Daily Life of a Peasant in the Middle Ages
The differences of the daily life of a peasant as opposed to a noble were vast. Daily life in the Middle ages was dictated by wealth, power and status and the feudal system. Perhaps the most striking feature of medieval village life was its self- sufficiency. The inhabitants tried to produce at home everything they required, in order to avoid the uncertainty and expense of trade. *The land gave them their food; the forest provided them with wood for houses and furniture. They made their own clothes of flax, wool, and leather. Their meal and flour were ground at the village mill, and at the village smithy their farm implements were manufactured.
1. Work
The daily life of a peasant in the Middle ages was hard. Medieval Serfs had to labor on the lord's land for two or three days each week, and at specially busy seasons, such as ploughing and harvesting. The daily life of a peasant in the Middle Ages can be described as follows:
§ The daily life of a peasant started at started in the summer as early as 3am
§ A peasant would start with breakfast, usually of pottage (vegetable soup)
§ Work in the fields or on the land started by dawn and the daily life of a peasant included the following common tasks:
v Reaping - To cut crops for harvest with a scythe, sickle, or reaper.
v Sowing - the process of planting seeds
v Ploughing - To break and turn over earth with a plough to form a furrow
v Binding and Thatching
v Haymaking - cutting grass and curing it for hay.
v Threshing - To beat the stems and husks of plants to separate the grains or seeds from the straw.
v Hedging - creating boundaries
§ Outside work finished at dusk, working hours were therefore longer during the summer months
§ Peasants made some of their own tools and utensils using wood, leather and the horns from cattle
§ Women generally ate when her husband and children had finished and had little leisure time
2. Houses
Houses had only one or two rooms and were made using the ‘Wattle and Daub’ process. A fire was lit on a stone slab in the middle of the room and since there was no chimney the smoke had to escape through the thatch; which led to the room being quite dark and smoky. There was little to no furniture, just stools and a table; at night-time the peasants slept on straw in the middle of the floor.
3. Food
As well as eating pottage mention earlier, their diet also consisted of bread, cheese and a choice between ale and cider. They drank alcohol constantly because it was safer than the contaminated water.
4. Clothes
Peasants grew flax, which the women used to weave linen cloth. They also wove wool, which they got from sheep. Majority of peasants would sport a tunic with linen pants. Women would vary between dresses of different materials.
5. Entertainment
Peasants did not work on a Sunday or a holy day. On particular days they would be caught participating in many pastimes that still exist today such as:
v Noughts and crosses;
v Blindman’s bluff;
v Carol singing.
6. Crime
Poverty and hunger forced many peasants into a life of crime such as stealing from the lord’s orchard or poaching deer from the forest. Such actions would encounter the wrath of the bailiff. As well as bringing the wrongdoers to the justice of the lord, the bailiff was in charge of collecting rent and taxes. Peasants were rarely imprisoned for their crimes but other punishments were just as harsh:
v Put in stocks/pillories
v Put in the ducking stool
v Hands cut off
v Hanged
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