[ch4s3]

The people farming didn't really own the land, in many cases they were captured or corralled in place and forced to farm. The were also forced to dig canals and occasionally do the soldiering. All of the early Mesopotamian city states use corvée labor. Being an early farmer was super shitty, and no one did it by choice.

[twoodfin]

Right, I’m saying the jerks who did the capturing and the forcing (the owners!) were doing well, not the proto-feudal farmers.