Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor
After the Thirty Years' War, the demands for corvée labour grew too high and the system became dysfunctional. The official decline of corvée is linked to the abolition of serfdom by Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor and Habsburg ruler, in 1781. Corvée labour continued to exist, however, and was only abolished during the revolutions of 1848, along with the legal inequality between the nobility and common people.