Canadensia wrote:The Parkus Empire wrote:They certainly didn't have freedom of movement. While they didn't have to pay a toll to leave, they had to pay a toll to wherever they went or passed through.
Which was still a substantial improvement on being legally denied this prospect almost in its entirety.
And having to provide a substantial portion of their crop and labour to their liege, as Geni already pointed out.
It's not really unless you actually have an income of money, which subsistence farmers didn't in most cases except in the most negligible amounts, even if they weren't serfs. If they didn't own their own land, they absolutely didn't.