Comment by thinkingemote

A good observation. Of course medieval people worked harder and died earlier and they had more days off working. The focus of my comment was on time and not energy and specifically about festivals on which people took time not to work and to take part in the festival. Or at the very least took time to notice more than not noticing or said "meh" to :-)

"Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's" https://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/rauch/worktime/hours_...

"Historians Explain: Medieval Peasants Took More Leisure Time Than Today’s ‘Wage Slave’ Workers" https://tlio.org.uk/medieval-workers-short-days-long-holiday...

However, Snopes gives the theory a mixed rating: Medieval Peasants Only Worked 150 Days Due to 'Frequent, Mandatory' Holidays? https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/medieval-peasant-only-work... worth a read if you are interested, dear reader, it's thorough.

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Interestingly it seems like some socialists and Anarchists also point to the theory and use it to show that Capitalism has vastly increased work on people. Can certainly see the green anarchism application with a non-exploited rural country with people with more personal and communal freedoms. I have not come across a capitalist historian refutation where the Capitalists and urbanisation lead to less exploitation, but I'd be happy to read one. Ideas promoting labour-saving technology could be adopted by any ideology.