Beginning in the 1950s two French medievalists - Georges Duby and Jean-François Lemarignier - independently argued that the beginnings of feudal society may be traced to a massive rupture in the fabric of medieval society around the year 1000.  Their initial arguments have been reified by others into a thesis of a great "feudal mutation," which remains the reigning orthodoxy to date.  Among the symptoms of the mutation were the appearance of independent castellans, the fragmentation of "public" power, and the appearance of a newly brutal, violent, and oppressive lordship.

This study challenges the thesis of the feudal mutation on several fundamental points.  First, I attack the utility of a distinction between "public" and "private" power, arguing that such a dichotomy is largely a product of the modern world and would have been unintelligible to aristocrats of the eleventh century.  Second, I argue that in focusing upon institutional analyses of lordship and personal relationships, the mutationnistes have overlooked fundamental continuities in the practice and mentalité of lordship.  While I am careful not to substitute a thesis of massive continuity for one of massive change, I nevertheless join Dominique Barthélemy in questioning whether the so-called "feudal transformation" is not a product of medieval documentary styles and of anachronistic modern preoccupation with the institutions of centralized states.

In making these arguments, I utilize a coherent body of evidence derived from the county of Maine and its neighbors in Western France.  Expanding upon the pioneering studies of Robert Latouche, I demonstrate that Maine did undergo a dramatic change in the geography of power over the course of the tenth century.  Yet while I confirm for Maine the existence of a change in the geography of power over the period 900-1110, I question whether these structural changes necessarily led to changes in aristocratic mentalité.  Drawing in part on theories derived from cultural anthropology, I address issues of  social order, violence, kinship structures, and the meaning of property.  Where the mutationnistes contrast a well-ordered Carolingian society based on principles of "public" power and accountability with a dis-ordered eleventh century in which power was exercised for the private benefit of the new castellans, I see substantial continuity in the forms and practice of lordship occurring in Maine.  By focusing on honor, prestige, the proper utilization of emotional and cultural symbols, and the very different ways that medieval aristocrats viewed kinship, violence and disputes, I argue for substantial continuity in the emotional and affective aspects of lordship. While the geography of lordship may have changed, its internal logic and traditional values did not.

In addressing the changes in structures and mentalities that occurred in Maine between 900 and 1110, I propose non-institutional methods of examining issues of lordship and order and thereby contribute to important debates about the "feudal transformation" and the nature of aristocratic society.

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