The Hundred Years War contributed to the decline of feudalism in many ways such as monarchs collecting taxes and raising large professional armies, the feeling of nationalism shifting power away from lords and that the survivors of the war were needed as soldiers and workers.The Hundred Years War took place between 1337 and 1453. It was a war for power between France and England. Previous English rulers had taken control of some land in France which the French wanted back. This started serious turmoil and caused a war to take place. In Medieval times, kings received knights from nobles, however, during the Hundred Years War, the Kings from both England and France, hired knights and had large armies. For this reason, they no longer needed nobles …show more content…
When the lords began to lose power, feudalism started to decline. Moreover, during the Hundred Years War, peasants were forced to fight and needed to pay heavy taxes more often to pay for the expensive equipment. For this reason, Peasants were put under the heaviest burden of the war. The few peasants who did survive the Hundred Years War, “were needed as soldiers and workers” (Textbook 5.4). The surviving peasants now took up the more important jobs in the feudal society as workers or soldiers. Before, peasants only used to farm land, which was very important but only the people of lower status used to do this work. However, as a result of the Hundred Years war, commoners had the opportunity to do something that, previously, only people of higher status than them used to do. This shifted the power from the lords to the common people. They could now demand more pay and better treatment because there was no one else left to do the tasks that they had to do. Although they were put under the most pressure to fight and pay higher taxes, the peasants also got the benefit of receiving more power. This way, the commoners could use their newfound influence to take charge and have more say than they ever