1066, the Norman conquest of England

England...'was a farming country, land was its absorbing interest; and originally plots of land had been owned outright by the men who settled and cleared them, and inherited by their children. But such independent farmers had no defense against the Viking raids, or resources to tide them over disasters like cattle sickness, a series of bad harvests, fire or storm. In the course of time, almost every man in the country had attached himself …

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