The occurrence of Christian fiction dates back to the XIII-XIV centuries. It was represented primarily by folk songs (love, epic, and feast). Existing for a long time in the oral tradition then started to record. The class struggle of the peasantry, national disasters during the war years and devastation were reflected in France in song-complaints (sets), as well as in ballads arising from the XIV century in many European countries. The cycle of ballads dedicated to the legendary robber Robin Hood - the beloved hero of the English people (recorded from the 15th century) was especially widely known. He is portrayed as a free shooter living with his retinue in the forest, the defender of the poor against the arbitrariness of the feudal lords and royal officials. The image of Robin Hood reflected the people's dream of freedom, human dignity and the nobility of a simple person.

In the work of some writers - immigrants from the peasant milieu - in contrast to the church-feudal tradition, the labor of peasants is praised as the basis of social life already at the end of the XIII century. In the first German peasant poem written by Werner Gardener, “The farmer Gelmbreht” an honest hardworking peasant is contrasted with a robber-knight. An even more pronounced class character is the allegorical poem of the English poet of the XIV century. William Langland (c. 1332 - c. 1377) "A vision of William of Peter the Great." The poem is imbued with sympathy for the peasants, who, according to the author, constitute the healthy foundation of any society. Peasant physical labor is considered in the poem as the main means of improving people, their salvation in the afterlife, and contrasted as a kind of ideal to parasitism of the clergy, judges, tax collectors, bad advisers to the king. Langland's ideas were quite popular among the participants in the Wat Tyler uprising.

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