The Holy Land in the Era of the Crusades: Kingdoms at the Crossroads of Civilizations, 1100–1300 by Helena Schrader

Author:Helena Schrader
Format: epub

Barons, Knights and the High Court: The Powerful Vassals of Outremer

In the crusader states, there were a variety of different kinds of fiefs. There were land fiefs (‘fié en terre’) familiar from Western Europe where a knight received one or more rural villages (casal), producing sufficient income to finance the maintenance of one or more knights (i.e. the knight[s], including their squires, horses, arms and armour). In the crusader states, however, there were also several money fiefs (‘fié en besans’). These likewise ensured that a knight had sufficient income to maintain himself, horses, equipment and status, but the income was derived from royal revenue. This could be a stipend directly paid from the king’s treasury, similar to a retainer for household knights, but in this case, hereditary. Or it might be something more exotic, such as the tribute owed by the Bedouins, or the revenue collected from markets or bazaars, or a portion of the income from economic monopolies such as salt extraction. It was common across the crusader states for individual knights to have mixed fiefs, that is, to draw income from both land and money fiefs, a practice that suggests knights sought to diversify revenue streams for their financial security. Such diversification was also applied geographically after the conquest of Cyprus. Nearly all lords (and probably many knights) held fiefs on the mainland and Cyprus.

Another unique feature of fiefs in the Holy Land was that there were many ‘sergeantries’, that is, fiefs owing not knights’ service, but rather service of a sergeant. Many of the ‘sergeantries’ were held by non-immigrant and non-Latin tenants. Finally, the laws of the crusader states distinguished between traditional fiefs granted or inherited and fiefs of conquest (‘fié de conquest’). While the former had to be bequeathed to the rightful heirs in accordance with the laws of the land, fiefs of conquest could be disposed of at will, bypassing legal heirs. One generation later, however, they were no longer viewed as fiefs of conquest and had to pass to the legal heirs.

The inheritance laws in the crusader states were shaped by the overriding imperative to ensure an adequate military force for the defence of the realm. To prevent the concentration of fiefs in one pair of hands with the effect of denying the kingdom needed fighting men, the inheritance of more than one fief was initially prohibited. However, the laws were soon modified to allow a man to inherit and hold more than one fief, on the condition he could meet all feudal obligations by financing knights for the fiefs he did not represent in-person. This could be done through sub-enfeoffing, i.e. creating ‘rear vassals’ or retaining knights (hiring knights for wages). It was common practice for a knight holding multiple fiefs to divide them among his heirs at his death, but this was not a legal requirement. An alternative was for the knight to designate his eldest son as his heir and for the heir to enfeoff his siblings as rear-tenants. Significantly, however,

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