Rural Rights & Peasant Unrest
Before the coming of industrialisation in Europe, the vast majority of men and women lived in the countryside, working the land, surviving the best they could, evolving a culture and folklore of their own.
Today civil wars are rare: by and large society settles its differences by peaceful means and violence in most Western countries is outlawed and controlled. All these are only comparatively recent achievements. At least until the end of the seventeenth century, a sense of insecurity was inseparable from the world of the countryside. Self-defence was only too obvious a necessity. One had to be in a position to defend oneself against the brutality and encroachments of quarrelsome neighbours. One had to protect one's sheep from the threat of stray dogs or wild animals. Until the middle of the nineteenth century, packs of wolves could emerge at any moment from the surrounding woods to attack sheep or poultry or even, in very severe winters, men. When labourers set off for the fields, they always carried an iron-shod stick; together with their rough boots, it was the very sign and symbol of a countryman.
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