> Just tell the peasants you're the hand of the god, and the god wants you to give their cows and grain to you. I think that worked pretty well for a looong tim

> Just tell the peasants you're the hand of the god, and the god wants you to give their cows and grain to you. I think that worked pretty well for a looong time. It did, until it didn't and you can read all about peasant revolts in a book all you want, which led to things like the Magna Carta. But I lived in Italy and worked on a farm that sprawled for many KMs in what was a feudal lord's manor and it was baffling just how much absurd complexity from a supply chain and logistics view tending that much land entailed since it was so fractured and disrupted by hills and valleys, and the amount of bureaucratic BS that had to be created and subsequently put up with in order to survive as a serf: it wasn't just cows, wine or grain that had to be rendered, but actual members of your family were taken into the homes as slaves, physical or sexual. I did the mistake of watching Passolini's Salo when I was there, and the level of somberness still stays with me to this day [0] when I think what horrid forms of cruelty Humans are capable of when they amass so much power and wealth. And this was just a modern take on things, just pondering the things they did openly during the dark ages and even in the height of Rome can send me to some dark places. 0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZhEDCk5Oh8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZhEDCk5Oh8