| rdfs:comment | - The Frisians were at that time unique in Europe in that they did not adhere to the feudal system. In fact, since the time the Frisian territories had been part of the Frankish empire of Charlemagne, they had drifted away from mainstream European culture on a separate course, similar to that of the Swiss Confederation. Egalitarianism was such that no noble class started to develop until the late thirteenth century, and even then these "nobles" were only been firsts among equals, with only as much power as they could grab, instead of being granted such power by a liege lord. These "nobles" were called chieftains (Dutch: hoofdelingen; Frisian: haadlingen).
|
| abstract | - The Frisians were at that time unique in Europe in that they did not adhere to the feudal system. In fact, since the time the Frisian territories had been part of the Frankish empire of Charlemagne, they had drifted away from mainstream European culture on a separate course, similar to that of the Swiss Confederation. Egalitarianism was such that no noble class started to develop until the late thirteenth century, and even then these "nobles" were only been firsts among equals, with only as much power as they could grab, instead of being granted such power by a liege lord. These "nobles" were called chieftains (Dutch: hoofdelingen; Frisian: haadlingen). The so-called Frisian freedom took the place of the feudal system in Frisian society. According to a popular myth, Charlemagne had granted the Frisians their freedom, that is to say: freedom from any and every lord excepting the Holy Roman emperor. A fake charter sought to legitimise this freedom, a not uncommon behaviour in those days. In an age when feudalism was embedded in religion, with every man having a lord above him, a king over the lords and God over all, the Frisian freedoms were seen as a sort of anarchy, or worse, a rebellion against God's will, and scandalised the rest of Europe. The Frisian lands in those days stretched along a large part of the North Sea coast, including West-Friesland, now part of North Holland, the Dutch provinces of Friesland and Groningen, excepting the city of Groningen, the German districts of Ostfriesland and Friesland and two small areas east of the Weser river, Wursten and Würden.
|
