World-building Part 1: the village (continued)

In the first post I was just trying to get a grasp on the geography of the village and to sum up, it is a narrow core of houses surrounded by strips of farmed land which are parceled out to the villagers. There are common fields for livestock, but also choice fields for the livestock of the wealthy. Running water is nearby.

Continuing on with Tomkeieff, the village, despite its small size, will have a social heirarchy. There will be a few local notables (one of which will be the clergy), 'free' farmers after that, and then the cottagers, who will be obligated to give up a day's work in exchange for the right to till some poor land. There might be slaves as well, but these will be very few and the property of the richest of the villagers - their living conditions might be no worse than that of a cottager except for less freedom of movement.

Politically we can have this two ways: one in which we imagine the village being subject to some feudal lord, or one in which, as Tomkeieff notes existed in pre-Norman England (albeit rare), the village is a self-governing entity. For my exercise in village-building, I'm going with the former. As a GM or writer, I'd prefer my heroes to have to deal with a powerful figure who is not necessarily their enemy, but does impose restrictions on what they can consider doing (or at least make them think twice about it).

I will explain myself a bit more here. I'm largely doing this world-building with a rpg in view. In most rpg's characters, as they gain in raw power seldom seem to gain in social status. I'm building this village with the view of, as a GM, starting off heroes in it. As sons and daughters of the villagers, our heroes concerns are going to be more parochial and intimate. They aren't going to care about stopping world-beating villians (that will come later when their power, influence, and obligations grow). Right now, they have to deal with the dire bear that is snatching sheep (and maybe the odd shepherd). Complicating matters for them is the local lord; maybe he is a good ruler, cognizant of his obligations, but can't have some yahoos getting the glory. He has to maintain his grip on power. So he might be trying to stop them, and maybe other villagers don't want to stir up trouble so they are also against our heroes.