Page:Gregor The story of Bohemia.pdf/91

 the wealthier and poorer zemans had tenants upon their lands, called kmets, and the kmets, with their families, constituted the bulk of the population. They were sometimes called sedlacy, this name being applied to small land-owners in Bohemia at the present time. The kmets, as tenants, paid rent in kind, and did menial service for their lords; but as they were not attached to the soil, they can not properly be called serfs. In theory, the noblemen, zemans, kmets, tradesmen, and other people, were equal before the law; but, as might be supposed, the powerful soon learned to oppress the weak, and gradually the idea grew that the life of a man was valuable according as he had means and influential friends. There was an ancient law that provided that if a nobleman killed a peasant, he paid a greater fine than if the peasant killed the nobleman; but contact with Teutonic neighbors soon taught the Slavs to reverse this method.

During the continual struggles for the throne, the country being in a state of anarchy, the common people lost much of their original liberty. Sometimes the poor peasant, being plundered by each of the contending parties in turn, only saved himself from starvation by accepting land from some lord upon very severe conditions. On account of excessive taxation, the smaller zemans often sold their lands to the wealthier land-owners, and thus there was a constant tendency towards greater and greater inequality.

At first titles of nobility were not hereditary, being dependent upon the wealth and official position of the person; these being lost, he was again a plebeian. And thus it often happened that members of the same family belonged to different social classes. Dur-