Every Level of Wealth in the Middle Ages (And Why Almost Nobody Climbed)

In the year 1300, the pepper in your kitchen cupboard would have been locked in a chest, and the person holding the key would have been a lord. So where would YOU stand on the medieval ladder of wealth? We climb all eight rungs of medieval English society, from the landless laborer earning a penny and a half a day to a king with £30,000 a year who was still constantly broke. At every level: what you earn, what you eat, where you sleep, and the one thing that stops you from climbing higher. Plus the one side door almost anyone could walk through, and the disaster that finally shook the whole ladder loose. To compare everyone fairly, we use one "measuring stick": a year of an unskilled laborer's work, about £2 around 1300. ⏱️ CHAPTERS 0:00 Your Kitchen 1:17 The Measuring Stick 2:05 Level 1: The Laborer 3:22 Level 2: The Serf 4:46 Level 3: The Free Farmer 5:55 Level 4: The Craftsman 7:19 Level 5: The Merchant 8:56 The Side Door 9:56 Level 6: The Knight 11:16 Level 7: The Earl 12:34 Level 8: The King 13:45 The Shake: The Black Death 15:21 Which Rung Are You On? 📚 SOURCES & FURTHER READING • Christopher Dyer, Standards of Living in the Later Middle Ages • Christopher Dyer, Making a Living in the Middle Ages • William C. Jordan, The Great Famine • H. S. Bennett, Life on the English Manor • Michael Prestwich, Edward I • Michael Prestwich, Armies and Warfare in the Middle Ages • R. H. C. Davis, The Medieval Warhorse • J. R. Maddicott, Thomas of Lancaster, 1307–1322 • John Hatcher, Plague, Population and the English Economy 1348–1530 • R. B. Dobson, The Peasants' Revolt of 1381 • Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (William de la Pole, William of Wykeham) • Statutes of the Realm (Sumptuary Law of 1363; Statute of Labourers, 1351) Figures are approximate and focus on England around 1300. "Measuring stick" conversions are our own calculations based on a laborer's income of about £2 a year. 💬 Now ask yourself the two questions from the end of the video: Whose time is this? And am I allowed to leave? Tell us in the comments which rung you're really standing on.