Neo-Serfdom in Hungary

In: Slavic review: interdisciplinary quarterly of Russian, Eurasian and East European studies, Band 34, Heft 2, S. 269-278

Abstract

In the particular case of Hungary, neo-serfdom is to be seen as an economic, political, and social evolution in which the political power of the nobility, especially that of the gentry, grew considerably; the demesne lands of the lords disproportionately increased at the expense of the serfs' rustical lands; the lords' seigneurial jurisdiction over their peasants increased; and the lords' management of their economy shifted from receiving rents to producing for markets. It was a system of social stagnation in which the evolution of cities and an urban middle class, a potential counterbalance to the nobility, was made impossible, and the serfs had no way out of their degrading environment and status. These conditions developed rapidly after the suppression of the Dózsa revolt of 1514, the greatest peasant movement of discontent in Hungary. As a result, the peasants were bound to the soil. The national Diet of 1547, however, enacted the serfs' right of migration, a freedom which was re enacted several times more.