•The renowned historian Chris Wickham, in his 2021 article “How Did the Feudal Economy Work? The Economic Logic of Medieval Societies” published in the journal Past & Present, examines how the medieval economies functioned, the critical role of peasants in this development, and why centuries of economic growth did not automatically lead to capitalism. Wickham is known to have passed away recently.
This peasant-landowner relationship was, according to Wickham, a defining feature of feudalism. He uses the term in a very economic sense, rather than in the political relationships between kings, nobles, and vassals that it is usually associated with.
Wickham places great importance on northern and central Italy, one of the most economically developed regions in medieval Europe. From the late 12th century, cities such as Milan, Genoa, Venice, and Florence experienced significant commercial and industrial expansion. These industries were based on extensive trading networks. Italian merchants imported wool from Castile and England, after North Africa. Cotton came from Sicily and the eastern Mediterranean, and wheat was brought to the growing populations of northern Italian cities, which could no longer feed their populations solely from the surrounding countryside. Banking and credit also expanded; Italian financial institutions eventually lent money to rulers across Europe.
This did not mean that medieval rural societies were peaceful or equal. Landowners could impose new burdens with difficulty; Wickham gives examples from France, Italy, and Spain, where the expanding landowning authority increased the burdens on rural communities. The development of more restrictive forms of slavery in parts of Eastern Europe also showed how landowners could strengthen their control over agricultural labour.
When the peasants took advantage of commercial opportunities, their lands could become more secure, reducing their risk of losing their property and becoming dependent on wage labour. Thus, commercial growth did not necessarily lead to capitalism. When trade contracted, the peasants were often able to produce more for their own consumption. This flexibility allowed the economic systems of the medieval period to survive periods of growth and decline without fundamentally changing their structure.
Wickham further developed these arguments in his 2023 book, The Donkey and the Boat: Reinterpreting the Mediterranean Economy, 950–1180. Published by Oxford University Press, the book offers a comprehensive comparison of the economies of Egypt, North Africa, Sicily, Byzantium, Islamic Spain, and northern and central Italy. Based largely on archaeological and written evidence, Wickham argues that regional economic development—including the purchasing power of peasants—was more important than long-distance trade alone, and that Mediterranean prosperity alone was not the key to economic development.
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