Social Change in the Countryside of Eleventh-Century Byzantium

Abstract

Offering a review of Byzantine rural society during the transitional eleventh century this chapter underlines the role the state played in the evolution of social and economic relations. It is argued that the appropriation by the state of a large part of the fertile land, dictated by financial considerations, greatly restricted the space for expansion of the provincial elite while benefitting certain individuals serving the regime. This nuances the notion that the eleventh and twelfth centuries saw the consolidation of the power of the landowning aristocracy. By the end of the eleventh century, a large portion of the peasantry had become dependent on private landowners. Nevertheless, despite the social and economic restrictions their subjection implied, dependent peasants retained a relatively elevated legal status, thanks to a fiscal apparatus and a legal framework that limited the freedom of great landlords.