With enough consolidation, locked-in agrarian societies can produce adverse effects even for the land-controlling aristocrats at the top of the heap.  A case in point is what happened to the agrarian societies of Europe in the end-game stages of their aristocratic systems, with the rise of the modern nation-state.  (This, by the way, was not coequal to democracy, which came later.  It simply involved the evolution of more cohesive and powerful countries, in the sense that we now understand the word.)

Before the rise of the nation-state, Europe’s aristocrats were accustomed to pretty much incessantly competing with one another for power and prestige on the field of battle.  But nations couldn’t tolerate this if they were to become something more than just loose-knit conglomerations of squabbling fiefdoms.  So as nations grew stronger, the aristocrats within those nations were effectively barred from raising arms against one another. 

They didn’t stop jockeying with one another for position and power, though.  Their arena just shifted from the battlefield to the royal court.

An interesting concurrent development is that during this same period, male aristocrats began adopting increasingly refined ways.  This ultimately reached the point where they wore velvet bows in their elegantly coifed hair, went around in silk pedal pushers and stockings, and carried perfumed lace hankies up their sleeves. 

Was this all just a coincidence?  There are reasons to believe otherwise.

The aristocrats of this age made a very deliberate and concerted effort to project an image of cultivation and refinement, because it was one of the few socially acceptable ways in which they could maintain their habit of continually one-upping one another.  It was beneficial for them to wear elaborately fancy clothing in the same way that it boosted their status to commission symphonies (which, incidentally, accounts for why so much of the world’s stock of such music originated in this era).

Projecting an image of refinement at court also helped advance the fortunes of an aristocrat in other ways. 

Bear in mind that the power equation at court involved cultivating others with power.  This required lots of charming and wooing—and of a highly competitive sort, because everybody else was trying to do the same thing.  The situation strongly favored a less threatening, more ingratiating style and manner.  A refined image, as opposed to one of raw power, was best suited to the need.

Also, because it wouldn’t help anybody anymore to be seen as an old-style bash-your-neighbor-type warrior-thug, the aristocrats learned to create at least the appearance of being cooperative with one another, while continuing to look for more subtle ways to do their rivals a dirty.   In other words, they became catty.  Moreover, given that the perceptions of others were of key importance, the aristocrats learned how to get a lot of mileage out of gossip.

By becoming prevalent, such behaviors became socially "normal."  But did they feel natural to the men who were expected to adopt them?  How did the more traditional warrior-chieftain nobles react to the new custom, in at least one royal court, of requesting admittance to a room not by knocking, but by using an elongated fingernail to scratch on the door?   And could they have failed to experience a certain knot in the gut to see serious power shifting to the dandified courtiers who were better suited to this new environment?