Other modern writers, without denying that the serf's disabilities put him at a very serious disadvantage in comparison with the modern peasant, have tried to attenuate the part played by the Church, and especially by monasticism, in perpetuating these conditions. Great pains have been taken to divert attention from the natural—it might almost be said, the necessary—legislation which supported these ecclesiastical corporations in their tenacious adherence to prescriptive rights. St Benedict of Aniane (d. 821) is indeed recorded to have made a practice of liberating the slaves bound to the land which was given to his monks; but, from at least 1150 onwards, the contrary principle was binding upon the whole Church; no ecclesiastic had a legal right to free a serf bound to his church, any more than he had a legal right to alienate any other part of his endowment, except at his or its full market value.

Even before Christianity had become the State Religion, it had been compelled to accept the social system of the day; and endowments came to it in the form not only of land, houses, and money, but also of slaves who went with the land. Therefore, from very early times, Church bondmen were extremely numerous. We have seen this in the case of Gregory the Great; later, when parishes were formed, bondmen were part of the parochial endowment.