immigrants from the German Bight , arriving during the Great Migration . By the 8th century, ethnic Frisians also started to colonize the coastal areas North of the Eider River under Danish rule. The nascent Frisian languages were spoken all along
6102-585: The acceptance of the lord to whose manor they proposed to migrate to. Villeins were generally able to hold their own property, unlike slaves. Villeinage, as opposed to other forms of serfdom, was most common in Continental European feudalism, where land ownership had developed from roots in Roman law . A variety of kinds of villeinage existed in Europe in the Middle Ages. Half-villeins received only half as many strips of land for their own use and owed
6215-507: The area, be sold together with land. Actual slaves, such as the kholops in Russia, could, by contrast, be traded like regular slaves, could be abused with no rights over their own bodies, could not leave the land they were bound to, and could marry only with their lord 's permission. Serfs who occupied a plot of land were required to work for the lord of the manor who owned that land. In return, they were entitled to protection, justice, and
6328-428: The author and then forgotten, but some useful ones survived, such as 'imbibe' and 'extrapolate'. Many of the most common polysyllabic English words are of Latin origin through the medium of Old French . Romance words make respectively 59%, 20% and 14% of English, German and Dutch vocabularies. Those figures can rise dramatically when only non-compound and non-derived words are included. Serf Serfdom
6441-425: The benefit of those who do not understand Latin. There are also songs written with Latin lyrics . The libretto for the opera-oratorio Oedipus rex by Igor Stravinsky is in Latin. Parts of Carl Orff 's Carmina Burana are written in Latin. Enya has recorded several tracks with Latin lyrics. The continued instruction of Latin is seen by some as a highly valuable component of a liberal arts education. Latin
6554-685: The boundaries of traditional East Frisia . Many Frisians speak Low Saxon dialects which have a Frisian substratum known as Friso-Saxon , especially in East Frisia, where the local dialects are called Oostfräisk ("East Frisian") or Oostfräisk Plat ( East Frisian Low Saxon ). In the provinces of Friesland and Groningen, and in North Frisia, there are also areas where Friso-Saxon dialects are predominantly spoken, such as Gronings . In West Frisia , there are West Frisian-influenced dialects of Dutch such as West Frisian Dutch and Stadsfries . While
6667-409: The careful work of Petrarch, Politian and others, first the demand for manuscripts, and then the rush to bring works into print, led to the circulation of inaccurate copies for several centuries following. Neo-Latin literature was extensive and prolific, but less well known or understood today. Works covered poetry, prose stories and early novels, occasional pieces and collections of letters, to name
6780-446: The ceremony of homage where a vassal placed his hands between those of his overlord . These oaths bound the lord and his new serf in a feudal contract and defined the terms of their agreement. Often these bargains were severe. A 7th-century Anglo Saxon "Oath of Fealty" states: By the Lord before whom this sanctuary is holy, I will to N. be true and faithful, and love all which he loves and shun all which he shuns, according to
6893-475: The city of Groningen founded the Upstalsboom League under the slogan of " Frisian freedom " to counter feudalizing tendencies . The league consisted of modern Friesland , Groningen , East Frisia , Harlingerland , Jever and Rüstringen . The Frisian districts in West Friesland West of the Zuiderzee did not participate, neither did the districts North of the Eider River along the Danish North Sea coast ( Schleswig-Holstein ). The former were occupied by
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#17327719472157006-415: The classicised Latin that followed through to the present are often grouped together as Neo-Latin , or New Latin, which have in recent decades become a focus of renewed study , given their importance for the development of European culture, religion and science. The vast majority of written Latin belongs to this period, but its full extent is unknown. The Renaissance reinforced the position of Latin as
7119-471: The concept of feudalism can also be applied to the societies of ancient Persia , ancient Mesopotamia , Egypt from the late Old Kingdom through the Middle Kingdom ( Sixth to Twelfth dynasty ), Islamic-ruled Northern and Central India , China ( Zhou dynasty and end of Han dynasty ) and Japan during the Shogunate . Wu Ta-k'un argued that the Shang-Zhou fengjian were kinship estates, quite distinct from feudalism. James Lee and Cameron Campbell describe
7232-487: The contemporary variety of the Frisian regions – North, South, West and East. The design was not accepted by the Interfrisian Council . Instead, the council adopted the idea of an Interfrisian flag and created a design of its own, containing elements of the flags of the council's three sections. Neither of the two flags is widely used. Latin language Latin ( lingua Latina , pronounced [ˈlɪŋɡʷa ɫaˈtiːna] , or Latinum [ɫaˈtiːnʊ̃] )
7345-480: The cottars' right to any land: "before the Enclosures Act the cottager was a farm labourer with land and after the Enclosures Act the cottager was a farm labourer without land". The bordars and cottars did not own their draught oxen or horses. The Domesday Book showed that England comprised 12% freeholders, 35% serfs or villeins, 30% cotters and bordars, and 9% slaves. Smerdy were a type of serfs above kholops in Medieval Poland and Kievan Rus' . Kholops were
7458-405: The count of Holland in 1289, and the latter were governed by the Duke of Schleswig and the king of Denmark . The same holds true for the district of Land Wursten East of the Weser River . The Upstalsboom League was revived in the early 14th century, but it collapsed after 1337. By then, the non-Frisian city of Groningen took the lead of the independent coastal districts. The 15th century saw
7571-412: The country's full Latin name. Some film and television in ancient settings, such as Sebastiane , The Passion of the Christ and Barbarians (2020 TV series) , have been made with dialogue in Latin. Occasionally, Latin dialogue is used because of its association with religion or philosophy, in such film/television series as The Exorcist and Lost (" Jughead "). Subtitles are usually shown for
7684-429: The decline in written Latin output. Despite having no native speakers, Latin is still used for a variety of purposes in the contemporary world. The largest organisation that retains Latin in official and quasi-official contexts is the Catholic Church . The Catholic Church required that Mass be carried out in Latin until the Second Vatican Council of 1962–1965 , which permitted the use of the vernacular . Latin remains
7797-425: The demise of Frisian republicanism. In East Frisia , a leading nobleman from the Cirksena-family managed to defeat his competitors with the help of the Hanseatic League. In 1464 he acquired the title of count of East Frisia. The king of Denmark was successful in subduing the coastal districts North of the Eider River. The Dutch provinces of Friesland and Groningen remained independent until 1498. By then Friesland
7910-424: The duties of serfdom, people bound themselves and their progeny. The social class of the peasantry can be differentiated into smaller categories. These distinctions were often less clear than suggested by their different names. Most often, there were two types of peasants: Lower classes of peasants, known as cottars or bordars , generally comprising the younger sons of villeins; vagabonds; and slaves, made up
8023-406: The early 16th century, the pirate and freedom fighter Pier Gerlofs Donia (Grutte Pier) challenged Saxon authority in Friesland during a prolonged guerrilla war, backed by the Duke of Guelders. He had several successes and was feared by Hollandic authorities, but he died as a farmer in 1520. According to the legend he was seven feet tall. A statue of Grutte Pier by Anne Woudwijk [ fy ]
8136-589: The educated and official world, Latin continued without its natural spoken base. Moreover, this Latin spread into lands that had never spoken Latin, such as the Germanic and Slavic nations. It became useful for international communication between the member states of the Holy Roman Empire and its allies. Without the institutions of the Roman Empire that had supported its uniformity, Medieval Latin
8249-626: The former, and economically and socially in the latter. The decline of serfdom in Western Europe has sometimes been attributed to the widespread plague epidemic of the Black Death , which reached Europe in 1347 and caused massive fatalities, disrupting society. Conversely, serfdom grew stronger in Central and Eastern Europe , where it had previously been less common (this phenomenon was known as " second serfdom "). In Eastern Europe,
8362-490: The institution persisted until the mid-19th century. In Russia, serfdom gradually evolved from the usual European form to become de facto slavery, though it continued to be called serfdom. In the Austrian Empire , serfdom was abolished by the 1781 Serfdom Patent ; corvées continued to exist until 1848. Serfdom was abolished in Russia in 1861. Prussia declared serfdom unacceptable in its General State Laws for
8475-703: The invention of printing and are now published in carefully annotated printed editions, such as the Loeb Classical Library , published by Harvard University Press , or the Oxford Classical Texts , published by Oxford University Press . Latin translations of modern literature such as: The Hobbit , Treasure Island , Robinson Crusoe , Paddington Bear , Winnie the Pooh , The Adventures of Tintin , Asterix , Harry Potter , Le Petit Prince , Max and Moritz , How
8588-751: The kings Aldegisel and Redbad , had its centre of power in the city of Utrecht . Its ancient customary law was drawn up as the Lex Frisionum in the late eighth century. Its end came in 734 at the Battle of the Boarn , when the Frisians were defeated by the Franks , who then conquered the western part up to the Lauwers . Frankish troops conquered the area east of the Lauwers in 785, after Charlemagne defeated
8701-704: The language of the Roman Rite . The Tridentine Mass (also known as the Extraordinary Form or Traditional Latin Mass) is celebrated in Latin. Although the Mass of Paul VI (also known as the Ordinary Form or the Novus Ordo) is usually celebrated in the local vernacular language, it can be and often is said in Latin, in part or in whole, especially at multilingual gatherings. It is the official language of
8814-440: The large areas where it had come to be natively spoken. However, even after the fall of Western Rome , Latin remained the common language of international communication , science, scholarship and academia in Europe until well into the early 19th century, by which time modern languages had supplanted it in common academic and political usage. Late Latin is the literary language from the 3rd century AD onward. No longer spoken as
8927-467: The late seventeenth century, when spoken skills began to erode. It then became increasingly taught only to be read. Latin grammar is highly fusional , with classes of inflections for case , number , person , gender , tense , mood , voice , and aspect . The Latin alphabet is directly derived from the Etruscan and Greek alphabets . Latin remains the official language of the Holy See and
9040-555: The later Middle Ages, serfdom began to disappear west of the Rhine even as it spread through eastern Europe. Serfdom reached Eastern Europe centuries later than Western Europe – it became dominant around the 15th century. In many of these countries serfdom was abolished during the Napoleonic invasions of the early 19th century, though in some it persisted until mid- or late- 19th century. The word serf originated from
9153-431: The later part of the Roman Republic , up to 75 BC, i.e. before the age of Classical Latin . It is attested both in inscriptions and in some of the earliest extant Latin literary works, such as the comedies of Plautus and Terence . The Latin alphabet was devised from the Etruscan alphabet . The writing later changed from what was initially either a right-to-left or a boustrophedon script to what ultimately became
9266-503: The laws of God and the order of the world. Nor will I ever with will or action, through word or deed, do anything which is unpleasing to him, on condition that he will hold to me as I shall deserve it, and that he will perform everything as it was in our agreement when I submitted myself to him and chose his will. To become a serf was a commitment that encompassed all aspects of the serf's life. The children born to serfs inherited their status, and were considered born into serfdom. By taking on
9379-421: The less prestigious colloquial registers , attested in inscriptions and some literary works such as those of the comic playwrights Plautus and Terence and the author Petronius . While often called a "dead language", Latin did not undergo language death . By the 6th to 9th centuries, natural language change eventually resulted in Latin as a vernacular language evolving into distinct Romance languages in
9492-471: The lower class of workers. The colonus system of the late Roman Empire can be considered the predecessor of Western European feudal serfdom. Freemen, or free tenants , held their land by one of a variety of contracts of feudal land-tenure and were essentially rent-paying tenant farmers who owed little or no service to the lord, and had a good degree of security of tenure and independence. In parts of 11th-century England freemen made up only 10% of
9605-496: The lowest class of serfs in the medieval and early modern Russia. They had status similar to slaves, and could be freely traded. The last type of serf was the slave. Slaves had the fewest rights and benefits from the manor. They owned no tenancy in land, worked for the lord exclusively and survived on donations from the landlord. It was always in the interest of the lord to prove that a servile arrangement existed, as this provided him with greater rights to fees and taxes. The status of
9718-594: The mainland inhabitants Warnii , rather than Frisians. During the 7th and 8th centuries, Frankish chronologies mention the northern Low Countries as the kingdom of the Frisians. According to Medieval legends, this kingdom comprised the coastal seelande provinces of the Netherlands , from the Scheldt River to the Weser River and further East. Archaeological research does not confirm this idea, as
9831-505: The majority of the inhabitants. In East Frisia, the idea of "Frisian freedom" became entangled with regional sentiments as well, though the East Frisian language had been replaced by Low German dialects as early as the 15th century. In Groningen, on the other hand, Frisian sentiments faded away at the end of the 16th century. In North Frisia, regional sentiments concentrate around the surviving North Frisian dialects, which are spoken by
9944-406: The manner of serfs , but in later times might buy their freedom. The basic land-holding unit for assessment of taxes and military contributions was – according to Homans – the ploegg (cf. "plow") or teen (cf. tithing , cf. " hundred "), which, however, also passed under other local names. The teen was pledged to supply ten men for the heer , or army. Ploegg or teen formed a unit of which
10057-408: The manorial administration and court baron . It was also a matter of discussion whether serfs could be required by law in times of war or conflict to fight for their lord's land and property. In the case of their lord's defeat, their own fate might be uncertain, so the serf certainly had an interest in supporting his lord. Villeins had more rights and status than those held as slaves, but were under
10170-429: The members were collectively responsible for the performance of any of the men. The ploegg or East Frisian rott was a compact holding that originated with a single lineage or kinship, whose men in early times went to war under their chief, and devolved in medieval times into a union of neighbors rather than kith and kin. Several, often three, ploeggs were grouped into a burar , whose members controlled and adjudicated
10283-466: The other varieties, as it was largely separated from the unifying influences in the western part of the Empire. Spoken Latin began to diverge into distinct languages by the 9th century at the latest, when the earliest extant Romance writings begin to appear. They were, throughout the period, confined to everyday speech, as Medieval Latin was used for writing. For many Italians using Latin, though, there
10396-511: The peasant population, and in most of the rest of Europe their numbers were also small. Ministeriales were hereditary unfree knights tied to their lord, that formed the lowest rung of nobility in the Holy Roman Empire . A villein (or villain ) represented the most common type of serf in the Middle Ages. Villeins had more rights and higher status than the lowest serf, but existed under a number of legal restrictions that differentiated them from freemen. Villeins generally rented small homes, with
10509-593: The petty kingdoms appear to have been rather small and short-lived. The earliest Frisian records name four social classes, the ethelings ( nobiles in Latin documents) and frilings , who together made up the "Free Frisians" who might bring suit at court, and the laten or liten with the slaves , who were absorbed into the laten during the Early Middle Ages , as slavery was not so much formally abolished, as evaporated. The laten were tenants of lands they did not own and might be tied to it in
10622-504: The preservation of civil liberties. Actual power, however, was usurped by the landowning gentry. Protests against aristocratic rule led to a democratic movement in the 1780s. During the late 19th and early 20th century, "Frisian freedom" became the slogan of a regionalist movement in Friesland, demanding equal rights for the Frisian language and culture within the Netherlands. The West Frisian language and its urban dialects are spoken by
10735-400: The right to cultivate certain fields within the manor to maintain their own subsistence. Serfs were often required not only to work on the lord's fields, but also in his mines and forests and to labour to maintain roads. The manor formed the basic unit of feudal society, and the lord of the manor and the villeins , and to a certain extent the serfs, were bound legally: by taxation in the case of
10848-433: The right to gather deadwood – an essential source of fuel – from their lord's forests. In addition to service, a serf was required to pay certain taxes and fees. Taxes were based on the assessed value of his lands and holdings. Fees were usually paid in the form of agricultural produce rather than cash. The best ration of wheat from the serf's harvest often went to the landlord. Generally hunting and trapping of wild game by
10961-413: The serfs on the lord's property was prohibited. On Easter Sunday the peasant family perhaps might owe an extra dozen eggs, and at Christmas, a goose was perhaps required, too. When a family member died, extra taxes were paid to the lord as a form of feudal relief to enable the heir to keep the right to till what land he had. Any young woman who wished to marry a serf outside of her manor was forced to pay
11074-601: The southern North Sea coast. Today, the whole region is sometimes referred to as Greater Frisia ( Latin : Frisia Magna ). Distant authors seem to have made little distinction between Frisians and Saxons. The Byzantine Procopius described three peoples living in Great Britain: Angles, Frisians and Britons, and the Danish author of Knútsdrápa celebrating the 11th-century Canute the Great used "Frisians" as
11187-547: The subdivisions of Frisia have their own regional flags, Frisia as a whole has not historically had a flag of its own. In September 2006, a flag for a united Frisia – known as the "Interfrisian Flag" – was designed by the Groep fan Auwerk . This separatist group supports the unification of Frisia as an independent country. The design was inspired by the Nordic Cross flag . The four pompeblêden (water lily leaves) represent
11300-479: The tax system implemented by Diocletian assessed taxes based on both land and the inhabitants of that land, it became administratively inconvenient for peasants to leave the land where they were counted in the census. Medieval serfdom really began with the breakup of the Carolingian Empire around the 10th century. During this period, powerful feudal lords encouraged the establishment of serfdom as
11413-531: The term Fräislound specifically refers to Ostfriesland . During the French occupation of the Netherlands , the name for the Frisian department was Frise . In English, both "Frisia" and "Friesland" may be interchangeably used to refer to the region. Frisia is commonly divided into three sections: The people, later to be known as Frisii , began settling in Frisia in the 6th century BC. According to Pliny
11526-443: The uses of pasturage (but not tillage) which the ploeggs held in common, and came to be in charge of roads, ditches and dikes. Twelve ploeggs made up a "long" hundred, responsible for supplying a hundred armed men, four of which made a go (cf. Gau ). Homans' ideas, which were largely based on studies now considered to be outdated, have not been followed up by Continental scholars. The 7th-century Frisian Realm (650–734) under
11639-422: The value of their labour. Villeinage was much preferable to being a vagabond, a slave, or an unlanded labourer. In many medieval countries, a villein could gain freedom by escaping from a manor to a city or borough and living there for more than a year; but this action involved the loss of land rights and agricultural livelihood, a prohibitive price unless the landlord was especially tyrannical or conditions in
11752-477: The village were unusually difficult. In medieval England, two types of villeins existed – villeins regardant that were tied to land and villeins in gross that could be traded separately from land. In England, the Domesday Book , of 1086, uses bordarii (bordar) and cottarii ( cottar ) as interchangeable terms, cottar deriving from the native Anglo-Saxon tongue whereas bordar derived from
11865-454: The work he had to perform on his own lands: when the lord's crops were ready to be harvested, so were his own. On the other hand, the serf of a benign lord could look forward to being well fed during his service; it was a lord without foresight who did not provide a substantial meal for his serfs during the harvest and planting times. In exchange for this work on the lord's demesne, the serfs had certain privileges and rights, including for example
11978-665: Was conquered by Duke Albert of Saxony-Meissen . The city of Groningen , which had started to dominate the surrounding rural districts, surrendered to count Edzard of East Frisia in 1506. The city conveyed its remaining privileges to the Habsburg Empire in 1536. The district of Butjadingen (formerly Rüstringen) was occupied by the Count of Oldenburg in 1514, the Land Wursten by the Prince-bishop of Bremen in 1525. In
12091-633: Was erected in Kimswert in 1985. In the 1560s many Frisans joined the revolt led by William of Orange against the Habsburg monarchy. In 1577 the province of Friesland became part of the nascent Dutch Republic , as its representatives signed the Union of Utrecht . The city of Groningen was conquered by the Dutch in 1594. Since then, membership of the Dutch Republic was perceived as a guarantee for
12204-413: Was free to develop on its own, there is no reason to suppose that the speech was uniform either diachronically or geographically. On the contrary, Romanised European populations developed their own dialects of the language, which eventually led to the differentiation of Romance languages . Late Latin is a kind of written Latin used in the 3rd to 6th centuries. This began to diverge from Classical forms at
12317-456: Was merged with or exchanged for various forms of taxation. The amount of labour required varied. In Poland, for example, it was commonly a few days per year per household in the 13th century, one day per week per household in the 14th century, four days per week per household in the 17th century, and six days per week per household in the 18th century. Early serfdom in Poland was mostly limited to
12430-496: Was much more liberal in its linguistic cohesion: for example, in classical Latin sum and eram are used as auxiliary verbs in the perfect and pluperfect passive, which are compound tenses. Medieval Latin might use fui and fueram instead. Furthermore, the meanings of many words were changed and new words were introduced, often under influence from the vernacular. Identifiable individual styles of classically incorrect Latin prevail. Renaissance Latin, 1300 to 1500, and
12543-441: Was no complete separation between Italian and Latin, even into the beginning of the Renaissance . Petrarch for example saw Latin as a literary version of the spoken language. Medieval Latin is the written Latin in use during that portion of the post-classical period when no corresponding Latin vernacular existed, that is from around 700 to 1500 AD. The spoken language had developed into the various Romance languages; however, in
12656-482: Was shut down in June 2019), and Vatican Radio & Television, all of which broadcast news segments and other material in Latin. A variety of organisations, as well as informal Latin 'circuli' ('circles'), have been founded in more recent times to support the use of spoken Latin. Moreover, a number of university classics departments have begun incorporating communicative pedagogies in their Latin courses. These include
12769-471: Was the status of many peasants under feudalism , specifically relating to manorialism , and similar systems. It was a condition of debt bondage and indentured servitude with similarities to and differences from slavery . It developed during late antiquity and the Early Middle Ages in Europe and lasted in some countries until the mid-19th century. Unlike slaves , serfs could not be bought, sold, or traded individually, though they could, depending on
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