Property Conditions. 27 



used in common for hunting, pasturing, fattening of 

 hogs by the oak mast, etc., rather than for the wood. In 

 return for the assignment of the fields, the free men, 

 who alone were fully recognized citizens of the com- 

 munity, had to fulfil the duties of citizens and espe- 

 cially of war service. 



Only gradually, by partition, immigration and uneven 

 numerical development, was the original Mark or dif- 

 ferentiation into family associations destroyed and a 

 more heterogeneous association of neighbors substituted. 

 At the same time inequality of ownership arose espe- 

 cially from the fact that those who owned a larger 

 number of slaves (the conquered race) had the advan- 

 tage in being able to clear and cultivate more readily new 

 and rough forest groimd. Those without slaves would 

 seek assistance from those more favored, exchanging for 

 rent or service their rights to the use of land ; out of this 

 relationship a certain vassalage and inequality of politi- 

 cal rights developed. 



Under the influence of Eoman doctrine a new aspect 

 regarding newly conquered territory developed, by which 

 the Dukes as representatives of the community laid 

 claim to all unseated or unappropriated land ; they then 

 distributed to their followers or donated to the newly 

 established church portions of this land, so that by the 

 year 900 A. D., a complete change in property relations 

 had been effected. In this way the large baronial estates 

 of private owners came into existence which were of such 

 great significance in the economic history of the Middle 

 Ages, changing considerably the estate of the free men 

 and changing the free mark societies into communities 

 under the dominion of the barons. 



