Final answer:
The feudal system was a social and political hierarchy with the king at the top, followed by nobles, and peasants at the bottom. Kings had overall control, but nobles also held significant power and wealth, which sometimes enabled them to challenge the king. Over time, feudalism declined as power centralized and society shifted toward capitalism.
Step-by-step explanation:
The feudal system was a hierarchical structure that prevailed in medieval Europe, marked by a distribution of power and land amongst various ranks of society. At its pinnacle was the king, who was deemed the most powerful and supreme ruler of the realm. The king had ultimate control over the land and, ostensibly, all the people within the feudal hierarchy, including the nobles, warriors, and the clergy. The nobles held considerable sway, wealth, and control over their own estates and fiefs, and they wielded power over their vassals and the peasants who worked the land. These peasants provided labor and payment in kind, primarily, which constituted the economic foundation of the feudal system.
Nobles provided military support to their king in return for protection and the rights to their lands, which they could in turn parcel out to lesser nobles and knights under similar terms. The intricacies of the feudal system ensured that while the king was officially the seamless head of state, the actual power dynamics could be complex, with some nobles amassing enough power to challenge, and at times even wage war against, their sovereign.
Despite its rigid structure, the feudal system was not immutable, and over time power could shift, as monarchs sought ways to consolidate authority, often at the expense of the nobility. Eventually, the feudal system gave way as Europe moved towards centralized monarchies, capitalism, and the socio-economic changes brought about by the Industrial Revolution.