The academic community has always questioned whether there has been a commune system in the long river of human history. Marxists believe that rural communes, namely, Mark of the Germanic nation, had already emerged as early as the early AD.
Engels once wrote "Mark" to quote classics and list his real evidence. Engels admitted: "The spontaneous fact that dominates all ethnic groups is the clan commune system."
clan commune system can be said to be the early form of development after tribe settlement. All commune members have the right to share the land and have the obligation to farm.
German The Mark system, that is, the rural commune system, evolved on the basis of the clan commune system and should have been born after they changed from nomad to settlement.
Caesar defines the Germanic nation for the first time in "Gallic War " and provides a detailed description of its national history.
Before the advent of Caesar's era, the Germans did not know how to plant, did not like fishing, and were not good at handicrafts. In Caesar's words, "They only care about one thing, conquer and end all resistance."
At the same time, Caesar also mentioned that there is no private land in the Germanic tribe. As the saying goes, "The leaders will allocate the land to the tribes and their relatives as they wish at the end of the year, and lead them to migrate to other places after one year." This is the clan commune system.
Rural commune system was born among the Germanic peoples after their settlement. For a long time, the Germans did not find their favorite settlements, and they wandered for a long time along the Jutland Peninsula and North Sea coasts. People at that time knew very little about it, and even once believed that the Germans were the branch of Celtic , or Celtic savages.
Around BC, the Germans who lived by water and grass gradually found a suitable place to survive. The branches of the Franks, the Anglo-Saxons, the Goths, and the Burgundians gradually established a social circle with their tribe as the core.
Their settlement laid a good foundation for the emergence of the rural commune system. Immediately afterwards, the clan commune system where tribes collectively farmed became a patriarchal system with kinship as the bond.
The Germanic farming changed from the participation of all tribal members to the labor of relatives.
The emergence of a large family commune with a patriarchal line as the parent, which directly promoted the emergence of an agricultural commune.
Rural communes were once prosperous among the Germanic peoples and helped him to migrate on a large scale to the territory of the Western Roman Empire of when the Huns invaded, and lasted for 200 years.
Rural communes also have their unique highlights, that is, there is no relationship between exploitation and being exploited. According to the records of " Salik Code ", the members of the commune are divided into three types: aristocrats, free men and semi-free men, while slaves and untouchables do not belong to any of them.
But the power of the semi-free man is close to that of the free man, and the untouchable man is close to that of the semi-free man.
So, they can also participate in the activities of the commune, enjoy the power and fulfill their obligations. Every year when land is divided, semi-free people and untouchables can have a place. They must participate in farming at the specified time and can grazle and fish and hunt during the slack farming period.
At the same time, they also enjoy certain political rights and can attend every time the villagers' meeting or the court holds a court hearing.
As the "Salic Code" says: "Any crime of infringement on others, including but not limited to damaging other people's property, occupying other people's arable land, beating or even killing others, will be fined."
But shortly after the Germanic migration, the commune system and even public ownership faded out of the Germanic dictionary.
This is because the decline of the rural commune system among the Germans is inevitable. The main reason for this situation is people's profit-seeking psychology.
First, rural communes can provide a breeding ground for individuals to pursue their own interests.
Compared with clan commune , the production foundation of rural communes has been reduced from the entire tribe to the large family. At the same time, in the clan tribe, except for the leader, most members are equal.
Clan Commune is equal compared to agricultural communes, and all members of the former are equal, and except for the chief, most people have roughly the same power and fulfill similar obligations. Poor is as poor as he is; rich is as rich as he is, there will be no differentiation.
But in rural communes, the contradiction between production and operation based on small plots of land.
When the composition of the labor subject separates from all tribal members into a family, then the individual's desire to pursue profit will begin to show its clues.
Among the family members, some are diligent and some are lazy. Diligent people naturally don’t want their lazy relatives to enjoy the fruits of their labor.
In this case, the big family gradually differentiated into small families.
They also want to own their own land, so they can do their own muscles and bones without having to worry about their own muscles and bones, and serve others' bodies. This point in makes rural communes inevitably withdraw from the Germanic historical stage.
In "The Complete Works of Marx and Engels", Marx revealed the secret in one sentence: "The agricultural commune period was a transitional period from public ownership to private ownership from native to secondary. "
When the rural commune changed from an agricultural commune to a neighboring commune, the independence of individuals was further strengthened.
"Salik Code" Chapter 59 records in detail how land changed from public ownership to private ownership due to changes in the inheritance system. In the 6th century AD, after the Germanic migration, members of the commune had autonomy over the land, and they could sell, rent and even give away the land.
At this time, the land of the commune becomes the private land of its members, that is, although the members nominally belong to the commune, their land is owned by themselves.
The land is uneven and of good quality, which is inevitable, which leads to some families being rich while others being poor.
Secondly, the agricultural commune with blood ties as the core began to gradually collapse.
In the early days of the formation of the agricultural commune, the owner of the large family was not allowed to distribute the land to his daughter after his death. As time goes by, the idea of equality between men and women gradually emerged. The "Salik Code" criticized the rumor of rumoring whether a man or not is an ignorant and backward behavior. Therefore, the Germanic nation began to see the phenomenon of inheritance of men and women.
From the perspective of equal rights awareness, this is tantamount to a huge progress. However, for the rural commune system, this is not conducive to its stability. Because one more person divides the land means that the big family gradually moves closer to the small family.
It is worth mentioning that the hospitality of Germans often invite people from other ethnic groups or other villages to settle in their places of residence. The Germanic immigration policy was very friendly. As long as they settled here for one year, the commune would distribute land and protect its land.
Some Germans will also transfer their inheritance to people who are not relatives. When there are children at home, adopting adopted sons or adopted daughters was once popular among Germans. They saw their godson or goddaughter who had no blood relationship, and after their death they passed the land and property to outsiders.
Finally, with the development of the Germanic rural communes, they developed severe class differentiation.
There was a beginning of a gap between the Germans, and the Salik Code provides a strong argument for this phenomenon.
Some Germanic free citizens have publicly signed an agreement to waive their joint oath obligation and waive their estate rights. This is because they are rich enough to not require these obligations and inheritance.
Of course, no one will think that they have too much money. This is mainly to avoid paying atonement money for other members of the commune family.
Atonement Money is paid when Germanic free people kill other free people according to their degree of closeness. When the murderer emptys his property and cannot repay a sufficient amount, the commune family members pay it for him.If you want to give up your family to help pay the atonement money, you can sign an agreement to to waive the joint oath obligation and waive the ownership of the estate.
Moreover, some free people have committed illegal acts such as robbery and theft to achieve "financial freedom".
In this way, wealth quickly differentiated, and the independence of small families was strengthened, and the composition of commune members became increasingly complex.
Where there are people, there will be disputes, power and identity differences. Those who get rich first become those who have a noble life. This is fully reflected in the Atonement Gold.
"The Edict of Rothar" is the code of the Germanic branch of the Lombards. It mentions: "When accepting compensation from the murderer, the relatives of the victim must consider the quality of the victim, the amount of personal wealth possession, the rank of the family and how he will be evaluated."
Lombard Kingdom Later, the free man was directly divided into two levels, namely the upper and the lower, and the basis for the division was not the origin, but the individual's wealth.
was also killed, and the difference between the atonement between the superior and inferior free people is exactly twice.
Code and the king's edict all show the recognition of class division among the Germanic peoples.
The wealthy are naturally unwilling to share their wealth with others, and these codes and the king's orders also directly reflect the recognition of class division by the Germanic people.
Rural communes have their positive significance. When they broke through the ground, they ended the clan public ownership era with the duality of public ownership and private ownership, laying the foundation for the emergence of the state and the complete social system. Although
seems to have achieved "equality for everyone", it will also lead to stagnation in society, and no outstanding people can jump to the leader. In other words, although there is no class in the public ownership of the clan, and there is no class solidification, it itself is a kind of class solidification. No matter how hard an individual makes, he must share it with others, which greatly reduces his enthusiasm and enterprising spirit.
is the rural commune system, which gives individuals an independent side and is willing to fight for their own interests. When countless individuals strive for their goals, they will naturally drag society forward.
