the countryside, always numbered more than any other demographic group during the Middle Ages.

However, under feudalism,

the greatest financial burden fell on the peasants. Peasants knew this, but they were trapped. The one thing that kept them hanging
on was the promise that the afterlife would be better than the earthly life. As a result, the European peasants behaved themselves
most of the time.
When food supplies ran low, though, peasants tended to get cranky. When they felt overtaxed, in addition to being hungry,
peasants often created problems for governments. Fortunately for those governments, peasant revolts rarely threatened national
stability. Peasants had no way of organizing on a large scale, nor of acquiring weapons and supplies.

The Jacquerie
In 1358, France was embroiled in the Hundred Years’ War and peasants were forced to deal with food shortages and farmland
ravaged by war. To make matters worse, mercenaries constantly pillaged the already-plundered land.
According to the unwritten rules of the feudal system, peasants paid rents and taxes to their lords in exchange not only for use of
the land but also for protection. In France, the lords still demanded the rents and taxes, but they offered little or no protection. The
peasants finally grew tired of the food shortages, the attacks, and the continued heavy taxation and did what most peasants do
when they get hungry and mad: they revolted.
The revolt broke out north of Paris and spread quickly. Peasants destroyed property and committed
acts of violence until their leader was finally beheaded. Nobles and government officials took the
opportunity to react violently toward the unruly peasants and squelch the rebellion. The revolt
Define Your Terms never threatened the national government or national security, but it was a headache.
The name of the revolt,
Jacquerie, probably comes from
the French term for a peasant, The Peasants’ Revolt of 1381
Jacques Bonhomme. As in France, English peasants felt the strain of the Hundred Years’ War and had little
patience for anyone intent on taking advantage of them.
In Essex, a group of peasants, out of frustration, reacted violently to a tax collector who attempted to enforce a poll tax; the poll
tax was intended to finance England’s military campaigns abroad.