I mean, past 1800 AD or so they were all degrees of shit everywhere agriculturalised. I don't have any reason to expect Feodor I was noticeably worse than Elizabeth I.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Serfdom proves otherwise, but it's not like it was a whole different ballgame.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Hmm. It had mostly died out in England by her time, apparently, which is interesting. It wasn't formally abolished until 1925, but obviously was in practice.

Elizabeth was the first pre-modern English monarch I thought of, but she was also one of the most repressive from what I've heard. She was also the first to adopt a policy of genocidal brutality in Ireland. Feodor... was apparently sickly and possibly intellectually disabled. I wonder if life was easier or harder at the time than it had been under the princes.