castle villeins, royal servant

Hungarian royal court - Structure
Szabadegyház - Festive banquet
castle villeins (Latin "iobagio castri")

Members of the royal castle organisation, in the best position. Legally they were not free: through the castle organisation they were in the king's possession, and they were not allowed to leave the castle arbitrarily, they could enjoy their privileges only within the castle organisation. Castle villeins were liable to compulsory military service (per head). They received their share from the possession of the castle (beneficiary right) and the tax of the castle people.Those who voluntarily joined the castle organisation with their possessions, could keep their proprietary rights. Castle villeins did not have uniform rights.

SGY


royal servant

The name of a special social layer, which first appeared in 1217. The translation of the Latin serviens regis/regalis (= the king's servant) is not correct enough, a better translation would be 'the person who owes service to the king'. The form "noble royal servant", which was wide-spread from the middle of the 13th century, refers to the fact that there were no more shaÁrpádifferences between the royal servants and the traditional nobility. After the 1267 law, which identified royal servants with the nobility the expression became rarely used, and although it still appeared in the 14th century, this expression died out of Hungarian Latinism.

ZSA