The Metayage system (Fr. métayage) is the cultivation of land for a proprietor by one who receives a proportion of the produce, as a kind of sharecropping. Origin and function Métayage was available under Roman law, although it wasn't in widespread use. In what is now northern Italy and southeastern France, the post Black Death population explosion of the late Middle Ages combined with the relative lack of free land made métayage an attractive system for both landowner and… (More on Metayage)