Members of the Second State, together with members of the First State, were lords during the feudalist era. Feudal systems were based on the system of rights and obligations known as manorialism, and governed economic relationships during the medieval era in Europe.
The privileged social groups, the clergy (First State) and the nobles (Second State), were landowners. They granted their fields to peasants (Third State), who could cultivate them for a living in exchange for becoming vassals to their lords, who had total rights over them. On the first hand, peasants had to pay "taxes" to their lords to be able to feed themselves from their fields, and had to obbey any of their orders. In turn, lords promised protection to their vassals, as they were powerful enough to have some military forces under their command.
