 Self-employed artisans lived in settlements as villages and towns began to take shape, creating a tradition of handicrafts.As the marketplaces became more sophisticated and advanced, market towns began to develop with important food and livestock markets and feudal landlords would begin to cash in on crops worked and tilled by peasants.Major cities would grow into silk, porcelain, and cotton centers providing work for a lot of people and made inter-regional trade easier so merchants and consumers participated in a local market system to exchange goods and services with one another.