Page 1
Page 2
Page 3
The Project Gutenberg eBook of Domesday Book and Beyond:
Three Essays in the Early History of England
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: Domesday Book and Beyond: Three Essays in the Early History
of England
Author: Frederic William Maitland
Release date: July 19, 2013 [eBook #43255]
Most recently updated: October 23, 2024
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43255
Credits: E-text prepared by KD Weeks, Irma Spehar, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from
page images generously made available by Internet
Archive/Canadian Libraries
(http://archive.org/details/toronto)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DOMESDAY
BOOK AND BEYOND: THREE ESSAYS IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF
ENGLAND ***
Three Essays in the Early History of England
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: Domesday Book and Beyond: Three Essays in the Early History
of England
Author: Frederic William Maitland
Release date: July 19, 2013 [eBook #43255]
Most recently updated: October 23, 2024
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43255
Credits: E-text prepared by KD Weeks, Irma Spehar, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from
page images generously made available by Internet
Archive/Canadian Libraries
(http://archive.org/details/toronto)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DOMESDAY
BOOK AND BEYOND: THREE ESSAYS IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF
ENGLAND ***
Page 4
The Project Gutenberg eBook, Domesday Book and Beyond, by Frederic
William Maitland
Note: Images of the original pages are available through Internet
Archive/Canadian Libraries. See
http://archive.org/details/domesdaybook00maituoft
William Maitland
Note: Images of the original pages are available through Internet
Archive/Canadian Libraries. See
http://archive.org/details/domesdaybook00maituoft
Page 5
Transcriber’s Note
The marginal paragraph descriptions are placed at the
Marginal descriptions
beginning of each paragraph, and will be shown as can be
seen here. On occasion, there are more than one for a single
paragraph.
The copious footnotes have been renumbered, consecutively, and gathered at the end of
this text. Internal references to those notes in the original have been modified to refer to
the new numbers, and all have been hyperlinked.
The page references in the Index have also been linked to the physical page on which the
topic appears.
There are two detailed maps. A link to the full image size has been added to each caption
for optional viewing.
Please refer to the Notes at the end of this text for additional detail.
The marginal paragraph descriptions are placed at the
Marginal descriptions
beginning of each paragraph, and will be shown as can be
seen here. On occasion, there are more than one for a single
paragraph.
The copious footnotes have been renumbered, consecutively, and gathered at the end of
this text. Internal references to those notes in the original have been modified to refer to
the new numbers, and all have been hyperlinked.
The page references in the Index have also been linked to the physical page on which the
topic appears.
There are two detailed maps. A link to the full image size has been added to each caption
for optional viewing.
Please refer to the Notes at the end of this text for additional detail.
Page 6
DOMESDAY BOOK AND
BEYOND
THREE ESSAYS
IN THE
EARLY HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE,
C. F. CLAY, Manager.
London: FETTER LANE, E.C.
Glasgow: 50, WELLINGTON STREET.
ALSO
London: STEVENS AND SONS, Ltd., 119 and 120, CHANCERY
LANE.
Leipzig: P. A. BROCKHAUS.
Bombay and Calcutta: MACMILLAN & CO. Ltd.
[All rights reserved.]
BEYOND
THREE ESSAYS
IN THE
EARLY HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE,
C. F. CLAY, Manager.
London: FETTER LANE, E.C.
Glasgow: 50, WELLINGTON STREET.
ALSO
London: STEVENS AND SONS, Ltd., 119 and 120, CHANCERY
LANE.
Leipzig: P. A. BROCKHAUS.
Bombay and Calcutta: MACMILLAN & CO. Ltd.
[All rights reserved.]
Page 7
DOMESDAY BOOK AND BEYOND
THREE ESSAYS
IN THE
EARLY HISTORY OF ENGLAND
BY
FREDERIC WILLIAM MAITLAND, LL.D.
FORMERLY DOWNING PROFESSOR OF THE LAWS OF
ENGLAND
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE,
OF LINCOLN’S INN, BARRISTER-AT-LAW.
CAMBRIDGE:
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
1907
First Edition 1897.
Reprinted 1907.
THREE ESSAYS
IN THE
EARLY HISTORY OF ENGLAND
BY
FREDERIC WILLIAM MAITLAND, LL.D.
FORMERLY DOWNING PROFESSOR OF THE LAWS OF
ENGLAND
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE,
OF LINCOLN’S INN, BARRISTER-AT-LAW.
CAMBRIDGE:
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
1907
First Edition 1897.
Reprinted 1907.
Page 8
Page 9
PREFACE.
The greater part of what is in this book was written in order that it might be
included in the History of English Law before the Time of Edward I. which
was published by Sir Frederick Pollock and me in the year 1895. Divers
reasons dictated a change of plan. Of one only need I speak. I knew that Mr
Round was on the eve of giving to the world his Feudal England, and that
thereby he would teach me and others many new lessons about the scheme
and meaning of Domesday Book. That I was well advised in waiting will be
evident to everyone who has studied his work. In its light I have suppressed,
corrected, added much. The delay has also enabled me to profit by Dr
Meitzen’s Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Germanen[1], a book which will
assuredly leave a deep mark upon all our theories of old English history.
The title under which I here collect my three Essays is chosen for the
purpose of indicating that I have followed that retrogressive method ‘from
the known to the unknown,’ of which Mr Seebohm is the apostle.
Domesday Book appears to me, not indeed as the known, but as the
knowable. The Beyond is still very dark: but the way to it lies through the
Norman record. A result is given to us: the problem is to find cause and
process. That in some sort I have been endeavouring to answer Mr
Seebohm, I can not conceal from myself or from others. A hearty
admiration of his English Village Community is one main source of this
book. That the task of disputing his conclusions might have fallen to
stronger hands than mine I well know. I had hoped that by this time Prof.
Vinogradoff’s Villainage in England would have had a sequel. When that
sequel comes (and may it come soon) my provisional answer can be
forgotten. One who by a few strokes of his pen has deprived the English
nation of its land, its folk-land, owes us some reparation. I have been trying
to show how we can best bear the loss, and abandon as little as may be of
what we learnt from Dr Konrad von Maurer and Dr Stubbs.
For my hastily compiled Domesday Statistics I have apologized in the
proper place. Here I will only add that I had but one long vacation to give to
a piece of work that would have been better performed had it been spread
The greater part of what is in this book was written in order that it might be
included in the History of English Law before the Time of Edward I. which
was published by Sir Frederick Pollock and me in the year 1895. Divers
reasons dictated a change of plan. Of one only need I speak. I knew that Mr
Round was on the eve of giving to the world his Feudal England, and that
thereby he would teach me and others many new lessons about the scheme
and meaning of Domesday Book. That I was well advised in waiting will be
evident to everyone who has studied his work. In its light I have suppressed,
corrected, added much. The delay has also enabled me to profit by Dr
Meitzen’s Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Germanen[1], a book which will
assuredly leave a deep mark upon all our theories of old English history.
The title under which I here collect my three Essays is chosen for the
purpose of indicating that I have followed that retrogressive method ‘from
the known to the unknown,’ of which Mr Seebohm is the apostle.
Domesday Book appears to me, not indeed as the known, but as the
knowable. The Beyond is still very dark: but the way to it lies through the
Norman record. A result is given to us: the problem is to find cause and
process. That in some sort I have been endeavouring to answer Mr
Seebohm, I can not conceal from myself or from others. A hearty
admiration of his English Village Community is one main source of this
book. That the task of disputing his conclusions might have fallen to
stronger hands than mine I well know. I had hoped that by this time Prof.
Vinogradoff’s Villainage in England would have had a sequel. When that
sequel comes (and may it come soon) my provisional answer can be
forgotten. One who by a few strokes of his pen has deprived the English
nation of its land, its folk-land, owes us some reparation. I have been trying
to show how we can best bear the loss, and abandon as little as may be of
what we learnt from Dr Konrad von Maurer and Dr Stubbs.
For my hastily compiled Domesday Statistics I have apologized in the
proper place. Here I will only add that I had but one long vacation to give to
a piece of work that would have been better performed had it been spread
Page 10
over many years. Mr Corbett, of King’s College, has already shown me how
by a little more patience and ingenuity I might have obtained some rounder
and therefore more significant figures. But of this it is for him to speak.
Among the friends whom I wish to thank for their advice and assistance I
am more especially grateful to Mr Herbert Fisher, of New College, who has
borne the tedious labour of reading all my sheets, and to Mr W. H.
Stevenson, of Exeter College, whose unrivalled knowledge of English
diplomatics has been generously placed at my service.
F. W. M.
20 January, 1897.
by a little more patience and ingenuity I might have obtained some rounder
and therefore more significant figures. But of this it is for him to speak.
Among the friends whom I wish to thank for their advice and assistance I
am more especially grateful to Mr Herbert Fisher, of New College, who has
borne the tedious labour of reading all my sheets, and to Mr W. H.
Stevenson, of Exeter College, whose unrivalled knowledge of English
diplomatics has been generously placed at my service.
F. W. M.
20 January, 1897.
Page 11
Page 12
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Preface v
Table of Contents vii
List of Abbreviations xiv
ESSAY I.
Domesday Book.
Domesday Book and its satellites, 1. Domesday and legal history, 2.
Domesday a geld book, 3. The danegeld, 3. The inquest and the geld
system, 5. Importance of the geld, 7. Unstable terminology of the
record, 8. The legal ideas of century xi. 9.
§ 1. Plan of the Survey, pp. 9–26.
The geographical basis, 9. The vill as the unit, 10. Modern and
ancient vills, 12. Omission of vills, 13. Fission of vills, 14. The
nucleated village and the vill of scattered steads, 15. Illustration by
maps, 16. Size of the vill, 17. Population of the vill, 19. Contrasts
between east and west, 20. Small vills, 20. Importance of the east, 21.
Manorial and non-manorial vills, 22. Distribution of free men and
serfs, 23. The classification of men, 23. The classes of men and the
geld system, 24. Our course, 25.
§ 2. The Serfs, pp. 26–36.
PAGE
Preface v
Table of Contents vii
List of Abbreviations xiv
ESSAY I.
Domesday Book.
Domesday Book and its satellites, 1. Domesday and legal history, 2.
Domesday a geld book, 3. The danegeld, 3. The inquest and the geld
system, 5. Importance of the geld, 7. Unstable terminology of the
record, 8. The legal ideas of century xi. 9.
§ 1. Plan of the Survey, pp. 9–26.
The geographical basis, 9. The vill as the unit, 10. Modern and
ancient vills, 12. Omission of vills, 13. Fission of vills, 14. The
nucleated village and the vill of scattered steads, 15. Illustration by
maps, 16. Size of the vill, 17. Population of the vill, 19. Contrasts
between east and west, 20. Small vills, 20. Importance of the east, 21.
Manorial and non-manorial vills, 22. Distribution of free men and
serfs, 23. The classification of men, 23. The classes of men and the
geld system, 24. Our course, 25.
§ 2. The Serfs, pp. 26–36.
Page 13
The servus of Domesday, 26. Legal position of the serf, 27. Degrees
of serfdom, 27. Predial element in serfdom, 28. The serf and criminal
law, 29. Serf and villein, 30. The serf of the Leges, 30. Return to the
servus of Domesday, 33. Disappearance of servus, 35.
§ 3. The Villeins, pp. 36–66.
The boors or coliberts, 36. The continental colibert, 37. The English
boor, 37. Villani, bordarii, cotarii, 38. The villein’s tenement, 40.
Villeins and cottiers, 41. Freedom and unfreedom of the villani, 41.
Meaning of freedom, 42. The villein as free, 43. The villein as unfree,
45. Anglo-Saxon free-holding, 46. Free-holding and seignorial rights,
47. The scale of free-holding, 49. Free land and immunity, 50.
Unfreedom of the villein, 50. Right of recapture, 50. Rarity of flight,
51. The villein and seignorial justice, 52. The villein and national
justice, 52. The villein and his land, 53. The villein’s land and the
geld, 54. The villein’s services, 56. The villein’s rent, 57. The English
for villanus, 58. Summary of the villein’s position, 60. Depression of
the peasants, 61. The Normans and the rustics, 61. Depression of the
sokemen, 63. The peasants on the royal demesne, 65.
§ 4. The Sokemen, pp. 66–79.
Sochemanni and liberi homines, 66. Lord and man, 67. Bonds
between lord and man, 67. Commendation, 69. Commendation and
protection, 70. Commendation and warranty, 71. Commendation and
tenure, 71. The lord’s interest in commendation, 72. The seignory
over the commended, 74. Commendation and service, 74. Land-loans
and services, 75. The man’s consuetudines, 76. Nature of
consuetudines, 78. Justiciary consuetudines, 78.
§ 5. Sake and Soke, pp. 80–107.
of serfdom, 27. Predial element in serfdom, 28. The serf and criminal
law, 29. Serf and villein, 30. The serf of the Leges, 30. Return to the
servus of Domesday, 33. Disappearance of servus, 35.
§ 3. The Villeins, pp. 36–66.
The boors or coliberts, 36. The continental colibert, 37. The English
boor, 37. Villani, bordarii, cotarii, 38. The villein’s tenement, 40.
Villeins and cottiers, 41. Freedom and unfreedom of the villani, 41.
Meaning of freedom, 42. The villein as free, 43. The villein as unfree,
45. Anglo-Saxon free-holding, 46. Free-holding and seignorial rights,
47. The scale of free-holding, 49. Free land and immunity, 50.
Unfreedom of the villein, 50. Right of recapture, 50. Rarity of flight,
51. The villein and seignorial justice, 52. The villein and national
justice, 52. The villein and his land, 53. The villein’s land and the
geld, 54. The villein’s services, 56. The villein’s rent, 57. The English
for villanus, 58. Summary of the villein’s position, 60. Depression of
the peasants, 61. The Normans and the rustics, 61. Depression of the
sokemen, 63. The peasants on the royal demesne, 65.
§ 4. The Sokemen, pp. 66–79.
Sochemanni and liberi homines, 66. Lord and man, 67. Bonds
between lord and man, 67. Commendation, 69. Commendation and
protection, 70. Commendation and warranty, 71. Commendation and
tenure, 71. The lord’s interest in commendation, 72. The seignory
over the commended, 74. Commendation and service, 74. Land-loans
and services, 75. The man’s consuetudines, 76. Nature of
consuetudines, 78. Justiciary consuetudines, 78.
§ 5. Sake and Soke, pp. 80–107.
Page 14
Sake and soke, 80. Private jurisdiction in the Leges, 80. Soke in the
Leges Henrici, 81. Kinds of soke in the Leges, 82. The Norman kings
and private justice, 83. Sake and soke in Domesday, 84. Meaning of
soke, 84. Meaning of sake, 84. Soke as jurisdiction, 86. Seignorial
justice before the Conquest, 87. Soke as a regality, 89. Soke over
villeins, 90. Private soke and hundredal soke, 91. Hundredal and
manorial soke, 92. The seignorial court, 94. Soke and the earl’s third
penny, 95. Soke and house-peace, 97. Soke over houses, 99. Vendible
soke, 100. Soke and mund, 100. Justice and jurisdiction, 102. Soke
and commendation, 103. Sokemen and ‘free men,’ 104. Holdings of
the sokemen, 106.
§ 6. The Manor, pp. 107–128.
What is a manor? 107. Manerium a technical term, 107. Manor and
hall, 109. Difference between manor and hall, 110. Size of the
maneria, 110. A large manor, 111. Enormous manors—Leominster,
Berkeley, Tewkesbury, Taunton, 112. Large manors in the Midlands,
114. Townhouses and berewicks attached to manors, 114. Manor and
soke, 115. Minute manors in the west, 116. Minute manors in the east,
117. The manor as a peasant’s holding, 118. Definition of a manor,
119. The manor and the geld, 120. Classification of men for the geld,
122. Proofs of connexion of the manor with the geld, 122. Land gelds
in a manor, 124. Geld and hall, 124. The lord and the man’s taxes,
125. Distinction between villeins and sokemen, 125. The lord’s
subsidiary liability, 126. Manors distributed to the Frenchmen, 127.
Summary, 128.
§ 7. Manor and Vill, pp. 129–150.
Manorial and non-manorial vills, 129. The vill of Orwell, 129. The
Wetherley hundred of Cambridgeshire, 131. The Wetherley sokemen,
134. The sokemen and seignorial justice, 135. Changes in the
Wetherley hundred, 135. Manorialism in Cambridgeshire, 136. The
Leges Henrici, 81. Kinds of soke in the Leges, 82. The Norman kings
and private justice, 83. Sake and soke in Domesday, 84. Meaning of
soke, 84. Meaning of sake, 84. Soke as jurisdiction, 86. Seignorial
justice before the Conquest, 87. Soke as a regality, 89. Soke over
villeins, 90. Private soke and hundredal soke, 91. Hundredal and
manorial soke, 92. The seignorial court, 94. Soke and the earl’s third
penny, 95. Soke and house-peace, 97. Soke over houses, 99. Vendible
soke, 100. Soke and mund, 100. Justice and jurisdiction, 102. Soke
and commendation, 103. Sokemen and ‘free men,’ 104. Holdings of
the sokemen, 106.
§ 6. The Manor, pp. 107–128.
What is a manor? 107. Manerium a technical term, 107. Manor and
hall, 109. Difference between manor and hall, 110. Size of the
maneria, 110. A large manor, 111. Enormous manors—Leominster,
Berkeley, Tewkesbury, Taunton, 112. Large manors in the Midlands,
114. Townhouses and berewicks attached to manors, 114. Manor and
soke, 115. Minute manors in the west, 116. Minute manors in the east,
117. The manor as a peasant’s holding, 118. Definition of a manor,
119. The manor and the geld, 120. Classification of men for the geld,
122. Proofs of connexion of the manor with the geld, 122. Land gelds
in a manor, 124. Geld and hall, 124. The lord and the man’s taxes,
125. Distinction between villeins and sokemen, 125. The lord’s
subsidiary liability, 126. Manors distributed to the Frenchmen, 127.
Summary, 128.
§ 7. Manor and Vill, pp. 129–150.
Manorial and non-manorial vills, 129. The vill of Orwell, 129. The
Wetherley hundred of Cambridgeshire, 131. The Wetherley sokemen,
134. The sokemen and seignorial justice, 135. Changes in the
Wetherley hundred, 135. Manorialism in Cambridgeshire, 136. The
Page 15
sokemen and the manors, 137. Hertfordshire sokemen, 138. The small
maneria, 138. The Danes and freedom, 139. The Danish counties,
139. The contrast between villeins and sokemen, 140. Free villages,
141. Village communities, 142. The villagers as co-owners, 142. The
waste land of the vill, 143. Co-ownership of mills and churches, 144.
The system of virgates in a free village, 144. The virgates and
inheritance, 145. The farm of the vill, 146. Round sums raised from
the villages, 147. The township and police law, 147. The free village
and Norman government, 149. Organization of the free village, 149.
§ 8. The Feudal Superstructure, pp. 150–172.
The higher ranks of men, 150. Dependent tenure, 151. Feudum, 152.
Alodium, 153. Application of the formula of dependent tenure, 154.
Military tenure, 156. The army and the land, 157. Feudalism and
army service, 158. Punishment for default of service, 159. The new
military service, 160. The thegns, 161. Nature of thegnship, 163. The
thegns of Domesday, 165. Greater and lesser thegns, 165. The great
lords, 166. The king as landlord, 166. The ancient demesne, 167. The
comital manors, 168. Private rights and governmental revenues, 168.
The English state, 170.
§ 9. The Boroughs, pp. 172–219.
Borough and village, 172. The borough in century xiii., 173. The
number of the boroughs, 173. The aid-paying boroughs of century xii,
174. List of aids, 175. The boroughs in Domesday, 176. The borough
as a county town, 178. The borough on no man’s land, 178.
Heterogeneous tenures in the boroughs, 179. Burgages attached to
rural manors, 180. The burgess and the rural manor, 181. Tenure of
the borough and tenure of land within the borough, 181. The king and
other landlords, 182.
The oldest burh, 183. The king’s burh, 184. The special peace of the
burh, 184. The town and the burh, 185. The building of boroughs,
maneria, 138. The Danes and freedom, 139. The Danish counties,
139. The contrast between villeins and sokemen, 140. Free villages,
141. Village communities, 142. The villagers as co-owners, 142. The
waste land of the vill, 143. Co-ownership of mills and churches, 144.
The system of virgates in a free village, 144. The virgates and
inheritance, 145. The farm of the vill, 146. Round sums raised from
the villages, 147. The township and police law, 147. The free village
and Norman government, 149. Organization of the free village, 149.
§ 8. The Feudal Superstructure, pp. 150–172.
The higher ranks of men, 150. Dependent tenure, 151. Feudum, 152.
Alodium, 153. Application of the formula of dependent tenure, 154.
Military tenure, 156. The army and the land, 157. Feudalism and
army service, 158. Punishment for default of service, 159. The new
military service, 160. The thegns, 161. Nature of thegnship, 163. The
thegns of Domesday, 165. Greater and lesser thegns, 165. The great
lords, 166. The king as landlord, 166. The ancient demesne, 167. The
comital manors, 168. Private rights and governmental revenues, 168.
The English state, 170.
§ 9. The Boroughs, pp. 172–219.
Borough and village, 172. The borough in century xiii., 173. The
number of the boroughs, 173. The aid-paying boroughs of century xii,
174. List of aids, 175. The boroughs in Domesday, 176. The borough
as a county town, 178. The borough on no man’s land, 178.
Heterogeneous tenures in the boroughs, 179. Burgages attached to
rural manors, 180. The burgess and the rural manor, 181. Tenure of
the borough and tenure of land within the borough, 181. The king and
other landlords, 182.
The oldest burh, 183. The king’s burh, 184. The special peace of the
burh, 184. The town and the burh, 185. The building of boroughs,
Page 16
186. The shire and its borough, 186. Military geography, 187. The
Burghal Hidage, 187. The shire’s wall-work, 188. Henry the Fowler
and the German burgs, 189. The shire thegns and their borough
houses, 189. The knights in the borough, 190. Burh-bót and castle-
guard, 191.
Borough and market, 192. Establishment of markets, 193. Moneyers
in the burh, 195. Burh and port, 195. Military and commercial
elements in the borough, 196. The borough and agriculture, 196.
Burgesses as cultivators, 197. Burgage tenure, 198. Eastern and
western boroughs, 199. Common property of the burgesses, 200. The
community as landholders, 200. Rights of common, 202. Absence of
communalism in the borough, 202. The borough community and its
lord, 203. The farm of the borough, 204. The sheriff and the farm of
the borough, 205. The community and the geld, 206. Partition of
taxes, 207. No corporation farming the borough, 208. Borough and
county organization, 209. Government of the boroughs, 209. The
borough court, 210. The law-men, 211. Definition of the borough,
212. Mediatized boroughs, 212. Boroughs on the king’s land and
other boroughs, 215. Attributes of the borough, 216. Classification of
the boroughs, 217. National element in the boroughs, 219.
ESSAY II.
England before the Conquest.
Object of this essay, 220. Fundamental controversies over Anglo-
Saxon history, 221. The Romanesque theory unacceptable, 222.
Feudalism as a normal stage, 223. Feudalism as progress and
retrogress, 224. Progress and retrogress in the history of legal ideas,
224. The contact of barbarism and civilization, 225. Our materials,
226.
§ 1. Book-land and the Land-book, pp. 226–244.
Burghal Hidage, 187. The shire’s wall-work, 188. Henry the Fowler
and the German burgs, 189. The shire thegns and their borough
houses, 189. The knights in the borough, 190. Burh-bót and castle-
guard, 191.
Borough and market, 192. Establishment of markets, 193. Moneyers
in the burh, 195. Burh and port, 195. Military and commercial
elements in the borough, 196. The borough and agriculture, 196.
Burgesses as cultivators, 197. Burgage tenure, 198. Eastern and
western boroughs, 199. Common property of the burgesses, 200. The
community as landholders, 200. Rights of common, 202. Absence of
communalism in the borough, 202. The borough community and its
lord, 203. The farm of the borough, 204. The sheriff and the farm of
the borough, 205. The community and the geld, 206. Partition of
taxes, 207. No corporation farming the borough, 208. Borough and
county organization, 209. Government of the boroughs, 209. The
borough court, 210. The law-men, 211. Definition of the borough,
212. Mediatized boroughs, 212. Boroughs on the king’s land and
other boroughs, 215. Attributes of the borough, 216. Classification of
the boroughs, 217. National element in the boroughs, 219.
ESSAY II.
England before the Conquest.
Object of this essay, 220. Fundamental controversies over Anglo-
Saxon history, 221. The Romanesque theory unacceptable, 222.
Feudalism as a normal stage, 223. Feudalism as progress and
retrogress, 224. Progress and retrogress in the history of legal ideas,
224. The contact of barbarism and civilization, 225. Our materials,
226.
§ 1. Book-land and the Land-book, pp. 226–244.
Page 17
The lands of the churches, 226. How the churches acquired their
lands, 227. The earliest land-books, 229. Exotic character of the book,
230. The book purports to convey ownership, 230. The book conveys
a superiority, 231. A modern analogy, 232. Conveyance of
superiorities in early times, 233. What had the king to give? 234. The
king’s alienable rights, 234. Royal rights in land, 235. The king’s
feorm, 236. Nature of the feorm, 237. Tribute and rent, 239. Mixture
of ownership and superiority, 240. Growth of the seignory, 241.
Book-land and church-right, 242. Book-land and testament, 243.
§ 2. Book-land and Folk-land, pp. 244–258.
What is folk-land? 244. Folk-land in the laws, 244. Folk-land in the
charters, 245. Land booked by the king to himself, 246. The consent
of the witan, 247. Consent and witness in the land-books, 247.
Attestation of the earliest books, 248, Confirmation and attestation,
250. Function of the witan, 251. The king and the people’s land, 252.
King’s land and crown land, 253. Fate of the king’s land on his death,
253. The new king and the old king’s heir, 254. Immunity of the
ancient demesne, 255. Rights of individuals in national land, 255. The
alod, 256. Book-land and privilege, 257. Kinds of land and kinds of
right, 257.
§ 3. Sake and Soke, pp. 258–292.
Importance of seignorial justice, 258. Theory of the modern origin of
seignorial justice, 258. Sake and soke in the Norman age, 259. The
Confessor’s writs, 259. Cnut’s writs, 260. Cnut’s law, 261. The book
and the writ, 261. Diplomatics, 262. The Anglo-Saxon writ, 264. Sake
and soke appear when writs appear, 265. Traditional evidence of sake
and soke, 267. Altitonantis, 268. Criticism of the earlier books, 269.
The clause of immunity, 270. Dissection of the words of immunity,
272. The trinoda necessitas, 273. The ángild, 274. The right to wites
and the right to a court, 275. The Taunton book, 276. The immunists
lands, 227. The earliest land-books, 229. Exotic character of the book,
230. The book purports to convey ownership, 230. The book conveys
a superiority, 231. A modern analogy, 232. Conveyance of
superiorities in early times, 233. What had the king to give? 234. The
king’s alienable rights, 234. Royal rights in land, 235. The king’s
feorm, 236. Nature of the feorm, 237. Tribute and rent, 239. Mixture
of ownership and superiority, 240. Growth of the seignory, 241.
Book-land and church-right, 242. Book-land and testament, 243.
§ 2. Book-land and Folk-land, pp. 244–258.
What is folk-land? 244. Folk-land in the laws, 244. Folk-land in the
charters, 245. Land booked by the king to himself, 246. The consent
of the witan, 247. Consent and witness in the land-books, 247.
Attestation of the earliest books, 248, Confirmation and attestation,
250. Function of the witan, 251. The king and the people’s land, 252.
King’s land and crown land, 253. Fate of the king’s land on his death,
253. The new king and the old king’s heir, 254. Immunity of the
ancient demesne, 255. Rights of individuals in national land, 255. The
alod, 256. Book-land and privilege, 257. Kinds of land and kinds of
right, 257.
§ 3. Sake and Soke, pp. 258–292.
Importance of seignorial justice, 258. Theory of the modern origin of
seignorial justice, 258. Sake and soke in the Norman age, 259. The
Confessor’s writs, 259. Cnut’s writs, 260. Cnut’s law, 261. The book
and the writ, 261. Diplomatics, 262. The Anglo-Saxon writ, 264. Sake
and soke appear when writs appear, 265. Traditional evidence of sake
and soke, 267. Altitonantis, 268. Criticism of the earlier books, 269.
The clause of immunity, 270. Dissection of the words of immunity,
272. The trinoda necessitas, 273. The ángild, 274. The right to wites
and the right to a court, 275. The Taunton book, 276. The immunists
Page 18
and the wite, 277. Justice and jurisdiction, 277. The Frankish
immunity, 278. Seignorial and ecclesiastical jurisdiction, 279.
Criminal justice of the church, 281. Antiquity of seignorial courts,
282. Justice, vassalage and tenure, 283. The lord and the accused
vassal, 284. The state, the lord and the vassal, 285. The landríca as
immunist, 286. The immunist’s rights over free men, 288. Sub-
delegation of justiciary rights, 289. Number of the immunists, 289.
Note: The Ángild Clause, 290.
§ 4. Book-land and Loan-land, pp. 293–318.
The book and the gift, 293. Book-land and service, 294. Military
service, 295. Escheat of book-land, 295. Alienation of book-land, 297.
The heriot and the testament, 298. The gift and the loan, 299. The
precarium, 300. The English land-loan, 301. Loans of church land to
the great, 302. The consideration for the loan, 303. St. Oswald’s loans,
303. Oswald’s letter to Edgar, 304. Feudalism in Oswald’s law, 307.
Oswald’s riding-men, 308. Heritable loans, 309. Wardship and
marriage, 310. Seignorial jurisdiction, 310. Oswald’s law and
England at large, 311. Inferences from Oswald’s loans, 312.
Economic position of Oswald’s tenants, 312. Loan-land and book-
land, 313. Book-land in the dooms, 314. Royal and other books, 315.
The gift and the loan, 317. Dependent tenure, 317.
§ 5. The Growth of Seignorial Power, pp. 318–340.
Subjection of free men, 318. The royal grantee and the land, 318.
Provender rents and the manorial economy, 319. The church and the
peasants, 320. Growth of the manorial system, 321. Church-scot and
tithes, 321. Jurisdictional rights of the lord, 322. The lord and the
man’s taxes, 323. Depression of the free ceorl, 324. The slaves, 325.
Growth of manors from below, 325.
Theories which connect the manor with the Roman villa, 326. The
Rectitudines, 327. Discussion of the Rectitudines, 328. The Tidenham
immunity, 278. Seignorial and ecclesiastical jurisdiction, 279.
Criminal justice of the church, 281. Antiquity of seignorial courts,
282. Justice, vassalage and tenure, 283. The lord and the accused
vassal, 284. The state, the lord and the vassal, 285. The landríca as
immunist, 286. The immunist’s rights over free men, 288. Sub-
delegation of justiciary rights, 289. Number of the immunists, 289.
Note: The Ángild Clause, 290.
§ 4. Book-land and Loan-land, pp. 293–318.
The book and the gift, 293. Book-land and service, 294. Military
service, 295. Escheat of book-land, 295. Alienation of book-land, 297.
The heriot and the testament, 298. The gift and the loan, 299. The
precarium, 300. The English land-loan, 301. Loans of church land to
the great, 302. The consideration for the loan, 303. St. Oswald’s loans,
303. Oswald’s letter to Edgar, 304. Feudalism in Oswald’s law, 307.
Oswald’s riding-men, 308. Heritable loans, 309. Wardship and
marriage, 310. Seignorial jurisdiction, 310. Oswald’s law and
England at large, 311. Inferences from Oswald’s loans, 312.
Economic position of Oswald’s tenants, 312. Loan-land and book-
land, 313. Book-land in the dooms, 314. Royal and other books, 315.
The gift and the loan, 317. Dependent tenure, 317.
§ 5. The Growth of Seignorial Power, pp. 318–340.
Subjection of free men, 318. The royal grantee and the land, 318.
Provender rents and the manorial economy, 319. The church and the
peasants, 320. Growth of the manorial system, 321. Church-scot and
tithes, 321. Jurisdictional rights of the lord, 322. The lord and the
man’s taxes, 323. Depression of the free ceorl, 324. The slaves, 325.
Growth of manors from below, 325.
Theories which connect the manor with the Roman villa, 326. The
Rectitudines, 327. Discussion of the Rectitudines, 328. The Tidenham
Page 19
case, 329. The Stoke case, 330. Inferences from these cases, 332. The
villa and the vicus, 333. Manors in the land-books, 334. The mansus
and the manens, 335. The hide, 336. The strip-holding and the villa,
337. The lord and the strips, 338. The ceorl and the slave, 339. The
condition of the Danelaw, 339.
§ 6. The Village Community, pp. 340–356.
Free villages, 340. Ownership by communities and ownership by
individuals, 341. Co-ownership and ownership by corporations, 341.
Ownership and governmental power, 342. Ownership and subordinate
governmental power, 343. Evolution of sovereignty and ownership,
343. Communal ownership as a stage, 344. The theory of normal
stages, 345.
Was land owned by village communities? 346. Meadows, pastures
and woods, 348. The bond between neighbours, 349. Feebleness of
village communalism, 349. Absence of organization, 350. The
German village on conquered soil, 351. Development of kingly
power, 351. The free village in England, 352. The village meeting,
353. What might have become of the free village, 353. Mark
communities, 354. Intercommoning between vills, 355. Last words,
356.
ESSAY III.
The Hide.
What was the hide? 357. Importance of the question, 357. Hide and
manse in Bede, 358. Hide and manse in the land-books, 358. The
large hide and the manorial arrangement, 360. Our course, 361.
§ 1. Measures and Fields, pp. 362–399.
villa and the vicus, 333. Manors in the land-books, 334. The mansus
and the manens, 335. The hide, 336. The strip-holding and the villa,
337. The lord and the strips, 338. The ceorl and the slave, 339. The
condition of the Danelaw, 339.
§ 6. The Village Community, pp. 340–356.
Free villages, 340. Ownership by communities and ownership by
individuals, 341. Co-ownership and ownership by corporations, 341.
Ownership and governmental power, 342. Ownership and subordinate
governmental power, 343. Evolution of sovereignty and ownership,
343. Communal ownership as a stage, 344. The theory of normal
stages, 345.
Was land owned by village communities? 346. Meadows, pastures
and woods, 348. The bond between neighbours, 349. Feebleness of
village communalism, 349. Absence of organization, 350. The
German village on conquered soil, 351. Development of kingly
power, 351. The free village in England, 352. The village meeting,
353. What might have become of the free village, 353. Mark
communities, 354. Intercommoning between vills, 355. Last words,
356.
ESSAY III.
The Hide.
What was the hide? 357. Importance of the question, 357. Hide and
manse in Bede, 358. Hide and manse in the land-books, 358. The
large hide and the manorial arrangement, 360. Our course, 361.
§ 1. Measures and Fields, pp. 362–399.
Page 20
Permanence and change in agrarian history, 362. Rapidity of change
in old times, 363. Devastation of villages, 363. Village colonies, 365.
Change of field systems, 365. Differences between different shires,
366. New and old villages, 367.
History of land measures, 368. Growth of uniform measures, 369.
Superficial measure, 370. The ancient elements of land measure, 372.
The German acre, 373. English acres, 373. Small and large acres, 374.
Anglo-Saxon rods and acres, 375. Customary acres and forest acres,
376. The acre and the day’s work, 377. The real acres in the fields,
379. The culturae or shots, 379. Delimitation of shots, 380. Real and
ideal acres, 381. Irregular length of acres, 383. The seliones or beds,
383. Acres divided lengthwise, 384. The virgate, 385. Yard and yard-
land, 385. The virgate a fraction of the hide, 385. The yard-land in
laws and charters, 386.
The hide as a measure, 387. The hide as a measure of arable, 388. The
hide of 120 acres, 389. Real and fiscal hides, 389. Causes of
divergence of fiscal from real hides, 390. Effects of the divergence,
392. Acreage of the hide in later days, 393. The carucate and bovate,
395. The ox-gang, 396. The fiscal carucate, 396. Acreage tilled by a
plough, 397. Walter of Henley’s programme of ploughing, 398.
§ 2. Domesday Statistics, pp. 399–490.
Statistical Tables, 400–403.
Domesday’s three statements, 399. Northern formulas, 404. Southern
formulas, 405. Kentish formulas, 406. Relation between the three
statements, 406. Introduction of statistics, 407. Explanation of
statistics, 407. Acreage, 407. Population, 408. Danegeld, 408. Hides,
carucates, sulungs, 408. Reduced hidage, 410. The teamlands, 410.
The teams, 411. The values, 411. The table of ratios, 411.
Imperfection of statistics, 412. Constancy of ratios, 413.
in old times, 363. Devastation of villages, 363. Village colonies, 365.
Change of field systems, 365. Differences between different shires,
366. New and old villages, 367.
History of land measures, 368. Growth of uniform measures, 369.
Superficial measure, 370. The ancient elements of land measure, 372.
The German acre, 373. English acres, 373. Small and large acres, 374.
Anglo-Saxon rods and acres, 375. Customary acres and forest acres,
376. The acre and the day’s work, 377. The real acres in the fields,
379. The culturae or shots, 379. Delimitation of shots, 380. Real and
ideal acres, 381. Irregular length of acres, 383. The seliones or beds,
383. Acres divided lengthwise, 384. The virgate, 385. Yard and yard-
land, 385. The virgate a fraction of the hide, 385. The yard-land in
laws and charters, 386.
The hide as a measure, 387. The hide as a measure of arable, 388. The
hide of 120 acres, 389. Real and fiscal hides, 389. Causes of
divergence of fiscal from real hides, 390. Effects of the divergence,
392. Acreage of the hide in later days, 393. The carucate and bovate,
395. The ox-gang, 396. The fiscal carucate, 396. Acreage tilled by a
plough, 397. Walter of Henley’s programme of ploughing, 398.
§ 2. Domesday Statistics, pp. 399–490.
Statistical Tables, 400–403.
Domesday’s three statements, 399. Northern formulas, 404. Southern
formulas, 405. Kentish formulas, 406. Relation between the three
statements, 406. Introduction of statistics, 407. Explanation of
statistics, 407. Acreage, 407. Population, 408. Danegeld, 408. Hides,
carucates, sulungs, 408. Reduced hidage, 410. The teamlands, 410.
The teams, 411. The values, 411. The table of ratios, 411.
Imperfection of statistics, 412. Constancy of ratios, 413.
Page 21
The team, 413. Variability of the caruca, 414. Constancy of the
caruca, 414. The villein’s teams, 415. The villein’s oxen, 416. Light
and heavy ploughs, 417. The team of Domesday and other
documents, 417.
The teamland, 418. Fractional parts of the teamland, 418. Land for
oxen and wood for swine, 419. The teamland no areal unit, 419. The
teamlands of Great and the teams of Little Domesday, 420. The
Leicestershire formulas, 420. Origin of the inquiry touching the
teamlands, 421. Modification of the inquiry, 423. The potential teams,
423. Normal relation between teams and teamlands, 424. The land of
deficient teams, 425. Actual and potential teamlands, 426. The land of
excessive teams, 427. Digression to East Anglia, 429. The teamland
no areal measure, 431. Eyton’s theory, 431. Domesday’s lineal
measure, 432. Measured teamlands, 433.
Amount of arable in England, 435. Decrease of arable, 436. The food
problem, 436. What was the population? 436. What was the field-
system? 437. What was the acre’s yield? 437. Consumption of beer,
438. The Englishman’s diet, 440. Is the arable superabundant? 441.
Amount of pasturage, 441. Area of the villages, 443. Produce and
value, 444. Varying size of acres, 445. The teamland in
Cambridgeshire, 445.
The hides of Domesday, 446. Relation between hides and teamlands,
447. Unhidated estates, 448. Beneficial hidation, 448. Effect of
privilege, 449. Divergence of hide from teamland, 450. Partition of
the geld, 451. Distribution of hides among counties and hundreds,
451. The hidage of Worcestershire, 451. The County Hidage, 455. Its
date, 456. The Northamptonshire Geld Roll, 457. Credibility of The
County Hidage, 458. Reductions of hidage, 458. The county quotas,
459. The hundred and the hundred hides, 459. Comparison of
Domesday hidage with Pipe Rolls, 460. Under-rated and over-rated
counties, 461. Hidage and value, 462. One pound, one hide, 465.
Equivalence of pound and hide, 465. Cases of under-taxation, 466.
Kent, 466. Devon and Cornwall, 467. Cases of over-taxation, 468.
Leicestershire, 468. Yorkshire, 469. Equity and hidage, 470.
Distribution of hides and of teamlands, 471. Area and value as
caruca, 414. The villein’s teams, 415. The villein’s oxen, 416. Light
and heavy ploughs, 417. The team of Domesday and other
documents, 417.
The teamland, 418. Fractional parts of the teamland, 418. Land for
oxen and wood for swine, 419. The teamland no areal unit, 419. The
teamlands of Great and the teams of Little Domesday, 420. The
Leicestershire formulas, 420. Origin of the inquiry touching the
teamlands, 421. Modification of the inquiry, 423. The potential teams,
423. Normal relation between teams and teamlands, 424. The land of
deficient teams, 425. Actual and potential teamlands, 426. The land of
excessive teams, 427. Digression to East Anglia, 429. The teamland
no areal measure, 431. Eyton’s theory, 431. Domesday’s lineal
measure, 432. Measured teamlands, 433.
Amount of arable in England, 435. Decrease of arable, 436. The food
problem, 436. What was the population? 436. What was the field-
system? 437. What was the acre’s yield? 437. Consumption of beer,
438. The Englishman’s diet, 440. Is the arable superabundant? 441.
Amount of pasturage, 441. Area of the villages, 443. Produce and
value, 444. Varying size of acres, 445. The teamland in
Cambridgeshire, 445.
The hides of Domesday, 446. Relation between hides and teamlands,
447. Unhidated estates, 448. Beneficial hidation, 448. Effect of
privilege, 449. Divergence of hide from teamland, 450. Partition of
the geld, 451. Distribution of hides among counties and hundreds,
451. The hidage of Worcestershire, 451. The County Hidage, 455. Its
date, 456. The Northamptonshire Geld Roll, 457. Credibility of The
County Hidage, 458. Reductions of hidage, 458. The county quotas,
459. The hundred and the hundred hides, 459. Comparison of
Domesday hidage with Pipe Rolls, 460. Under-rated and over-rated
counties, 461. Hidage and value, 462. One pound, one hide, 465.
Equivalence of pound and hide, 465. Cases of under-taxation, 466.
Kent, 466. Devon and Cornwall, 467. Cases of over-taxation, 468.
Leicestershire, 468. Yorkshire, 469. Equity and hidage, 470.
Distribution of hides and of teamlands, 471. Area and value as
Page 22
elements of geldability, 472. The equitable teamland, 473. Artificial
valets, 473. The new assessments of Henry II., 473.
Acreage of the fiscal hide, 475. Equation between hide and acres,
475. The hide of 120 acres, 476. Evidence from Cambridgeshire, 476.
Evidence from the Isle of Ely, 476. Evidence from Middlesex, 477.
Meaning of the Middlesex entries, 478. Evidence in the Geld
Inquests, 478. Result of the evidence, 480. Evidence from Essex, 480.
Acreage of the fiscal carucate, 483. Acreage of the fiscal sulung, 484.
Kemble’s theory, 485. The ploughland and the plough, 486. The
Yorkshire carucates, 487. Relation between teamlands and fiscal
carucates, 487. The fiscal hide of 120 acres, 489. Antiquity of the
large hide, 489.
§ 3. Beyond Domesday, pp, 490–520.
The hide beyond Domesday, 490. Arguments in favour of small hides,
490. Continuity of the hide in the land-books, 491. Examples from
charters of Chertsey, 492. Examples from charters of Malmesbury,
492. Permanence of the hidation, 493. Gifts of villages, 494. Gifts of
manses in villages, 495. The largest gifts, 496. The Winchester estate
at Chilcombe, 496. The Winchester estates at Downton and Taunton,
498. Kemble and the Taunton estate, 499. Difficulty of identifying
parcels, 500. The numerous hides in ancient documents, 501. The
Burghal Hidage, 502. The Tribal Hidage, 506. Bede’s hidage, 508.
Bede and the land-books, 509. Gradual reduction of hidage, 510.
Over-estimates of hidage, 510. Size of Bede’s hide, 511. Evidence
from Iona, 512. Evidence from Selsey, 513. Conclusion in favour of
the large hide, 515. Continental analogies, 515. The German Hufe,
515. The Königshufe, 516. The large hide on the continent, 517. The
large hide not too large, 518. The large hide and the manor, 519. Last
words, 520.
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.
valets, 473. The new assessments of Henry II., 473.
Acreage of the fiscal hide, 475. Equation between hide and acres,
475. The hide of 120 acres, 476. Evidence from Cambridgeshire, 476.
Evidence from the Isle of Ely, 476. Evidence from Middlesex, 477.
Meaning of the Middlesex entries, 478. Evidence in the Geld
Inquests, 478. Result of the evidence, 480. Evidence from Essex, 480.
Acreage of the fiscal carucate, 483. Acreage of the fiscal sulung, 484.
Kemble’s theory, 485. The ploughland and the plough, 486. The
Yorkshire carucates, 487. Relation between teamlands and fiscal
carucates, 487. The fiscal hide of 120 acres, 489. Antiquity of the
large hide, 489.
§ 3. Beyond Domesday, pp, 490–520.
The hide beyond Domesday, 490. Arguments in favour of small hides,
490. Continuity of the hide in the land-books, 491. Examples from
charters of Chertsey, 492. Examples from charters of Malmesbury,
492. Permanence of the hidation, 493. Gifts of villages, 494. Gifts of
manses in villages, 495. The largest gifts, 496. The Winchester estate
at Chilcombe, 496. The Winchester estates at Downton and Taunton,
498. Kemble and the Taunton estate, 499. Difficulty of identifying
parcels, 500. The numerous hides in ancient documents, 501. The
Burghal Hidage, 502. The Tribal Hidage, 506. Bede’s hidage, 508.
Bede and the land-books, 509. Gradual reduction of hidage, 510.
Over-estimates of hidage, 510. Size of Bede’s hide, 511. Evidence
from Iona, 512. Evidence from Selsey, 513. Conclusion in favour of
the large hide, 515. Continental analogies, 515. The German Hufe,
515. The Königshufe, 516. The large hide on the continent, 517. The
large hide not too large, 518. The large hide and the manor, 519. Last
words, 520.
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.
Page 23
B. = Birch, Cartularium Saxonicum, London, 1885–7–93.
D. B. = Domesday Book.
E. = Earle, Land Charters, Oxford, 1888.
E. H. R. = English Historical Review.
H. & S. = Haddan and Stubbs, Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents, vol.
iii, Oxford, 1871.
K. = Kemble, Codex Diplomaticus Ævi Saxonici, London, 1839–48.
T. = Thorpe, Diplomatarium Anglicanum, London, 1865.
ADDENDUM.
p. 347, note 794. Instances of the periodic reallotment of the whole land
of a vill, exclusive of houses and crofts, seem to have been not unknown
in the north of England. Here the reallotment is found in connexion with
a husbandry which knows no permanent severance of the arable from the
grass-land, but from time to time ploughs up a tract and after a while
allows it to become grass-land once more. See F. W. Dendy, The Ancient
Farms of Northumberland, Archaeologia Aeliana, Vol. xvi. I have to
thank Mr Edward Bateson for a reference to this paper.
D. B. = Domesday Book.
E. = Earle, Land Charters, Oxford, 1888.
E. H. R. = English Historical Review.
H. & S. = Haddan and Stubbs, Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents, vol.
iii, Oxford, 1871.
K. = Kemble, Codex Diplomaticus Ævi Saxonici, London, 1839–48.
T. = Thorpe, Diplomatarium Anglicanum, London, 1865.
ADDENDUM.
p. 347, note 794. Instances of the periodic reallotment of the whole land
of a vill, exclusive of houses and crofts, seem to have been not unknown
in the north of England. Here the reallotment is found in connexion with
a husbandry which knows no permanent severance of the arable from the
grass-land, but from time to time ploughs up a tract and after a while
allows it to become grass-land once more. See F. W. Dendy, The Ancient
Farms of Northumberland, Archaeologia Aeliana, Vol. xvi. I have to
thank Mr Edward Bateson for a reference to this paper.
Page 24
Page 25
ESSAY I.
DOMESDAY BOOK.
At midwinter in the year 1085 William the
Domesday Book and its
Conqueror wore his crown at Gloucester and there satellites.
he had deep speech with his wise men. The outcome
of that speech was the mission throughout all
England of ‘barons,’ ‘legates’ or ‘justices’ charged with the duty of
collecting from the verdicts of the shires, the hundreds and the vills a
descriptio of his new realm. The outcome of that mission was the descriptio
preserved for us in two manuscript volumes, which within a century after
their making had already acquired the name of Domesday Book. The
second of those volumes, sometimes known as Little Domesday, deals with
but three counties, namely Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk, while the first
volume comprehends the rest of England. Along with these we must place
certain other documents that are closely connected with the grand inquest.
We have in the so-called Inquisitio Comitatus Cantabrigiae, a copy, an
imperfect copy, of the verdicts delivered by the Cambridgeshire jurors, and
this, as we shall hereafter see, is a document of the highest value, even
though in some details it is not always very trustworthy[2]. We have in the
so-called Inquisitio Eliensis an account of the estates of the Abbey of Ely in
Cambridgeshire, Suffolk and other counties, an account which has as its
ultimate source the verdicts of the juries and which contains some
particulars which were omitted from Domesday Book[3]. We have in the so-
called Exon Domesday an account of Cornwall and Devonshire and of
certain lands in Somerset, Dorset and Wiltshire; this also seems to have
been constructed directly or indirectly out of the verdicts delivered in those
counties, and it contains certain particulars about the amount of stock upon
the various estates which are omitted from what, for distinction’s sake, is
sometimes called the Exchequer Domesday[4]. At the beginning of this
Exon Domesday we have certain accounts relating to the payment of a great
geld, seemingly the geld of six shillings on the hide that William levied in
the winter of 1083–4, two years before the deep speech at Gloucester[5].
Lastly, in the Northamptonshire Geld Roll[6] we have some precious
DOMESDAY BOOK.
At midwinter in the year 1085 William the
Domesday Book and its
Conqueror wore his crown at Gloucester and there satellites.
he had deep speech with his wise men. The outcome
of that speech was the mission throughout all
England of ‘barons,’ ‘legates’ or ‘justices’ charged with the duty of
collecting from the verdicts of the shires, the hundreds and the vills a
descriptio of his new realm. The outcome of that mission was the descriptio
preserved for us in two manuscript volumes, which within a century after
their making had already acquired the name of Domesday Book. The
second of those volumes, sometimes known as Little Domesday, deals with
but three counties, namely Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk, while the first
volume comprehends the rest of England. Along with these we must place
certain other documents that are closely connected with the grand inquest.
We have in the so-called Inquisitio Comitatus Cantabrigiae, a copy, an
imperfect copy, of the verdicts delivered by the Cambridgeshire jurors, and
this, as we shall hereafter see, is a document of the highest value, even
though in some details it is not always very trustworthy[2]. We have in the
so-called Inquisitio Eliensis an account of the estates of the Abbey of Ely in
Cambridgeshire, Suffolk and other counties, an account which has as its
ultimate source the verdicts of the juries and which contains some
particulars which were omitted from Domesday Book[3]. We have in the so-
called Exon Domesday an account of Cornwall and Devonshire and of
certain lands in Somerset, Dorset and Wiltshire; this also seems to have
been constructed directly or indirectly out of the verdicts delivered in those
counties, and it contains certain particulars about the amount of stock upon
the various estates which are omitted from what, for distinction’s sake, is
sometimes called the Exchequer Domesday[4]. At the beginning of this
Exon Domesday we have certain accounts relating to the payment of a great
geld, seemingly the geld of six shillings on the hide that William levied in
the winter of 1083–4, two years before the deep speech at Gloucester[5].
Lastly, in the Northamptonshire Geld Roll[6] we have some precious
Page 26
information about fiscal affairs as they stood some few years before the
survey[7].
Such in brief are the documents out of which, with
Domesday and legal
some small help from the Anglo-Saxon dooms and history.
land-books, from the charters of Norman kings and
from the so-called Leges of the Conqueror, the
Confessor and Henry I., some future historian may be able to reconstruct
the land-law which obtained in the conquered England of 1086, and (for our
records frequently speak of the tempus Regis Edwardi) the unconquered
England of 1065. The reflection that but for the deep speech at Gloucester,
but for the lucky survival of two or three manuscripts, he would have
known next to nothing of that law, will make him modest and cautious. At
the present moment, though much has been done towards forcing
Domesday Book to yield its meaning, some of the legal problems that are
raised by it, especially those which concern the time of King Edward, have
hardly been stated, much less solved. It is with some hope of stating, with
little hope of solving them that we begin this essay. If only we can ask the
right questions we shall have done something for a good end. If English
history is to be understood, the law of Domesday Book must be mastered.
We have here an absolutely unique account of feudalism in two different
stages of its growth, the more trustworthy, though the more puzzling,
because it gives us particulars and not generalities.
Puzzling enough it certainly is, and this for many reasons. Our task may be
the easier if we state some of those reasons at the outset.
To say that Domesday Book is no collection of laws
Domesday a geld book.
or treatise on law would be needless. Very seldom
does it state any rule in general terms, and when it
does so we shall usually find cause for believing that this rule is itself an
exception, a local custom, a provincial privilege. Thus, if we are to come by
general rules, we must obtain them inductively by a comparison of many
thousand particular instances. But further, Domesday Book is no register of
title, no register of all those rights and facts which constitute the system of
land-holdership. One great purpose seems to mould both its form and its
substance; it is a geld-book.
survey[7].
Such in brief are the documents out of which, with
Domesday and legal
some small help from the Anglo-Saxon dooms and history.
land-books, from the charters of Norman kings and
from the so-called Leges of the Conqueror, the
Confessor and Henry I., some future historian may be able to reconstruct
the land-law which obtained in the conquered England of 1086, and (for our
records frequently speak of the tempus Regis Edwardi) the unconquered
England of 1065. The reflection that but for the deep speech at Gloucester,
but for the lucky survival of two or three manuscripts, he would have
known next to nothing of that law, will make him modest and cautious. At
the present moment, though much has been done towards forcing
Domesday Book to yield its meaning, some of the legal problems that are
raised by it, especially those which concern the time of King Edward, have
hardly been stated, much less solved. It is with some hope of stating, with
little hope of solving them that we begin this essay. If only we can ask the
right questions we shall have done something for a good end. If English
history is to be understood, the law of Domesday Book must be mastered.
We have here an absolutely unique account of feudalism in two different
stages of its growth, the more trustworthy, though the more puzzling,
because it gives us particulars and not generalities.
Puzzling enough it certainly is, and this for many reasons. Our task may be
the easier if we state some of those reasons at the outset.
To say that Domesday Book is no collection of laws
Domesday a geld book.
or treatise on law would be needless. Very seldom
does it state any rule in general terms, and when it
does so we shall usually find cause for believing that this rule is itself an
exception, a local custom, a provincial privilege. Thus, if we are to come by
general rules, we must obtain them inductively by a comparison of many
thousand particular instances. But further, Domesday Book is no register of
title, no register of all those rights and facts which constitute the system of
land-holdership. One great purpose seems to mould both its form and its
substance; it is a geld-book.
Page 27
When Duke William became king of the English, he
Danegeld.
found (so he might well think) among the most
valuable of his newly acquired regalia, a right to
levy a land-tax under the name of geld or danegeld. A detailed history of
that tax cannot be written. It is under the year 991 that our English chronicle
first mentions a tribute paid to the Danes[8]; £10,000 was then paid to them.
In 994 the yet larger sum of £16,000[9] was levied. In 1002 the tribute had
risen to £24,000[10], in 1007 to £30,000[11], in 1009 East Kent paid
£3,000[12]; £21,000 was raised in 1014[13]; in 1018 Cnut when newly
crowned took £72,000 besides £11,000 paid by the Londoners[14]; in 1040
Harthacnut took £21,099 besides a sum of £11,048 that was paid for thirty-
two ships[15]. With a Dane upon the throne, this tribute seems to have
become an occasional war-tax. How often it was levied we cannot tell; but
that it was levied more than once by the Confessor is not doubtful[16]. We
are told that he abolished it in or about the year 1051, some eight or nine
years after his accession, some fifteen before his death. No sooner was
William crowned than ‘he laid on men a geld exceeding stiff.’ In the next
year ‘he set a mickle geld’ on the people. In the winter of 1083–4 he raised
a geld of 72 pence (6 Norman shillings) upon the hide. That this tax was
enormously heavy is plain. Taking one case with another, it would seem that
the hide was frequently supposed to be worth about £1 a year and there
were many hides in England that were worth far less. But grievous as was
the tax which immediately preceded the making of the survey, we are not
entitled to infer that it was of unprecedented severity. It brought William but
£415 or thereabouts from Dorset and £510 or thereabouts from
Somerset[17]. Worcestershire was deemed to contain about 1200 hides and
therefore, even if none of its hides had been exempted, it would have
contributed but £360. If the huge sums mentioned by the chronicler had
really been exacted, and that too within the memory of men who were yet
living, William might well regard the right to levy a geld as the most
precious jewel in his English crown. To secure a due and punctual payment
of it was worth a gigantic effort, a survey such as had never been made and
a record such as had never been penned since the grandest days of the old
Roman Empire. But further, the assessment of the geld sadly needed
reform. Owing to one cause and another, owing to privileges and
immunities that had been capriciously granted, owing also, so we think, to a
radically vicious method of computing the geldable areas of counties and
Danegeld.
found (so he might well think) among the most
valuable of his newly acquired regalia, a right to
levy a land-tax under the name of geld or danegeld. A detailed history of
that tax cannot be written. It is under the year 991 that our English chronicle
first mentions a tribute paid to the Danes[8]; £10,000 was then paid to them.
In 994 the yet larger sum of £16,000[9] was levied. In 1002 the tribute had
risen to £24,000[10], in 1007 to £30,000[11], in 1009 East Kent paid
£3,000[12]; £21,000 was raised in 1014[13]; in 1018 Cnut when newly
crowned took £72,000 besides £11,000 paid by the Londoners[14]; in 1040
Harthacnut took £21,099 besides a sum of £11,048 that was paid for thirty-
two ships[15]. With a Dane upon the throne, this tribute seems to have
become an occasional war-tax. How often it was levied we cannot tell; but
that it was levied more than once by the Confessor is not doubtful[16]. We
are told that he abolished it in or about the year 1051, some eight or nine
years after his accession, some fifteen before his death. No sooner was
William crowned than ‘he laid on men a geld exceeding stiff.’ In the next
year ‘he set a mickle geld’ on the people. In the winter of 1083–4 he raised
a geld of 72 pence (6 Norman shillings) upon the hide. That this tax was
enormously heavy is plain. Taking one case with another, it would seem that
the hide was frequently supposed to be worth about £1 a year and there
were many hides in England that were worth far less. But grievous as was
the tax which immediately preceded the making of the survey, we are not
entitled to infer that it was of unprecedented severity. It brought William but
£415 or thereabouts from Dorset and £510 or thereabouts from
Somerset[17]. Worcestershire was deemed to contain about 1200 hides and
therefore, even if none of its hides had been exempted, it would have
contributed but £360. If the huge sums mentioned by the chronicler had
really been exacted, and that too within the memory of men who were yet
living, William might well regard the right to levy a geld as the most
precious jewel in his English crown. To secure a due and punctual payment
of it was worth a gigantic effort, a survey such as had never been made and
a record such as had never been penned since the grandest days of the old
Roman Empire. But further, the assessment of the geld sadly needed
reform. Owing to one cause and another, owing to privileges and
immunities that had been capriciously granted, owing also, so we think, to a
radically vicious method of computing the geldable areas of counties and
Page 28
hundreds, the old assessment was full of anomalies and iniquities. Some
estates were over-rated, others were scandalously under-rated. That William
intended to correct the old assessment, or rather to sweep it away and put a
new assessment in its stead, seems highly probable, though it has not been
proved that either he or his sons accomplished this feat[18]. For this purpose,
however, materials were to be collected which would enable the royal
officers to decide what changes were necessary in order that all England
might be taxed in accordance with a just and uniform plan. Concerning each
estate they were to know the number of geldable units (‘hides’ or
‘carucates’) for which it had answered in King Edward’s day, they were to
know the number of plough oxen that there were upon it, they were to know
its true annual value, they were to know whether that value had been rising
or falling during the past twenty years. Domesday Book has well been
called a rate book, and the task of spelling out a land law from the
particulars that it states is not unlike the task that would lie before any one
who endeavoured to construct our modern law of real property out of rate
books, income tax returns and similar materials. All the lands, all the land-
holders of England may be brought before us, but we are told only of such
facts, such rights, such legal relationships as bear on the actual or potential
payment of geld. True, that some minor purposes may be achieved by the
king’s commissioners, though the quest for geld is their one main object.
About the rents and renders due from his own demesne manors the king
may thus obtain some valuable information. Also he may learn, as it were
by the way, whether any of his barons or other men have presumed to
occupy, to ‘invade,’ lands which he has reserved for himself. Again, if
several persons are in dispute about a tract of ground, the contest may be
appeased by the testimony of shire and hundred, or may be reserved for the
king’s audience; at any rate the existence of an outstanding claim may be
recorded by the royal commissioners. Here and there the peculiar customs
of a shire or a borough will be stated, and incidentally the services that
certain tenants owe to their lords may be noticed. But all this is done
sporadically and unsystematically. Our record is no register of title, it is no
feodary, it is no custumal, it is no rent roll; it is a tax book, a geld book.
We say this, not by way of vain complaint against its
The survey and the geld
meagreness, but because in our belief a care for geld system.
and for all that concerns the assessment and payment
estates were over-rated, others were scandalously under-rated. That William
intended to correct the old assessment, or rather to sweep it away and put a
new assessment in its stead, seems highly probable, though it has not been
proved that either he or his sons accomplished this feat[18]. For this purpose,
however, materials were to be collected which would enable the royal
officers to decide what changes were necessary in order that all England
might be taxed in accordance with a just and uniform plan. Concerning each
estate they were to know the number of geldable units (‘hides’ or
‘carucates’) for which it had answered in King Edward’s day, they were to
know the number of plough oxen that there were upon it, they were to know
its true annual value, they were to know whether that value had been rising
or falling during the past twenty years. Domesday Book has well been
called a rate book, and the task of spelling out a land law from the
particulars that it states is not unlike the task that would lie before any one
who endeavoured to construct our modern law of real property out of rate
books, income tax returns and similar materials. All the lands, all the land-
holders of England may be brought before us, but we are told only of such
facts, such rights, such legal relationships as bear on the actual or potential
payment of geld. True, that some minor purposes may be achieved by the
king’s commissioners, though the quest for geld is their one main object.
About the rents and renders due from his own demesne manors the king
may thus obtain some valuable information. Also he may learn, as it were
by the way, whether any of his barons or other men have presumed to
occupy, to ‘invade,’ lands which he has reserved for himself. Again, if
several persons are in dispute about a tract of ground, the contest may be
appeased by the testimony of shire and hundred, or may be reserved for the
king’s audience; at any rate the existence of an outstanding claim may be
recorded by the royal commissioners. Here and there the peculiar customs
of a shire or a borough will be stated, and incidentally the services that
certain tenants owe to their lords may be noticed. But all this is done
sporadically and unsystematically. Our record is no register of title, it is no
feodary, it is no custumal, it is no rent roll; it is a tax book, a geld book.
We say this, not by way of vain complaint against its
The survey and the geld
meagreness, but because in our belief a care for geld system.
and for all that concerns the assessment and payment
Page 29
of geld colours far more deeply than commentators have usually supposed
the information that is given to us about other matters. We should not be
surprised if definitions and distinctions which at first sight have little
enough to do with fiscal arrangements, for example the definition of a
manor and the distinction between a villein and a ‘free man,’ involved
references to the apportionment and the levy of the land-tax. Often enough
it happens that legal ideas of a very general kind are defined by fiscal rules;
for example, our modern English idea of ‘occupation’ has become so much
part and parcel of a system of assessment that lawyers are always ready to
argue that a certain man must be an ‘occupier’ because such men as he are
rated to the relief of the poor. It seems then a fair supposition that any line
that Domesday Book draws systematically and sharply, whether it be
between various classes of men or between various classes of tenements, is
somehow or another connected with the main theme of that book—
geldability, actual or potential.
Since we have mentioned the stories told by the
Weight of the danegeld.
chronicler about the tribute paid to the Danes, we
may make a comment upon them which will become
of importance hereafter. Those stories look true, and they seem to be
accepted by modern historians. Had we been told just once that some large
number of pounds, for example £60,000, was levied, or had the same round
sum been repeated in year after year, we might well have said that such
figures deserved no attention, and that by £60,000 our annalist merely
meant a big sum of money. But, as will have been seen, he varies his figures
from year to year and is not always content with a round number; he speaks
of £21,099 and of £11,048[19]. We can hardly therefore treat his statements
as mere loose talk and are reluctantly driven to suppose that they are true or
near the truth. If this be so, then, unless some discovery has yet to be made
in the history of money, no word but ‘appalling’ will adequately describe
the taxation of which he speaks. We know pretty accurately the amount of
money that became due when Henry I. or Henry II. imposed a danegeld of
two shillings on the hide. The following table constructed from the pipe
rolls will show the sum charged against each county. We arrange the shires
in the order of their indebtedness, for a few of the many caprices of the
allotment will thus be visible, and our table may be of use to us in other
contexts[20].
the information that is given to us about other matters. We should not be
surprised if definitions and distinctions which at first sight have little
enough to do with fiscal arrangements, for example the definition of a
manor and the distinction between a villein and a ‘free man,’ involved
references to the apportionment and the levy of the land-tax. Often enough
it happens that legal ideas of a very general kind are defined by fiscal rules;
for example, our modern English idea of ‘occupation’ has become so much
part and parcel of a system of assessment that lawyers are always ready to
argue that a certain man must be an ‘occupier’ because such men as he are
rated to the relief of the poor. It seems then a fair supposition that any line
that Domesday Book draws systematically and sharply, whether it be
between various classes of men or between various classes of tenements, is
somehow or another connected with the main theme of that book—
geldability, actual or potential.
Since we have mentioned the stories told by the
Weight of the danegeld.
chronicler about the tribute paid to the Danes, we
may make a comment upon them which will become
of importance hereafter. Those stories look true, and they seem to be
accepted by modern historians. Had we been told just once that some large
number of pounds, for example £60,000, was levied, or had the same round
sum been repeated in year after year, we might well have said that such
figures deserved no attention, and that by £60,000 our annalist merely
meant a big sum of money. But, as will have been seen, he varies his figures
from year to year and is not always content with a round number; he speaks
of £21,099 and of £11,048[19]. We can hardly therefore treat his statements
as mere loose talk and are reluctantly driven to suppose that they are true or
near the truth. If this be so, then, unless some discovery has yet to be made
in the history of money, no word but ‘appalling’ will adequately describe
the taxation of which he speaks. We know pretty accurately the amount of
money that became due when Henry I. or Henry II. imposed a danegeld of
two shillings on the hide. The following table constructed from the pipe
rolls will show the sum charged against each county. We arrange the shires
in the order of their indebtedness, for a few of the many caprices of the
allotment will thus be visible, and our table may be of use to us in other
contexts[20].
Page 30
Approximate Charge of a Danegeld of Two Shillings on the Hide in the
Middle of the Twelfth Century.
£ £
Wiltshire 389 Cambridge 114
Derby and
Norfolk 330 110
Nottingham
Somerset 278 Hertford 110
Lincoln 266 Bedford 110
Dorset 248 Kent 105
Oxford 242 Devon 104
Essex 236 Worcester 101
Suffolk 235 Leicester 100
Sussex 210 Hereford 94
Bucks 205 Middlesex 100
Berks 202 Huntingdon 71
Gloucester 190 Stafford 44
S. Hants 180 Cornwall 44
Surrey 177 Rutland 44
York 160 Northumberland 44
Warwick 129 Cheshire[21] 0
N. Hants 120
Salop 118 Total 5198
Now be it understood that these figures do not show The geld of old times.
the amount of money that Henry I. and Henry II.
could obtain by a danegeld. They had to take much less. When it was last
levied, the tax was not bringing in £3500, so many were the churches and
great folk who had obtained temporary or permanent exemptions from it.
We will cite Leicestershire for example. The total of the geld charged upon
it was almost exactly or quite exactly £100. On the second roll of Henry
II.’s reign we find that £25. 7s. 6d. have been paid into the treasury, that
£22. 8s. 3d. have been ‘pardoned’ to magnates and templars, that £51. 8s.
2d. are written off in respect of waste, and that 16s. 0d. are still due. On the
eighth roll the account shows that £62. 12s. 7d. have been paid and that
£37. 6s. 9d. have been ‘pardoned.’ No, what our table displays is the
Middle of the Twelfth Century.
£ £
Wiltshire 389 Cambridge 114
Derby and
Norfolk 330 110
Nottingham
Somerset 278 Hertford 110
Lincoln 266 Bedford 110
Dorset 248 Kent 105
Oxford 242 Devon 104
Essex 236 Worcester 101
Suffolk 235 Leicester 100
Sussex 210 Hereford 94
Bucks 205 Middlesex 100
Berks 202 Huntingdon 71
Gloucester 190 Stafford 44
S. Hants 180 Cornwall 44
Surrey 177 Rutland 44
York 160 Northumberland 44
Warwick 129 Cheshire[21] 0
N. Hants 120
Salop 118 Total 5198
Now be it understood that these figures do not show The geld of old times.
the amount of money that Henry I. and Henry II.
could obtain by a danegeld. They had to take much less. When it was last
levied, the tax was not bringing in £3500, so many were the churches and
great folk who had obtained temporary or permanent exemptions from it.
We will cite Leicestershire for example. The total of the geld charged upon
it was almost exactly or quite exactly £100. On the second roll of Henry
II.’s reign we find that £25. 7s. 6d. have been paid into the treasury, that
£22. 8s. 3d. have been ‘pardoned’ to magnates and templars, that £51. 8s.
2d. are written off in respect of waste, and that 16s. 0d. are still due. On the
eighth roll the account shows that £62. 12s. 7d. have been paid and that
£37. 6s. 9d. have been ‘pardoned.’ No, what our table displays is the
Page 31
amount that would be raised if all exemptions were disregarded and no
penny forborne. And now let us turn back to the chronicle and (not to take
an extreme example) read of £30,000 being raised. Unless we are prepared
to bring against the fathers of English history a charge of repeated, wanton
and circumstantial lying, we shall think of the danegeld of Æthelred’s reign
and of Cnut’s as of an impost so heavy that it was fully capable of
transmuting a whole nation. Therefore the lines that are drawn by the
incidence of this tribute will be deep and permanent; but still we must
remember that primarily they will be fiscal lines.
Then again, we ought not to look to Domesday Book
Unstable terminology of
for a settled and stable scheme of technical terms. the survey.
Such a scheme could not be established in a brief
twenty years. About one half of the technical terms
that meet us, about one half of the terms which, as we think, ought to be
precisely defined, are, we may say, English terms. They are ancient English
words, or they are words brought hither by the Danes, or they are Latin
words which have long been in use in England and have acquired special
meanings in relation to English affairs. On the other hand, about half the
technical terms are French. Some of them are old Latin words which have
acquired special meanings in France, some are Romance words newly
coined in France, some are Teutonic words which tell of the Frankish
conquest of Gaul. In the one great class we place scira, hundredum,
wapentac, hida, berewica, inland, haga, soka, saka, geldum, gablum,
scotum, heregeat, gersuma, thegnus, sochemannus, burus, coscet; in the
other comitatus, carucata, virgata, bovata, arpentum, manerium, feudum,
alodium, homagium, relevium, baro, vicecomes, vavassor, villanus,
bordarius, colibertus, hospes. It is not in twenty years that a settled and
stable scheme can be formed out of such elements as these. And often
enough it is very difficult for us to give just the right meaning to some
simple Latin word. If we translate miles by soldier or warrior, this may be
too indefinite; if we translate it by knight, this may be too definite, and yet
leave open the question whether we are comparing the miles of 1086 with
the cniht of unconquered England or with the knight of the thirteenth
century. If we render vicecomes by sheriff we are making our sheriff too
little of a vicomte. When comes is before us we have to choose between
giving Britanny an earl, giving Chester a count, or offending some of our
penny forborne. And now let us turn back to the chronicle and (not to take
an extreme example) read of £30,000 being raised. Unless we are prepared
to bring against the fathers of English history a charge of repeated, wanton
and circumstantial lying, we shall think of the danegeld of Æthelred’s reign
and of Cnut’s as of an impost so heavy that it was fully capable of
transmuting a whole nation. Therefore the lines that are drawn by the
incidence of this tribute will be deep and permanent; but still we must
remember that primarily they will be fiscal lines.
Then again, we ought not to look to Domesday Book
Unstable terminology of
for a settled and stable scheme of technical terms. the survey.
Such a scheme could not be established in a brief
twenty years. About one half of the technical terms
that meet us, about one half of the terms which, as we think, ought to be
precisely defined, are, we may say, English terms. They are ancient English
words, or they are words brought hither by the Danes, or they are Latin
words which have long been in use in England and have acquired special
meanings in relation to English affairs. On the other hand, about half the
technical terms are French. Some of them are old Latin words which have
acquired special meanings in France, some are Romance words newly
coined in France, some are Teutonic words which tell of the Frankish
conquest of Gaul. In the one great class we place scira, hundredum,
wapentac, hida, berewica, inland, haga, soka, saka, geldum, gablum,
scotum, heregeat, gersuma, thegnus, sochemannus, burus, coscet; in the
other comitatus, carucata, virgata, bovata, arpentum, manerium, feudum,
alodium, homagium, relevium, baro, vicecomes, vavassor, villanus,
bordarius, colibertus, hospes. It is not in twenty years that a settled and
stable scheme can be formed out of such elements as these. And often
enough it is very difficult for us to give just the right meaning to some
simple Latin word. If we translate miles by soldier or warrior, this may be
too indefinite; if we translate it by knight, this may be too definite, and yet
leave open the question whether we are comparing the miles of 1086 with
the cniht of unconquered England or with the knight of the thirteenth
century. If we render vicecomes by sheriff we are making our sheriff too
little of a vicomte. When comes is before us we have to choose between
giving Britanny an earl, giving Chester a count, or offending some of our
Page 32
comites by invidious distinctions. Time will show what these words shall
mean. Some will perish in the struggle for existence; others have long and
adventurous careers before them. At present two sets of terms are rudely
intermixed; the time when they will grow into an organic whole is but
beginning.
To this we must add that, unless we have mistaken
Legal ideas of cent. xi.
the general drift of legal history, the law implied in
Domesday Book ought to be for us very difficult
law, far more difficult than the law of the thirteenth century, for the
thirteenth century is nearer to us than is the eleventh. The grown man will
find it easier to think the thoughts of the school-boy than to think the
thoughts of the baby. And yet the doctrine that our remote forefathers being
simple folk had simple law dies hard. Too often we allow ourselves to
suppose that, could we but get back to the beginning, we should find that all
was intelligible and should then be able to watch the process whereby
simple ideas were smothered under subtleties and technicalities. But it is
not so. Simplicity is the outcome of technical subtlety; it is the goal not the
starting point. As we go backwards the familiar outlines become blurred;
the ideas become fluid, and instead of the simple we find the indefinite. But
difficult though our task may be, we must turn to it.
mean. Some will perish in the struggle for existence; others have long and
adventurous careers before them. At present two sets of terms are rudely
intermixed; the time when they will grow into an organic whole is but
beginning.
To this we must add that, unless we have mistaken
Legal ideas of cent. xi.
the general drift of legal history, the law implied in
Domesday Book ought to be for us very difficult
law, far more difficult than the law of the thirteenth century, for the
thirteenth century is nearer to us than is the eleventh. The grown man will
find it easier to think the thoughts of the school-boy than to think the
thoughts of the baby. And yet the doctrine that our remote forefathers being
simple folk had simple law dies hard. Too often we allow ourselves to
suppose that, could we but get back to the beginning, we should find that all
was intelligible and should then be able to watch the process whereby
simple ideas were smothered under subtleties and technicalities. But it is
not so. Simplicity is the outcome of technical subtlety; it is the goal not the
starting point. As we go backwards the familiar outlines become blurred;
the ideas become fluid, and instead of the simple we find the indefinite. But
difficult though our task may be, we must turn to it.
Page 33
Page 34
§ 1. Plan of the Survey.
England was already mapped out into counties,
The geographical basis.
hundreds or wapentakes and vills. Trithings or
ridings appear in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, lathes
in Kent, rapes in Sussex, while leets appear, at least sporadically, in
Norfolk[22]. These provincial peculiarities we must pass by, nor will we
pause to comment at any length on the changes in the boundaries of
counties and of hundreds that have taken place since the date of the survey.
Though these changes have been many and some few of them have been
large[23], we may still say that as a general rule the political geography of
England was already stereotyped. And we see that already there are many
curious anomalies, ‘detached portions’ of counties, discrete hundreds,
places that are extra-hundredal[24], places that for one purpose are in one
county and for another purpose in another county[25]. We see also that
proprietary rights have already been making sport of arrangements which in
our eyes should be fixed by public law. Earls, sheriffs and others have
enjoyed a marvellous power of taking a tract of land out of one district and
placing it, or ‘making it lie’ in another district[26]. Land is constantly spoken
of as though it were the most portable of things; it can easily be taken from
one vill or hundred and be added to or placed in or caused to lie in another
vill or hundred. This ‘notional movability’ of land, if we may use such a
term, will become of importance to us when we are studying the formation
of manors.
For the present, however, we are concerned with the
The vill as the
general truth that England is divided into counties, geographical unit.
hundreds or wapentakes and vills. This is the
geographical basis of the survey. That basis,
however, is hidden from us by the form of our record. The plan adopted by
those who fashioned Domesday Book out of the returns provided for them
by the king’s commissioners is a curious, compromising plan. We may say
that in part it is geographical, while in part it is feudal or proprietary. It
takes each county separately and thus far it is geographical; but within the
England was already mapped out into counties,
The geographical basis.
hundreds or wapentakes and vills. Trithings or
ridings appear in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, lathes
in Kent, rapes in Sussex, while leets appear, at least sporadically, in
Norfolk[22]. These provincial peculiarities we must pass by, nor will we
pause to comment at any length on the changes in the boundaries of
counties and of hundreds that have taken place since the date of the survey.
Though these changes have been many and some few of them have been
large[23], we may still say that as a general rule the political geography of
England was already stereotyped. And we see that already there are many
curious anomalies, ‘detached portions’ of counties, discrete hundreds,
places that are extra-hundredal[24], places that for one purpose are in one
county and for another purpose in another county[25]. We see also that
proprietary rights have already been making sport of arrangements which in
our eyes should be fixed by public law. Earls, sheriffs and others have
enjoyed a marvellous power of taking a tract of land out of one district and
placing it, or ‘making it lie’ in another district[26]. Land is constantly spoken
of as though it were the most portable of things; it can easily be taken from
one vill or hundred and be added to or placed in or caused to lie in another
vill or hundred. This ‘notional movability’ of land, if we may use such a
term, will become of importance to us when we are studying the formation
of manors.
For the present, however, we are concerned with the
The vill as the
general truth that England is divided into counties, geographical unit.
hundreds or wapentakes and vills. This is the
geographical basis of the survey. That basis,
however, is hidden from us by the form of our record. The plan adopted by
those who fashioned Domesday Book out of the returns provided for them
by the king’s commissioners is a curious, compromising plan. We may say
that in part it is geographical, while in part it is feudal or proprietary. It
takes each county separately and thus far it is geographical; but within the
Page 35
boundaries of each county it arranges the lands under the names of the
tenants in chief who hold them. Thus all the lands in Cambridgeshire of
which Count Alan is tenant in chief are brought together, no matter that they
lie scattered about in various hundreds. Therefore it is necessary for us to
understand that the original returns reported by the surveyors did not reach
the royal treasury in this form. At least as regards the county of Cambridge,
we can be certain of this. The hundreds were taken one by one; they were
taken in a geographical order, and not until the justices had learned all that
was to be known of Staplehow hundred did they call upon the jurors of
Cheveley hundred for their verdict. That such was their procedure we might
have guessed even had we not been fortunate enough to have a copy of the
Cambridgeshire verdicts; for, though the commissioners seem to have held
but one moot for each shire, still it is plain that each hundred was
represented by a separate set of jurors[27]. But from these Cambridgeshire
verdicts we learn what otherwise we could hardly have known. Within each
hundred the survey was made by vills[28]. If we suppose the commissioners
charging the jurors we must represent them as saying, not ‘Tell us what
tenants in chief have lands in your hundred and how much each of them
holds,’ but ‘Tell us about each vill in your hundred, who holds land in it.’
Thus, for example, the men of the Armingford hundred are called up. They
make a separate report about each vill in it. They begin by stating that the
vill is rated at a certain number of hides and then they proceed to distribute
those hides among the tenants in chief. Thus, for example, they say that
Abington was rated at 5 hides, and that those 5 hides are distributed thus[29]:
hides virgates
Hugh Pincerna holds of the bishop of
21⁄2 1
⁄2
Winchester
1
The king ⁄2
Ralph and Robert hold of Hardouin de
1 11⁄2
Eschalers
Earl Roger 1
1
Picot the sheriff ⁄2
Alwin Hamelecoc the bedel holds of the 1
⁄2
king
5 0
tenants in chief who hold them. Thus all the lands in Cambridgeshire of
which Count Alan is tenant in chief are brought together, no matter that they
lie scattered about in various hundreds. Therefore it is necessary for us to
understand that the original returns reported by the surveyors did not reach
the royal treasury in this form. At least as regards the county of Cambridge,
we can be certain of this. The hundreds were taken one by one; they were
taken in a geographical order, and not until the justices had learned all that
was to be known of Staplehow hundred did they call upon the jurors of
Cheveley hundred for their verdict. That such was their procedure we might
have guessed even had we not been fortunate enough to have a copy of the
Cambridgeshire verdicts; for, though the commissioners seem to have held
but one moot for each shire, still it is plain that each hundred was
represented by a separate set of jurors[27]. But from these Cambridgeshire
verdicts we learn what otherwise we could hardly have known. Within each
hundred the survey was made by vills[28]. If we suppose the commissioners
charging the jurors we must represent them as saying, not ‘Tell us what
tenants in chief have lands in your hundred and how much each of them
holds,’ but ‘Tell us about each vill in your hundred, who holds land in it.’
Thus, for example, the men of the Armingford hundred are called up. They
make a separate report about each vill in it. They begin by stating that the
vill is rated at a certain number of hides and then they proceed to distribute
those hides among the tenants in chief. Thus, for example, they say that
Abington was rated at 5 hides, and that those 5 hides are distributed thus[29]:
hides virgates
Hugh Pincerna holds of the bishop of
21⁄2 1
⁄2
Winchester
1
The king ⁄2
Ralph and Robert hold of Hardouin de
1 11⁄2
Eschalers
Earl Roger 1
1
Picot the sheriff ⁄2
Alwin Hamelecoc the bedel holds of the 1
⁄2
king
5 0
Page 36
Now in Domesday Book we must look to several different pages to get this
information about the vill of Abington,—dash;to one page for Earl Roger’s
land, to another page for Picot’s land, and we may easily miss the important
fact that this vill of Abington has been rated as a whole at the neat, round
figure of 5 hides. And then we see that the whole hundred of Armingford
has been rated at the neat, round figure of 100 hides, and has consisted of
six vills rated at 10 hides apiece and eight vills rated at 5 hides apiece[30].
Thus we are brought to look upon the vill as a unit in a system of
assessment. All this is concealed from us by the form of Domesday Book.
When that book mentions the name of a place, when
Stability of the vill.
it says that Roger holds Sutton or that Ralph holds
three hides in Norton, we regard that name as the
name of a vill; it may or may not be also the name of a manor. Speaking
very generally we may say that the place so named will in after times be
known as a vill and in our own day will be a civil parish. No doubt in some
parts of the country new vills have been created since the Conqueror’s time.
Some names that occur in our record fail to obtain a permanent place on the
roll of English vills, become the names of hamlets or disappear altogether;
on the other hand, new names come to the front. Of course we dare not say
dogmatically that all the names mentioned in Domesday Book were the
names of vills; very possibly (if this distinction was already known) some
of them were the names of hamlets; nor, again, do we imply that the villa of
1086 had much organization; but a place that is mentioned in Domesday
Book will probably be recognized as a vill in the thirteenth, a civil parish in
the nineteenth century. Let us take Cambridgeshire by way of example.
Excluding the Isle of Ely, we find that the political geography of the
Conqueror’s reign has endured until our own time. The boundaries of the
hundreds lie almost where they lay, the number of vills has hardly been
increased or diminished. The chief changes amount to this:—A small tract
on the east side of the county containing Exning and Bellingham has been
made over to Suffolk; four other names contained in Domesday no longer
stand for parishes, while the names of five of our modern parishes—one of
them is the significant name of Newton—are not found there[31]. But about
a hundred and ten vills that were vills in 1086 are vills or civil parishes at
the present day, and in all probability they then had approximately the same
boundaries that they have now.
information about the vill of Abington,—dash;to one page for Earl Roger’s
land, to another page for Picot’s land, and we may easily miss the important
fact that this vill of Abington has been rated as a whole at the neat, round
figure of 5 hides. And then we see that the whole hundred of Armingford
has been rated at the neat, round figure of 100 hides, and has consisted of
six vills rated at 10 hides apiece and eight vills rated at 5 hides apiece[30].
Thus we are brought to look upon the vill as a unit in a system of
assessment. All this is concealed from us by the form of Domesday Book.
When that book mentions the name of a place, when
Stability of the vill.
it says that Roger holds Sutton or that Ralph holds
three hides in Norton, we regard that name as the
name of a vill; it may or may not be also the name of a manor. Speaking
very generally we may say that the place so named will in after times be
known as a vill and in our own day will be a civil parish. No doubt in some
parts of the country new vills have been created since the Conqueror’s time.
Some names that occur in our record fail to obtain a permanent place on the
roll of English vills, become the names of hamlets or disappear altogether;
on the other hand, new names come to the front. Of course we dare not say
dogmatically that all the names mentioned in Domesday Book were the
names of vills; very possibly (if this distinction was already known) some
of them were the names of hamlets; nor, again, do we imply that the villa of
1086 had much organization; but a place that is mentioned in Domesday
Book will probably be recognized as a vill in the thirteenth, a civil parish in
the nineteenth century. Let us take Cambridgeshire by way of example.
Excluding the Isle of Ely, we find that the political geography of the
Conqueror’s reign has endured until our own time. The boundaries of the
hundreds lie almost where they lay, the number of vills has hardly been
increased or diminished. The chief changes amount to this:—A small tract
on the east side of the county containing Exning and Bellingham has been
made over to Suffolk; four other names contained in Domesday no longer
stand for parishes, while the names of five of our modern parishes—one of
them is the significant name of Newton—are not found there[31]. But about
a hundred and ten vills that were vills in 1086 are vills or civil parishes at
the present day, and in all probability they then had approximately the same
boundaries that they have now.
Page 37
This may be a somewhat too favourable example of
Omission of vills.
permanence and continuity. Of all counties
Cambridgeshire is the one whose ancient geography
can be the most easily examined; but wherever we have looked we have
come to the conclusion that the distribution of England into vills is in the
main as old as the Norman conquest[32]. Two causes of difficulty may be
noticed, for they are of some interest. Owing to what we have called the
‘notional movability’ of land, we never can be quite sure that when certain
hides or acres are said to be in or lie in a certain place they are really and
physically in that place. They are really in one village, but they are spoken
of as belonging to another village, because their occupants pay their geld or
do their services in the latter. Manorial and fiscal geography interferes with
physical and villar geography. We have lately seen how land rated at five
hides was comprised, as a matter of fact, in the vill of Abington; but of
those five hides, one virgate ‘lay in’ Shingay, a half-hide ‘lay in’ Litlington
while a half-virgate ‘lay and had always lain’ in Morden[33]. This, if we
mistake not, leads in some cases to an omission of the names of small vills.
A great lord has a compact estate, perhaps the whole of one of the small
southern hundreds. He treats it as a whole, and all the land that he has there
will be ascribed to some considerable village in which he has his hall. We
should be rash in supposing that there were no other villages on this land.
For example, in Surrey there is now-a-days a hundred called Farnham
which comprises the parish of Farnham, the parish of Frensham and some
other villages. If we mistake not, all that Domesday Book has to say of the
whole of this territory is that the Bishop of Winchester holds Farnham, that
it has been rated at 60 hides, that it has been worth the large sum of £65 a
year and that there are so many tenants upon it[34]. We certainly must not
draw the inference that there was but one vill in this tract. If the bishop is
tenant in chief of the whole hundred and has become responsible for all the
geld that is levied therefrom, there is no great reason why the surveyors
should trouble themselves about the vills. Thus the simple Episcopus tenet
Ferneham may dispose of some 25,000 acres of land. So the same bishop
has an estate at Chilcombe in Hampshire; but clearly the name Ciltecumbe
covers a wide territory for there are no less than nine churches upon it[35].
We never can be very certain about the boundaries of these large and
compact estates.
Omission of vills.
permanence and continuity. Of all counties
Cambridgeshire is the one whose ancient geography
can be the most easily examined; but wherever we have looked we have
come to the conclusion that the distribution of England into vills is in the
main as old as the Norman conquest[32]. Two causes of difficulty may be
noticed, for they are of some interest. Owing to what we have called the
‘notional movability’ of land, we never can be quite sure that when certain
hides or acres are said to be in or lie in a certain place they are really and
physically in that place. They are really in one village, but they are spoken
of as belonging to another village, because their occupants pay their geld or
do their services in the latter. Manorial and fiscal geography interferes with
physical and villar geography. We have lately seen how land rated at five
hides was comprised, as a matter of fact, in the vill of Abington; but of
those five hides, one virgate ‘lay in’ Shingay, a half-hide ‘lay in’ Litlington
while a half-virgate ‘lay and had always lain’ in Morden[33]. This, if we
mistake not, leads in some cases to an omission of the names of small vills.
A great lord has a compact estate, perhaps the whole of one of the small
southern hundreds. He treats it as a whole, and all the land that he has there
will be ascribed to some considerable village in which he has his hall. We
should be rash in supposing that there were no other villages on this land.
For example, in Surrey there is now-a-days a hundred called Farnham
which comprises the parish of Farnham, the parish of Frensham and some
other villages. If we mistake not, all that Domesday Book has to say of the
whole of this territory is that the Bishop of Winchester holds Farnham, that
it has been rated at 60 hides, that it has been worth the large sum of £65 a
year and that there are so many tenants upon it[34]. We certainly must not
draw the inference that there was but one vill in this tract. If the bishop is
tenant in chief of the whole hundred and has become responsible for all the
geld that is levied therefrom, there is no great reason why the surveyors
should trouble themselves about the vills. Thus the simple Episcopus tenet
Ferneham may dispose of some 25,000 acres of land. So the same bishop
has an estate at Chilcombe in Hampshire; but clearly the name Ciltecumbe
covers a wide territory for there are no less than nine churches upon it[35].
We never can be very certain about the boundaries of these large and
compact estates.
Page 38
A second cause of difficulty lies in the fact that in
Fission of vills.
comparatively modern times, from the twelfth
century onwards, two or three contiguous villages
will often bear the same name and be distinguished only by what we may
call their surnames—thus Guilden Morden and Steeple Morden, Stratfield
Saye, Stratfield Turgis, Stratfield Mortimer, Tolleshunt Knights, Tolleshunt
Major, Tolleshunt Darcy. Such cases are common; in some districts they are
hardly exceptional. Doubtless they point to a time when a single village by
some process of colonization or subdivision become two villages. Now
Domesday Book seldom enables us to say for certain whether the change
has already taken place. In a few instances it marks off the little village
from the great village of the same name[36]. In some other instances it will
speak, for example, of Mordune and Mordune Alia, of Emingeforde and
Emingeforde Alia, or the like, thus showing both that the change has taken
place, and also that it is so recent that it is recognized only by very clumsy
terms. In Cambridgeshire, since we have the original verdicts, we can see
that the two Mordens are already distinct; the one is rated at ten hides, the
other at five[37]. On the other hand, we can see that our Great and Little
Shelford are rated as one vill of twenty hides[38], our Castle Camps and
Shudy Camps as one vill of five hides[39]. Elsewhere we are left to guess
whether the fission is complete, and the surnames that many of our vills
ultimately acquire, the names of families which rose to greatness in the
twelfth and thirteenth centuries, will often suggest that the surveyors saw
but one vill where we see two[40]. However, the broad truth stands out that
England was divided into vills and that in general the vill of Domesday
Book is still a vill in after days[41].
The ‘vill’ or ‘town’ of the later middle ages was, like
The nucleated village
the ‘civil parish’ of our own day, a tract of land with and the vill of scattered
some houses on it, and this tract was a unit in the steads.
national system of police and finance[42], But we are
not entitled to make for ourselves any one typical picture of the English vill.
We are learning from the ordnance map (that marvellous palimpsest, which
under Dr Meitzen’s guidance we are beginning to decipher) that in all
probability we must keep at least two types before our minds. On the one
hand, there is what we might call the true village or the nucleated village. In
the purest form of this type there is one and only one cluster of houses. It is
Fission of vills.
comparatively modern times, from the twelfth
century onwards, two or three contiguous villages
will often bear the same name and be distinguished only by what we may
call their surnames—thus Guilden Morden and Steeple Morden, Stratfield
Saye, Stratfield Turgis, Stratfield Mortimer, Tolleshunt Knights, Tolleshunt
Major, Tolleshunt Darcy. Such cases are common; in some districts they are
hardly exceptional. Doubtless they point to a time when a single village by
some process of colonization or subdivision become two villages. Now
Domesday Book seldom enables us to say for certain whether the change
has already taken place. In a few instances it marks off the little village
from the great village of the same name[36]. In some other instances it will
speak, for example, of Mordune and Mordune Alia, of Emingeforde and
Emingeforde Alia, or the like, thus showing both that the change has taken
place, and also that it is so recent that it is recognized only by very clumsy
terms. In Cambridgeshire, since we have the original verdicts, we can see
that the two Mordens are already distinct; the one is rated at ten hides, the
other at five[37]. On the other hand, we can see that our Great and Little
Shelford are rated as one vill of twenty hides[38], our Castle Camps and
Shudy Camps as one vill of five hides[39]. Elsewhere we are left to guess
whether the fission is complete, and the surnames that many of our vills
ultimately acquire, the names of families which rose to greatness in the
twelfth and thirteenth centuries, will often suggest that the surveyors saw
but one vill where we see two[40]. However, the broad truth stands out that
England was divided into vills and that in general the vill of Domesday
Book is still a vill in after days[41].
The ‘vill’ or ‘town’ of the later middle ages was, like
The nucleated village
the ‘civil parish’ of our own day, a tract of land with and the vill of scattered
some houses on it, and this tract was a unit in the steads.
national system of police and finance[42], But we are
not entitled to make for ourselves any one typical picture of the English vill.
We are learning from the ordnance map (that marvellous palimpsest, which
under Dr Meitzen’s guidance we are beginning to decipher) that in all
probability we must keep at least two types before our minds. On the one
hand, there is what we might call the true village or the nucleated village. In
the purest form of this type there is one and only one cluster of houses. It is
Page 39
a fairly large cluster; it stands in the midst of its fields, of its territory, and
until lately a considerable part of its territory will probably have consisted
of spacious ‘common fields.’ In a country in which there are villages of this
type the parish boundaries seem almost to draw themselves[43]. On the other
hand, we may easily find a country in which there are few villages of this
character. The houses which lie within the boundary of the parish are
scattered about in small clusters; here two or three, there three or four.
These clusters often have names of their own, and it seems a mere chance
that the name borne by one of them should be also the name of the whole
parish or vill[44]. We see no traces of very large fields. On the face of the
map there is no reason why a particular group of cottages should be
reckoned to belong to this parish rather than to the next. As our eyes grow
accustomed to the work we may arrive at some extremely important
conclusions such as those which Meitzen has suggested. The outlines of our
nucleated villages may have been drawn for us by Germanic settlers,
whereas in the land of hamlets and scattered steads old Celtic arrangements
may never have been thoroughly effaced. Towards theories of this kind we
are slowly winning our way. In the meantime let us remember that a villa of
Domesday Book may correspond to one of at least two very different
models or may be intermediate between various types. It may be a fairly
large and agrarianly organic unit, or it may be a group of small agrarian
units which are being held together in one whole merely by an external
force, by police law and fiscal law[45].
Two little fragments of ‘the original one inch
Illustrations by maps.
ordnance map’ will be more eloquent than would be
many paragraphs of written discourse. The one
pictures a district on the border between Oxfordshire and Berkshire cut by
the Thames and the main line of the Great Western Railway; the other a
district on the border between Devon and Somerset, north of Collumpton
and south of Wiveliscombe. Neither is an extreme example. True villages
we may easily find. Cambridgeshire, for instance, would have afforded
some beautiful specimens, for many of the ‘open fields’ were still open
when the ordnance map of that county was made. But throughout large
tracts of England, even though there has been an ‘inclosure’ and there are
no longer any open fields, our map often shows a land of villages. When it
does so and the district that it portrays is a purely agricultural district, we
until lately a considerable part of its territory will probably have consisted
of spacious ‘common fields.’ In a country in which there are villages of this
type the parish boundaries seem almost to draw themselves[43]. On the other
hand, we may easily find a country in which there are few villages of this
character. The houses which lie within the boundary of the parish are
scattered about in small clusters; here two or three, there three or four.
These clusters often have names of their own, and it seems a mere chance
that the name borne by one of them should be also the name of the whole
parish or vill[44]. We see no traces of very large fields. On the face of the
map there is no reason why a particular group of cottages should be
reckoned to belong to this parish rather than to the next. As our eyes grow
accustomed to the work we may arrive at some extremely important
conclusions such as those which Meitzen has suggested. The outlines of our
nucleated villages may have been drawn for us by Germanic settlers,
whereas in the land of hamlets and scattered steads old Celtic arrangements
may never have been thoroughly effaced. Towards theories of this kind we
are slowly winning our way. In the meantime let us remember that a villa of
Domesday Book may correspond to one of at least two very different
models or may be intermediate between various types. It may be a fairly
large and agrarianly organic unit, or it may be a group of small agrarian
units which are being held together in one whole merely by an external
force, by police law and fiscal law[45].
Two little fragments of ‘the original one inch
Illustrations by maps.
ordnance map’ will be more eloquent than would be
many paragraphs of written discourse. The one
pictures a district on the border between Oxfordshire and Berkshire cut by
the Thames and the main line of the Great Western Railway; the other a
district on the border between Devon and Somerset, north of Collumpton
and south of Wiveliscombe. Neither is an extreme example. True villages
we may easily find. Cambridgeshire, for instance, would have afforded
some beautiful specimens, for many of the ‘open fields’ were still open
when the ordnance map of that county was made. But throughout large
tracts of England, even though there has been an ‘inclosure’ and there are
no longer any open fields, our map often shows a land of villages. When it
does so and the district that it portrays is a purely agricultural district, we
Page 40
may generally assume without going far wrong that the villages are ancient,
for during at least the last three centuries the predominant current in our
agrarian history has set against the formation of villages and towards the
distribution of scattered homesteads. To find the purest specimens of a land
of hamlets we ought to go to Wales or to Cornwall or to other parts of ‘the
Celtic fringe’; very fair examples might be found throughout the west of
England. Also we may perhaps find hamlets rather than villages wherever
there have been within the historic period large tracts of forest land. Very
often, again, the parish or township looks on our map like a hybrid. We
seem to see a village with satellitic hamlets. Much more remains to be done
before we shall be able to construe the testimony of our fields and walls and
hedges, but at least two types of vill must be in our eyes when we are
reading Domesday Book[46].
for during at least the last three centuries the predominant current in our
agrarian history has set against the formation of villages and towards the
distribution of scattered homesteads. To find the purest specimens of a land
of hamlets we ought to go to Wales or to Cornwall or to other parts of ‘the
Celtic fringe’; very fair examples might be found throughout the west of
England. Also we may perhaps find hamlets rather than villages wherever
there have been within the historic period large tracts of forest land. Very
often, again, the parish or township looks on our map like a hybrid. We
seem to see a village with satellitic hamlets. Much more remains to be done
before we shall be able to construe the testimony of our fields and walls and
hedges, but at least two types of vill must be in our eyes when we are
reading Domesday Book[46].
Page 41
A LAND OF VILLAGES
On the border between Oxfordshire and Berkshire.
[Larger map]
[Between pp. 16–17]
On the border between Oxfordshire and Berkshire.
[Larger map]
[Between pp. 16–17]
Page 42
A LAND OF HAMLETS
On the border between Somerset and Devon.
[Larger map]
To say that the villa of Domesday Book is in general
Size of the vill.
the vill of the thirteenth century and the civil parish
of the nineteenth is to say that the areal extent of the
On the border between Somerset and Devon.
[Larger map]
To say that the villa of Domesday Book is in general
Size of the vill.
the vill of the thirteenth century and the civil parish
of the nineteenth is to say that the areal extent of the
Page 43
villa varied widely from case to case. More important is it for us to observe
that the number of inhabitants of the villa varied widely from case to case.
The error into which we are most likely to fall will be that of making our
vill too populous. Some vills, especially some royal vills, are populous
enough; a few contain a hundred households; but the average township is
certainly much smaller than this[47]. Before we give any figures, it should
first be observed that Domesday Book never enables us to count heads. It
states the number of the tenants of various classes, sochemanni, villani,
bordarii, and the like, and leaves us to suppose that each of these persons is,
or may be, the head of a household. It also states how many servi there are.
Whether we ought to suppose that only the heads of servile households are
reckoned, or whether we ought to think of the servi as having no
households but as living within the lord’s gates and being enumerated, men,
women and able-bodied children, by the head—this is a difficult question.
Still we may reach some results which will enable us to compare township
with township. By way of fair sample we may take the Armingford hundred
of Cambridgeshire, and all persons who are above the rank of servi we will
include under the term ‘the non-servile population[48].’
Armingford Hundred.
Non-servile
Servi Total
population
Abington 19 0 19
Bassingbourn 35 3 38
Clapton 19 0 19
Croydon 29 0 29
Hatley 18 3 21
Litlington 37 6 43
Melbourn 62 1 63
Meldreth 44 7 51
Morden 43 11 54
Morden Alia 50 0 50
Shingay 18 0 18
Tadlow 27 4 31
that the number of inhabitants of the villa varied widely from case to case.
The error into which we are most likely to fall will be that of making our
vill too populous. Some vills, especially some royal vills, are populous
enough; a few contain a hundred households; but the average township is
certainly much smaller than this[47]. Before we give any figures, it should
first be observed that Domesday Book never enables us to count heads. It
states the number of the tenants of various classes, sochemanni, villani,
bordarii, and the like, and leaves us to suppose that each of these persons is,
or may be, the head of a household. It also states how many servi there are.
Whether we ought to suppose that only the heads of servile households are
reckoned, or whether we ought to think of the servi as having no
households but as living within the lord’s gates and being enumerated, men,
women and able-bodied children, by the head—this is a difficult question.
Still we may reach some results which will enable us to compare township
with township. By way of fair sample we may take the Armingford hundred
of Cambridgeshire, and all persons who are above the rank of servi we will
include under the term ‘the non-servile population[48].’
Armingford Hundred.
Non-servile
Servi Total
population
Abington 19 0 19
Bassingbourn 35 3 38
Clapton 19 0 19
Croydon 29 0 29
Hatley 18 3 21
Litlington 37 6 43
Melbourn 62 1 63
Meldreth 44 7 51
Morden 43 11 54
Morden Alia 50 0 50
Shingay 18 0 18
Tadlow 27 4 31
Page 44
Wendy 12 4 16
Whaddon 44 6 50
Total 457 45 502
Here in fourteen vills we have an average of thirty-two non-servile
households for every vill. Now even in our own day a parish with thirty-two
houses, though small, is not extremely small. But we should form a wrong
picture of the England of the eleventh century if we filled all parts of it with
such vills as these. We will take at random fourteen vills in Staffordshire
held by Earl Roger[49].
Non-servile
Servi Total
population
Claverlege 4 0 45
Nordlege 9 0 9
Alvidelege 13 0 13
Halas 40 2 42
Chenistelei 11 0 11
Otne 7 1 8
Nortberie 20 1 21
Erlide 8 2 10
Gaitone 16 0 16
Cressvale 8 0 8
Dodintone 3 0 3
Modreshale 5 0 5
Almentone 8 0 8
Metford 7 1 8
Total 200 7 207
Here for fourteen vills we have an average of but fourteen non-servile
households and the servi are so few that we may neglect them. We will next
look at a page in the survey of Somersetshire which describes certain vills
that have fallen to the lot of the bishop of Coutances[50].
Whaddon 44 6 50
Total 457 45 502
Here in fourteen vills we have an average of thirty-two non-servile
households for every vill. Now even in our own day a parish with thirty-two
houses, though small, is not extremely small. But we should form a wrong
picture of the England of the eleventh century if we filled all parts of it with
such vills as these. We will take at random fourteen vills in Staffordshire
held by Earl Roger[49].
Non-servile
Servi Total
population
Claverlege 4 0 45
Nordlege 9 0 9
Alvidelege 13 0 13
Halas 40 2 42
Chenistelei 11 0 11
Otne 7 1 8
Nortberie 20 1 21
Erlide 8 2 10
Gaitone 16 0 16
Cressvale 8 0 8
Dodintone 3 0 3
Modreshale 5 0 5
Almentone 8 0 8
Metford 7 1 8
Total 200 7 207
Here for fourteen vills we have an average of but fourteen non-servile
households and the servi are so few that we may neglect them. We will next
look at a page in the survey of Somersetshire which describes certain vills
that have fallen to the lot of the bishop of Coutances[50].
Page 45
Non-
servile Servi Total
population
Winemeresham 8 3 11
Chetenore 3 1 4
Widicumbe 21 6 27
Harpetrev 10 2 12
Hotune 11 0 11
Lilebere 6 1 7
Wintreth 4 2 6
Aisecome 11 7 18
Clutone 22 1 23
Temesbare 7 3 10
Nortone 16 3 19
Cliveham 15 1 16
Ferenberge 13 6 19
Cliveware 6 0 6
Total 153 36 189
Here we have on the average but eleven non-servile households for each
village, and even if we suppose each servus to represent a household, we
have not fourteen households. Yet smaller vills will be found in Devonshire,
many vills in which the total number of the persons mentioned does not
exceed ten and near half of these are servi. In Cornwall the townships, if
townships we ought to call them, are yet smaller; often we can attribute no
more than five or six families to the vill even if we include the servi.
Unless our calculations mislead us, the density of the
Population of the vills.
population in the average vill of a given county
varies somewhat directly with the density of the
population in that county; at all events we can not Contrast between east
and west.
say that where vills are populous, vills will be few.
As regards this matter no precise results are
attainable; our document is full of snares for arithmeticians. Still if for a
moment we have recourse to the crude method of dividing the number of
servile Servi Total
population
Winemeresham 8 3 11
Chetenore 3 1 4
Widicumbe 21 6 27
Harpetrev 10 2 12
Hotune 11 0 11
Lilebere 6 1 7
Wintreth 4 2 6
Aisecome 11 7 18
Clutone 22 1 23
Temesbare 7 3 10
Nortone 16 3 19
Cliveham 15 1 16
Ferenberge 13 6 19
Cliveware 6 0 6
Total 153 36 189
Here we have on the average but eleven non-servile households for each
village, and even if we suppose each servus to represent a household, we
have not fourteen households. Yet smaller vills will be found in Devonshire,
many vills in which the total number of the persons mentioned does not
exceed ten and near half of these are servi. In Cornwall the townships, if
townships we ought to call them, are yet smaller; often we can attribute no
more than five or six families to the vill even if we include the servi.
Unless our calculations mislead us, the density of the
Population of the vills.
population in the average vill of a given county
varies somewhat directly with the density of the
population in that county; at all events we can not Contrast between east
and west.
say that where vills are populous, vills will be few.
As regards this matter no precise results are
attainable; our document is full of snares for arithmeticians. Still if for a
moment we have recourse to the crude method of dividing the number of
Page 46
acres comprised in a modern county by the number of the persons who are
mentioned in the survey of that county, the outcome of our calculation will
be remarkable and will point to some broad truth[51]. For Suffolk the
quotient is 46 or thereabouts; for Norfolk but little larger[52]; for Essex 61,
for Lincoln 67; for Bedford, Berkshire, Northampton, Leicester, Middlesex,
Oxford, Kent and Somerset it lies between 70 and 80, for Buckingham,
Warwick, Sussex, Wiltshire and Dorset it lies between 80 and 90; Devon,
Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford are thinly peopled, Cornwall, Stafford,
Shropshire very thinly. Some particular results that we should thus attain
would be delusive. Thus we should say that men were sparse in
Cambridgeshire, did we not remember that a large part of our modern
Cambridgeshire was then a sheet of water. Permanent physical causes
interfere with the operation of the general rule. Thus Surrey, with its wide
heaths has, as we might expect, but few men to the square mile. Derbyshire
has many vills lying waste; Yorkshire is so much wasted that it can give us
no valuable result; and again, Yorkshire and Cheshire were larger than they
are now, while Rutland and the adjacent counties had not their present
boundaries. For all this however, we come to a very general rule:—the
density of the population decreases as we pass from east to west. With this
we may connect another rule:—land is much more valuable in the east than
it is in the west. This matter is indeed hedged in by many thorny questions;
still whatever hypothesis we may adopt as to the mode in which land was
valued, one general truth comes out pretty plainly, namely, that, economic
arrangements being what they were, it was far better to have a team-land in
Essex than to have an equal area of arable land in Devon.
Between eastern and western England there were
Small vills.
differences visible to the natural eye. With these
were connected unseen and legal differences, partly
as causes, partly as effects. But for the moment let us dwell on the fact that
many an English vill has very few inhabitants. We are to speak hereafter of
village communities. Let us therefore reflect that a community of some
eight or ten householders is not likely to be a highly organized entity. This
is not all, for these eight or ten householders will often belong to two, three
or four different social and economic, if not legal, classes. Some may be
sokemen, some villani, bordarii, cotarii, and besides them there will be a
few servi. If a vill consists, as in Devonshire often enough it will, of some
mentioned in the survey of that county, the outcome of our calculation will
be remarkable and will point to some broad truth[51]. For Suffolk the
quotient is 46 or thereabouts; for Norfolk but little larger[52]; for Essex 61,
for Lincoln 67; for Bedford, Berkshire, Northampton, Leicester, Middlesex,
Oxford, Kent and Somerset it lies between 70 and 80, for Buckingham,
Warwick, Sussex, Wiltshire and Dorset it lies between 80 and 90; Devon,
Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford are thinly peopled, Cornwall, Stafford,
Shropshire very thinly. Some particular results that we should thus attain
would be delusive. Thus we should say that men were sparse in
Cambridgeshire, did we not remember that a large part of our modern
Cambridgeshire was then a sheet of water. Permanent physical causes
interfere with the operation of the general rule. Thus Surrey, with its wide
heaths has, as we might expect, but few men to the square mile. Derbyshire
has many vills lying waste; Yorkshire is so much wasted that it can give us
no valuable result; and again, Yorkshire and Cheshire were larger than they
are now, while Rutland and the adjacent counties had not their present
boundaries. For all this however, we come to a very general rule:—the
density of the population decreases as we pass from east to west. With this
we may connect another rule:—land is much more valuable in the east than
it is in the west. This matter is indeed hedged in by many thorny questions;
still whatever hypothesis we may adopt as to the mode in which land was
valued, one general truth comes out pretty plainly, namely, that, economic
arrangements being what they were, it was far better to have a team-land in
Essex than to have an equal area of arable land in Devon.
Between eastern and western England there were
Small vills.
differences visible to the natural eye. With these
were connected unseen and legal differences, partly
as causes, partly as effects. But for the moment let us dwell on the fact that
many an English vill has very few inhabitants. We are to speak hereafter of
village communities. Let us therefore reflect that a community of some
eight or ten householders is not likely to be a highly organized entity. This
is not all, for these eight or ten householders will often belong to two, three
or four different social and economic, if not legal, classes. Some may be
sokemen, some villani, bordarii, cotarii, and besides them there will be a
few servi. If a vill consists, as in Devonshire often enough it will, of some
Page 47
three villani, some four bordarii and some two servi, the ‘township-moot,’
if such a moot there be, will be a queer little assembly, the manorial court, if
such a court there be, will not have much to do. These men can not have
many communal affairs; there will be no great scope for dooms or for by-
laws; they may well take all their disputes into the hundred court, especially
in Devonshire where the hundreds are small. Thus of the visible vill of the
eleventh century and its material surroundings we may form a wrong
notion. Often enough in the west its common fields (if common fields it
had) were not wide fields; the men who had shares therein were few and
belonged to various classes. Thus of two villages in Gloucestershire,
Brookthorpe and Harescombe, all that we can read is that in Brostrop there
were two teams, one villanus, three bordarii, four servi, while in
Hersecome there were two teams, two bordarii and five servi[53]. Many a
Devonshire township can produce but two or three teams. Often enough our
‘village community’ will be a heterogeneous little group whose main capital
consists of some 300 acres of arable land and some 20 beasts of the plough.
On the other hand, we must be careful not to omit
Importance of the east.
from our view the rich and thickly populated shires
or to imagine or to speak as though we imagined that
a general theory of English history can neglect the East of England. If we
leave Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Suffolk out of account we are to all
appearance leaving out of account not much less than a quarter of the whole
nation[54]. Let us make three groups of counties: (1) a South-Western group
containing Devon, Somerset, Dorset and Wiltshire: (2) a Mid-Western
group containing the shires of Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Salop,
Stafford and Warwick: (3) an Eastern group containing Lincolnshire,
Norfolk and Suffolk. The first of these groups has the largest; the third the
smallest acreage. In Domesday Book, however, the figures which state their
population seem to be these[55]:—
South-Western Group: 49,155
Mid-Western Group: 33,191
Eastern Group: 72,883
These figures are so emphatic that they may cause us for a moment to doubt
their value, and on details we must lay no stress. But we have materials
which enable us to check the general effect. In 1297 Edward I. levied a lay
if such a moot there be, will be a queer little assembly, the manorial court, if
such a court there be, will not have much to do. These men can not have
many communal affairs; there will be no great scope for dooms or for by-
laws; they may well take all their disputes into the hundred court, especially
in Devonshire where the hundreds are small. Thus of the visible vill of the
eleventh century and its material surroundings we may form a wrong
notion. Often enough in the west its common fields (if common fields it
had) were not wide fields; the men who had shares therein were few and
belonged to various classes. Thus of two villages in Gloucestershire,
Brookthorpe and Harescombe, all that we can read is that in Brostrop there
were two teams, one villanus, three bordarii, four servi, while in
Hersecome there were two teams, two bordarii and five servi[53]. Many a
Devonshire township can produce but two or three teams. Often enough our
‘village community’ will be a heterogeneous little group whose main capital
consists of some 300 acres of arable land and some 20 beasts of the plough.
On the other hand, we must be careful not to omit
Importance of the east.
from our view the rich and thickly populated shires
or to imagine or to speak as though we imagined that
a general theory of English history can neglect the East of England. If we
leave Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Suffolk out of account we are to all
appearance leaving out of account not much less than a quarter of the whole
nation[54]. Let us make three groups of counties: (1) a South-Western group
containing Devon, Somerset, Dorset and Wiltshire: (2) a Mid-Western
group containing the shires of Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Salop,
Stafford and Warwick: (3) an Eastern group containing Lincolnshire,
Norfolk and Suffolk. The first of these groups has the largest; the third the
smallest acreage. In Domesday Book, however, the figures which state their
population seem to be these[55]:—
South-Western Group: 49,155
Mid-Western Group: 33,191
Eastern Group: 72,883
These figures are so emphatic that they may cause us for a moment to doubt
their value, and on details we must lay no stress. But we have materials
which enable us to check the general effect. In 1297 Edward I. levied a lay
Page 48
subsidy of a ninth[56]. The sums borne by our three groups of counties were
these:—
South-Western Group: 4,038
Mid-Western Group: 3,514
Eastern Group: 7,329
There is a curious resemblance between these two sets of figures. Then in
1377 and 1381 returns were made for a poll-tax[57]. The number of polls
returned in our three groups were these:—
1377 1381
South-Western Group: 183,842 106,086
Mid-Western Group: 158,245 115,679
Eastern Group: 255,498 182,830
No doubt all inferences drawn from medieval statistics are exceedingly
precarious; but, unless a good many figures have conspired to deceive us,
Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Suffolk were at the time of the Conquest and for
three centuries afterwards vastly richer and more populous than any tract of
equal area in the West.
Another distinction between the eastern counties and
Manorial and non-
the rest of England is apparent. In many shires we manorial vills.
shall find that the name of each vill is mentioned
once and no more. This is so because the land of
each vill belongs in its entirety to some one tenant in chief. We may go
further: we may say, though at present in an untechnical sense, that each vill
is a manor. Such is the general rule, though there will be exceptions to it.
On the other hand, in the eastern counties this rule will become the
exception. For example, of the fourteen vills in the Armingford hundred of
Cambridgeshire there is but one of which it is true that the whole of its land
is held by a single tenant in chief. In this county it is common to find that
three or four Norman lords hold land in the same vill. This seems true not
only of Cambridgeshire but also of Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Lincoln,
Nottingham, Derby, and some parts of Yorkshire. Even in other districts of
England the rule that each vill has a single lord is by no means unbroken in
these:—
South-Western Group: 4,038
Mid-Western Group: 3,514
Eastern Group: 7,329
There is a curious resemblance between these two sets of figures. Then in
1377 and 1381 returns were made for a poll-tax[57]. The number of polls
returned in our three groups were these:—
1377 1381
South-Western Group: 183,842 106,086
Mid-Western Group: 158,245 115,679
Eastern Group: 255,498 182,830
No doubt all inferences drawn from medieval statistics are exceedingly
precarious; but, unless a good many figures have conspired to deceive us,
Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Suffolk were at the time of the Conquest and for
three centuries afterwards vastly richer and more populous than any tract of
equal area in the West.
Another distinction between the eastern counties and
Manorial and non-
the rest of England is apparent. In many shires we manorial vills.
shall find that the name of each vill is mentioned
once and no more. This is so because the land of
each vill belongs in its entirety to some one tenant in chief. We may go
further: we may say, though at present in an untechnical sense, that each vill
is a manor. Such is the general rule, though there will be exceptions to it.
On the other hand, in the eastern counties this rule will become the
exception. For example, of the fourteen vills in the Armingford hundred of
Cambridgeshire there is but one of which it is true that the whole of its land
is held by a single tenant in chief. In this county it is common to find that
three or four Norman lords hold land in the same vill. This seems true not
only of Cambridgeshire but also of Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Lincoln,
Nottingham, Derby, and some parts of Yorkshire. Even in other districts of
England the rule that each vill has a single lord is by no means unbroken in
Page 49
the Conqueror’s day and we can see that there were many exceptions to it in
the Confessor’s. A careful examination of all England vill by vill would
perhaps show that the contrast which we are noting is neither so sharp nor
so ancient as at first sight it seems to be: nevertheless it exists.
A better known contrast there is. The eastern
The distribution of free
counties are the home of liberty[58]. We may divide men and serfs.
the tillers of the soil into five great classes; these in
order of dignity and freedom are (1) liberi homines,
(2) sochemanni, (3) villani, (4) bordarii, cotarii etc., (5) servi. The two first
of these classes are to be found in large numbers only in Norfolk, Suffolk,
Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire. We
shall hereafter see that Cambridgeshire also has been full of sokemen,
though since the Conquest they have fallen from their high estate. On the
other hand, the number of servi increases pretty steadily as we cross the
country from east to west. It reaches its maximum in Cornwall and
Gloucestershire; it is very low in Norfolk, Suffolk, Derby, Leicester,
Middlesex, Sussex; it descends to zero in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire. This
descent to zero may fairly warn us that the terms with which we are dealing
may not bear precisely the same meaning in all parts of England, or that a
small class is apt to be reckoned as forming part of a larger class. But still it
is clear enough that some of these terms are used with care and express real
and important distinctions.
Of this we are assured by a document which seems
The classification of
to reproduce the wording of the instructions which men.
defined the duty of at least one party of royal
commissioners[59]. We are about to speak of the
mode in which the occupants of the soil are classified by Domesday Book,
and therefore this document deserves our best attention. It runs thus:—The
King’s barons inquired by the oath of the sheriff of the shire and of all the
barons and of their Frenchmen and of the whole hundred, the priest, reeve
and six villani of every vill, how the mansion (mansio) is called, who held it
in the time of King Edward, who holds it now, how many hides, how many
plough-teams on the demesne, how many plough-teams of the men, how
many villani, how many cotarii, how many servi, how many liberi homines,
how many sochemanni, how much wood, how much meadow, how much
pasture, how many mills, how many fisheries, how much has been taken
the Confessor’s. A careful examination of all England vill by vill would
perhaps show that the contrast which we are noting is neither so sharp nor
so ancient as at first sight it seems to be: nevertheless it exists.
A better known contrast there is. The eastern
The distribution of free
counties are the home of liberty[58]. We may divide men and serfs.
the tillers of the soil into five great classes; these in
order of dignity and freedom are (1) liberi homines,
(2) sochemanni, (3) villani, (4) bordarii, cotarii etc., (5) servi. The two first
of these classes are to be found in large numbers only in Norfolk, Suffolk,
Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire. We
shall hereafter see that Cambridgeshire also has been full of sokemen,
though since the Conquest they have fallen from their high estate. On the
other hand, the number of servi increases pretty steadily as we cross the
country from east to west. It reaches its maximum in Cornwall and
Gloucestershire; it is very low in Norfolk, Suffolk, Derby, Leicester,
Middlesex, Sussex; it descends to zero in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire. This
descent to zero may fairly warn us that the terms with which we are dealing
may not bear precisely the same meaning in all parts of England, or that a
small class is apt to be reckoned as forming part of a larger class. But still it
is clear enough that some of these terms are used with care and express real
and important distinctions.
Of this we are assured by a document which seems
The classification of
to reproduce the wording of the instructions which men.
defined the duty of at least one party of royal
commissioners[59]. We are about to speak of the
mode in which the occupants of the soil are classified by Domesday Book,
and therefore this document deserves our best attention. It runs thus:—The
King’s barons inquired by the oath of the sheriff of the shire and of all the
barons and of their Frenchmen and of the whole hundred, the priest, reeve
and six villani of every vill, how the mansion (mansio) is called, who held it
in the time of King Edward, who holds it now, how many hides, how many
plough-teams on the demesne, how many plough-teams of the men, how
many villani, how many cotarii, how many servi, how many liberi homines,
how many sochemanni, how much wood, how much meadow, how much
pasture, how many mills, how many fisheries, how much has been taken
Page 50
away therefrom, how much added thereto, and how much there is now, how
much each liber homo and sochemannus had and has:—All this thrice over,
to wit as regards the time of King Edward, the time when King William
gave it, and the present time, and whether more can be had thence than is
had now[60].
Five classes of men are mentioned and they are
Basis of classification.
mentioned in an order that is extremely curious:—
villani, cotarii, servi, liberi homines, sochemanni. It
descends three steps, then it leaps from the very bottom of the scale to the
very top and thence it descends one step. A parody of it might speak of the
rural population of modern England as consisting of large farmers, small
farmers, cottagers, great landlords, small landlords. But a little
consideration will convince us that beneath this apparent caprice there lies
some legal principle. We shall observe that these five species of tenants are
grouped into two genera. The king wants to know how much each liber
homo, how much each sochemannus holds; he does not want to know how
much each villanus, each cotarius, each servus holds. Connecting this with
the main object of the whole survey, we shall probably be brought to the
guess that between the sokeman and the villein there is some broad
distinction which concerns the king as the recipient of geld. May it not be
this:—the villein’s lord is answerable for the geld due from the land that the
villein holds, the sokeman’s lord is not answerable, at least he is not
answerable as principal debtor for the geld due from the land that the
sokeman holds? If this be so, the order in which the five classes of men are
mentioned will not seem unnatural. It proceeds outwards from the lord and
his mansio. First it mentions the persons seated on land for the geld of
which he is responsible, and them it arranges in an ‘order of merit.’ Then it
turns to persons who, though in some way or another connected with the
lord and his mansio, are themselves tax-payers, and concerning them the
commissioners are to inquire how much each of them holds. Of course we
can not say that this theory is proved by the statement that lies before us;
but it is suggested by that statement and may for a while serve us as a
working hypothesis. If this theory be sound, then we have here a distinction
of the utmost importance. For one mighty purpose, the purpose that is
uppermost in King William’s mind, the villanus is not a landowner, his lord
is the landowner; on the other hand the sochemannus is a landowner, and is
much each liber homo and sochemannus had and has:—All this thrice over,
to wit as regards the time of King Edward, the time when King William
gave it, and the present time, and whether more can be had thence than is
had now[60].
Five classes of men are mentioned and they are
Basis of classification.
mentioned in an order that is extremely curious:—
villani, cotarii, servi, liberi homines, sochemanni. It
descends three steps, then it leaps from the very bottom of the scale to the
very top and thence it descends one step. A parody of it might speak of the
rural population of modern England as consisting of large farmers, small
farmers, cottagers, great landlords, small landlords. But a little
consideration will convince us that beneath this apparent caprice there lies
some legal principle. We shall observe that these five species of tenants are
grouped into two genera. The king wants to know how much each liber
homo, how much each sochemannus holds; he does not want to know how
much each villanus, each cotarius, each servus holds. Connecting this with
the main object of the whole survey, we shall probably be brought to the
guess that between the sokeman and the villein there is some broad
distinction which concerns the king as the recipient of geld. May it not be
this:—the villein’s lord is answerable for the geld due from the land that the
villein holds, the sokeman’s lord is not answerable, at least he is not
answerable as principal debtor for the geld due from the land that the
sokeman holds? If this be so, the order in which the five classes of men are
mentioned will not seem unnatural. It proceeds outwards from the lord and
his mansio. First it mentions the persons seated on land for the geld of
which he is responsible, and them it arranges in an ‘order of merit.’ Then it
turns to persons who, though in some way or another connected with the
lord and his mansio, are themselves tax-payers, and concerning them the
commissioners are to inquire how much each of them holds. Of course we
can not say that this theory is proved by the statement that lies before us;
but it is suggested by that statement and may for a while serve us as a
working hypothesis. If this theory be sound, then we have here a distinction
of the utmost importance. For one mighty purpose, the purpose that is
uppermost in King William’s mind, the villanus is not a landowner, his lord
is the landowner; on the other hand the sochemannus is a landowner, and is
Page 51
taxed as such. We are not saying that this is a purely fiscal distinction. In
legal logic the lord’s liability for the geld that is apportioned on the land
occupied by his villeins may be rather an effect than a cause. A lawyer
might argue that the lord must pay because the occupier is his villanus, not
that the occupier is a villanus because the lord pays. And yet, as we may
often see in legal history, there will be action and reaction between cause
and effect. The geld is no trifle. Levied at that rate of six shillings on the
hide at which King William has just now levied it, it is a momentous force
capable of depressing and displacing whole classes of men. In 1086 this tax
is so much in everybody’s mind that any distinction as to its incidence will
cut deeply into the body of the law.
Now this classification of men we will take as the
Our course.
starting point for our enterprise. If we could define
the liber homo, sochemannus, villanus, cotarius,
servus, we should have solved some of the great legal problems of
Domesday Book, for by the way we should have had to define two other
difficult terms, namely manerium and soca. It would then remain that we
should say something of the higher strata of society, of earls and sheriffs, of
barons, knights, thegns and their tenures, of such terms as alodium and
feudum, of the general theory of landownership or landholdership. We will
begin with the lowest order of men, with the servi, and thence work our
way upwards. But our course can not be straightforward. There are so many
terms to be explained that sometimes we shall be compelled to leave a
question but partially answered while we are endeavouring to find a partial
answer for some yet more difficult question.
legal logic the lord’s liability for the geld that is apportioned on the land
occupied by his villeins may be rather an effect than a cause. A lawyer
might argue that the lord must pay because the occupier is his villanus, not
that the occupier is a villanus because the lord pays. And yet, as we may
often see in legal history, there will be action and reaction between cause
and effect. The geld is no trifle. Levied at that rate of six shillings on the
hide at which King William has just now levied it, it is a momentous force
capable of depressing and displacing whole classes of men. In 1086 this tax
is so much in everybody’s mind that any distinction as to its incidence will
cut deeply into the body of the law.
Now this classification of men we will take as the
Our course.
starting point for our enterprise. If we could define
the liber homo, sochemannus, villanus, cotarius,
servus, we should have solved some of the great legal problems of
Domesday Book, for by the way we should have had to define two other
difficult terms, namely manerium and soca. It would then remain that we
should say something of the higher strata of society, of earls and sheriffs, of
barons, knights, thegns and their tenures, of such terms as alodium and
feudum, of the general theory of landownership or landholdership. We will
begin with the lowest order of men, with the servi, and thence work our
way upwards. But our course can not be straightforward. There are so many
terms to be explained that sometimes we shall be compelled to leave a
question but partially answered while we are endeavouring to find a partial
answer for some yet more difficult question.
Page 52
Page 53
§ 2. The Serfs.
The existence of some 25,000 serfs is recorded. In
The serfs in Domesday
the thirteenth century servus and villanus are, at least Book.
among lawyers, equivalent words. The only unfree
man is the ‘serf-villein’ and the lawyers are trying to
subject him to the curious principle that he is the lord’s chattel but a free
man in relation to all but his lord[61]. It is far otherwise in Domesday Book.
In entry after entry and county after county the servi are kept well apart
from the villani, bordarii, cotarii. Often they are mentioned in quite another
context to that in which the villani are enumerated. As an instance we may
take a manor in Surrey[62]:—‘In demesne there are 5 teams and there are 25
villani and 6 bordarii with 14 teams. There is one mill of 2 shillings and
one fishery and one church and 4 acres of meadow, and wood for 150
pannage pigs, and 2 stone-quarries of 2 shillings and 2 nests of hawks in the
wood and 10 servi.’ Often enough the servi are placed between two other
sources of wealth, the church and the mill. In some counties they seem to
take precedence over the villani; the common formula is ‘In dominio sunt a
carucae et b servi et c villani et d bordarii cum e carucis.’ But this is
delusive; the formula is bringing the servi into connexion with the demesne
teams and separating them from the teams of the tenants. We must render it
thus—‘On the demesne there are a teams and b servi; and there are c villani
and d bordarii with e teams.’ Still we seem to see a gently graduated scale
of social classes, villani, bordarii, cotarii, servi, and while the jurors of one
county will arrange them in one fashion, the jurors of another county may
adopt a different scheme. Thus in their classification of mankind the jurors
will sometimes lay great stress on the possession of plough oxen. In
Hertfordshire we read:—‘There are 6 teams in demesne and 41 villani and
17 bordarii have 20 teams ... there are 22 cotarii and 12 servi[63].’—‘The
priest, 13 villani and 4 bordarii have 6 teams ... there are two cotarii and 4
servi[64].’—‘The priest and 24 villani have 13 teams ... there are 12
bordarii, 16 cotarii and 11 servi[65].’ A division is in this instance made
between the people who have oxen and the people who have none; villani
The existence of some 25,000 serfs is recorded. In
The serfs in Domesday
the thirteenth century servus and villanus are, at least Book.
among lawyers, equivalent words. The only unfree
man is the ‘serf-villein’ and the lawyers are trying to
subject him to the curious principle that he is the lord’s chattel but a free
man in relation to all but his lord[61]. It is far otherwise in Domesday Book.
In entry after entry and county after county the servi are kept well apart
from the villani, bordarii, cotarii. Often they are mentioned in quite another
context to that in which the villani are enumerated. As an instance we may
take a manor in Surrey[62]:—‘In demesne there are 5 teams and there are 25
villani and 6 bordarii with 14 teams. There is one mill of 2 shillings and
one fishery and one church and 4 acres of meadow, and wood for 150
pannage pigs, and 2 stone-quarries of 2 shillings and 2 nests of hawks in the
wood and 10 servi.’ Often enough the servi are placed between two other
sources of wealth, the church and the mill. In some counties they seem to
take precedence over the villani; the common formula is ‘In dominio sunt a
carucae et b servi et c villani et d bordarii cum e carucis.’ But this is
delusive; the formula is bringing the servi into connexion with the demesne
teams and separating them from the teams of the tenants. We must render it
thus—‘On the demesne there are a teams and b servi; and there are c villani
and d bordarii with e teams.’ Still we seem to see a gently graduated scale
of social classes, villani, bordarii, cotarii, servi, and while the jurors of one
county will arrange them in one fashion, the jurors of another county may
adopt a different scheme. Thus in their classification of mankind the jurors
will sometimes lay great stress on the possession of plough oxen. In
Hertfordshire we read:—‘There are 6 teams in demesne and 41 villani and
17 bordarii have 20 teams ... there are 22 cotarii and 12 servi[63].’—‘The
priest, 13 villani and 4 bordarii have 6 teams ... there are two cotarii and 4
servi[64].’—‘The priest and 24 villani have 13 teams ... there are 12
bordarii, 16 cotarii and 11 servi[65].’ A division is in this instance made
between the people who have oxen and the people who have none; villani
Page 54
have oxen, cotarii and servi have none; sometimes the bordarii stand above
this line, sometimes below it.
Of the legal position of the servus Domesday Book
Legal position of the
tells us little or nothing; but earlier and later serf.
documents oblige us to think of him as a slave, one
who in the main has no legal rights. He is the theów
of the Anglo-Saxon dooms, the servus of the ecclesiastical canons. But
though we do right in calling him a slave, still we might well be mistaken
were we to think of the line which divides him from other men as being as
sharp as the line which a mature jurisprudence will draw between thing and
person. We may well doubt whether this principle—‘The slave is a thing,
not a person’—can be fully understood by a grossly barbarous age. It
implies the idea of a person, and in the world of sense we find not persons
but men.
Thus degrees of servility are possible. A class may
Degrees of serfdom.
stand, as it were, half-way between the class of
slaves and the class of free men. The Kentish law of
the seventh century as it appears in the dooms of Æthelbert[66], like many of
its continental sisters, knows a class of men who perhaps are not free men
and yet are not slaves; it knows the læt as well as the theów. From what race
the Kentish læt has sprung, and how, when it comes to details, the law will
treat him—these are obscure questions, and the latter of them can not be
answered unless we apply to him what is written about the laeti, liti and lidi
of the continent. He is thus far a person that he has a small wergild but
possibly he is bound to the soil. Only in Æthelbert’s dooms do we read of
him. From later days, until Domesday Book breaks the silence, we do not
obtain any definite evidence of the existence of any class of men who are
not slaves but none the less are tied to the land. Of men who are bound to
do heavy labour services for their lords we do hear, but we do not hear that
if they run away they can be captured and brought back. As we shall see by
and by, Domesday Book bears witness to the existence of a class of buri,
burs, coliberti, who seem to be distinctly superior to the servi, but distinctly
inferior to the villeins, bordiers and cottiers. It is by no means impossible
that they, without being slaves, are in a very proper and intelligible sense
unfree men, that they have civil rights which they can assert in courts of
law, but that they are tied to the soil. The gulf between the seventh and the
this line, sometimes below it.
Of the legal position of the servus Domesday Book
Legal position of the
tells us little or nothing; but earlier and later serf.
documents oblige us to think of him as a slave, one
who in the main has no legal rights. He is the theów
of the Anglo-Saxon dooms, the servus of the ecclesiastical canons. But
though we do right in calling him a slave, still we might well be mistaken
were we to think of the line which divides him from other men as being as
sharp as the line which a mature jurisprudence will draw between thing and
person. We may well doubt whether this principle—‘The slave is a thing,
not a person’—can be fully understood by a grossly barbarous age. It
implies the idea of a person, and in the world of sense we find not persons
but men.
Thus degrees of servility are possible. A class may
Degrees of serfdom.
stand, as it were, half-way between the class of
slaves and the class of free men. The Kentish law of
the seventh century as it appears in the dooms of Æthelbert[66], like many of
its continental sisters, knows a class of men who perhaps are not free men
and yet are not slaves; it knows the læt as well as the theów. From what race
the Kentish læt has sprung, and how, when it comes to details, the law will
treat him—these are obscure questions, and the latter of them can not be
answered unless we apply to him what is written about the laeti, liti and lidi
of the continent. He is thus far a person that he has a small wergild but
possibly he is bound to the soil. Only in Æthelbert’s dooms do we read of
him. From later days, until Domesday Book breaks the silence, we do not
obtain any definite evidence of the existence of any class of men who are
not slaves but none the less are tied to the land. Of men who are bound to
do heavy labour services for their lords we do hear, but we do not hear that
if they run away they can be captured and brought back. As we shall see by
and by, Domesday Book bears witness to the existence of a class of buri,
burs, coliberti, who seem to be distinctly superior to the servi, but distinctly
inferior to the villeins, bordiers and cottiers. It is by no means impossible
that they, without being slaves, are in a very proper and intelligible sense
unfree men, that they have civil rights which they can assert in courts of
law, but that they are tied to the soil. The gulf between the seventh and the
Page 55
eleventh centuries is too wide to allow of our connecting them with the læt
of Æthelbert’s laws, but still our documents are not exhaustive enough to
justify us in denying that all along there has been a class (though it can
hardly have been a large class) of men who could not quit their tenements
and yet were no slaves. As we shall see hereafter, liberty was in certain
contexts reckoned a matter of degree; even the villanus, even the
sochemannus was not for every purpose liber homo. When this is so, the
theów or servus is like to appear as the unfreest of persons rather than as no
person but a thing.
In the second place, we may guess that from a
Prædial element in
remote time there has been in the condition of the serfage.
theów a certain element of praediality. The slaves
have not been worked in gangs nor housed in
barracks[67]. The servus has often been a servus casatus, he has had a
cottage or even a manse and yardland which de facto he might call his own.
There is here no legal limitation of his master’s power. Some slave trade
there has been; but on the whole it seems probable that the theów has been
usually treated as annexed to a tenement. The duties exacted of him from
year to year have remained constant. The consequence is that a free man in
return for a plot of land may well agree to do all that a theów usually does
and see in this no descent into slavery. Thus the slave gets a chance of
acquiring what will be as a matter of fact a peculium. In the seventh century
the church tried to turn this matter of fact into matter of law. ‘Non licet
homini,’ says Theodore’s Penitential, ‘a servo tollere pecuniam, quam ipse
labore suo adquesierit[68].’ We have no reason for thinking that this effort
was very strenuous or very successful, or that the law of the eleventh
century allowed the servus any proprietary rights; and yet he might often be
the occupier of land and of chattels with which, so long as he did his
customary services, his lord would seldom meddle.
In the third place, we may believe that for some time
The serf in criminal law.
past police law and punitive law have been doing
something to conceal, if not to obliterate, the line
which separates the slave from other men. A mature jurisprudence may be
able to hold fast the fundamental principle that a slave is not a person but a
thing, while at the same time it both limits the master’s power of abusing
his human chattel and guards against those dangers which may arise from
of Æthelbert’s laws, but still our documents are not exhaustive enough to
justify us in denying that all along there has been a class (though it can
hardly have been a large class) of men who could not quit their tenements
and yet were no slaves. As we shall see hereafter, liberty was in certain
contexts reckoned a matter of degree; even the villanus, even the
sochemannus was not for every purpose liber homo. When this is so, the
theów or servus is like to appear as the unfreest of persons rather than as no
person but a thing.
In the second place, we may guess that from a
Prædial element in
remote time there has been in the condition of the serfage.
theów a certain element of praediality. The slaves
have not been worked in gangs nor housed in
barracks[67]. The servus has often been a servus casatus, he has had a
cottage or even a manse and yardland which de facto he might call his own.
There is here no legal limitation of his master’s power. Some slave trade
there has been; but on the whole it seems probable that the theów has been
usually treated as annexed to a tenement. The duties exacted of him from
year to year have remained constant. The consequence is that a free man in
return for a plot of land may well agree to do all that a theów usually does
and see in this no descent into slavery. Thus the slave gets a chance of
acquiring what will be as a matter of fact a peculium. In the seventh century
the church tried to turn this matter of fact into matter of law. ‘Non licet
homini,’ says Theodore’s Penitential, ‘a servo tollere pecuniam, quam ipse
labore suo adquesierit[68].’ We have no reason for thinking that this effort
was very strenuous or very successful, or that the law of the eleventh
century allowed the servus any proprietary rights; and yet he might often be
the occupier of land and of chattels with which, so long as he did his
customary services, his lord would seldom meddle.
In the third place, we may believe that for some time
The serf in criminal law.
past police law and punitive law have been doing
something to conceal, if not to obliterate, the line
which separates the slave from other men. A mature jurisprudence may be
able to hold fast the fundamental principle that a slave is not a person but a
thing, while at the same time it both limits the master’s power of abusing
his human chattel and guards against those dangers which may arise from
Page 56
the existence of things which have wills, and sometimes bad wills, of their
own. But an immature jurisprudence is incapable of this exploit. It begins to
play fast and loose with its elementary notions. It begins to punish the
criminous slave without being quite certain as to how far it is punishing him
and how far it is punishing his master. Confusion is easy, for if the slave be
punished by death or mutilation, his master will suffer, and a pecuniary
mulct exacted from the slave is exacted from his master. Learned writers
have come to the most opposite opinions as to the extent to which the
Anglo-Saxon dooms by their distribution of penalties recognize the
personality of the theów. But this is not all. For a long time past the law has
had before it the difficult problem of dealing with crimes and delicts
committed by poor and economically dependent free men, men who have
no land of their own, who are here to-day and gone to-morrow, ‘men from
whom no right can be had.’ It has been endeavouring to make the lords
answerable to a certain extent for the misdeeds of their free retainers. If a
slave is charged with a crime his master is bound to produce him in court.
But the law requires that the lord shall in very similar fashion produce his
free ‘loaf eater,’ his mainpast, nay, it has been endeavouring to enforce the
rule that every free man who has no land of his own shall have a lord bound
to produce him when he is accused. Also it has been fostering the growth of
private justice. The lord’s duty of producing his men, bond and free, has
been becoming the duty of holding a court in which his men, free and bond,
will answer for themselves. How far this process had gone in the days of the
Confessor is a question to which we shall return[69].
For all this however, we may say with certainty that
Serf and villein.
in the eleventh century the servi were marked off
from all other men by definite legal lines. What is
more, we may say that every man who was not a theów was in some
definite legal sense a free man. This sharp contrast is put before us by the
laws of Cnut as well as by those of his predecessors. If a freeman works on
a holiday, he pays for it with his healsfang; if a theówman does the like, he
pays for it with his hide or his hide-geld[70]. Equally sharp is the same
distinction in the Leges Henrici, and this too in passages which, so far as we
know, are not borrowed from Anglo-Saxon documents. For many purposes
‘aut servus aut liber homo’ is a perfect dilemma. There is no confusion
whatever between the villani and the servi. The villani are ‘viles et inopes
own. But an immature jurisprudence is incapable of this exploit. It begins to
play fast and loose with its elementary notions. It begins to punish the
criminous slave without being quite certain as to how far it is punishing him
and how far it is punishing his master. Confusion is easy, for if the slave be
punished by death or mutilation, his master will suffer, and a pecuniary
mulct exacted from the slave is exacted from his master. Learned writers
have come to the most opposite opinions as to the extent to which the
Anglo-Saxon dooms by their distribution of penalties recognize the
personality of the theów. But this is not all. For a long time past the law has
had before it the difficult problem of dealing with crimes and delicts
committed by poor and economically dependent free men, men who have
no land of their own, who are here to-day and gone to-morrow, ‘men from
whom no right can be had.’ It has been endeavouring to make the lords
answerable to a certain extent for the misdeeds of their free retainers. If a
slave is charged with a crime his master is bound to produce him in court.
But the law requires that the lord shall in very similar fashion produce his
free ‘loaf eater,’ his mainpast, nay, it has been endeavouring to enforce the
rule that every free man who has no land of his own shall have a lord bound
to produce him when he is accused. Also it has been fostering the growth of
private justice. The lord’s duty of producing his men, bond and free, has
been becoming the duty of holding a court in which his men, free and bond,
will answer for themselves. How far this process had gone in the days of the
Confessor is a question to which we shall return[69].
For all this however, we may say with certainty that
Serf and villein.
in the eleventh century the servi were marked off
from all other men by definite legal lines. What is
more, we may say that every man who was not a theów was in some
definite legal sense a free man. This sharp contrast is put before us by the
laws of Cnut as well as by those of his predecessors. If a freeman works on
a holiday, he pays for it with his healsfang; if a theówman does the like, he
pays for it with his hide or his hide-geld[70]. Equally sharp is the same
distinction in the Leges Henrici, and this too in passages which, so far as we
know, are not borrowed from Anglo-Saxon documents. For many purposes
‘aut servus aut liber homo’ is a perfect dilemma. There is no confusion
whatever between the villani and the servi. The villani are ‘viles et inopes
Page 57
personae’ but clearly enough they are liberi homines. So also in the
Quadripartitus, the Latin translation of the ancient dooms made in Henry
I.’s reign, there is no confusion about this matter; the theówman becomes a
servus, while villanus is the equivalent for ceorl. The Norman writers still
tell how according to the old law of the English the villanus might become
a thegn if he acquired five hides of land[71]; at times they will put before us
villani and thaini or even villani and barones as an exhaustive classification
of free men[72].
Let us learn what may be learnt of the servus from
The serf of the Leges.
theLeges Henrici. Every man is either a liber homo
or a servus[73]. Free men are either two-hundred-men
or twelve-hundred-men; perhaps we ought to add that there is also a class of
six-hundred-men[74]. A serf becomes such either by birth or by some event,
such as a sale into slavery, that happens in his lifetime[75]. Servile blood is
transmitted from father to child; some lords hold that it is also transmitted
by mother to child[76]. If a slave is to be freed this should be done publicly,
in court, or church or market, and lance and helmet or other the arms of free
men should be given him, while he should give his lord thirty pence, that is
the price of his skin, as a sign that he is henceforth ‘worthy of his hide.’ On
the other hand, when a free man falls into slavery then also there should be
a public ceremony. He should put his head between his lord’s hands and
should receive as the arms of slavery some bill-hook or the like[77]. Public
ceremonies are requisite, for the state is endangered by the uncertain
condition of accused criminals; the lords will assert at one moment that
their men are free and at the next moment that these same men are
slaves[78]. The descent of a free man into slavery is treated as no uncommon
event; the slave may well have free kinsfolk[79]. But, to come to the
fundamental rule, the villanus, the meanest of free men, is a two-hundred-
man, that is to say, if he be slain the very substantial wergild of 200 Saxon
shillings or £4 must be paid to his kinsfolk[80], while a man-bót of 30
shillings is paid to his lord[81]. But if a servus be slain his kinsfolk receive
the comparatively trifling sum of 40 pence while the lord gets the man-bót
of 20 shillings[82]. That the serf’s kinsfolk should receive a small sum need
not surprise us. Germanic law has never found it easy to carry the principle
that the slave is a chattel to extreme conclusions; but the payment seems
trifling and half contemptuous; at any rate the life of the villein is worth the
Quadripartitus, the Latin translation of the ancient dooms made in Henry
I.’s reign, there is no confusion about this matter; the theówman becomes a
servus, while villanus is the equivalent for ceorl. The Norman writers still
tell how according to the old law of the English the villanus might become
a thegn if he acquired five hides of land[71]; at times they will put before us
villani and thaini or even villani and barones as an exhaustive classification
of free men[72].
Let us learn what may be learnt of the servus from
The serf of the Leges.
theLeges Henrici. Every man is either a liber homo
or a servus[73]. Free men are either two-hundred-men
or twelve-hundred-men; perhaps we ought to add that there is also a class of
six-hundred-men[74]. A serf becomes such either by birth or by some event,
such as a sale into slavery, that happens in his lifetime[75]. Servile blood is
transmitted from father to child; some lords hold that it is also transmitted
by mother to child[76]. If a slave is to be freed this should be done publicly,
in court, or church or market, and lance and helmet or other the arms of free
men should be given him, while he should give his lord thirty pence, that is
the price of his skin, as a sign that he is henceforth ‘worthy of his hide.’ On
the other hand, when a free man falls into slavery then also there should be
a public ceremony. He should put his head between his lord’s hands and
should receive as the arms of slavery some bill-hook or the like[77]. Public
ceremonies are requisite, for the state is endangered by the uncertain
condition of accused criminals; the lords will assert at one moment that
their men are free and at the next moment that these same men are
slaves[78]. The descent of a free man into slavery is treated as no uncommon
event; the slave may well have free kinsfolk[79]. But, to come to the
fundamental rule, the villanus, the meanest of free men, is a two-hundred-
man, that is to say, if he be slain the very substantial wergild of 200 Saxon
shillings or £4 must be paid to his kinsfolk[80], while a man-bót of 30
shillings is paid to his lord[81]. But if a servus be slain his kinsfolk receive
the comparatively trifling sum of 40 pence while the lord gets the man-bót
of 20 shillings[82]. That the serf’s kinsfolk should receive a small sum need
not surprise us. Germanic law has never found it easy to carry the principle
that the slave is a chattel to extreme conclusions; but the payment seems
trifling and half contemptuous; at any rate the life of the villein is worth the
Page 58
life of twenty-four serfs[83]. Then again, it is by no means certain that a lord
can not kill his serf with impunity. ‘If,’ says our text, ‘a man slay his own
serf, his is the sin and his is the loss’:—we may interpret this to mean that
he has sinned but sinned against himself[84]. Then again, for the evil deeds
of his slave the master is in some degree responsible. If my slave be guilty
of a petty theft not worthy of death, I am bound to make restitution; if the
crime be a capital one and he be taken handhaving, then he must ‘die like a
free man[85].’ If my slave be guilty of homicide, my duty is to set him free
and hand him over to the kindred of the slain, but apparently I may
purchase his life by a sum of 40 shillings, a sum much less than the wer of
the slain man[86]. We must not be too hard on the owners of delinquent
slaves. There are cases, for example, in which, several slaves having
committed a crime, one of them chosen by lot must suffer for the sins of
all[87]. Our author is borrowing from the laws of several different centuries
and does not arrive at any neat result; nor must we wonder at this, for the
problems presented to jurisprudence by the crimes and delicts of slaves are
very intricate. Then again, we have the rule that if free men and serfs join in
a crime, the whole guilt is to be attributed to the free: he who joins with a
slave in a theft has no companion[88]. On the whole, though the slave is
likely to have as a matter of fact a peculium of his own, a peculium out of
which he may be able to pay for his offences and even perhaps to purchase
his liberty[89], the servus of our Leges seems to be in the main a rightless
being. We look in vain for any trace of that idea of the relativity of servitude
which becomes the core of Bracton’s doctrine[90]. At the same time we
observe that many, perhaps most, of the rules which mark the slavish
condition of the serf are ancient rules and rules that are becoming obsolete.
In the twelfth century the old system of wer and bót is already vanishing,
though an antiquarian lawyer may yet try to revivify it. When it disappears
altogether before the new law, which holds every grave crime to be a
felony, and punishes almost every felony with death[91], many grand
differences between the villein and the serf will have perished. The gallows
is a great leveller.
If now we recur to the days of the Conquest, we
Return to the servus of
cannot doubt that the law knew a definite class of Domesday.
slaves, and marked them off by many distinctions
from the villani and cotarii, and even from the
can not kill his serf with impunity. ‘If,’ says our text, ‘a man slay his own
serf, his is the sin and his is the loss’:—we may interpret this to mean that
he has sinned but sinned against himself[84]. Then again, for the evil deeds
of his slave the master is in some degree responsible. If my slave be guilty
of a petty theft not worthy of death, I am bound to make restitution; if the
crime be a capital one and he be taken handhaving, then he must ‘die like a
free man[85].’ If my slave be guilty of homicide, my duty is to set him free
and hand him over to the kindred of the slain, but apparently I may
purchase his life by a sum of 40 shillings, a sum much less than the wer of
the slain man[86]. We must not be too hard on the owners of delinquent
slaves. There are cases, for example, in which, several slaves having
committed a crime, one of them chosen by lot must suffer for the sins of
all[87]. Our author is borrowing from the laws of several different centuries
and does not arrive at any neat result; nor must we wonder at this, for the
problems presented to jurisprudence by the crimes and delicts of slaves are
very intricate. Then again, we have the rule that if free men and serfs join in
a crime, the whole guilt is to be attributed to the free: he who joins with a
slave in a theft has no companion[88]. On the whole, though the slave is
likely to have as a matter of fact a peculium of his own, a peculium out of
which he may be able to pay for his offences and even perhaps to purchase
his liberty[89], the servus of our Leges seems to be in the main a rightless
being. We look in vain for any trace of that idea of the relativity of servitude
which becomes the core of Bracton’s doctrine[90]. At the same time we
observe that many, perhaps most, of the rules which mark the slavish
condition of the serf are ancient rules and rules that are becoming obsolete.
In the twelfth century the old system of wer and bót is already vanishing,
though an antiquarian lawyer may yet try to revivify it. When it disappears
altogether before the new law, which holds every grave crime to be a
felony, and punishes almost every felony with death[91], many grand
differences between the villein and the serf will have perished. The gallows
is a great leveller.
If now we recur to the days of the Conquest, we
Return to the servus of
cannot doubt that the law knew a definite class of Domesday.
slaves, and marked them off by many distinctions
from the villani and cotarii, and even from the
Page 59
coliberti. Sums that seem high were being paid for men whose freedom was
being purchased[92]. At Lewes the toll paid for the sale of an ox was a
halfpenny; on the sale of a man it was fourpence[93]. In later documents we
may sometimes see a distinction well drawn. Thus in the Black Book of
Peterborough, compiled in 1127 or thereabouts, we may read how on one of
his manors the abbot has eight herdsmen (bovarii), how each of them holds
ten acres, has to do labour services and render loaves and poultry. And then
we read that each of them must pay one penny for his head if he be a free
man (liber homo), while he pays nothing if he be a servus[94]. This is a well-
drawn distinction. Of two men whose economic position is precisely the
same, the one may be free, the other a slave, and it is the free man, not the
slave, who has to pay a head-penny. Now when the Conqueror’s surveyors,
or rather the jurors, call a man a servus they are, so it seems to us, thinking
rather of his legal status than of his position in the economy of a manor. At
any rate we ought to observe that the economic stratification of society may
cut the legal stratification. We are accustomed perhaps to suppose that while
the villani have lands that are in some sense their own, while they support
themselves and their families by tilling those lands, the servus has no land
that is in any sense his own, but is fed at his lord’s board, is housed in his
lord’s court, and spends all his time in the cultivation of his lord’s demesne
lands. Such may have been the case in those parts of England where we
hear of but few servi; those few may have been inmates of the lord’s house
and have had no plots of their own. But such can hardly have been the case
in the south-western counties; the servi are too many to be menials. Indeed
it would seem that these servi sometimes had arable plots, and had oxen,
which were to be distinguished from the demesne oxen of their lords—not
indeed as a matter of law, but as a matter of economic usage[95]. It is plain
that the legal and the economic lines may intersect one another; the menial
who is fed by the lord and who must give his whole time to the lord’s work
may be a free man; the slave may have a cottage and oxen and a plot of
arable land, and labour for himself as well labouring for his lord. Hence a
perplexed and uncertain terminology:—the servus who has land and oxen
may be casually called a villanus[96], and we cannot be sure that no one
whom our record calls a servus has the wergild of a free man. Nor can we
be sure that the enumeration of the servi is always governed by one
consistent principle. In the shires of Gloucester, Hereford and Worcester we
read of numerous ancillae—in Worcestershire of 677 servi and 101
being purchased[92]. At Lewes the toll paid for the sale of an ox was a
halfpenny; on the sale of a man it was fourpence[93]. In later documents we
may sometimes see a distinction well drawn. Thus in the Black Book of
Peterborough, compiled in 1127 or thereabouts, we may read how on one of
his manors the abbot has eight herdsmen (bovarii), how each of them holds
ten acres, has to do labour services and render loaves and poultry. And then
we read that each of them must pay one penny for his head if he be a free
man (liber homo), while he pays nothing if he be a servus[94]. This is a well-
drawn distinction. Of two men whose economic position is precisely the
same, the one may be free, the other a slave, and it is the free man, not the
slave, who has to pay a head-penny. Now when the Conqueror’s surveyors,
or rather the jurors, call a man a servus they are, so it seems to us, thinking
rather of his legal status than of his position in the economy of a manor. At
any rate we ought to observe that the economic stratification of society may
cut the legal stratification. We are accustomed perhaps to suppose that while
the villani have lands that are in some sense their own, while they support
themselves and their families by tilling those lands, the servus has no land
that is in any sense his own, but is fed at his lord’s board, is housed in his
lord’s court, and spends all his time in the cultivation of his lord’s demesne
lands. Such may have been the case in those parts of England where we
hear of but few servi; those few may have been inmates of the lord’s house
and have had no plots of their own. But such can hardly have been the case
in the south-western counties; the servi are too many to be menials. Indeed
it would seem that these servi sometimes had arable plots, and had oxen,
which were to be distinguished from the demesne oxen of their lords—not
indeed as a matter of law, but as a matter of economic usage[95]. It is plain
that the legal and the economic lines may intersect one another; the menial
who is fed by the lord and who must give his whole time to the lord’s work
may be a free man; the slave may have a cottage and oxen and a plot of
arable land, and labour for himself as well labouring for his lord. Hence a
perplexed and uncertain terminology:—the servus who has land and oxen
may be casually called a villanus[96], and we cannot be sure that no one
whom our record calls a servus has the wergild of a free man. Nor can we
be sure that the enumeration of the servi is always governed by one
consistent principle. In the shires of Gloucester, Hereford and Worcester we
read of numerous ancillae—in Worcestershire of 677 servi and 101
Page 60
ancillae[97]—and this may make us think that in this district all the able-
bodied serfs are enumerated, whether or no they have cottages to
themselves[98]. We may strongly suspect that the king’s commissioners were
not much interested in the line that separated the villani from the servi,
since the lord was as directly answerable for the geld of any lands that were
in the occupation of his villeins as he was for the geld of those plots that
were tilled for him by his slaves. That there should have been never a theów
in all Yorkshire and Lincolnshire is hardly credible, and yet we hear of no
servi in those counties.
This being so, we encounter some difficulty if we
Disappearance of servi.
would put just the right interpretation on a
remarkable fact that is visible in Essex. The
description of that county tells us not only how many villani, bordarii and
servi there are now, but also how many there were in King Edward’s day,
and thus shows what changes have taken place during the last twenty years.
Now on manor after manor the number of villeins and bordiers, if of them
we make one class, has increased, while the number of servi has fallen. We
take 100 entries (four batches of 25 apiece) and see that the number of
villani and bordarii has risen from 1486 to 1894, while the number of servi
has fallen from 423 to 303. We make another experiment with a hundred
entries. This gives the following result:—
1066 1086
Villani 1273 1247
Bordarii 810 1241
Servi 384 312
This decrease in the number of servi seems to be pretty evenly distributed
throughout the county[99]. We shall not readily ascribe the change to any
mildheartedness of the lords. They are Frenchmen, and in all probability
they have got the most they could out of a mass of peasantry made
malleable and manageable by the Conquest. We may rather be entitled to
infer that there has been a considerable change in rural economy. For the
cultivation of his demesne land the lord begins to rely less and less on the
labour of serfs whom he feeds, more and more upon the labour of tenants
who have plots of their own and who feed themselves. From this again we
bodied serfs are enumerated, whether or no they have cottages to
themselves[98]. We may strongly suspect that the king’s commissioners were
not much interested in the line that separated the villani from the servi,
since the lord was as directly answerable for the geld of any lands that were
in the occupation of his villeins as he was for the geld of those plots that
were tilled for him by his slaves. That there should have been never a theów
in all Yorkshire and Lincolnshire is hardly credible, and yet we hear of no
servi in those counties.
This being so, we encounter some difficulty if we
Disappearance of servi.
would put just the right interpretation on a
remarkable fact that is visible in Essex. The
description of that county tells us not only how many villani, bordarii and
servi there are now, but also how many there were in King Edward’s day,
and thus shows what changes have taken place during the last twenty years.
Now on manor after manor the number of villeins and bordiers, if of them
we make one class, has increased, while the number of servi has fallen. We
take 100 entries (four batches of 25 apiece) and see that the number of
villani and bordarii has risen from 1486 to 1894, while the number of servi
has fallen from 423 to 303. We make another experiment with a hundred
entries. This gives the following result:—
1066 1086
Villani 1273 1247
Bordarii 810 1241
Servi 384 312
This decrease in the number of servi seems to be pretty evenly distributed
throughout the county[99]. We shall not readily ascribe the change to any
mildheartedness of the lords. They are Frenchmen, and in all probability
they have got the most they could out of a mass of peasantry made
malleable and manageable by the Conquest. We may rather be entitled to
infer that there has been a considerable change in rural economy. For the
cultivation of his demesne land the lord begins to rely less and less on the
labour of serfs whom he feeds, more and more upon the labour of tenants
who have plots of their own and who feed themselves. From this again we
Page 61
may perhaps infer that the labour services of the villani and bordarii are
being augmented. But at any rate it speaks ill of their fate, that under the
sway of foreigners, who may fairly be suspected of some harshness and
greed, their inferiors, the true servi, are somewhat rapidly disappearing.
However, it is by no means impossible that with a slavery so complete as
that of the English theów the Normans were not very familiar in their own
country[100].
being augmented. But at any rate it speaks ill of their fate, that under the
sway of foreigners, who may fairly be suspected of some harshness and
greed, their inferiors, the true servi, are somewhat rapidly disappearing.
However, it is by no means impossible that with a slavery so complete as
that of the English theów the Normans were not very familiar in their own
country[100].
Page 62
Page 63
§ 3. The Villeins.
Next above the servi we see the small but interesting
The boors or coliberts.
class of buri, burs or coliberti. Probably it was not
mentioned in the writ which set the commissioners
their task, and this may well be the reason why it appears as but a very
small class. It has some 900 members; still it is represented in fourteen
shires: Hampshire, Berkshire, Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset, Devon,
Cornwall, Buckingham, Oxford, Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Warwick,
Shropshire—in short, in the shires of Wessex and western Mercia. Twice
over our record explains—a piece of rare good fortune—that buri and
coliberti are all one[101]. In general they are presented to us as being akin
rather to the servi than to the villani or bordarii, as when we are told, ‘In
demesne there is one virgate of land and there are 3 teams and 11 servi and
5 coliberti, and there are 15 villani and 15 bordarii with 8 teams[102].’ But
this rule is by no means unbroken; sometimes the coliberti are separated
from the servi and a precedence over the cotarii or even over the bordarii is
given them. Thus of a Wiltshire manor it is written, ‘In demesne there are 8
teams and 20 servi and 41 villani and 30 bordarii and 7 coliberti and 74
cotarii have among them all 27 teams[103].’ Again of a Warwickshire manor,
‘There is land for 26 teams; in demesne are 3 teams and 4 servi and 43
villani and 6 coliberti and 10 bordarii with 16 teams[104].’ A classification
which turns upon legal status is cut by a classification which turns upon
economic condition. The colibertus we take to be an unfreer man (how
there come to be degrees of freedom is a question to be asked by and by)
than the cotarius or the bordarius, but on a given manor he may be a more
important person, for he may have plough beasts while the cotarius has
none, he may have two oxen while the bordarius has but an ox.
In calling him a colibertus the Norman clerks are
The Continental colibert.
giving him a foreign name, the etymological origin
of which is very dark[105]; but this much seems plain,
that in the France of the eleventh century a large The English boor.
class bearing this name had been formed out of
Next above the servi we see the small but interesting
The boors or coliberts.
class of buri, burs or coliberti. Probably it was not
mentioned in the writ which set the commissioners
their task, and this may well be the reason why it appears as but a very
small class. It has some 900 members; still it is represented in fourteen
shires: Hampshire, Berkshire, Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset, Devon,
Cornwall, Buckingham, Oxford, Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Warwick,
Shropshire—in short, in the shires of Wessex and western Mercia. Twice
over our record explains—a piece of rare good fortune—that buri and
coliberti are all one[101]. In general they are presented to us as being akin
rather to the servi than to the villani or bordarii, as when we are told, ‘In
demesne there is one virgate of land and there are 3 teams and 11 servi and
5 coliberti, and there are 15 villani and 15 bordarii with 8 teams[102].’ But
this rule is by no means unbroken; sometimes the coliberti are separated
from the servi and a precedence over the cotarii or even over the bordarii is
given them. Thus of a Wiltshire manor it is written, ‘In demesne there are 8
teams and 20 servi and 41 villani and 30 bordarii and 7 coliberti and 74
cotarii have among them all 27 teams[103].’ Again of a Warwickshire manor,
‘There is land for 26 teams; in demesne are 3 teams and 4 servi and 43
villani and 6 coliberti and 10 bordarii with 16 teams[104].’ A classification
which turns upon legal status is cut by a classification which turns upon
economic condition. The colibertus we take to be an unfreer man (how
there come to be degrees of freedom is a question to be asked by and by)
than the cotarius or the bordarius, but on a given manor he may be a more
important person, for he may have plough beasts while the cotarius has
none, he may have two oxen while the bordarius has but an ox.
In calling him a colibertus the Norman clerks are
The Continental colibert.
giving him a foreign name, the etymological origin
of which is very dark[105]; but this much seems plain,
that in the France of the eleventh century a large The English boor.
class bearing this name had been formed out of
Page 64
ancient elements, Roman coloni and Germanic liti, a class which was not
rightless (for it could be distinguished from the class of servi, and a
colibertus might be made a servus by way of punishment for his crimes) but
which yet was unfree, for the colibertus who left his lord might be pursued
and recaptured[106]. As to the Englishman upon whom this name is
bestowed we know him to be a gebúr, a boor, and we learn something of
him from that mysterious document entitled ‘Rectitudines Singularum
Personarum[107].’ His services, we are told, vary from place to place; in
some districts he works for his lord two days a week and during harvest-
time three days a week; he pays gafol in money, barley, sheep and poultry;
also he has ploughing to do besides his week-work; he pays hearth-penny;
he and one of his fellows must between them feed a dog. It is usual to
provide him with an outfit of two oxen, one cow, six sheep, and seed for
seven acres of his yardland, and also to provide him with household stuff;
on his death all these chattels go back to his lord. Thus the boor is put
before us as a tenant with a house and a yardland or virgate, and two plough
oxen. He will therefore play a more important part in the manorial economy
than the cottager who has no beasts. But he is a very dependent person; his
beasts, even the poor furniture of his house, his pots and crocks, are
provided for him by his lord. Probably it is this that marks him off from the
ordinary villanus or ‘townsman,’ and brings him near the serf. In a sense he
may be a free man. We have seen how the law, whether we look for it to the
code of Cnut or to theLeges Henrici, is holding fast the proposition that
every one who is not a theówman is a free man, that every one is either a
liber homo or a servus. We have no warrant for denying to the boor the full
wergild of 200 shillings. He pays the hearth-penny, or Peter’s penny, and
the document that tells us this elsewhere mentions this payment as the mark
of a free man[108]. And yet in a very true and accurate sense he may be
unfree, unfree to quit his lord’s service. All that he has belongs to his lord;
he must be perpetually in debt to his lord; he could hardly leave his lord
without being guilty of something very like theft, an abstraction of chattels
committed to his charge. Very probably if he flies, his lord has a right to
recapture him. On the other hand, so dependent a man will be in a very
strict sense a tenant at will. When he dies not only his tenement but his
stock will belong to the lord; like the French colibert he is mainmortable.
At the same time, to one familiar with the cartularies of the thirteenth
century the rents and services that this boor has to pay and perform for his
rightless (for it could be distinguished from the class of servi, and a
colibertus might be made a servus by way of punishment for his crimes) but
which yet was unfree, for the colibertus who left his lord might be pursued
and recaptured[106]. As to the Englishman upon whom this name is
bestowed we know him to be a gebúr, a boor, and we learn something of
him from that mysterious document entitled ‘Rectitudines Singularum
Personarum[107].’ His services, we are told, vary from place to place; in
some districts he works for his lord two days a week and during harvest-
time three days a week; he pays gafol in money, barley, sheep and poultry;
also he has ploughing to do besides his week-work; he pays hearth-penny;
he and one of his fellows must between them feed a dog. It is usual to
provide him with an outfit of two oxen, one cow, six sheep, and seed for
seven acres of his yardland, and also to provide him with household stuff;
on his death all these chattels go back to his lord. Thus the boor is put
before us as a tenant with a house and a yardland or virgate, and two plough
oxen. He will therefore play a more important part in the manorial economy
than the cottager who has no beasts. But he is a very dependent person; his
beasts, even the poor furniture of his house, his pots and crocks, are
provided for him by his lord. Probably it is this that marks him off from the
ordinary villanus or ‘townsman,’ and brings him near the serf. In a sense he
may be a free man. We have seen how the law, whether we look for it to the
code of Cnut or to theLeges Henrici, is holding fast the proposition that
every one who is not a theówman is a free man, that every one is either a
liber homo or a servus. We have no warrant for denying to the boor the full
wergild of 200 shillings. He pays the hearth-penny, or Peter’s penny, and
the document that tells us this elsewhere mentions this payment as the mark
of a free man[108]. And yet in a very true and accurate sense he may be
unfree, unfree to quit his lord’s service. All that he has belongs to his lord;
he must be perpetually in debt to his lord; he could hardly leave his lord
without being guilty of something very like theft, an abstraction of chattels
committed to his charge. Very probably if he flies, his lord has a right to
recapture him. On the other hand, so dependent a man will be in a very
strict sense a tenant at will. When he dies not only his tenement but his
stock will belong to the lord; like the French colibert he is mainmortable.
At the same time, to one familiar with the cartularies of the thirteenth
century the rents and services that this boor has to pay and perform for his
Page 65
virgate will not appear enormous. If we mistake not, many a villanus of
Henry III.’s day would have thought them light. Of course any such
comparison is beset by difficulties, for at present we know all too little of
the history of wages and prices. Nevertheless the intermediation of this
class of buri or coliberti between the serfs and the villeins of Domesday
Book must tend to raise our estimate both of the legal freedom and of the
economic welfare of that great mass of peasants which is now to come
before us[109].
That great mass consists of some 108,500 villani,
Villani, bordarii, cotarii.
some 82,600 bordarii, and some 6,800 cotarii and
coscets[110]. Though in manor after manor we may
find representatives of each of these three classes, we can see that for some
important purpose they form but one grand class, and that the term villanus
may be used to cover the whole genus as well as to designate one of its
three species. In the Exon Domesday a common formula, having stated the
number of hides in the manor and the number of teams for which it can find
work, proceeds to divide the land and the existing teams between the
demesne and the villani—the villani, it will say, have so many hides and so
many teams. Then it will state how many villani, bordarii, cotarii there are.
But it will sometimes fall out that there are no villani if that term is to be
used in its specific sense, and so, after having been told that the villani have
so much land and so many teams, we learn that the only villani on this
manor are bordarii[111]. The lines which divide the three species are, we
may be sure, much rather economic than legal lines. Of course the law may
recognise them upon occasion[112], but we can not say that the bordarius
has a different status from that of the villanus. In the Leges both fall under
the term villani; indeed, as hereafter will be seen, that term has sometimes
to cover all men who are not servi but are not noble. Nor must we suppose
that the economic lines are drawn with much precision or according to any
one uniform pattern. Of villani and bordarii we may read in every county;
cotarii or coscets in considerable numbers are found only in Kent, Sussex,
Surrey, Middlesex, Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset, Berkshire, Hertford and
Cambridge, though they are not absolutely unknown in Buckingham, in
Devon, in Hereford, Worcester, Shropshire, Yorkshire. We can not tell how
the English jurors would have expressed the distinction between bordarii
and cotarii, for while the cot is English, the borde is French. If we are
Henry III.’s day would have thought them light. Of course any such
comparison is beset by difficulties, for at present we know all too little of
the history of wages and prices. Nevertheless the intermediation of this
class of buri or coliberti between the serfs and the villeins of Domesday
Book must tend to raise our estimate both of the legal freedom and of the
economic welfare of that great mass of peasants which is now to come
before us[109].
That great mass consists of some 108,500 villani,
Villani, bordarii, cotarii.
some 82,600 bordarii, and some 6,800 cotarii and
coscets[110]. Though in manor after manor we may
find representatives of each of these three classes, we can see that for some
important purpose they form but one grand class, and that the term villanus
may be used to cover the whole genus as well as to designate one of its
three species. In the Exon Domesday a common formula, having stated the
number of hides in the manor and the number of teams for which it can find
work, proceeds to divide the land and the existing teams between the
demesne and the villani—the villani, it will say, have so many hides and so
many teams. Then it will state how many villani, bordarii, cotarii there are.
But it will sometimes fall out that there are no villani if that term is to be
used in its specific sense, and so, after having been told that the villani have
so much land and so many teams, we learn that the only villani on this
manor are bordarii[111]. The lines which divide the three species are, we
may be sure, much rather economic than legal lines. Of course the law may
recognise them upon occasion[112], but we can not say that the bordarius
has a different status from that of the villanus. In the Leges both fall under
the term villani; indeed, as hereafter will be seen, that term has sometimes
to cover all men who are not servi but are not noble. Nor must we suppose
that the economic lines are drawn with much precision or according to any
one uniform pattern. Of villani and bordarii we may read in every county;
cotarii or coscets in considerable numbers are found only in Kent, Sussex,
Surrey, Middlesex, Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset, Berkshire, Hertford and
Cambridge, though they are not absolutely unknown in Buckingham, in
Devon, in Hereford, Worcester, Shropshire, Yorkshire. We can not tell how
the English jurors would have expressed the distinction between bordarii
and cotarii, for while the cot is English, the borde is French. If we are
Page 66
entitled to draw any inference from the distribution of the cottiers, it would
be that the smallest of small tenements were to be found chiefly along the
southern shore; but then there are no cotarii in Hampshire, plenty in Sussex,
Surrey, Wiltshire and Dorset. Again, in the two shires last mentioned some
distinction seems to be taken between the coscets and the cotarii, the former
being superior to the latter[113]. Two centuries later we find a similar
distinction among the tenants of Worcester Priory. There are cotmanni
whose rents and services are heavier, and whose tenements are presumably
larger than those of the cotarii, though the difference is not very great[114].
The vagueness of distinctions such as these is well
Size of the villain’s
illustrated by the failure of the term bordarius (and tenement.
none is more prominent in Domesday Book) to take
firm root in this country[115]. The successors of the
bordarii seem to become in the later documents either villani with small or
cottiers with large tenements. Distinctions which turn on the amount of land
that is possessed or the amount of service that is done cannot be accurately
formulated and forced upon a whole country. Perhaps in general we may
endow the villanus of Domesday Book with a virgate or quarter of a hide,
while we ascribe to the bordarius a less quantity and doubt whether the
cotarius usually had arable land. But the survey of Middlesex, which is the
main authority touching this matter, shows that the villanus may on
occasion have a whole hide[116], that is four virgates, and that often he has
but half a virgate; it shows us that the bordarius, though often he has but
four or five acres, may have a half virgate, that is as much as many a
villanus[117]; it shows us that the cotarius may have five acres, that is as
much as many a bordarius[118], though he will often have no more than a
croft[119]. In Essex we hear of bordarii who held no arable land[120]. Nor
dare we lay down any stern rule about the possession of plough beasts. It
would seem as if sometimes the bordarius had oxen, while sometimes he
had none[121]. The villanus might have two oxen, but he might have more or
less. We may find that in Cornwall a single team of eight is forthcoming
where there are[122]
3 villani 4 borarii, 2 servi
2 ” 2 ” 3 ”
0 ” 5 ” 2 ”
be that the smallest of small tenements were to be found chiefly along the
southern shore; but then there are no cotarii in Hampshire, plenty in Sussex,
Surrey, Wiltshire and Dorset. Again, in the two shires last mentioned some
distinction seems to be taken between the coscets and the cotarii, the former
being superior to the latter[113]. Two centuries later we find a similar
distinction among the tenants of Worcester Priory. There are cotmanni
whose rents and services are heavier, and whose tenements are presumably
larger than those of the cotarii, though the difference is not very great[114].
The vagueness of distinctions such as these is well
Size of the villain’s
illustrated by the failure of the term bordarius (and tenement.
none is more prominent in Domesday Book) to take
firm root in this country[115]. The successors of the
bordarii seem to become in the later documents either villani with small or
cottiers with large tenements. Distinctions which turn on the amount of land
that is possessed or the amount of service that is done cannot be accurately
formulated and forced upon a whole country. Perhaps in general we may
endow the villanus of Domesday Book with a virgate or quarter of a hide,
while we ascribe to the bordarius a less quantity and doubt whether the
cotarius usually had arable land. But the survey of Middlesex, which is the
main authority touching this matter, shows that the villanus may on
occasion have a whole hide[116], that is four virgates, and that often he has
but half a virgate; it shows us that the bordarius, though often he has but
four or five acres, may have a half virgate, that is as much as many a
villanus[117]; it shows us that the cotarius may have five acres, that is as
much as many a bordarius[118], though he will often have no more than a
croft[119]. In Essex we hear of bordarii who held no arable land[120]. Nor
dare we lay down any stern rule about the possession of plough beasts. It
would seem as if sometimes the bordarius had oxen, while sometimes he
had none[121]. The villanus might have two oxen, but he might have more or
less. We may find that in Cornwall a single team of eight is forthcoming
where there are[122]
3 villani 4 borarii, 2 servi
2 ” 2 ” 3 ”
0 ” 5 ” 2 ”
Page 67
1 ” 5 ” 1 ”
2 ” 5 ” 4 ”
2 ” 3 ” 1 ”
3 ” 6 ” 3 ”
In some Gloucestershire manors every villein seems to have a full plough
team[123]. Merely economic grades are essentially indefinite. Who could
have defined a ‘cottage’ in the eleventh century? Who can define one
now[124]?
In truth the vast class of men that we are examining
Villeins and cottiers.
must have been heterogeneous to a high degree. Not
only were some members of it much wealthier than
others, but in all probability some were economically subject to others. So it
was in later days. In the thirteenth century we may easily find a manor in
which the lord is paying hardly any wages. He gets nearly all his
agricultural work done for him by his villeins and his cottiers. Out of his
cottiers however he will get but one day’s work in the week. If then we ask
what the cottiers are doing during the rest of their time, the answer surely
must be that they are often working as hired labourers on the villein’s
virgates, for a cottier can not have spent five days in the week over the
tillage of his poor little tenement. It is a remarkable feature of the manorial
arrangement that the meanest of the lord’s nativi are but rarely working for
him. Thus if we were to remove the lord in order that the village community
might be revealed, we should still see not only rich and poor, but employers
and employed, villagers and ‘undersettles.’
Now all these people are in a sense unfree, while yet
Freedom and unfreedom
in some other sense they are free. Let us then spend of villani.
a short while in discussing the various meanings that
freedom may have in a legal classification of the
sorts and conditions of men. When we have put out of account the rightless
slave, who is a thing, it still remains possible to say that some men are
unfree, while others are free, and even that freedom is a matter of degree.
But we may use various standards for the measurement of liberty.
Perhaps in the first place we shall think of what
Meaning of freedom.
German writers call Freizügigkeit, the power to
2 ” 5 ” 4 ”
2 ” 3 ” 1 ”
3 ” 6 ” 3 ”
In some Gloucestershire manors every villein seems to have a full plough
team[123]. Merely economic grades are essentially indefinite. Who could
have defined a ‘cottage’ in the eleventh century? Who can define one
now[124]?
In truth the vast class of men that we are examining
Villeins and cottiers.
must have been heterogeneous to a high degree. Not
only were some members of it much wealthier than
others, but in all probability some were economically subject to others. So it
was in later days. In the thirteenth century we may easily find a manor in
which the lord is paying hardly any wages. He gets nearly all his
agricultural work done for him by his villeins and his cottiers. Out of his
cottiers however he will get but one day’s work in the week. If then we ask
what the cottiers are doing during the rest of their time, the answer surely
must be that they are often working as hired labourers on the villein’s
virgates, for a cottier can not have spent five days in the week over the
tillage of his poor little tenement. It is a remarkable feature of the manorial
arrangement that the meanest of the lord’s nativi are but rarely working for
him. Thus if we were to remove the lord in order that the village community
might be revealed, we should still see not only rich and poor, but employers
and employed, villagers and ‘undersettles.’
Now all these people are in a sense unfree, while yet
Freedom and unfreedom
in some other sense they are free. Let us then spend of villani.
a short while in discussing the various meanings that
freedom may have in a legal classification of the
sorts and conditions of men. When we have put out of account the rightless
slave, who is a thing, it still remains possible to say that some men are
unfree, while others are free, and even that freedom is a matter of degree.
But we may use various standards for the measurement of liberty.
Perhaps in the first place we shall think of what
Meaning of freedom.
German writers call Freizügigkeit, the power to
Page 68
leave the master whom one has been serving. This power our ancestors
would perhaps have called ‘fare-worthiness[125].’ If the master has the right
to recapture the servant who leaves his service, or even if he has the right to
call upon the officers of the state to pursue him and bring him back to his
work, then we may account this servant an unfree man, albeit the relation
between him and his master has been created by free contract. Such
unfreedom is very distinct from rightlessness. As a freak of jurisprudence
we might imagine a modern nobleman entitled to reduce by force and arms
his fugitive butler to well-paid and easy duties, while all the same that
butler had rights against all the world including his master, had access to all
courts, and could even sue for his wages if they were not punctually paid. If
we call him unfree, then freedom will look like a matter of degree, for the
master’s power to get back his fugitive may be defined by law in divers
manners. May he go in pursuit and use force? Must he send a constable or
sheriff’s officer? Must he first go to court and obtain a judgment, ‘a decree
for specific performance’ of the contract of service? The right of recapture
seems to shade off gradually into a right to insist that a breach of the
contract of service is a criminal offence to be punished by fine or
imprisonment. Then, again, there may seem to us to be more of unfreedom
in the case of one who was born a servant than in the case of one who has
contracted to serve, though we should note that one may be born to serve
without being born rightless. More to the point than these obvious
reflections will be the remark that in the thirteenth century we learn to think
of various spheres or planes of justice. A right good in one sphere may have
no existence in another. The rights of the villeins in their tenements are
sanctioned by manorial justice; they are ignored by the king’s courts. Here,
again, the ideas of freedom and unfreedom find a part to play. True that in
the order of legal logic freedom may precede royal protection; a tenure is
protected because it is free; still men are soon arguing that it is free because
it is protected, and this probably discloses an idea which lies deep[126]:—the
king’s courts, the national courts, are open to the free; we approach the
rightlessness of the slave if our rights are recognized only in a court of
which our lord is the president.
The thirteenth century will also supply us with the notion that continuous
agricultural service, service in which there is a considerable element of
uncertainty, is unfree service. Where from day to day the lord’s will counts
would perhaps have called ‘fare-worthiness[125].’ If the master has the right
to recapture the servant who leaves his service, or even if he has the right to
call upon the officers of the state to pursue him and bring him back to his
work, then we may account this servant an unfree man, albeit the relation
between him and his master has been created by free contract. Such
unfreedom is very distinct from rightlessness. As a freak of jurisprudence
we might imagine a modern nobleman entitled to reduce by force and arms
his fugitive butler to well-paid and easy duties, while all the same that
butler had rights against all the world including his master, had access to all
courts, and could even sue for his wages if they were not punctually paid. If
we call him unfree, then freedom will look like a matter of degree, for the
master’s power to get back his fugitive may be defined by law in divers
manners. May he go in pursuit and use force? Must he send a constable or
sheriff’s officer? Must he first go to court and obtain a judgment, ‘a decree
for specific performance’ of the contract of service? The right of recapture
seems to shade off gradually into a right to insist that a breach of the
contract of service is a criminal offence to be punished by fine or
imprisonment. Then, again, there may seem to us to be more of unfreedom
in the case of one who was born a servant than in the case of one who has
contracted to serve, though we should note that one may be born to serve
without being born rightless. More to the point than these obvious
reflections will be the remark that in the thirteenth century we learn to think
of various spheres or planes of justice. A right good in one sphere may have
no existence in another. The rights of the villeins in their tenements are
sanctioned by manorial justice; they are ignored by the king’s courts. Here,
again, the ideas of freedom and unfreedom find a part to play. True that in
the order of legal logic freedom may precede royal protection; a tenure is
protected because it is free; still men are soon arguing that it is free because
it is protected, and this probably discloses an idea which lies deep[126]:—the
king’s courts, the national courts, are open to the free; we approach the
rightlessness of the slave if our rights are recognized only in a court of
which our lord is the president.
The thirteenth century will also supply us with the notion that continuous
agricultural service, service in which there is a considerable element of
uncertainty, is unfree service. Where from day to day the lord’s will counts
Page 69
for much in determining the work that his tenants must do, such tenants,
even if they be free men, are not holding freely. But uncertainty is a matter
of degree, and therefore unfreedom may easily be regarded as a matter of
degree[127].
Then, again, in the law books of the Norman age we see distinct traces of a
usage which would make liber or liberalis an equivalent for our noble, or at
least for our gentle. The common man with the wergild of 200 shillings,
though indubitably he is no servus, is not liberalis homo[128].
Lastly, in our thirteenth century we learn that privileges and exceptional
immunities are ‘liberties’ and ‘franchises.’ What is our definition of a
liberty, a franchise? A portion of royal power in the hands of a subject. In
Henry III.’s day we do not say that the Earl of Chester is a freer man, more
of a liber homo, than is the Earl of Gloucester, but we do say that he has
more, greater, higher liberties.
Therefore we shall not be surprised if in Domesday Book what we read of
freedom, of free men, of free land is sadly obscure. Let us then observe that
the villanus both is and is not a free man.
According to the usual terminology of the Leges,
The villein as free.
everyone who is above the rank of a servus, but
below the rank of a thegn, is a villanus. The villanus
is the non-noble liber homo. All those numerous sokemen of the eastern
counties whom Domesday ranks above the villani, all those numerous liberi
homines whom it ranks above the sokemen, are, according to this scheme,
villani if they be not thegns. And this scheme is still of great importance, for
it is the scheme of bót and wer. By what have been the most vital of all the
rules of law, all these men have been massed together; each of them has a
wer of two hundred shillings[129]. This, we may remark in passing, is no
trivial sum, though the shillings are the small Saxon shillings of four pence
or five pence. There seems to be a good deal of evidence that for a long
time past the ox had been valued at 30 pence, the sheep at 5 pence[130]. At
this rate the ceorl’s death must be paid for by the price of some twenty-four
or thirty oxen. The sons of a villanus who had but two oxen must have been
under some temptation to wish that their father would get himself killed by
a solvent thegn. Very rarely indeed do the Leges notice the sokeman or
even if they be free men, are not holding freely. But uncertainty is a matter
of degree, and therefore unfreedom may easily be regarded as a matter of
degree[127].
Then, again, in the law books of the Norman age we see distinct traces of a
usage which would make liber or liberalis an equivalent for our noble, or at
least for our gentle. The common man with the wergild of 200 shillings,
though indubitably he is no servus, is not liberalis homo[128].
Lastly, in our thirteenth century we learn that privileges and exceptional
immunities are ‘liberties’ and ‘franchises.’ What is our definition of a
liberty, a franchise? A portion of royal power in the hands of a subject. In
Henry III.’s day we do not say that the Earl of Chester is a freer man, more
of a liber homo, than is the Earl of Gloucester, but we do say that he has
more, greater, higher liberties.
Therefore we shall not be surprised if in Domesday Book what we read of
freedom, of free men, of free land is sadly obscure. Let us then observe that
the villanus both is and is not a free man.
According to the usual terminology of the Leges,
The villein as free.
everyone who is above the rank of a servus, but
below the rank of a thegn, is a villanus. The villanus
is the non-noble liber homo. All those numerous sokemen of the eastern
counties whom Domesday ranks above the villani, all those numerous liberi
homines whom it ranks above the sokemen, are, according to this scheme,
villani if they be not thegns. And this scheme is still of great importance, for
it is the scheme of bót and wer. By what have been the most vital of all the
rules of law, all these men have been massed together; each of them has a
wer of two hundred shillings[129]. This, we may remark in passing, is no
trivial sum, though the shillings are the small Saxon shillings of four pence
or five pence. There seems to be a good deal of evidence that for a long
time past the ox had been valued at 30 pence, the sheep at 5 pence[130]. At
this rate the ceorl’s death must be paid for by the price of some twenty-four
or thirty oxen. The sons of a villanus who had but two oxen must have been
under some temptation to wish that their father would get himself killed by
a solvent thegn. Very rarely indeed do the Leges notice the sokeman or
Page 70
mention liberi homines so as to exclude the villani from the scope of that
term[131]. Domesday Book also on occasion can divide mankind into slaves
and free men. It does so when it tells us that on a Gloucestershire manor
there were twelve servi whom the lord had made free[132]. It does so again
when it tells us that in the city of Chester the bishop had eight shillings if a
free man, four shillings if a serf, did work upon a festival[133]. So in a
description of the manor of South Perrott in Somerset we read that a certain
custom is due to it from the manor of ‘Cruche’ (Crewkerne), namely, that
every free man must render one bloom of iron. We look for these free men
at ‘Cruche’ and see no one on the manor but villani, bordarii, coliberti and
servi[134]. Of the Count of Mortain’s manor of Bickenhall it is written that
every free man renders a bloom of iron at the king’s manor of Curry; but at
Bickenhall there is no one above the condition of a villanus[135]. Other
passages will suggest that the villanus sometimes is and sometimes is not
liber homo. On a Norfolk manor we find free villeins, liberi villani[136]
For all this, however, there must be some very
The villein as unfree.
important sense in which the villanus is not free. In
the survey of the eastern counties he is separated
from the liberi homines by the whole class of sochemanni. ‘In this manor,’
we are told, ‘there was at that time a free man with half a hide who has now
been made one of the villeins[137].’ At times the word francus is introduced
so as to suggest for a moment that, though the villein may be liber homo, he
is not francus[138]. But this suggestion, even if it be made, is not
maintained, and there are hundreds of passages which implicitly deny that
the villein is liber homo. But then these passages draw the line between
freedom and unfreedom at a point high in the legal scale, a point far above
the heads of the villani. At least for the main purposes of Domesday Book
the free man is a man who holds land freely. Let us observe what is said of
the men who have been holding manors. The formula will vary somewhat
from county to county, but we shall often find four phrases used as
equivalent, ‘X tenuit et liber homo fuit,’ ‘X tenuit ut liber homo,’ ‘X tenuit et
cum terra sua liber fuit,’ ‘X tenuit libere[139].’ But this freeholding implies a
high degree of freedom, freedom of a kind that would have shocked the
lawyers of a later age.
With some regrets we must leave the peasants for a
Anglo-Saxon
while in order that we may glance at the higher strata
term[131]. Domesday Book also on occasion can divide mankind into slaves
and free men. It does so when it tells us that on a Gloucestershire manor
there were twelve servi whom the lord had made free[132]. It does so again
when it tells us that in the city of Chester the bishop had eight shillings if a
free man, four shillings if a serf, did work upon a festival[133]. So in a
description of the manor of South Perrott in Somerset we read that a certain
custom is due to it from the manor of ‘Cruche’ (Crewkerne), namely, that
every free man must render one bloom of iron. We look for these free men
at ‘Cruche’ and see no one on the manor but villani, bordarii, coliberti and
servi[134]. Of the Count of Mortain’s manor of Bickenhall it is written that
every free man renders a bloom of iron at the king’s manor of Curry; but at
Bickenhall there is no one above the condition of a villanus[135]. Other
passages will suggest that the villanus sometimes is and sometimes is not
liber homo. On a Norfolk manor we find free villeins, liberi villani[136]
For all this, however, there must be some very
The villein as unfree.
important sense in which the villanus is not free. In
the survey of the eastern counties he is separated
from the liberi homines by the whole class of sochemanni. ‘In this manor,’
we are told, ‘there was at that time a free man with half a hide who has now
been made one of the villeins[137].’ At times the word francus is introduced
so as to suggest for a moment that, though the villein may be liber homo, he
is not francus[138]. But this suggestion, even if it be made, is not
maintained, and there are hundreds of passages which implicitly deny that
the villein is liber homo. But then these passages draw the line between
freedom and unfreedom at a point high in the legal scale, a point far above
the heads of the villani. At least for the main purposes of Domesday Book
the free man is a man who holds land freely. Let us observe what is said of
the men who have been holding manors. The formula will vary somewhat
from county to county, but we shall often find four phrases used as
equivalent, ‘X tenuit et liber homo fuit,’ ‘X tenuit ut liber homo,’ ‘X tenuit et
cum terra sua liber fuit,’ ‘X tenuit libere[139].’ But this freeholding implies a
high degree of freedom, freedom of a kind that would have shocked the
lawyers of a later age.
With some regrets we must leave the peasants for a
Anglo-Saxon
while in order that we may glance at the higher strata
Page 71
of society. We may take it as certain that, at least in ‘freeholding.’
the eyes of William’s ministers, the ordinary holder
of a manor in the time of the Confessor had been holding it under (sub)
some lord, if not of (de) some lord. But then the closeness of the connexion
between him and his lord, the character of the relation between lord, man
and land, had varied much from case to case. Now these matters are often
expressed in terms of a calculus of personal freedom. But let us begin with
some phrases which seem intelligible enough. The man can, or he can not,
‘sell or give his land’; he can, or he can not, ‘sell or give it without the
licence of his lord’; he can sell it if he has first offered it to his lord[140]; he
can sell it on paying his lord two shillings[141]. This seems very simple:—
the lord can, or (as the case may be) can not, prevent his tenant from
alienating the land; he has a right of preemption or he has a right to exact a
fine when there is a change of tenants. But then come phrases that are less
in harmony with our idea of feudal tenure. The man can not sell his land
‘away from’ his lord[142], he can not give or sell it ‘outside’ a certain manor
belonging to his lord[143], or, being the tenant of some church, he can not
‘separate’ his land from the church[144], or give or sell it outside the
church[145]
We have perhaps taken for granted under the
Freeholding and the
influence of later law that an alienation will not lord’s rights.
impair the lord’s rights, and will but give him a new
instead of an old tenant. But it is not of any mere
substitution such as this that these men of the eleventh century are thinking.
They have it in their minds that the man may wish, may be able, utterly to
withdraw his land from the sphere of his lord’s rights. Therefore in many
cases they note with some care that the man, though he can give or sell his
land, can not altogether put an end to such relation as has existed between
this land and his lord. He can sell, but some of the lord’s rights will
‘remain,’ in particular the lord’s ‘soke’ over the land (for the present let us
say his jurisdiction over the land) will remain[146]. The purchaser will not of
necessity become the ‘man’ of this lord, will not of necessity owe him any
servitium or consuetudo, but will come under his jurisdiction[147].
Interchanging however with these phrases[148], we have others which seem
to point to the same set of distinctions, but to express them in terms of
personal freedom. The man can, or else he can not, withdraw from his lord,
the eyes of William’s ministers, the ordinary holder
of a manor in the time of the Confessor had been holding it under (sub)
some lord, if not of (de) some lord. But then the closeness of the connexion
between him and his lord, the character of the relation between lord, man
and land, had varied much from case to case. Now these matters are often
expressed in terms of a calculus of personal freedom. But let us begin with
some phrases which seem intelligible enough. The man can, or he can not,
‘sell or give his land’; he can, or he can not, ‘sell or give it without the
licence of his lord’; he can sell it if he has first offered it to his lord[140]; he
can sell it on paying his lord two shillings[141]. This seems very simple:—
the lord can, or (as the case may be) can not, prevent his tenant from
alienating the land; he has a right of preemption or he has a right to exact a
fine when there is a change of tenants. But then come phrases that are less
in harmony with our idea of feudal tenure. The man can not sell his land
‘away from’ his lord[142], he can not give or sell it ‘outside’ a certain manor
belonging to his lord[143], or, being the tenant of some church, he can not
‘separate’ his land from the church[144], or give or sell it outside the
church[145]
We have perhaps taken for granted under the
Freeholding and the
influence of later law that an alienation will not lord’s rights.
impair the lord’s rights, and will but give him a new
instead of an old tenant. But it is not of any mere
substitution such as this that these men of the eleventh century are thinking.
They have it in their minds that the man may wish, may be able, utterly to
withdraw his land from the sphere of his lord’s rights. Therefore in many
cases they note with some care that the man, though he can give or sell his
land, can not altogether put an end to such relation as has existed between
this land and his lord. He can sell, but some of the lord’s rights will
‘remain,’ in particular the lord’s ‘soke’ over the land (for the present let us
say his jurisdiction over the land) will remain[146]. The purchaser will not of
necessity become the ‘man’ of this lord, will not of necessity owe him any
servitium or consuetudo, but will come under his jurisdiction[147].
Interchanging however with these phrases[148], we have others which seem
to point to the same set of distinctions, but to express them in terms of
personal freedom. The man can, or else he can not, withdraw from his lord,
Page 72
go away from his lord, withdraw from his lord’s manor; he can or he can
not withdraw with his land; he can or can not go to another lord, or go
wherever he pleases[149]. Some of these phrases will, if taken literally, seem
to say that the persons of whom they are used are tied to the soil; they can
not leave the land, or the manor, or the soke. Probably in some of these
cases the bond between man and lord is a perpetual bond of homage and
fealty, and if the man breaks that bond by refusing the due obedience or
putting himself under another lord, he is guilty of a wrong[150]. But of
pursuing him and capturing him and reducing him to servitude there can be
no talk. Many of these persons who ‘can not recede’ are men of wealth and
rank, of high rank that is recognized by law, they are king’s thegns or the
thegns of the churches, they are ‘twelve-hundred men[151].’ However, it is
not the man’s power to leave his lord so much as the power to leave his lord
and take his land with him, that these phrases bring to our notice; or rather
the assumption is made that no one will want to leave his lord if he must
also leave his land behind him. And then this power of taking land from this
lord and bringing it under another lord is conceived as an index of personal
freedom. Thus we read: ‘These men were so free that they could go where
they pleased[152],’ and again, ‘Four sokemen held this land, of whom three
were free, while the fourth held one hide but could not give or sell it[153].’
Not that no one is called a liber homo unless he has this power of ‘receding’
from his lord; far from it; all is a matter of degree; but the free man is freer
if he can ‘go to what lord he pleases,’ and often enough the phrases ‘X
tenuit et liber homo fuit,’ ‘X tenuit libere,’ ‘X tenuit ut liber homo’ seem to
have no other meaning than this, that the occupant of the land enjoyed the
liberty of taking it with him whithersoever he would. Therefore there is no
tautology in saying that the holder of the land was a thegn and a free man,
though of course there is a sense, there are many senses, in which every
thegn is free[154]. All this talk of the freedom that consists in choosing a lord
and subjecting land to him may well puzzle us, for it puzzled the men of the
twelfth century. The chronicler of Abingdon abbey had to explain that in the
old days a free man could do strange things[155]
Comparisons may be instituted between the freedom
The scale of freeholding.
of one free man and that of another:—‘Five thegns
held this land of Earl Edwin and could go with their
land whither they would, and below them they had four soldiers, who were
not withdraw with his land; he can or can not go to another lord, or go
wherever he pleases[149]. Some of these phrases will, if taken literally, seem
to say that the persons of whom they are used are tied to the soil; they can
not leave the land, or the manor, or the soke. Probably in some of these
cases the bond between man and lord is a perpetual bond of homage and
fealty, and if the man breaks that bond by refusing the due obedience or
putting himself under another lord, he is guilty of a wrong[150]. But of
pursuing him and capturing him and reducing him to servitude there can be
no talk. Many of these persons who ‘can not recede’ are men of wealth and
rank, of high rank that is recognized by law, they are king’s thegns or the
thegns of the churches, they are ‘twelve-hundred men[151].’ However, it is
not the man’s power to leave his lord so much as the power to leave his lord
and take his land with him, that these phrases bring to our notice; or rather
the assumption is made that no one will want to leave his lord if he must
also leave his land behind him. And then this power of taking land from this
lord and bringing it under another lord is conceived as an index of personal
freedom. Thus we read: ‘These men were so free that they could go where
they pleased[152],’ and again, ‘Four sokemen held this land, of whom three
were free, while the fourth held one hide but could not give or sell it[153].’
Not that no one is called a liber homo unless he has this power of ‘receding’
from his lord; far from it; all is a matter of degree; but the free man is freer
if he can ‘go to what lord he pleases,’ and often enough the phrases ‘X
tenuit et liber homo fuit,’ ‘X tenuit libere,’ ‘X tenuit ut liber homo’ seem to
have no other meaning than this, that the occupant of the land enjoyed the
liberty of taking it with him whithersoever he would. Therefore there is no
tautology in saying that the holder of the land was a thegn and a free man,
though of course there is a sense, there are many senses, in which every
thegn is free[154]. All this talk of the freedom that consists in choosing a lord
and subjecting land to him may well puzzle us, for it puzzled the men of the
twelfth century. The chronicler of Abingdon abbey had to explain that in the
old days a free man could do strange things[155]
Comparisons may be instituted between the freedom
The scale of freeholding.
of one free man and that of another:—‘Five thegns
held this land of Earl Edwin and could go with their
land whither they would, and below them they had four soldiers, who were
Page 73
as free as themselves[156].’ A high degree of liberty is marked when we are
told that, ‘The said men were so free that they could sell their land with
soke and sake wherever they would[157].’ But there are yet higher degrees of
liberty. Of Worcestershire it is written, ‘When the king goes upon a military
expedition, if anyone who is summoned stays at home, then if he is so free a
man that he has his sake and soke and can go whither he pleases with his
land, he with all his land shall be in the king’s mercy[158].’ The free man is
the freer if he has soke and sake, if he has jurisdiction over other men.
Exceptional privileges, immunities from common burdens, are already
regarded as ‘liberties.’ This is no new thing; often enough when the Anglo-
Saxon land books speak of freedom they mean privilege.
told that, ‘The said men were so free that they could sell their land with
soke and sake wherever they would[157].’ But there are yet higher degrees of
liberty. Of Worcestershire it is written, ‘When the king goes upon a military
expedition, if anyone who is summoned stays at home, then if he is so free a
man that he has his sake and soke and can go whither he pleases with his
land, he with all his land shall be in the king’s mercy[158].’ The free man is
the freer if he has soke and sake, if he has jurisdiction over other men.
Exceptional privileges, immunities from common burdens, are already
regarded as ‘liberties.’ This is no new thing; often enough when the Anglo-
Saxon land books speak of freedom they mean privilege.
Page 74
The idea of freedom is equally vague and elastic if,
Free land.
instead of applying it to men, we apply it to land or
the tenure of land. Two bordarii are now holding a
small plot; ‘they themselves held it freely in King Edward’s day[159].’ Here
no doubt there has been a fall; but how deep a fall we can not be sure. To
say that a man’s land is free may imply far more freedom than freehold
tenure implies in later times; it may imply that the bond between him and
his lord, if indeed he has a lord, is of a purely personal character and hardly
gives the lord any hold over the land[160]. But this is not all. Perfect freedom
is not attained so long as the land owes any single duty to the state. Often
enough—but exactly how often it were no easy task to tell—the libera terra
of our record is land that has been exempted even from the danegeld; it is
highly privileged land[161]. Let us remember that at the present day, though
the definition of free land or freehold land has long ago been fixed, we still
speak as though free land might become freer if it were ‘free of land-tax
and tithe rent-charge.’
If now we return to the villanus and deny that he is
The unfreedom of the
liber homo and deny also that he is holding freely, villein.
we shall be saying little and using the laxest of
terms. There are half-a-dozen questions that we
would fain ask about him, and there will be no harm in asking them, though
Domesday Book is taciturn.
Is he free to quit his lord and his land, or can he be
Can the villein be
pursued and captured? No one word can be obtained pursued?
in answer to this question. We can only say that in
Henry II.’s day the ordinary peasant was regarded by
the royal officials as ascriptitius; the land that he occupied was said to be
part of his lord’s demesne; his chattels were his lord’s[162]. But then this was
conceived to be, at least in some degree, the result of the Norman Conquest
and subsequent rebellions of the peasantry[163]. To this we may add that in
one of our sets of Leges, the French Leis of William the Conqueror, there
are certain clauses which would be of great importance could we suppose
that they had an authoritative origin, and which in any case are remarkable
enough. The nativus who flies from the land on which he is born, let none
retain him or his chattels; if the lords will not send back these men to their
Free land.
instead of applying it to men, we apply it to land or
the tenure of land. Two bordarii are now holding a
small plot; ‘they themselves held it freely in King Edward’s day[159].’ Here
no doubt there has been a fall; but how deep a fall we can not be sure. To
say that a man’s land is free may imply far more freedom than freehold
tenure implies in later times; it may imply that the bond between him and
his lord, if indeed he has a lord, is of a purely personal character and hardly
gives the lord any hold over the land[160]. But this is not all. Perfect freedom
is not attained so long as the land owes any single duty to the state. Often
enough—but exactly how often it were no easy task to tell—the libera terra
of our record is land that has been exempted even from the danegeld; it is
highly privileged land[161]. Let us remember that at the present day, though
the definition of free land or freehold land has long ago been fixed, we still
speak as though free land might become freer if it were ‘free of land-tax
and tithe rent-charge.’
If now we return to the villanus and deny that he is
The unfreedom of the
liber homo and deny also that he is holding freely, villein.
we shall be saying little and using the laxest of
terms. There are half-a-dozen questions that we
would fain ask about him, and there will be no harm in asking them, though
Domesday Book is taciturn.
Is he free to quit his lord and his land, or can he be
Can the villein be
pursued and captured? No one word can be obtained pursued?
in answer to this question. We can only say that in
Henry II.’s day the ordinary peasant was regarded by
the royal officials as ascriptitius; the land that he occupied was said to be
part of his lord’s demesne; his chattels were his lord’s[162]. But then this was
conceived to be, at least in some degree, the result of the Norman Conquest
and subsequent rebellions of the peasantry[163]. To this we may add that in
one of our sets of Leges, the French Leis of William the Conqueror, there
are certain clauses which would be of great importance could we suppose
that they had an authoritative origin, and which in any case are remarkable
enough. The nativus who flies from the land on which he is born, let none
retain him or his chattels; if the lords will not send back these men to their
Page 75
land the king’s officers are to do it[164]. On the other hand, the tillers of the
soil are not to be worked beyond their proper rent; their lord may not
remove them from their land so long as they perform their right
services[165]. Whether or no we suppose that in the writer’s opinion the
ordinary peasant was a nativus (of nativi Domesday Book has nothing to
say) we still have law more favourable to the peasant than was the common
law of Bracton’s age:—a tiller who does his accustomed service is not to be
ejected; he is no tenant at will.
Hereafter we shall show that the English peasants
Rarity of flight.
did suffer by the substitution of French for English
lords. But the question that we have asked, so
urgent, so fundamental, as it may seem to us, is really one which, as the
history of the Roman coloni might prove, can long remain unanswered.
Men may become economically so dependent on their lords, on wealthy
masters and creditors, that the legal question whether they can quit their
service has no interest. Who wishes to leave his all and go forth a beggar
into the world? On the whole we can find no evidence whatever that the
men of the Confessor’s day who were retrospectively called villani were
tied to the soil. Certainly in Norman times the tradition was held that
according to the old law the villanus might acquire five hides of land and so
‘thrive to thegn-right[166].’
Our next question should be whether he was subject
The villein and
to seignorial justice. This is part of a much wider seignorial justice.
question that we must face hereafter, for seignorial
justice should be treated as a whole. We must here
anticipate a conclusion, the proof of which will come by and by, namely,
that the villanus sometimes was and sometimes was not the justiciable of a
court in which his lord or his lord’s steward presided. All depended on the
answer to the question whether his lord had ‘sake and soke.’ His lord might
have justiciary rights over all his tenants, or merely over his villani, or he
might have no justiciary rights, for as yet ‘sake and soke’ were in the king’s
gift, and the mere fact that a lord had ‘men’ or tenants did not give him a
jurisdiction over them.
With this question is connected another, namely, whether the villani had a
locus standi in the national courts. We have seen six villani together with
soil are not to be worked beyond their proper rent; their lord may not
remove them from their land so long as they perform their right
services[165]. Whether or no we suppose that in the writer’s opinion the
ordinary peasant was a nativus (of nativi Domesday Book has nothing to
say) we still have law more favourable to the peasant than was the common
law of Bracton’s age:—a tiller who does his accustomed service is not to be
ejected; he is no tenant at will.
Hereafter we shall show that the English peasants
Rarity of flight.
did suffer by the substitution of French for English
lords. But the question that we have asked, so
urgent, so fundamental, as it may seem to us, is really one which, as the
history of the Roman coloni might prove, can long remain unanswered.
Men may become economically so dependent on their lords, on wealthy
masters and creditors, that the legal question whether they can quit their
service has no interest. Who wishes to leave his all and go forth a beggar
into the world? On the whole we can find no evidence whatever that the
men of the Confessor’s day who were retrospectively called villani were
tied to the soil. Certainly in Norman times the tradition was held that
according to the old law the villanus might acquire five hides of land and so
‘thrive to thegn-right[166].’
Our next question should be whether he was subject
The villein and
to seignorial justice. This is part of a much wider seignorial justice.
question that we must face hereafter, for seignorial
justice should be treated as a whole. We must here
anticipate a conclusion, the proof of which will come by and by, namely,
that the villanus sometimes was and sometimes was not the justiciable of a
court in which his lord or his lord’s steward presided. All depended on the
answer to the question whether his lord had ‘sake and soke.’ His lord might
have justiciary rights over all his tenants, or merely over his villani, or he
might have no justiciary rights, for as yet ‘sake and soke’ were in the king’s
gift, and the mere fact that a lord had ‘men’ or tenants did not give him a
jurisdiction over them.
With this question is connected another, namely, whether the villani had a
locus standi in the national courts. We have seen six villani together with
Page 76
the priest (undoubtedly a free man) and the reeve of
The villein and national
each vill summoned to swear in the great justice.
inquest[167]. One of the most famous scenes recorded
by our book is that in which William of Chernet
claimed a Hampshire manor on behalf of Hugh de Port and produced his
witnesses from among the best and eldest men of the county; but Picot, the
sheriff of Cambridgeshire, who was in possession, replied with the
testimony of villeins and mean folk and reeves, who were willing to support
his case by oath or by ordeal[168]. Again, in Norfolk, Roger the sheriff
claimed a hundred acres and five villani and a mill as belonging to the royal
manor of Branfort, and five villani of the said manor testified in his favour
and offered to make whatever proof anyone might adjudge to them, but the
half-hundred of Ipswich testified that the land belonged to a certain church
of St. Peter that Wihtgar held, and he offered to deraign this[169]. Certainly
this does not look as if villani were excluded from the national moots. But a
rule which valued the oath of a single thegn as highly as the oath of six
ceorls would make the ceorl but a poor witness and tend to keep him out of
court[170]. The men who are active in the communal courts, who make the
judgments there, are usually men of thegnly rank; but to go to court as a
doomsman is one thing, to go as a litigant is another[171].
We may now approach the question whether, and if
The villein and his land.
so in what sense, the land that the villanus occupies
is his land. Throughout Domesday Book a
distinction is sedulously maintained between the land of the villeins (terra
villanorum) and the land that the lord has in dominio. Let us notice this
phrase. Only the demesne land does the lord hold in dominio, in ownership.
The delicate shade of difference that Bracton would see between dominicum
and dominium is not as yet marked. In later times it became strictly correct
to say that the lord held in demesne (in dominico suo) not only the lands
which he occupied by himself or his servants, but also the lands held of him
by villein tenure[172]. This usage appears very plainly in the Dialogue on the
Exchequer. ‘You shall know,’ says the writer, ‘that we give the name
demesnes (dominica) to those lands that a man cultivates at his own cost or
by his own labour, and also to those which are possessed in his name by his
ascriptitii; for by the law of this kingdom not only can these ascriptitii be
removed by their lords from the lands that they now possess and transferred
The villein and national
each vill summoned to swear in the great justice.
inquest[167]. One of the most famous scenes recorded
by our book is that in which William of Chernet
claimed a Hampshire manor on behalf of Hugh de Port and produced his
witnesses from among the best and eldest men of the county; but Picot, the
sheriff of Cambridgeshire, who was in possession, replied with the
testimony of villeins and mean folk and reeves, who were willing to support
his case by oath or by ordeal[168]. Again, in Norfolk, Roger the sheriff
claimed a hundred acres and five villani and a mill as belonging to the royal
manor of Branfort, and five villani of the said manor testified in his favour
and offered to make whatever proof anyone might adjudge to them, but the
half-hundred of Ipswich testified that the land belonged to a certain church
of St. Peter that Wihtgar held, and he offered to deraign this[169]. Certainly
this does not look as if villani were excluded from the national moots. But a
rule which valued the oath of a single thegn as highly as the oath of six
ceorls would make the ceorl but a poor witness and tend to keep him out of
court[170]. The men who are active in the communal courts, who make the
judgments there, are usually men of thegnly rank; but to go to court as a
doomsman is one thing, to go as a litigant is another[171].
We may now approach the question whether, and if
The villein and his land.
so in what sense, the land that the villanus occupies
is his land. Throughout Domesday Book a
distinction is sedulously maintained between the land of the villeins (terra
villanorum) and the land that the lord has in dominio. Let us notice this
phrase. Only the demesne land does the lord hold in dominio, in ownership.
The delicate shade of difference that Bracton would see between dominicum
and dominium is not as yet marked. In later times it became strictly correct
to say that the lord held in demesne (in dominico suo) not only the lands
which he occupied by himself or his servants, but also the lands held of him
by villein tenure[172]. This usage appears very plainly in the Dialogue on the
Exchequer. ‘You shall know,’ says the writer, ‘that we give the name
demesnes (dominica) to those lands that a man cultivates at his own cost or
by his own labour, and also to those which are possessed in his name by his
ascriptitii; for by the law of this kingdom not only can these ascriptitii be
removed by their lords from the lands that they now possess and transferred
Page 77
to other places, but they may be sold and dispersed at will; so that rightly
are both they and the lands which they cultivate for the behalf of their lords
accounted to be dominia[173].’ Far other is the normal, if not invariable,
usage of Domesday Book. The terrae villanorum, the silvae villanorum, the
piscariae villanorum, the molini villanorum—for the villeins have woods
and fisheries and mills—these the lord does not hold in dominio[174]. Then
again the oxen of the villeins are carefully distinguished from the oxen of
the demesne, while often enough they are not distinguished from the oxen
of those who in every sense are free tenants[175]. Now as regards both the
land and the oxen we seem put to the dilemma that either they belong to the
lord or else they belong to the villeins. We cannot avoid this dilemma, as we
can in later days, by saying that according to the common law the
ownership of these things is with the lord, while according to the custom of
the manor it is with the villeins, for we believe that a hall-moot, a manorial
court, is still a somewhat exceptional institution.
On the whole we can hardly doubt that both in their land and in their oxen
the villeins have had rights protected by law. Let us glance once more at the
scheme of bót and wer that has been in force. A villein is slain; the manbót
payable to his lord is marked off from the much heavier wergild that is
payable to his kindred. If all that a villein could have belonged to his lord
such a distinction would be idle.
Still we take it that for one most important purpose
The villein’s land and the
the villein’s land is the lord’s land:—the lord must geld.
answer for the geld that is due from it. Not that the
burden falls ultimately on the lord. On the contrary,
it is not unlikely that he makes his villeins pay the geld that is due from his
demesne land; it is one of their services that they must ‘defend their lord’s
inland’ against the geld. But over against the state the lord represents as
well the land of his villeins as his own demesne land. From the great levy of
1084 the demesne lands of the barons had been exempted[176], but no doubt
they had been responsible for the tax assessed on the lands held by their
villani. We much doubt whether the collectors of the geld went round to the
cottages of the villeins and demanded here six pence and there four pence;
they presented themselves at the lord’s hall and asked for a large sum. Nay,
we believe that very often a perfectly free tenant paid his geld to his lord, or
through his lord[177]. Hence arrangements by which some hides were made
are both they and the lands which they cultivate for the behalf of their lords
accounted to be dominia[173].’ Far other is the normal, if not invariable,
usage of Domesday Book. The terrae villanorum, the silvae villanorum, the
piscariae villanorum, the molini villanorum—for the villeins have woods
and fisheries and mills—these the lord does not hold in dominio[174]. Then
again the oxen of the villeins are carefully distinguished from the oxen of
the demesne, while often enough they are not distinguished from the oxen
of those who in every sense are free tenants[175]. Now as regards both the
land and the oxen we seem put to the dilemma that either they belong to the
lord or else they belong to the villeins. We cannot avoid this dilemma, as we
can in later days, by saying that according to the common law the
ownership of these things is with the lord, while according to the custom of
the manor it is with the villeins, for we believe that a hall-moot, a manorial
court, is still a somewhat exceptional institution.
On the whole we can hardly doubt that both in their land and in their oxen
the villeins have had rights protected by law. Let us glance once more at the
scheme of bót and wer that has been in force. A villein is slain; the manbót
payable to his lord is marked off from the much heavier wergild that is
payable to his kindred. If all that a villein could have belonged to his lord
such a distinction would be idle.
Still we take it that for one most important purpose
The villein’s land and the
the villein’s land is the lord’s land:—the lord must geld.
answer for the geld that is due from it. Not that the
burden falls ultimately on the lord. On the contrary,
it is not unlikely that he makes his villeins pay the geld that is due from his
demesne land; it is one of their services that they must ‘defend their lord’s
inland’ against the geld. But over against the state the lord represents as
well the land of his villeins as his own demesne land. From the great levy of
1084 the demesne lands of the barons had been exempted[176], but no doubt
they had been responsible for the tax assessed on the lands held by their
villani. We much doubt whether the collectors of the geld went round to the
cottages of the villeins and demanded here six pence and there four pence;
they presented themselves at the lord’s hall and asked for a large sum. Nay,
we believe that very often a perfectly free tenant paid his geld to his lord, or
through his lord[177]. Hence arrangements by which some hides were made
Page 78
to acquit other hides; such, for example, was the arrangement at
Tewkesbury; there were fifty hides which had to acquit the whole ninety-
five hides from all geld and royal service[178]. And then it might be that the
lord, enjoying a special privilege, was entitled to take the geld from his
tenants and yet paid no geld to the king; thus did the canons of St. Petroc in
Cornwall[179] and the monks of St. Edmund in Suffolk[180]. But as regards
lands occupied by villeins, the king, so it seems to us, looks for his geld to
the lord and he does not look behind the lord. This is no detail of a fiscal
system. A potent force has thus been set in motion. He who pays for land,—
it is but fair that he should be considered the owner of that land. We have a
hint of this principle in a law of Cnut:—‘He who has “defended” land with
the witness of the shire, is to enjoy it without question during his life and on
his death may give or sell it to whom he pleases[181].’ We have another hint
of this principle in a story told by Heming, the monk of Worcester:—in
Cnut’s time but four days of grace were given to the landowner for the
payment of the geld; when these had elapsed, anyone who paid the geld
might have the land[182]. It is a principle which, if it is applied to the case of
lord and villein, will attribute the ownership of the land to the lord and not
to the villein.
And then we would ask: What services do the
The villein’s services.
villeins render? A deep silence answers us, and as
will hereafter be shown, there are many reasons why
we should not import the information given us by the monastic cartularies,
even such early cartularies as the Black Book of Peterborough, into the days
of the Confessor. No doubt the villeins usually do some labour upon the
lord’s demesne lands. In particular they help to plough it. A manor, we can
see, is generally so arranged that the ratio borne by the demesne oxen to the
demesne land will be smaller than that borne by the villeins’ oxen to the
villeins’ land. Thus, to give one example out of a hundred, in a
Somersetshire manor the lord has four hides and three teams, the villeins
have two hides and three teams[183]. But then the lord gets some help in his
agriculture from those who are undoubtedly free tenants. The teams of the
free tenants are often covered by the same phrase that covers the teams of
the villeins[184]. Radknights who are liberi homines plough and harrow at
the lord’s court[185]. The very few entries which tell us of the labour of the
villeins are quite insufficient to condemn the whole class to unlimited, or
Tewkesbury; there were fifty hides which had to acquit the whole ninety-
five hides from all geld and royal service[178]. And then it might be that the
lord, enjoying a special privilege, was entitled to take the geld from his
tenants and yet paid no geld to the king; thus did the canons of St. Petroc in
Cornwall[179] and the monks of St. Edmund in Suffolk[180]. But as regards
lands occupied by villeins, the king, so it seems to us, looks for his geld to
the lord and he does not look behind the lord. This is no detail of a fiscal
system. A potent force has thus been set in motion. He who pays for land,—
it is but fair that he should be considered the owner of that land. We have a
hint of this principle in a law of Cnut:—‘He who has “defended” land with
the witness of the shire, is to enjoy it without question during his life and on
his death may give or sell it to whom he pleases[181].’ We have another hint
of this principle in a story told by Heming, the monk of Worcester:—in
Cnut’s time but four days of grace were given to the landowner for the
payment of the geld; when these had elapsed, anyone who paid the geld
might have the land[182]. It is a principle which, if it is applied to the case of
lord and villein, will attribute the ownership of the land to the lord and not
to the villein.
And then we would ask: What services do the
The villein’s services.
villeins render? A deep silence answers us, and as
will hereafter be shown, there are many reasons why
we should not import the information given us by the monastic cartularies,
even such early cartularies as the Black Book of Peterborough, into the days
of the Confessor. No doubt the villeins usually do some labour upon the
lord’s demesne lands. In particular they help to plough it. A manor, we can
see, is generally so arranged that the ratio borne by the demesne oxen to the
demesne land will be smaller than that borne by the villeins’ oxen to the
villeins’ land. Thus, to give one example out of a hundred, in a
Somersetshire manor the lord has four hides and three teams, the villeins
have two hides and three teams[183]. But then the lord gets some help in his
agriculture from those who are undoubtedly free tenants. The teams of the
free tenants are often covered by the same phrase that covers the teams of
the villeins[184]. Radknights who are liberi homines plough and harrow at
the lord’s court[185]. The very few entries which tell us of the labour of the
villeins are quite insufficient to condemn the whole class to unlimited, or
Page 79
even to very heavy work. On a manor in Herefordshire there are twelve
bordiers who work one day in the week[186]. On the enormous manor of
Leominster there are 238 villani and 85 bordarii. The villani plough and
sow with their own seed 140 acres of their lord’s land and they pay 11
pounds and 52 pence[187]. On the manor of Marcle, which also is in
Herefordshire, there are 36 villani and 10 bordarii with 40 teams. These
villani plough and sow with their own seed 80 acres of wheat and 71 of
oats[188]. At Kingston, yet another manor in the same county, ‘the villani
who dwelt there in King Edward’s day carried venison to Hereford and did
no other service, so says the shire[189].’ On one Worcestershire manor of
Westminster Abbey 10 villeins and 10 bordiers with 6 teams plough 6 acres
and sow them with their own seed; on another 8 villeins and 6 bordiers with
6 teams do the like by 4 acres[190]. This is light work. Casually we are told
of burgesses living at Tamworth who have to work like the other villeins of
the manor of Drayton to which they are attached[191], and we are told of
men on a royal manor who do such works for the king as the reeve may
command[192]; but, curiously enough, it is not of any villeins but of the
Bishop of Worcester’s riding men (radmanni) that it is written ‘they do
whatever is commanded them[193].’
With our thirteenth century cartularies before us, we
Money rents paid by
might easily underrate the amount of money that was villeins.
already being paid as the rent of land at the date of
the Conquest. In several counties we come across
small groups of censarii, censores, gablatores who pay for their land in
money, of cervisarii and mellitarii who bring beer and honey. Renders in
kind, in herrings, eels, salmon are not uncommon, and sometimes they are
‘appreciated,’ valued in terms of money. The pannage pig or the grass
swine, which the villeins give in return for mast and herbage, is often
mentioned. Throughout Sussex it seems to be the custom that the lord
should have ‘for herbage’ one pig from every villein who has seven
pigs[194]. But money will be taken instead of swine, oxen or fish[195]. The
gersuma, the tailla, the theoretically free gifts of the tenants, are sums of
money. But often enough the villanus is paying a substantial money rent.
We have seen how at Leominster villeins plough and sow 140 acres for
their lord and pay a rent of more than £11[196]. At Lewisham in Kent the
Abbot of Gand has a manor valued at £30; of this £2 is due to the profits of
bordiers who work one day in the week[186]. On the enormous manor of
Leominster there are 238 villani and 85 bordarii. The villani plough and
sow with their own seed 140 acres of their lord’s land and they pay 11
pounds and 52 pence[187]. On the manor of Marcle, which also is in
Herefordshire, there are 36 villani and 10 bordarii with 40 teams. These
villani plough and sow with their own seed 80 acres of wheat and 71 of
oats[188]. At Kingston, yet another manor in the same county, ‘the villani
who dwelt there in King Edward’s day carried venison to Hereford and did
no other service, so says the shire[189].’ On one Worcestershire manor of
Westminster Abbey 10 villeins and 10 bordiers with 6 teams plough 6 acres
and sow them with their own seed; on another 8 villeins and 6 bordiers with
6 teams do the like by 4 acres[190]. This is light work. Casually we are told
of burgesses living at Tamworth who have to work like the other villeins of
the manor of Drayton to which they are attached[191], and we are told of
men on a royal manor who do such works for the king as the reeve may
command[192]; but, curiously enough, it is not of any villeins but of the
Bishop of Worcester’s riding men (radmanni) that it is written ‘they do
whatever is commanded them[193].’
With our thirteenth century cartularies before us, we
Money rents paid by
might easily underrate the amount of money that was villeins.
already being paid as the rent of land at the date of
the Conquest. In several counties we come across
small groups of censarii, censores, gablatores who pay for their land in
money, of cervisarii and mellitarii who bring beer and honey. Renders in
kind, in herrings, eels, salmon are not uncommon, and sometimes they are
‘appreciated,’ valued in terms of money. The pannage pig or the grass
swine, which the villeins give in return for mast and herbage, is often
mentioned. Throughout Sussex it seems to be the custom that the lord
should have ‘for herbage’ one pig from every villein who has seven
pigs[194]. But money will be taken instead of swine, oxen or fish[195]. The
gersuma, the tailla, the theoretically free gifts of the tenants, are sums of
money. But often enough the villanus is paying a substantial money rent.
We have seen how at Leominster villeins plough and sow 140 acres for
their lord and pay a rent of more than £11[196]. At Lewisham in Kent the
Abbot of Gand has a manor valued at £30; of this £2 is due to the profits of
Page 80
the port while two mills with ‘the gafol of the rustics’ bring in £8. 12s.[197]
Such entries as the following are not uncommon—there is one villein
rendering 30d.[198]—there is one villein rendering 10s.[199]—46 cotarii with
one hide render 30 shillings a year[200]—the villeins give 13s. 4d. by way of
consuetudo[201]. No doubt it would be somewhat rare to find a villein
discharging all his dues in money—this is suggested when we are told how
on the land of St. Augustin one Wadard holds a large piece ‘de terra
villanorum’ and yet renders no service to the abbot save 30s. a year[202]. At
least in one instance the villeins seem to be holding the manor in farm, that
is to say, they are farming the demesne land and paying a rent in money or
in provender[203]. We dare not represent the stream of economic history as
flowing uninterruptedly from a system of labour services to a system of
rents. We must remember that in the Conqueror’s reign the lord very often
had numerous serfs whose whole time was given to the cultivation of his
demesne. In the south-western counties he will often have two, three or
more serfs for every team that he has on his demesne, and, while this is so,
we can not safely say that his husbandry requires that the villeins should be
labouring on his land for three or four days in every week.
As a last question we may ask: What was the
The English for villanus.
English for villanus? It is a foreign word, one of
those words which came in with the Conqueror.
Surely, we may argue, there must have been some English equivalent for it.
Yet we have the greatest difficulty in finding the proper term. True that in
the Quadripartitus and the Leges villanus generally represents ceorl; ceorl
when it is not rendered by villanus is left untranslated in some such form as
cyrliscus homo. But then ceorl must be a wider word than the villanus of
Domesday Book, for it has to cover all the non-noble free men; it must
comprehend the numerous sochemanni and liberi homines of northern and
eastern England. This in itself is not a little remarkable; it makes us suspect
that some of the lines drawn by Domesday Book are by no means very old;
they can not be drawn by any of those terms that have been current in the
Anglo-Saxon dooms or which still are current in the text-books that lawyers
are compiling. To suppose that villanus is equivalent to gebúr is impossible;
we have the best warrant for saying that the Latin for gebúr is not villanus
but colibertus[204]. Nor can we hold that the villanus is a geneat. In the last
days of the old English kingdom the geneat, the ‘companion,’ the ‘fellow,’
Such entries as the following are not uncommon—there is one villein
rendering 30d.[198]—there is one villein rendering 10s.[199]—46 cotarii with
one hide render 30 shillings a year[200]—the villeins give 13s. 4d. by way of
consuetudo[201]. No doubt it would be somewhat rare to find a villein
discharging all his dues in money—this is suggested when we are told how
on the land of St. Augustin one Wadard holds a large piece ‘de terra
villanorum’ and yet renders no service to the abbot save 30s. a year[202]. At
least in one instance the villeins seem to be holding the manor in farm, that
is to say, they are farming the demesne land and paying a rent in money or
in provender[203]. We dare not represent the stream of economic history as
flowing uninterruptedly from a system of labour services to a system of
rents. We must remember that in the Conqueror’s reign the lord very often
had numerous serfs whose whole time was given to the cultivation of his
demesne. In the south-western counties he will often have two, three or
more serfs for every team that he has on his demesne, and, while this is so,
we can not safely say that his husbandry requires that the villeins should be
labouring on his land for three or four days in every week.
As a last question we may ask: What was the
The English for villanus.
English for villanus? It is a foreign word, one of
those words which came in with the Conqueror.
Surely, we may argue, there must have been some English equivalent for it.
Yet we have the greatest difficulty in finding the proper term. True that in
the Quadripartitus and the Leges villanus generally represents ceorl; ceorl
when it is not rendered by villanus is left untranslated in some such form as
cyrliscus homo. But then ceorl must be a wider word than the villanus of
Domesday Book, for it has to cover all the non-noble free men; it must
comprehend the numerous sochemanni and liberi homines of northern and
eastern England. This in itself is not a little remarkable; it makes us suspect
that some of the lines drawn by Domesday Book are by no means very old;
they can not be drawn by any of those terms that have been current in the
Anglo-Saxon dooms or which still are current in the text-books that lawyers
are compiling. To suppose that villanus is equivalent to gebúr is impossible;
we have the best warrant for saying that the Latin for gebúr is not villanus
but colibertus[204]. Nor can we hold that the villanus is a geneat. In the last
days of the old English kingdom the geneat, the ‘companion,’ the ‘fellow,’
Page 81
appears as a horseman who rides on his lord’s errands; we must seek him
among the radmanni and rachenistres and drengi of Domesday Book[205].
We shall venture the guess that when the Norman clerks wrote down
villanus, the English jurors had said túnesman. As a matter of etymology
the two words answer to each other well enough; the villa is the tún, and the
men of the villa are the men of the tún. In the enlarged Latin version of the
laws of Cnut, known as Instituta Cnuti, there is an important remark:—
tithes are to be paid both from the lands of the thegn and from the lands of
the villeins—‘tam de dominio liberalis hominis, id est þegenes, quam de
terra villanorum, id est tuumannes (corr. tunmannes)[206].’ Then in a
collection of dooms known as the Northumbrian Priests’ Law there is a
clause which orders the payment of Peter’s pence. If a king’s thegn or
landlord (landrica) withholds his penny, he must pay ten half-marks, half to
Christ, half to the king; but if a túnesman withholds it, then let the landlord
pay it and take an ox from the man[207]. A very valuable passage this is. It
shows us how the lord is becoming responsible for the man’s taxes: if the
tenant will not pay them, the lord must. It is then in connexion with this
responsibility of the lord that the term townsman meets us, and, if we
mistake not, it is the lord’s responsibility for geld that is the chief agent in
the definition of the class of villani. The pressure of taxation, civil and
ecclesiastical, has been forming new social strata, and a new word, in itself
a vague word, is making its way into the vocabulary of the law[208].
The class of villeins may well be heterogeneous. It
Summary.
may well contain (so we think) men who, or whose
ancestors, have owned the land under a political
supremacy, not easily to be distinguished from landlordship, that belongs to
the king; and, on the other hand, it may well contain those who have never
in themselves or their predecessors been other than the tenants of another
man’s soil. In some counties on the Welsh march there are groups of
hospites who in fact or theory are colonists whom the lord has invited onto
his land[209]; but this word, very common in France, is not common in
England. Our record is not concerned to describe the nature or the origin of
the villein’s tenure; it is in quest of geld and of the persons who ought to be
charged with geld, and so it matters not whether the lord has let land to the
villein or has acquired rights over land of which the villein was once the
owner. Therefore we lay down no broad principle about the rights of the
among the radmanni and rachenistres and drengi of Domesday Book[205].
We shall venture the guess that when the Norman clerks wrote down
villanus, the English jurors had said túnesman. As a matter of etymology
the two words answer to each other well enough; the villa is the tún, and the
men of the villa are the men of the tún. In the enlarged Latin version of the
laws of Cnut, known as Instituta Cnuti, there is an important remark:—
tithes are to be paid both from the lands of the thegn and from the lands of
the villeins—‘tam de dominio liberalis hominis, id est þegenes, quam de
terra villanorum, id est tuumannes (corr. tunmannes)[206].’ Then in a
collection of dooms known as the Northumbrian Priests’ Law there is a
clause which orders the payment of Peter’s pence. If a king’s thegn or
landlord (landrica) withholds his penny, he must pay ten half-marks, half to
Christ, half to the king; but if a túnesman withholds it, then let the landlord
pay it and take an ox from the man[207]. A very valuable passage this is. It
shows us how the lord is becoming responsible for the man’s taxes: if the
tenant will not pay them, the lord must. It is then in connexion with this
responsibility of the lord that the term townsman meets us, and, if we
mistake not, it is the lord’s responsibility for geld that is the chief agent in
the definition of the class of villani. The pressure of taxation, civil and
ecclesiastical, has been forming new social strata, and a new word, in itself
a vague word, is making its way into the vocabulary of the law[208].
The class of villeins may well be heterogeneous. It
Summary.
may well contain (so we think) men who, or whose
ancestors, have owned the land under a political
supremacy, not easily to be distinguished from landlordship, that belongs to
the king; and, on the other hand, it may well contain those who have never
in themselves or their predecessors been other than the tenants of another
man’s soil. In some counties on the Welsh march there are groups of
hospites who in fact or theory are colonists whom the lord has invited onto
his land[209]; but this word, very common in France, is not common in
England. Our record is not concerned to describe the nature or the origin of
the villein’s tenure; it is in quest of geld and of the persons who ought to be
charged with geld, and so it matters not whether the lord has let land to the
villein or has acquired rights over land of which the villein was once the
owner. Therefore we lay down no broad principle about the rights of the
Page 82
villein, but we have suggested that taken in the mass the villani of the
Confessor’s reign were far more ‘law-worthy’ than were the villani of the
thirteenth century. We can not treat either the legal or the economic history
of our peasantry as a continuous whole; it is divided into two parts by the
red thread of the Norman Conquest. That is a catastrophe. William might do
his best to make it as little of a catastrophe as was possible, to insist that
each French lord should have precisely the same rights that had been
enjoyed by his English antecessor; it may even be that he endeavoured to
assure to those who were becoming villani the rights that they had enjoyed
under King Edward[210]. Such a task, if attempted, was impossible. We hear
indeed that the English ‘redeemed their lands,’ but probably this refers only
to those English lords, those thegns or the like, who were fortunate enough
to find that a ransom would be accepted[211]. We have no warrant for
thinking that the peasants, the common ‘townsmen,’ obtained from the king
any covenanted mercies. They were handed over to new lords, who were
very free in fact, if not in theory, to get out of them all that could be got
without gross cruelty.
We are not left to speculate about this matter. In after
Depression of the
days those who were likely to hold a true tradition, villeins.
the great financier of the twelfth, the great lawyer of
the thirteenth century, believed that there had been a
catastrophe. As a result of the Conquest, the peasants, at all events some of
the peasants, had fallen from their free estate; free men, holding freely, they
had been compelled to do unfree services[212]. But if we need not rely upon
speculation, neither need we rely upon tradition. Domesday Book is full of
evidence that the tillers of the soil are being depressed.
Here we may read of a free man with half a hide
The Normans and the
who has now been made one of the villeins[213], peasants.
there of the holder of a small manor who now
cultivates it as the farmer of a French lord graviter et
miserabiliter[214], and there of a sokeman who has lost his land for not
paying geld, though none was due[215]; while the great Richard of
Tonbridge has condescended to abstract a virgate from a villein or a villein
from a virgate[216]. But, again, it is not on a few cases in which our record
states that some man has suffered an injustice that we would rely. Rather we
notice what it treats as a quite common event. Free men are being ‘added
Confessor’s reign were far more ‘law-worthy’ than were the villani of the
thirteenth century. We can not treat either the legal or the economic history
of our peasantry as a continuous whole; it is divided into two parts by the
red thread of the Norman Conquest. That is a catastrophe. William might do
his best to make it as little of a catastrophe as was possible, to insist that
each French lord should have precisely the same rights that had been
enjoyed by his English antecessor; it may even be that he endeavoured to
assure to those who were becoming villani the rights that they had enjoyed
under King Edward[210]. Such a task, if attempted, was impossible. We hear
indeed that the English ‘redeemed their lands,’ but probably this refers only
to those English lords, those thegns or the like, who were fortunate enough
to find that a ransom would be accepted[211]. We have no warrant for
thinking that the peasants, the common ‘townsmen,’ obtained from the king
any covenanted mercies. They were handed over to new lords, who were
very free in fact, if not in theory, to get out of them all that could be got
without gross cruelty.
We are not left to speculate about this matter. In after
Depression of the
days those who were likely to hold a true tradition, villeins.
the great financier of the twelfth, the great lawyer of
the thirteenth century, believed that there had been a
catastrophe. As a result of the Conquest, the peasants, at all events some of
the peasants, had fallen from their free estate; free men, holding freely, they
had been compelled to do unfree services[212]. But if we need not rely upon
speculation, neither need we rely upon tradition. Domesday Book is full of
evidence that the tillers of the soil are being depressed.
Here we may read of a free man with half a hide
The Normans and the
who has now been made one of the villeins[213], peasants.
there of the holder of a small manor who now
cultivates it as the farmer of a French lord graviter et
miserabiliter[214], and there of a sokeman who has lost his land for not
paying geld, though none was due[215]; while the great Richard of
Tonbridge has condescended to abstract a virgate from a villein or a villein
from a virgate[216]. But, again, it is not on a few cases in which our record
states that some man has suffered an injustice that we would rely. Rather we
notice what it treats as a quite common event. Free men are being ‘added
Page 83
to’ manors to which they did not belong. Thus in Suffolk a number of free
men have been added to the manor of Montfort; they pay no ‘custom’ to it
before the Conquest, but now they pay £15; Ælfric who was reeve under
Roger Bigot set them this custom[217]. Hard by them were men who used to
pay 20 shillings, but this same Ælfric raised their rent to 100 shillings[218].
‘A free man held this land and could sell it, but Waleran father of John has
added him to this manor[219]’:—Entries of this kind are common. The
utmost rents are being exacted from the farmers:—this manor was let for
three years at a rent of £12 and a yearly gift of an ounce of gold, but all the
farmers who took it were ruined[220]—that manor was let for £3. 15s. but
the men were thereby ruined and now it is valued at only 45s.[221] About
these matters French and English can not agree:—this manor renders £70
by weight, but the English value it at only £60 by tale[222]—the English fix
the value at £80, but the French at £100[223]—Frenchmen and Englishmen
agree that it is worth £50, but Richard let it to an Englishman for £60, who
thereby lost £10 a year, at the very least[224]. ‘It can not pay,’ ‘it can hardly
pay,’ ‘it could not stand’ the rent, such are the phrases that we hear. If the
lord gets the most out of the farmer to whom he has leased the manor, we
may be sure that the farmer is making the most out of the villeins.
But the most convincing proof of the depression of
Depression of the
the peasantry comes to us from Cambridgeshire. The sokemen.
rural population of that county as it existed in 1086
has been classified thus[225]:—
sochemanni 213
villani 1902
bordarii 1428
cotarii 736
servi 548
But we also learn that the Cambridgeshire of the Confessor’s day had
contained at the very least 900 instead of 200 sokemen[226]. This is an
enormous and a significant change. Let us look at a single village. In
Meldreth there is a manor; it is now a manor of the most ordinary kind; it is
rated at 3 hides and 1 virgate, but contains 5 team-lands; in demesne are
half a hide and one team, and 15 bordarii and 3 cotarii have 4 teams, and
men have been added to the manor of Montfort; they pay no ‘custom’ to it
before the Conquest, but now they pay £15; Ælfric who was reeve under
Roger Bigot set them this custom[217]. Hard by them were men who used to
pay 20 shillings, but this same Ælfric raised their rent to 100 shillings[218].
‘A free man held this land and could sell it, but Waleran father of John has
added him to this manor[219]’:—Entries of this kind are common. The
utmost rents are being exacted from the farmers:—this manor was let for
three years at a rent of £12 and a yearly gift of an ounce of gold, but all the
farmers who took it were ruined[220]—that manor was let for £3. 15s. but
the men were thereby ruined and now it is valued at only 45s.[221] About
these matters French and English can not agree:—this manor renders £70
by weight, but the English value it at only £60 by tale[222]—the English fix
the value at £80, but the French at £100[223]—Frenchmen and Englishmen
agree that it is worth £50, but Richard let it to an Englishman for £60, who
thereby lost £10 a year, at the very least[224]. ‘It can not pay,’ ‘it can hardly
pay,’ ‘it could not stand’ the rent, such are the phrases that we hear. If the
lord gets the most out of the farmer to whom he has leased the manor, we
may be sure that the farmer is making the most out of the villeins.
But the most convincing proof of the depression of
Depression of the
the peasantry comes to us from Cambridgeshire. The sokemen.
rural population of that county as it existed in 1086
has been classified thus[225]:—
sochemanni 213
villani 1902
bordarii 1428
cotarii 736
servi 548
But we also learn that the Cambridgeshire of the Confessor’s day had
contained at the very least 900 instead of 200 sokemen[226]. This is an
enormous and a significant change. Let us look at a single village. In
Meldreth there is a manor; it is now a manor of the most ordinary kind; it is
rated at 3 hides and 1 virgate, but contains 5 team-lands; in demesne are
half a hide and one team, and 15 bordarii and 3 cotarii have 4 teams, and
Page 84
there is one servus. But before the Conquest this land was held by 15
sokemen; 10 of them were under the soke of the Abbey of Ely and held 2
hides and half a virgate; the other 5 held 1 hide and half a virgate and were
the men of Earl Ælfgar[227]. What has become of these fifteen sokemen?
They are now represented by fifteen bordiers and five cottiers; and the
demesne land of the manor is a new thing. The sokemen have fallen, and
their fall has brought with it the consolidation of manorial husbandry and
seignorial power. At Orwell Earl Roger has now a small estate; a third of it
is in demesne, while the residue is held by 2 villeins and 3 bordiers, and
there is a serf there. This land had belonged to six sokemen, and those six
had been under no less than five different lords; two belonged to Edith the
Fair, one to Archbishop Stigand, one to Robert Wimarc’s son, one to the
king, and one to Earl Ælfgar[228]. Displacements such as this we may see in
village after village. No one can read the survey of Cambridgeshire without
seeing that the freer sorts of the peasantry have been thrust out, or rather
thrust down.
Evidence so cogent as this we shall hardly find in
Further illustrations of
any part of the record save that which relates to depression.
Cambridgeshire and Bedfordshire. But great
movements of the kind that we are examining will
hardly confine themselves within the boundaries of a county. A little
variation in the formula which tells us who held the land in 1066 may hide
from us the true state of the case. We can not expect that men will be very
accurate in stating the legal relationships that existed twenty years ago.
Since the day when King Edward was alive and dead many things have
happened, many new words and new forms of thought have become
familiar. But taking the verdicts as we find them, there is still no lack of
evidence. In Essex we may see the liberi homines disappearing[229]. But we
need not look only to the eastern counties. At Bromley, in Surrey, Bishop
Odo has a manor of 32 hides, 4 of which had belonged to ‘free men’ who
could go where they pleased, but now there are only villeins, cottiers, and
serfs[230]. We turn the page and find Odo holding 10 hides which had
belonged to ‘the alodiaries of the vill[231].’ In Kent Hugh de Port is holding
land that was held by 6 free men who could go whither they would; there
are now 6 villeins and 14 bordiers there, with one team between them[232].
Students of Domesday were too apt to treat the antecessores of the Norman
sokemen; 10 of them were under the soke of the Abbey of Ely and held 2
hides and half a virgate; the other 5 held 1 hide and half a virgate and were
the men of Earl Ælfgar[227]. What has become of these fifteen sokemen?
They are now represented by fifteen bordiers and five cottiers; and the
demesne land of the manor is a new thing. The sokemen have fallen, and
their fall has brought with it the consolidation of manorial husbandry and
seignorial power. At Orwell Earl Roger has now a small estate; a third of it
is in demesne, while the residue is held by 2 villeins and 3 bordiers, and
there is a serf there. This land had belonged to six sokemen, and those six
had been under no less than five different lords; two belonged to Edith the
Fair, one to Archbishop Stigand, one to Robert Wimarc’s son, one to the
king, and one to Earl Ælfgar[228]. Displacements such as this we may see in
village after village. No one can read the survey of Cambridgeshire without
seeing that the freer sorts of the peasantry have been thrust out, or rather
thrust down.
Evidence so cogent as this we shall hardly find in
Further illustrations of
any part of the record save that which relates to depression.
Cambridgeshire and Bedfordshire. But great
movements of the kind that we are examining will
hardly confine themselves within the boundaries of a county. A little
variation in the formula which tells us who held the land in 1066 may hide
from us the true state of the case. We can not expect that men will be very
accurate in stating the legal relationships that existed twenty years ago.
Since the day when King Edward was alive and dead many things have
happened, many new words and new forms of thought have become
familiar. But taking the verdicts as we find them, there is still no lack of
evidence. In Essex we may see the liberi homines disappearing[229]. But we
need not look only to the eastern counties. At Bromley, in Surrey, Bishop
Odo has a manor of 32 hides, 4 of which had belonged to ‘free men’ who
could go where they pleased, but now there are only villeins, cottiers, and
serfs[230]. We turn the page and find Odo holding 10 hides which had
belonged to ‘the alodiaries of the vill[231].’ In Kent Hugh de Port is holding
land that was held by 6 free men who could go whither they would; there
are now 6 villeins and 14 bordiers there, with one team between them[232].
Students of Domesday were too apt to treat the antecessores of the Norman
Page 85
lords as being in all cases lords of manors. Lords of manors, or rather
holders of manors, they often were, but as we shall see more fully hereafter,
when we are examining the term manerium, such phrases are likely to
deceive us. Often enough they were very small people with very little land.
For example these six free men whom Hugh de Port represents had only
two and a half team-lands. We pass by a few pages and find Hugh de
Montfort with a holding which comprises but one team-land and a half; he
has 4 villeins and 2 bordiers there. His antecessores were three free men,
who could go whither they would[233]. They had need for but 12 oxen; they
had no more land than they could easily till, at all events with the help of
two or three cottagers or slaves. To all appearance they were no better than
peasants. They or their sons may still be tilling the land as Hugh’s villeins.
When we look for such instances we very easily find them. The case is not
altered by the fact that the term ‘manor’ is given to the holdings of these
antecessores. In Sussex an under-tenant of Earl Roger has an estate with
four villeins upon it. His antecessores were two free men who held the land
as two manors. And how much land was there to be divided between the
two? There was one team-land. Such holders of maneria were tillers of the
soil, peasants, at best yeomen[234]. If they were of thegnly rank, this again
does not alter the case. When in the survey of Dorset we read how four
thegns held two team-lands, how six thegns held two team-lands, eight
thegns two team-lands, nine thegns four team-lands, eleven thegns four
team-lands[235], we can not of course be certain that each of these groups of
co-tenants had but one holding; but thegnly rank is inherited, and if a thegn
will have nine or ten sons there will soon be tillers of the soil with the
wergild of twelve hundred shillings. Now if these things are being done in
the middling strata of society, if the sokemen are being suppressed or
depressed in Cambridgeshire, the alodiaries in Sussex, what is likely to be
the fate of the poor? They will have to till their lord’s demesne graviter et
miserabiliter. He can afford to dispense with serfs, for he has villeins.
A last argument must be added. What we see in the
The peasants on the
thirteenth century of the ancient demesne of the royal demesne.
crown[236] might lead us to expect that in Domesday
Book ‘the manors of St. Edward’ would stand out in
bold relief. Instead of a population mainly consisting of villeins shall we not
find upon them large numbers of sokemen, the ancestors of the men who in
holders of manors, they often were, but as we shall see more fully hereafter,
when we are examining the term manerium, such phrases are likely to
deceive us. Often enough they were very small people with very little land.
For example these six free men whom Hugh de Port represents had only
two and a half team-lands. We pass by a few pages and find Hugh de
Montfort with a holding which comprises but one team-land and a half; he
has 4 villeins and 2 bordiers there. His antecessores were three free men,
who could go whither they would[233]. They had need for but 12 oxen; they
had no more land than they could easily till, at all events with the help of
two or three cottagers or slaves. To all appearance they were no better than
peasants. They or their sons may still be tilling the land as Hugh’s villeins.
When we look for such instances we very easily find them. The case is not
altered by the fact that the term ‘manor’ is given to the holdings of these
antecessores. In Sussex an under-tenant of Earl Roger has an estate with
four villeins upon it. His antecessores were two free men who held the land
as two manors. And how much land was there to be divided between the
two? There was one team-land. Such holders of maneria were tillers of the
soil, peasants, at best yeomen[234]. If they were of thegnly rank, this again
does not alter the case. When in the survey of Dorset we read how four
thegns held two team-lands, how six thegns held two team-lands, eight
thegns two team-lands, nine thegns four team-lands, eleven thegns four
team-lands[235], we can not of course be certain that each of these groups of
co-tenants had but one holding; but thegnly rank is inherited, and if a thegn
will have nine or ten sons there will soon be tillers of the soil with the
wergild of twelve hundred shillings. Now if these things are being done in
the middling strata of society, if the sokemen are being suppressed or
depressed in Cambridgeshire, the alodiaries in Sussex, what is likely to be
the fate of the poor? They will have to till their lord’s demesne graviter et
miserabiliter. He can afford to dispense with serfs, for he has villeins.
A last argument must be added. What we see in the
The peasants on the
thirteenth century of the ancient demesne of the royal demesne.
crown[236] might lead us to expect that in Domesday
Book ‘the manors of St. Edward’ would stand out in
bold relief. Instead of a population mainly consisting of villeins shall we not
find upon them large numbers of sokemen, the ancestors of the men who in
Page 86
after days will be protected by the little writ of right and the
Monstraverunt? Nothing of the kind. The royal manor differs in no such
mode as this from any other manor. If it lies in a county in which other
manors have sokemen, then it may or may not have sokemen. If it lies in a
county in which other manors have no sokemen, it will have none.
Cambridgeshire is a county in which there are some, and have been many,
sokemen; there is hardly a sokeman upon the ancient demesne. In after days
the men of Chesterton, for example, will have all the peculiar rights
attributed by lawyers to the sokemen of St. Edward. But St. Edward, if we
trust Domesday Book, had never a sokeman there; he had two villeins and a
number of bordiers and cottiers[237]. It seems fairly clear that from an early
time, if not from the first days of the Conquest onwards, the king was the
best of landlords. The tenants of those manors that were conceived as
annexed to the crown, those tenants one and all, save the class of slaves
which was disappearing, got a better, a more regular justice than that which
the villeins of other lords could hope for. It was the king’s justice, and
therefore—for the king’s public and private capacities were hardly to be
distinguished—it was public justice, and so became formal justice, defined
by writs, administered in the last resort by the highest court, the ablest
lawyers. And so sokemen disappear from private manors. Some of them as
tenants in free socage may maintain their position; many fall down into the
class of tenants in villeinage. On the ancient demesne the sokemen
multiply; they appear where Domesday knew them not; for those who are
protected by royal justice can hardly (now that villeinage implies a
precarious tenure) be called villeins, they must be ‘villein sokemen’ at the
least. Whether or no we trust the tradition which ascribes to the Conqueror a
law in favour of the tillers of the soil, we can hardly doubt that the villani
and bordarii whom Domesday Book shows us on the royal manors are
treated as having legal rights in their holdings. And if this be true of them, it
should be true of their peers upon other manors. Yes, it should be true; the
manorial courts that are arising should do impartial justice even between
lord and villeins; but who is to make it true?
Monstraverunt? Nothing of the kind. The royal manor differs in no such
mode as this from any other manor. If it lies in a county in which other
manors have sokemen, then it may or may not have sokemen. If it lies in a
county in which other manors have no sokemen, it will have none.
Cambridgeshire is a county in which there are some, and have been many,
sokemen; there is hardly a sokeman upon the ancient demesne. In after days
the men of Chesterton, for example, will have all the peculiar rights
attributed by lawyers to the sokemen of St. Edward. But St. Edward, if we
trust Domesday Book, had never a sokeman there; he had two villeins and a
number of bordiers and cottiers[237]. It seems fairly clear that from an early
time, if not from the first days of the Conquest onwards, the king was the
best of landlords. The tenants of those manors that were conceived as
annexed to the crown, those tenants one and all, save the class of slaves
which was disappearing, got a better, a more regular justice than that which
the villeins of other lords could hope for. It was the king’s justice, and
therefore—for the king’s public and private capacities were hardly to be
distinguished—it was public justice, and so became formal justice, defined
by writs, administered in the last resort by the highest court, the ablest
lawyers. And so sokemen disappear from private manors. Some of them as
tenants in free socage may maintain their position; many fall down into the
class of tenants in villeinage. On the ancient demesne the sokemen
multiply; they appear where Domesday knew them not; for those who are
protected by royal justice can hardly (now that villeinage implies a
precarious tenure) be called villeins, they must be ‘villein sokemen’ at the
least. Whether or no we trust the tradition which ascribes to the Conqueror a
law in favour of the tillers of the soil, we can hardly doubt that the villani
and bordarii whom Domesday Book shows us on the royal manors are
treated as having legal rights in their holdings. And if this be true of them, it
should be true of their peers upon other manors. Yes, it should be true; the
manorial courts that are arising should do impartial justice even between
lord and villeins; but who is to make it true?
Page 87
Page 88
§ 4. The Sokemen.
Now of a large part of England we may say that all
The sochemanni and
the occupiers of land who are not holding liberi homines.
‘manors[238]’ will belong to some of those classes of
which we have already spoken. They will be villeins,
bordiers, cottiers, ‘boors’ or serfs. Here and there we may find a few
persons who are described as liberi homines. In some of the western
counties, Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Shropshire, there are
rachenistres or radmans; between the Ribble and the Mersey we may find a
party of drengs. Still it is generally true that two of those five classes that
seem to have been mentioned in King William’s writ[239], the sochemanni
and the liberi homines, are largely represented only in certain counties.
They are to be seen in Essex, yet more thickly in Suffolk and Norfolk. In
Lincolnshire nearly half of the rural population consists of sokemen, though
there is no class of persons described as liberi homines. There are some
sokemen in Yorkshire, but they are not very numerous and there are hardly
any liberi homines. We have seen how in Cambridgeshire and Bedfordshire
the sokemen have fared ill; but still some are left there. Traces of them may
be found in Hertford and Buckingham; they are thick in Leicester,
Nottingham and Northampton; there are some in Derbyshire. There have
been sokemen in Middlesex[240] and in Surrey[241]; but they have been
suppressed; a few remain in Kent[242]; so we should be rash were we to find
anything characteristically Scandinavian in the sokemen. Even in Suffolk
they are suffering ill at the hands of their new masters[243], while in
Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire they have been suppressed or
displaced.
We have now to enter on a difficult task, a
Lord and man.
discussion of the relation which exists between these
sochemanni and liberi homines on the one hand and
their lord upon the other. The character of this relation varies from case to
case. We may distinguish three different bonds by which a man may be
bound to a lord, a personal bond, a tenurial bond, a jurisdictional or
Now of a large part of England we may say that all
The sochemanni and
the occupiers of land who are not holding liberi homines.
‘manors[238]’ will belong to some of those classes of
which we have already spoken. They will be villeins,
bordiers, cottiers, ‘boors’ or serfs. Here and there we may find a few
persons who are described as liberi homines. In some of the western
counties, Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Shropshire, there are
rachenistres or radmans; between the Ribble and the Mersey we may find a
party of drengs. Still it is generally true that two of those five classes that
seem to have been mentioned in King William’s writ[239], the sochemanni
and the liberi homines, are largely represented only in certain counties.
They are to be seen in Essex, yet more thickly in Suffolk and Norfolk. In
Lincolnshire nearly half of the rural population consists of sokemen, though
there is no class of persons described as liberi homines. There are some
sokemen in Yorkshire, but they are not very numerous and there are hardly
any liberi homines. We have seen how in Cambridgeshire and Bedfordshire
the sokemen have fared ill; but still some are left there. Traces of them may
be found in Hertford and Buckingham; they are thick in Leicester,
Nottingham and Northampton; there are some in Derbyshire. There have
been sokemen in Middlesex[240] and in Surrey[241]; but they have been
suppressed; a few remain in Kent[242]; so we should be rash were we to find
anything characteristically Scandinavian in the sokemen. Even in Suffolk
they are suffering ill at the hands of their new masters[243], while in
Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire they have been suppressed or
displaced.
We have now to enter on a difficult task, a
Lord and man.
discussion of the relation which exists between these
sochemanni and liberi homines on the one hand and
their lord upon the other. The character of this relation varies from case to
case. We may distinguish three different bonds by which a man may be
bound to a lord, a personal bond, a tenurial bond, a jurisdictional or
Page 89
justiciary bond. But the language of Domesday Book is not very patient of
this analysis. However in the second volume we very frequently come upon
two ideas which are sharply contrasted with each other; the one is expressed
by the term commendatio, the other by the term soca[244]. To these we must
add the great vague term consuetudo, and we shall also have to consider the
phrases which describe the various degrees of that freedom of ‘withdrawing
himself with his land’ that a man may enjoy.
In order that we may become familiar with the use
Bonds between lord and
made of these terms and phrases we will transcribe a man.
few typical entries:
Two free men, of whom Ælfwin had not even the commendation[245].
Of these men Harold had not even the commendation[246].
Thus commendation seems put before us as the slightest bond that there can
be between lord and man. Very often we are told that the lord had the
commendation and nothing more[247]. Thus it is contrasted with the soke:—
His predecessor had only the commendation of this, and Harold had
the soke[248].
Of these six free men St Benet had the soke, and of one of them the
commendation[249].
And the commendation is contrasted with the ‘custom,’ the consuetudo,
perhaps we might say the ‘service’:—
Of the said sokeman Ralph Peverel had a custom of 3 shillings a year,
but in the Confessor’s time his ancestor had only the
commendation[250].
R. Malet claims 18 free men, 3 of them by commendation, and the rest
for all custom[251].
And the soke is contrasted with the consuetudo:—
To this manor belong 4 men for all custom, and other 4 for soke
only[252].
this analysis. However in the second volume we very frequently come upon
two ideas which are sharply contrasted with each other; the one is expressed
by the term commendatio, the other by the term soca[244]. To these we must
add the great vague term consuetudo, and we shall also have to consider the
phrases which describe the various degrees of that freedom of ‘withdrawing
himself with his land’ that a man may enjoy.
In order that we may become familiar with the use
Bonds between lord and
made of these terms and phrases we will transcribe a man.
few typical entries:
Two free men, of whom Ælfwin had not even the commendation[245].
Of these men Harold had not even the commendation[246].
Thus commendation seems put before us as the slightest bond that there can
be between lord and man. Very often we are told that the lord had the
commendation and nothing more[247]. Thus it is contrasted with the soke:—
His predecessor had only the commendation of this, and Harold had
the soke[248].
Of these six free men St Benet had the soke, and of one of them the
commendation[249].
And the commendation is contrasted with the ‘custom,’ the consuetudo,
perhaps we might say the ‘service’:—
Of the said sokeman Ralph Peverel had a custom of 3 shillings a year,
but in the Confessor’s time his ancestor had only the
commendation[250].
R. Malet claims 18 free men, 3 of them by commendation, and the rest
for all custom[251].
And the soke is contrasted with the consuetudo:—
To this manor belong 4 men for all custom, and other 4 for soke
only[252].
Page 90
In a given case all these bonds may be united:—
There are 7 sokemen who are the Saint’s men with sake and soke and
all custom[253].
Over this man the Saint has sake and soke and commendation with all
custom[254].
Then if the man ‘withdraws,’ or gives or sells his land, we often read of the
soke ‘remaining’; we sometimes read of the commendation, the custom, the
service ‘remaining.’
These free men could sell or give their land, but the commendation and
the soke and sake would remain to St Edmund[255].
These men could sell their land, but the soke would remain to the Saint
and the service (servitium), whoever might be the buyer[256].
They could give and sell their land, but the soke and the
commendation and the service would remain to the Saint[257].
But after all, these distinctions are not maintained with rigour, for the soke
is sometimes spoken of as though it were a species of consuetudo. We have
a tangled skein in our hands.
The thread that looks as if it would be the easiest to
Commendation.
unravel, is that which is styled ‘mere
commendation.’ The same idea is expressed by other
phrases—‘he committed himself to Bishop Herman for his
defence[258]’—‘they submitted themselves with their land to the abbey for
defence[259]’—‘he became the man of Goisfrid of his own free
will[260]’—‘she put herself with her land in the hand of the queen[261].’
‘Homage’ is not a common term in Domesday Book, but if, when speaking
of the old time, it says, as it constantly does, that one person was the man of
another, no doubt it is telling us of a relationship which had its origin in an
oath and a symbolic ceremony[262]. ‘She put herself into the hands of the
queen’—we should take these words to mean just what they say. An Anglo-
Saxon oath of fealty (hyldáð) has been preserved[263]. The swearer promises
to be faithful and true to his lord, to love all that his lord loves and eschew
all that his lord eschews. He makes no distinct reference to any land, but he
There are 7 sokemen who are the Saint’s men with sake and soke and
all custom[253].
Over this man the Saint has sake and soke and commendation with all
custom[254].
Then if the man ‘withdraws,’ or gives or sells his land, we often read of the
soke ‘remaining’; we sometimes read of the commendation, the custom, the
service ‘remaining.’
These free men could sell or give their land, but the commendation and
the soke and sake would remain to St Edmund[255].
These men could sell their land, but the soke would remain to the Saint
and the service (servitium), whoever might be the buyer[256].
They could give and sell their land, but the soke and the
commendation and the service would remain to the Saint[257].
But after all, these distinctions are not maintained with rigour, for the soke
is sometimes spoken of as though it were a species of consuetudo. We have
a tangled skein in our hands.
The thread that looks as if it would be the easiest to
Commendation.
unravel, is that which is styled ‘mere
commendation.’ The same idea is expressed by other
phrases—‘he committed himself to Bishop Herman for his
defence[258]’—‘they submitted themselves with their land to the abbey for
defence[259]’—‘he became the man of Goisfrid of his own free
will[260]’—‘she put herself with her land in the hand of the queen[261].’
‘Homage’ is not a common term in Domesday Book, but if, when speaking
of the old time, it says, as it constantly does, that one person was the man of
another, no doubt it is telling us of a relationship which had its origin in an
oath and a symbolic ceremony[262]. ‘She put herself into the hands of the
queen’—we should take these words to mean just what they say. An Anglo-
Saxon oath of fealty (hyldáð) has been preserved[263]. The swearer promises
to be faithful and true to his lord, to love all that his lord loves and eschew
all that his lord eschews. He makes no distinct reference to any land, but he
Page 91
refers to some compact which exists between him and his lord:—He will be
faithful and true on condition that his lord treats him according to his
deserts and according to the covenant that has been established between
them.
To all seeming there need not be any land in the
Commendation and
case; and, if the man has land, the act of protection.
commendation will not give the lord as a matter of
course any rights in that land. Certainly Domesday
Book seems to assume that in general every owner or holder of land must
have had a lord. This assumption is very worthy of notice. A law of
Æthelstan[264] had said that lordless men ‘of whom no right could be had’
were to have lords, but this command seems aimed at the landless folk, not
at those whose land is a sufficient surety for their good behaviour. The law
had not directly commanded the landed men to commend themselves, but it
had supplied them with motives for so doing[265]. What did a man gain by
this act of submission? Of advantages that might be called ‘extra-legal’ we
will say nothing, though in the wild days of Æthelred the Unready, and even
during the Confessor’s reign, there was lawlessness enough to make the
small proprietor wish that he had a mightier friend than the law could be.
But there were distinct legal advantages to be had by commendation. In the
first place, the life of the great man’s man was protected not only by a wer-
gild, but by a man-bót:—a man-bót due to one who had the power to exact
it; and if, as one of our authorities assures us, the amount of the man-bót
varied with the rank of the lord[266], this would help to account for a
remarkable fact disclosed by Domesday Book, namely, that the chosen lord
was usually a person of the very highest rank, an earl, an archbishop, the
king. Then, again, if the man got into a scrape, his lord might be of service
to him. Suppose the man accused of theft: in certain cases he might escape
with a single, instead of a triple ordeal, if he had a lord who would swear to
his good character[267]. In yet other cases his lord would come forward as
his compurgator; perhaps he was morally bound to do so; and, being a man
of high rank, would swear a crushing oath. And within certain limits that we
can not well define the lord might warrant the doings of his man, might take
upon himself the task of defending an action to which his man was
subjected[268]. What the man has sought by his submission is defensio,
faithful and true on condition that his lord treats him according to his
deserts and according to the covenant that has been established between
them.
To all seeming there need not be any land in the
Commendation and
case; and, if the man has land, the act of protection.
commendation will not give the lord as a matter of
course any rights in that land. Certainly Domesday
Book seems to assume that in general every owner or holder of land must
have had a lord. This assumption is very worthy of notice. A law of
Æthelstan[264] had said that lordless men ‘of whom no right could be had’
were to have lords, but this command seems aimed at the landless folk, not
at those whose land is a sufficient surety for their good behaviour. The law
had not directly commanded the landed men to commend themselves, but it
had supplied them with motives for so doing[265]. What did a man gain by
this act of submission? Of advantages that might be called ‘extra-legal’ we
will say nothing, though in the wild days of Æthelred the Unready, and even
during the Confessor’s reign, there was lawlessness enough to make the
small proprietor wish that he had a mightier friend than the law could be.
But there were distinct legal advantages to be had by commendation. In the
first place, the life of the great man’s man was protected not only by a wer-
gild, but by a man-bót:—a man-bót due to one who had the power to exact
it; and if, as one of our authorities assures us, the amount of the man-bót
varied with the rank of the lord[266], this would help to account for a
remarkable fact disclosed by Domesday Book, namely, that the chosen lord
was usually a person of the very highest rank, an earl, an archbishop, the
king. Then, again, if the man got into a scrape, his lord might be of service
to him. Suppose the man accused of theft: in certain cases he might escape
with a single, instead of a triple ordeal, if he had a lord who would swear to
his good character[267]. In yet other cases his lord would come forward as
his compurgator; perhaps he was morally bound to do so; and, being a man
of high rank, would swear a crushing oath. And within certain limits that we
can not well define the lord might warrant the doings of his man, might take
upon himself the task of defending an action to which his man was
subjected[268]. What the man has sought by his submission is defensio,
Page 92
tuitio; the lord is his defensor, tutor, protector, advocatus, in a word, his
warrantor[269].
Of warranty we are accustomed to think chiefly in
Commendation and
connexion with the title to land:—the feoffor warranty.
warrants the feoffee in his enjoyment of the
tenement. But to all appearance in the eleventh
century it is rather as lord than as giver, seller or lender, that the vouchee
comes to the defence of his man. If the land is conceived as having once
been the warrantor’s land, this may be but a fiction:—the man has given up
his land and then taken it again merely in order that he may be able to say
with some truth that he has it by his lord’s gift. But we can not be sure that
as yet any such fiction is necessary. ‘I will defend any action that is brought
against you for this land’:—as yet men see no reason why such a promise as
this, if made with due ceremony, should not be enforced. A certain amount
of ‘maintenance’ is desirable in their eyes and laudable.
Though we began with the statement that where
Commendation and
there is commendation there may yet be no land in tenure.
the case, we have none the less been already led to
the supposition that often enough land does get
involved in this nexus between man and lord. No doubt a landless man may
commend himself and get no land in return for his homage; but with such
an one Domesday Book is not concerned. The cases in which it takes an
interest are those in which a landholder has commended himself. Now we
dare not say that a landholder can never commend himself without
commending his land also[270]. Howbeit, the usual practice certainly is that
a man who submits or commits himself for ‘defence’ or ‘protection’ shall
take his land with him; he ‘goes with his land’ to a lord. Very curious are
some of the instances which show how large a liberty men have enjoyed of
taking land wherever they please. ‘Tostig bought this land from the church
of Malmesbury for three lives’:—in this there is nothing strange; leases for
three lives granted by churches to thegns have been common. But of course
we should assume that during the lease the land could have no other lord
than the church of Malmesbury. Not so, however, for during his lease Tostig
‘could go with that land to whatever lord he pleased[271].’ In Essex there
was before the Conquest a man who held land; that land in some sort
belonged to the Abbey of Barking, and could not be separated from the
warrantor[269].
Of warranty we are accustomed to think chiefly in
Commendation and
connexion with the title to land:—the feoffor warranty.
warrants the feoffee in his enjoyment of the
tenement. But to all appearance in the eleventh
century it is rather as lord than as giver, seller or lender, that the vouchee
comes to the defence of his man. If the land is conceived as having once
been the warrantor’s land, this may be but a fiction:—the man has given up
his land and then taken it again merely in order that he may be able to say
with some truth that he has it by his lord’s gift. But we can not be sure that
as yet any such fiction is necessary. ‘I will defend any action that is brought
against you for this land’:—as yet men see no reason why such a promise as
this, if made with due ceremony, should not be enforced. A certain amount
of ‘maintenance’ is desirable in their eyes and laudable.
Though we began with the statement that where
Commendation and
there is commendation there may yet be no land in tenure.
the case, we have none the less been already led to
the supposition that often enough land does get
involved in this nexus between man and lord. No doubt a landless man may
commend himself and get no land in return for his homage; but with such
an one Domesday Book is not concerned. The cases in which it takes an
interest are those in which a landholder has commended himself. Now we
dare not say that a landholder can never commend himself without
commending his land also[270]. Howbeit, the usual practice certainly is that
a man who submits or commits himself for ‘defence’ or ‘protection’ shall
take his land with him; he ‘goes with his land’ to a lord. Very curious are
some of the instances which show how large a liberty men have enjoyed of
taking land wherever they please. ‘Tostig bought this land from the church
of Malmesbury for three lives’:—in this there is nothing strange; leases for
three lives granted by churches to thegns have been common. But of course
we should assume that during the lease the land could have no other lord
than the church of Malmesbury. Not so, however, for during his lease Tostig
‘could go with that land to whatever lord he pleased[271].’ In Essex there
was before the Conquest a man who held land; that land in some sort
belonged to the Abbey of Barking, and could not be separated from the
Page 93
abbey; but the holder of it was the man (‘merely the man’ say the jurors) of
one Leofhild the predecessor of Geoffrey de Mandeville[272]. In this last
case we may satisfy ourselves by saying that a purely personal relation is
distinguished from a tenurial relation; the man of Leofhild is the tenant of
the abbey. But what of Tostig’s case? Land that he holds of the church of
Malmesbury, and that too by no perpetual tenure, he can commend to
another lord. From the man’s point of view, protection, defence, warranty, is
the essence of commendation, and the warranty that he chiefly needs is the
warranty of his possession, of the title by which he holds his land. It can not
but be therefore that the lord to whom he commends himself and his land,
should be in some sort his landlord.
Not that he need pay rent, or perform other services
The lord’s interest in
in return for the land. The land is his land; he has not commendation.
obtained it from his lord; on the contrary he has
carried it to his lord. Mere commendation is
therefore distinguished by a score of entries from a relation that involves
the payment of consuetudines. Doubtless however the lord obtains ‘a
valuable consideration’ for all that he gives. Part of this will probably lie
without the legal sphere. He has a sworn retainer who will fight whenever
he is told to fight. But even the law allows the man to go great lengths in his
lord’s defence[273]. In a rough age happy is the lord who has many sworn to
defend him. When at a later time we see that the claimant of land must offer
proof ‘by the body of a certain free man of his,’ we are taught that the lords
have relied upon the testimony and the strong right arms of their vassals.
That in all cases the lord got more than this we can not say, though perhaps
commendation carried with it the right to the heriot, the horse and armour
of the dead man[274]. The relation is often put before us as temporary.
Numerous are the persons who ‘can seek lords where they choose’ or who
can ‘go with their land wherever they please.’ How large a liberty these
phrases accord to lord and man it were hard to tell. We can not believe that
either party to the contract could dissolve it just at the moment when the
other had some need to enforce it; but still at other times the man might
dissolve it, and we may suppose that the lord could do so too. But the
connexion might be of a more permanent kind. Perhaps in most cases in
which we are told that a man can not withdraw his land from his lord the
bond between them is regarded as something other than commendation—
one Leofhild the predecessor of Geoffrey de Mandeville[272]. In this last
case we may satisfy ourselves by saying that a purely personal relation is
distinguished from a tenurial relation; the man of Leofhild is the tenant of
the abbey. But what of Tostig’s case? Land that he holds of the church of
Malmesbury, and that too by no perpetual tenure, he can commend to
another lord. From the man’s point of view, protection, defence, warranty, is
the essence of commendation, and the warranty that he chiefly needs is the
warranty of his possession, of the title by which he holds his land. It can not
but be therefore that the lord to whom he commends himself and his land,
should be in some sort his landlord.
Not that he need pay rent, or perform other services
The lord’s interest in
in return for the land. The land is his land; he has not commendation.
obtained it from his lord; on the contrary he has
carried it to his lord. Mere commendation is
therefore distinguished by a score of entries from a relation that involves
the payment of consuetudines. Doubtless however the lord obtains ‘a
valuable consideration’ for all that he gives. Part of this will probably lie
without the legal sphere. He has a sworn retainer who will fight whenever
he is told to fight. But even the law allows the man to go great lengths in his
lord’s defence[273]. In a rough age happy is the lord who has many sworn to
defend him. When at a later time we see that the claimant of land must offer
proof ‘by the body of a certain free man of his,’ we are taught that the lords
have relied upon the testimony and the strong right arms of their vassals.
That in all cases the lord got more than this we can not say, though perhaps
commendation carried with it the right to the heriot, the horse and armour
of the dead man[274]. The relation is often put before us as temporary.
Numerous are the persons who ‘can seek lords where they choose’ or who
can ‘go with their land wherever they please.’ How large a liberty these
phrases accord to lord and man it were hard to tell. We can not believe that
either party to the contract could dissolve it just at the moment when the
other had some need to enforce it; but still at other times the man might
dissolve it, and we may suppose that the lord could do so too. But the
connexion might be of a more permanent kind. Perhaps in most cases in
which we are told that a man can not withdraw his land from his lord the
bond between them is regarded as something other than commendation—
Page 94
there is commendation and something more. But this is no universal truth.
You might be the lord’s man ‘merely by commendation’ and yet be unable
to sell your land without the lord’s leave[275]. At any rate, in one way and
another ‘the commendation’ is considered as capable of binding the land.
The commended man will be spoken of as holding the land under (sub) his
lord, if not of (de) his lord[276]. In many cases if he sells the land ‘the
commendation will remain to his lord’—by which is meant, not that the
vendor will continue to be the man of that lord (for the purposes of the
Domesday Inquest this would be a matter of indifference) but that the lord’s
rights over the land are not destroyed. The purchaser comes to the land and
finds the commendation inhering in it[277].
And so, again, the lord’s rights under the
The seignory over the
commendation seem to constitute an alienable and commended.
heritable seignory. It is thus that we may best explain
the case, very common in East Anglia, in which a
man is commended half to one and half to another lord[278]. Thus we read of
a case in which a free man was commended, as to one-third to Wulfsige,
and as to the residue to Wulfsige’s two brothers[279]. In this instance it
seems clear that the commendation has descended to three co-heirs. In other
cases a lord may have made over his rights to two religious houses; thus we
hear of a man who is common to the Abbots of Ely and St. Edmund’s[280].
In some cases a man may, in others he may not, be able to prevent himself
being transferred from lord to lord, or from ancestor to heir. What passes by
alienation or inheritance may be regarded rather as a right to his
commendation than as the commendation itself[281]. Of course there is
nothing to hinder one from being the man of several different lords. Ælfric
Black held lands of the Abbot of Westminster which he could not separate
from the church, but for other lands he was the man of Archbishop
Stigand[282]. Already a lofty edifice is being constructed; B, to whom C is
commended, is himself commended to A; and in this case a certain relation
exists between C and A; C is ‘sub-commended’ to A[283].
In a given case the somewhat vague obligation of the
Commendation and
commended man may be rendered definite by a service.
bargain which imposes upon him the payment of
rent or the performance of some specified services.
When this is so, we shall often find that the land is moving, if we may so
You might be the lord’s man ‘merely by commendation’ and yet be unable
to sell your land without the lord’s leave[275]. At any rate, in one way and
another ‘the commendation’ is considered as capable of binding the land.
The commended man will be spoken of as holding the land under (sub) his
lord, if not of (de) his lord[276]. In many cases if he sells the land ‘the
commendation will remain to his lord’—by which is meant, not that the
vendor will continue to be the man of that lord (for the purposes of the
Domesday Inquest this would be a matter of indifference) but that the lord’s
rights over the land are not destroyed. The purchaser comes to the land and
finds the commendation inhering in it[277].
And so, again, the lord’s rights under the
The seignory over the
commendation seem to constitute an alienable and commended.
heritable seignory. It is thus that we may best explain
the case, very common in East Anglia, in which a
man is commended half to one and half to another lord[278]. Thus we read of
a case in which a free man was commended, as to one-third to Wulfsige,
and as to the residue to Wulfsige’s two brothers[279]. In this instance it
seems clear that the commendation has descended to three co-heirs. In other
cases a lord may have made over his rights to two religious houses; thus we
hear of a man who is common to the Abbots of Ely and St. Edmund’s[280].
In some cases a man may, in others he may not, be able to prevent himself
being transferred from lord to lord, or from ancestor to heir. What passes by
alienation or inheritance may be regarded rather as a right to his
commendation than as the commendation itself[281]. Of course there is
nothing to hinder one from being the man of several different lords. Ælfric
Black held lands of the Abbot of Westminster which he could not separate
from the church, but for other lands he was the man of Archbishop
Stigand[282]. Already a lofty edifice is being constructed; B, to whom C is
commended, is himself commended to A; and in this case a certain relation
exists between C and A; C is ‘sub-commended’ to A[283].
In a given case the somewhat vague obligation of the
Commendation and
commended man may be rendered definite by a service.
bargain which imposes upon him the payment of
rent or the performance of some specified services.
When this is so, we shall often find that the land is moving, if we may so
Page 95
speak, not from the man but from the lord. The man is taking land from the
lord to hold during good behaviour[284], or for life[285], or for lives. A form
of lease or loan (lǽn) which gives the land to the lessee and to two or three
successive heirs of his, has from of old been commonly used by some of the
great churches[286]. Also we see landowners giving up their land to the
churches and taking it back again as mere life tenants. During their lives the
church is to have some ‘service,’ or at least some ‘recognition’ of its
lordship, while after their deaths the church will have the land in
demesne[287]. This is something different from mere commendation. We see
here the feuda oblata or beneficia oblata which foreign jurists have
contrasted with feuda or beneficia data. The land is brought into the bargain
by the man, not by the lord. But often the land comes from the lord, and the
tenancy is no merely temporary tenancy; it is heritable. The king has
provided his thegns with lands; the earls, the churches have provided their
thegns with lands, and these thegns have heritable estates, and already they
are conceived as holding them of (de) the churches, the earls, the king. But
we must not as yet be led away into any discussion about the architecture of
the very highest storeys of the feudal or vassalic edifice. It must at present
suffice that in humbler quarters there has been much letting and hiring of
land. The leases, if we choose to call them so, the gifts, if we choose to call
them so, have created heritable rights and perdurable relationships.
There is no kind of service that can not be purchased
Land-loans and services.
by a grant or lease of land. Godric’s wife had land
from the king because she fed his dogs[288]. Ælfgyfu
the maiden had land from Godric the sheriff that she might teach his
daughter orfrey work[289]. The monks of Pershore stipulate that their
dominion shall be recognized by ‘a day’s farm’ in every year, that is, that
the lessee shall once a year furnish the convent with a day’s victual[290]. The
king’s thegns between the Ribble and the Mersey have ‘like villeins’ to
make lodges for the king, and fisheries and deer-hays, and must send their
reapers to cut the king’s crops at harvest time[291]. The radmen and
radknights of the west must ride on their lord’s errands and make
themselves generally useful; they plough and harrow and mow, and do
whatever is commanded them[292].
But we would here speak chiefly of the lowly ‘free
The man’s
men’ and sokemen of the eastern counties. Besides
lord to hold during good behaviour[284], or for life[285], or for lives. A form
of lease or loan (lǽn) which gives the land to the lessee and to two or three
successive heirs of his, has from of old been commonly used by some of the
great churches[286]. Also we see landowners giving up their land to the
churches and taking it back again as mere life tenants. During their lives the
church is to have some ‘service,’ or at least some ‘recognition’ of its
lordship, while after their deaths the church will have the land in
demesne[287]. This is something different from mere commendation. We see
here the feuda oblata or beneficia oblata which foreign jurists have
contrasted with feuda or beneficia data. The land is brought into the bargain
by the man, not by the lord. But often the land comes from the lord, and the
tenancy is no merely temporary tenancy; it is heritable. The king has
provided his thegns with lands; the earls, the churches have provided their
thegns with lands, and these thegns have heritable estates, and already they
are conceived as holding them of (de) the churches, the earls, the king. But
we must not as yet be led away into any discussion about the architecture of
the very highest storeys of the feudal or vassalic edifice. It must at present
suffice that in humbler quarters there has been much letting and hiring of
land. The leases, if we choose to call them so, the gifts, if we choose to call
them so, have created heritable rights and perdurable relationships.
There is no kind of service that can not be purchased
Land-loans and services.
by a grant or lease of land. Godric’s wife had land
from the king because she fed his dogs[288]. Ælfgyfu
the maiden had land from Godric the sheriff that she might teach his
daughter orfrey work[289]. The monks of Pershore stipulate that their
dominion shall be recognized by ‘a day’s farm’ in every year, that is, that
the lessee shall once a year furnish the convent with a day’s victual[290]. The
king’s thegns between the Ribble and the Mersey have ‘like villeins’ to
make lodges for the king, and fisheries and deer-hays, and must send their
reapers to cut the king’s crops at harvest time[291]. The radmen and
radknights of the west must ride on their lord’s errands and make
themselves generally useful; they plough and harrow and mow, and do
whatever is commanded them[292].
But we would here speak chiefly of the lowly ‘free
The man’s
men’ and sokemen of the eastern counties. Besides
Page 96
having their commendation and their soke, the lord consuetudines.
very often has what is known as their consuetudo or
their consuetudines. Often they are the lord’s men de omni consuetudine. In
all probability the word when thus employed, when contrasted with
commendation on the one hand and with soke on the other, points to
payments and renders to be made in money and in kind and to services of
an agricultural character. Of such services only one stands out prominently;
it is very frequently mentioned in the survey of East Anglia; it is fold-soke,
soca faldae. The man must not have a fold of his own; his sheep must lie in
the lord’s fold. It is manure that the lord wants; the demand for manure has
played a large part in the history of the human race. Often enough this is the
one consuetudo, the one definite service, that the lord gets out of his free
men[293]. And then a man who is consuetus ad faldam, tied to his lord’s
fold, is hardly to be considered as being in all respects a ‘free’ man. Those
who are not ‘fold-worthy’ are to be classed with those who are not ‘moot-
worthy’ or ‘fyrd-worthy.’ We are tempted to say that a man’s caput is
diminished by his having to seek his lord’s fold, just as it would be
diminished if he were excluded from the communal courts or the national
host[294]. From the nature of this one consuetudo and from the prominence
that is given to it, we may guess the character of the other consuetudines.
Suit to the lord’s mill would be analogous to suit to his fold[295]. Of ‘mill-
soke’ we read nothing, but often enough a surprisingly large part of the total
value of a manor is ascribed to its mill, and we may argue that the lord has
not invested capital in a costly undertaking without making sure of a return.
We may well suppose that like the radmen of the west the free men and
sokemen of the east give their lord some help in his husbandry at harvest
time. From a document which comes to us from the abbey of Ely, and
which is slightly older than the Domesday Inquest, we learn that certain of
St. Etheldreda’s sokemen in Suffolk had nothing to do but to plough and
thresh whenever the abbot required this of them; others had to plough and
weed and reap, to carry the victual of the monks to the minster and furnish
horses whenever called upon to do so[296]. This seems to point rather to
‘boon-days’ than to continuous ‘week-work,’ and we observe that the
sokemen of the east like the radmen of the west have horses. Occasionally
we learn that a sokeman has to pay an annual sum of money to his lord;
sometimes this looks like a substantial rent, sometimes like a mere
very often has what is known as their consuetudo or
their consuetudines. Often they are the lord’s men de omni consuetudine. In
all probability the word when thus employed, when contrasted with
commendation on the one hand and with soke on the other, points to
payments and renders to be made in money and in kind and to services of
an agricultural character. Of such services only one stands out prominently;
it is very frequently mentioned in the survey of East Anglia; it is fold-soke,
soca faldae. The man must not have a fold of his own; his sheep must lie in
the lord’s fold. It is manure that the lord wants; the demand for manure has
played a large part in the history of the human race. Often enough this is the
one consuetudo, the one definite service, that the lord gets out of his free
men[293]. And then a man who is consuetus ad faldam, tied to his lord’s
fold, is hardly to be considered as being in all respects a ‘free’ man. Those
who are not ‘fold-worthy’ are to be classed with those who are not ‘moot-
worthy’ or ‘fyrd-worthy.’ We are tempted to say that a man’s caput is
diminished by his having to seek his lord’s fold, just as it would be
diminished if he were excluded from the communal courts or the national
host[294]. From the nature of this one consuetudo and from the prominence
that is given to it, we may guess the character of the other consuetudines.
Suit to the lord’s mill would be analogous to suit to his fold[295]. Of ‘mill-
soke’ we read nothing, but often enough a surprisingly large part of the total
value of a manor is ascribed to its mill, and we may argue that the lord has
not invested capital in a costly undertaking without making sure of a return.
We may well suppose that like the radmen of the west the free men and
sokemen of the east give their lord some help in his husbandry at harvest
time. From a document which comes to us from the abbey of Ely, and
which is slightly older than the Domesday Inquest, we learn that certain of
St. Etheldreda’s sokemen in Suffolk had nothing to do but to plough and
thresh whenever the abbot required this of them; others had to plough and
weed and reap, to carry the victual of the monks to the minster and furnish
horses whenever called upon to do so[296]. This seems to point rather to
‘boon-days’ than to continuous ‘week-work,’ and we observe that the
sokemen of the east like the radmen of the west have horses. Occasionally
we learn that a sokeman has to pay an annual sum of money to his lord;
sometimes this looks like a substantial rent, sometimes like a mere
Page 97
‘recognition’; but the words that most nearly translate our ‘rent,’ redditus,
census, gablum are seldom used in this context. All is consuetudo
It is an interesting word. We perhaps are eager to
Nature of consuetudines.
urge the dilemma that in these cases the land must
have been brought into the bargain either by the lord
or by the tenant:—either the lord is conceived as having let land to the
tenant, or the theory is that the tenant has commended land to the lord. But
the dilemma is not perfect. It may well be that this relationship is thought of
as having existed from all time; it may well be that this relationship, though
under slowly varying forms, has really existed for several centuries, and has
had its beginning in no contract, in no bargain. In origin the rights of the
lord may be the rights of kings and ealdormen, rights over subjects rather
than rights over tenants. The word consuetudo covers taxes as well as rents,
and, if the sokeman has to do work for his lord, very often, especially in
Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire, he has to do work for the king or for the
sheriff also. If he has to do carrying service for the lord, he has to do
carrying service (avera) for the sheriff also or in lieu thereof to pay a small
sum of money[297]. And another aspect of this word consuetudo is
interesting to us. Land that is burdened with customs is customary land
(terra consuetudinaria)[298]. As yet this term does not imply that the tenure,
though protected by custom, is not protected by law; there is no opposition
between law and custom; the customary tenant of Domesday Book is the
tenant who renders customs, and the more customs he renders the more
customary he is[299].
This word consuetudo is the widest of words.
Justiciary consuetudines.
Perhaps we find the best equivalent for
consuetudines in our own vague ‘dues[300].’ It covers
what we should call rents; it covers what we should call rates and taxes; but
further it covers what we should call the proceeds and profits of justice. Let
us construe a few entries. At Romney there are burgesses who in return for
the service that they do on the sea are quit of all customs except three,
namely, larceny, peace-breach and ambush[301]. In Berkshire King Edward
gave to one of his foresters half a hide of land free from all custom, except
the king’s forfeiture, such as larceny, homicide, hám-fare and peace-
breach[302]. In what sense can a crime be a custom? In a fiscal sense. A
crime is a source of revenue. In what sense should we wish to have our land
census, gablum are seldom used in this context. All is consuetudo
It is an interesting word. We perhaps are eager to
Nature of consuetudines.
urge the dilemma that in these cases the land must
have been brought into the bargain either by the lord
or by the tenant:—either the lord is conceived as having let land to the
tenant, or the theory is that the tenant has commended land to the lord. But
the dilemma is not perfect. It may well be that this relationship is thought of
as having existed from all time; it may well be that this relationship, though
under slowly varying forms, has really existed for several centuries, and has
had its beginning in no contract, in no bargain. In origin the rights of the
lord may be the rights of kings and ealdormen, rights over subjects rather
than rights over tenants. The word consuetudo covers taxes as well as rents,
and, if the sokeman has to do work for his lord, very often, especially in
Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire, he has to do work for the king or for the
sheriff also. If he has to do carrying service for the lord, he has to do
carrying service (avera) for the sheriff also or in lieu thereof to pay a small
sum of money[297]. And another aspect of this word consuetudo is
interesting to us. Land that is burdened with customs is customary land
(terra consuetudinaria)[298]. As yet this term does not imply that the tenure,
though protected by custom, is not protected by law; there is no opposition
between law and custom; the customary tenant of Domesday Book is the
tenant who renders customs, and the more customs he renders the more
customary he is[299].
This word consuetudo is the widest of words.
Justiciary consuetudines.
Perhaps we find the best equivalent for
consuetudines in our own vague ‘dues[300].’ It covers
what we should call rents; it covers what we should call rates and taxes; but
further it covers what we should call the proceeds and profits of justice. Let
us construe a few entries. At Romney there are burgesses who in return for
the service that they do on the sea are quit of all customs except three,
namely, larceny, peace-breach and ambush[301]. In Berkshire King Edward
gave to one of his foresters half a hide of land free from all custom, except
the king’s forfeiture, such as larceny, homicide, hám-fare and peace-
breach[302]. In what sense can a crime be a custom? In a fiscal sense. A
crime is a source of revenue. In what sense should we wish to have our land
Page 98
free of crimes, free even, if this be possible, of larceny and homicide? In
this sense:—we should wish that no money whatever should go out of our
land, neither by way of rent, nor by way of tax, rate, toll, nor yet again by
way of forisfactura, of payment for crime committed. We should wish also
that our land with the tenants on it should be quit or quiet (quieta) from the
incursions of royal and national officers, whether they be in search of taxes
or in search of criminals and the fines due from criminals, and we should
also like to put those fines in our own pockets. Justice therefore takes its
place among the consuetudines: ‘larceny’ is a source of income. A lord who
has ‘his customs,’ is a lord who has among other sources of revenue, justice
or the profits of justice[303]. ‘Justice or the profits of justice,’ we say, for our
record does not care to distinguish between them. It is thinking of money
while we are engaged in questioning it about the constitution and
competence of tribunals. It gives us but crooked answers. However, we
must make the best that can be made of them, and in particular must form
some opinion about the consuetudines known as sake and soke.
this sense:—we should wish that no money whatever should go out of our
land, neither by way of rent, nor by way of tax, rate, toll, nor yet again by
way of forisfactura, of payment for crime committed. We should wish also
that our land with the tenants on it should be quit or quiet (quieta) from the
incursions of royal and national officers, whether they be in search of taxes
or in search of criminals and the fines due from criminals, and we should
also like to put those fines in our own pockets. Justice therefore takes its
place among the consuetudines: ‘larceny’ is a source of income. A lord who
has ‘his customs,’ is a lord who has among other sources of revenue, justice
or the profits of justice[303]. ‘Justice or the profits of justice,’ we say, for our
record does not care to distinguish between them. It is thinking of money
while we are engaged in questioning it about the constitution and
competence of tribunals. It gives us but crooked answers. However, we
must make the best that can be made of them, and in particular must form
some opinion about the consuetudines known as sake and soke.
Page 99
Page 100
§ 5. Sake and soke.
We may best begin our investigation by recalling the
Sake and soke.
law of later times. In the thirteenth century seignorial
justice, that is, justice in private hands, has two
roots. A certain civil jurisdiction belongs to the lord as such; if he has
tenants enough to form a court, he is at liberty to hold a court of and for his
tenants. This kind of seignorial justice we call specifically feudal justice.
But very often a lord has other and greater powers than the feudal principle
would give him; in particular he has the view of frankpledge and the police
justice that the view of frankpledge implies. All such powers must in theory
have their origin in grants made by the king; they are franchises. With
feudal justice therefore we contrast ‘franchisal’ justice[304].
Now if we go back to the Norman period we shall
Private jurisdiction in the
begin to doubt whether the feudal principle—the Leges.
principle which as a matter of course gives the lord
justiciary powers over his tenants—is of very ancient
origin[305]. The state of things that then existed should be revealed to us by
theLeges Henrici; for, if that book has any plan at all, it is a treatise on the
law of jurisdiction, a treatise on ‘soke.’ To this topic the writer constantly
returns after many digressions, and the leading theme of his work is found
in the following sentence:—‘As to the soke of pleas, there is that which
belongs properly and exclusively to the royal fiscus; there is that which it
participates with others; there is that which belongs to the sheriffs and royal
bailiffs as comprised in their ferms; there is that which belongs to the
barons who have soke and sake[306].’ But, when all has been said, the
picture that is left on our minds is that of a confused conflict between
inconsistent and indefinite principles, and very possibly the compiler in
giving us such a picture is fulfilling the duty of a faithful portrayer of facts,
though he does not satisfy our demand for a rational theory.
On the one hand, it seems plain that there is a
Soke in the Leges
seignorial justice which is not ‘franchisal.’ Certain Henrici.
persons have a certain ‘soke’ apart from any
We may best begin our investigation by recalling the
Sake and soke.
law of later times. In the thirteenth century seignorial
justice, that is, justice in private hands, has two
roots. A certain civil jurisdiction belongs to the lord as such; if he has
tenants enough to form a court, he is at liberty to hold a court of and for his
tenants. This kind of seignorial justice we call specifically feudal justice.
But very often a lord has other and greater powers than the feudal principle
would give him; in particular he has the view of frankpledge and the police
justice that the view of frankpledge implies. All such powers must in theory
have their origin in grants made by the king; they are franchises. With
feudal justice therefore we contrast ‘franchisal’ justice[304].
Now if we go back to the Norman period we shall
Private jurisdiction in the
begin to doubt whether the feudal principle—the Leges.
principle which as a matter of course gives the lord
justiciary powers over his tenants—is of very ancient
origin[305]. The state of things that then existed should be revealed to us by
theLeges Henrici; for, if that book has any plan at all, it is a treatise on the
law of jurisdiction, a treatise on ‘soke.’ To this topic the writer constantly
returns after many digressions, and the leading theme of his work is found
in the following sentence:—‘As to the soke of pleas, there is that which
belongs properly and exclusively to the royal fiscus; there is that which it
participates with others; there is that which belongs to the sheriffs and royal
bailiffs as comprised in their ferms; there is that which belongs to the
barons who have soke and sake[306].’ But, when all has been said, the
picture that is left on our minds is that of a confused conflict between
inconsistent and indefinite principles, and very possibly the compiler in
giving us such a picture is fulfilling the duty of a faithful portrayer of facts,
though he does not satisfy our demand for a rational theory.
On the one hand, it seems plain that there is a
Soke in the Leges
seignorial justice which is not ‘franchisal.’ Certain Henrici.
persons have a certain ‘soke’ apart from any
Page 101
regalities which may have been expressly conceded to them by the king.
But it is not clear that the legal basis of this soke is the simple feudal
principle stated above, namely, that jurisdiction springs from the mere fact
of tenure. An element of which we hear little in later days, is prominent in
the Leges, the element of rank or personal status. ‘The archbishops,
bishops, earls and other ‘powers’ (potestates) have sake and soke, toll, team
and infangenethef in their own lands[307].’ Here the principle seems to be
that men of a certain rank have certain jurisdictional powers, and the vague
term potestates may include in this class all the king’s barons. But then the
freeholding vavassores have a certain jurisdiction, they have the pleas
which concern wer and wíte (that is to say ‘emendable’ pleas) over their
own men and their own property, and sometimes over another man’s men
who have been arrested or attached in the act of trespass[308]. Whatever else
we may think of these vavassores, they are not barons and probably they are
not immediate tenants of the king[309]. It is clear, however, that there may
be a ‘lord’ with ‘men’ who yet has no sake or soke over them[310]. We are
told indeed that every lord may summon his man to stand to right in his
court, and that if the man be resident in the remotest manor of the honour of
which he holds, he still must go to the plea[311]. Here for a moment we seem
to have a fairly clear announcement of what we call the simple feudal
principle, unadulterated by any element of personal rank; still our text
supposes that the lord in question is a great man, he has no mere manor but
an honour or several honours. On the whole, our law seems for the time to
be taking the shape that French law took. If we leave out of sight the
definitely granted franchisal powers, then we may say that a baron or the
holder of a grand fief has ‘high justice,’ or if that term be too technical, a
higher justice, while the vavassor has ‘low justice’ or a lower justice. But in
this province, as in other provinces, of English law personal rank becomes
of less and less importance. The rules which would determine it and its
consequences are never allowed to become definite, and in the end a great
generalization surmounts all difficulties:—every lord has a certain civil
justice over his tenants; whatsoever powers go beyond this, are franchises.
As to the sort of jurisdiction that a lord of our Leges
Kinds of soke in the
has, we can make no statement in general terms. Leges.
Such categories as ‘civil’ and ‘criminal’ are too
modern for use. We must of course except the pleas
But it is not clear that the legal basis of this soke is the simple feudal
principle stated above, namely, that jurisdiction springs from the mere fact
of tenure. An element of which we hear little in later days, is prominent in
the Leges, the element of rank or personal status. ‘The archbishops,
bishops, earls and other ‘powers’ (potestates) have sake and soke, toll, team
and infangenethef in their own lands[307].’ Here the principle seems to be
that men of a certain rank have certain jurisdictional powers, and the vague
term potestates may include in this class all the king’s barons. But then the
freeholding vavassores have a certain jurisdiction, they have the pleas
which concern wer and wíte (that is to say ‘emendable’ pleas) over their
own men and their own property, and sometimes over another man’s men
who have been arrested or attached in the act of trespass[308]. Whatever else
we may think of these vavassores, they are not barons and probably they are
not immediate tenants of the king[309]. It is clear, however, that there may
be a ‘lord’ with ‘men’ who yet has no sake or soke over them[310]. We are
told indeed that every lord may summon his man to stand to right in his
court, and that if the man be resident in the remotest manor of the honour of
which he holds, he still must go to the plea[311]. Here for a moment we seem
to have a fairly clear announcement of what we call the simple feudal
principle, unadulterated by any element of personal rank; still our text
supposes that the lord in question is a great man, he has no mere manor but
an honour or several honours. On the whole, our law seems for the time to
be taking the shape that French law took. If we leave out of sight the
definitely granted franchisal powers, then we may say that a baron or the
holder of a grand fief has ‘high justice,’ or if that term be too technical, a
higher justice, while the vavassor has ‘low justice’ or a lower justice. But in
this province, as in other provinces, of English law personal rank becomes
of less and less importance. The rules which would determine it and its
consequences are never allowed to become definite, and in the end a great
generalization surmounts all difficulties:—every lord has a certain civil
justice over his tenants; whatsoever powers go beyond this, are franchises.
As to the sort of jurisdiction that a lord of our Leges
Kinds of soke in the
has, we can make no statement in general terms. Leges.
Such categories as ‘civil’ and ‘criminal’ are too
modern for use. We must of course except the pleas
Page 102
of the crown, of which a long and ungeneralized list is set before us[312]. We
must except the pleas of the church. We must except certain pleas which
belong in part to the king and in part to the church[313]. Then we observe
that the justice of an archbishop, bishop or earl, probably the justice of a
baron also, extends as high as infangenethef, while that of a vavassor goes
no higher than such offences as are emendable. The whole matter however
is complicated by royal grants. The king may grant away a demesne manor
and retain not only ‘the exclusive soke’ (i.e. the soke over the pleas of the
crown), but also ‘the common soke’ in his hand[314], and a great man may
by purchase acquire soke (for example, we may suppose, the hundredal
soke) over lands that are not his own[315]. Then again, we may suspect that
what is said of ‘soke’ in general does not apply to any jurisdiction that a
lord may exercise over his servi and villani. As to the servi, very possibly
the lord’s right over them is still conceived as proprietary rather than
jurisdictional, while for his villani (serf and villein are not yet convertible
terms) the lord, whatever his rank may be, will probably hold a
‘hallmoot[316]’ and exercise that ‘common soke’ which does not infringe the
royal preserves. On the whole, the law of the thirteenth century seems to
evolve itself somewhat easily out of the law of these Leges, the process of
development being threefold: (1) the lord’s rank as bishop, abbot, earl,
baron, becomes unimportant; (2) the element of tenure becomes all-
important; the mere fact that the man holds land of the lord makes him the
lord’s justiciable; thus a generalization becomes possible which permits
even so lowly a person as a burgess of Dunstable to hold a court for his
tenants[317]; (3) the obsolescence of the old law of wíte and wer, the growth
of the new law of felony, the emergence in Glanvill’s book of the distinction
between criminal and civil pleas as a grand primary distinction, the
introduction of the specially royal processes of presentment and inquest,
bring about a new apportionment of the field of justice and a rational
demarcation of feudal from franchisal powers. Still when we see the lords,
especially the prelates of the church, relying upon prescription for their
choicest franchises[318], we may learn (if such a lesson be needed) that new
theories could not master all the ancient facts.
Whether the Conqueror or either of his sons would
The Norman kings and
have admitted that any justice could be done in private jurisdiction.
England that was not his justice, we may fairly
must except the pleas of the church. We must except certain pleas which
belong in part to the king and in part to the church[313]. Then we observe
that the justice of an archbishop, bishop or earl, probably the justice of a
baron also, extends as high as infangenethef, while that of a vavassor goes
no higher than such offences as are emendable. The whole matter however
is complicated by royal grants. The king may grant away a demesne manor
and retain not only ‘the exclusive soke’ (i.e. the soke over the pleas of the
crown), but also ‘the common soke’ in his hand[314], and a great man may
by purchase acquire soke (for example, we may suppose, the hundredal
soke) over lands that are not his own[315]. Then again, we may suspect that
what is said of ‘soke’ in general does not apply to any jurisdiction that a
lord may exercise over his servi and villani. As to the servi, very possibly
the lord’s right over them is still conceived as proprietary rather than
jurisdictional, while for his villani (serf and villein are not yet convertible
terms) the lord, whatever his rank may be, will probably hold a
‘hallmoot[316]’ and exercise that ‘common soke’ which does not infringe the
royal preserves. On the whole, the law of the thirteenth century seems to
evolve itself somewhat easily out of the law of these Leges, the process of
development being threefold: (1) the lord’s rank as bishop, abbot, earl,
baron, becomes unimportant; (2) the element of tenure becomes all-
important; the mere fact that the man holds land of the lord makes him the
lord’s justiciable; thus a generalization becomes possible which permits
even so lowly a person as a burgess of Dunstable to hold a court for his
tenants[317]; (3) the obsolescence of the old law of wíte and wer, the growth
of the new law of felony, the emergence in Glanvill’s book of the distinction
between criminal and civil pleas as a grand primary distinction, the
introduction of the specially royal processes of presentment and inquest,
bring about a new apportionment of the field of justice and a rational
demarcation of feudal from franchisal powers. Still when we see the lords,
especially the prelates of the church, relying upon prescription for their
choicest franchises[318], we may learn (if such a lesson be needed) that new
theories could not master all the ancient facts.
Whether the Conqueror or either of his sons would
The Norman kings and
have admitted that any justice could be done in private jurisdiction.
England that was not his justice, we may fairly
Page 103
doubt. They issued numerous charters which had no other object than that
of giving or confirming to the donees ‘their sake and soke,’ and, so far as
we can see, there is no jurisdiction, at least none over free men, that is not
accounted to be ‘sake and soke.’ Occasionally it is said that the donees are
to have ‘their court.’ However far the feudalization of justice had gone
either in Normandy or in England before the Conquest, the Conquest itself
was likely to conceal from view the question whether or no all seignorial
jurisdiction is delegated from above; for thenceforward every lay tenant in
chief, as no mere matter of theory, but as a plain matter of fact, held his land
by a title derived newly and immediately from the king. Thus it would be
easy for the king to maintain that, if the lords exercised jurisdictional
powers, they did so by virtue of his grant, an expressed grant or an implied
grant. Gradually the process of subinfeudation would make the theoretical
question prominent and pressing, for certainly the Norman nobles
conceived that, even if their justice was delegated to them by the king, no
rule of law prevented them from appointing sub-delegates. If they claimed
to give away land, they claimed also to give away justice, and no earnest
effort can have been made to prevent their doing this[319].
Returning from this brief digression, we must
Sake and soke in
consider sake and soke as they are in Domesday Domesday Book.
Book. For a moment we will attend to the words
themselves[320]. Of the two soke is by far the
commoner; indeed we hardly ever find sake except in connexion with soke,
and when we do, it seems just an equivalent for soke. We have but an
alliterative jingle like ‘judgment and justice[321].’ Apparently it matters little
or nothing whether we say of a lord that he has soke, or that he has sake, or
that he has soke and sake. But not only is soke the commoner, it is also the
wider word; we can not substitute sake for it in all contexts. Thus, for
example, we say that a man renders soke to his lord or to his lord’s manor;
also we say that a piece of land is a soke of such and such a manor; no
similar use is made of sake.
Now as a matter of etymology sake seems the easier
Meaning of sake.
of the two words. It is the Anglo-Saxon sacu, the
German Sache, a thing, a matter, and hence a
‘matter’ or ‘cause’ in the lawyer’s sense of these terms, a ‘matter’ in dispute
between litigants, a ‘cause’ before the court. It is still in use among us, for
of giving or confirming to the donees ‘their sake and soke,’ and, so far as
we can see, there is no jurisdiction, at least none over free men, that is not
accounted to be ‘sake and soke.’ Occasionally it is said that the donees are
to have ‘their court.’ However far the feudalization of justice had gone
either in Normandy or in England before the Conquest, the Conquest itself
was likely to conceal from view the question whether or no all seignorial
jurisdiction is delegated from above; for thenceforward every lay tenant in
chief, as no mere matter of theory, but as a plain matter of fact, held his land
by a title derived newly and immediately from the king. Thus it would be
easy for the king to maintain that, if the lords exercised jurisdictional
powers, they did so by virtue of his grant, an expressed grant or an implied
grant. Gradually the process of subinfeudation would make the theoretical
question prominent and pressing, for certainly the Norman nobles
conceived that, even if their justice was delegated to them by the king, no
rule of law prevented them from appointing sub-delegates. If they claimed
to give away land, they claimed also to give away justice, and no earnest
effort can have been made to prevent their doing this[319].
Returning from this brief digression, we must
Sake and soke in
consider sake and soke as they are in Domesday Domesday Book.
Book. For a moment we will attend to the words
themselves[320]. Of the two soke is by far the
commoner; indeed we hardly ever find sake except in connexion with soke,
and when we do, it seems just an equivalent for soke. We have but an
alliterative jingle like ‘judgment and justice[321].’ Apparently it matters little
or nothing whether we say of a lord that he has soke, or that he has sake, or
that he has soke and sake. But not only is soke the commoner, it is also the
wider word; we can not substitute sake for it in all contexts. Thus, for
example, we say that a man renders soke to his lord or to his lord’s manor;
also we say that a piece of land is a soke of such and such a manor; no
similar use is made of sake.
Now as a matter of etymology sake seems the easier
Meaning of sake.
of the two words. It is the Anglo-Saxon sacu, the
German Sache, a thing, a matter, and hence a
‘matter’ or ‘cause’ in the lawyer’s sense of these terms, a ‘matter’ in dispute
between litigants, a ‘cause’ before the court. It is still in use among us, for
Page 104
though we do not speak of a sake between two persons, we do speak of a
man acting for another’s sake, or for God’s sake, or for the sake of
money[322]. In Latin therefore sake may be rendered by placitum:—‘Roger
has sake over them’ will become ‘Rogerius habet placita super eos[323]’;
Roger has the right to hold plea over them. Thus easily enough sake
becomes the right to have a court and to do justice.
As to soke, this has a very similar signification, but
Meaning of soke.
the route by which it attains that signification is
somewhat doubtful. We must start with this that
soke, socna, soca, is the Anglo-Saxon sócn and has for its primary meaning
a seeking. It may become connected with justice or jurisdiction by one or by
both of two ways. One of these is explained by a passage in theLeges
Henrici which says that the king has certain causes or pleas ‘in socna i.e.
quaestione sua.’ The king has certain pleas within his investigation, or his
right to investigate. A later phrase may help us:—the king is entitled to
‘inquire of, hear and determine’ these matters[324]. But the word might
journey along another path which would lead to much the same end. It
means seeking, following, suing, making suit, sequi, sectam facere. The
duty known as soca faldae is the duty of seeking the lord’s fold. Thus soca
may be the duty of seeking or suing at the lord’s court and the correlative
right of the lord to keep a court and exact suit. Without denying that the
word has traversed the first of the two routes, the route by way of
‘investigation’—in the face of theLeges Henrici we can hardly deny this—
we may confidently assert that it has traversed the second, the route by way
of ‘suit.’ There are several passages which assure us that soke is a genus of
which fold-soke is a species. Thus:—‘Of these men Peter’s predecessor had
fold-soke and commendation and Stigand had the other soke[325].’ In a
document which is very closely connected with the great survey we find
what seems to be a Latin translation of our word. The churches of
Worcester and Evesham were quarrelling about certain lands at Hamton.
Under the eye of the king’s commissioners they came to a compromise,
which declared that the fifteen hides at Hamton belonged to the bishop of
Worcester’s hundred of Oswaldslaw and ought to pay the king’s geld and
perform the king’s services along with the bishop and ought ‘to seek the
said hundred for pleading’:—requirere ad placitandum, this is the main
kind of ‘seeking’ that soke implies[326]. If we look back far enough in the
man acting for another’s sake, or for God’s sake, or for the sake of
money[322]. In Latin therefore sake may be rendered by placitum:—‘Roger
has sake over them’ will become ‘Rogerius habet placita super eos[323]’;
Roger has the right to hold plea over them. Thus easily enough sake
becomes the right to have a court and to do justice.
As to soke, this has a very similar signification, but
Meaning of soke.
the route by which it attains that signification is
somewhat doubtful. We must start with this that
soke, socna, soca, is the Anglo-Saxon sócn and has for its primary meaning
a seeking. It may become connected with justice or jurisdiction by one or by
both of two ways. One of these is explained by a passage in theLeges
Henrici which says that the king has certain causes or pleas ‘in socna i.e.
quaestione sua.’ The king has certain pleas within his investigation, or his
right to investigate. A later phrase may help us:—the king is entitled to
‘inquire of, hear and determine’ these matters[324]. But the word might
journey along another path which would lead to much the same end. It
means seeking, following, suing, making suit, sequi, sectam facere. The
duty known as soca faldae is the duty of seeking the lord’s fold. Thus soca
may be the duty of seeking or suing at the lord’s court and the correlative
right of the lord to keep a court and exact suit. Without denying that the
word has traversed the first of the two routes, the route by way of
‘investigation’—in the face of theLeges Henrici we can hardly deny this—
we may confidently assert that it has traversed the second, the route by way
of ‘suit.’ There are several passages which assure us that soke is a genus of
which fold-soke is a species. Thus:—‘Of these men Peter’s predecessor had
fold-soke and commendation and Stigand had the other soke[325].’ In a
document which is very closely connected with the great survey we find
what seems to be a Latin translation of our word. The churches of
Worcester and Evesham were quarrelling about certain lands at Hamton.
Under the eye of the king’s commissioners they came to a compromise,
which declared that the fifteen hides at Hamton belonged to the bishop of
Worcester’s hundred of Oswaldslaw and ought to pay the king’s geld and
perform the king’s services along with the bishop and ought ‘to seek the
said hundred for pleading’:—requirere ad placitandum, this is the main
kind of ‘seeking’ that soke implies[326]. If we look back far enough in the
Page 105
Anglo-Saxon dooms, there is indeed much to make us think that the act of
seeking a lord and placing oneself under his protection, and the
consequences of that act, the relation between man and lord, the fealty
promised by the one, the warranty due from the other, have been known as
sócn[327]. If so, then there may have been a time when commendation and
soke were all one. But this time must be already ancient, for although we do
not know what English word was represented by commendatio, still there is
no distinction more emphatically drawn by Domesday Book than that
between commendatio and soca.
Now when we meet with soca in the Leges Henrici
Soke as jurisdiction.
we naturally construe it by some such terms as
‘jurisdiction,’ ‘justice,’ ‘the right to hold a court.’ We
have seen that the author of that treatise renders it by the Latin quaestio. We
also meet the following phrases which seem clear enough:—‘Every cause
shall be determined in the hundred, or in the county, or in the hallmoot of
those who have soke, or in the courts of the lords[328]’; ‘... according to the
soke of pleas, which some have in their own land over their own men, some
over their own men and strangers, either in all causes or in some
causes[329]’: ... ‘grithbrice or hámsócn or any of those matters which exceed
their soke and sake[330]’: ‘in capital causes the soke is the king’s[331].’ So
again our author explains that though a baron has soke this will not give
him a right to justice over himself; no one, he says, can have his own
forfeiture; no one has a soke of impunity:—‘nullus enim socnam habet
impune peccandi[332].’ The use that Domesday Book makes of the word
may not be quite so clear. Sometimes we are inclined to render it by suit, in
particular when fold-soke is contrasted with ‘other soke.’ But very generally
we must construe it by justice or by justiciary rights, though we must be
careful not to introduce the seignorial court where it does not exist, and to
remember that a lord may be entitled to receive the wites or fines incurred
by his criminous men without holding a court for them. Those men may be
tried and condemned in a hundred court, but the wite will be paid to their
lord. Then the word is applied to tracts of land. A tract over which a lord has
justiciary power, or a wite-exacting power, is his soke, and very often his
soke is contrasted with those other lands over which he has rights of a more
definitely proprietary kind. But we must turn from words to law.
seeking a lord and placing oneself under his protection, and the
consequences of that act, the relation between man and lord, the fealty
promised by the one, the warranty due from the other, have been known as
sócn[327]. If so, then there may have been a time when commendation and
soke were all one. But this time must be already ancient, for although we do
not know what English word was represented by commendatio, still there is
no distinction more emphatically drawn by Domesday Book than that
between commendatio and soca.
Now when we meet with soca in the Leges Henrici
Soke as jurisdiction.
we naturally construe it by some such terms as
‘jurisdiction,’ ‘justice,’ ‘the right to hold a court.’ We
have seen that the author of that treatise renders it by the Latin quaestio. We
also meet the following phrases which seem clear enough:—‘Every cause
shall be determined in the hundred, or in the county, or in the hallmoot of
those who have soke, or in the courts of the lords[328]’; ‘... according to the
soke of pleas, which some have in their own land over their own men, some
over their own men and strangers, either in all causes or in some
causes[329]’: ... ‘grithbrice or hámsócn or any of those matters which exceed
their soke and sake[330]’: ‘in capital causes the soke is the king’s[331].’ So
again our author explains that though a baron has soke this will not give
him a right to justice over himself; no one, he says, can have his own
forfeiture; no one has a soke of impunity:—‘nullus enim socnam habet
impune peccandi[332].’ The use that Domesday Book makes of the word
may not be quite so clear. Sometimes we are inclined to render it by suit, in
particular when fold-soke is contrasted with ‘other soke.’ But very generally
we must construe it by justice or by justiciary rights, though we must be
careful not to introduce the seignorial court where it does not exist, and to
remember that a lord may be entitled to receive the wites or fines incurred
by his criminous men without holding a court for them. Those men may be
tried and condemned in a hundred court, but the wite will be paid to their
lord. Then the word is applied to tracts of land. A tract over which a lord has
justiciary power, or a wite-exacting power, is his soke, and very often his
soke is contrasted with those other lands over which he has rights of a more
definitely proprietary kind. But we must turn from words to law.
Page 106
Already before the Conquest there was plenty of
Seignorial justice before
seignorial justice in England. The greatest of the the Conquest.
Anglo-Saxon lords had enjoyed wide and high
justiciary rights. Naturally it is of the rights of the
churches that we hear most, for the rights that they had under King Edward
they still claim under King William. Foremost among them we may notice
the church of Canterbury. On the great day at Penenden Heath, Lanfranc
proved that throughout the lands of his church in Kent the king had but
three rights; all other justice was in the hands of the archbishop[333]. In
Warwickshire the Archbishop of York has soke and sake, toll and team,
church-scot and all other ‘forfeitures’ save those four which the king has
throughout the whole realm[334]. These four forfeitures are probably the
four reserved pleas of the crown that are mentioned in the laws of Cnut—
mundbryce, hámsócn, forsteal and fyrdwíte[335]. But even these rights
though usually reserved to the king may have been made over to the lord. In
Yorkshire neither king nor earl has any ‘custom’ within the lands of St.
Peter of York, St. John of Beverley, St. Wilfrid of Ripon, St. Cuthbert of
Durham and the Holy Trinity. We are asked specially to note that in this
region there are four royal highways, three by land and one by water where
the king claims all forfeitures even when they run through the land of the
archbishop or of the earl[336]. Within his immense manor of Taunton the
Bishop of Winchester has pleas of the highest class, and three times a year
without any summons his men must meet to hold them[337]. In
Worcestershire seven of the twelve hundreds into which the county is
divided are in the heads of four great churches; Worcester has three,
Westminster two, Evesham one, Pershore one. Westminster holds its lands
as freely as the king held them in his demesne; Pershore enjoys all the pleas
of the free men; no sheriff can claim anything within the territory of St.
Mary of Worcester, neither in any plea, nor in any other matter[338]. In East
Anglia we frequently hear of the reserved pleas of the crown. In this Danish
district they are accounted to be six in number; probably they are griðbrice,
hámsócn, fihtwíte and fyrdwíte, outlaw’s-work and the receipt of
outlaws[339]. Often we read how over the men of some lord the king and the
earl have ‘the six forfeitures,’ or how ‘the soke of the six forfeitures’ lies in
some royal manor[340]. But then there is a large tract in which these six
forfeitures belong to St. Edmund; some other lord may have sake and soke
in a given parcel of that tract, but the six forfeitures belong to St. Edmund;
Seignorial justice before
seignorial justice in England. The greatest of the the Conquest.
Anglo-Saxon lords had enjoyed wide and high
justiciary rights. Naturally it is of the rights of the
churches that we hear most, for the rights that they had under King Edward
they still claim under King William. Foremost among them we may notice
the church of Canterbury. On the great day at Penenden Heath, Lanfranc
proved that throughout the lands of his church in Kent the king had but
three rights; all other justice was in the hands of the archbishop[333]. In
Warwickshire the Archbishop of York has soke and sake, toll and team,
church-scot and all other ‘forfeitures’ save those four which the king has
throughout the whole realm[334]. These four forfeitures are probably the
four reserved pleas of the crown that are mentioned in the laws of Cnut—
mundbryce, hámsócn, forsteal and fyrdwíte[335]. But even these rights
though usually reserved to the king may have been made over to the lord. In
Yorkshire neither king nor earl has any ‘custom’ within the lands of St.
Peter of York, St. John of Beverley, St. Wilfrid of Ripon, St. Cuthbert of
Durham and the Holy Trinity. We are asked specially to note that in this
region there are four royal highways, three by land and one by water where
the king claims all forfeitures even when they run through the land of the
archbishop or of the earl[336]. Within his immense manor of Taunton the
Bishop of Winchester has pleas of the highest class, and three times a year
without any summons his men must meet to hold them[337]. In
Worcestershire seven of the twelve hundreds into which the county is
divided are in the heads of four great churches; Worcester has three,
Westminster two, Evesham one, Pershore one. Westminster holds its lands
as freely as the king held them in his demesne; Pershore enjoys all the pleas
of the free men; no sheriff can claim anything within the territory of St.
Mary of Worcester, neither in any plea, nor in any other matter[338]. In East
Anglia we frequently hear of the reserved pleas of the crown. In this Danish
district they are accounted to be six in number; probably they are griðbrice,
hámsócn, fihtwíte and fyrdwíte, outlaw’s-work and the receipt of
outlaws[339]. Often we read how over the men of some lord the king and the
earl have ‘the six forfeitures,’ or how ‘the soke of the six forfeitures’ lies in
some royal manor[340]. But then there is a large tract in which these six
forfeitures belong to St. Edmund; some other lord may have sake and soke
in a given parcel of that tract, but the six forfeitures belong to St. Edmund;
Page 107
they are indeed ‘the six forfeitures of St. Edmund[341].’ Other arrangements
were possible. We hear of men over whom St. Benet had three
forfeitures[342]. The lawmen of Stamford had sake and soke within their
houses and over their men, save geld, heriot, larceny and forfeitures
exceeding 40 ores of silver[343]. Certain burgesses of Romney serve the
king on the sea, and therefore they have their own forfeitures, save larceny,
peace-breach and forsteal, and these belong, not to the king, but to the
archbishop[344]. Sometimes King William will be careful to limit his
confirmation of a lord’s sake and soke to the ‘emendable forfeitures,’ the
offences which can be paid for with money[345].
That in the Confessor’s day justiciary rights could
Soke as a regality.
only be claimed by virtue of royal grants, that they
did not arise out of the mere relation between lord
and man, lord and tenant, or lord and villein, seems to us fairly certain. In
the first place, as already said, soke is frequently contrasted with
commendation. In the second place, as we turn over the pages of our record,
we shall see it remarked of some man, who held a manor in the days before
the Conquest, that he had it with sake and soke, and the remark is made in
such a context that thereby he is singled out from among his fellows[346].
Thus it is said of a little group of villeins and sokemen in Essex that ‘their
lord had sake and soke[347].’ Not that we can argue that a lord has no soke
unless it is expressly ascribed to him. The surveyors have no great interest
in this matter. Sometimes such a phrase as ‘he held it freely’ seems to serve
as an equivalent for ‘he held it with sake and soke[348].’ It is said of the
Countess Judith, a lady of exalted rank, that she had a manse in Lincoln
without sake and soke[349]. Then we are told that throughout the city of
Canterbury the king had sake and soke except in the lands of the Holy
Trinity (Christ Church), St. Augustin, Queen Edith, and three other
lords[350]. We have a list of fifteen persons who had sake and soke in the
two lathes of Sutton and Aylesford[351], a list of thirty-five persons who had
sake and soke, toll and team in Lincolnshire (it includes the queen, a
bishop, three abbots and two earls[352]), and a list of nineteen persons who
had similar rights in the shires of Derby and Nottingham[353]. Such lists
would have been pointless had any generalization been possible. Then in
East Anglia it is common enough to find that the men who are reckoned to
be the liberi homines of some lord are under the soke of another lord or
were possible. We hear of men over whom St. Benet had three
forfeitures[342]. The lawmen of Stamford had sake and soke within their
houses and over their men, save geld, heriot, larceny and forfeitures
exceeding 40 ores of silver[343]. Certain burgesses of Romney serve the
king on the sea, and therefore they have their own forfeitures, save larceny,
peace-breach and forsteal, and these belong, not to the king, but to the
archbishop[344]. Sometimes King William will be careful to limit his
confirmation of a lord’s sake and soke to the ‘emendable forfeitures,’ the
offences which can be paid for with money[345].
That in the Confessor’s day justiciary rights could
Soke as a regality.
only be claimed by virtue of royal grants, that they
did not arise out of the mere relation between lord
and man, lord and tenant, or lord and villein, seems to us fairly certain. In
the first place, as already said, soke is frequently contrasted with
commendation. In the second place, as we turn over the pages of our record,
we shall see it remarked of some man, who held a manor in the days before
the Conquest, that he had it with sake and soke, and the remark is made in
such a context that thereby he is singled out from among his fellows[346].
Thus it is said of a little group of villeins and sokemen in Essex that ‘their
lord had sake and soke[347].’ Not that we can argue that a lord has no soke
unless it is expressly ascribed to him. The surveyors have no great interest
in this matter. Sometimes such a phrase as ‘he held it freely’ seems to serve
as an equivalent for ‘he held it with sake and soke[348].’ It is said of the
Countess Judith, a lady of exalted rank, that she had a manse in Lincoln
without sake and soke[349]. Then we are told that throughout the city of
Canterbury the king had sake and soke except in the lands of the Holy
Trinity (Christ Church), St. Augustin, Queen Edith, and three other
lords[350]. We have a list of fifteen persons who had sake and soke in the
two lathes of Sutton and Aylesford[351], a list of thirty-five persons who had
sake and soke, toll and team in Lincolnshire (it includes the queen, a
bishop, three abbots and two earls[352]), and a list of nineteen persons who
had similar rights in the shires of Derby and Nottingham[353]. Such lists
would have been pointless had any generalization been possible. Then in
East Anglia it is common enough to find that the men who are reckoned to
be the liberi homines of some lord are under the soke of another lord or
Page 108
render their soke to the king and the earl, that is to say, to the hundred court.
Often enough it is said somewhat pointedly that the men over whom the
king and the earl have soke are liberi homines, and this may for a moment
suggest that the lord as a matter of course has soke over such of his men as
are not ranked as ‘free men’; possibly it may suggest that freedom in this
context implies subjection to a national as opposed to a seignorial
tribunal[354]. But on the one hand a lord often enough has soke over those
who are distinctively ‘free men[355],’ while on the other hand, as will be
explained below, he has not the soke over his sokeman[356].
But we must go further and say that the lord has not
Soke over villeins.
always the soke over his villeins. This is a matter of
much importance. An entry relating to a manor in
Suffolk seems to put it beyond doubt:—In the hundred and a half of
Sanford Auti a thegn held Wenham in King Edward’s time for a manor and
three carucates of land; there were then nine villani, four bordarii and one
servus and there were two teams on the demesne; Auti had the soke over his
demesne and the soke of the villeins was in Bercolt[357]. Now Bercolt, the
modern Bergholt, was a royal manor, the seat of a great court, which had
soke over many men in the neighbouring villages. To all seeming it was the
court for the hundred, or ‘hundred-and-a-half,’ of Sanford[358]. Here then
we seem to have villeins who are not under the soke of their lord but are the
justiciables of the hundred court. In another case, also from Suffolk, it is
said of the lord of a manor that he had soke ‘only over the demesne of his
hall,’ and this seems to exclude from the scope of his justiciary rights the
land held by thirty-two villeins and eight bordiers[359]. We may find the line
drawn at various places. Not very unfrequently in East Anglia a lord has the
soke over those men who are bound to his sheep-fold, while those who are
‘fold-worthy’ attend the hundred court[360]. In one case a curious and
instructive distinction is taken:—‘In Farwell lay in King Edward’s day the
sake and soke of all who had less than thirty acres, but of all who had thirty
acres the soke and sake lay in the hundred[361].’ In this case the line seems
to be drawn just below the virgater, no matter the legal class to which the
virgater belongs. To our thinking it is plain enough that many a manerium
of the Confessor’s day had no court of its own. As we shall see hereafter,
the manors are often far too small to allow of our endowing each of them
with a court. When of a Cheshire manor we hear that ‘this manor has its
Often enough it is said somewhat pointedly that the men over whom the
king and the earl have soke are liberi homines, and this may for a moment
suggest that the lord as a matter of course has soke over such of his men as
are not ranked as ‘free men’; possibly it may suggest that freedom in this
context implies subjection to a national as opposed to a seignorial
tribunal[354]. But on the one hand a lord often enough has soke over those
who are distinctively ‘free men[355],’ while on the other hand, as will be
explained below, he has not the soke over his sokeman[356].
But we must go further and say that the lord has not
Soke over villeins.
always the soke over his villeins. This is a matter of
much importance. An entry relating to a manor in
Suffolk seems to put it beyond doubt:—In the hundred and a half of
Sanford Auti a thegn held Wenham in King Edward’s time for a manor and
three carucates of land; there were then nine villani, four bordarii and one
servus and there were two teams on the demesne; Auti had the soke over his
demesne and the soke of the villeins was in Bercolt[357]. Now Bercolt, the
modern Bergholt, was a royal manor, the seat of a great court, which had
soke over many men in the neighbouring villages. To all seeming it was the
court for the hundred, or ‘hundred-and-a-half,’ of Sanford[358]. Here then
we seem to have villeins who are not under the soke of their lord but are the
justiciables of the hundred court. In another case, also from Suffolk, it is
said of the lord of a manor that he had soke ‘only over the demesne of his
hall,’ and this seems to exclude from the scope of his justiciary rights the
land held by thirty-two villeins and eight bordiers[359]. We may find the line
drawn at various places. Not very unfrequently in East Anglia a lord has the
soke over those men who are bound to his sheep-fold, while those who are
‘fold-worthy’ attend the hundred court[360]. In one case a curious and
instructive distinction is taken:—‘In Farwell lay in King Edward’s day the
sake and soke of all who had less than thirty acres, but of all who had thirty
acres the soke and sake lay in the hundred[361].’ In this case the line seems
to be drawn just below the virgater, no matter the legal class to which the
virgater belongs. To our thinking it is plain enough that many a manerium
of the Confessor’s day had no court of its own. As we shall see hereafter,
the manors are often far too small to allow of our endowing each of them
with a court. When of a Cheshire manor we hear that ‘this manor has its
Page 109
pleas in its lord’s hall’ we are being told of something that is
exceptional[362]. In the thirteenth century no one would have made such a
remark. In the eleventh the halimote or hall-moot looks like a novelty.
Seignorial justice is as yet very closely connected
Private soke and
with the general scheme of national justice. hundredal soke.
Frequently the lord who has justice has a hundred.
We remember how seven of the twelve hundreds of
Worcestershire are in the hands of four great churches[363]. St. Etheldreda of
Ely has the soke of five and a half hundreds in Suffolk[364]. In Essex Swain
had the half-hundred of Clavering, and the pleas thereof brought him in 25s.
a year[365]. In Nottinghamshire the Bishop of Lincoln had all the customs of
the king and the earl throughout the wapentake of Newark[366]. The monks
of Battle Abbey claimed that the sake and soke of twenty-two hundreds and
a half and all royal ‘forfeitures’ were annexed to their manor of Wye[367].
But further—and this deserves attention—when the hundredal jurisdiction
was not in the hands of some other lord, it was conceived as belonging to
the king. The sake and soke of a hundred or of several hundreds is
described as ‘lying in,’ or being annexed to, some royal manor and it is
farmed by the farmer of that manor. Oxfordshire gives us the best example
of this. The soke of four and a half hundreds belongs to the royal manor of
Bensington, that of two hundreds to Headington, that of two and a half to
Kirtlington, that of three to Upton, that of three to Shipton, that of two to
Bampton, that of two to Bloxham and Adderbury[368]. What we see here we
may see elsewhere also[369]. If then King William gives the royal manor of
Wye to his newly founded church of St. Martin in the Place of Battle, the
monks will contend that they have obtained as an appurtenance the
hundredal soke over a large part of the county of Kent[370].
The law seems as yet, if we may so speak,
Hundredal and manorial
unconscious of the fact that underneath or beside the soke.
hundredal soke a new soke is growing up. It seems
to treat the soke over a man or over a piece of land
as an indivisible thing that must ‘lie’ somewhere and can not be in two
places at once. It has indeed to admit that while one lord has the soke, the
king or another lord may have certain reserved and exalted ‘forfeitures,’ the
three forfeitures or the four or the six, as the case may be[371]; but it has no
classification of courts. The lord’s court, if it be not the court of an ancient
exceptional[362]. In the thirteenth century no one would have made such a
remark. In the eleventh the halimote or hall-moot looks like a novelty.
Seignorial justice is as yet very closely connected
Private soke and
with the general scheme of national justice. hundredal soke.
Frequently the lord who has justice has a hundred.
We remember how seven of the twelve hundreds of
Worcestershire are in the hands of four great churches[363]. St. Etheldreda of
Ely has the soke of five and a half hundreds in Suffolk[364]. In Essex Swain
had the half-hundred of Clavering, and the pleas thereof brought him in 25s.
a year[365]. In Nottinghamshire the Bishop of Lincoln had all the customs of
the king and the earl throughout the wapentake of Newark[366]. The monks
of Battle Abbey claimed that the sake and soke of twenty-two hundreds and
a half and all royal ‘forfeitures’ were annexed to their manor of Wye[367].
But further—and this deserves attention—when the hundredal jurisdiction
was not in the hands of some other lord, it was conceived as belonging to
the king. The sake and soke of a hundred or of several hundreds is
described as ‘lying in,’ or being annexed to, some royal manor and it is
farmed by the farmer of that manor. Oxfordshire gives us the best example
of this. The soke of four and a half hundreds belongs to the royal manor of
Bensington, that of two hundreds to Headington, that of two and a half to
Kirtlington, that of three to Upton, that of three to Shipton, that of two to
Bampton, that of two to Bloxham and Adderbury[368]. What we see here we
may see elsewhere also[369]. If then King William gives the royal manor of
Wye to his newly founded church of St. Martin in the Place of Battle, the
monks will contend that they have obtained as an appurtenance the
hundredal soke over a large part of the county of Kent[370].
The law seems as yet, if we may so speak,
Hundredal and manorial
unconscious of the fact that underneath or beside the soke.
hundredal soke a new soke is growing up. It seems
to treat the soke over a man or over a piece of land
as an indivisible thing that must ‘lie’ somewhere and can not be in two
places at once. It has indeed to admit that while one lord has the soke, the
king or another lord may have certain reserved and exalted ‘forfeitures,’ the
three forfeitures or the four or the six, as the case may be[371]; but it has no
classification of courts. The lord’s court, if it be not the court of an ancient
Page 110
hundred, is conceived as the court of a half-hundred, or of a quarter of a
hundred[372], or as the court of a district that has been carved out from a
hundred[373]. Thus Stigand had the soke of the half-hundred of Hersham,
save Thorpe which belonged to St. Edmund, and Pulham which belonged to
St. Etheldreda[374]; thus also the king had the soke of the half-hundred of
Diss, except the land of St. Edmund, where he shared the soke with the
saint, and except the lands of Wulfgæt and of Stigand[375]. But it is
impossible to maintain this theory. The hundred is becoming full of manors,
within each of which a lord is exercising or endeavouring to exercise a soke
over all, or certain classes, of his men. It is possible that in Lincolnshire we
see the beginnings of a differentiating process; we meet with the word
frisoca, frigsoca, frigesoca. Whether this stands for ‘free soken,’ or, as
seems more likely, for ‘frið soken,’ soke in matters relating to the peace, it
seems to mark off one kind of soke from other kinds[376]. We have to
remember that in later days the relation of the manorial to the hundredal
courts is curious. In no accurate sense can we say that the court of the
manor is below the court of the hundred. No appeal, no complaint of false
judgment, lies from the one to the other; and yet, unless the manor enjoys
some exceptional privilege, it is not extra-hundredal and its jurisdiction in
personal causes is over-lapped by the jurisdiction of the hundred court: the
two courts arise from different principles[377]. In Domesday Book the feudal
or tenurial principle seems still struggling for recognition. Already the
Norman lords are assuming a soke which their antecessores did not
enjoy[378]. As will be seen below, they are enlarging and consolidating their
manors and thereby rendering a manorial justice possible and profitable.
Whether we ought to hold that the mere shock and jar of conquest and
dispossession was sufficient to set up the process which covered our land
with small courts, or whether we ought to hold that an element of foreign
law worked the change, is a question that will never be answered unless the
Norman archives have yet many secrets to tell. The great ‘honorial’ courts
of later days may be French; still it is hardly in this region that we should
look for much foreign law. It is in English words that the French baron of
the Conqueror’s day must speak when he claims justiciary rights. But that
the process was far from being complete in 1086 seems evident.
Many questions about the distribution and the
The seignorial court.
constitution of the courts we must leave unsolved.
hundred[372], or as the court of a district that has been carved out from a
hundred[373]. Thus Stigand had the soke of the half-hundred of Hersham,
save Thorpe which belonged to St. Edmund, and Pulham which belonged to
St. Etheldreda[374]; thus also the king had the soke of the half-hundred of
Diss, except the land of St. Edmund, where he shared the soke with the
saint, and except the lands of Wulfgæt and of Stigand[375]. But it is
impossible to maintain this theory. The hundred is becoming full of manors,
within each of which a lord is exercising or endeavouring to exercise a soke
over all, or certain classes, of his men. It is possible that in Lincolnshire we
see the beginnings of a differentiating process; we meet with the word
frisoca, frigsoca, frigesoca. Whether this stands for ‘free soken,’ or, as
seems more likely, for ‘frið soken,’ soke in matters relating to the peace, it
seems to mark off one kind of soke from other kinds[376]. We have to
remember that in later days the relation of the manorial to the hundredal
courts is curious. In no accurate sense can we say that the court of the
manor is below the court of the hundred. No appeal, no complaint of false
judgment, lies from the one to the other; and yet, unless the manor enjoys
some exceptional privilege, it is not extra-hundredal and its jurisdiction in
personal causes is over-lapped by the jurisdiction of the hundred court: the
two courts arise from different principles[377]. In Domesday Book the feudal
or tenurial principle seems still struggling for recognition. Already the
Norman lords are assuming a soke which their antecessores did not
enjoy[378]. As will be seen below, they are enlarging and consolidating their
manors and thereby rendering a manorial justice possible and profitable.
Whether we ought to hold that the mere shock and jar of conquest and
dispossession was sufficient to set up the process which covered our land
with small courts, or whether we ought to hold that an element of foreign
law worked the change, is a question that will never be answered unless the
Norman archives have yet many secrets to tell. The great ‘honorial’ courts
of later days may be French; still it is hardly in this region that we should
look for much foreign law. It is in English words that the French baron of
the Conqueror’s day must speak when he claims justiciary rights. But that
the process was far from being complete in 1086 seems evident.
Many questions about the distribution and the
The seignorial court.
constitution of the courts we must leave unsolved.
Page 111
Not only does our record tell us nothing of courts in unambiguous words,
but it hardly has a word that will answer to our ‘court.’ The term curia is in
use, but it seems always to signify a physical object, the lord’s house or the
court-yard around it, never an institution, a tribunal[379]. Almost all that we
are told is conveyed to us under the cover of such words as sake, soke,
placita, forisfacturae. We know that the Bishop of Winchester has a court at
Taunton, for his tenants are bound to come together thrice a year to hold his
pleas without being summoned[380]. This phrase—‘to hold his pleas’—
seems to tell us distinctly enough that the suitors are the doomsmen of the
court. Then, again, we have the well-known story of what happened at
Orwell in Cambridgeshire. In that village Count Roger had a small estate;
he had land for a team and a half. This land had belonged to six sokemen.
He had borrowed three of them from Picot the sheriff in order that they
might hold his pleas, and having got them he refused to return them[381].
That the court that he wished to hold was a court merely for his land at
Orwell is highly improbable, but he had other lands scattered about in the
various villages of the Wetherly hundred, though in all his tenants amounted
to but 14 villeins, 42 bordiers, 15 cottiers, and 4 serfs. We can not draw the
inference that men of the class known as sokemen were necessary for the
constitution of a court, for at the date of the survey there was no sokeman
left in all Roger’s land in Cambridgeshire; the three that he borrowed from
Picot had disappeared or were reckoned as villeins or worse. Still he held a
court and that court had doomsmen. But we can not argue that every lord
who had soke, or sake and soke, had a court of his own. It may be that in
some cases he was satisfied with claiming the ‘forfeitures’ which his men
incurred in the hundred courts. This is suggested to us by what we read of
the earl’s third penny.
In the county court and in every hundred court that
Soke and the earl’s third
has not passed into private hands, the king is entitled penny.
to but two-thirds of the proceeds of justice and the
earl gets the other third, except perhaps in certain
exceptional cases in which the king has the whole profit of some specially
royal plea. The soke in the hundred courts belongs to the king and the earl.
And just as the king’s rights as the lord of a hundredal court become bound
up with, and are let to farm with, some royal manor, so the earl’s third
penny will be annexed to some comital manor. Thus the third penny of
but it hardly has a word that will answer to our ‘court.’ The term curia is in
use, but it seems always to signify a physical object, the lord’s house or the
court-yard around it, never an institution, a tribunal[379]. Almost all that we
are told is conveyed to us under the cover of such words as sake, soke,
placita, forisfacturae. We know that the Bishop of Winchester has a court at
Taunton, for his tenants are bound to come together thrice a year to hold his
pleas without being summoned[380]. This phrase—‘to hold his pleas’—
seems to tell us distinctly enough that the suitors are the doomsmen of the
court. Then, again, we have the well-known story of what happened at
Orwell in Cambridgeshire. In that village Count Roger had a small estate;
he had land for a team and a half. This land had belonged to six sokemen.
He had borrowed three of them from Picot the sheriff in order that they
might hold his pleas, and having got them he refused to return them[381].
That the court that he wished to hold was a court merely for his land at
Orwell is highly improbable, but he had other lands scattered about in the
various villages of the Wetherly hundred, though in all his tenants amounted
to but 14 villeins, 42 bordiers, 15 cottiers, and 4 serfs. We can not draw the
inference that men of the class known as sokemen were necessary for the
constitution of a court, for at the date of the survey there was no sokeman
left in all Roger’s land in Cambridgeshire; the three that he borrowed from
Picot had disappeared or were reckoned as villeins or worse. Still he held a
court and that court had doomsmen. But we can not argue that every lord
who had soke, or sake and soke, had a court of his own. It may be that in
some cases he was satisfied with claiming the ‘forfeitures’ which his men
incurred in the hundred courts. This is suggested to us by what we read of
the earl’s third penny.
In the county court and in every hundred court that
Soke and the earl’s third
has not passed into private hands, the king is entitled penny.
to but two-thirds of the proceeds of justice and the
earl gets the other third, except perhaps in certain
exceptional cases in which the king has the whole profit of some specially
royal plea. The soke in the hundred courts belongs to the king and the earl.
And just as the king’s rights as the lord of a hundredal court become bound
up with, and are let to farm with, some royal manor, so the earl’s third
penny will be annexed to some comital manor. Thus the third penny of
Page 112
Dorsetshire was annexed to Earl Harold’s manor of Pireton[382], and the
third penny of Warwickshire to Earl Edwin’s manor of Cote[383]. Harold had
a manor in Herefordshire to which belonged the third penny of three
hundreds[384]; Godwin had a manor in Hampshire to which belonged the
third penny of six hundreds[385]; the third penny of three Devonian
hundreds belonged to the manor of Blackpool[386]. Now, at least in some
cases, the king could not by his grants deprive the earl of his right; the
grantee of soke had to take it subject to the earl’s third penny. Thus for the
shires of Derby and Nottingham we have a list of nineteen persons who
were entitled to the king’s two-pence, but only three of them were entitled
to the earl’s penny[387]. The monks of Battle declared that throughout many
hundreds in Kent they were entitled to ‘the king’s two-pence’; the earl’s
third penny belonged to Odo of Bayeux[388]. And so of certain ‘free men’ in
Norfolk it is said that ‘their soke is in the hundred for the third penny[389].’
A man commits an offence; he incurs a wíte; two-thirds of it should go to
his lord; one-third to the earl: in what court should he be tried? The answer
that Domesday Book suggests by its silence is that this is a matter of
indifference; it does not care to distinguish between the right to hold a court
and the right to take the profits of justice. Just once the veil is raised for a
moment. In Suffolk lies the hundred of Blything; its head is the vill of
Blythburgh where there is a royal manor[390]. Within that hundred lies the
considerable town of Dunwich, which Edric holds as a manor. Now in
Dunwich the king has this custom that two or three men shall go to the
hundred court if they be duly summoned, and if they make default they
shall pay a fine of two ores, and if a thief be caught there he shall be judged
there and corporeal justice shall be done in Blythburgh and the lord of
Dunwich shall have the thief’s chattels. Apparently in this case the lord of
Dunwich will see to the trying but not to the hanging of the thief; but, at any
rate, a rare effort is here made to define how justice shall be done[391]. The
rarity of such efforts is very significant. Of course Domesday Book is not a
treatise on jurisdiction; still if there were other terms in use, we should not
be for ever put off with the vague, undifferentiated soke. On the whole, we
take it that the lord who enjoyed soke had a right to keep a court if he chose
to do so, and that generally he did this, though he would be far from
keeping a separate court for each of his little manors; but if his possessions
were small he may have contented himself with attending the hundred court
and claiming the fines incurred by his men. Sometimes a lord seems to have
third penny of Warwickshire to Earl Edwin’s manor of Cote[383]. Harold had
a manor in Herefordshire to which belonged the third penny of three
hundreds[384]; Godwin had a manor in Hampshire to which belonged the
third penny of six hundreds[385]; the third penny of three Devonian
hundreds belonged to the manor of Blackpool[386]. Now, at least in some
cases, the king could not by his grants deprive the earl of his right; the
grantee of soke had to take it subject to the earl’s third penny. Thus for the
shires of Derby and Nottingham we have a list of nineteen persons who
were entitled to the king’s two-pence, but only three of them were entitled
to the earl’s penny[387]. The monks of Battle declared that throughout many
hundreds in Kent they were entitled to ‘the king’s two-pence’; the earl’s
third penny belonged to Odo of Bayeux[388]. And so of certain ‘free men’ in
Norfolk it is said that ‘their soke is in the hundred for the third penny[389].’
A man commits an offence; he incurs a wíte; two-thirds of it should go to
his lord; one-third to the earl: in what court should he be tried? The answer
that Domesday Book suggests by its silence is that this is a matter of
indifference; it does not care to distinguish between the right to hold a court
and the right to take the profits of justice. Just once the veil is raised for a
moment. In Suffolk lies the hundred of Blything; its head is the vill of
Blythburgh where there is a royal manor[390]. Within that hundred lies the
considerable town of Dunwich, which Edric holds as a manor. Now in
Dunwich the king has this custom that two or three men shall go to the
hundred court if they be duly summoned, and if they make default they
shall pay a fine of two ores, and if a thief be caught there he shall be judged
there and corporeal justice shall be done in Blythburgh and the lord of
Dunwich shall have the thief’s chattels. Apparently in this case the lord of
Dunwich will see to the trying but not to the hanging of the thief; but, at any
rate, a rare effort is here made to define how justice shall be done[391]. The
rarity of such efforts is very significant. Of course Domesday Book is not a
treatise on jurisdiction; still if there were other terms in use, we should not
be for ever put off with the vague, undifferentiated soke. On the whole, we
take it that the lord who enjoyed soke had a right to keep a court if he chose
to do so, and that generally he did this, though he would be far from
keeping a separate court for each of his little manors; but if his possessions
were small he may have contented himself with attending the hundred court
and claiming the fines incurred by his men. Sometimes a lord seems to have
Page 113
soke only over his own demesne lands[392]; in this case the wites that will
come to him will be few. We may in later times see some curious
compromises. If a thief is caught on the land of the Prior of Canterbury at
Brook in Kent, the borhs-elder and frank-pledges of Brook are to take him
to the court of the hundred of Wye, which belongs to the Abbot of Battle.
Then, if he is not one of the Prior’s men, he will be judged by the hundred.
But if he is the Prior’s man, then the bailiff of Brook will ‘crave the Prior’s
court.’ The Prior’s folk will then go apart and judge the accused, a few of
the hundredors going with them to act as assessors. If the tribunal thus
constituted cannot agree, then once more the accused will be brought back
into the hundred and will there be judged by the hundredors in common. In
this instance we see that even in Henry II.’s day the Prior has not
thoroughly extricated his court from the hundred moot[393].
It seems possible that a further hint as to the history
Soke and house-peace.
of soke is given us by certain entries relating to the
boroughs. It will already have become apparent that
if there is soke over men, there is also soke over land: if men ‘render soke’
so also acres ‘render soke.’ We can see that a very elaborate web of rules is
thus woven. One man strikes another. Before we can tell what the striker
ought to pay and to whom he ought to pay it, we ought to know who had
soke over the striker, over the stricken, over the spot where the blow was
given, over the spot where the offender was attached or arrested or accused.
‘The men of Southwark testify that in King Edward’s time no one took toll
on the strand or in the water-street save the king, and if any one in the act of
committing an offence was there challenged, he paid the amends to the
king, but if without being challenged he escaped under a man who had sake
and soke, that man had the amends[394].’ Then we read how at Wallingford
certain owners of houses enjoyed ‘the gafol of their houses, and blood, if
blood was shed there and the man was received inside before he was
challenged by the king’s reeve, except on Saturday, for then the king had
the forfeiture on account of the market; and for adultery and larceny they
had the forfeiture in their houses, but the other forfeitures were the
king’s[395].’ We can not hope to recover the intricate rules which governed
these affairs, rules which must have been as intricate as those of our ‘private
international law.’ But the description of Wallingford tells us of
householders who enjoy the ‘forfeitures’ which arise from crimes
come to him will be few. We may in later times see some curious
compromises. If a thief is caught on the land of the Prior of Canterbury at
Brook in Kent, the borhs-elder and frank-pledges of Brook are to take him
to the court of the hundred of Wye, which belongs to the Abbot of Battle.
Then, if he is not one of the Prior’s men, he will be judged by the hundred.
But if he is the Prior’s man, then the bailiff of Brook will ‘crave the Prior’s
court.’ The Prior’s folk will then go apart and judge the accused, a few of
the hundredors going with them to act as assessors. If the tribunal thus
constituted cannot agree, then once more the accused will be brought back
into the hundred and will there be judged by the hundredors in common. In
this instance we see that even in Henry II.’s day the Prior has not
thoroughly extricated his court from the hundred moot[393].
It seems possible that a further hint as to the history
Soke and house-peace.
of soke is given us by certain entries relating to the
boroughs. It will already have become apparent that
if there is soke over men, there is also soke over land: if men ‘render soke’
so also acres ‘render soke.’ We can see that a very elaborate web of rules is
thus woven. One man strikes another. Before we can tell what the striker
ought to pay and to whom he ought to pay it, we ought to know who had
soke over the striker, over the stricken, over the spot where the blow was
given, over the spot where the offender was attached or arrested or accused.
‘The men of Southwark testify that in King Edward’s time no one took toll
on the strand or in the water-street save the king, and if any one in the act of
committing an offence was there challenged, he paid the amends to the
king, but if without being challenged he escaped under a man who had sake
and soke, that man had the amends[394].’ Then we read how at Wallingford
certain owners of houses enjoyed ‘the gafol of their houses, and blood, if
blood was shed there and the man was received inside before he was
challenged by the king’s reeve, except on Saturday, for then the king had
the forfeiture on account of the market; and for adultery and larceny they
had the forfeiture in their houses, but the other forfeitures were the
king’s[395].’ We can not hope to recover the intricate rules which governed
these affairs, rules which must have been as intricate as those of our ‘private
international law.’ But the description of Wallingford tells us of
householders who enjoy the ‘forfeitures’ which arise from crimes
Page 114
committed in their own houses, and a suspicion may cross our minds that
the right to these forfeitures is not in its origin a purely jurisdictional or
justiciary right. However, these householders are great people (the Bishop
of Salisbury, the Abbot of St Albans are among them), their town houses are
considered as appurtenant to their rural manors and the soke over the manor
comprehends the town house. And so when we read how the twelve lawmen
of Stamford had sake and soke within their houses and over their own men
‘save geld, and heriot, and corporeal forfeitures to the amount of 40 ores of
silver and larceny’ we may be reading of rights which can properly be
described as justiciary[396].
But a much more difficult case comes before us at
Soke in houses.
Warwick[397]. We first hear of the town houses that
are held by great men as parts of their manors, and
then we hear that ‘besides these houses there are in the borough nineteen
burgesses who have nineteen houses with sake and soke and all customs.’
Now we can not easily believe that the burgess’s house is a jurisdictional
area, or that in exacting a mulct from one who commits a crime in that
house the burgess will be playing the magistrate or exercising a right to do
justice or take the profits of justice by virtue of a grant made to him by the
king. Rather we are likely to see here a relic of the ancient ‘house-
peace[398].’ If you commit an act of violence in a man’s house, whatever
you may have to pay to the person whom you strike and to the king, you
will also have to make amends to the owner of the house, even though he be
but a ceorl or a boor, for you have broken his peace[399]. The right of the
burgess to exact a mulct from one who has shed blood or committed
adultery within his walls may in truth be a right of this kind, and yet, like
other rights to other mulcts, it is now conceived as an emanation of sake
and soke. If in the eleventh century we hear but little of this householder’s
right, may this not be because the householder has surrendered it to his lord,
or the lord has usurped it from the householder, and thus it has gone to
swell the mass of the lord’s jurisdictional rights? At Broughton in
Huntingdonshire the Abbot of Ramsey has a manor with some sokemen
upon it ‘and these sokemen say that they used to have legerwite
(fornication-fine), bloodwite and larceny up to fourpence, and above
fourpence the Abbot had the forfeiture of larceny[400].’ Various
interpretations may be set upon this difficult passage. We may fashion for
the right to these forfeitures is not in its origin a purely jurisdictional or
justiciary right. However, these householders are great people (the Bishop
of Salisbury, the Abbot of St Albans are among them), their town houses are
considered as appurtenant to their rural manors and the soke over the manor
comprehends the town house. And so when we read how the twelve lawmen
of Stamford had sake and soke within their houses and over their own men
‘save geld, and heriot, and corporeal forfeitures to the amount of 40 ores of
silver and larceny’ we may be reading of rights which can properly be
described as justiciary[396].
But a much more difficult case comes before us at
Soke in houses.
Warwick[397]. We first hear of the town houses that
are held by great men as parts of their manors, and
then we hear that ‘besides these houses there are in the borough nineteen
burgesses who have nineteen houses with sake and soke and all customs.’
Now we can not easily believe that the burgess’s house is a jurisdictional
area, or that in exacting a mulct from one who commits a crime in that
house the burgess will be playing the magistrate or exercising a right to do
justice or take the profits of justice by virtue of a grant made to him by the
king. Rather we are likely to see here a relic of the ancient ‘house-
peace[398].’ If you commit an act of violence in a man’s house, whatever
you may have to pay to the person whom you strike and to the king, you
will also have to make amends to the owner of the house, even though he be
but a ceorl or a boor, for you have broken his peace[399]. The right of the
burgess to exact a mulct from one who has shed blood or committed
adultery within his walls may in truth be a right of this kind, and yet, like
other rights to other mulcts, it is now conceived as an emanation of sake
and soke. If in the eleventh century we hear but little of this householder’s
right, may this not be because the householder has surrendered it to his lord,
or the lord has usurped it from the householder, and thus it has gone to
swell the mass of the lord’s jurisdictional rights? At Broughton in
Huntingdonshire the Abbot of Ramsey has a manor with some sokemen
upon it ‘and these sokemen say that they used to have legerwite
(fornication-fine), bloodwite and larceny up to fourpence, and above
fourpence the Abbot had the forfeiture of larceny[400].’ Various
interpretations may be set upon this difficult passage. We may fashion for
Page 115
ourselves a village court (though there are but ten sokemen) and suppose
that the commune of sokemen enjoyed the smaller fines incurred by any of
its members. But we are inclined to connect this entry with those relating to
Wallingford and to Warwick and to believe that each sokeman has enjoyed a
right to exact a sum of money for the breach of his peace. The law does not
clearly mark off the right of the injured housefather from the right of the
offended magistrate. How could it do so? If you commit an act of violence
you must pay a wite to the king. Why so? Because you have wronged the
king by breaking his peace and he requires ‘amends’ from you. With this
thought in our minds we may now approach an obscure problem.
We have said that seignorial justice is regarded as
Vendible soke.
having its origin in royal grants, and in the main this
seems true. We hardly state an exception to this rule
if we say that grantees of justice become in their turn grantors. Not merely
could the earl who had soke grant this to one of his thegns, but that thegn
would be said to hold the soke ‘under’ or ‘of’ the earl. Justice, we may say,
was already being subinfeudated[401]. But now and again we meet with
much more startling statements. Usually if a man over whom his lord has
soke ‘withdraws himself with his land,’ or ‘goes elsewhere with his land,’
the lord’s soke over that land ‘remains’: he still has jurisdictional rights
over that land though it is commended to a new lord. We may be surprised
at being very frequently told that this is the case, for we can hardly imagine
a man having power to take his land out of one sphere of justice and to put
it into another. But that some men, and they not men of high rank, enjoyed
this power seems probable. Of a Hertfordshire manor we read: ‘In this
manor there were six sokemen, men of Archbishop Stigand, and each had
one hide, and they could sell, saving the soke, and one of them could even
sell his soke with the land[402].’ This case may be exceptional; there may
have been a very unusual compact between the archbishop and this
egregiously free sokeman; but the frequency with which we are told that on
a sale the soke ‘remains’ does not favour this supposition.
We seem driven to the conclusion that in some parts
Soke and mund.
of the country the practice of commendation had
been allowed to interfere even with jurisdictional
relationships: that there were men who could ‘go with their land to what
lord they chose’ and carry with them not merely their homage, but also their
that the commune of sokemen enjoyed the smaller fines incurred by any of
its members. But we are inclined to connect this entry with those relating to
Wallingford and to Warwick and to believe that each sokeman has enjoyed a
right to exact a sum of money for the breach of his peace. The law does not
clearly mark off the right of the injured housefather from the right of the
offended magistrate. How could it do so? If you commit an act of violence
you must pay a wite to the king. Why so? Because you have wronged the
king by breaking his peace and he requires ‘amends’ from you. With this
thought in our minds we may now approach an obscure problem.
We have said that seignorial justice is regarded as
Vendible soke.
having its origin in royal grants, and in the main this
seems true. We hardly state an exception to this rule
if we say that grantees of justice become in their turn grantors. Not merely
could the earl who had soke grant this to one of his thegns, but that thegn
would be said to hold the soke ‘under’ or ‘of’ the earl. Justice, we may say,
was already being subinfeudated[401]. But now and again we meet with
much more startling statements. Usually if a man over whom his lord has
soke ‘withdraws himself with his land,’ or ‘goes elsewhere with his land,’
the lord’s soke over that land ‘remains’: he still has jurisdictional rights
over that land though it is commended to a new lord. We may be surprised
at being very frequently told that this is the case, for we can hardly imagine
a man having power to take his land out of one sphere of justice and to put
it into another. But that some men, and they not men of high rank, enjoyed
this power seems probable. Of a Hertfordshire manor we read: ‘In this
manor there were six sokemen, men of Archbishop Stigand, and each had
one hide, and they could sell, saving the soke, and one of them could even
sell his soke with the land[402].’ This case may be exceptional; there may
have been a very unusual compact between the archbishop and this
egregiously free sokeman; but the frequency with which we are told that on
a sale the soke ‘remains’ does not favour this supposition.
We seem driven to the conclusion that in some parts
Soke and mund.
of the country the practice of commendation had
been allowed to interfere even with jurisdictional
relationships: that there were men who could ‘go with their land to what
lord they chose’ and carry with them not merely their homage, but also their
Page 116
suit of court and their ‘forfeitures.’ This may seem to us intolerable. If it be
true, it tells us that the state has been very weak; it tells us that the national
scheme of justice has been torn to shreds by free contract, that men have
had the utmost difficulty in distinguishing between property and political
power, between personal relationships and the magistracy to which land is
subject. But unless we are mistaken, the house-peace in its decay has helped
to produce this confusion. In a certain sense a mere ceorl has had what is
now called a soke,—it used to be called a mund or grið—over his house and
over his loaf-eaters: that is to say, he has been entitled to have money paid
to him if his house-peace were broken or his loaf-eaters beaten. This right
he has been able to transfer to a lord. In one way or another it has now
come into the lord’s hand and become mixed up with other rights. In Henry
I.’s day a lawyer will be explaining that if a villein receives money when
blood is shed or fornication is committed in his house, this is because he has
purchased these forfeitures from his lord[403]. This reverses the order of
history.
Such is the best explanation that we can give of the
Soke and jurisdiction.
men who sell their soke with their land. No doubt we
are accusing Domesday Book of being very obscure,
of using a single word to express some three or four different ideas. In some
degree the obscurity may be due to the fact that French justiciars and
French clerks have become the exponents of English law. But we may
gravely doubt whether Englishmen would have produced a result more
intelligible to us. One cause of difficulty we may perhaps remove. In
accordance with common wont we have from time to time spoken of
seignorial jurisdiction. But if the word jurisdiction be strictly construed,
then in all likelihood there never has been in this country any seignorial
jurisdiction. It is not the part of the lord to declare the law (ius dicere);
‘curia domini debet facere iudicia et non dominus[404].’ From first to last
this seems to be so, unless we take account of theories that come to us from
a time when the lord’s court was fast becoming an obsolete institution[405].
So it is in Domesday Book. In the hundred court the sheriff presides; it is he
that appoints a day for the litigation, but the men of the hundred, the men
who come together ‘to give and receive right,’ make the judgments[406]. The
tenants of the Bishop of Winchester ‘hold the bishops’ pleas’ at Taunton;
Earl Roger borrows sokemen ‘to hold his pleas[407].’ Thus the erection of a
true, it tells us that the state has been very weak; it tells us that the national
scheme of justice has been torn to shreds by free contract, that men have
had the utmost difficulty in distinguishing between property and political
power, between personal relationships and the magistracy to which land is
subject. But unless we are mistaken, the house-peace in its decay has helped
to produce this confusion. In a certain sense a mere ceorl has had what is
now called a soke,—it used to be called a mund or grið—over his house and
over his loaf-eaters: that is to say, he has been entitled to have money paid
to him if his house-peace were broken or his loaf-eaters beaten. This right
he has been able to transfer to a lord. In one way or another it has now
come into the lord’s hand and become mixed up with other rights. In Henry
I.’s day a lawyer will be explaining that if a villein receives money when
blood is shed or fornication is committed in his house, this is because he has
purchased these forfeitures from his lord[403]. This reverses the order of
history.
Such is the best explanation that we can give of the
Soke and jurisdiction.
men who sell their soke with their land. No doubt we
are accusing Domesday Book of being very obscure,
of using a single word to express some three or four different ideas. In some
degree the obscurity may be due to the fact that French justiciars and
French clerks have become the exponents of English law. But we may
gravely doubt whether Englishmen would have produced a result more
intelligible to us. One cause of difficulty we may perhaps remove. In
accordance with common wont we have from time to time spoken of
seignorial jurisdiction. But if the word jurisdiction be strictly construed,
then in all likelihood there never has been in this country any seignorial
jurisdiction. It is not the part of the lord to declare the law (ius dicere);
‘curia domini debet facere iudicia et non dominus[404].’ From first to last
this seems to be so, unless we take account of theories that come to us from
a time when the lord’s court was fast becoming an obsolete institution[405].
So it is in Domesday Book. In the hundred court the sheriff presides; it is he
that appoints a day for the litigation, but the men of the hundred, the men
who come together ‘to give and receive right,’ make the judgments[406]. The
tenants of the Bishop of Winchester ‘hold the bishops’ pleas’ at Taunton;
Earl Roger borrows sokemen ‘to hold his pleas[407].’ Thus the erection of a
Page 117
new court is no very revolutionary proceeding; it passes unnoticed. If once
it be granted that all the justiciary profits arising from a certain group of
men or tract of land are to go to a certain lord, it is very much a matter of
indifference to kings and sheriffs whether the lord holds a court of his own
or exacts this money in the hundred court. Indeed, a sheriff may be inclined
to say ‘I am not going to do your justice for nothing; do it yourself.’ So long
as every lord will come to the hundred court himself or send his steward,
the sheriff will have no lack of capable doomsmen. Then the men of the
lord’s precinct may well wish for a court at their doors; they will be spared
the long journey to the hundred court; they will settle their own affairs and
be a law unto themselves. Thus we ought not to say that the lax use of the
word soke covers a confusion between ‘jurisdiction’ and the profits of
‘jurisdiction,’ and if we say that the confusion is between justice and the
profits of justice, we are pointing to a distinction which the men of the
Confessor’s time might regard as somewhat shadowy. In any case their lord
is to have their wites; in any case they will get the judgment of their peers;
what is left to dispute about is mere geography, the number of the courts,
the demarcation of justiciary areas. We may say, if we will, that far-sighted
men would not have argued in this manner, for seignorial justice was a
force mighty for good and for ill; but it has not been proved to our
satisfaction that the men who ruled England in the age before the Conquest
were far-sighted. Their work ended in a stupendous failure.
To the sake and soke of the old English law we shall
Soke and commendation.
have to return once more in our next essay. Our
discussion of the sake and soke of Domesday Book
was induced by a consideration of the various bonds which may bind a man
to a lord. And now we ought to understand that in the eastern counties it is
extremely common for a man to be bound to one lord by commendation and
to another lord by soke. Very often indeed a man is commended to one lord,
while the soke over him and over his land ‘lies in’ some hundred court
which belongs to another lord or is still in the hands of the king and the earl.
How to draw with any exactness the line between the rights given to the one
lord by the commendation and to the other lord by the soke we can not tell.
For instance, we find many men who can not sell their land without the
consent of a lord. This we may usually regard as the result of some term in
the bargain of commendation; but in some cases it may well be the outcome
it be granted that all the justiciary profits arising from a certain group of
men or tract of land are to go to a certain lord, it is very much a matter of
indifference to kings and sheriffs whether the lord holds a court of his own
or exacts this money in the hundred court. Indeed, a sheriff may be inclined
to say ‘I am not going to do your justice for nothing; do it yourself.’ So long
as every lord will come to the hundred court himself or send his steward,
the sheriff will have no lack of capable doomsmen. Then the men of the
lord’s precinct may well wish for a court at their doors; they will be spared
the long journey to the hundred court; they will settle their own affairs and
be a law unto themselves. Thus we ought not to say that the lax use of the
word soke covers a confusion between ‘jurisdiction’ and the profits of
‘jurisdiction,’ and if we say that the confusion is between justice and the
profits of justice, we are pointing to a distinction which the men of the
Confessor’s time might regard as somewhat shadowy. In any case their lord
is to have their wites; in any case they will get the judgment of their peers;
what is left to dispute about is mere geography, the number of the courts,
the demarcation of justiciary areas. We may say, if we will, that far-sighted
men would not have argued in this manner, for seignorial justice was a
force mighty for good and for ill; but it has not been proved to our
satisfaction that the men who ruled England in the age before the Conquest
were far-sighted. Their work ended in a stupendous failure.
To the sake and soke of the old English law we shall
Soke and commendation.
have to return once more in our next essay. Our
discussion of the sake and soke of Domesday Book
was induced by a consideration of the various bonds which may bind a man
to a lord. And now we ought to understand that in the eastern counties it is
extremely common for a man to be bound to one lord by commendation and
to another lord by soke. Very often indeed a man is commended to one lord,
while the soke over him and over his land ‘lies in’ some hundred court
which belongs to another lord or is still in the hands of the king and the earl.
How to draw with any exactness the line between the rights given to the one
lord by the commendation and to the other lord by the soke we can not tell.
For instance, we find many men who can not sell their land without the
consent of a lord. This we may usually regard as the result of some term in
the bargain of commendation; but in some cases it may well be the outcome
Page 118
of soke. Thus at Sturston in Norfolk we see a free man of St Etheldreda of
Ely; his sake and soke belong to Archbishop Stigand’s manor of Earsham
(Sturston and Earsham lie some five miles apart); now this man if he wishes
to give or sell his land must obtain the licence both of St Etheldreda and of
Stigand[408]. And so as regards the forfeiture of land. We are perhaps
accustomed to think of the escheat propter delictum tenentis as having its
origin in the ideas of homage and tenure rather than in the justiciary rights
of the lord. Howbeit there is much to make us think that the right to take the
land of one who has forfeited that land by crime was closely connected with
the right to other wites or forisfacturae. ‘Of all the thegns who hold land in
the Well wapentake of Lincolnshire, St Mary of Lincoln had two-thirds of
every forisfactura and the earl the other third; and so of their heriots; and so
if they forfeited their land, two-thirds went to St Mary and the remainder to
the earl[409].’ St Mary has not enfeoffed these thegns; but by some royal
grant she has two-thirds of the soke over them. In Suffolk one Brungar held
a small manor with soke. He was a ‘free man’ commended to Robert
Wimarc’s son; but the sake and soke over him belonged to St Edmund.
Unfortunately for Brungar, stolen horses were found in his house, and we
fear that he came to a bad end. At any rate he drops out of the story. Then St
Edmund’s Abbot, who had the sake and soke, and Robert, who had the
commendation, went to law, and right gladly would we have heard the plea;
but they came to some compromise and to all seeming Robert got the
land[410]. If we are puzzled by this labyrinthine web of legal relationships,
we may console ourselves with the reflection that the Normans also were
puzzled by it. They seem to have felt the necessity of attributing the
lordship of land to one lord and one only (though of course that lord might
have another lord above him), of consolidating soke with commendation,
homage with justice, and in the end they brought out a simple and
symmetrical result, albeit to the last the relation of seignorial to hundredal
justice is not to be explained by any elegant theory of feudalism.
Yet another problem shall be stated, though we have
Sokemen and free men.
little hope of solving it. The writ, or rather one of the
writs, which defined the scope of the survey seems
to have spoken of liberi homines and sochemanni as of two classes of men
that were to be distinguished from each other. In Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk
this distinction is often drawn. In one and the same manor we shall find
Ely; his sake and soke belong to Archbishop Stigand’s manor of Earsham
(Sturston and Earsham lie some five miles apart); now this man if he wishes
to give or sell his land must obtain the licence both of St Etheldreda and of
Stigand[408]. And so as regards the forfeiture of land. We are perhaps
accustomed to think of the escheat propter delictum tenentis as having its
origin in the ideas of homage and tenure rather than in the justiciary rights
of the lord. Howbeit there is much to make us think that the right to take the
land of one who has forfeited that land by crime was closely connected with
the right to other wites or forisfacturae. ‘Of all the thegns who hold land in
the Well wapentake of Lincolnshire, St Mary of Lincoln had two-thirds of
every forisfactura and the earl the other third; and so of their heriots; and so
if they forfeited their land, two-thirds went to St Mary and the remainder to
the earl[409].’ St Mary has not enfeoffed these thegns; but by some royal
grant she has two-thirds of the soke over them. In Suffolk one Brungar held
a small manor with soke. He was a ‘free man’ commended to Robert
Wimarc’s son; but the sake and soke over him belonged to St Edmund.
Unfortunately for Brungar, stolen horses were found in his house, and we
fear that he came to a bad end. At any rate he drops out of the story. Then St
Edmund’s Abbot, who had the sake and soke, and Robert, who had the
commendation, went to law, and right gladly would we have heard the plea;
but they came to some compromise and to all seeming Robert got the
land[410]. If we are puzzled by this labyrinthine web of legal relationships,
we may console ourselves with the reflection that the Normans also were
puzzled by it. They seem to have felt the necessity of attributing the
lordship of land to one lord and one only (though of course that lord might
have another lord above him), of consolidating soke with commendation,
homage with justice, and in the end they brought out a simple and
symmetrical result, albeit to the last the relation of seignorial to hundredal
justice is not to be explained by any elegant theory of feudalism.
Yet another problem shall be stated, though we have
Sokemen and free men.
little hope of solving it. The writ, or rather one of the
writs, which defined the scope of the survey seems
to have spoken of liberi homines and sochemanni as of two classes of men
that were to be distinguished from each other. In Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk
this distinction is often drawn. In one and the same manor we shall find
Page 119
both ‘free men’ and sokemen[411]; we may even hear of sokemen who
formerly were ‘free men[412].’ But the import of this distinction evades us.
Sometimes it is said of sokemen that they ‘hold freely[413].’ We read that
four sokemen held this land of whom three were free, while the fourth had
one hide but could not give or sell it[414]. This may suggest that the
principle of the division is to be found in the power to alienate the land, to
‘withdraw’ with the land to another lord[415]. There may be truth in the
suggestion, but we can not square it with all our cases[416]. Often enough
the ‘free man’ can not sell without the consent of his lord[417]. We have just
met with a ‘free man’ who had to obtain the consent both of the lord of his
commendation and of the lord of his soke[418]. On the other hand, the
sokeman who can sell without his lord’s leave is no rare being[419], and it
was of a sokeman that we read how he could sell, not only his land, but also
his soke[420].
Again, we dare not say that while the ‘free man’ is
Difference between ‘free
the justiciable of a national court, the soke over the men’ and sokemen.
sokeman belongs to his lord. Neither side of this
proposition is true. Very often the soke over the ‘free
man’ belongs to a church or to some other lord[421], who may or may not be
his lord by commendation[422]. Very often the lord has not the soke over his
sokemen. This may seem a paradox, but it is true. We make it clearer by
saying that you may have a man who is your man and who is a sokeman,
but yet you have no soke over him; his soke ‘lies’ or ‘is rendered’
elsewhere. This is a common enough phenomenon, but it is apt to escape
attention. When we are told that a certain English lord had a sokeman at a
certain place, we must not jump to the conclusion that he had soke over that
man of his. Thus in Hertfordshire Æthelmær held a manor and in it there
were four sokemen; they were, we are told, his homines: but over two of
them the king had sake and soke[423]. Unless we are greatly mistaken, the
soke of many of the East Anglian sokemen, no matter whose men they
were, lay in the hundred courts. This prevents our saying that a sokeman is
one over whom his lord has soke, or one who renders soke to his lord. We
may doubt whether the line between the sokemen and the ‘free men’ is
drawn in accordance with any one principle. Not only is freedom a matter
of degree, but freedom is measured along several different scales. At one
time it is to the power of alienation or ‘withdrawal’ that attention is
formerly were ‘free men[412].’ But the import of this distinction evades us.
Sometimes it is said of sokemen that they ‘hold freely[413].’ We read that
four sokemen held this land of whom three were free, while the fourth had
one hide but could not give or sell it[414]. This may suggest that the
principle of the division is to be found in the power to alienate the land, to
‘withdraw’ with the land to another lord[415]. There may be truth in the
suggestion, but we can not square it with all our cases[416]. Often enough
the ‘free man’ can not sell without the consent of his lord[417]. We have just
met with a ‘free man’ who had to obtain the consent both of the lord of his
commendation and of the lord of his soke[418]. On the other hand, the
sokeman who can sell without his lord’s leave is no rare being[419], and it
was of a sokeman that we read how he could sell, not only his land, but also
his soke[420].
Again, we dare not say that while the ‘free man’ is
Difference between ‘free
the justiciable of a national court, the soke over the men’ and sokemen.
sokeman belongs to his lord. Neither side of this
proposition is true. Very often the soke over the ‘free
man’ belongs to a church or to some other lord[421], who may or may not be
his lord by commendation[422]. Very often the lord has not the soke over his
sokemen. This may seem a paradox, but it is true. We make it clearer by
saying that you may have a man who is your man and who is a sokeman,
but yet you have no soke over him; his soke ‘lies’ or ‘is rendered’
elsewhere. This is a common enough phenomenon, but it is apt to escape
attention. When we are told that a certain English lord had a sokeman at a
certain place, we must not jump to the conclusion that he had soke over that
man of his. Thus in Hertfordshire Æthelmær held a manor and in it there
were four sokemen; they were, we are told, his homines: but over two of
them the king had sake and soke[423]. Unless we are greatly mistaken, the
soke of many of the East Anglian sokemen, no matter whose men they
were, lay in the hundred courts. This prevents our saying that a sokeman is
one over whom his lord has soke, or one who renders soke to his lord. We
may doubt whether the line between the sokemen and the ‘free men’ is
drawn in accordance with any one principle. Not only is freedom a matter
of degree, but freedom is measured along several different scales. At one
time it is to the power of alienation or ‘withdrawal’ that attention is
Page 120
attracted, at another to the number or the kind of the services and ‘customs’
that the man must render to his lord. When we see that in Lincolnshire there
is no class of ‘free men’ but that there are some eleven thousand sokemen,
we shall probably be persuaded that the distinction drawn in East Anglia
was of no very great importance to the surveyors or the king. It may have
been a matter of pure personal rank. These liberi homines may have
enjoyed a wergild of more than 200 shillings, for in the Norman age we see
traces of a usage which will not allow that any one is ‘free’ if he is not
noble[424]. But perhaps when the Domesday of East Anglia has been fully
explored, hundred by hundred and vill by vill, we shall come to the
conclusion that the ‘free men’ of one district would have been called
sokemen in another district[425].
Some of these sokemen and ‘free men’ had very
Holdings of the
small tenements. Let us look at a list of tenants in sokemen.
Norfolk. ‘In Carleton were 2 free men with 7 acres.
In Kicklington were 2 free men with 2 acres. In
Forncett 1 free man with 2 acres. In Tanaton 4 free men with 4 acres. In
Wacton 2 free men with 11⁄2 acres. In Stratton 1 free man with 4 acres. In
Moulton 3 free men with 5 acres. In Tibenham 2 free men with 7 acres. In
Aslacton 1 free man with 1 acre[426].’ These eighteen free men had but
sixteen oxen among them. We think it highly probable that in the survey of
East Anglia one and the same free man is sometimes mentioned several
times; he holds a little land under one lord, and a little under another lord;
but in all he holds little. Then again, we see that these small freemen often
have a few bordiers or even a few free men ‘below them[427].’ And then we
observe that, while some of them are spoken of as having belonged to the
manors of their lords, others are reported to have had manors of their own.
that the man must render to his lord. When we see that in Lincolnshire there
is no class of ‘free men’ but that there are some eleven thousand sokemen,
we shall probably be persuaded that the distinction drawn in East Anglia
was of no very great importance to the surveyors or the king. It may have
been a matter of pure personal rank. These liberi homines may have
enjoyed a wergild of more than 200 shillings, for in the Norman age we see
traces of a usage which will not allow that any one is ‘free’ if he is not
noble[424]. But perhaps when the Domesday of East Anglia has been fully
explored, hundred by hundred and vill by vill, we shall come to the
conclusion that the ‘free men’ of one district would have been called
sokemen in another district[425].
Some of these sokemen and ‘free men’ had very
Holdings of the
small tenements. Let us look at a list of tenants in sokemen.
Norfolk. ‘In Carleton were 2 free men with 7 acres.
In Kicklington were 2 free men with 2 acres. In
Forncett 1 free man with 2 acres. In Tanaton 4 free men with 4 acres. In
Wacton 2 free men with 11⁄2 acres. In Stratton 1 free man with 4 acres. In
Moulton 3 free men with 5 acres. In Tibenham 2 free men with 7 acres. In
Aslacton 1 free man with 1 acre[426].’ These eighteen free men had but
sixteen oxen among them. We think it highly probable that in the survey of
East Anglia one and the same free man is sometimes mentioned several
times; he holds a little land under one lord, and a little under another lord;
but in all he holds little. Then again, we see that these small freemen often
have a few bordiers or even a few free men ‘below them[427].’ And then we
observe that, while some of them are spoken of as having belonged to the
manors of their lords, others are reported to have had manors of their own.
Page 121
Page 122
§ 6. The Manor.
This brings us face to face with a question that we
What is a manor?
have hitherto evaded. What is a manor? The word
manerium appears on page after page of Domesday
Book, but to define its meaning will task our patience. Perhaps we may
have to say that sometimes the term is loosely used, that it has now a wider,
now a narrower compass, but we can not say that it is not a technical term.
Indeed the one statement that we can safely make about it is that, at all
events in certain passages and certain contexts, it is a technical term.
We may be led to this opinion by observing that in
‘Manor’ a technical
the description of certain counties—Middlesex, term.
Buckingham, Bedford, Cambridge, Huntingdon,
Derby, Nottingham, Lincoln, York—the symbol M
which represents a manor, is often carried out into the margin, and is
sometimes contrasted with the S which represents a soke and the B which
represents a berewick. This no doubt has been done—though it may not
have been very consistently done—for the purpose of guiding the eye of
officials who will turn over the pages in search of manors. But much clearer
evidence is forthcoming. Throughout the survey of Essex it is common to
find entries which take such a form as this: ‘Thurkil held it for two hides
and for one manor’; ‘Brithmær held it for five hides and for one manor’;
‘Two free men who were brothers held it for two hides and for two manors’;
‘Three free men held it for three manors and for four hides and twenty-
seven acres[428].’ In Sussex again the statement ‘X tenuit pro uno
manerio[429]’ frequently occurs. Such phrases as ‘Four brothers held it for
two manors, Hugh received it for one manor[430],’—‘These four manors are
now for one manor[431],’—‘Then there were two halls, now it is in one
manor[432],’—‘A certain thegn held four hides and it was a manor[433],’—
are by no means unusual[434]. A clerk writes ‘Elmer tenuit’ and then is at
pains to add by way of interlineation ‘pro manerio[435].’ ‘Eight thegns held
this manor, one of them, Alwin, held two hides for a manor; another, Ulf,
two hides for a manor; another, Algar, one hide and a half for a manor; Elsi
This brings us face to face with a question that we
What is a manor?
have hitherto evaded. What is a manor? The word
manerium appears on page after page of Domesday
Book, but to define its meaning will task our patience. Perhaps we may
have to say that sometimes the term is loosely used, that it has now a wider,
now a narrower compass, but we can not say that it is not a technical term.
Indeed the one statement that we can safely make about it is that, at all
events in certain passages and certain contexts, it is a technical term.
We may be led to this opinion by observing that in
‘Manor’ a technical
the description of certain counties—Middlesex, term.
Buckingham, Bedford, Cambridge, Huntingdon,
Derby, Nottingham, Lincoln, York—the symbol M
which represents a manor, is often carried out into the margin, and is
sometimes contrasted with the S which represents a soke and the B which
represents a berewick. This no doubt has been done—though it may not
have been very consistently done—for the purpose of guiding the eye of
officials who will turn over the pages in search of manors. But much clearer
evidence is forthcoming. Throughout the survey of Essex it is common to
find entries which take such a form as this: ‘Thurkil held it for two hides
and for one manor’; ‘Brithmær held it for five hides and for one manor’;
‘Two free men who were brothers held it for two hides and for two manors’;
‘Three free men held it for three manors and for four hides and twenty-
seven acres[428].’ In Sussex again the statement ‘X tenuit pro uno
manerio[429]’ frequently occurs. Such phrases as ‘Four brothers held it for
two manors, Hugh received it for one manor[430],’—‘These four manors are
now for one manor[431],’—‘Then there were two halls, now it is in one
manor[432],’—‘A certain thegn held four hides and it was a manor[433],’—
are by no means unusual[434]. A clerk writes ‘Elmer tenuit’ and then is at
pains to add by way of interlineation ‘pro manerio[435].’ ‘Eight thegns held
this manor, one of them, Alwin, held two hides for a manor; another, Ulf,
two hides for a manor; another, Algar, one hide and a half for a manor; Elsi
Page 123
one hide, Turkill one hide, Lodi one hide, Osulf one hide, Elric a half-
hide[436]’—when we read this we feel sure that the scribe is using his terms
carefully and that he is telling us that the holdings of the five thegns last
mentioned were not manors. And then Hugh de Port holds Wallop in
Hampshire ‘for half a manor[437].’ But let us say at once that at least one
rule of law, or of local custom, demands a definition of a manerium. In the
shires of Nottingham and Derby a thegn who has more than six manors
pays a relief of £8 to the king, but if he has only six manors or less, then a
relief of 3 marks to the sheriff[438]. It seems clear therefore that not only did
the Norman rulers treat the term manerium as an accurate term charged with
legal meaning, but they thought that it, or rather some English equivalent
for it, had been in the Confessor’s day an accurate term charged with legal
meaning.
The term manerium seems to have come in with the
The word manerium.
Conqueror[439], though other derivatives from the
Latin verb manere, in particular mansa, mansio,
mansiuncula had been freely employed by the scribes of the land-books.
But these had as a rule been used as representatives of the English hide, and
just for this reason they were incapable of expressing the notion that the
Normans desired to express by the word manerium. In its origin that word
is but one more name for a house. Throughout the Exeter Domesday the
word mansio is used instead of the manerium of the Exchequer record, and
even in the Exchequer record we may find these two terms used
interchangeably:—‘Three free men belonged to this manerium; one of them
had half a hide and could withdraw himself without the licence of the lord
of the mansio[440].’ If we look for the vernacular term that was rendered by
manerium, we are likely to find it in the English heal. Though this is not
connected with the Latin aula, still these two words bearing a similar
meaning meet and are fused in the aula, haula, halla of Domesday Book.
Now this term stands in the first instance for a house
Manor and hall.
and can be exchanged with curia. You may say that
there is meadow enough for the horses of the
curia[441], and that there are three horses in the aula[442]; you may speak
indifferently of a mill that serves the hall[443], or of the mill that grinds the
corn of the court[444]. But further, you may say that in Stonham there are 50
acres of the demesne land of the hall in Creeting, or that in Thorney there
hide[436]’—when we read this we feel sure that the scribe is using his terms
carefully and that he is telling us that the holdings of the five thegns last
mentioned were not manors. And then Hugh de Port holds Wallop in
Hampshire ‘for half a manor[437].’ But let us say at once that at least one
rule of law, or of local custom, demands a definition of a manerium. In the
shires of Nottingham and Derby a thegn who has more than six manors
pays a relief of £8 to the king, but if he has only six manors or less, then a
relief of 3 marks to the sheriff[438]. It seems clear therefore that not only did
the Norman rulers treat the term manerium as an accurate term charged with
legal meaning, but they thought that it, or rather some English equivalent
for it, had been in the Confessor’s day an accurate term charged with legal
meaning.
The term manerium seems to have come in with the
The word manerium.
Conqueror[439], though other derivatives from the
Latin verb manere, in particular mansa, mansio,
mansiuncula had been freely employed by the scribes of the land-books.
But these had as a rule been used as representatives of the English hide, and
just for this reason they were incapable of expressing the notion that the
Normans desired to express by the word manerium. In its origin that word
is but one more name for a house. Throughout the Exeter Domesday the
word mansio is used instead of the manerium of the Exchequer record, and
even in the Exchequer record we may find these two terms used
interchangeably:—‘Three free men belonged to this manerium; one of them
had half a hide and could withdraw himself without the licence of the lord
of the mansio[440].’ If we look for the vernacular term that was rendered by
manerium, we are likely to find it in the English heal. Though this is not
connected with the Latin aula, still these two words bearing a similar
meaning meet and are fused in the aula, haula, halla of Domesday Book.
Now this term stands in the first instance for a house
Manor and hall.
and can be exchanged with curia. You may say that
there is meadow enough for the horses of the
curia[441], and that there are three horses in the aula[442]; you may speak
indifferently of a mill that serves the hall[443], or of the mill that grinds the
corn of the court[444]. But further, you may say that in Stonham there are 50
acres of the demesne land of the hall in Creeting, or that in Thorney there
Page 124
are 24 acres which belong to the hall in Stonham[445], or that Roger de
Rames has lands which once were in the hall of St Edmund[446], or that in
the hall of Grantham there are three carucates of land[447], or that
Guthmund’s sake and soke extended only over the demesne of his hall[448].
We feel that to such phrases as these we should do no great violence were
we to substitute ‘manor’ for ‘hall.’ Other phrases serve to bring these two
words very closely together. One and the same page tells us, first, that Hugh
de Port holds as one manor what four brothers held as two manors, and
then, that on another estate there is one hall though of old there were two
halls[449]:—these two stories seem to have the same point. ‘Four brothers
held this; there was only one hall there[450].’ ‘Two brothers held it and each
had his hall; now it is as one manor[451].’ ‘In these two lands there is but one
hall[452].’ ‘Then there were two halls; now it is in one manor[453].’ ‘Ten
manors; ten thegns, each had his hall[454].’ ‘Ingelric set these men to his
hall.... Ingelric added these men to his manor[455].’
We do not contend that manerium and halla are
Difference between
precisely equivalent. Now and again we shall be told manor and hall.
of a manerium sine halla[456] as of some exceptional
phenomenon. The term manerium has contracted a
shade of technical meaning; it refers, so we think, to a system of taxation,
and thus it is being differentiated from the term hall. Suppose, for example,
that a hall or manor has meant a house from which taxes are collected, and
that some one removes that house, houses being very portable things[457]:
‘by construction of law,’ as we now say, there still may be a hall or manor
on the old site; or we may take advantage of the new wealth of words and
say that, though the hall has gone, the manor remains: to do this is neater
than to say that there is a ‘constructive’ hall where no hall can be seen. Then
again, manerium is proving itself to be the more elastic of the two terms.
We may indeed speak of a considerable stretch of land as belonging to or
even as ‘being in’ a certain hall, and this stretch may include not only land
that the owner of the hall occupies and cultivates by himself or his servants,
but also land and houses that are occupied by his villeins[458]: still we could
hardly talk of the hall being a league long and a league wide or containing a
square league. Of manerium, however, we may use even such phrases as
those just mentioned[459]. For all this, we can think of no English word for
Rames has lands which once were in the hall of St Edmund[446], or that in
the hall of Grantham there are three carucates of land[447], or that
Guthmund’s sake and soke extended only over the demesne of his hall[448].
We feel that to such phrases as these we should do no great violence were
we to substitute ‘manor’ for ‘hall.’ Other phrases serve to bring these two
words very closely together. One and the same page tells us, first, that Hugh
de Port holds as one manor what four brothers held as two manors, and
then, that on another estate there is one hall though of old there were two
halls[449]:—these two stories seem to have the same point. ‘Four brothers
held this; there was only one hall there[450].’ ‘Two brothers held it and each
had his hall; now it is as one manor[451].’ ‘In these two lands there is but one
hall[452].’ ‘Then there were two halls; now it is in one manor[453].’ ‘Ten
manors; ten thegns, each had his hall[454].’ ‘Ingelric set these men to his
hall.... Ingelric added these men to his manor[455].’
We do not contend that manerium and halla are
Difference between
precisely equivalent. Now and again we shall be told manor and hall.
of a manerium sine halla[456] as of some exceptional
phenomenon. The term manerium has contracted a
shade of technical meaning; it refers, so we think, to a system of taxation,
and thus it is being differentiated from the term hall. Suppose, for example,
that a hall or manor has meant a house from which taxes are collected, and
that some one removes that house, houses being very portable things[457]:
‘by construction of law,’ as we now say, there still may be a hall or manor
on the old site; or we may take advantage of the new wealth of words and
say that, though the hall has gone, the manor remains: to do this is neater
than to say that there is a ‘constructive’ hall where no hall can be seen. Then
again, manerium is proving itself to be the more elastic of the two terms.
We may indeed speak of a considerable stretch of land as belonging to or
even as ‘being in’ a certain hall, and this stretch may include not only land
that the owner of the hall occupies and cultivates by himself or his servants,
but also land and houses that are occupied by his villeins[458]: still we could
hardly talk of the hall being a league long and a league wide or containing a
square league. Of manerium, however, we may use even such phrases as
those just mentioned[459]. For all this, we can think of no English word for
Page 125
which manerium can stand, save hall; tún, it is clear enough, was translated
by villa, not by manerium
If now we turn from words to look at the things
Size of the maneria.
which those words signify, we shall soon be
convinced that to describe a typical manerium is an
impossible feat, for on the one hand there are enormous maneria and on the
other hand there are many holdings called maneria which are so small that
we, with our reminiscences of the law of later days, can hardly bring
ourselves to speak of them as manors. If we look in the world of sense for
the essence of the manerium we shall find nothing that is common to all
maneria save a piece of ground—very large it may be, or very small—held
(in some sense or another) by a single person or by a group of co-tenants,
for even upon a house we shall not be able to insist very strictly. After
weary arithmetical labours we might indeed obtain an average manor; we
might come to the conclusion that the average manor contained so many
hides or acres, possibly that it included land occupied by so many sokemen,
villeins, bordiers, serfs; but an average is not a type, and the uselessness of
such calculations will soon become apparent.
We may begin by looking at a somewhat large
A large manor.
manor. Let it be that of Staines in Middlesex, which
is held by St Peter of Westminster[460]. It is rated at
19 hides but contains land for 24 plough-teams. To the demesne belong 11
hides and there are 13 teams there. The villeins have 11 teams. There are:—
by villa, not by manerium
If now we turn from words to look at the things
Size of the maneria.
which those words signify, we shall soon be
convinced that to describe a typical manerium is an
impossible feat, for on the one hand there are enormous maneria and on the
other hand there are many holdings called maneria which are so small that
we, with our reminiscences of the law of later days, can hardly bring
ourselves to speak of them as manors. If we look in the world of sense for
the essence of the manerium we shall find nothing that is common to all
maneria save a piece of ground—very large it may be, or very small—held
(in some sense or another) by a single person or by a group of co-tenants,
for even upon a house we shall not be able to insist very strictly. After
weary arithmetical labours we might indeed obtain an average manor; we
might come to the conclusion that the average manor contained so many
hides or acres, possibly that it included land occupied by so many sokemen,
villeins, bordiers, serfs; but an average is not a type, and the uselessness of
such calculations will soon become apparent.
We may begin by looking at a somewhat large
A large manor.
manor. Let it be that of Staines in Middlesex, which
is held by St Peter of Westminster[460]. It is rated at
19 hides but contains land for 24 plough-teams. To the demesne belong 11
hides and there are 13 teams there. The villeins have 11 teams. There are:—
Page 126
3 villeins with a half-hide apiece.
4 villeins with a hide between them.
8 villeins with a half-virgate apiece.
36 bordiers with 3 hides between them.
1 villein with 1 virgate.
4 bordiers with 40 acres between them.
10 bordiers with 5 acres apiece.
5 cottiers with 4 acres.
8 bordiers with 1 virgate.
3 cottiers with 9 acres.
13 serfs.46 burgesses paying 40 shillings a year.
There are 6 mills of 64 shillings and one fish-weir of 6s. 8d. and one weir
which renders nothing. There is pasture sufficient for the cattle of the vill.
There is meadow for the 24 teams, and in addition to this there is meadow
worth 20s. a year. There is wood for 30 pigs; there are 2 arpents of vineyard. To
this manor belong four berewicks. Altogether it is worth £35 and formerly it
was worth £40.—This is a handsome manor.—The next manor that is
mentioned would be a fairer specimen. It is Sunbury held by St Peter of
Westminster[461]. It is rated at 7 hides and there is land for but 6 teams. To the
demesne belong 4 hides and there is one team there. The villeins have 4 teams.
There are:—
A priest with a half-virgate.
8 villeins with a virgate apiece.
2 villeins with a virgate.
5 bordiers with a virgate.
5 cottiers.
1 serf.
There is meadow for 6 teams and pasture enough for the cattle of the vill.
Altogether it is worth £6 and has been worth £7. Within this one county of
Middlesex we can see wide variations. There are manors which are worth £50
and there are manors which are not worth as many shillings. The archbishop’s
grand manor at Harrow has land for 70 teams[462]; the Westminster manor of
Cowley has land for but one team and the only tenants upon it are two
villeins[463].
But far larger variations than these are to be found. Let us look at a few
gigantic manors. Leominster in Herefordshire had been held by Queen Edith
4 villeins with a hide between them.
8 villeins with a half-virgate apiece.
36 bordiers with 3 hides between them.
1 villein with 1 virgate.
4 bordiers with 40 acres between them.
10 bordiers with 5 acres apiece.
5 cottiers with 4 acres.
8 bordiers with 1 virgate.
3 cottiers with 9 acres.
13 serfs.46 burgesses paying 40 shillings a year.
There are 6 mills of 64 shillings and one fish-weir of 6s. 8d. and one weir
which renders nothing. There is pasture sufficient for the cattle of the vill.
There is meadow for the 24 teams, and in addition to this there is meadow
worth 20s. a year. There is wood for 30 pigs; there are 2 arpents of vineyard. To
this manor belong four berewicks. Altogether it is worth £35 and formerly it
was worth £40.—This is a handsome manor.—The next manor that is
mentioned would be a fairer specimen. It is Sunbury held by St Peter of
Westminster[461]. It is rated at 7 hides and there is land for but 6 teams. To the
demesne belong 4 hides and there is one team there. The villeins have 4 teams.
There are:—
A priest with a half-virgate.
8 villeins with a virgate apiece.
2 villeins with a virgate.
5 bordiers with a virgate.
5 cottiers.
1 serf.
There is meadow for 6 teams and pasture enough for the cattle of the vill.
Altogether it is worth £6 and has been worth £7. Within this one county of
Middlesex we can see wide variations. There are manors which are worth £50
and there are manors which are not worth as many shillings. The archbishop’s
grand manor at Harrow has land for 70 teams[462]; the Westminster manor of
Cowley has land for but one team and the only tenants upon it are two
villeins[463].
But far larger variations than these are to be found. Let us look at a few
gigantic manors. Leominster in Herefordshire had been held by Queen Edith
Page 127
together with sixteen members[464]. The names of these
Enormous manors.
members are given and we may find them scattered Leominster.
about over a wide tract of Herefordshire. In this manor
with its members there were 80 hides. In the demesne
there were 30 teams. There were 8 reeves and 16 beadles and 8 radknights and
238 villeins, 75 bordiers and 82 male and female serfs. These in all had 230
teams; so that with the demesne teams there were no less than 260. Further
there were Norman barons paying rents to this manor. Ralph de Mortemer for
example paid 15s. and Hugh de Lacy 6s. 8d. It is let to farm at a rent of £60
and besides this has to support a house of nuns; were it freed from this duty, it
might, so thinks the county, be let at a rent of £120. It is a most interesting
manor, for we see strong traces of a neat symmetrical arrangement:—witness
the 16 members, 8 reeves, 8 radknights, 16 beadles; very probably it has a
Welsh basis[465]. But we have in this place to note that it is called a manor, and
for certain purposes it is treated as a single whole. For what purposes? Well, for
one thing, it is let to farm as a single whole. This, however, is of no very great
importance, for landlords and farmers may make what bargains they please.
But also it is taxed as a single whole. It is rated at the nice round figures of 80
hides.
No less handsome and yet more valuable is Berkeley in
Berkeley.
Gloucestershire[466]. It brought in a rent of £170 of
refined money. It had eighteen members which were
dispersed abroad over so wide a field that a straight line Tewkesbury.
of thirty miles would hardly join their uttermost
points[467]. ‘All the aforesaid members belong to Berkeley.’ There were 29
radknights, 162 villeins, 147 bordiers, 22 coliberts, 161 male and female serfs,
besides some unenumerated men of the radknights; on the demesne land were
541⁄2 teams; and the tenants had 192. Tewkesbury also is a splendid manor.
‘When it was all together in King Edward’s time it was worth £100,’ though
now but £50 at the most can be had from it and in the turmoil of the Conquest
its value fell to £12[468]. It was a scattered unit, but still it was a unit for fiscal
purposes. It was reckoned to contain 95 hides, but the 45 which were in
demesne were quit of geld, and matters had been so arranged that all the geld
on the remaining 50 hides had, as between the lord and his various tenants,
been thrown on 35 of those hides. The ‘head of the manor’ was at Tewkesbury;
the members were dispersed abroad; but ‘they gelded in Tewkesbury[469].’
Enormous manors.
members are given and we may find them scattered Leominster.
about over a wide tract of Herefordshire. In this manor
with its members there were 80 hides. In the demesne
there were 30 teams. There were 8 reeves and 16 beadles and 8 radknights and
238 villeins, 75 bordiers and 82 male and female serfs. These in all had 230
teams; so that with the demesne teams there were no less than 260. Further
there were Norman barons paying rents to this manor. Ralph de Mortemer for
example paid 15s. and Hugh de Lacy 6s. 8d. It is let to farm at a rent of £60
and besides this has to support a house of nuns; were it freed from this duty, it
might, so thinks the county, be let at a rent of £120. It is a most interesting
manor, for we see strong traces of a neat symmetrical arrangement:—witness
the 16 members, 8 reeves, 8 radknights, 16 beadles; very probably it has a
Welsh basis[465]. But we have in this place to note that it is called a manor, and
for certain purposes it is treated as a single whole. For what purposes? Well, for
one thing, it is let to farm as a single whole. This, however, is of no very great
importance, for landlords and farmers may make what bargains they please.
But also it is taxed as a single whole. It is rated at the nice round figures of 80
hides.
No less handsome and yet more valuable is Berkeley in
Berkeley.
Gloucestershire[466]. It brought in a rent of £170 of
refined money. It had eighteen members which were
dispersed abroad over so wide a field that a straight line Tewkesbury.
of thirty miles would hardly join their uttermost
points[467]. ‘All the aforesaid members belong to Berkeley.’ There were 29
radknights, 162 villeins, 147 bordiers, 22 coliberts, 161 male and female serfs,
besides some unenumerated men of the radknights; on the demesne land were
541⁄2 teams; and the tenants had 192. Tewkesbury also is a splendid manor.
‘When it was all together in King Edward’s time it was worth £100,’ though
now but £50 at the most can be had from it and in the turmoil of the Conquest
its value fell to £12[468]. It was a scattered unit, but still it was a unit for fiscal
purposes. It was reckoned to contain 95 hides, but the 45 which were in
demesne were quit of geld, and matters had been so arranged that all the geld
on the remaining 50 hides had, as between the lord and his various tenants,
been thrown on 35 of those hides. The ‘head of the manor’ was at Tewkesbury;
the members were dispersed abroad; but ‘they gelded in Tewkesbury[469].’
Page 128
No list of great manors would be complete without a
Taunton.
notice of Taunton[470]. ‘The bishop of Winchester holds
Tantone or has a mansion called Tantone. Stigand held
it in King Edward’s day and it gelded for 54 hides and 21⁄2 virgates. There is
land for 100 teams, and besides this the bishop in his demesne has land for 20
teams which never gelded.’ ‘With all its appendages and customs it is worth
£154. 12d.’ ‘Tantone’ then is valued as a whole and it has gelded as a whole.
But ‘Tantone’ in this sense covers far more than the borough which bears that
name; it covers many places which have names of their own and had names of
their own when the survey was made[471]. We might speak of the bishop of
Exeter’s manor of Crediton in Devon which is worth £75 and in which are 264
villeins and 73 bordiers[472], or of the bishop of Winchester’s manor of
Chilcombe in Hampshire where there are nine churches[473]; but we turn to
another part of England.
If we wish to see a midland manor with many members
Large manors in the
we may look at Rothley in Leicestershire[474]. The vill midlands.
of Rothley itself is not very large and it is separately
valued at but 62s. But ‘to this manor belong the
following members,’ and then we read of no less than twenty-one members
scattered over a large area and containing 204 sokemen who with 157 villeins
and 94 bordiers have 82 teams and who pay in all £31. 8s. 1d. Their rents are
thus reckoned as forming a single whole. In Lincolnshire Earl Edwin’s manor
of Kirton had 25 satellites, Earl Morcar’s manor of Caistor 16, the Queen’s
manor of Horncastle 15[475]. A Northamptonshire manor of 27 hides lay
scattered about in six hundreds[476].
It is common enough to see a town-house annexed to a
Town-houses and
rural manor. Sometimes a considerable group of houses berewicks attached to
or ‘haws’ in the borough is deemed to ‘lie in’ or form manors.
part of a manor remote from its walls. Thus, to give but
two examples, twelve houses in London belong to the Bishop of Durham’s
manor of Waltham in Essex; twenty-eight houses in London to the manor of
Barking[477]. Not only these houses but their occupants are deemed to belong to
the manor; thus 80 burgesses in Dunwich pertain to one of the Ely manors[478].
The berewick (bereuita)[479] also frequently meets our eye. Its name seems to
signify primarily a wick, or village, in which barley is grown; but, like the
barton (bertona) and the grange (grangia) of later days, it seems often to be a
detached portion of a manor which is in part dependent on, and yet in part
Taunton.
notice of Taunton[470]. ‘The bishop of Winchester holds
Tantone or has a mansion called Tantone. Stigand held
it in King Edward’s day and it gelded for 54 hides and 21⁄2 virgates. There is
land for 100 teams, and besides this the bishop in his demesne has land for 20
teams which never gelded.’ ‘With all its appendages and customs it is worth
£154. 12d.’ ‘Tantone’ then is valued as a whole and it has gelded as a whole.
But ‘Tantone’ in this sense covers far more than the borough which bears that
name; it covers many places which have names of their own and had names of
their own when the survey was made[471]. We might speak of the bishop of
Exeter’s manor of Crediton in Devon which is worth £75 and in which are 264
villeins and 73 bordiers[472], or of the bishop of Winchester’s manor of
Chilcombe in Hampshire where there are nine churches[473]; but we turn to
another part of England.
If we wish to see a midland manor with many members
Large manors in the
we may look at Rothley in Leicestershire[474]. The vill midlands.
of Rothley itself is not very large and it is separately
valued at but 62s. But ‘to this manor belong the
following members,’ and then we read of no less than twenty-one members
scattered over a large area and containing 204 sokemen who with 157 villeins
and 94 bordiers have 82 teams and who pay in all £31. 8s. 1d. Their rents are
thus reckoned as forming a single whole. In Lincolnshire Earl Edwin’s manor
of Kirton had 25 satellites, Earl Morcar’s manor of Caistor 16, the Queen’s
manor of Horncastle 15[475]. A Northamptonshire manor of 27 hides lay
scattered about in six hundreds[476].
It is common enough to see a town-house annexed to a
Town-houses and
rural manor. Sometimes a considerable group of houses berewicks attached to
or ‘haws’ in the borough is deemed to ‘lie in’ or form manors.
part of a manor remote from its walls. Thus, to give but
two examples, twelve houses in London belong to the Bishop of Durham’s
manor of Waltham in Essex; twenty-eight houses in London to the manor of
Barking[477]. Not only these houses but their occupants are deemed to belong to
the manor; thus 80 burgesses in Dunwich pertain to one of the Ely manors[478].
The berewick (bereuita)[479] also frequently meets our eye. Its name seems to
signify primarily a wick, or village, in which barley is grown; but, like the
barton (bertona) and the grange (grangia) of later days, it seems often to be a
detached portion of a manor which is in part dependent on, and yet in part
Page 129
independent of, the main body. Probably at the berewick the lord has some
demesne land and some farm buildings, a barn or the like, and the villeins of
the berewick are but seldom called upon to leave its limits; but the lord has no
hall there, he does not consume its produce upon the spot, and yet for some
important purposes the berewick is a part of the manor. The berewick might
well be some way off from the hall; a manor in Hampshire had three berewicks
on the mainland and two in the Isle of Wight[480].
Then again in the north and east the manor is often the
Manor and soke.
centre of an extensive but very discrete territory known
as its soke. One says that certain lands are ‘soke’ or are
‘the soke,’ or are ‘in the soke’ of such a manor, or that ‘their soke belongs’ to
such a manor. One contrasts the soke of the manor with the ‘inland’ and with
the berewicks[481]. The soke in this context seems to be the territory in which
the lord’s rights are, or have been, of a justiciary rather than of a proprietary
kind[482]. The manor of the eastern counties is a discrete, a dissipated thing. Far
from lying within a ring fence, it often consists of a small nucleus of demesne
land and villein tenements in one village, together with many detached parcels
in many other villages, which are held by ‘free men’ and sokemen. In such a
case we may use the term manerium now in a wider, now in a narrower sense.
In valuing the manor, we hardly know whether to include or exclude these free
men. We say that the manor ‘with the free men’ is worth so much[483], or that
the manor ‘without the free men’ is worth so much[484], that the manor is worth
£10 and that the free men pay 40 shillings[485], that Thurmot had soke over the
manor and over three of the free men while the Abbot of Ely had soke over the
other three[486].
From one extreme we may pass to the other extreme. If
Minute manors.
there were huge manors, there were also tiny manors.
Let us begin in the south-west of England. Quite
common is the manor which is said to have land for but one team; common
also is the manor which is said to have land for but half a team. This means, as
we believe, that the first of these manors has but some 120 acres of arable,
while the second has but 60 acres or thereabouts. ‘Domesday measures’ are, it
is well known, the matter of many disputes; therefore we will not wholly rely
upon them, but will look at some of these ‘half-team’ manors and observe how
much they are worth, how many tenants and how much stock they have upon
them.
demesne land and some farm buildings, a barn or the like, and the villeins of
the berewick are but seldom called upon to leave its limits; but the lord has no
hall there, he does not consume its produce upon the spot, and yet for some
important purposes the berewick is a part of the manor. The berewick might
well be some way off from the hall; a manor in Hampshire had three berewicks
on the mainland and two in the Isle of Wight[480].
Then again in the north and east the manor is often the
Manor and soke.
centre of an extensive but very discrete territory known
as its soke. One says that certain lands are ‘soke’ or are
‘the soke,’ or are ‘in the soke’ of such a manor, or that ‘their soke belongs’ to
such a manor. One contrasts the soke of the manor with the ‘inland’ and with
the berewicks[481]. The soke in this context seems to be the territory in which
the lord’s rights are, or have been, of a justiciary rather than of a proprietary
kind[482]. The manor of the eastern counties is a discrete, a dissipated thing. Far
from lying within a ring fence, it often consists of a small nucleus of demesne
land and villein tenements in one village, together with many detached parcels
in many other villages, which are held by ‘free men’ and sokemen. In such a
case we may use the term manerium now in a wider, now in a narrower sense.
In valuing the manor, we hardly know whether to include or exclude these free
men. We say that the manor ‘with the free men’ is worth so much[483], or that
the manor ‘without the free men’ is worth so much[484], that the manor is worth
£10 and that the free men pay 40 shillings[485], that Thurmot had soke over the
manor and over three of the free men while the Abbot of Ely had soke over the
other three[486].
From one extreme we may pass to the other extreme. If
Minute manors.
there were huge manors, there were also tiny manors.
Let us begin in the south-west of England. Quite
common is the manor which is said to have land for but one team; common
also is the manor which is said to have land for but half a team. This means, as
we believe, that the first of these manors has but some 120 acres of arable,
while the second has but 60 acres or thereabouts. ‘Domesday measures’ are, it
is well known, the matter of many disputes; therefore we will not wholly rely
upon them, but will look at some of these ‘half-team’ manors and observe how
much they are worth, how many tenants and how much stock they have upon
them.
Page 130
(i) A Somersetshire manor[487]. Half the land is in demesne; half is held by
7 bordiers. The only plough beasts are 4 oxen on the demesne; there are 3
beasts that do not plough, 20 sheep, 7 acres of underwood, 20 acres of
pasture. It is worth 12s., formerly it was worth 10s.
(ii) A Somersetshire manor[488]. A quarter of the land is in demesne; the
rest is held by 2 villeins and 3 bordiers. The men have one team;
apparently the demesne has no plough-oxen. No other animals are
mentioned. There are 140 acres of wood, 41 acres of moor, 40 acres of
pasture. It is worth 12s. 6d. and has been worth 20s.
(iii) A Somersetshire manor[489]. All the land, save 10 acres, is in demesne;
2 bordiers hold the 10 acres. There is a team on the demesne; there are 2
beasts that do not plough, 7 pigs, 16 sheep, 4 acres of meadow, 7 of
pasture. Value, 6s.
(iv) A Somersetshire manor[490]. The whole of the arable is in demesne;
the only tenant is a bordier. There are 4 plough-oxen and 11 goats and 7
acres of underwood. Value, 6s.
(v) A Devonshire manor[491]. To all seeming all is in demesne and there
are no tenants. There are 4 plough-beasts, 15 sheep, 5 goats, 4 acres of
meadow. Value, 3s.
(vi) A Devonshire manor[492]. Value, 3s. All seems to be in demesne; we
see no tenants and no stock.
We have been at no great pains to select examples, and yet smaller manors may
be found, manors which provide arable land for but two oxen. Thus
(vii) A Somersetshire manor[493] occupied by one villein. We read nothing of any stock. Value, 15d.
(viii) A Somersetshire manor[494] with 3 bordiers on it. Value, 4s.
(ix) A Somersetshire manor[495] with one bordier on it. Value, 30d.
The lowest value of a manor in this part of the world is, so far as we have
observed, one shilling; that manor to all appearance was nothing but a piece of
pasture land[496]. Yet each of these holdings is a mansio, and the Bishop of
Winchester’s holding at Taunton is a mansio.
From one side of England we will journey to the other
Small manors in the east.
side; from Devon and Somerset to Essex and Suffolk.
We soon observe that in describing the holdings of the
7 bordiers. The only plough beasts are 4 oxen on the demesne; there are 3
beasts that do not plough, 20 sheep, 7 acres of underwood, 20 acres of
pasture. It is worth 12s., formerly it was worth 10s.
(ii) A Somersetshire manor[488]. A quarter of the land is in demesne; the
rest is held by 2 villeins and 3 bordiers. The men have one team;
apparently the demesne has no plough-oxen. No other animals are
mentioned. There are 140 acres of wood, 41 acres of moor, 40 acres of
pasture. It is worth 12s. 6d. and has been worth 20s.
(iii) A Somersetshire manor[489]. All the land, save 10 acres, is in demesne;
2 bordiers hold the 10 acres. There is a team on the demesne; there are 2
beasts that do not plough, 7 pigs, 16 sheep, 4 acres of meadow, 7 of
pasture. Value, 6s.
(iv) A Somersetshire manor[490]. The whole of the arable is in demesne;
the only tenant is a bordier. There are 4 plough-oxen and 11 goats and 7
acres of underwood. Value, 6s.
(v) A Devonshire manor[491]. To all seeming all is in demesne and there
are no tenants. There are 4 plough-beasts, 15 sheep, 5 goats, 4 acres of
meadow. Value, 3s.
(vi) A Devonshire manor[492]. Value, 3s. All seems to be in demesne; we
see no tenants and no stock.
We have been at no great pains to select examples, and yet smaller manors may
be found, manors which provide arable land for but two oxen. Thus
(vii) A Somersetshire manor[493] occupied by one villein. We read nothing of any stock. Value, 15d.
(viii) A Somersetshire manor[494] with 3 bordiers on it. Value, 4s.
(ix) A Somersetshire manor[495] with one bordier on it. Value, 30d.
The lowest value of a manor in this part of the world is, so far as we have
observed, one shilling; that manor to all appearance was nothing but a piece of
pasture land[496]. Yet each of these holdings is a mansio, and the Bishop of
Winchester’s holding at Taunton is a mansio.
From one side of England we will journey to the other
Small manors in the east.
side; from Devon and Somerset to Essex and Suffolk.
We soon observe that in describing the holdings of the
Page 131
‘free men’ and sokemen of this eastern district as they were in King Edward’s
day, our record constantly introduces the term manerium. A series of entries
telling us how ‘a free man held x hides or carucates or acres’ will ever and anon
be broken by an entry that tells us how ‘a free man held x hides or carucates or
acres for a manor’[497]. We soon give up counting the cases in which the manor
is rated at 60 acres. We begin counting the cases in which it is rated at 30 acres
and find them numerous; we see manors rated at 24 acres, at 20, at 15, at 12
acres. But this, it may be said, tells us little, for these manors may be
extravagantly underrated[498]. Let us then look at a few of them.
(i) In Espalle Siric held 30 acres for a manor; there were always 3 bordiers
and one team and 4 acres of meadow; wood for 60 pigs and 13 beasts. It
was then worth 10s.[499]
(ii) In Torentuna Turchetel a free man held 30 acres for a manor; there
were always 2 bordiers and one team and a half. It is worth 10s.[500]
(iii) In Bonghea Godric a free man held 30 acres for a manor; there were 1
bordier and 1 team and 2 acres of meadow. It was then worth 8s.[501]
(iv) Three free men and their mother held 30 acres for a manor. There was
half a team. Value, 5s.[502]
(v) In Rincham a free man held 30 acres for a manor. There were half a
team and one acre of meadow. Value, 5s.[503]
(vi) In Wenham Ælfgar a free man held 24 acres for a manor. Value, 4s.
[504]
(vii) In Torp a free man held 20 acres for a manor. One team; wood for 5
pigs. Value, 40d.[505]
(viii) In Tudenham Ælfric the deacon, a free man, held 12 acres for a
manor. One team, 3 bordiers, 2 acres of meadow, 1 rouncey, 2 beasts that
do not plough, 11 pigs, 40 sheep. Value, 3s.[506]
We are not speaking of curiosities; the sixty acre manor was very common in
Essex, the thirty acre manor was no rarity in Suffolk.
Now it is plain enough that the ‘lord’ of such a manor,
The manor as a peasant’s
—or rather the holder of such a manor, for there was holding.
little lordship in the case,—was often enough a peasant,
day, our record constantly introduces the term manerium. A series of entries
telling us how ‘a free man held x hides or carucates or acres’ will ever and anon
be broken by an entry that tells us how ‘a free man held x hides or carucates or
acres for a manor’[497]. We soon give up counting the cases in which the manor
is rated at 60 acres. We begin counting the cases in which it is rated at 30 acres
and find them numerous; we see manors rated at 24 acres, at 20, at 15, at 12
acres. But this, it may be said, tells us little, for these manors may be
extravagantly underrated[498]. Let us then look at a few of them.
(i) In Espalle Siric held 30 acres for a manor; there were always 3 bordiers
and one team and 4 acres of meadow; wood for 60 pigs and 13 beasts. It
was then worth 10s.[499]
(ii) In Torentuna Turchetel a free man held 30 acres for a manor; there
were always 2 bordiers and one team and a half. It is worth 10s.[500]
(iii) In Bonghea Godric a free man held 30 acres for a manor; there were 1
bordier and 1 team and 2 acres of meadow. It was then worth 8s.[501]
(iv) Three free men and their mother held 30 acres for a manor. There was
half a team. Value, 5s.[502]
(v) In Rincham a free man held 30 acres for a manor. There were half a
team and one acre of meadow. Value, 5s.[503]
(vi) In Wenham Ælfgar a free man held 24 acres for a manor. Value, 4s.
[504]
(vii) In Torp a free man held 20 acres for a manor. One team; wood for 5
pigs. Value, 40d.[505]
(viii) In Tudenham Ælfric the deacon, a free man, held 12 acres for a
manor. One team, 3 bordiers, 2 acres of meadow, 1 rouncey, 2 beasts that
do not plough, 11 pigs, 40 sheep. Value, 3s.[506]
We are not speaking of curiosities; the sixty acre manor was very common in
Essex, the thirty acre manor was no rarity in Suffolk.
Now it is plain enough that the ‘lord’ of such a manor,
The manor as a peasant’s
—or rather the holder of such a manor, for there was holding.
little lordship in the case,—was often enough a peasant,
Page 132
a tiller of the soil. He was under soke and under commendation; commended it
may be to one lord, rendering soke to another. Sometimes he is called a
sokeman[507]. But he has a manor. Sometimes he has a full team, sometimes but
half a team. Sometimes he has a couple of bordiers seated on his land, who
help him in his husbandry. Sometimes there is no trace of tenants, and his
holding is by no means too large to permit of his cultivating it by his own
labour and that of his sons. No doubt in the west country even before the
Conquest these petty mansiones or maneria were being accumulated in the
hands of the wealthy. The thegn who was the antecessor of the Norman baron,
sometimes held a group, a geographically discontinuous group, of petty manors
as well as some more substantial and better consolidated estates. But still each
little holding is reckoned a manor, while in the east of England there is nothing
to show that the nameless free men who held the manors which are said to
consist of 60, 40, 30 acres had usually more than one manor apiece. When
therefore we are told that already before the Conquest England was full of
manors, we must reply: Yes, but of what manors[508]
Now were the differences between various manors a
Definition of a manor.
mere difference in size and in value, a student of law
might pass them by. Our notion of ownership is the
same whether it be applied to the largest and most precious, or to the smallest
and most worthless of things. But in this case we have not to deal with mere
differences in size or value. The examples that we have given will have proved
that few, if any, propositions of legal import will hold good of all maneria. We
must expressly reject some suggestions that the later history of our law may
make to us. ‘A manor has a court of its own’:—this is plainly untrue. To say
nothing of extreme cases, of the smallest of the manors that we have noticed,
we can not easily believe that a manor with less than ten tenants has a court of
its own, yet the number of such manors is exceedingly large. ‘A manor has
freehold tenants’:—this of course we must deny, unless we hold that the villani
are freeholders. ‘A manor has villein or customary tenants’:—even this
proposition, though true of many cases, we can not accept. Not only may we
find a manor the only tenants upon which are liberi homines[509], but we are
compelled to protest that a manor need not have any tenants at all. ‘A manor
must contain demesne land’:—this again we can not believe. In one case we
read that the whole manor is being farmed by the villeins so that there is
nothing in demesne[510], while in other cases we are told that there is nothing in
demesne and see no trace of any recent change[511]. Thus, one after another, all
the familiar propositions seem to fail us, and yet we have seen good reason to
may be to one lord, rendering soke to another. Sometimes he is called a
sokeman[507]. But he has a manor. Sometimes he has a full team, sometimes but
half a team. Sometimes he has a couple of bordiers seated on his land, who
help him in his husbandry. Sometimes there is no trace of tenants, and his
holding is by no means too large to permit of his cultivating it by his own
labour and that of his sons. No doubt in the west country even before the
Conquest these petty mansiones or maneria were being accumulated in the
hands of the wealthy. The thegn who was the antecessor of the Norman baron,
sometimes held a group, a geographically discontinuous group, of petty manors
as well as some more substantial and better consolidated estates. But still each
little holding is reckoned a manor, while in the east of England there is nothing
to show that the nameless free men who held the manors which are said to
consist of 60, 40, 30 acres had usually more than one manor apiece. When
therefore we are told that already before the Conquest England was full of
manors, we must reply: Yes, but of what manors[508]
Now were the differences between various manors a
Definition of a manor.
mere difference in size and in value, a student of law
might pass them by. Our notion of ownership is the
same whether it be applied to the largest and most precious, or to the smallest
and most worthless of things. But in this case we have not to deal with mere
differences in size or value. The examples that we have given will have proved
that few, if any, propositions of legal import will hold good of all maneria. We
must expressly reject some suggestions that the later history of our law may
make to us. ‘A manor has a court of its own’:—this is plainly untrue. To say
nothing of extreme cases, of the smallest of the manors that we have noticed,
we can not easily believe that a manor with less than ten tenants has a court of
its own, yet the number of such manors is exceedingly large. ‘A manor has
freehold tenants’:—this of course we must deny, unless we hold that the villani
are freeholders. ‘A manor has villein or customary tenants’:—even this
proposition, though true of many cases, we can not accept. Not only may we
find a manor the only tenants upon which are liberi homines[509], but we are
compelled to protest that a manor need not have any tenants at all. ‘A manor
must contain demesne land’:—this again we can not believe. In one case we
read that the whole manor is being farmed by the villeins so that there is
nothing in demesne[510], while in other cases we are told that there is nothing in
demesne and see no trace of any recent change[511]. Thus, one after another, all
the familiar propositions seem to fail us, and yet we have seen good reason to
Page 133
believe that manerium has some exact meaning. It remains that we should
hazard an explanation.
A manor is a house against which geld is charged. To
The manor and the geld.
the opinion that in some way or another the definition
of a manor is intimately connected with the great tax
we shall be brought by phrases such as the following: ‘Richard holds Fivehide
of the Earl which Brihtmær held in King Edward’s time for forty acres and for
a manor[512].’—‘Two free men who were brothers, Bondi and Ælfric held it for
two hides and for two manors[513].’ When we say that a man holds land ‘as’ or
‘for’ (pro) forty acres, we mean that his holding, be its real size what it may, is
rated to the geld at forty acres. If we add the words ‘and as (or for) one manor,’
surely we are still speaking of the geld. For one moment the thought may cross
our minds that, besides a tax on land, there has been an additional tax on
‘halls,’ on houses of a certain size or value; but this we soon dismiss as most
unlikely. To raise but one out of many objections: had there been such a house-
tax, it would have left plain traces of itself in those ‘Geld Inquests’ of the
south-western counties that have come down to us. Rather we regard the matter
thus:—The geld is a land-tax, a tax of so much per hide or carucate. In all
likelihood it has been assessed according to a method which we might call the
method of subpartitioned provincial quotas. The assumption has been made
that a shire or other large district contains a certain number of hides; this
number has then been apportioned among the hundreds of that shire, and the
number allotted to each hundred has been apportioned among the vills of that
hundred. The common result is that some neat number of hides, five, ten or the
like is attributed to the vill[514]. This again has been divided between the
holdings in that vill. Ultimately it is settled that for fiscal purposes a given
holding contains, or must be deemed to contain, this or that number of hides,
virgates, or acres. Thus far the system makes no use of the manerium. But it
now has to discover some house against which a demand may be made for
every particular penny of geld. Despite the ‘realism’ of the system, it has to
face the fact that, after all, taxes must be paid by men and not by land. Men live
in houses. It seeks the tax-payer in his house. Now, were all the occupiers of
land absolute owners of the land that they occupied, even were it true that
every acre had some one person as its absolute owner, the task would be
simple. A schedule of five columns, such we are familiar with, would set forth
‘Owner’s Name,’ ‘Place of Residence,’ ‘Description of Geldable Property,’
‘Hidage,’ ‘Amount due.’ But the occupier is not always the owner; what is
more, there is no absolute ownership. Two, three, four persons will be
hazard an explanation.
A manor is a house against which geld is charged. To
The manor and the geld.
the opinion that in some way or another the definition
of a manor is intimately connected with the great tax
we shall be brought by phrases such as the following: ‘Richard holds Fivehide
of the Earl which Brihtmær held in King Edward’s time for forty acres and for
a manor[512].’—‘Two free men who were brothers, Bondi and Ælfric held it for
two hides and for two manors[513].’ When we say that a man holds land ‘as’ or
‘for’ (pro) forty acres, we mean that his holding, be its real size what it may, is
rated to the geld at forty acres. If we add the words ‘and as (or for) one manor,’
surely we are still speaking of the geld. For one moment the thought may cross
our minds that, besides a tax on land, there has been an additional tax on
‘halls,’ on houses of a certain size or value; but this we soon dismiss as most
unlikely. To raise but one out of many objections: had there been such a house-
tax, it would have left plain traces of itself in those ‘Geld Inquests’ of the
south-western counties that have come down to us. Rather we regard the matter
thus:—The geld is a land-tax, a tax of so much per hide or carucate. In all
likelihood it has been assessed according to a method which we might call the
method of subpartitioned provincial quotas. The assumption has been made
that a shire or other large district contains a certain number of hides; this
number has then been apportioned among the hundreds of that shire, and the
number allotted to each hundred has been apportioned among the vills of that
hundred. The common result is that some neat number of hides, five, ten or the
like is attributed to the vill[514]. This again has been divided between the
holdings in that vill. Ultimately it is settled that for fiscal purposes a given
holding contains, or must be deemed to contain, this or that number of hides,
virgates, or acres. Thus far the system makes no use of the manerium. But it
now has to discover some house against which a demand may be made for
every particular penny of geld. Despite the ‘realism’ of the system, it has to
face the fact that, after all, taxes must be paid by men and not by land. Men live
in houses. It seeks the tax-payer in his house. Now, were all the occupiers of
land absolute owners of the land that they occupied, even were it true that
every acre had some one person as its absolute owner, the task would be
simple. A schedule of five columns, such we are familiar with, would set forth
‘Owner’s Name,’ ‘Place of Residence,’ ‘Description of Geldable Property,’
‘Hidage,’ ‘Amount due.’ But the occupier is not always the owner; what is
more, there is no absolute ownership. Two, three, four persons will be
Page 134
interested in the land; the occupier will have a lord and that lord a lord; the
occupier may be a serf, a villein, a sokeman; there is commendation to be
considered and soke and all the infinite varieties of the power to ‘withdraw’ the
land from the lord. Rude and hard and arbitrary lines must be drawn. Of course
the state will endeavour to collect the geld in big sums. It will endeavour to
make the great folk answer for the geld which lies on any land that is in any
way subject to their power; thus the cost of collecting petty sums will be saved
and the tax will be charged on men who are solvent. The central power may
even hold out certain advantages to the lord who will become responsible for
the geld of his tenants or justiciables or commended men. The hints that we get
in divers counties that the lord’s ‘inland’ has borne no geld seem to point in this
direction, though the arrangements about this matter seem to have varied from
shire to shire[515]. On the pipe rolls of a later day we see that the geld charged
against the magnates is often ‘pardoned.’ For one reason the king can not easily
tax the rich; for another he can not easily tax the poor; so he gets at the poor
through the rich. The small folk will gladly accept any scheme that will keep
the tax-collector from their doors, even though they purchase their relief by
onerous promises of rents and services. The great men, again, may find
advantage in such bargains; they want periodical rents and services, and in
order to obtain them will accept a certain responsibility for occasional taxes.
This process had gone very far on the eve of the Conquest. Moreover the great
men had enjoyed a large liberty of paying their geld where they pleased, of
making special compositions with the king, of turning some wide and discrete
territory into a single geld-paying unit, of forming such ‘manors’ as Taunton or
Berkeley or Leominster.
In King Edward’s day, the occupiers of the soil might,
Classification of men for
so it seems to us, be divided by the financier into three the geld.
main classes. In the first class we place the man who
has a manor. He has, that is, a house at which he is
charged with geld. He may be a great man or a small, an earl or a peasant; he
may be charged at that house with the geld of a hundred hides or with the geld
of fifteen acres. In the second class we place the villeins, bordiers, cottiers. The
geld apportioned to the land that they occupy is demanded from their lord at his
manor, or one of his manors. How he recoups himself for having to make this
payment, that is his concern; but he is responsible for it to the king, not as
guarantor but as principal debtor. But then, at least in the east and north, there
are many men who fall into neither of these classes. They are not villeins, they
are sokemen or ‘free men’; but their own tenements are not manors; they
occupier may be a serf, a villein, a sokeman; there is commendation to be
considered and soke and all the infinite varieties of the power to ‘withdraw’ the
land from the lord. Rude and hard and arbitrary lines must be drawn. Of course
the state will endeavour to collect the geld in big sums. It will endeavour to
make the great folk answer for the geld which lies on any land that is in any
way subject to their power; thus the cost of collecting petty sums will be saved
and the tax will be charged on men who are solvent. The central power may
even hold out certain advantages to the lord who will become responsible for
the geld of his tenants or justiciables or commended men. The hints that we get
in divers counties that the lord’s ‘inland’ has borne no geld seem to point in this
direction, though the arrangements about this matter seem to have varied from
shire to shire[515]. On the pipe rolls of a later day we see that the geld charged
against the magnates is often ‘pardoned.’ For one reason the king can not easily
tax the rich; for another he can not easily tax the poor; so he gets at the poor
through the rich. The small folk will gladly accept any scheme that will keep
the tax-collector from their doors, even though they purchase their relief by
onerous promises of rents and services. The great men, again, may find
advantage in such bargains; they want periodical rents and services, and in
order to obtain them will accept a certain responsibility for occasional taxes.
This process had gone very far on the eve of the Conquest. Moreover the great
men had enjoyed a large liberty of paying their geld where they pleased, of
making special compositions with the king, of turning some wide and discrete
territory into a single geld-paying unit, of forming such ‘manors’ as Taunton or
Berkeley or Leominster.
In King Edward’s day, the occupiers of the soil might,
Classification of men for
so it seems to us, be divided by the financier into three the geld.
main classes. In the first class we place the man who
has a manor. He has, that is, a house at which he is
charged with geld. He may be a great man or a small, an earl or a peasant; he
may be charged at that house with the geld of a hundred hides or with the geld
of fifteen acres. In the second class we place the villeins, bordiers, cottiers. The
geld apportioned to the land that they occupy is demanded from their lord at his
manor, or one of his manors. How he recoups himself for having to make this
payment, that is his concern; but he is responsible for it to the king, not as
guarantor but as principal debtor. But then, at least in the east and north, there
are many men who fall into neither of these classes. They are not villeins, they
are sokemen or ‘free men’; but their own tenements are not manors; they
Page 135
belong to or ‘lie in’ some manor of their lord. These men, we think, can be
personally charged with the geld; but they pay their geld at their lord’s hall and
he is in some measure bound to exact the payment.
Any thing that could be called a strict proof of this
Proofs of connexion
theory we can not offer; but it has been suggested by between the manor and
many facts and phrases which we can not otherwise the geld.
explain. In the first place, our record seems to assume
that every holding either is a manor or forms part of a manor[516]. Then we are
told how lands ‘geld’ at or in some manor or at the caput manerii. Thus lands
which lie many miles away from Tewkesbury, but which belong to the manor
of Tewkesbury, ‘geld in Tewkesbury[517].’ Sometimes the same information is
conveyed to us by a phrase that deserves notice. A piece of land is said to
‘defend itself’ in or at some manor, or, which is the same thing, to have its
wara or render its wara, that is to say, its defence, its answer to the demand for
geld, there[518]. ‘In Middleton two sokemen had 16 acres of land and they
rendered their wara in the said Middleton, but they could give and sell their
land to whom they pleased[519].’ When we are told that certain lands are in
warnode Drogonis or in warnode Archiepiscopi, it is meant that the lands
belong to Drogo or the Archbishop for the purpose of ‘defence’ against the
geld[520]. It is not sufficient that land should be taxed, it must be taxed ‘in’
some place, which may be remote from that in which, as a matter of physical
fact, it lies[521]. One clear case of a free tenant paying his geld to his lord is put
before us:—‘Leofwin had half a hide and could withdraw with his land and he
paid geld to his lord and his lord paid nothing[522].’ Besides this we have cases
in which the lord enjoys the special privilege of collecting the geld from his
tenants and keeping it for his own use[523]. A remarkable Kentish entry tells us
that at Peckham the archbishop had an estate which had been rated at six
sullungs, and then that ‘of the land of this manor a certain man of the
archbishop held a half-sullung which in King Edward’s day gelded with these
six sullungs, although being free land it did not belong to the manor save for
the purpose of the scot[524].’ Here we have land so free that the one connexion
between it and the manor to which it is attributed consists in the payment of
geld—it gelds along with the other lands of the manor. In the great lawsuit
between the churches of Worcester and Evesham about the lands at Hamton,
the former contended that these lands should pay their geld along with the other
estates of the bishop[525].
personally charged with the geld; but they pay their geld at their lord’s hall and
he is in some measure bound to exact the payment.
Any thing that could be called a strict proof of this
Proofs of connexion
theory we can not offer; but it has been suggested by between the manor and
many facts and phrases which we can not otherwise the geld.
explain. In the first place, our record seems to assume
that every holding either is a manor or forms part of a manor[516]. Then we are
told how lands ‘geld’ at or in some manor or at the caput manerii. Thus lands
which lie many miles away from Tewkesbury, but which belong to the manor
of Tewkesbury, ‘geld in Tewkesbury[517].’ Sometimes the same information is
conveyed to us by a phrase that deserves notice. A piece of land is said to
‘defend itself’ in or at some manor, or, which is the same thing, to have its
wara or render its wara, that is to say, its defence, its answer to the demand for
geld, there[518]. ‘In Middleton two sokemen had 16 acres of land and they
rendered their wara in the said Middleton, but they could give and sell their
land to whom they pleased[519].’ When we are told that certain lands are in
warnode Drogonis or in warnode Archiepiscopi, it is meant that the lands
belong to Drogo or the Archbishop for the purpose of ‘defence’ against the
geld[520]. It is not sufficient that land should be taxed, it must be taxed ‘in’
some place, which may be remote from that in which, as a matter of physical
fact, it lies[521]. One clear case of a free tenant paying his geld to his lord is put
before us:—‘Leofwin had half a hide and could withdraw with his land and he
paid geld to his lord and his lord paid nothing[522].’ Besides this we have cases
in which the lord enjoys the special privilege of collecting the geld from his
tenants and keeping it for his own use[523]. A remarkable Kentish entry tells us
that at Peckham the archbishop had an estate which had been rated at six
sullungs, and then that ‘of the land of this manor a certain man of the
archbishop held a half-sullung which in King Edward’s day gelded with these
six sullungs, although being free land it did not belong to the manor save for
the purpose of the scot[524].’ Here we have land so free that the one connexion
between it and the manor to which it is attributed consists in the payment of
geld—it gelds along with the other lands of the manor. In the great lawsuit
between the churches of Worcester and Evesham about the lands at Hamton,
the former contended that these lands should pay their geld along with the other
estates of the bishop[525].
Page 136
Let us observe the first question that the commissioners
Land gelds in a manor.
are to ask of the jurors. What is the name of the
mansio? Every piece of geldable land is connected with
some mansio, at which it gelds. Let us observe how the commissioners and the
jurors proceed in a district where the villae and the mansiones or maneria are
but rarely coincident. The jurors of the Armingford hundred of Cambridgeshire
are speaking of their country vill by vill. They come to the vill of Abington[526].
Abington, they say, was rated at five hides. Of these five hides the king has a
half-hide; this lies in Litlington. Earl Roger has one virgate; this lies in his
manor of Shingay. Picot the sheriff has a half-virgate; this lies and has always
lain in Morden. In what sense important to the commissioners or their master
can a bundle of strips scattered about in the fields of Abington be said to lie in
Litlington, in Shingay, or in Morden? We answer that it gelds there.
Hence the importance of the hall. It is the place where
Geld and hall.
geld is demanded and paid. A manor without a hall is a
thing to be carefully noted, otherwise some geld may
be lost[527]. A man’s land has descended to his three sons: if ‘there is only one
hall,’ but one demand for geld need be made; if ‘each has his hall,’ there must
be three separate demands. When we are told that two brothers held land and
that each had his house (domus) though they dwelt in one court (curia), a nice
problem is being put before us:—Two halls, or one hall—Two manors or one
manor[528].
The petty maneria of Suffolk, what can they be but
The petty manors.
holdings which geld by themselves? The holders of
them are not great men, they have no tenants or just
two or three bordiers; sometimes they can not ‘withdraw’ their lands from their
lords. But still they pay their own taxes at their own houses.
In supposing that forces have been at work which tend
The lord and his man’s
to make the lord responsible for the taxes of his men, taxes.
we are not without a warrant in the ancient dooms. ‘If a
king’s thegn or a lord of land (landrica) neglects to pay
the Rome penny, let him forfeit ten half-marks, half to Christ, half to the king.
If a “townsman” withholds the penny, let the lord of the land pay the penny and
take an ox from the man, and if the lord neglects to do this, then let Christ and
the king receive the full bót of 12 ores[529].’ The right of doing justice is also
the duty of doing justice. It is natural that the lord with soke should become a
tax-gatherer, and he will gladly guarantee the taxes if thereby he can prevent
Land gelds in a manor.
are to ask of the jurors. What is the name of the
mansio? Every piece of geldable land is connected with
some mansio, at which it gelds. Let us observe how the commissioners and the
jurors proceed in a district where the villae and the mansiones or maneria are
but rarely coincident. The jurors of the Armingford hundred of Cambridgeshire
are speaking of their country vill by vill. They come to the vill of Abington[526].
Abington, they say, was rated at five hides. Of these five hides the king has a
half-hide; this lies in Litlington. Earl Roger has one virgate; this lies in his
manor of Shingay. Picot the sheriff has a half-virgate; this lies and has always
lain in Morden. In what sense important to the commissioners or their master
can a bundle of strips scattered about in the fields of Abington be said to lie in
Litlington, in Shingay, or in Morden? We answer that it gelds there.
Hence the importance of the hall. It is the place where
Geld and hall.
geld is demanded and paid. A manor without a hall is a
thing to be carefully noted, otherwise some geld may
be lost[527]. A man’s land has descended to his three sons: if ‘there is only one
hall,’ but one demand for geld need be made; if ‘each has his hall,’ there must
be three separate demands. When we are told that two brothers held land and
that each had his house (domus) though they dwelt in one court (curia), a nice
problem is being put before us:—Two halls, or one hall—Two manors or one
manor[528].
The petty maneria of Suffolk, what can they be but
The petty manors.
holdings which geld by themselves? The holders of
them are not great men, they have no tenants or just
two or three bordiers; sometimes they can not ‘withdraw’ their lands from their
lords. But still they pay their own taxes at their own houses.
In supposing that forces have been at work which tend
The lord and his man’s
to make the lord responsible for the taxes of his men, taxes.
we are not without a warrant in the ancient dooms. ‘If a
king’s thegn or a lord of land (landrica) neglects to pay
the Rome penny, let him forfeit ten half-marks, half to Christ, half to the king.
If a “townsman” withholds the penny, let the lord of the land pay the penny and
take an ox from the man, and if the lord neglects to do this, then let Christ and
the king receive the full bót of 12 ores[529].’ The right of doing justice is also
the duty of doing justice. It is natural that the lord with soke should become a
tax-gatherer, and he will gladly guarantee the taxes if thereby he can prevent
Page 137
the king’s officers from entering his precinct and meddling with his
justiciables. At no time has the state found it easy to collect taxes from the
poor; over and over again it has been glad to avail itself of the landlord’s
intermediation[530].
Our theory that while the lord is directly and primarily
Distinction between
responsible for the geld of his villeins, he is but villeins and sokemen.
subsidiarily responsible for the geld of those of his
sokemen or ‘free men’ who are deemed to belong to his
manor, is founded in part on what we take to have been the wording of King
William’s writ[531], in part on the form taken by the returns made thereto. The
writ draws a marked line between the villein and the sokeman. The king wishes
to know how much land each sokeman, each liber homo, holds; he does not
care that any distinction should be drawn between the lord’s demesne lands and
the lands of the villeins. And, on the whole, his commands are obeyed. A
typical entry in the survey of East Anglia will first describe in one mass the
land held by the lord and his villeins, will tell us how many carucates this land
is rated at, how many teams there are on the demesne, and how many the men
have, then it will enumerate sheep and pigs and goats, and then, as it were in an
appendix, it will add that so many sokemen belong to this manor and that
between them they hold so many carucates or acres[532]. In Suffolk even the
names of these humble tenants are sometimes recorded[533]. And then, we have
seen[534] that there is some doubt as to whether or no these men are or are not
to be reckoned as part of the manor for all purposes. We have to say that the
manor ‘with the free men,’ or ‘without the free men’ is worth so much.
After all, we are only supposing that the fashion in
The lord’s subsidiary
which the danegeld was put in charge resembled in liability.
some of its main outlines the fashion in which a very
similar tax was put in charge under Richard I. In 1194
the land-tax that was levied for the payment of the king’s ransom seems to have
been assessed according to the hidage stated in Domesday Book[535]. Then in
1198 a new assessment was made. We are told that the king ordained that every
baron should with the sheriffs aid distrain his men to pay the tax cast upon
them, and that if, owing to the baron’s default, distresses were not made, then
the amount due from the baron’s men should be seized from the baron’s own
demesne and he should be left to recoup himself as best he could[536]. Now it is
a liability of this sort that we are venturing to carry back into the Confessor’s
day. The lord is responsible to the state as principal, and indeed as sole, debtor
justiciables. At no time has the state found it easy to collect taxes from the
poor; over and over again it has been glad to avail itself of the landlord’s
intermediation[530].
Our theory that while the lord is directly and primarily
Distinction between
responsible for the geld of his villeins, he is but villeins and sokemen.
subsidiarily responsible for the geld of those of his
sokemen or ‘free men’ who are deemed to belong to his
manor, is founded in part on what we take to have been the wording of King
William’s writ[531], in part on the form taken by the returns made thereto. The
writ draws a marked line between the villein and the sokeman. The king wishes
to know how much land each sokeman, each liber homo, holds; he does not
care that any distinction should be drawn between the lord’s demesne lands and
the lands of the villeins. And, on the whole, his commands are obeyed. A
typical entry in the survey of East Anglia will first describe in one mass the
land held by the lord and his villeins, will tell us how many carucates this land
is rated at, how many teams there are on the demesne, and how many the men
have, then it will enumerate sheep and pigs and goats, and then, as it were in an
appendix, it will add that so many sokemen belong to this manor and that
between them they hold so many carucates or acres[532]. In Suffolk even the
names of these humble tenants are sometimes recorded[533]. And then, we have
seen[534] that there is some doubt as to whether or no these men are or are not
to be reckoned as part of the manor for all purposes. We have to say that the
manor ‘with the free men,’ or ‘without the free men’ is worth so much.
After all, we are only supposing that the fashion in
The lord’s subsidiary
which the danegeld was put in charge resembled in liability.
some of its main outlines the fashion in which a very
similar tax was put in charge under Richard I. In 1194
the land-tax that was levied for the payment of the king’s ransom seems to have
been assessed according to the hidage stated in Domesday Book[535]. Then in
1198 a new assessment was made. We are told that the king ordained that every
baron should with the sheriffs aid distrain his men to pay the tax cast upon
them, and that if, owing to the baron’s default, distresses were not made, then
the amount due from the baron’s men should be seized from the baron’s own
demesne and he should be left to recoup himself as best he could[536]. Now it is
a liability of this sort that we are venturing to carry back into the Confessor’s
day. The lord is responsible to the state as principal, and indeed as sole, debtor
Page 138
for so much of the geld as is due from his demesne land and from the land of
his villani, while as regards any lands of ‘free men’ or sokemen which are
attached to his manor, his liability is not primary nor absolute; he is bound to
take measures to make these men pay their taxes; if he fails in this duty, then
their taxes will become due from his demesne[537].
When we read that in Nottinghamshire the relief of the
Manors distributed to the
thegn who had six manors or less was three marks, Frenchmen.
while his who had more than six manors was eight
pounds[538], this may seem to hint that some inferior
limit was set to the size of the manor. If so, it was drawn at a very low point in
the scale of tenements. Possibly some general rule had compelled all men who
held less than a bovate or half-virgate to ‘add’ themselves to the manor of some
lord. But the Nottinghamshire rule is rude and arbitrary. He who has seven
houses against which geld is charged is a big man. On the other hand, it is
probable that the Norman lords brought with them some notion, and not a very
modest notion, of what a reasonably sufficient manerium should be. The king
has in some cases rewarded them by a promise of ten or twenty manors without
specifying very carefully what those manors are to be like. He has promised
Count Eustace a hundred manors[539]. Thus we would explain a not uncommon
class of entries:—‘fourteen free men commended to Wulfsige were delivered to
Rainald to make up (ad perficiendum) this manor of Carlington[540].’—‘in
Berningham a free man held 20 acres of land and this was delivered to Walter
Giffard to make up Letheringsett[541].’—‘Peter claims the land which belonged
to seventeen free men as having been delivered to him to make up this
manor[542].’—‘This land was delivered to Peter to make up some, but his men
do not know what, manor[543].’ The small ‘free men’ of the east have been
‘added to’ manors to which they did not belong in King Edward’s day. A few of
the free men of Suffolk still ‘remain in the king’s hand’ ready to be delivered
out to complete the manors of their conquerors[544]. Here too we may perhaps
find the explanation of the entry which says that Hugh de Port held Wallop ‘for
half a manor[545].’ The king has promised him a dozen or score of manors; and
this estate at Wallop worth but fifteen shillings a year, really no gentleman
would take it for a manor.
Such then is the best explanation that we can offer of
Summary.
the manerium of Domesday Book. About details we
may be wrong, but that this term has a technical
meaning which is connected with the levy of the danegeld we can not doubt. It
his villani, while as regards any lands of ‘free men’ or sokemen which are
attached to his manor, his liability is not primary nor absolute; he is bound to
take measures to make these men pay their taxes; if he fails in this duty, then
their taxes will become due from his demesne[537].
When we read that in Nottinghamshire the relief of the
Manors distributed to the
thegn who had six manors or less was three marks, Frenchmen.
while his who had more than six manors was eight
pounds[538], this may seem to hint that some inferior
limit was set to the size of the manor. If so, it was drawn at a very low point in
the scale of tenements. Possibly some general rule had compelled all men who
held less than a bovate or half-virgate to ‘add’ themselves to the manor of some
lord. But the Nottinghamshire rule is rude and arbitrary. He who has seven
houses against which geld is charged is a big man. On the other hand, it is
probable that the Norman lords brought with them some notion, and not a very
modest notion, of what a reasonably sufficient manerium should be. The king
has in some cases rewarded them by a promise of ten or twenty manors without
specifying very carefully what those manors are to be like. He has promised
Count Eustace a hundred manors[539]. Thus we would explain a not uncommon
class of entries:—‘fourteen free men commended to Wulfsige were delivered to
Rainald to make up (ad perficiendum) this manor of Carlington[540].’—‘in
Berningham a free man held 20 acres of land and this was delivered to Walter
Giffard to make up Letheringsett[541].’—‘Peter claims the land which belonged
to seventeen free men as having been delivered to him to make up this
manor[542].’—‘This land was delivered to Peter to make up some, but his men
do not know what, manor[543].’ The small ‘free men’ of the east have been
‘added to’ manors to which they did not belong in King Edward’s day. A few of
the free men of Suffolk still ‘remain in the king’s hand’ ready to be delivered
out to complete the manors of their conquerors[544]. Here too we may perhaps
find the explanation of the entry which says that Hugh de Port held Wallop ‘for
half a manor[545].’ The king has promised him a dozen or score of manors; and
this estate at Wallop worth but fifteen shillings a year, really no gentleman
would take it for a manor.
Such then is the best explanation that we can offer of
Summary.
the manerium of Domesday Book. About details we
may be wrong, but that this term has a technical
meaning which is connected with the levy of the danegeld we can not doubt. It
Page 139
loses that meaning in course of time because the danegeld gives way before
newer forms of taxation. It never again acquires a technical meaning until the
late days when retrospective lawyers find the essence of a manor in its
court[546].
newer forms of taxation. It never again acquires a technical meaning until the
late days when retrospective lawyers find the essence of a manor in its
court[546].
Page 140
Page 141
§ 7. Manor and Vill.
After what has now been said, it is needless to repeat
Manorial and non-
that in Domesday Book the manerium and the villa are manorial vills.
utterly different things[547]. In a given case the two may
coincide, and throughout a great tract of England such
cases were common and we may even say that they were normal. But in the
east this was not so. We may easily find a village which taken as a whole has
been utterly free from seignorial domination. Orwell in Cambridgeshire will be
a good example[548].
In King Edward’s day this vill of Orwell was rated at 4
The vill of Orwell.
hides: probably it was somewhat underrated for at the
date of the survey it was deemed capable of finding
land for nearly 6 teams. The following table will show who held the four hides
before the Conquest:—
H. V. A.
2
Two sokemen, men of Edith the Fair ⁄3
1
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand 1 ⁄3
A sokeman, man of Robert Wimarc’s
11⁄3
son
2
A sokeman, man of the King ⁄3
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar 11⁄3
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 3
1
A sokeman, man of the King ⁄3
1
Sigar a man of Æsgar the Staller 1 ⁄3
Turbert a man of Edith the Fair 31⁄4 5
Achil a man of Earl Harold 1
A sokeman of the King 1
St. Mary of Chatteris 1
⁄3
St. Mary of Chatteris 1
⁄4
4 0 0[549]
After what has now been said, it is needless to repeat
Manorial and non-
that in Domesday Book the manerium and the villa are manorial vills.
utterly different things[547]. In a given case the two may
coincide, and throughout a great tract of England such
cases were common and we may even say that they were normal. But in the
east this was not so. We may easily find a village which taken as a whole has
been utterly free from seignorial domination. Orwell in Cambridgeshire will be
a good example[548].
In King Edward’s day this vill of Orwell was rated at 4
The vill of Orwell.
hides: probably it was somewhat underrated for at the
date of the survey it was deemed capable of finding
land for nearly 6 teams. The following table will show who held the four hides
before the Conquest:—
H. V. A.
2
Two sokemen, men of Edith the Fair ⁄3
1
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand 1 ⁄3
A sokeman, man of Robert Wimarc’s
11⁄3
son
2
A sokeman, man of the King ⁄3
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar 11⁄3
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 3
1
A sokeman, man of the King ⁄3
1
Sigar a man of Æsgar the Staller 1 ⁄3
Turbert a man of Edith the Fair 31⁄4 5
Achil a man of Earl Harold 1
A sokeman of the King 1
St. Mary of Chatteris 1
⁄3
St. Mary of Chatteris 1
⁄4
4 0 0[549]
Page 142
It will be seen that eight of the most exalted persons in the land, the king, the
archbishop, three earls, two royal marshals or stallers, and that mysterious lady
known as Edith the Fair, to say nothing of the church of Chatteris, had a certain
interest in this little Cambridgeshire village. But then how slight an interest it
was! Every one of the tenants was free to ‘withdraw himself,’ ‘to give or sell
his land.’ Now we can not say that all of them were peasants. Achil the man of
Harold seems to have had other lands in the neighbouring villages of Harlton
and Barrington[550]. It is probable that Turbert, Edith’s man, had another virgate
at Kingston[551]: he was one of the jurors of the hundred in which Orwell
lay[552]. Sigar the man of Æsgar was another juror, and held land at Thriplow,
Foxton, Haslingfield and Shepreth; he seems to have been his lord’s
steward[553]. But we may be fairly certain that the unnamed sokemen tilled
their own soil, though perhaps they had help from a few cottagers. And they
can not have been constantly employed in cultivating the demesne lands of
their lords. They must go some distance to find any such demesne lands. The
Wetherley hundred, in which Orwell lies, is full of the sokemen of these great
folk: Waltheof, for example, has 3 men in Comberton, 4 in Barton, 3 in
Grantchester, 1 in Wratworth: but he has no demesne land, and if he had it, he
could not get it tilled by these scattered tenants. The Fair Edith has half a hide
in Haslingfield and we are told that this belongs to the manor of Swavesey.
Now at Swavesey Edith has a considerable manor[554], but it can not have got
much in the way of labour out of a tenant who lived at Haslingfield, for the two
villages are a long ten miles apart. As to the king’s sokemen, their only
recorded services are the avera and the inward. The former seems to be a
carrying service done at the sheriff’s bidding and to be only exigible when the
king comes into the shire, while inward seems to be the duty of forming a body
guard for the king while he is in the shire:—if in any year the king did not
come, a small sum of money was taken instead[555].
Lest it should be thought that in picking out the village
A Cambridgeshire
of Orwell we have studiously sought a rare case, we hundred.
will here set out in a tabular form what we can learn of
the state of the hundred in which Orwell lies. The
Wetherley hundred contained twelve vills: it was a land of true villages which
until very lately had wide open fields[556]. In the Confessor’s day the lands in it
were allotted thus:—
Cambridgeshire. Wetherley Hundred[557].
I. Comberton. A vill of 6 hides.
archbishop, three earls, two royal marshals or stallers, and that mysterious lady
known as Edith the Fair, to say nothing of the church of Chatteris, had a certain
interest in this little Cambridgeshire village. But then how slight an interest it
was! Every one of the tenants was free to ‘withdraw himself,’ ‘to give or sell
his land.’ Now we can not say that all of them were peasants. Achil the man of
Harold seems to have had other lands in the neighbouring villages of Harlton
and Barrington[550]. It is probable that Turbert, Edith’s man, had another virgate
at Kingston[551]: he was one of the jurors of the hundred in which Orwell
lay[552]. Sigar the man of Æsgar was another juror, and held land at Thriplow,
Foxton, Haslingfield and Shepreth; he seems to have been his lord’s
steward[553]. But we may be fairly certain that the unnamed sokemen tilled
their own soil, though perhaps they had help from a few cottagers. And they
can not have been constantly employed in cultivating the demesne lands of
their lords. They must go some distance to find any such demesne lands. The
Wetherley hundred, in which Orwell lies, is full of the sokemen of these great
folk: Waltheof, for example, has 3 men in Comberton, 4 in Barton, 3 in
Grantchester, 1 in Wratworth: but he has no demesne land, and if he had it, he
could not get it tilled by these scattered tenants. The Fair Edith has half a hide
in Haslingfield and we are told that this belongs to the manor of Swavesey.
Now at Swavesey Edith has a considerable manor[554], but it can not have got
much in the way of labour out of a tenant who lived at Haslingfield, for the two
villages are a long ten miles apart. As to the king’s sokemen, their only
recorded services are the avera and the inward. The former seems to be a
carrying service done at the sheriff’s bidding and to be only exigible when the
king comes into the shire, while inward seems to be the duty of forming a body
guard for the king while he is in the shire:—if in any year the king did not
come, a small sum of money was taken instead[555].
Lest it should be thought that in picking out the village
A Cambridgeshire
of Orwell we have studiously sought a rare case, we hundred.
will here set out in a tabular form what we can learn of
the state of the hundred in which Orwell lies. The
Wetherley hundred contained twelve vills: it was a land of true villages which
until very lately had wide open fields[556]. In the Confessor’s day the lands in it
were allotted thus:—
Cambridgeshire. Wetherley Hundred[557].
I. Comberton. A vill of 6 hides.
Page 143
H. V. A. C. B.
1. Seven sokemen of the King 1 1 0 4 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 3 0
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand
2. A man of Earl Waltheof 1 15 1 0
3. A sokeman, man of the King 1 0
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand 1 15 2 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 1 15
4. The King 2 2 0 5 0
5 3 15[558] 12 0
II. Barton. A vill of 7 hides.
1. Two sokemen, men of Earl
1 1 15
Waltheof
3 15[559] 4 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof
1 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof
2. Juhael the King’s hunter 1 0 0 1 0
3. A sokeman, man of Edith the Fair 2 0
6 0
4. Twenty-three sokemen of the King 3 0 0
7 0 0 12 0
III. Grantchester. A vill of 7 hides[560]
1. Five sokemen, men of the King 3 0 1 0
2. Two sokemen, men of the King
2 1 0
A sokeman, man of Æsgar the 6 0
2 0
Staller
3. A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
3 0
Three sokemen, men of Earl 4 0
2 0 0
Waltheof
4. Godman a man of Edith the Fair 1 15 1 0
5. Juhael the King’s hunter 1 0 4
6. Wulfric, the King’s man 15 3
7 0 0 12 7
IV. Haslingfield. A vill of 20 hides.
H. V. A. C. B.
1. The King 7 1 0 8 0
1. Seven sokemen of the King 1 1 0 4 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 3 0
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand
2. A man of Earl Waltheof 1 15 1 0
3. A sokeman, man of the King 1 0
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand 1 15 2 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 1 15
4. The King 2 2 0 5 0
5 3 15[558] 12 0
II. Barton. A vill of 7 hides.
1. Two sokemen, men of Earl
1 1 15
Waltheof
3 15[559] 4 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof
1 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof
2. Juhael the King’s hunter 1 0 0 1 0
3. A sokeman, man of Edith the Fair 2 0
6 0
4. Twenty-three sokemen of the King 3 0 0
7 0 0 12 0
III. Grantchester. A vill of 7 hides[560]
1. Five sokemen, men of the King 3 0 1 0
2. Two sokemen, men of the King
2 1 0
A sokeman, man of Æsgar the 6 0
2 0
Staller
3. A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
3 0
Three sokemen, men of Earl 4 0
2 0 0
Waltheof
4. Godman a man of Edith the Fair 1 15 1 0
5. Juhael the King’s hunter 1 0 4
6. Wulfric, the King’s man 15 3
7 0 0 12 7
IV. Haslingfield. A vill of 20 hides.
H. V. A. C. B.
1. The King 7 1 0 8 0
Page 144
2. Five sokemen, men of the King
3 0 0
A sokeman, man of Æsgar the 4 0
1 3 0
Staller
3. Ealdred a man of Edith the Fair 1 0 15 1 4
4. Edith the Fair, belonging to
2 0 4
Swavesey
5. Sigar a man of Æsgar the Staller 5 0 0 6 0
6. Two sokemen of the King 1 1 3 2 0
7. Merewin, a man of Edith the Fair 12 0 0
20 0 0 22 0
V. Harlton. A vill of 5 hides.
1. Achil, a King’s thegn and under
him five sokemen of whom four
were his men while the fifth was
the man of Ernulf 4 0 0 6 0
2. Godman a man of Æsgar the
1 0 0 1 0
Staller
5 0 0 7 0
VI. Barrington. A vill of 10 hides.
1. Eadric Púr a King’s thegn
Fifteen sokemen, men of the King 3 0
Four sokemen, men of Earl Ælfgar 4 1 15
Three sokemen, men of Æsgar the 2 0 15 11 0
Staller 1 0 0
Eadric Púr, holding of the Church 15
of Chatteris
2. The Church of Chatteris 2 0 0 4 0
3. Ethsi, holding of Robert Wimarc’s
20 3
son
4. Achil the Dane, a man of Earl
40 6
Harold
5. A sokeman, man of the King 15 2
11 0 0[561] 17 3
VII. Shepreth. A vill of 5 hides.
H. V. A. C. B.
1. Four sokemen, men of the King
2 0 15 2 2
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
3 0 0
A sokeman, man of Æsgar the 4 0
1 3 0
Staller
3. Ealdred a man of Edith the Fair 1 0 15 1 4
4. Edith the Fair, belonging to
2 0 4
Swavesey
5. Sigar a man of Æsgar the Staller 5 0 0 6 0
6. Two sokemen of the King 1 1 3 2 0
7. Merewin, a man of Edith the Fair 12 0 0
20 0 0 22 0
V. Harlton. A vill of 5 hides.
1. Achil, a King’s thegn and under
him five sokemen of whom four
were his men while the fifth was
the man of Ernulf 4 0 0 6 0
2. Godman a man of Æsgar the
1 0 0 1 0
Staller
5 0 0 7 0
VI. Barrington. A vill of 10 hides.
1. Eadric Púr a King’s thegn
Fifteen sokemen, men of the King 3 0
Four sokemen, men of Earl Ælfgar 4 1 15
Three sokemen, men of Æsgar the 2 0 15 11 0
Staller 1 0 0
Eadric Púr, holding of the Church 15
of Chatteris
2. The Church of Chatteris 2 0 0 4 0
3. Ethsi, holding of Robert Wimarc’s
20 3
son
4. Achil the Dane, a man of Earl
40 6
Harold
5. A sokeman, man of the King 15 2
11 0 0[561] 17 3
VII. Shepreth. A vill of 5 hides.
H. V. A. C. B.
1. Four sokemen, men of the King
2 0 15 2 2
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
Page 145
2. The Church of Chatteris 1 1 15 1 4
3. Sigar a man of Æsgar the Staller 1 0 0 1 0
4. Heming a man of the King 1 15 4
5. The Church of Ely 15 2
5 0 0 5 4
VIII. Orwell. A vill of 4 hides.
1. Two sokemen, men of Edith the
Fair 20
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand 1 10
A sokeman, man of Robert 1 10 1 4
Wimarc’s son 20
A sokeman, man of the King 1 10
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
2. A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 3 0
1 0
A sokeman, man of the King 10
3. Sigar, a man of Æsgar the Staller 1 10 4
4. Turbert, a man of Edith the Fair 3 121⁄2 1 4
5. Achil, a man of Earl Harold 1 0 2
6. A sokeman, man of the King 1 0 3
7. The Church of Chatteris 10 1
8. The Church of Chatteris 71⁄2 1
⁄2
4 0 0 5 2
IX. Wratworth. A vill of 4 hides.
1. A sokeman, man of Edith the Fair
3 10
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand
3 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
1 10 3 0
A sokeman, man of Robert
10
Wimarc’s son
20
A sokeman, man of the King
2. A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof
2 20
A sokeman, man of Robert 1 0
10
Wimarc’s son
3. A sokeman, man of Edith the Fair 1 10 4
4. A sokeman, man of the King 1 0 3
5. Two sokemen, men of the King 2 0 4
4 0 0 5 3
X. Whitwell. A vill of 4 hides.
3. Sigar a man of Æsgar the Staller 1 0 0 1 0
4. Heming a man of the King 1 15 4
5. The Church of Ely 15 2
5 0 0 5 4
VIII. Orwell. A vill of 4 hides.
1. Two sokemen, men of Edith the
Fair 20
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand 1 10
A sokeman, man of Robert 1 10 1 4
Wimarc’s son 20
A sokeman, man of the King 1 10
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
2. A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 3 0
1 0
A sokeman, man of the King 10
3. Sigar, a man of Æsgar the Staller 1 10 4
4. Turbert, a man of Edith the Fair 3 121⁄2 1 4
5. Achil, a man of Earl Harold 1 0 2
6. A sokeman, man of the King 1 0 3
7. The Church of Chatteris 10 1
8. The Church of Chatteris 71⁄2 1
⁄2
4 0 0 5 2
IX. Wratworth. A vill of 4 hides.
1. A sokeman, man of Edith the Fair
3 10
A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand
3 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
1 10 3 0
A sokeman, man of Robert
10
Wimarc’s son
20
A sokeman, man of the King
2. A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof
2 20
A sokeman, man of Robert 1 0
10
Wimarc’s son
3. A sokeman, man of Edith the Fair 1 10 4
4. A sokeman, man of the King 1 0 3
5. Two sokemen, men of the King 2 0 4
4 0 0 5 3
X. Whitwell. A vill of 4 hides.
Page 146
1. A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
A sokeman, man of Robert 1 20
Wimarc’s son 1 0 1 4
A sokeman, A sokeman, man of the 2 0
King
2. A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand 15
A sokeman, man of Edith the Fair 10 4
[A sokeman] 15
3. Six sokemen, men of the King
1 1 0
A sokeman, man of Robert
2 0 2 0
Wimarc’s son
1 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
4. Godwin a man of Edith the Fair 2 0 1 0
4 0 0 5 0
XI. Wimpole. A vill of 4 hides.
1. Edith the Fair 2 2 15 3 0
2. Earl Gyrth 1 1 15 2 0
4 0 0 5 0
XII. ARRINGTON. A vill of 4 hides.
1. Ælfric, a King’s thegn
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 1 1 10
A sokeman, man of the Abbot of 1 0 0
8 0
Ely 1 0 0
A sokeman, man of Robert 20
Wimarc’s son
2. A man of Edith the Fair 2 0 4
4 0 0[562] 8 4
Now if by a ‘manor’ we mean what our historical The Wetherley sokemen.
economists usually mean when they use that term, we
must protest that before the Norman Conquest there were very few manors in
the Wetherley hundred. In no one case was the whole of a village coincident
with a manor, with a lord’s estate. The king had considerable manors in
Comberton and Haslingfield. Sigar had a manor at Haslingfield; the church of
Chatteris had a manor at Barrington besides some land at Shepreth; Wimpole
was divided between Edith and Earl Gyrth; Harlton between Achil and
Godman. But in Barton, Grantchester, Shepreth, Orwell, Wratworth, Whitwell
and Arrington we see nothing manorial, unless we hold ourselves free to use
A sokeman, man of Robert 1 20
Wimarc’s son 1 0 1 4
A sokeman, A sokeman, man of the 2 0
King
2. A sokeman, man of Abp Stigand 15
A sokeman, man of Edith the Fair 10 4
[A sokeman] 15
3. Six sokemen, men of the King
1 1 0
A sokeman, man of Robert
2 0 2 0
Wimarc’s son
1 0
A sokeman, man of Earl Ælfgar
4. Godwin a man of Edith the Fair 2 0 1 0
4 0 0 5 0
XI. Wimpole. A vill of 4 hides.
1. Edith the Fair 2 2 15 3 0
2. Earl Gyrth 1 1 15 2 0
4 0 0 5 0
XII. ARRINGTON. A vill of 4 hides.
1. Ælfric, a King’s thegn
A sokeman, man of Earl Waltheof 1 1 10
A sokeman, man of the Abbot of 1 0 0
8 0
Ely 1 0 0
A sokeman, man of Robert 20
Wimarc’s son
2. A man of Edith the Fair 2 0 4
4 0 0[562] 8 4
Now if by a ‘manor’ we mean what our historical The Wetherley sokemen.
economists usually mean when they use that term, we
must protest that before the Norman Conquest there were very few manors in
the Wetherley hundred. In no one case was the whole of a village coincident
with a manor, with a lord’s estate. The king had considerable manors in
Comberton and Haslingfield. Sigar had a manor at Haslingfield; the church of
Chatteris had a manor at Barrington besides some land at Shepreth; Wimpole
was divided between Edith and Earl Gyrth; Harlton between Achil and
Godman. But in Barton, Grantchester, Shepreth, Orwell, Wratworth, Whitwell
and Arrington we see nothing manorial, unless we hold ourselves free to use
Page 147
that term of a little tenement which to all appearance might easily be cultivated
by the labour of one household, at all events with occasional help supplied by a
few cottagers. Indeed it is difficult to say what profit some of the great people
whose names we have mentioned were deriving from those of their men who
dwelt in the Wetherley hundred. We take the Mercian earl for example[563]. One
of the sokemen of Grantchester, four of the sokemen of Barrington, one of the
sokemen of Shepreth, one of the sokemen of Orwell, one of the sokemen of
Wratworth, two of the sokemen of Whitwell were Ælfgar’s men. That Ælfgar
got a little money or a little provender out of them is probable, that they did
some carrying service for him is possible and perhaps they aided him at harvest
time on some manor of his in another part of the county; but that they were not
the tillers of his land seems clear[564].
What is more, our analysis of this Wetherley hundred
The sokeman and
enables us to drive home the remark that very often a seignorial justice.
sokeman was not the sokeman of his lord or, in other
words, that he was not under seignorial justice[565].
Ælfgar had ten sokemen scattered about in six villages. Did he hold a court for
them? We think not. Did they go to the court of some distant manor? We think
not. The court they attended was the Wetherley hundred-moot. One of the
sokemen in Arrington was in a somewhat exceptional position—exceptional,
that is, in this hundred. Not only was he the man of the Abbot of Ely, but his
soke belonged to the Abbot; and if he sold his tenement, and this he could do
without the Abbot’s consent, the soke over his land would ‘remain’ to the
Abbot[566]. He was not only his lord’s man but his lord’s justiciable and
probably attended some court outside the hundred. But for the more part these
men of Wetherley were not the justiciables of their lords. It was a very free
hundred when the Normans came there: much too free for the nation’s welfare
we may think, for these sokemen could go with their land to what lord they
pleased. Also be it noted in passing that the churches have little in Wetherley.
In 1086 there had been a change. The sokemen had
Changes in the Wetherley
disappeared. The Norman lords had made demesne hundred.
land where their English antecessores possessed none.
Count Roger had instituted a seignorial court at Orwell.
He had borrowed three sokemen ‘to hold his pleas’ from Picot the sheriff and
had refused to give them up again[567]. Apparently they had sunk to the level of
villani. Two centuries afterwards we see the hundred of Wetherley once more.
There is villeinage enough in it. The villein at Orwell, for example, holds only
by the labour of one household, at all events with occasional help supplied by a
few cottagers. Indeed it is difficult to say what profit some of the great people
whose names we have mentioned were deriving from those of their men who
dwelt in the Wetherley hundred. We take the Mercian earl for example[563]. One
of the sokemen of Grantchester, four of the sokemen of Barrington, one of the
sokemen of Shepreth, one of the sokemen of Orwell, one of the sokemen of
Wratworth, two of the sokemen of Whitwell were Ælfgar’s men. That Ælfgar
got a little money or a little provender out of them is probable, that they did
some carrying service for him is possible and perhaps they aided him at harvest
time on some manor of his in another part of the county; but that they were not
the tillers of his land seems clear[564].
What is more, our analysis of this Wetherley hundred
The sokeman and
enables us to drive home the remark that very often a seignorial justice.
sokeman was not the sokeman of his lord or, in other
words, that he was not under seignorial justice[565].
Ælfgar had ten sokemen scattered about in six villages. Did he hold a court for
them? We think not. Did they go to the court of some distant manor? We think
not. The court they attended was the Wetherley hundred-moot. One of the
sokemen in Arrington was in a somewhat exceptional position—exceptional,
that is, in this hundred. Not only was he the man of the Abbot of Ely, but his
soke belonged to the Abbot; and if he sold his tenement, and this he could do
without the Abbot’s consent, the soke over his land would ‘remain’ to the
Abbot[566]. He was not only his lord’s man but his lord’s justiciable and
probably attended some court outside the hundred. But for the more part these
men of Wetherley were not the justiciables of their lords. It was a very free
hundred when the Normans came there: much too free for the nation’s welfare
we may think, for these sokemen could go with their land to what lord they
pleased. Also be it noted in passing that the churches have little in Wetherley.
In 1086 there had been a change. The sokemen had
Changes in the Wetherley
disappeared. The Norman lords had made demesne hundred.
land where their English antecessores possessed none.
Count Roger had instituted a seignorial court at Orwell.
He had borrowed three sokemen ‘to hold his pleas’ from Picot the sheriff and
had refused to give them up again[567]. Apparently they had sunk to the level of
villani. Two centuries afterwards we see the hundred of Wetherley once more.
There is villeinage enough in it. The villein at Orwell, for example, holds only
Page 148
10 acres but works for his lord on 152 days in the year, besides boon-days[568].
And yet we should go far astray if we imposed upon these Cambridgeshire
villages that neat manorial system which we see at its neatest and strongest in
the abbatial cartularies. The villages do not become manors. The manors are
small. The manors are intermixed in the open fields. There are often
freeholders in the village who are not the tenants of any lord who has a manor
there. A villein will hold two tenements of two lords. The villein of one lord
will be the freeholder of another. The ‘manorial system’ has been forced upon
the villages, but it fits them badly[569].
In the thirteenth century the common field of a
Manorialism in
Cambridgeshire village was often a very maze of Cambridgeshire.
proprietary rights, and yet the village was an agrarian
whole. Let us take, for example, Duxford as it stood in
the reign of Edward I.[570] We see 39 villein tenements each of which has
fourteen acres in the fields. These tenements are divided between five different
manors. Four of our typical ‘townsmen’ hold of Henry de Lacy, who holds of
Simon de Furneaux, who holds of the Count of Britanny, who holds of the
king. Two hold of Ralph of Duxford, who holds of Basilia wife of Baldwyn of
St George, who holds of William Mortimer, who holds of Simon de Furneaux,
who holds of the Count of Britanny, who holds of the king. Eight hold of the
Templars, who hold of Roger de Colville, who holds of the Earl of Albemarle,
who holds of the king. Nine hold of William le Goyz, who holds of Henry of
Boxworth, who holds of Richard de Freville, who holds of the king. Sixteen
hold of John d’Abernon, who holds of the Earl Marshal, who holds of the king.
Three of the greatest ‘honours’ in England are represented. Three monasteries
and two parochial churches have strips in the fields. And yet there are normal
tenements cut according to one pattern, tenements of fourteen acres the holders
of which, though their other services may differ, pay for the more part an equal
rent[571]. The village seems to say that it must be one, though the lords would
make it many. And then we look back to the Confessor’s day and we see that a
good part of Duxford was held by sokemen[572].
Perhaps we shall be guilty of needless repetition; but
The sokemen and the
what is written in Domesday Book about maneria is manors.
admirably designed for the deception of modern
readers whose heads are full of ‘the manorial system.’
Therefore let us look at two Hertfordshire villages. In one of them there is a
manerium which Ralph Basset holds of Robert of Ouilly[573]. It has been rated
And yet we should go far astray if we imposed upon these Cambridgeshire
villages that neat manorial system which we see at its neatest and strongest in
the abbatial cartularies. The villages do not become manors. The manors are
small. The manors are intermixed in the open fields. There are often
freeholders in the village who are not the tenants of any lord who has a manor
there. A villein will hold two tenements of two lords. The villein of one lord
will be the freeholder of another. The ‘manorial system’ has been forced upon
the villages, but it fits them badly[569].
In the thirteenth century the common field of a
Manorialism in
Cambridgeshire village was often a very maze of Cambridgeshire.
proprietary rights, and yet the village was an agrarian
whole. Let us take, for example, Duxford as it stood in
the reign of Edward I.[570] We see 39 villein tenements each of which has
fourteen acres in the fields. These tenements are divided between five different
manors. Four of our typical ‘townsmen’ hold of Henry de Lacy, who holds of
Simon de Furneaux, who holds of the Count of Britanny, who holds of the
king. Two hold of Ralph of Duxford, who holds of Basilia wife of Baldwyn of
St George, who holds of William Mortimer, who holds of Simon de Furneaux,
who holds of the Count of Britanny, who holds of the king. Eight hold of the
Templars, who hold of Roger de Colville, who holds of the Earl of Albemarle,
who holds of the king. Nine hold of William le Goyz, who holds of Henry of
Boxworth, who holds of Richard de Freville, who holds of the king. Sixteen
hold of John d’Abernon, who holds of the Earl Marshal, who holds of the king.
Three of the greatest ‘honours’ in England are represented. Three monasteries
and two parochial churches have strips in the fields. And yet there are normal
tenements cut according to one pattern, tenements of fourteen acres the holders
of which, though their other services may differ, pay for the more part an equal
rent[571]. The village seems to say that it must be one, though the lords would
make it many. And then we look back to the Confessor’s day and we see that a
good part of Duxford was held by sokemen[572].
Perhaps we shall be guilty of needless repetition; but
The sokemen and the
what is written in Domesday Book about maneria is manors.
admirably designed for the deception of modern
readers whose heads are full of ‘the manorial system.’
Therefore let us look at two Hertfordshire villages. In one of them there is a
manerium which Ralph Basset holds of Robert of Ouilly[573]. It has been rated
Page 149
at 4, but is now rated at 2 hides. There is land for 4 teams. In demesne are 2
teams; and 31⁄2 villani with 2 sokemen of 1 hide and 5 bordarii have 2 teams.
There are 1 cottager and 1 serf and a mill of 10 shillings and meadow for 3
teams. It is now worth £3; in King Edward’s day it was worth £5. Now here,
we say, is a pretty little manor of the common kind. Let us then explore its past
history. ‘Five sokemen held this manor.’ Yes, we say, before the Conquest this
manor was held in physically undivided shares by five lords. Their shares were
small and they were humble people; but still they had a manor. But let us read
further. ‘Two of them were the men of Brihtric and held 11⁄2 hides; other two
were the men of Osulf the son of Frane and held 11⁄2 hides; and the fifth was the
man of Eadmer Atule and held a hide.’ We will at once finish the story and see
how Robert of Ouilly came by this manor. ‘No one of these five sokemen
belonged to his antecessor Wigot; every one of them might sell his land. One
of them bought (i.e. redeemed) his land for nine ounces of gold from King
William, so the men of the hundred say, and afterwards turned for protection to
Wigot.’ So Robert’s title to this manor is none of the best. But are we sure that
before the Conquest there was anything that we should call a manor? These
five sokemen who have unequal shares, who have three different lords, who
hold in all but 4 team-lands, whose land is worth but £5, do not look like a set
of coparceners to whom a ‘manor’ has descended. When Robert of Ouilly has
got his manor there are upon it 2 sokemen, 3 villeins, 5 bordarii, a cottager and
a serf. It was not a splendid manor for five lords.
We turn over a few pages. Hardouin of Eschalers has a
Hertfordshire sokemen.
manor rated at 51⁄2 hides[574]. It contains land for 8
teams. In demesne are 2 hides less 20 acres, and 3
teams; 11 villani with the priest and 5 bordarii have 5 teams. There are 4
cottagers and 6 serfs. It is worth £9; in the Confessor’s day it was worth £10.
Who held this manor in the past? Nine sokemen held it. Rather a large party of
joint lords, we say; but still, families will grow. Howbeit, we must finish the
sentence:—‘Of these, one, Sired by name, was the man of Earl Harold and held
1 hide and 3 virgates for a manor; another, Alfred, a man of Earl Ælfgar, held
11⁄2 hides for a manor; and the other seven were sokemen of King Edward and
held 2 hides and 1 virgate and they supplied the sheriff with 9 pence a year or
21⁄4 averae (carrying services).’ No, we have not been reading of the joint
holders of a ‘manor’; we have been reading of peasant proprietors. Two of
them were substantial folk; each of the two held a manerium at which geld was
paid; the other seven gelded at one of the king’s maneria under the view of his
teams; and 31⁄2 villani with 2 sokemen of 1 hide and 5 bordarii have 2 teams.
There are 1 cottager and 1 serf and a mill of 10 shillings and meadow for 3
teams. It is now worth £3; in King Edward’s day it was worth £5. Now here,
we say, is a pretty little manor of the common kind. Let us then explore its past
history. ‘Five sokemen held this manor.’ Yes, we say, before the Conquest this
manor was held in physically undivided shares by five lords. Their shares were
small and they were humble people; but still they had a manor. But let us read
further. ‘Two of them were the men of Brihtric and held 11⁄2 hides; other two
were the men of Osulf the son of Frane and held 11⁄2 hides; and the fifth was the
man of Eadmer Atule and held a hide.’ We will at once finish the story and see
how Robert of Ouilly came by this manor. ‘No one of these five sokemen
belonged to his antecessor Wigot; every one of them might sell his land. One
of them bought (i.e. redeemed) his land for nine ounces of gold from King
William, so the men of the hundred say, and afterwards turned for protection to
Wigot.’ So Robert’s title to this manor is none of the best. But are we sure that
before the Conquest there was anything that we should call a manor? These
five sokemen who have unequal shares, who have three different lords, who
hold in all but 4 team-lands, whose land is worth but £5, do not look like a set
of coparceners to whom a ‘manor’ has descended. When Robert of Ouilly has
got his manor there are upon it 2 sokemen, 3 villeins, 5 bordarii, a cottager and
a serf. It was not a splendid manor for five lords.
We turn over a few pages. Hardouin of Eschalers has a
Hertfordshire sokemen.
manor rated at 51⁄2 hides[574]. It contains land for 8
teams. In demesne are 2 hides less 20 acres, and 3
teams; 11 villani with the priest and 5 bordarii have 5 teams. There are 4
cottagers and 6 serfs. It is worth £9; in the Confessor’s day it was worth £10.
Who held this manor in the past? Nine sokemen held it. Rather a large party of
joint lords, we say; but still, families will grow. Howbeit, we must finish the
sentence:—‘Of these, one, Sired by name, was the man of Earl Harold and held
1 hide and 3 virgates for a manor; another, Alfred, a man of Earl Ælfgar, held
11⁄2 hides for a manor; and the other seven were sokemen of King Edward and
held 2 hides and 1 virgate and they supplied the sheriff with 9 pence a year or
21⁄4 averae (carrying services).’ No, we have not been reading of the joint
holders of a ‘manor’; we have been reading of peasant proprietors. Two of
them were substantial folk; each of the two held a manerium at which geld was
paid; the other seven gelded at one of the king’s maneria under the view of his
Page 150
bailiffs. Maneria there have been everywhere; but ‘manors’ we see in the
making. Hardouin has made one under our eyes.
We hear the objection that, be it never so humble, a
The small maneria.
manor is a manor. But is that truism quite true? If all
that we want for the constitution of a manor is a
proprietor of some land who has a right to exact from some other man, or two
or three other men, the whole or some part of the labour that is necessary for
the tillage of his soil, we may indeed see manors everywhere and at all times.
Even if we introduce a more characteristically medieval element and demand
that the tillers shall be neither menial servants nor labourers hired for money,
but men who make their living by cultivating for their own behoof small plots
which the proprietor allows them to occupy, still we shall have the utmost
difficulty if we would go behind manorialism. But suppose for a moment that
we have a village the land of which is being held by nine sokemen, each of
whom has a hide or half-hide scattered about in the open fields, and each of
whom controls the labour of a couple of serfs, shall we not be misleading the
public and ourselves if we speak of nine manors or even of nine ‘embryo
manors’? At any rate it is clear enough that if these estates of the sokemen are
‘embryo manors,’ then these embryos were deposited in the common fields. In
that case the common fields, the hides and yard-lands of the village are not the
creatures of manorialism.
We have seen free villages; we have seen a free
The Danes and freedom.
hundred. We might have found yet freer hundreds had
we gone to Suffolk. We have chosen Cambridgeshire
because Cambridgeshire can not be called a Danish county, except in a sense in
which, notwithstanding the wasted condition of Yorkshire, about one half of the
English nation lived in Danish counties. When men divide up England between
the three laws, they place Cambridgeshire under the Danelaw; but to that law
they subject about one half of the inhabitants of England. There may have been
many men of Scandinavian race in Cambridgeshire; but we find hundreds not
wapentakes, hides not carucates, while among the names of villages there are
few indeed which betray a Scandinavian origin. The Wetherley hundred was
not many miles away from the classic fields of Hitchin[575].
But in truth we must be careful how we use our Dane.
The Danish counties.
Yorkshire was a Danish county in a sense in which
Cambridgeshire was not Danish; it was a land of
trithings and wapentakes, a land without hides, where many a village testified
making. Hardouin has made one under our eyes.
We hear the objection that, be it never so humble, a
The small maneria.
manor is a manor. But is that truism quite true? If all
that we want for the constitution of a manor is a
proprietor of some land who has a right to exact from some other man, or two
or three other men, the whole or some part of the labour that is necessary for
the tillage of his soil, we may indeed see manors everywhere and at all times.
Even if we introduce a more characteristically medieval element and demand
that the tillers shall be neither menial servants nor labourers hired for money,
but men who make their living by cultivating for their own behoof small plots
which the proprietor allows them to occupy, still we shall have the utmost
difficulty if we would go behind manorialism. But suppose for a moment that
we have a village the land of which is being held by nine sokemen, each of
whom has a hide or half-hide scattered about in the open fields, and each of
whom controls the labour of a couple of serfs, shall we not be misleading the
public and ourselves if we speak of nine manors or even of nine ‘embryo
manors’? At any rate it is clear enough that if these estates of the sokemen are
‘embryo manors,’ then these embryos were deposited in the common fields. In
that case the common fields, the hides and yard-lands of the village are not the
creatures of manorialism.
We have seen free villages; we have seen a free
The Danes and freedom.
hundred. We might have found yet freer hundreds had
we gone to Suffolk. We have chosen Cambridgeshire
because Cambridgeshire can not be called a Danish county, except in a sense in
which, notwithstanding the wasted condition of Yorkshire, about one half of the
English nation lived in Danish counties. When men divide up England between
the three laws, they place Cambridgeshire under the Danelaw; but to that law
they subject about one half of the inhabitants of England. There may have been
many men of Scandinavian race in Cambridgeshire; but we find hundreds not
wapentakes, hides not carucates, while among the names of villages there are
few indeed which betray a Scandinavian origin. The Wetherley hundred was
not many miles away from the classic fields of Hitchin[575].
But in truth we must be careful how we use our Dane.
The Danish counties.
Yorkshire was a Danish county in a sense in which
Cambridgeshire was not Danish; it was a land of
trithings and wapentakes, a land without hides, where many a village testified
Page 151
by its name to a Scandinavian settlement. And yet to all appearance it was in
the Confessor’s day a land where the manors stood thick[576]. Then we have
that wonderful contrast between Yorkshire and Lincolnshire which Ellis
summed up in these figures:—
Sochemanni Villani Bordarii
Lincolnshire 11,503 7,723 4,024
Yorkshire 447 5,079 1,819
Perhaps this contrast would have been less violent if Yorkshire had not been
devastated: but violent it is and must be. It will provoke the remark that the
‘faults’ (if any faults there be) in a truly economic stratification of mankind are
not likely to occur just at the boundaries of the shires, whereas so long as each
county has a court from which there is no appeal to any central tribunal, we
may expect to find that lines which have their origin in fiscal practice will be
sharp lines and will coincide with the metes and bounds of jurisdictional
districts.
Nor should it escape remark that the names by which a
The contrast between
grand distinction is expressed are in their origin very villeins and sokemen.
loose terms and etymologically ill-fitted to the purpose
that they are serving. In English the villanus is the
túnesman or, as we should say, the villager. And yet to all seeming the sokeman
is essentially a villager. What is more the land where the sokemen and ‘free
men’ lived was a land of true villages, of big villages, of limitless ‘open fields,’
whereas the hamleted west was servile. Then again sokeman is a very odd term.
If it signified that the man to whom it is applied was always the justiciable of
the lord to whom he was commended, we could understand it. Even if this man
were always the justiciable of a court that had passed into private hands, we
could still understand it. But apparently there are plenty of sokemen whose
soke ‘is’ or ‘lies’ in those hundred courts that have no lord but the king. The
best guess that we can make as to the manner in which they have acquired their
name is that in an age which is being persuaded that some ‘service’ must be
done by every one who holds land, suit of court appears as the only service that
is done by all these men. They may owe other services; but they all owe suit of
court. If so we may see their legal successors in those freeholders of the twelfth
century who are ‘acquitting’ their lords and their villages by doing suit at the
national courts[577]. But when a new force comes into play (and the tribute to
the pirate was a new and a powerful force) new lines of demarcation must be
the Confessor’s day a land where the manors stood thick[576]. Then we have
that wonderful contrast between Yorkshire and Lincolnshire which Ellis
summed up in these figures:—
Sochemanni Villani Bordarii
Lincolnshire 11,503 7,723 4,024
Yorkshire 447 5,079 1,819
Perhaps this contrast would have been less violent if Yorkshire had not been
devastated: but violent it is and must be. It will provoke the remark that the
‘faults’ (if any faults there be) in a truly economic stratification of mankind are
not likely to occur just at the boundaries of the shires, whereas so long as each
county has a court from which there is no appeal to any central tribunal, we
may expect to find that lines which have their origin in fiscal practice will be
sharp lines and will coincide with the metes and bounds of jurisdictional
districts.
Nor should it escape remark that the names by which a
The contrast between
grand distinction is expressed are in their origin very villeins and sokemen.
loose terms and etymologically ill-fitted to the purpose
that they are serving. In English the villanus is the
túnesman or, as we should say, the villager. And yet to all seeming the sokeman
is essentially a villager. What is more the land where the sokemen and ‘free
men’ lived was a land of true villages, of big villages, of limitless ‘open fields,’
whereas the hamleted west was servile. Then again sokeman is a very odd term.
If it signified that the man to whom it is applied was always the justiciable of
the lord to whom he was commended, we could understand it. Even if this man
were always the justiciable of a court that had passed into private hands, we
could still understand it. But apparently there are plenty of sokemen whose
soke ‘is’ or ‘lies’ in those hundred courts that have no lord but the king. The
best guess that we can make as to the manner in which they have acquired their
name is that in an age which is being persuaded that some ‘service’ must be
done by every one who holds land, suit of court appears as the only service that
is done by all these men. They may owe other services; but they all owe suit of
court. If so we may see their legal successors in those freeholders of the twelfth
century who are ‘acquitting’ their lords and their villages by doing suit at the
national courts[577]. But when a new force comes into play (and the tribute to
the pirate was a new and a powerful force) new lines of demarcation must be
Page 152
drawn, new classes of men must be formed and words will be borrowed for the
purpose with little care for etymological niceties. One large and widely-spread
class may find a name for itself in a district where the ordinary ‘townsmen’ or
villagers are no longer treated as taxpayers responsible to the state, while some
practice peculiar to a small part of the country may confer the name of
‘sokemen’ on those tillers of the soil who are rated to the geld. We are not
arguing that this distinction, even when it first emerged, implied nothing that
concerned the economic position of the villein and the sokeman. The most
dependent peasants would naturally be the people who could not be directly
charged with the geld, and the peasants who could not pay the geld would
naturally become dependent on those who would pay it for them; still we are
not entitled to assume that the fiscal scheme accurately mirrored the economic
facts, or that the varying practice of different moots and different collectors
may not have stamped as the villeins of one shire those who would have been
the sokemen of another[578].
Be this as it may, any theory of English history must
Free villages.
face the free, the lordless, village and must account for
it as for one of the normal phenomena which existed in
the year of grace 1066. How common it was we shall never know until the
material contained in Domesday Book has been geographically rearranged by
counties, hundreds and vills. But whether common or no, it was normal, just as
normal as the village which was completely subject to seignorial power. We
have before us villages which, taken as wholes, have no lords. What is more, it
seems obvious enough that, unless there has been some great catastrophe in the
past, some insurrection of the peasants or the like, the village of Orwell—and
other villages might be named by the dozen—has never had a lord. Such
lordships as exist in it are plainly not the relics of a dominion which has been
split up among divers persons by the action of gifts and inheritances. The
sokemen of Orwell have worshipped every rising sun. One has commended
himself to the ill-fated Harold, another to the ill-fated Waltheof, a third has
chosen the Mercian Ælfgar, a fourth has placed himself under the aspiring
Archbishop; yet all are free to ‘withdraw.’ We have here a very free village
indeed, for its members enjoy a freedom of which no freeholder of the
thirteenth century would even dream, and in a certain sense we have here a free
village community. How much communalism is there? Of this most difficult
question only a few words will now be said, for our guesses about remote ages
we will yet a while reserve.
purpose with little care for etymological niceties. One large and widely-spread
class may find a name for itself in a district where the ordinary ‘townsmen’ or
villagers are no longer treated as taxpayers responsible to the state, while some
practice peculiar to a small part of the country may confer the name of
‘sokemen’ on those tillers of the soil who are rated to the geld. We are not
arguing that this distinction, even when it first emerged, implied nothing that
concerned the economic position of the villein and the sokeman. The most
dependent peasants would naturally be the people who could not be directly
charged with the geld, and the peasants who could not pay the geld would
naturally become dependent on those who would pay it for them; still we are
not entitled to assume that the fiscal scheme accurately mirrored the economic
facts, or that the varying practice of different moots and different collectors
may not have stamped as the villeins of one shire those who would have been
the sokemen of another[578].
Be this as it may, any theory of English history must
Free villages.
face the free, the lordless, village and must account for
it as for one of the normal phenomena which existed in
the year of grace 1066. How common it was we shall never know until the
material contained in Domesday Book has been geographically rearranged by
counties, hundreds and vills. But whether common or no, it was normal, just as
normal as the village which was completely subject to seignorial power. We
have before us villages which, taken as wholes, have no lords. What is more, it
seems obvious enough that, unless there has been some great catastrophe in the
past, some insurrection of the peasants or the like, the village of Orwell—and
other villages might be named by the dozen—has never had a lord. Such
lordships as exist in it are plainly not the relics of a dominion which has been
split up among divers persons by the action of gifts and inheritances. The
sokemen of Orwell have worshipped every rising sun. One has commended
himself to the ill-fated Harold, another to the ill-fated Waltheof, a third has
chosen the Mercian Ælfgar, a fourth has placed himself under the aspiring
Archbishop; yet all are free to ‘withdraw.’ We have here a very free village
indeed, for its members enjoy a freedom of which no freeholder of the
thirteenth century would even dream, and in a certain sense we have here a free
village community. How much communalism is there? Of this most difficult
question only a few words will now be said, for our guesses about remote ages
we will yet a while reserve.
Page 153
In the first place, we can not doubt that the ‘open field
Village communities.
system’ of agriculture prevails as well in the free
villages as in those that are under the control of a lord.
The sokeman’s hide or virgate is no ring-fenced ‘close’ but is composed of
many scattered strips. Again, we can hardly doubt that the practice of ‘co-
aration’ prevailed. The sokeman had seldom beasts enough to make up a team.
It is well known that the whole scheme of land-measurements which runs
through Domesday Book is based upon the theory that land is ploughed by
teams of eight oxen. It is perhaps possible that smaller teams were sometimes
employed; but when we read that a certain man ‘always ploughed with three
oxen[579],’ or ‘used to plough with two oxen but now ploughs with half a
team[580],’ or ‘used to plough with a team but now ploughs with two oxen[581],’
we are reading, not of small teams, but of the number of oxen that the man in
question contributed towards the team of eight that was made up by him and
his neighbours. When of a piece of land in Bedfordshire it is said that ‘one ox
ploughs there,’ this means that the land in question supplies but one ox in a
team of eight[582]; and here and not in any monstrous birth do we find the
explanation of ‘terra est dimidio bovi et ibi est semibos[583]’:—there is a
sixteenth part of a teamland and its tenant along with some other man provides
an ox. There may have been light ploughs as well as heavy ploughs, but the
heavy plough must have been extremely common, since the term ‘plough team’
(caruca) seems invariably to mean a team of eight.
Then one notable case meets our eye in which the
The villagers as co-
ownership of land, of arable land, seems to be owners.
attributed to a village community. In Goldington, a
village in Bedfordshire, Walter now holds a hide; there
is land for one team and meadow for half a team. ‘The men of the vill held this
land in common and could sell it[584].’ Apparently the men of the vill were
Ælfwin Sac a man of the Bishop of Lincoln who held half a team-land and
‘could do what he liked with it,’ nine sokemen who held three team-lands
between them, three other sokemen who held three team-lands, and Ælfmær a
man of Asgil who held three team-lands[585]. How it came about that these
men, besides holding land in severalty, held a tract in common, we are left to
guess. Nor can we say whether such a case was usual or unusual. Very often in
Little Domesday we meet an entry which tells how x free men held y acres and
had z teams; for example, how 15 free men held 40 acres and had 2 teams[586].
In general we may well suppose that each of them held his strips in severalty,
but we dare not say that such a phrase never points to co-ownership.
Village communities.
system’ of agriculture prevails as well in the free
villages as in those that are under the control of a lord.
The sokeman’s hide or virgate is no ring-fenced ‘close’ but is composed of
many scattered strips. Again, we can hardly doubt that the practice of ‘co-
aration’ prevailed. The sokeman had seldom beasts enough to make up a team.
It is well known that the whole scheme of land-measurements which runs
through Domesday Book is based upon the theory that land is ploughed by
teams of eight oxen. It is perhaps possible that smaller teams were sometimes
employed; but when we read that a certain man ‘always ploughed with three
oxen[579],’ or ‘used to plough with two oxen but now ploughs with half a
team[580],’ or ‘used to plough with a team but now ploughs with two oxen[581],’
we are reading, not of small teams, but of the number of oxen that the man in
question contributed towards the team of eight that was made up by him and
his neighbours. When of a piece of land in Bedfordshire it is said that ‘one ox
ploughs there,’ this means that the land in question supplies but one ox in a
team of eight[582]; and here and not in any monstrous birth do we find the
explanation of ‘terra est dimidio bovi et ibi est semibos[583]’:—there is a
sixteenth part of a teamland and its tenant along with some other man provides
an ox. There may have been light ploughs as well as heavy ploughs, but the
heavy plough must have been extremely common, since the term ‘plough team’
(caruca) seems invariably to mean a team of eight.
Then one notable case meets our eye in which the
The villagers as co-
ownership of land, of arable land, seems to be owners.
attributed to a village community. In Goldington, a
village in Bedfordshire, Walter now holds a hide; there
is land for one team and meadow for half a team. ‘The men of the vill held this
land in common and could sell it[584].’ Apparently the men of the vill were
Ælfwin Sac a man of the Bishop of Lincoln who held half a team-land and
‘could do what he liked with it,’ nine sokemen who held three team-lands
between them, three other sokemen who held three team-lands, and Ælfmær a
man of Asgil who held three team-lands[585]. How it came about that these
men, besides holding land in severalty, held a tract in common, we are left to
guess. Nor can we say whether such a case was usual or unusual. Very often in
Little Domesday we meet an entry which tells how x free men held y acres and
had z teams; for example, how 15 free men held 40 acres and had 2 teams[586].
In general we may well suppose that each of them held his strips in severalty,
but we dare not say that such a phrase never points to co-ownership.
Page 154
Then as to such part of the land as is not arable:—Even
The waste land of the vill.
in the free village a few enclosed meadows will
probably be found; but the pasture ground lies open for
‘the cattle of the vill.’ At the date of the survey, though several Norman lords
have estates in one vill, the common formula used in connexion with each
estate is, not ‘there is pasture for the cattle of this manor, or of this land,’ but
‘there is pasture for the cattle of the vill.’ Occasionally we read of ‘common
pasture’ in a context which shows that the pasture is common not to several
manorial lords but to the villeins of one lord[587]. In the hundred of Coleness in
Suffolk there is a pasture which is common to all the men of the hundred[588].
But, as might be expected, we hear little of the mode in which pasture rights
were allotted or regulated. Such rights were probably treated as appurtenances
of the arable land:—‘The canons of Waltham claim as much wood as belongs
to one hide[589].’ If the rights of user are known, no one cares about the bare
ownership of pasture land or wood land:—it is all one whether we say that Earl
Edwin is entitled to one third of a certain wood or to every third oak that grows
therein[590].
Sometimes the ownership of a mill is divided into so
Co-ownership of mills.
many shares that we are tempted to think that this mill
has been erected at the cost of the vill. In Suffolk a free
man holds a little manerium which is composed of 24 acres of land, 11⁄2 acres
of meadow and ‘a fourth part of the mill in every third year[591]’:—he takes his
turn with his neighbours in the enjoyment of the revenue of the mill. We may
even be led to suspect that the parish churches have sometimes been treated as
belonging to the men of the vill who have subscribed to erect or to endow
them. In Suffolk a twelfth part of a church belongs to a petty manerium which
contains 30 acres and is cultivated by two bordiers with a single team[592].
When a parish church gets its virgate by ‘the charity of the neighbours[593],’
when nine free men give it twenty acres for the good of their souls[594], we may
see in this some trace of communal action.
Incidentally we may notice that the system of virgate
The system of virgates in
holdings seems quite compatible with an absence of a free village.
seignorial control. In the free village, for example in
Orwell, we shall often find that one man has twice,
thrice or four times as much as another man:—the same is the case in the
manorialized villages of Middlesex, where a villein may have as much as a
hide or as little as a half-virgate; but all the holdings will bear, at least in theory,
The waste land of the vill.
in the free village a few enclosed meadows will
probably be found; but the pasture ground lies open for
‘the cattle of the vill.’ At the date of the survey, though several Norman lords
have estates in one vill, the common formula used in connexion with each
estate is, not ‘there is pasture for the cattle of this manor, or of this land,’ but
‘there is pasture for the cattle of the vill.’ Occasionally we read of ‘common
pasture’ in a context which shows that the pasture is common not to several
manorial lords but to the villeins of one lord[587]. In the hundred of Coleness in
Suffolk there is a pasture which is common to all the men of the hundred[588].
But, as might be expected, we hear little of the mode in which pasture rights
were allotted or regulated. Such rights were probably treated as appurtenances
of the arable land:—‘The canons of Waltham claim as much wood as belongs
to one hide[589].’ If the rights of user are known, no one cares about the bare
ownership of pasture land or wood land:—it is all one whether we say that Earl
Edwin is entitled to one third of a certain wood or to every third oak that grows
therein[590].
Sometimes the ownership of a mill is divided into so
Co-ownership of mills.
many shares that we are tempted to think that this mill
has been erected at the cost of the vill. In Suffolk a free
man holds a little manerium which is composed of 24 acres of land, 11⁄2 acres
of meadow and ‘a fourth part of the mill in every third year[591]’:—he takes his
turn with his neighbours in the enjoyment of the revenue of the mill. We may
even be led to suspect that the parish churches have sometimes been treated as
belonging to the men of the vill who have subscribed to erect or to endow
them. In Suffolk a twelfth part of a church belongs to a petty manerium which
contains 30 acres and is cultivated by two bordiers with a single team[592].
When a parish church gets its virgate by ‘the charity of the neighbours[593],’
when nine free men give it twenty acres for the good of their souls[594], we may
see in this some trace of communal action.
Incidentally we may notice that the system of virgate
The system of virgates in
holdings seems quite compatible with an absence of a free village.
seignorial control. In the free village, for example in
Orwell, we shall often find that one man has twice,
thrice or four times as much as another man:—the same is the case in the
manorialized villages of Middlesex, where a villein may have as much as a
hide or as little as a half-virgate; but all the holdings will bear, at least in theory,
Page 155
some simple relation to each other. Thus in Orwell the virgates are divided into
thirds and quarters, and in several instances a man has four thirds of a virgate.
In Essex and East Anglia, though we may find many irregular and many very
small holdings, tenements of 60, 45, 40, 30, 20, 15 acres are far commoner than
they would be were it not that a unit of 120 acres will very easily break into
such pieces. Domesday Book takes no notice of family law and its ‘vendere
potuit’ merely excludes the interference of the lord and does not imply that a
man is at liberty to disappoint his expectant heirs. Very possibly there has been
among the small folk but little giving or selling of land.
Nor is a law which gives the dead man’s land to all his
The virgates and
sons as co-heirs a sufficient force to destroy the system inheritance.
of hides and virgates when once it is established by
some original allotment. In the higher ranks of society
we see large groups of thegns holding land in common, holding as the Normans
say ‘in parage.’ We can hardly doubt that they are co-heirs holding an
inheritance that has not been physically partitioned[595]. Sometimes it is said of
a single man that he holds in parage[596]. This gives us a valuable hint. Holding
in parage implies that one of the ‘pares,’ one of the parceners,—as a general
rule he would be the eldest of them—is answerable to king and lord for the
services due from the land, while his fellows are bound only to him; they must
help him to discharge duties for which he is primarily responsible[597]. This
seems the import of such passages as the following—‘Five thegns held two
bovates; one of them was the senior (the elder, and we may almost say the lord)
of the others[598]’—‘Eight thegns held this manor; one of them Alli, a man of
King Edward, was the senior of the others[599]’—‘Godric and his brothers held
three carucates; two of them served the third[600]’—‘Chetel and Turver were
brothers and after the death of their father they divided the land, but so that
Chetel in doing the king’s service should have help from Turver his
brother[601]’—‘Siwate, Alnod, Fenchel and Aschil divided the land of their
father equally, and they held in such wise that if there were need for attendance
in the king’s host and Siwate could go, his brothers were to aid him [with
money and provisions]; and on the next occasion another brother was to go and
Siwate like the rest was to help him; and so on down the list; but Siwate was
the king’s man[602].’ No doubt similar arrangements were made by co-heirs of
lowlier station[603]. The integrity of the tenement is maintained though several
men have an interest in it. In relation to the lord and the state one of them
represents his fellows. When the shares become very small, some of the
claimants might be bought out by the others[604].
thirds and quarters, and in several instances a man has four thirds of a virgate.
In Essex and East Anglia, though we may find many irregular and many very
small holdings, tenements of 60, 45, 40, 30, 20, 15 acres are far commoner than
they would be were it not that a unit of 120 acres will very easily break into
such pieces. Domesday Book takes no notice of family law and its ‘vendere
potuit’ merely excludes the interference of the lord and does not imply that a
man is at liberty to disappoint his expectant heirs. Very possibly there has been
among the small folk but little giving or selling of land.
Nor is a law which gives the dead man’s land to all his
The virgates and
sons as co-heirs a sufficient force to destroy the system inheritance.
of hides and virgates when once it is established by
some original allotment. In the higher ranks of society
we see large groups of thegns holding land in common, holding as the Normans
say ‘in parage.’ We can hardly doubt that they are co-heirs holding an
inheritance that has not been physically partitioned[595]. Sometimes it is said of
a single man that he holds in parage[596]. This gives us a valuable hint. Holding
in parage implies that one of the ‘pares,’ one of the parceners,—as a general
rule he would be the eldest of them—is answerable to king and lord for the
services due from the land, while his fellows are bound only to him; they must
help him to discharge duties for which he is primarily responsible[597]. This
seems the import of such passages as the following—‘Five thegns held two
bovates; one of them was the senior (the elder, and we may almost say the lord)
of the others[598]’—‘Eight thegns held this manor; one of them Alli, a man of
King Edward, was the senior of the others[599]’—‘Godric and his brothers held
three carucates; two of them served the third[600]’—‘Chetel and Turver were
brothers and after the death of their father they divided the land, but so that
Chetel in doing the king’s service should have help from Turver his
brother[601]’—‘Siwate, Alnod, Fenchel and Aschil divided the land of their
father equally, and they held in such wise that if there were need for attendance
in the king’s host and Siwate could go, his brothers were to aid him [with
money and provisions]; and on the next occasion another brother was to go and
Siwate like the rest was to help him; and so on down the list; but Siwate was
the king’s man[602].’ No doubt similar arrangements were made by co-heirs of
lowlier station[603]. The integrity of the tenement is maintained though several
men have an interest in it. In relation to the lord and the state one of them
represents his fellows. When the shares become very small, some of the
claimants might be bought out by the others[604].
Page 156
But, to return to the village, we must once more notice
The farm.
that the Canons of St Paul’s have let their manor of
Willesden to the villeins[605]. This leads us to speculate
as to the incidence and collection of those great provender rents of which we
read when royal manors are described. In King Edward’s day a royal manor is
often charged with the whole or some aliquot share of a ‘one night’s farm,’ that
is one day’s victual for the king’s household. Definite amounts of bread,
cheese, malt, meat, beer, honey, wool have to be supplied; thus, for example,
Cheltenham must furnish three thousand loaves for the king’s dogs and King’s
Barton must do the like[606]. Then too Edward the sheriff receives as the profits
of the shrievalty of Wiltshire, 130 pigs, 32 bacons, certain quantities of wheat,
malt, oats, and honey, 400 chicken, 1600 eggs, 100 cheeses, 100 lambs, 52
fleeces[607]. Between the king and the men of the manor, no doubt there stands
a farmer, either the sheriff or some other person, who is bound to supply the
due quantity of provender; but to say that this is so does not solve the problem
that is before us. We have still to ask how this due quantity is obtained from the
men of the village. It is a quantity which can be expressed by round figures; it
is 3000 dog-cakes, or the like. We do not arrive at these pretty results by adding
up the rents due from individuals. Again, just in the counties which are the
homes of freedom we hear much of sums of money that are paid to a lord by
way of free will offering[608]. In Norfolk and Suffolk the villagers will give a
yearly gersuma, in Lincoln they will pay a yearly tailla, and this will be a neat
round sum; very often it is 20 shillings, or 40 or 10.
In this particular we seem to see an increase of
Round sums raised from
something that may be called communalism, as we go the villages.
backwards. Of course in the cartularies of a later age
we may discover round sums of money which, under
the names of ‘tallage’ or ‘aid’ are imposed upon the vill as a whole; but in
general we may accept the rule that tributes to be paid by the vill as a whole, in
money or in kind, are not of recent origin. They are more prominent in the
oldest than in other documents. As examples, we may notice the ‘cornage’ of
the Boldon Book—one vill renders 20 shillings, another 30 shillings for
cornage[609]; also the contributions of sheep, poultry, bread and cloth which the
vills of Peterborough Abbey bring to the monks on the festival of their patron
saint—one vill supplying ten rams and twenty ells of cloth, another four rams,
five ells of cloth, ten chicken and three hundred loaves[610]. But then we have
to notice that a village which has to pay a provender rent or even a tailla or
The farm.
that the Canons of St Paul’s have let their manor of
Willesden to the villeins[605]. This leads us to speculate
as to the incidence and collection of those great provender rents of which we
read when royal manors are described. In King Edward’s day a royal manor is
often charged with the whole or some aliquot share of a ‘one night’s farm,’ that
is one day’s victual for the king’s household. Definite amounts of bread,
cheese, malt, meat, beer, honey, wool have to be supplied; thus, for example,
Cheltenham must furnish three thousand loaves for the king’s dogs and King’s
Barton must do the like[606]. Then too Edward the sheriff receives as the profits
of the shrievalty of Wiltshire, 130 pigs, 32 bacons, certain quantities of wheat,
malt, oats, and honey, 400 chicken, 1600 eggs, 100 cheeses, 100 lambs, 52
fleeces[607]. Between the king and the men of the manor, no doubt there stands
a farmer, either the sheriff or some other person, who is bound to supply the
due quantity of provender; but to say that this is so does not solve the problem
that is before us. We have still to ask how this due quantity is obtained from the
men of the village. It is a quantity which can be expressed by round figures; it
is 3000 dog-cakes, or the like. We do not arrive at these pretty results by adding
up the rents due from individuals. Again, just in the counties which are the
homes of freedom we hear much of sums of money that are paid to a lord by
way of free will offering[608]. In Norfolk and Suffolk the villagers will give a
yearly gersuma, in Lincoln they will pay a yearly tailla, and this will be a neat
round sum; very often it is 20 shillings, or 40 or 10.
In this particular we seem to see an increase of
Round sums raised from
something that may be called communalism, as we go the villages.
backwards. Of course in the cartularies of a later age
we may discover round sums of money which, under
the names of ‘tallage’ or ‘aid’ are imposed upon the vill as a whole; but in
general we may accept the rule that tributes to be paid by the vill as a whole, in
money or in kind, are not of recent origin. They are more prominent in the
oldest than in other documents. As examples, we may notice the ‘cornage’ of
the Boldon Book—one vill renders 20 shillings, another 30 shillings for
cornage[609]; also the contributions of sheep, poultry, bread and cloth which the
vills of Peterborough Abbey bring to the monks on the festival of their patron
saint—one vill supplying ten rams and twenty ells of cloth, another four rams,
five ells of cloth, ten chicken and three hundred loaves[610]. But then we have
to notice that a village which has to pay a provender rent or even a tailla or
Page 157
gersuma is not altogether a free village. Its communal action is called out by
seignorial pressure.
And as we go backwards the township seems to lose
The township and police
such definiteness as is given to it by the police law of law.
the thirteenth century[611]. This was to be expected, for
such law implies a powerful, centralized state, which
sends its justices round the country to amerce the townships and compel these
local communities to do their duties. Once and once only does the township
appear in the Anglo-Saxon dooms. This is in a law of Edgar. If a man who is on
a journey buys cattle, then on his return home he must turn them onto the
common pasture, ‘with the witness of the township.’ If he fails to do so, then
after five nights the townsmen are to give information to the elder of the
hundred, and in that case they and their cattle-herd will be free of blame, and
the man who brought the cattle into the town will forfeit them, half to the lord
and half to the hundred. If, on the other hand, the townsmen fail in the duty of
giving information, their herd will pay for it with his skin[612]. The township
has very little organization of which the state can make use. It does not seem
even to have an ‘elder’ or head-man, and, from the threat of a flogging, we may
gather that its common herdsman will be a slave. Purchases of cattle can not be
made ‘with the witness of the township’; the purchaser ought to seek out two or
three of those twelve standing witnesses who are appointed for every
hundred[613]. So again, in the twelfth century we see the finder of a stray beast
bringing it into the vill; he conducts it to the church-door and tells his story to
the priest, the reeve and as many of the best men of the vill as can be got
together. Then the reeve sends to the four neighbouring vills, calls in from each
the priest, the reeve and three or four men and recounts the tale in their
presence. Then on the following day he goes to the head-man of the hundred
and puts the whole matter before him and delivers up the beast to him, unless
indeed the place where it was found straying was within the domain of some
lord who had sake and soke[614]. Here again, the organization of the township
appears to be of a most rudimentary kind. It has no court, unless its lord has
sake and soke; it has no power to detain an estray for safe custody. In this very
simple case it requires the help of other vills and must transmit the cause to the
hundred court. And so again, though there may be some reason for thinking
that at one time the murder fine—the fine payable if the slayer of a foreigner
was not arrested—was primarily exigible from the vill in which the corpse was
found, the hundred being but subsidiarily liable, still this rule seems to have
been soon abandoned and the burden of the fine, a fine far too heavy for a
seignorial pressure.
And as we go backwards the township seems to lose
The township and police
such definiteness as is given to it by the police law of law.
the thirteenth century[611]. This was to be expected, for
such law implies a powerful, centralized state, which
sends its justices round the country to amerce the townships and compel these
local communities to do their duties. Once and once only does the township
appear in the Anglo-Saxon dooms. This is in a law of Edgar. If a man who is on
a journey buys cattle, then on his return home he must turn them onto the
common pasture, ‘with the witness of the township.’ If he fails to do so, then
after five nights the townsmen are to give information to the elder of the
hundred, and in that case they and their cattle-herd will be free of blame, and
the man who brought the cattle into the town will forfeit them, half to the lord
and half to the hundred. If, on the other hand, the townsmen fail in the duty of
giving information, their herd will pay for it with his skin[612]. The township
has very little organization of which the state can make use. It does not seem
even to have an ‘elder’ or head-man, and, from the threat of a flogging, we may
gather that its common herdsman will be a slave. Purchases of cattle can not be
made ‘with the witness of the township’; the purchaser ought to seek out two or
three of those twelve standing witnesses who are appointed for every
hundred[613]. So again, in the twelfth century we see the finder of a stray beast
bringing it into the vill; he conducts it to the church-door and tells his story to
the priest, the reeve and as many of the best men of the vill as can be got
together. Then the reeve sends to the four neighbouring vills, calls in from each
the priest, the reeve and three or four men and recounts the tale in their
presence. Then on the following day he goes to the head-man of the hundred
and puts the whole matter before him and delivers up the beast to him, unless
indeed the place where it was found straying was within the domain of some
lord who had sake and soke[614]. Here again, the organization of the township
appears to be of a most rudimentary kind. It has no court, unless its lord has
sake and soke; it has no power to detain an estray for safe custody. In this very
simple case it requires the help of other vills and must transmit the cause to the
hundred court. And so again, though there may be some reason for thinking
that at one time the murder fine—the fine payable if the slayer of a foreigner
was not arrested—was primarily exigible from the vill in which the corpse was
found, the hundred being but subsidiarily liable, still this rule seems to have
been soon abandoned and the burden of the fine, a fine far too heavy for a
Page 158
single vill, was cast upon the hundred[615]. For all this, however, the law knew
and made use of the township. The Domesday commissioners required the
testimony of the priest, the reeve and six villani of every vill. So soon as the
law about suit to the hundred court becomes at all plain, the suit is due rather
from vills than from men, and the burden is discharged by the lord of the vill or
his steward, or, if neither of them can attend, then by the priest, the reeve and
four of the vill’s best men[616].
How could these requirements be met by a vill which
The free village and
had no lord? It would be a fair remark that the Norman government.
existence of such vills is not contemplated by the
Norman rulers. The men who will represent the vill
before the Domesday commissioners will in their eyes be villani. This
assumption is becoming true enough. We have seen Orwell full of sokemen; in
1086 there is never a sokeman in it; there is no one in it who is above the rank
of a villein. Count Roger and Walter Giffard, Count Alan and Geoffrey de
Mandeville can make such arrangements about the suit of Orwell, the reeveship
of Orwell, as they think fit. Everywhere the Frenchmen are consolidating their
manors, creating demesne land where their English antecessores had none,
devising scientific frontiers, doing what in them lies to make every vill a
manor. Thus is evolved that state of things which comes before us in the
thirteenth century. The work of the foreigners was done so completely that we
can see but very little of the institutions that they swept away.
On the whole, however, we shall do well not to endow
Organization of the free
the free township of the Confessor’s day with much village.
organization. We may be certain that, at least as a
general rule, it had no court; we may doubt very
gravely whether it always had any elder, head-man, or reeve. Often it was a
small and yet a heterogeneous, and a politically distracted body. Some of its
members might be attached to the house of Godwin, some had sworn to live
and die for the house of Leofric. Just because it is free it has few, if any,
communal payments to make. Only if it comes under a single lord will it have
to render a provender rent, a tailla or gersuma. As a sphere for communal
action there remains only the regulation of the arable lands, the woods and
waste. We can not say for certain that these give scope for much regulation.
The arable strips are held in severalty; if by chance some of them are held in
common, this in all probability is a case rather of co-ownership than of
communal ownership. The pasture rights may well be regarded as
and made use of the township. The Domesday commissioners required the
testimony of the priest, the reeve and six villani of every vill. So soon as the
law about suit to the hundred court becomes at all plain, the suit is due rather
from vills than from men, and the burden is discharged by the lord of the vill or
his steward, or, if neither of them can attend, then by the priest, the reeve and
four of the vill’s best men[616].
How could these requirements be met by a vill which
The free village and
had no lord? It would be a fair remark that the Norman government.
existence of such vills is not contemplated by the
Norman rulers. The men who will represent the vill
before the Domesday commissioners will in their eyes be villani. This
assumption is becoming true enough. We have seen Orwell full of sokemen; in
1086 there is never a sokeman in it; there is no one in it who is above the rank
of a villein. Count Roger and Walter Giffard, Count Alan and Geoffrey de
Mandeville can make such arrangements about the suit of Orwell, the reeveship
of Orwell, as they think fit. Everywhere the Frenchmen are consolidating their
manors, creating demesne land where their English antecessores had none,
devising scientific frontiers, doing what in them lies to make every vill a
manor. Thus is evolved that state of things which comes before us in the
thirteenth century. The work of the foreigners was done so completely that we
can see but very little of the institutions that they swept away.
On the whole, however, we shall do well not to endow
Organization of the free
the free township of the Confessor’s day with much village.
organization. We may be certain that, at least as a
general rule, it had no court; we may doubt very
gravely whether it always had any elder, head-man, or reeve. Often it was a
small and yet a heterogeneous, and a politically distracted body. Some of its
members might be attached to the house of Godwin, some had sworn to live
and die for the house of Leofric. Just because it is free it has few, if any,
communal payments to make. Only if it comes under a single lord will it have
to render a provender rent, a tailla or gersuma. As a sphere for communal
action there remains only the regulation of the arable lands, the woods and
waste. We can not say for certain that these give scope for much regulation.
The arable strips are held in severalty; if by chance some of them are held in
common, this in all probability is a case rather of co-ownership than of
communal ownership. The pasture rights may well be regarded as
Page 159
appurtenances of the arable strips. The practice of ‘co-aration’ need not be
enforced by law; the man who will not help his neighbours must be content to
see his own land unploughed. The course of agriculture is fixed and will not be
often or easily altered. The ‘realism’ which roots every right and duty in a
definite patch of soil, the rapid conversion of new arrangements into
immemorial customs, the practice of taking turn and turn about, the practice of
casting lots, these will do much towards settling questions such as our modern
imaginations would solve by means of a village council. No doubt, from time
to time a new departure is made; new land is reclaimed from the waste, perhaps
the pasture rights are stinted or redistributed, a mill is built or a church is
endowed;—but all this requires no periodic assemblies, no organization that we
dare call either permanent or legal. Once in five years or so there may be
something to be done, and done it will be by a resolution of the villagers which
is or calls itself an unanimous resolution. If the Cambridgeshire townships had
been landowning corporations, each of them would have passed as a single unit
into the hands of some Norman baron. But this did not happen. On the contrary,
the Norman barons had to content themselves with intermixed strips; the strips
of Ælfgar’s men went to Count Roger, the strips of Edith’s men went to Count
Alan. We are far from denying the existence of a communal sentiment, of a
notion that somehow or another the men of the vill taken as a whole owned the
lands of the vill, but this sentiment, this notion, if strong was vague. There were
no institutions in which it could realize itself, there was no form of speech or
thought in which it could find an apt expression. It evaded the grasp of law. At
the touch of jurisprudence the township became a mere group of individuals,
each with his separate rights[617].
enforced by law; the man who will not help his neighbours must be content to
see his own land unploughed. The course of agriculture is fixed and will not be
often or easily altered. The ‘realism’ which roots every right and duty in a
definite patch of soil, the rapid conversion of new arrangements into
immemorial customs, the practice of taking turn and turn about, the practice of
casting lots, these will do much towards settling questions such as our modern
imaginations would solve by means of a village council. No doubt, from time
to time a new departure is made; new land is reclaimed from the waste, perhaps
the pasture rights are stinted or redistributed, a mill is built or a church is
endowed;—but all this requires no periodic assemblies, no organization that we
dare call either permanent or legal. Once in five years or so there may be
something to be done, and done it will be by a resolution of the villagers which
is or calls itself an unanimous resolution. If the Cambridgeshire townships had
been landowning corporations, each of them would have passed as a single unit
into the hands of some Norman baron. But this did not happen. On the contrary,
the Norman barons had to content themselves with intermixed strips; the strips
of Ælfgar’s men went to Count Roger, the strips of Edith’s men went to Count
Alan. We are far from denying the existence of a communal sentiment, of a
notion that somehow or another the men of the vill taken as a whole owned the
lands of the vill, but this sentiment, this notion, if strong was vague. There were
no institutions in which it could realize itself, there was no form of speech or
thought in which it could find an apt expression. It evaded the grasp of law. At
the touch of jurisprudence the township became a mere group of individuals,
each with his separate rights[617].
Page 160
Page 161
§ 8. The Feudal Superstructure.
It remains that we should speak very briefly of the
The higher ranks of men.
higher ranks of men and the tenure by which they held
their land. Little accurate information can be extorted
from our record. The upper storeys of the old English edifice have been
demolished and a new superstructure has been reared in their stead. It is not the
office of Domesday Book to tell us much even of the new nobility, of the
services which the counts and barons are to render to the king in return for their
handsome endowments:—as to the old nobility, that has perished. Still there are
some questions that we ought to ask.
The general theory that all land tenure, except indeed
Dependent tenure.
the tenure by which the king holds land in demesne, is
dependent tenure, seems to be implied, not only by
many particular entries, but also by the whole scheme of the book. Every
holder of land, except the king, holds it of (de) some lord, and therefore every
acre of land that is not royal demesne can be arranged under the name of some
tenant in chief. Even a church will hold its land, if not of the king, then of some
other lord[618]. The terms of the tenure are but very rarely described, for
Domesday Book is no feodary. Just now and again a tenure in elemosina is
noticed and in some of these cases this term seems already to bear the technical
sense that it will have in later days; the tenant owes a spiritual, but no secular
service[619]. A few instances of what later lawyers would call a ‘tenure by
divine service,’ as distinct from a tenure in frank-almoin, may be found[620]. A
few words here and there betray the existence of tenure by knight’s service and
of castle guard[621]. In the servientes Regis who have been enfeoffed in divers
counties we may see the predecessors of the tenants by serjeanty[622]. We shall
remark, however, the absence of those abstract terms which are to become the
names of the various tenures. We read of servientes, sochemanni, villani,
burgenses, but not of seriantia[623], socagium, villenagium, burgagium. As we
pursue our retrogressive course through the middle ages, we do not find that
the law of personal condition becomes more and more distinct from the law of
land tenure; on the contrary, the two become less and less separable.
It remains that we should speak very briefly of the
The higher ranks of men.
higher ranks of men and the tenure by which they held
their land. Little accurate information can be extorted
from our record. The upper storeys of the old English edifice have been
demolished and a new superstructure has been reared in their stead. It is not the
office of Domesday Book to tell us much even of the new nobility, of the
services which the counts and barons are to render to the king in return for their
handsome endowments:—as to the old nobility, that has perished. Still there are
some questions that we ought to ask.
The general theory that all land tenure, except indeed
Dependent tenure.
the tenure by which the king holds land in demesne, is
dependent tenure, seems to be implied, not only by
many particular entries, but also by the whole scheme of the book. Every
holder of land, except the king, holds it of (de) some lord, and therefore every
acre of land that is not royal demesne can be arranged under the name of some
tenant in chief. Even a church will hold its land, if not of the king, then of some
other lord[618]. The terms of the tenure are but very rarely described, for
Domesday Book is no feodary. Just now and again a tenure in elemosina is
noticed and in some of these cases this term seems already to bear the technical
sense that it will have in later days; the tenant owes a spiritual, but no secular
service[619]. A few instances of what later lawyers would call a ‘tenure by
divine service,’ as distinct from a tenure in frank-almoin, may be found[620]. A
few words here and there betray the existence of tenure by knight’s service and
of castle guard[621]. In the servientes Regis who have been enfeoffed in divers
counties we may see the predecessors of the tenants by serjeanty[622]. We shall
remark, however, the absence of those abstract terms which are to become the
names of the various tenures. We read of servientes, sochemanni, villani,
burgenses, but not of seriantia[623], socagium, villenagium, burgagium. As we
pursue our retrogressive course through the middle ages, we do not find that
the law of personal condition becomes more and more distinct from the law of
land tenure; on the contrary, the two become less and less separable.
Page 162
It has sometimes been said that a feudal tenure was the
Feudum.
only kind of land tenure that the Norman conquerors
could conceive. In a certain sense this may be true, but
we should have preferred to say that probably they could not easily conceive a
kind of tenure that was not dependent:—every one who holds land (except he
be the king) holds it of someone else. The adjective ‘feudal’ was not in their
vocabulary, and their use of the word feudum—occasionally we meet the older
feum[624]—is exceedingly obscure. Very rarely does it denote a tenure or a mass
of rights; usually, though it may connote rights of a certain order, it denotes a
stretch of land; thus we may read of the fee of the Bishop of Bayeux, thereby
being meant the territory which the bishop holds. Occasionally, however, we
hear of a man holding land in feudo. One instance may be enough to show that
such a phrase did not imply military tenure:—‘William the Chamberlain held
this manor in feudo of the Queen [Matilda] at a rent of £3 a year and after her
death he held it in the same fashion of the king[625].’ All sense of militariness,
and all sense of precariousness, that the word has ever had in its continental
history, seems to be disappearing. Already the process has begun which will
make it applicable to every person who has heritable rights in land. William the
Chamberlain is, we take it, already a fee farmer, that is, a rent-paying tenant
with heritable rights[626]. As to the word beneficium, which feum or feudum has
been supplanting, we shall hardly find it with its old meaning. It seems to be
holding its own only within the sphere of ecclesiastical rights, where the
‘benefice’ will survive until our own day[627].
A yet more interesting and equally foreign word is not
Alodium.
unfrequently used, namely, alodium. The Norman
commissioners deemed that a large number of English
tenants in Kent, Sussex, Surrey and Hampshire and some in Berkshire had been
alodiarii or aloarii and had held in alodium or sicut alodium. The appearance
of this term in one district and in one only is far from proving that there had
been anything peculiar in the law of that district. It may well be a mere chance
that the liberi homines of other counties are not called alodiaries. Still in
Hampshire, where alodiaries abounded, it was not every free man holding land
who had an alod[628]. Perhaps we shall be right in thinking that the term
pointed to heritability:—the free man who holds land but has no alod has only
an estate for life. Certainly it does not mean that the tenant has no lord. The
alodiary may hold his alod ‘of’ his lord[629]; he may owe service to his
lord[630]; he may pay a relief[631]; he may have no power ‘to withdraw himself
with his land’ from his lord[632]. The Norman lawyers had no speculative
Feudum.
only kind of land tenure that the Norman conquerors
could conceive. In a certain sense this may be true, but
we should have preferred to say that probably they could not easily conceive a
kind of tenure that was not dependent:—every one who holds land (except he
be the king) holds it of someone else. The adjective ‘feudal’ was not in their
vocabulary, and their use of the word feudum—occasionally we meet the older
feum[624]—is exceedingly obscure. Very rarely does it denote a tenure or a mass
of rights; usually, though it may connote rights of a certain order, it denotes a
stretch of land; thus we may read of the fee of the Bishop of Bayeux, thereby
being meant the territory which the bishop holds. Occasionally, however, we
hear of a man holding land in feudo. One instance may be enough to show that
such a phrase did not imply military tenure:—‘William the Chamberlain held
this manor in feudo of the Queen [Matilda] at a rent of £3 a year and after her
death he held it in the same fashion of the king[625].’ All sense of militariness,
and all sense of precariousness, that the word has ever had in its continental
history, seems to be disappearing. Already the process has begun which will
make it applicable to every person who has heritable rights in land. William the
Chamberlain is, we take it, already a fee farmer, that is, a rent-paying tenant
with heritable rights[626]. As to the word beneficium, which feum or feudum has
been supplanting, we shall hardly find it with its old meaning. It seems to be
holding its own only within the sphere of ecclesiastical rights, where the
‘benefice’ will survive until our own day[627].
A yet more interesting and equally foreign word is not
Alodium.
unfrequently used, namely, alodium. The Norman
commissioners deemed that a large number of English
tenants in Kent, Sussex, Surrey and Hampshire and some in Berkshire had been
alodiarii or aloarii and had held in alodium or sicut alodium. The appearance
of this term in one district and in one only is far from proving that there had
been anything peculiar in the law of that district. It may well be a mere chance
that the liberi homines of other counties are not called alodiaries. Still in
Hampshire, where alodiaries abounded, it was not every free man holding land
who had an alod[628]. Perhaps we shall be right in thinking that the term
pointed to heritability:—the free man who holds land but has no alod has only
an estate for life. Certainly it does not mean that the tenant has no lord. The
alodiary may hold his alod ‘of’ his lord[629]; he may owe service to his
lord[630]; he may pay a relief[631]; he may have no power ‘to withdraw himself
with his land’ from his lord[632]. The Norman lawyers had no speculative
Page 163
objection to the existence of alodiaries; it in no way contradicted such doctrine
of tenure as they had formed. In 1086 there were still alodiaries in
Berkshire[633], and in royal charters of a much later day there is talk of the
alodiaries of Kent as of an existing class[634]. It is just possible that William’s
commissioners saw some difference between holding in feudo and holding in
alodio. If ever they contrasted the two words, they may have hinted that while
the feudum has been given by the lord to the man, the alodium has been
brought by the man to the lord; but we can not be very certain that they ever
opposed these terms to each other[635]. Such sparse evidence as we can obtain
from Normandy strengthens our belief that the wide, the almost insuperable,
gulf that modern theorists have found or have set between ‘alodial ownership’
and ‘feudal tenure’ was not perceptible in the eleventh century[636]. It can be no
part of our task to trace the history of these terms alodium and feudum behind
the date at which they are brought into England, but hereafter we shall see that
here in England a process had been at work which, had these terms been in use,
would have brought the alod very near to the feud, the feud very near to the
alod.
It is probable that this process had gone somewhat
Application of the
further in Normandy than in England. It is probable formula of dependent
that the Normans knew that in imposing upon all tenure.
English lands ‘the formula of dependent tenure’ they
were simplifying matters. They seem to think, and they may be pretty right in
thinking, that every English land-holder had held his land under (sub) some
lord; but apparently they do not think that every English land-holder had held
his land of (de) some lord. Not unfrequently they show that this is so. Thus one
Sigar holds a piece of Cambridgeshire of Geoffrey de Mandeville; he used to
hold it under Æsgar the Staller[637]. We catch a slight shade of difference
between the two prepositions; sub lays stress on the lord’s power, which may
well be of a personal or justiciary, rather than of a proprietary kind, while de
imports a theory about the origin of the tenure; it makes the tenant’s rights look
like derivative rights:—it is supposed that he gets his land from his lord. And at
least in the eastern counties—so it may well have seemed to the Normans—
matters sadly needed simplification. Even elsewhere and when a large estate is
at stake they can not always get an answer to the question ‘Of whom was this
land holden[638]?’ Still they thought that some of the greatest men in the realm
had held their lands, or some of their lands, of the king or of someone else. The
formulas which are used throughout the description of Hampshire and some
other counties seem to assume that every holder of a manor, at all events if a
of tenure as they had formed. In 1086 there were still alodiaries in
Berkshire[633], and in royal charters of a much later day there is talk of the
alodiaries of Kent as of an existing class[634]. It is just possible that William’s
commissioners saw some difference between holding in feudo and holding in
alodio. If ever they contrasted the two words, they may have hinted that while
the feudum has been given by the lord to the man, the alodium has been
brought by the man to the lord; but we can not be very certain that they ever
opposed these terms to each other[635]. Such sparse evidence as we can obtain
from Normandy strengthens our belief that the wide, the almost insuperable,
gulf that modern theorists have found or have set between ‘alodial ownership’
and ‘feudal tenure’ was not perceptible in the eleventh century[636]. It can be no
part of our task to trace the history of these terms alodium and feudum behind
the date at which they are brought into England, but hereafter we shall see that
here in England a process had been at work which, had these terms been in use,
would have brought the alod very near to the feud, the feud very near to the
alod.
It is probable that this process had gone somewhat
Application of the
further in Normandy than in England. It is probable formula of dependent
that the Normans knew that in imposing upon all tenure.
English lands ‘the formula of dependent tenure’ they
were simplifying matters. They seem to think, and they may be pretty right in
thinking, that every English land-holder had held his land under (sub) some
lord; but apparently they do not think that every English land-holder had held
his land of (de) some lord. Not unfrequently they show that this is so. Thus one
Sigar holds a piece of Cambridgeshire of Geoffrey de Mandeville; he used to
hold it under Æsgar the Staller[637]. We catch a slight shade of difference
between the two prepositions; sub lays stress on the lord’s power, which may
well be of a personal or justiciary, rather than of a proprietary kind, while de
imports a theory about the origin of the tenure; it makes the tenant’s rights look
like derivative rights:—it is supposed that he gets his land from his lord. And at
least in the eastern counties—so it may well have seemed to the Normans—
matters sadly needed simplification. Even elsewhere and when a large estate is
at stake they can not always get an answer to the question ‘Of whom was this
land holden[638]?’ Still they thought that some of the greatest men in the realm
had held their lands, or some of their lands, of the king or of someone else. The
formulas which are used throughout the description of Hampshire and some
other counties seem to assume that every holder of a manor, at all events if a
Page 164
layman, had held it of the king, if he did not hold it of another lord. Tenure in
feudo again they regarded as no innovation[639]. They saw the work of
subinfeudation:—Brihtmær held land of Azor and Azor of Harold; we may well
suppose that Harold held it of the king and that some villeins held part of it of
Brihtmær, and thus we see already a feudal ladder with no less than five
rungs[640]. They saw that the thegns owed ‘service’ to their lords[641]. They saw
the heriot; they sometimes called it a relief[642]. We can not be sure that this
change of names imported any change in the law; when a burgess of Hereford
died the king took a heriot, but if he could not get the heriot he took the dead
man’s land[643]. They saw that in certain cases an heir had to ‘seek’ his
ancestor’s lord if he wished to enjoy his ancestor’s land[644]. They saw that
many a free man could not give or sell his land without his lord’s consent. They
saw that great and powerful men could not give or sell their land without the
king’s consent[645].
They saw something very like military tenure. No
Military tenure.
matter with which we have to deal is darker than the
constitution of the English army on the eve of its
defeat. We may indeed safely believe that no English king had ever
relinquished the right to call upon all the free men of his realm to resist an
invader. On the other hand, it seems quite clear that, as a matter of fact, ‘the
host’ was no longer ‘the nation in arms.’ The common folk of a shire could
hardly be got to fight outside their shire, and ill-armed troops of peasants were
now of little avail. The only army upon which the king could habitually rely
was a small force. The city of Oxford sent but twenty men or twenty
pounds[646]: Leicester sent twelve men[647]: Warwick sent ten[648]. In Berkshire
the law was that, if the king called out the host, one soldier (miles) should go
for every five hides and should receive from each hide four shillings as his
stipend for two months’ service. If the man who was summoned made default,
he forfeited all his land to the king; but there were cases in which he might
send one of his men as a substitute, and for a default committed by his
substitute he suffered no forfeiture, but only a fine of fifty shillings[649]. It is
probable that a similar ‘five hide rule’ obtained throughout a large part of
England. The borough of Wilton was bound to send twenty shillings or one
man ‘as for an honour of five hides[650].’ When an army or a fleet was called
out, Exeter ‘served to the amount of five hides[651].’ All this points to a small
force of well armed soldiers. For example, ‘the five hide rule’ would be
satisfied if Worcestershire sent a contingent of 240 men. But not only was the
army small; it was a territorial army; it grew out of the soil.
feudo again they regarded as no innovation[639]. They saw the work of
subinfeudation:—Brihtmær held land of Azor and Azor of Harold; we may well
suppose that Harold held it of the king and that some villeins held part of it of
Brihtmær, and thus we see already a feudal ladder with no less than five
rungs[640]. They saw that the thegns owed ‘service’ to their lords[641]. They saw
the heriot; they sometimes called it a relief[642]. We can not be sure that this
change of names imported any change in the law; when a burgess of Hereford
died the king took a heriot, but if he could not get the heriot he took the dead
man’s land[643]. They saw that in certain cases an heir had to ‘seek’ his
ancestor’s lord if he wished to enjoy his ancestor’s land[644]. They saw that
many a free man could not give or sell his land without his lord’s consent. They
saw that great and powerful men could not give or sell their land without the
king’s consent[645].
They saw something very like military tenure. No
Military tenure.
matter with which we have to deal is darker than the
constitution of the English army on the eve of its
defeat. We may indeed safely believe that no English king had ever
relinquished the right to call upon all the free men of his realm to resist an
invader. On the other hand, it seems quite clear that, as a matter of fact, ‘the
host’ was no longer ‘the nation in arms.’ The common folk of a shire could
hardly be got to fight outside their shire, and ill-armed troops of peasants were
now of little avail. The only army upon which the king could habitually rely
was a small force. The city of Oxford sent but twenty men or twenty
pounds[646]: Leicester sent twelve men[647]: Warwick sent ten[648]. In Berkshire
the law was that, if the king called out the host, one soldier (miles) should go
for every five hides and should receive from each hide four shillings as his
stipend for two months’ service. If the man who was summoned made default,
he forfeited all his land to the king; but there were cases in which he might
send one of his men as a substitute, and for a default committed by his
substitute he suffered no forfeiture, but only a fine of fifty shillings[649]. It is
probable that a similar ‘five hide rule’ obtained throughout a large part of
England. The borough of Wilton was bound to send twenty shillings or one
man ‘as for an honour of five hides[650].’ When an army or a fleet was called
out, Exeter ‘served to the amount of five hides[651].’ All this points to a small
force of well armed soldiers. For example, ‘the five hide rule’ would be
satisfied if Worcestershire sent a contingent of 240 men. But not only was the
army small; it was a territorial army; it grew out of the soil.
Page 165
At first sight this ‘five hide rule’ may seem to have in it
The army and the land.
little that is akin to a feudal system of knights’ fees. We
may suppose that it will work thus:—The host is
summoned; the number of hides in each hundred is known. To despatch a
company of soldiers proportioned to the number of the hides, for example
twenty warriors if the hundred contains just one hundred hides, is the business
of the hundred court and the question ‘Who must go?’ will be answered by
election, rotation or lot. But it is not probable that the territorializing process
will stop here, and this for several reasons. An army that can not be mobilized
without the action of the hundred moots is not a handy force. While the
hundredors are deliberating the Danes or Welshmen will be burning and
slaying. Also a king will not easily be content with the responsibility of a
fluctuating and indeterminate body of hundredors; he will insist, if he can, that
there must be some one person answerable to him for each unit of military
power. A serviceable system will not have been established until the country is
divided into ‘five-hide-units,’ until every man’s holding is such an unit, or is
composed of several such units, or is an aliquot share of such an unit. Then
again the holdings with which the rule will have to deal are not homogeneous;
they are not all of one and the same order. It is not as though to each plot of
land there corresponded some one person who was the only person interested
in it; the occupiers of the soil have lords and again those lords have lords. The
king will insist, if he can, that the lords who stand high in this scale must
answer to him for the service that is due from all the lands over which they
exercise a dominion, and then he will leave them free to settle, as between
themselves and their dependants, the ultimate incidence of the burden:—thus
room will be made for the play of free contract. At all events when, as is not
unusual, some lord is the lord of a whole hundred and of its court, the king will
regard him as personally liable for the production of the whole contingent that
is due from that hundred. In this way a system will be evolved which for many
practical purposes will be indistinguishable from the system of knights’ fees,
and all this without any help from the definitely feudal idea that military
service is the return which the tenant makes to the lord for the gift of land that
the lord has made to the tenant.
That this process had already done much of its work
Feudalism and army
when the old English army received its last summons, service.
we can not doubt, though it is very possible that this
work had been done sporadically. We see that the land
was being plotted out into five-hide-units. In one passage the Norman clerks
The army and the land.
little that is akin to a feudal system of knights’ fees. We
may suppose that it will work thus:—The host is
summoned; the number of hides in each hundred is known. To despatch a
company of soldiers proportioned to the number of the hides, for example
twenty warriors if the hundred contains just one hundred hides, is the business
of the hundred court and the question ‘Who must go?’ will be answered by
election, rotation or lot. But it is not probable that the territorializing process
will stop here, and this for several reasons. An army that can not be mobilized
without the action of the hundred moots is not a handy force. While the
hundredors are deliberating the Danes or Welshmen will be burning and
slaying. Also a king will not easily be content with the responsibility of a
fluctuating and indeterminate body of hundredors; he will insist, if he can, that
there must be some one person answerable to him for each unit of military
power. A serviceable system will not have been established until the country is
divided into ‘five-hide-units,’ until every man’s holding is such an unit, or is
composed of several such units, or is an aliquot share of such an unit. Then
again the holdings with which the rule will have to deal are not homogeneous;
they are not all of one and the same order. It is not as though to each plot of
land there corresponded some one person who was the only person interested
in it; the occupiers of the soil have lords and again those lords have lords. The
king will insist, if he can, that the lords who stand high in this scale must
answer to him for the service that is due from all the lands over which they
exercise a dominion, and then he will leave them free to settle, as between
themselves and their dependants, the ultimate incidence of the burden:—thus
room will be made for the play of free contract. At all events when, as is not
unusual, some lord is the lord of a whole hundred and of its court, the king will
regard him as personally liable for the production of the whole contingent that
is due from that hundred. In this way a system will be evolved which for many
practical purposes will be indistinguishable from the system of knights’ fees,
and all this without any help from the definitely feudal idea that military
service is the return which the tenant makes to the lord for the gift of land that
the lord has made to the tenant.
That this process had already done much of its work
Feudalism and army
when the old English army received its last summons, service.
we can not doubt, though it is very possible that this
work had been done sporadically. We see that the land
was being plotted out into five-hide-units. In one passage the Norman clerks
Page 166
call such a unit an honour, an ‘honour of five hides[652].’ There is an old theory
based upon legal texts that such an honour qualifies its lord or owner to be a
thegn. If a ceorl prospers so that he has five hides ‘to the king’s útware,’ that is,
an estate rated as five hides for military purposes, he is worthy of a thegn’s
wergild[653]. Then the Anglo-Saxon charters show us how the kings have been
endowing their thegns with tracts of territory which are deemed to contain just
five or some multiple of five hides[654]. The thegn with five hides will have
tenants below him; but none of them need serve in the host if their lord goes, as
he ought to go, in person. Then each of these territorial units continues to owe
the same quantum of military service, though the number of persons interested
in it be increased or diminished, and thus the ultimate incidence of the duty
becomes the subject-matter of private arrangements. That is the point of a story
from Lincolnshire which we have already recounted:—A man’s land descends
to his four sons; they divide it equally and agree to take turns in doing the
military service that is due from it; but only the eldest of them is to be the
king’s man[655]. Then we see that the great nobles lead or send to the war all the
milites that are due from the lands over which they have a seignory. There are
already wide lands which owe military service—we can not put it otherwise—
to the bishop of Winchester as lord of Taunton:—they owe ‘attendance in the
host along with the men of the bishop[656].’ The churches of Worcester and
Evesham fell out about certain lands at Hamton; one of the disputed questions
was whether or no Hamton ought to do its military service ‘in the bishop’s
hundred of Oswaldslaw’ or elsewhere[657]. This question we take to be one of
great importance to the bishop. Lord of the triple hundred of Oswaldslaw, lord
of three hundred hides, he is bound to put sixty warriors into the field and he is
anxious that men who ought to be helping him to make up this tale shall not be
serving in another contingent.
But from Worcestershire we obtain a still more
Default of service.
precious piece of information. The custom of that
county is this:—When the king summons the host and
his summons is disregarded by one who is a lord with jurisdiction, ‘by one who
is so free a man that he has sake and soke and can go with his land where he
pleases,’ then all his lands are in the king’s mercy. But if the defaulter be the
man of another lord and the lord sends a substitute in his stead, then he, the
defaulter, must pay forty shillings to his lord,—to his lord, not to the king, for
the king has had the service that was due; but if the lord does not send a
substitute, then the forty shillings which the defaulter pays to the lord, the lord
must pay to the king[658]. A feudalist of the straiter sort might well find fault
based upon legal texts that such an honour qualifies its lord or owner to be a
thegn. If a ceorl prospers so that he has five hides ‘to the king’s útware,’ that is,
an estate rated as five hides for military purposes, he is worthy of a thegn’s
wergild[653]. Then the Anglo-Saxon charters show us how the kings have been
endowing their thegns with tracts of territory which are deemed to contain just
five or some multiple of five hides[654]. The thegn with five hides will have
tenants below him; but none of them need serve in the host if their lord goes, as
he ought to go, in person. Then each of these territorial units continues to owe
the same quantum of military service, though the number of persons interested
in it be increased or diminished, and thus the ultimate incidence of the duty
becomes the subject-matter of private arrangements. That is the point of a story
from Lincolnshire which we have already recounted:—A man’s land descends
to his four sons; they divide it equally and agree to take turns in doing the
military service that is due from it; but only the eldest of them is to be the
king’s man[655]. Then we see that the great nobles lead or send to the war all the
milites that are due from the lands over which they have a seignory. There are
already wide lands which owe military service—we can not put it otherwise—
to the bishop of Winchester as lord of Taunton:—they owe ‘attendance in the
host along with the men of the bishop[656].’ The churches of Worcester and
Evesham fell out about certain lands at Hamton; one of the disputed questions
was whether or no Hamton ought to do its military service ‘in the bishop’s
hundred of Oswaldslaw’ or elsewhere[657]. This question we take to be one of
great importance to the bishop. Lord of the triple hundred of Oswaldslaw, lord
of three hundred hides, he is bound to put sixty warriors into the field and he is
anxious that men who ought to be helping him to make up this tale shall not be
serving in another contingent.
But from Worcestershire we obtain a still more
Default of service.
precious piece of information. The custom of that
county is this:—When the king summons the host and
his summons is disregarded by one who is a lord with jurisdiction, ‘by one who
is so free a man that he has sake and soke and can go with his land where he
pleases,’ then all his lands are in the king’s mercy. But if the defaulter be the
man of another lord and the lord sends a substitute in his stead, then he, the
defaulter, must pay forty shillings to his lord,—to his lord, not to the king, for
the king has had the service that was due; but if the lord does not send a
substitute, then the forty shillings which the defaulter pays to the lord, the lord
must pay to the king[658]. A feudalist of the straiter sort might well find fault
Page 167
with this rule. He might object that the lord ought to forfeit his land, not only if
he himself fails to attend the host, but also if he fails to bring with him his due
tale of milites. Feudalism was not perfected in a day. Still here we have the root
of the matter—the lord is bound to bring into the field a certain number of
milites, perhaps one man from every five hides, and if he can not bring those
who are bound to follow him, he must bring others or pay a fine. His man, on
the other hand, is bound to him and is not bound to the king. That man by
shirking his duty will commit no offence against the king. The king is ceasing
to care about the ultimate incidence of the military burden, because he relies
upon the responsibility of the magnates. How this system worked in the eastern
counties where the power of the magnates was feebler, we can not tell. It is not
improbable that one of the forces that is attaching the small free proprietors to
the manors of their lords is this ‘five hide rule’; they are being compelled to
bring their acres into five-hide-units, to club together under the
superintendence of a lord who will answer for them to the king, while as to the
villeins, so seldom have they fought that they are ceasing to be ‘fyrd-
worthy[659].’ But in the west we have already what in substance are knights’
fees. The Bishop of Worcester held 300 hides over which he had sake and soke
and all customs; he was bound to put 60 milites into the field; if he failed in this
duty he had to pay 40 shillings for each deficient miles. At the beginning of
Henry II.’s reign he was charged with 60 knights’ fees[660].
We are not doubting that the Conqueror defined the
The new military service.
amount of military service that was to be due to him
from each of his tenants in chief, nor are we suggesting
that he paid respect to the rule about the five hides, but it seems questionable
whether he introduced any very new principle. A new theoretic element may
come to the front, a contractual element:—the tenant in chief must bring up his
knights because that is the service that was stipulated for when he received his
land. But we cannot say that even this theory was unfamiliar to the English.
The rulers of the churches had been giving or ‘loaning’ lands to thegns. In so
doing they had not been dissipating the wealth of the saints without receiving
some ‘valuable consideration’ for the gift or the loan (lǽn); they looked to their
thegns for the military service that their land owed to the king. To this point we
must return in our next essay; but quite apart from definitely feudal bargains
between the king and his magnates, between the magnates and their
dependants, a definition of the duty of military service which connects it with
the ownership of land (and to such a definition men will come so soon as the
well-armed few can defeat the ill-armed many) will naturally produce a state of
he himself fails to attend the host, but also if he fails to bring with him his due
tale of milites. Feudalism was not perfected in a day. Still here we have the root
of the matter—the lord is bound to bring into the field a certain number of
milites, perhaps one man from every five hides, and if he can not bring those
who are bound to follow him, he must bring others or pay a fine. His man, on
the other hand, is bound to him and is not bound to the king. That man by
shirking his duty will commit no offence against the king. The king is ceasing
to care about the ultimate incidence of the military burden, because he relies
upon the responsibility of the magnates. How this system worked in the eastern
counties where the power of the magnates was feebler, we can not tell. It is not
improbable that one of the forces that is attaching the small free proprietors to
the manors of their lords is this ‘five hide rule’; they are being compelled to
bring their acres into five-hide-units, to club together under the
superintendence of a lord who will answer for them to the king, while as to the
villeins, so seldom have they fought that they are ceasing to be ‘fyrd-
worthy[659].’ But in the west we have already what in substance are knights’
fees. The Bishop of Worcester held 300 hides over which he had sake and soke
and all customs; he was bound to put 60 milites into the field; if he failed in this
duty he had to pay 40 shillings for each deficient miles. At the beginning of
Henry II.’s reign he was charged with 60 knights’ fees[660].
We are not doubting that the Conqueror defined the
The new military service.
amount of military service that was to be due to him
from each of his tenants in chief, nor are we suggesting
that he paid respect to the rule about the five hides, but it seems questionable
whether he introduced any very new principle. A new theoretic element may
come to the front, a contractual element:—the tenant in chief must bring up his
knights because that is the service that was stipulated for when he received his
land. But we cannot say that even this theory was unfamiliar to the English.
The rulers of the churches had been giving or ‘loaning’ lands to thegns. In so
doing they had not been dissipating the wealth of the saints without receiving
some ‘valuable consideration’ for the gift or the loan (lǽn); they looked to their
thegns for the military service that their land owed to the king. To this point we
must return in our next essay; but quite apart from definitely feudal bargains
between the king and his magnates, between the magnates and their
dependants, a definition of the duty of military service which connects it with
the ownership of land (and to such a definition men will come so soon as the
well-armed few can defeat the ill-armed many) will naturally produce a state of
Page 168
things which will be patient of, even if it will not engender, a purely feudal
explanation. If one of the men to whom the Bishop of Worcester looks for
military service makes a default, the fine that is due from him will go to the
bishop, not to the king. Why so? One explanation will be that the bishop has
over him a sake and soke of the very highest order, which comprehends even
that fyrd-wíte, that fine for the neglect of military duty, which is one of the
usually reserved pleas of the crown[661]. Another explanation will be that this
man has broken a contract that he made with the bishop and therefore owes
amends to the bishop:—to the bishop, not to the king, who was no party to the
contract. Sometimes the one explanation will be the truer, sometimes the other.
Sometimes both will be true enough. As a matter of fact, we believe that these
men of the Bishop of Worcester or their predecessors in title have solemnly
promised to do whatever service the king demands from the bishop[662]. Still
we can hardly doubt which of the two explanations is the older, and, if we
attribute to the Norman invaders, as perhaps we may, a definite apprehension of
the theory that knight’s service is the outcome of feudal compacts, this still
leaves open the inquiry whether the past history of military service in
Frankland had not been very like the past history of military service in
England. Already in the days of Charles the Great the duty of fighting the
Emperor’s battles was being bound up with the tenure of land by the operation
of a rule very similar to that of which we have been speaking. The owner of
three (at a later time of four) manses was to serve; men who held but a manse
apiece were to group themselves together to supply soldiers. Then at a later
time the feudal theory of free contract was brought in to explain an already
existing state of things[663].
Closely connected with this matter is another thorny
The thegns.
topic, namely, the status of the thegn and the relation of
the thegn to his lord. In the Confessor’s day many
maneria had been held by thegns; some of them were still holding their lands
when the survey was made and were still called thegns. The king’s thegns were
numerous, but the queen also had thegns, the earls had thegns, the churches had
thegns and we find thegns ascribed to men who were neither earls nor prelates
but themselves were thegns[664]. Many of the king’s thegns were able to give or
sell the lands that they held, ‘to go to whatever lord they pleased[665].’ On the
other hand, many of the thegns of the churches held lands which they could not
‘withdraw’ from the churches[666]; in other words ‘the thegn-lands’ of the
church could not be separated from the church[667]. The Conqueror respected
the bond that tied them to the church. The Abbot of Ely complained to him that
explanation. If one of the men to whom the Bishop of Worcester looks for
military service makes a default, the fine that is due from him will go to the
bishop, not to the king. Why so? One explanation will be that the bishop has
over him a sake and soke of the very highest order, which comprehends even
that fyrd-wíte, that fine for the neglect of military duty, which is one of the
usually reserved pleas of the crown[661]. Another explanation will be that this
man has broken a contract that he made with the bishop and therefore owes
amends to the bishop:—to the bishop, not to the king, who was no party to the
contract. Sometimes the one explanation will be the truer, sometimes the other.
Sometimes both will be true enough. As a matter of fact, we believe that these
men of the Bishop of Worcester or their predecessors in title have solemnly
promised to do whatever service the king demands from the bishop[662]. Still
we can hardly doubt which of the two explanations is the older, and, if we
attribute to the Norman invaders, as perhaps we may, a definite apprehension of
the theory that knight’s service is the outcome of feudal compacts, this still
leaves open the inquiry whether the past history of military service in
Frankland had not been very like the past history of military service in
England. Already in the days of Charles the Great the duty of fighting the
Emperor’s battles was being bound up with the tenure of land by the operation
of a rule very similar to that of which we have been speaking. The owner of
three (at a later time of four) manses was to serve; men who held but a manse
apiece were to group themselves together to supply soldiers. Then at a later
time the feudal theory of free contract was brought in to explain an already
existing state of things[663].
Closely connected with this matter is another thorny
The thegns.
topic, namely, the status of the thegn and the relation of
the thegn to his lord. In the Confessor’s day many
maneria had been held by thegns; some of them were still holding their lands
when the survey was made and were still called thegns. The king’s thegns were
numerous, but the queen also had thegns, the earls had thegns, the churches had
thegns and we find thegns ascribed to men who were neither earls nor prelates
but themselves were thegns[664]. Many of the king’s thegns were able to give or
sell the lands that they held, ‘to go to whatever lord they pleased[665].’ On the
other hand, many of the thegns of the churches held lands which they could not
‘withdraw’ from the churches[666]; in other words ‘the thegn-lands’ of the
church could not be separated from the church[667]. The Conqueror respected
the bond that tied them to the church. The Abbot of Ely complained to him that
Page 169
the foreigners had been abstracting the lands of St. Etheldreda. His answer was
that her demesne manors must at once be given back to her, while as for the
men who have occupied her thegnlands, they must either make their peace with
the abbot or surrender their holdings[668]. Thus the abbot seems to have had the
benefit of that forfeiture which his thegns incurred by espousing the cause of
Harold. We see therefore that the relation between thegn, lord and land varied
from case to case. The land might have proceeded from the lord and be held of
the lord by the thegn as a perpetually inheritable estate, or as an estate granted
to him for life, or granted to him and two successive heirs[669]; on the other
hand, the lord’s hold over the land might be slight and the bond between thegn
and lord might be a mere commendation which the thegn could at any time
dissolve. Again, the relation between thegn and lord is no longer conceived as a
menial, ‘serviential’ or ministerial relation. The Taini Regis are often contrasted
with the Servientes Regis[670]. The one trait of thegnship which comes out
clearly on the face of our record is that the thegn is a man of war[671]. But even
this trait is obscured by language which seems to show that there has been a
great redistribution of military service. Though there is no Latin word that will
translate thegn except miles, though these two terms are never contrasted with
each other, and though there are thegns still existing, still of these two terms
one belongs to the old, the other to the new order of things[672]. Thus thegnship
is already becoming antiquated and we are left to guess from older dooms and
later Leges what was its essence in the days of King Edward.
The task is difficult for we can see that this institution
Nature of thegnship.
has undergone many changes in the course of a long
history and yet can not tell how much has remained
unchanged. We begin by thinking of thegnship as a relation between two men.
The thegn is somebody’s thegn. The household of the great man, but more
especially the king’s household, is the cradle of thegnship. The king’s thegns
are his free servants—servants but also companions. In peace they have duties
to perform about his court and about his person; they are his body-guard in war.
Then the king—and other great lords follow his example—begins to give lands
to his thegns, and thus the nature of the thegnship is modified. The thegn no
longer lives in his lord’s court; he is a warrior endowed with land. Then the
thegnship becomes more than a relationship, it becomes a status. The thegn is a
‘twelve hundred man’; his wergild and his oath countervail those of six ceorls.
This status seems to be hereditary; the thegn’s sons are ‘dearer born’ than are
the sons of the ceorl[673]. But we can not tell how far this principle is carried.
We can not easily reconcile this hereditary transmission of thegn-right with the
that her demesne manors must at once be given back to her, while as for the
men who have occupied her thegnlands, they must either make their peace with
the abbot or surrender their holdings[668]. Thus the abbot seems to have had the
benefit of that forfeiture which his thegns incurred by espousing the cause of
Harold. We see therefore that the relation between thegn, lord and land varied
from case to case. The land might have proceeded from the lord and be held of
the lord by the thegn as a perpetually inheritable estate, or as an estate granted
to him for life, or granted to him and two successive heirs[669]; on the other
hand, the lord’s hold over the land might be slight and the bond between thegn
and lord might be a mere commendation which the thegn could at any time
dissolve. Again, the relation between thegn and lord is no longer conceived as a
menial, ‘serviential’ or ministerial relation. The Taini Regis are often contrasted
with the Servientes Regis[670]. The one trait of thegnship which comes out
clearly on the face of our record is that the thegn is a man of war[671]. But even
this trait is obscured by language which seems to show that there has been a
great redistribution of military service. Though there is no Latin word that will
translate thegn except miles, though these two terms are never contrasted with
each other, and though there are thegns still existing, still of these two terms
one belongs to the old, the other to the new order of things[672]. Thus thegnship
is already becoming antiquated and we are left to guess from older dooms and
later Leges what was its essence in the days of King Edward.
The task is difficult for we can see that this institution
Nature of thegnship.
has undergone many changes in the course of a long
history and yet can not tell how much has remained
unchanged. We begin by thinking of thegnship as a relation between two men.
The thegn is somebody’s thegn. The household of the great man, but more
especially the king’s household, is the cradle of thegnship. The king’s thegns
are his free servants—servants but also companions. In peace they have duties
to perform about his court and about his person; they are his body-guard in war.
Then the king—and other great lords follow his example—begins to give lands
to his thegns, and thus the nature of the thegnship is modified. The thegn no
longer lives in his lord’s court; he is a warrior endowed with land. Then the
thegnship becomes more than a relationship, it becomes a status. The thegn is a
‘twelve hundred man’; his wergild and his oath countervail those of six ceorls.
This status seems to be hereditary; the thegn’s sons are ‘dearer born’ than are
the sons of the ceorl[673]. But we can not tell how far this principle is carried.
We can not easily reconcile this hereditary transmission of thegn-right with the
Page 170
original principle that thegnship is a relation between two men. We may have
thegns who are nobody’s thegns, or else we may have persons entitled to the
thegnly wergild who yet are not thegns. What is more, since the law which
regulates the inheritance of land does not favour the first-born, we may have
poor thegns and landless thegns. Yet another principle comes into play. A duty
of finding well armed warriors for the host is being territorialized; every five
hides should find a soldier. The thegn from of old has to attend the host with
adequate equipment; the men who under the new system have to attend the host
with horse and heavy armour are usually thegns. Then the man who has five
hides, and who therefore ought to put a warrior into the field, is a thegn or is
entitled to be a thegn. The ceorl obtains the thegnly wergild if he has an estate
rated for military purposes at five hides. Another version of this tradition
requires of the ceorl who ‘thrives to thegn-right’ five hides of his own land, a
church, a kitchen, a house in the burh, a special office in the king’s hall. To be
‘worthy of thegn-right’ may be one thing, to be a thegn, another. To be a thegn
one must be some one’s thegn. The prosperous ceorl will be no thegn until he
has put himself under some lord. But the bond between him and his lord may
be dissoluble at will and may hardly affect his land. It is, we repeat, very
difficult to discover how these various principles were working together,
checking and controlling each other in the first half of the eleventh century.
Several inconsistent elements seem to be blended. There is the element of
hereditary caste:—the thegn transmits thegnly blood to his offspring. There is
the element of personal relationship:—he is the thegn of some lord and owes
fealty to that lord. There is the military element:—he is a warrior who has
horse and heavy armour and is bound to fight the nation’s battles. Connected
with this last there is the proprietary element:—each five hides must send a
warrior to the host; the man with five hides is entitled to become, perhaps he
may be compelled to become a thegn, a warrior[674].
On the whole, we gather from Domesday Book that the
The thegns of Domesday.
military element is subduing the others. The thegn is
the man who for one reason or another is a warrior. For
one reason or another, we say; for the class of thegns is by no means
homogeneous. On the one hand, we see the thegns of the churches, who have
been endowed by the prelates in order that they may do the military service due
from the ecclesiastical lands. Many of the prelates have thegns, and for the
creation of thegnlands by the churches it would not be easy to find any
explanation save that which we have already found in the territorialization of
military service. The thegn might pay some annual ‘recognition’ to the church,
thegns who are nobody’s thegns, or else we may have persons entitled to the
thegnly wergild who yet are not thegns. What is more, since the law which
regulates the inheritance of land does not favour the first-born, we may have
poor thegns and landless thegns. Yet another principle comes into play. A duty
of finding well armed warriors for the host is being territorialized; every five
hides should find a soldier. The thegn from of old has to attend the host with
adequate equipment; the men who under the new system have to attend the host
with horse and heavy armour are usually thegns. Then the man who has five
hides, and who therefore ought to put a warrior into the field, is a thegn or is
entitled to be a thegn. The ceorl obtains the thegnly wergild if he has an estate
rated for military purposes at five hides. Another version of this tradition
requires of the ceorl who ‘thrives to thegn-right’ five hides of his own land, a
church, a kitchen, a house in the burh, a special office in the king’s hall. To be
‘worthy of thegn-right’ may be one thing, to be a thegn, another. To be a thegn
one must be some one’s thegn. The prosperous ceorl will be no thegn until he
has put himself under some lord. But the bond between him and his lord may
be dissoluble at will and may hardly affect his land. It is, we repeat, very
difficult to discover how these various principles were working together,
checking and controlling each other in the first half of the eleventh century.
Several inconsistent elements seem to be blended. There is the element of
hereditary caste:—the thegn transmits thegnly blood to his offspring. There is
the element of personal relationship:—he is the thegn of some lord and owes
fealty to that lord. There is the military element:—he is a warrior who has
horse and heavy armour and is bound to fight the nation’s battles. Connected
with this last there is the proprietary element:—each five hides must send a
warrior to the host; the man with five hides is entitled to become, perhaps he
may be compelled to become a thegn, a warrior[674].
On the whole, we gather from Domesday Book that the
The thegns of Domesday.
military element is subduing the others. The thegn is
the man who for one reason or another is a warrior. For
one reason or another, we say; for the class of thegns is by no means
homogeneous. On the one hand, we see the thegns of the churches, who have
been endowed by the prelates in order that they may do the military service due
from the ecclesiastical lands. Many of the prelates have thegns, and for the
creation of thegnlands by the churches it would not be easy to find any
explanation save that which we have already found in the territorialization of
military service. The thegn might pay some annual ‘recognition’ to the church,
Page 171
he might send his labourers to help his lord for a day or two at harvest time; but
we may be sure that he was not rack-rented and that, if military service be left
out of account, the church was a loser by endowing him. Here the land
proceeds from the lord to the thegn; the thegn can not give or sell it; the holder
of that land can have no lord but the church; if he forfeits the land, he forfeits it
to the church. But, on the other hand, we see numerous king’s thegns who are
able ‘to go to what lord they please.’ We may see in them landed proprietors
who by the play of ‘the five hide rule’ have become bound to serve as warriors.
We may be fairly certain that they have not been endowed by the king,
otherwise they would not enjoy the liberty, that marvellous liberty, of leaving
him, of putting themselves under the protection and the banner of some earl or
some prelate. Not that every thegn will (if we may borrow phrases from a later
age) possess a full ‘thegn’s fee’ or owe the service of a whole warrior. Large
groups of thegns we may see who obviously are brothers or cousins enjoying in
undivided shares the inheritance of some dead ancestor. They may take it in
turns to go to the war; the king may hold the eldest of them responsible for all
the service; but each of them will be called a thegn, will be entitled to a thegnly
wergild and swear a thegnly oath. Still, on the whole, the thegn of Domesday
Book is a warrior, and he holds—though perhaps along with his coparceners—
land that is bound to supply a warrior.
In the main all thegns seem to have the same legal
Greater and lesser thegns.
status, though they may not be all of equal rank. All of
them seem to have the wergild of twelve hundred
shillings. A law of Cnut, after describing the heriot of the earl, distinguishes
two classes of thegns; there is ‘the king’s thegn who is nighest to him’ and
whose heriot includes four horses and 50 mancuses of gold, and ‘the middle
thegn’ or ‘less thegn’ from whom he gets but one horse and one set of arms or
£2.[675] This law should we think be read in connexion with the rule that is
recorded by Domesday Book as prevailing in the shires of Derby and
Nottingham:—the thegn who had fewer than seven manors paid a relief of 3
marks to the sheriff, while he who had seven and upwards paid £8 to the
king[676]. A rude line is drawn between the richer and the poorer thegns of the
king. The former deal immediately with the king and pay their reliefs directly
to him; the latter are under the sheriff and their reliefs are comprised in his
farm. Thus the wealthy thegns, like the barones maiores of later days, are
‘nigher to’ the king than are the ‘less-thegns’ or those barones minores who in a
certain sense are their successors.
we may be sure that he was not rack-rented and that, if military service be left
out of account, the church was a loser by endowing him. Here the land
proceeds from the lord to the thegn; the thegn can not give or sell it; the holder
of that land can have no lord but the church; if he forfeits the land, he forfeits it
to the church. But, on the other hand, we see numerous king’s thegns who are
able ‘to go to what lord they please.’ We may see in them landed proprietors
who by the play of ‘the five hide rule’ have become bound to serve as warriors.
We may be fairly certain that they have not been endowed by the king,
otherwise they would not enjoy the liberty, that marvellous liberty, of leaving
him, of putting themselves under the protection and the banner of some earl or
some prelate. Not that every thegn will (if we may borrow phrases from a later
age) possess a full ‘thegn’s fee’ or owe the service of a whole warrior. Large
groups of thegns we may see who obviously are brothers or cousins enjoying in
undivided shares the inheritance of some dead ancestor. They may take it in
turns to go to the war; the king may hold the eldest of them responsible for all
the service; but each of them will be called a thegn, will be entitled to a thegnly
wergild and swear a thegnly oath. Still, on the whole, the thegn of Domesday
Book is a warrior, and he holds—though perhaps along with his coparceners—
land that is bound to supply a warrior.
In the main all thegns seem to have the same legal
Greater and lesser thegns.
status, though they may not be all of equal rank. All of
them seem to have the wergild of twelve hundred
shillings. A law of Cnut, after describing the heriot of the earl, distinguishes
two classes of thegns; there is ‘the king’s thegn who is nighest to him’ and
whose heriot includes four horses and 50 mancuses of gold, and ‘the middle
thegn’ or ‘less thegn’ from whom he gets but one horse and one set of arms or
£2.[675] This law should we think be read in connexion with the rule that is
recorded by Domesday Book as prevailing in the shires of Derby and
Nottingham:—the thegn who had fewer than seven manors paid a relief of 3
marks to the sheriff, while he who had seven and upwards paid £8 to the
king[676]. A rude line is drawn between the richer and the poorer thegns of the
king. The former deal immediately with the king and pay their reliefs directly
to him; the latter are under the sheriff and their reliefs are comprised in his
farm. Thus the wealthy thegns, like the barones maiores of later days, are
‘nigher to’ the king than are the ‘less-thegns’ or those barones minores who in a
certain sense are their successors.
Page 172
The kings, the earls and the churches have of course
The great lords.
many demesne manors. Of the ecclesiastical estates we
shall speak in our next essay, for they can be best
examined in the light that is cast upon them by the Anglo-Saxon charters. Here
we will merely observe that some of the churches have not only large, but well
compacted territories. The abbey of St. Etheldreda, for example, besides having
outlying manors, holds the two hundreds which make up the isle of Ely; her
property in Cambridgeshire is valued at £318[677]. The earls also are rich in
demesne manors and so is the king.
King William is much richer than King Edward was.
The king as landlord.
The Conqueror has been chary in appointing earls and
consequently he has in his hand, not only the royal
manors, but also a great many comital manors, to say nothing of some other
estates which, for one reason or another, he has kept to himself. Edward had
been rich, but when compared with his earls he had not been extravagantly
rich. In Somersetshire, for example, there were twelve royal manors which may
have brought in a revenue of £500 or thereabouts, while there were fifteen
comital manors which were worth nearly £300[678]. The royal demesne had
been a scattered territory; the king had something in most shires, but was far
richer in some than in others. It was not so much in the number of his manors
as in their size and value that he excelled the richest of his subjects. Somehow
or another he had acquired many of those vills which were to be the smaller
boroughs and the market towns of later days. We may well suppose that from
of old the vills that a king would wish to get and to keep would be the
flourishing vills, but again we can not doubt that many a vill has prospered
because it was the king’s.
Among the manors which William holds in the south-
The ancient demesne.
west a distinction is drawn by the Exeter Domesday.
The manors which the Confessor held are ‘The King’s
Demesne which belongs to the kingdom,’ while those which were held by the
house of Godwin are the ‘Comital Manors[679].’ So in East Anglia certain
manors are distinguished as pertaining or having pertained to the kingdom or
kingship, the regnum or regio[680]. This does not seem to have implied that they
were inalienably annexed to the crown, for King Edward had given some of
them away. Neither when it speaks of the time of William, nor when it speaks
of the time of Edward, does our record draw any clear line between those
manors which the king holds as king and those which he holds in his private
The great lords.
many demesne manors. Of the ecclesiastical estates we
shall speak in our next essay, for they can be best
examined in the light that is cast upon them by the Anglo-Saxon charters. Here
we will merely observe that some of the churches have not only large, but well
compacted territories. The abbey of St. Etheldreda, for example, besides having
outlying manors, holds the two hundreds which make up the isle of Ely; her
property in Cambridgeshire is valued at £318[677]. The earls also are rich in
demesne manors and so is the king.
King William is much richer than King Edward was.
The king as landlord.
The Conqueror has been chary in appointing earls and
consequently he has in his hand, not only the royal
manors, but also a great many comital manors, to say nothing of some other
estates which, for one reason or another, he has kept to himself. Edward had
been rich, but when compared with his earls he had not been extravagantly
rich. In Somersetshire, for example, there were twelve royal manors which may
have brought in a revenue of £500 or thereabouts, while there were fifteen
comital manors which were worth nearly £300[678]. The royal demesne had
been a scattered territory; the king had something in most shires, but was far
richer in some than in others. It was not so much in the number of his manors
as in their size and value that he excelled the richest of his subjects. Somehow
or another he had acquired many of those vills which were to be the smaller
boroughs and the market towns of later days. We may well suppose that from
of old the vills that a king would wish to get and to keep would be the
flourishing vills, but again we can not doubt that many a vill has prospered
because it was the king’s.
Among the manors which William holds in the south-
The ancient demesne.
west a distinction is drawn by the Exeter Domesday.
The manors which the Confessor held are ‘The King’s
Demesne which belongs to the kingdom,’ while those which were held by the
house of Godwin are the ‘Comital Manors[679].’ So in East Anglia certain
manors are distinguished as pertaining or having pertained to the kingdom or
kingship, the regnum or regio[680]. This does not seem to have implied that they
were inalienably annexed to the crown, for King Edward had given some of
them away. Neither when it speaks of the time of William, nor when it speaks
of the time of Edward, does our record draw any clear line between those
manors which the king holds as king and those which he holds in his private
Page 173
capacity, though it may just hint that certain ancient estates ought not to be
alienated. The degree in which the various manors of the crown stood outside
the national system of finance, justice and police we can not accurately
ascertain. Some, but by no means all, pay no geld. Of some it is said that they
have never paid geld. Perhaps in these ingeldable manors we may see those
which constituted the royal demesne of the West Saxon kings at some remote
date. Of the king’s vill of Gomshall in Surrey it is written: ‘the villeins of this
vill were free from all the affairs of the sheriff[681],’ as though it were no
general truth that with a royal manor the sheriff had nothing to do.
As with the estates of the king, so with the estates of
The comital manors.
the earls, we find it impossible to distinguish between
private property and official property. Certain manors
are regarded as the ‘manors of the shire’ (mansiones de comitatu[682]); certain
vills are ‘comital vills[683],’ they belong to ‘the consulate[684].’ Hereditary right
tempered by outlawry was fast becoming the title by which the earldoms were
holden. The position of the house of Leofric in Mercia was far from being as
strong as the position of the house of Rolf in Normandy, and yet we may be
sure that King Harold would not have been able to treat the sons of Ælfgar as
removable officers. But one of the best marked features of Domesday Book, a
feature displayed on page after page, the enormous wealth of the house of
Godwin, seems only explicable by the supposition that the earlships and the
older ealdormanships had carried with them a title to the enjoyment of wide
lands. That enormous wealth had been acquired within a marvellously short
time. Godwin was a new man: nothing certain is known of his ancestry. His
daughter’s marriage with the king will account for something; Harold’s
marriage with the daughter of Ælfgar will account for something, for instance,
for manors which Harold held in the middle of Ælfgar’s country[685]; and a
great deal of simple rapacity is laid to the charge of Harold by jurors whose
testimony is not to be lightly rejected[686]; but the greater part of the land
ascribed to Godwin, his widow and his sons, seems to consist of comitales
villae.
The wealth of the earls is a matter of great importance.
Private rights and
If we subtract the estates of the king, the estates of the governmental revenues.
earls, and the estates of the churches—and, as we shall
see hereafter, the churches had obtained the bulk of
their wealth directly from the kings,—if we subtract again the lands which the
king, the earls, the churches have granted to their thegns, the England of 1065
alienated. The degree in which the various manors of the crown stood outside
the national system of finance, justice and police we can not accurately
ascertain. Some, but by no means all, pay no geld. Of some it is said that they
have never paid geld. Perhaps in these ingeldable manors we may see those
which constituted the royal demesne of the West Saxon kings at some remote
date. Of the king’s vill of Gomshall in Surrey it is written: ‘the villeins of this
vill were free from all the affairs of the sheriff[681],’ as though it were no
general truth that with a royal manor the sheriff had nothing to do.
As with the estates of the king, so with the estates of
The comital manors.
the earls, we find it impossible to distinguish between
private property and official property. Certain manors
are regarded as the ‘manors of the shire’ (mansiones de comitatu[682]); certain
vills are ‘comital vills[683],’ they belong to ‘the consulate[684].’ Hereditary right
tempered by outlawry was fast becoming the title by which the earldoms were
holden. The position of the house of Leofric in Mercia was far from being as
strong as the position of the house of Rolf in Normandy, and yet we may be
sure that King Harold would not have been able to treat the sons of Ælfgar as
removable officers. But one of the best marked features of Domesday Book, a
feature displayed on page after page, the enormous wealth of the house of
Godwin, seems only explicable by the supposition that the earlships and the
older ealdormanships had carried with them a title to the enjoyment of wide
lands. That enormous wealth had been acquired within a marvellously short
time. Godwin was a new man: nothing certain is known of his ancestry. His
daughter’s marriage with the king will account for something; Harold’s
marriage with the daughter of Ælfgar will account for something, for instance,
for manors which Harold held in the middle of Ælfgar’s country[685]; and a
great deal of simple rapacity is laid to the charge of Harold by jurors whose
testimony is not to be lightly rejected[686]; but the greater part of the land
ascribed to Godwin, his widow and his sons, seems to consist of comitales
villae.
The wealth of the earls is a matter of great importance.
Private rights and
If we subtract the estates of the king, the estates of the governmental revenues.
earls, and the estates of the churches—and, as we shall
see hereafter, the churches had obtained the bulk of
their wealth directly from the kings,—if we subtract again the lands which the
king, the earls, the churches have granted to their thegns, the England of 1065
Page 174
will not appear to us a land of very great landowners, and we may obtain a
valuable hint as to one of the origins of feudalism. A vast amount of land is or
has recently been held by office-holders, by the holders of the kingship, the
earlships, or the ealdormanships. We seem to see their proprietary rights arising
in the sphere of public law, growing out of governmental rights, which however
themselves are conceived as being in some sort proprietary. Many a passage in
Domesday Book will suggest to us that a right to take tribute and a right to take
the profits of justice have helped to give the king and the earls their manors and
their seignories. Even in his own demesne manors the king is apt to appear
rather as a tribute taker than as a landowner. Manors of very unequal size and
value have had to supply him with equal quantities of victuals; each has to give
‘a night’s farm’ once a year. Then from the counties at large he has taken a
tribute; from Oxfordshire, for example, £10 for a hawk, 20 shillings for a
sumpter horse, £23 for dogs and 6 sesters of honey[687]; from Worcestershire
£10 or a Norway hawk, 20 shillings for a sumpter horse[688]; from
Warwickshire £23 for ‘the dog’s custom,’ 20 shillings for a sumpter horse, £10
for a hawk and 24 sesters of honey[689]. The farm of the county that the sheriff
pays is made up out of obscure old items of this sort. Many men who are not
the king’s tenants must assist him in his hunting, must help in the erection of
his deer-hays[690]. Then there are the avera and the inwards that are exacted by
the king or his sheriff from sokemen who are not the king’s men. The sheriff
also is entitled to provender rents; out of ‘the revenues which belong to the
shrievalty’ of Wiltshire, Edward of Salisbury gets pigs, wheat, barley, oats,
honey, poultry, eggs, cheeses, lambs and fleeces; and besides this he seems to
have ‘reveland’ which belongs to him as sheriff[691]. Then we see curious
payments in money and renders in kind made to some royal or some comital
manor by the holders of other manors. In Devonshire, Charlton which belongs
to the Bishop of Coutances, Honiton which belongs to the Count of Mortain,
Smaurige which belongs to Ralph de Pomerai, Membury which belongs to
William Chevre, Roverige which belongs to St. Mary of Rouen, each of these
manors used to pay twenty pence a year to the royal manor of Axminster[692].
In Somersetshire there are manors which have owed consuetudines, masses of
iron and sheep and lambs to the royal manors of South Perrott and Cury, or the
comital manors of Crewkerne and Dulverton[693]. Then again, we find that
pasture rights are connected with justiciary rights:—Godwin had a manor in
Hampshire to which belonged the third penny of six hundreds, and in all the
woods of those six hundreds he had free pasture and pannage[694]; the third
penny of three hundreds in Devonshire and the third animal of the moorland
pastures were annexed to the manor of Molland[695]. Many things seem to
valuable hint as to one of the origins of feudalism. A vast amount of land is or
has recently been held by office-holders, by the holders of the kingship, the
earlships, or the ealdormanships. We seem to see their proprietary rights arising
in the sphere of public law, growing out of governmental rights, which however
themselves are conceived as being in some sort proprietary. Many a passage in
Domesday Book will suggest to us that a right to take tribute and a right to take
the profits of justice have helped to give the king and the earls their manors and
their seignories. Even in his own demesne manors the king is apt to appear
rather as a tribute taker than as a landowner. Manors of very unequal size and
value have had to supply him with equal quantities of victuals; each has to give
‘a night’s farm’ once a year. Then from the counties at large he has taken a
tribute; from Oxfordshire, for example, £10 for a hawk, 20 shillings for a
sumpter horse, £23 for dogs and 6 sesters of honey[687]; from Worcestershire
£10 or a Norway hawk, 20 shillings for a sumpter horse[688]; from
Warwickshire £23 for ‘the dog’s custom,’ 20 shillings for a sumpter horse, £10
for a hawk and 24 sesters of honey[689]. The farm of the county that the sheriff
pays is made up out of obscure old items of this sort. Many men who are not
the king’s tenants must assist him in his hunting, must help in the erection of
his deer-hays[690]. Then there are the avera and the inwards that are exacted by
the king or his sheriff from sokemen who are not the king’s men. The sheriff
also is entitled to provender rents; out of ‘the revenues which belong to the
shrievalty’ of Wiltshire, Edward of Salisbury gets pigs, wheat, barley, oats,
honey, poultry, eggs, cheeses, lambs and fleeces; and besides this he seems to
have ‘reveland’ which belongs to him as sheriff[691]. Then we see curious
payments in money and renders in kind made to some royal or some comital
manor by the holders of other manors. In Devonshire, Charlton which belongs
to the Bishop of Coutances, Honiton which belongs to the Count of Mortain,
Smaurige which belongs to Ralph de Pomerai, Membury which belongs to
William Chevre, Roverige which belongs to St. Mary of Rouen, each of these
manors used to pay twenty pence a year to the royal manor of Axminster[692].
In Somersetshire there are manors which have owed consuetudines, masses of
iron and sheep and lambs to the royal manors of South Perrott and Cury, or the
comital manors of Crewkerne and Dulverton[693]. Then again, we find that
pasture rights are connected with justiciary rights:—Godwin had a manor in
Hampshire to which belonged the third penny of six hundreds, and in all the
woods of those six hundreds he had free pasture and pannage[694]; the third
penny of three hundreds in Devonshire and the third animal of the moorland
pastures were annexed to the manor of Molland[695]. Many things seem to
Page 175
indicate that the distinction between private rights and governmental powers
has been but faintly perceived in the past.
If now we look at that English state which is the
The English state.
outcome of a purely English history, we see that it has
already taken a pyramidal or conical shape. It is a
society of lords and men. At its base are the cultivators of the soil, at its apex is
the king. This cone is as yet but low. Even at the end of William’s reign the
peasant seldom had more than two lords between him and the king, but already
in the Confessor’s reign he might well have three[696]. Also the cone is obtuse:
the angle at its apex will grow acuter under Norman rulers. We can indeed
obtain no accurate statistics, but the number of landholders who were King
Edward’s men must have been much larger than the tale of the Norman tenants
in chief. In the geographical distribution of the large estates under William
there is but little more regularity than there was under his predecessor. In
Cheshire and in Shropshire the Conqueror formed two great fiefs for Hugh of
Avranches and Roger of Montgomery, well compacted fiefs, the like of which
England had not yet seen. But the units which William found in existence and
which he distributed among his followers were for the more part discrete units,
and seldom did the Norman baron acquire as his honour any wide stretch of
continuous territory. Still a great change took place in the substance of the
cone, or if that substance is made up of lords and men and acres, then in the
nature of, or rather the relation between, the forces which held the atoms
together. Every change makes for symmetry, simplicity, consolidation. Some of
these changes will seem to us predestined. To speculate as to what would have
happened had Harold repelled the invader would be vain, and certainly we have
no reason for believing that in that case the formula of dependent tenure would
ever have got hold of every acre of English land and every right in English
land. The law of ‘land loans’ (Lehnrecht) would hardly have become our only
land law, had not a conqueror enjoyed an unbounded power, or a power
bounded only by some reverence for the churches, of deciding by what men
and on what terms every rood of England should be holden. Had it not been for
this, we should surely have had some franc alleu to oppose to the fief, some
Eigen to oppose to the Lehn. But if England was not to be for ever a prey to
rebellions and civil wars, the power of the lords over their men must have been
—not indeed increased, but—territorialized; the liberty of ‘going with one’s
land to whatever lord one chose’ must have been curtailed. As yet the central
force embodied in the kingship was too feeble to deal directly with every one
of its subjects, to govern them and protect them. The intermediation of the
has been but faintly perceived in the past.
If now we look at that English state which is the
The English state.
outcome of a purely English history, we see that it has
already taken a pyramidal or conical shape. It is a
society of lords and men. At its base are the cultivators of the soil, at its apex is
the king. This cone is as yet but low. Even at the end of William’s reign the
peasant seldom had more than two lords between him and the king, but already
in the Confessor’s reign he might well have three[696]. Also the cone is obtuse:
the angle at its apex will grow acuter under Norman rulers. We can indeed
obtain no accurate statistics, but the number of landholders who were King
Edward’s men must have been much larger than the tale of the Norman tenants
in chief. In the geographical distribution of the large estates under William
there is but little more regularity than there was under his predecessor. In
Cheshire and in Shropshire the Conqueror formed two great fiefs for Hugh of
Avranches and Roger of Montgomery, well compacted fiefs, the like of which
England had not yet seen. But the units which William found in existence and
which he distributed among his followers were for the more part discrete units,
and seldom did the Norman baron acquire as his honour any wide stretch of
continuous territory. Still a great change took place in the substance of the
cone, or if that substance is made up of lords and men and acres, then in the
nature of, or rather the relation between, the forces which held the atoms
together. Every change makes for symmetry, simplicity, consolidation. Some of
these changes will seem to us predestined. To speculate as to what would have
happened had Harold repelled the invader would be vain, and certainly we have
no reason for believing that in that case the formula of dependent tenure would
ever have got hold of every acre of English land and every right in English
land. The law of ‘land loans’ (Lehnrecht) would hardly have become our only
land law, had not a conqueror enjoyed an unbounded power, or a power
bounded only by some reverence for the churches, of deciding by what men
and on what terms every rood of England should be holden. Had it not been for
this, we should surely have had some franc alleu to oppose to the fief, some
Eigen to oppose to the Lehn. But if England was not to be for ever a prey to
rebellions and civil wars, the power of the lords over their men must have been
—not indeed increased, but—territorialized; the liberty of ‘going with one’s
land to whatever lord one chose’ must have been curtailed. As yet the central
force embodied in the kingship was too feeble to deal directly with every one
of its subjects, to govern them and protect them. The intermediation of the
Page 176
lords was necessary; the state could not but be pyramidal; and, while this was
so, the freedom that men had of forsaking one lord for another, of forsaking
even the king for the ambitious earl, was a freedom that was akin to anarchy.
Such a liberty must have its wings clipt; free contract must be taught to know
its place; the lord’s hold over the man’s land must become permanent. This
change, if it makes at first for a more definite feudalism, or (to use words more
strictly) if it substitutes feudalism for vassalism, makes also for the stability of
the state, for the increase of the state’s power over the individual, and in the
end for the disappearance of feudalism. The freeholder of the thirteenth century
is much more like the subject of a modern state than was the free man of the
Confessor’s day who could place himself and his land under the power and
warranty of whatever lord he chose. Lordship in becoming landlordship begins
to lose its most dangerous element; it is ceasing to be a religion, it is becoming
a ‘real’ right, a matter for private law. Again, we may guess, if we please, that
but for the Norman Conquest the mass of the English peasantry would never
have fallen so low as fall it did. The ‘sokemen’ would hardly have been turned
into ‘villeins,’ the ‘villeins’ would hardly have become ‘serfs.’ And yet the
villeins of the Confessor’s time were in a perilous position. Already they were
occupying lands which for two most important purposes were reckoned the
lands of their lords, lands for which their lords gelded, lands for which their
lords fought. Even in an English England the time might have come when the
state, refusing to look behind their lords, would have left the protection of their
rights to a Hofrecht, to ‘the custom of the manor.’
It is, we repeat it, vain to speculate about such matters,
Last words.
for we know too little of the relative strength of the
various forces that were at work, and an accident, a
war, a famine, may at any moment decide the fate, even the legal fate, of a
great class. And above all there is the unanswerable question whether Harold or
any near successor of his would or could have done what William did so soon
as the survey was accomplished, when he proved that, after all, the pyramid
was no pyramid and that every particle of it was in immediate contact with
him, and ‘there came to him all the land-sitting men who were worth aught
from over all England, whosesoever men they were, and they bowed
themselves to him, and became this man’s men[697].’
so, the freedom that men had of forsaking one lord for another, of forsaking
even the king for the ambitious earl, was a freedom that was akin to anarchy.
Such a liberty must have its wings clipt; free contract must be taught to know
its place; the lord’s hold over the man’s land must become permanent. This
change, if it makes at first for a more definite feudalism, or (to use words more
strictly) if it substitutes feudalism for vassalism, makes also for the stability of
the state, for the increase of the state’s power over the individual, and in the
end for the disappearance of feudalism. The freeholder of the thirteenth century
is much more like the subject of a modern state than was the free man of the
Confessor’s day who could place himself and his land under the power and
warranty of whatever lord he chose. Lordship in becoming landlordship begins
to lose its most dangerous element; it is ceasing to be a religion, it is becoming
a ‘real’ right, a matter for private law. Again, we may guess, if we please, that
but for the Norman Conquest the mass of the English peasantry would never
have fallen so low as fall it did. The ‘sokemen’ would hardly have been turned
into ‘villeins,’ the ‘villeins’ would hardly have become ‘serfs.’ And yet the
villeins of the Confessor’s time were in a perilous position. Already they were
occupying lands which for two most important purposes were reckoned the
lands of their lords, lands for which their lords gelded, lands for which their
lords fought. Even in an English England the time might have come when the
state, refusing to look behind their lords, would have left the protection of their
rights to a Hofrecht, to ‘the custom of the manor.’
It is, we repeat it, vain to speculate about such matters,
Last words.
for we know too little of the relative strength of the
various forces that were at work, and an accident, a
war, a famine, may at any moment decide the fate, even the legal fate, of a
great class. And above all there is the unanswerable question whether Harold or
any near successor of his would or could have done what William did so soon
as the survey was accomplished, when he proved that, after all, the pyramid
was no pyramid and that every particle of it was in immediate contact with
him, and ‘there came to him all the land-sitting men who were worth aught
from over all England, whosesoever men they were, and they bowed
themselves to him, and became this man’s men[697].’
Page 177
Page 178
§ 9. The Boroughs.
Dark as the history of our villages may be, the history
Borough and village.
of the boroughs is darker yet; or rather, perhaps, the
darkness seems blacker because we are compelled to
suppose that it conceals from our view changes more rapid and intricate than
those that have happened in the open country. The few paragraphs that follow
will be devoted mainly to the development of one suggestion which has come
to us from foreign books, but which may throw a little light where every feeble
ray is useful. At completeness we must not aim, and in our first words we ought
to protest that no general theory will tell the story of every or any particular
town[698].
In the thirteenth century a legal, though a wavering,
The borough in cent. xiii.
line is drawn between the borough and the mere vill or
rural township[699]. It is a wavering line, for stress can
be laid now upon one and now upon another attribute of the ancient and
indubitable boroughs, and this selected attribute can then be employed as a test
for the claims of other towns. When in Edward I.’s day the sheriffs are being
told to bid every borough send two burgesses to the king’s parliaments, there
are somewhat more than 150 places to which such summonses will at times be
addressed, though before the end of the middle ages the number of
‘parliamentary boroughs’ will have shrunk to 100 or thereabouts[700]. Many
towns seem to hover on the border line and in some cases the sheriff has been
able to decide whether or no a town shall be represented in the councils of the
realm. Yet if we go back to the early years of the tenth century, we shall still
find this contrast between the borough and the mere township existing as a
contrast whence legal consequences flow. Where lies the contrast? What is it
that makes a borough to be a borough? That is the problem that we desire to
solve. It is a legal problem. We are not to ask why some places are thickly
populated or why trade has flowed in this or that channel. We are to ask why
certain vills are severed from other vills and are called boroughs.
We may reasonably wish, however, since mental
The number of the
pictures must be painted, to know at the outset boroughs.
whereabouts the line will be drawn, and whether when
Dark as the history of our villages may be, the history
Borough and village.
of the boroughs is darker yet; or rather, perhaps, the
darkness seems blacker because we are compelled to
suppose that it conceals from our view changes more rapid and intricate than
those that have happened in the open country. The few paragraphs that follow
will be devoted mainly to the development of one suggestion which has come
to us from foreign books, but which may throw a little light where every feeble
ray is useful. At completeness we must not aim, and in our first words we ought
to protest that no general theory will tell the story of every or any particular
town[698].
In the thirteenth century a legal, though a wavering,
The borough in cent. xiii.
line is drawn between the borough and the mere vill or
rural township[699]. It is a wavering line, for stress can
be laid now upon one and now upon another attribute of the ancient and
indubitable boroughs, and this selected attribute can then be employed as a test
for the claims of other towns. When in Edward I.’s day the sheriffs are being
told to bid every borough send two burgesses to the king’s parliaments, there
are somewhat more than 150 places to which such summonses will at times be
addressed, though before the end of the middle ages the number of
‘parliamentary boroughs’ will have shrunk to 100 or thereabouts[700]. Many
towns seem to hover on the border line and in some cases the sheriff has been
able to decide whether or no a town shall be represented in the councils of the
realm. Yet if we go back to the early years of the tenth century, we shall still
find this contrast between the borough and the mere township existing as a
contrast whence legal consequences flow. Where lies the contrast? What is it
that makes a borough to be a borough? That is the problem that we desire to
solve. It is a legal problem. We are not to ask why some places are thickly
populated or why trade has flowed in this or that channel. We are to ask why
certain vills are severed from other vills and are called boroughs.
We may reasonably wish, however, since mental
The number of the
pictures must be painted, to know at the outset boroughs.
whereabouts the line will be drawn, and whether when
Page 179
we are speaking of the Conqueror’s reign and earlier times we shall have a
large or a small number of boroughs on our hands. Will it be a hundred and
fifty, or a hundred, or will it be only fifty? At once we will say that some fifty
boroughs stand out prominently and will demand our best attention, though a
second and far less important class was already being formed.
In the middle of the twelfth century the Exchequer was
The aid-paying boroughs
treating certain places in an exceptional fashion. It was of cent. xii.
subjecting them to a special tax in the form of an
auxilium or donum. This fact we may take as the
starting point for our researches. Now if we read the unique Pipe Roll of Henry
I.’s reign and the earliest Pipe Rolls of Henry II.’s we observe that an ‘aid’ or a
‘gift’ is from time to time collected from the ‘cities and boroughs,’ and if we
put down the names of the towns which are charged with this impost, we obtain
a remarkable result[701]. Speaking broadly we may say that the only towns
which pay are ‘county towns.’ For a large part of England this is strictly true.
We will follow the order of Domesday Book, beginning however with its
second zone. If London is in Middlesex[702], it is Middlesex’s one borough. In
Hertfordshire is Hertford. In Buckinghamshire is Buckingham, but no aid can
be expected from it. In Oxfordshire is Oxford. In Gloucestershire is Gloucester,
but Winchcombe also asserts its burghal rank. In Worcestershire is Worcester,
while Droitwich appears occasionally with a small gift. Hereford is the one
borough of Herefordshire. Turning to the third zone, we pass rapidly through
Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire; each
has its borough. This will be true of Leicestershire also; but Leicester is by this
time so completely in the hands of its earl that the king gets nothing from it.
Nor, it would seem, does he get anything from Warwick. Half in Warwickshire,
half in Staffordshire lies Tamworth; Stafford also pays. At times Bridgenorth
appears beside Shrewsbury. Nothing is received from Chester, for it is the head
of a palatinate. Derby, Nottingham and York are the only representatives of
their shires. Lincolnshire has Stamford on its border as well as Lincoln in its
centre. Norfolk has Thetford as well as Norwich; but Suffolk has only Ipswich
and Essex only Colchester.
In the southern zone matters are not so simple. Kent
Aid-paying boroughs in
contains Canterbury and Rochester; Surrey contains the south.
Guildford and Southwark; Sussex only Chichester.
Hampshire has Winchester; Southampton is receiving
special treatment. Wallingford represents Berkshire. When we get to Wiltshire
large or a small number of boroughs on our hands. Will it be a hundred and
fifty, or a hundred, or will it be only fifty? At once we will say that some fifty
boroughs stand out prominently and will demand our best attention, though a
second and far less important class was already being formed.
In the middle of the twelfth century the Exchequer was
The aid-paying boroughs
treating certain places in an exceptional fashion. It was of cent. xii.
subjecting them to a special tax in the form of an
auxilium or donum. This fact we may take as the
starting point for our researches. Now if we read the unique Pipe Roll of Henry
I.’s reign and the earliest Pipe Rolls of Henry II.’s we observe that an ‘aid’ or a
‘gift’ is from time to time collected from the ‘cities and boroughs,’ and if we
put down the names of the towns which are charged with this impost, we obtain
a remarkable result[701]. Speaking broadly we may say that the only towns
which pay are ‘county towns.’ For a large part of England this is strictly true.
We will follow the order of Domesday Book, beginning however with its
second zone. If London is in Middlesex[702], it is Middlesex’s one borough. In
Hertfordshire is Hertford. In Buckinghamshire is Buckingham, but no aid can
be expected from it. In Oxfordshire is Oxford. In Gloucestershire is Gloucester,
but Winchcombe also asserts its burghal rank. In Worcestershire is Worcester,
while Droitwich appears occasionally with a small gift. Hereford is the one
borough of Herefordshire. Turning to the third zone, we pass rapidly through
Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire; each
has its borough. This will be true of Leicestershire also; but Leicester is by this
time so completely in the hands of its earl that the king gets nothing from it.
Nor, it would seem, does he get anything from Warwick. Half in Warwickshire,
half in Staffordshire lies Tamworth; Stafford also pays. At times Bridgenorth
appears beside Shrewsbury. Nothing is received from Chester, for it is the head
of a palatinate. Derby, Nottingham and York are the only representatives of
their shires. Lincolnshire has Stamford on its border as well as Lincoln in its
centre. Norfolk has Thetford as well as Norwich; but Suffolk has only Ipswich
and Essex only Colchester.
In the southern zone matters are not so simple. Kent
Aid-paying boroughs in
contains Canterbury and Rochester; Surrey contains the south.
Guildford and Southwark; Sussex only Chichester.
Hampshire has Winchester; Southampton is receiving
special treatment. Wallingford represents Berkshire. When we get to Wiltshire
Page 180
and Dorset we are in the classical land of small boroughs. There are various
little towns whose fate is in the balance; Marlborough and Calne seem for the
moment to be the most prominent. In Somersetshire, whatever may have been
true in the past, Ilchester is standing out as the one borough that pays an aid.
Exeter has now no second in Devonshire. If there is a borough in Cornwall, it
makes no gift to the king.
We may obtain some notion of the relative rank of
List of aids.
these towns if we set forth the amounts with which they
are charged in 1130 and in 1156, though the materials
for this comparison are unfortunately incomplete.
Pipe Pipe Pipe Pipe
Roll Roll Roll Roll
31 2 Hen. 31 2 Hen.
Hen.I II Hen.I II
£ £ £ £
Wiltshire
London 120 120 17
boroughs
Winchester 80 Calne 1
Dorset
Lincoln 60 60 15
boroughs
York 40 40 Huntingdon 8 8
Norwich 30 331⁄3 Ipswich 7 31⁄3
Exeter 20 Guildford 5 5
Canterbury 20 131⁄3 Southwark 5 5
Colchester 20 Hertford 5
122⁄3[703]
Oxford 20 20 Stamford 5
Gloucester 15 15 Bedford 5 62⁄3
Wallingford 15 Shrewsbury 5
Worcester 15 Droitwich 5
Cambridge 12 12 Stafford 31⁄3 31⁄3
Hereford 10 Winchcombe 3 5
Thetford 10 Tamworth 2¾
1¼[704]
Northampton 10 Ilchester 21⁄2
Rochester 10 Chichester[705]
little towns whose fate is in the balance; Marlborough and Calne seem for the
moment to be the most prominent. In Somersetshire, whatever may have been
true in the past, Ilchester is standing out as the one borough that pays an aid.
Exeter has now no second in Devonshire. If there is a borough in Cornwall, it
makes no gift to the king.
We may obtain some notion of the relative rank of
List of aids.
these towns if we set forth the amounts with which they
are charged in 1130 and in 1156, though the materials
for this comparison are unfortunately incomplete.
Pipe Pipe Pipe Pipe
Roll Roll Roll Roll
31 2 Hen. 31 2 Hen.
Hen.I II Hen.I II
£ £ £ £
Wiltshire
London 120 120 17
boroughs
Winchester 80 Calne 1
Dorset
Lincoln 60 60 15
boroughs
York 40 40 Huntingdon 8 8
Norwich 30 331⁄3 Ipswich 7 31⁄3
Exeter 20 Guildford 5 5
Canterbury 20 131⁄3 Southwark 5 5
Colchester 20 Hertford 5
122⁄3[703]
Oxford 20 20 Stamford 5
Gloucester 15 15 Bedford 5 62⁄3
Wallingford 15 Shrewsbury 5
Worcester 15 Droitwich 5
Cambridge 12 12 Stafford 31⁄3 31⁄3
Hereford 10 Winchcombe 3 5
Thetford 10 Tamworth 2¾
1¼[704]
Northampton 10 Ilchester 21⁄2
Rochester 10 Chichester[705]
Page 181
Nottingham
Derby
15 15
Now we are not putting this forward as a list of those Value of the list.
English towns that were the most prosperous in the
middle of the twelfth century. We have made no mention of flourishing
seaports, of Dover, Hastings, Bristol, Yarmouth. Nor is this a list of all the
places that are casually called burgi on rolls of Henry II.’s reign. That name is
given to Scarborough, Knaresborough, Tickhill, Cirencester and various other
towns. New tests of ‘burgality’ (if we may make that word) are emerging and
old tests are becoming obsolete. We see too that some towns are dropping out
of the list of aid-paying boroughs. In 1130 Wallingford has thrice failed to pay
its aid of £15 and the whole debt of £45 must be forgiven to the burgesses pro
paupertate eorum[706]. So Wallingford drops out of this list. Probably
Buckingham has dropped out at an earlier time for a similar reason. But still
this list, especially in the form that it takes in Henry I.’s time, is of great
importance to those who are going to study the boroughs of Domesday Book. It
looks like a traditional list. It deals out nice round sums. It is endeavouring to
keep Wallingford on a par with Gloucester and above Northampton. It is
retaining Winchcombe.
If we make the experiment, we shall discover that this
The boroughs in
catalogue really is a good prologue to Domesday Book. Domesday.
We will once more visit the counties which form the
second zone. The account that our record gives of
Hertfordshire has a preface. That preface deals with the borough of Hertford
and precedes even the list of the Hertfordshire tenants in chief. Buckingham in
Buckinghamshire and Oxford in Oxfordshire are similarly treated. In
Gloucestershire the city of Gloucester and the borough of Winchcombe are
described before the body of the county is touched. In Worcestershire,
Herefordshire, Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Bedfordshire,
Northamptonshire, Leicestershire, Warwickshire, Staffordshire[707], Shropshire,
Cheshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire[708] and Yorkshire the same procedure
is adopted: the account of the shire’s city or borough precedes the account of
the shire. In Lincolnshire the description of the county is introduced by the
description of Lincoln and Stamford; also of Torksey, which had been a place
of military importance and seems to have been closely united with the city of
Derby
15 15
Now we are not putting this forward as a list of those Value of the list.
English towns that were the most prosperous in the
middle of the twelfth century. We have made no mention of flourishing
seaports, of Dover, Hastings, Bristol, Yarmouth. Nor is this a list of all the
places that are casually called burgi on rolls of Henry II.’s reign. That name is
given to Scarborough, Knaresborough, Tickhill, Cirencester and various other
towns. New tests of ‘burgality’ (if we may make that word) are emerging and
old tests are becoming obsolete. We see too that some towns are dropping out
of the list of aid-paying boroughs. In 1130 Wallingford has thrice failed to pay
its aid of £15 and the whole debt of £45 must be forgiven to the burgesses pro
paupertate eorum[706]. So Wallingford drops out of this list. Probably
Buckingham has dropped out at an earlier time for a similar reason. But still
this list, especially in the form that it takes in Henry I.’s time, is of great
importance to those who are going to study the boroughs of Domesday Book. It
looks like a traditional list. It deals out nice round sums. It is endeavouring to
keep Wallingford on a par with Gloucester and above Northampton. It is
retaining Winchcombe.
If we make the experiment, we shall discover that this
The boroughs in
catalogue really is a good prologue to Domesday Book. Domesday.
We will once more visit the counties which form the
second zone. The account that our record gives of
Hertfordshire has a preface. That preface deals with the borough of Hertford
and precedes even the list of the Hertfordshire tenants in chief. Buckingham in
Buckinghamshire and Oxford in Oxfordshire are similarly treated. In
Gloucestershire the city of Gloucester and the borough of Winchcombe are
described before the body of the county is touched. In Worcestershire,
Herefordshire, Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Bedfordshire,
Northamptonshire, Leicestershire, Warwickshire, Staffordshire[707], Shropshire,
Cheshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire[708] and Yorkshire the same procedure
is adopted: the account of the shire’s city or borough precedes the account of
the shire. In Lincolnshire the description of the county is introduced by the
description of Lincoln and Stamford; also of Torksey, which had been a place
of military importance and seems to have been closely united with the city of
Page 182
Lincoln by some governmental bond[709]. Convenient arrangement is not the
strong point of ‘Little Domesday’; but what is said therein of Colchester is said
at the very end of the survey of Essex, while Norwich, Yarmouth and Thetford
stand at the end of the royal estates in Norfolk, and Ipswich stands at the end of
the royal estates in Suffolk.
If now we enter the southern zone and keep in our
Southern boroughs in
minds the scheme that we have seen prevailing in the Domesday.
greater part of England, we shall observe that the
account of Kent has a prologue touching Dover,
Canterbury and Rochester. In Berkshire an excellent account of Wallingford
precedes the rubric Terra Regis. Four places in Dorset are singled out for
prefatory treatment, namely, Dorchester, Bridport, Wareham and Shaftesbury.
In Devon Exeter stands, if we may so speak, above the line, and stands alone,
though Barnstaple, Lidford and Totness are reckoned as boroughs. Of the other
counties there is more to be said. If we compare the first page of the survey of
Somerset with the first pages that are devoted to its two neighbours, Dorset and
Devon, we shall probably come to the conclusion that the compilers of the
book scrupled to put any Somerset vill on a par with Exeter, Dorchester,
Bridport, Wareham and Shaftesbury. In each of the three cases the page is
mapped out in precisely the same fashion. The second column is headed by
Terra Regis. A long way down in the first column begins the list of tenants in
chief. The upper part of the first column contains in one case the account of
Exeter, in another the account of the four Dorset boroughs, but in the third case,
that of Somerset, it is left blank. In Wiltshire Malmesbury and Marlborough
stand above the line; but, if we look to the foot of the page, we shall suspect
that the compilers can not easily force their general scheme upon this part of
the country. In Surrey no place stands above the line. Guildford is the first
place mentioned on the Terra Regis; Southwark seems to be inadequately
treated on a later page. The case of Sussex is like that of Somerset; the list of
the tenants in chief is preceded by a blank space. In Hampshire a whole column
is left blank. On a later page the borough of Southampton has a column to
itself; in the next column stands the Terra Regis of the Isle of Wight. And now
let us turn back to the Middlesex that we have as yet ignored. Nearly two
columns, to say nothing of some precedent pages, are void[710].
Now we must not be led away into speculations which
The boroughs and the
would be vain. We must not, for example, inquire plan of Domesday Book.
whether the information that had been obtained
strong point of ‘Little Domesday’; but what is said therein of Colchester is said
at the very end of the survey of Essex, while Norwich, Yarmouth and Thetford
stand at the end of the royal estates in Norfolk, and Ipswich stands at the end of
the royal estates in Suffolk.
If now we enter the southern zone and keep in our
Southern boroughs in
minds the scheme that we have seen prevailing in the Domesday.
greater part of England, we shall observe that the
account of Kent has a prologue touching Dover,
Canterbury and Rochester. In Berkshire an excellent account of Wallingford
precedes the rubric Terra Regis. Four places in Dorset are singled out for
prefatory treatment, namely, Dorchester, Bridport, Wareham and Shaftesbury.
In Devon Exeter stands, if we may so speak, above the line, and stands alone,
though Barnstaple, Lidford and Totness are reckoned as boroughs. Of the other
counties there is more to be said. If we compare the first page of the survey of
Somerset with the first pages that are devoted to its two neighbours, Dorset and
Devon, we shall probably come to the conclusion that the compilers of the
book scrupled to put any Somerset vill on a par with Exeter, Dorchester,
Bridport, Wareham and Shaftesbury. In each of the three cases the page is
mapped out in precisely the same fashion. The second column is headed by
Terra Regis. A long way down in the first column begins the list of tenants in
chief. The upper part of the first column contains in one case the account of
Exeter, in another the account of the four Dorset boroughs, but in the third case,
that of Somerset, it is left blank. In Wiltshire Malmesbury and Marlborough
stand above the line; but, if we look to the foot of the page, we shall suspect
that the compilers can not easily force their general scheme upon this part of
the country. In Surrey no place stands above the line. Guildford is the first
place mentioned on the Terra Regis; Southwark seems to be inadequately
treated on a later page. The case of Sussex is like that of Somerset; the list of
the tenants in chief is preceded by a blank space. In Hampshire a whole column
is left blank. On a later page the borough of Southampton has a column to
itself; in the next column stands the Terra Regis of the Isle of Wight. And now
let us turn back to the Middlesex that we have as yet ignored. Nearly two
columns, to say nothing of some precedent pages, are void[710].
Now we must not be led away into speculations which
The boroughs and the
would be vain. We must not, for example, inquire plan of Domesday Book.
whether the information that had been obtained
Page 183
touching London and Winchester was too bulky to fill a room that had been left
for it. We must not inquire whether something was to be said of Chichester or
Hastings, of Ilchester or of Bristol that has not been said. But apparently we
may attribute to King William’s officials a certain general idea. It is an idea
which suits the greater part of England very well, though they find difficulties
in their way when they endeavour to impose it on some of the counties that lie
south of the Thames. The broad fact stands clear that throughout the larger part
of England the commissioners found a town in each county, and in general one
town only, which required special treatment. They do not locate it on the Terra
Regis; they do not locate it on any man’s land. It stands outside the general
system of land tenure.
For a while, then, let us confine our attention to these
The borough on no man’s
county towns, and we shall soon see why it is that they land.
are rarely brought under any rubric which would
describe them as pieces of the king’s soil or pieces of
some one else’s soil. The trait to which we allude we shall call (for want of a
better term) the tenurial heterogeneity of the burgesses. In those boroughs that
are fully described we seldom, if ever, find that all the burgesses have the same
landlord. Of course there is a sense in which, according to the view of the
Domesday surveyors and of all later lawyers, every inch of borough land is
held of one landlord, namely, the king; but in that sense every inch of England
has the same landlord. The fact that we would bring into relief is this, that
normally the burgesses of the borough do not hold their burgages immediately
of one and the same lord; they are not ‘peers of a tenure’; the group that they
constitute is not a tenurial group. Far rather we shall find that, though there will
be some burgesses holding immediately of the king, there will be others whose
titles can be traced to the king only through the medium of other lords. And the
mesne lord will often be a very great man, some prelate or baron with a
widespread honour. Within the borough he will, to use the language of
Domesday Book, ‘have’ or ‘hold’ a small group of burgesses, and sometimes
they will be reckoned as annexed to or as ‘lying in’ some manor distant from
the town. It seems generally expected that the barons of the county should have
a few burgages apiece in the county town. This arrangement does not look new.
Seemingly the great men of an earlier day, the antecessores of the Frenchmen,
have owned town-houses: not so much houses for their own use, as houses or
‘haws’ (hagae) in which they could keep a few ‘burgesses.’
for it. We must not inquire whether something was to be said of Chichester or
Hastings, of Ilchester or of Bristol that has not been said. But apparently we
may attribute to King William’s officials a certain general idea. It is an idea
which suits the greater part of England very well, though they find difficulties
in their way when they endeavour to impose it on some of the counties that lie
south of the Thames. The broad fact stands clear that throughout the larger part
of England the commissioners found a town in each county, and in general one
town only, which required special treatment. They do not locate it on the Terra
Regis; they do not locate it on any man’s land. It stands outside the general
system of land tenure.
For a while, then, let us confine our attention to these
The borough on no man’s
county towns, and we shall soon see why it is that they land.
are rarely brought under any rubric which would
describe them as pieces of the king’s soil or pieces of
some one else’s soil. The trait to which we allude we shall call (for want of a
better term) the tenurial heterogeneity of the burgesses. In those boroughs that
are fully described we seldom, if ever, find that all the burgesses have the same
landlord. Of course there is a sense in which, according to the view of the
Domesday surveyors and of all later lawyers, every inch of borough land is
held of one landlord, namely, the king; but in that sense every inch of England
has the same landlord. The fact that we would bring into relief is this, that
normally the burgesses of the borough do not hold their burgages immediately
of one and the same lord; they are not ‘peers of a tenure’; the group that they
constitute is not a tenurial group. Far rather we shall find that, though there will
be some burgesses holding immediately of the king, there will be others whose
titles can be traced to the king only through the medium of other lords. And the
mesne lord will often be a very great man, some prelate or baron with a
widespread honour. Within the borough he will, to use the language of
Domesday Book, ‘have’ or ‘hold’ a small group of burgesses, and sometimes
they will be reckoned as annexed to or as ‘lying in’ some manor distant from
the town. It seems generally expected that the barons of the county should have
a few burgages apiece in the county town. This arrangement does not look new.
Seemingly the great men of an earlier day, the antecessores of the Frenchmen,
have owned town-houses: not so much houses for their own use, as houses or
‘haws’ (hagae) in which they could keep a few ‘burgesses.’
Page 184
Some examples of this remarkable arrangement should
Heterogeneous tenures in
be given. First we will look at Oxford. The king has the boroughs.
many houses; the Archbishop of Canterbury has 7; the
Bishop of Winchester 9; the Bishop of Bayeux 18; the
Bishop of Lincoln 30; the Bishop of Coutances 2; the Bishop of Hereford 3; the
Abbot of St Edmund’s 1; the Abbot of Abingdon 14; the Abbot of Eynsham 13.
And so with the worldly great:—the Count of Mortain has 10; Count Hugh has
7; the Count of Evreux 1; Robert of Ouilly 12; Roger of Ivry 15; Walter Giffard
17:—but we need not repeat the whole long list[711]. It is so at Wallingford;
King Edward had 8 virgates on which were 276 houses, and they paid him £11
rent; Bishop Walkelin of Winchester has 27, which pay 25 shillings; the Abbot
of Abingdon has two acres, on which are 7 houses paying 4 shillings; Milo
Crispin has 20 houses, which pay 12 shillings and 10 pence; and so forth[712].
Further, it is said that the Bishop’s 27 houses are valued in Brightwell; and,
turning to the account of Brightwell, there, sure enough, we find mention of the
25 shillings which these houses pay[713]. Milo’s 20 houses are said to ‘lie in’
Newnham; he has also in Wallingford 6 houses which are in Hazeley, 1 which
is in Stoke, 1 which is in Chalgrove, one acre with 6 houses which is in Sutton,
one acre with 11 houses which is in Bray; ‘all this land’ we are told ‘belongs to
Oxfordshire, but nevertheless it is in Wallingford.’ Yes, Milo’s manor of
Chalgrove lies five, his manor of Hazeley lies seven miles from Wallingford;
nevertheless, houses which are physically in Wallingford are constructively in
Chalgrove and Hazeley. That we are not dealing with a Norman novelty is in
this case extremely plain. Wallingford is a border town. We read first of the
Berkshire landowners who have burgesses within it. There follows a list of the
Oxfordshire ‘thegns’ who hold houses in Wallingford. Archbishop Lanfranc
and Count Hugh appear in this context as ‘thegns’ of Oxfordshire.
When we have obtained this clue, we soon begin to see
Examples of
that what is true of Oxford and Wallingford is true even heterogeneity.
of those towns of which no substantive description is
given us. Thus there are ‘haws’ or town-houses in
Winchester which are attached to manors in all corners of Hampshire, at
Wallop, Clatford, Basingstoke, Eversley, Candover, Strathfield, Minstead and
elsewhere. Some of the manors to which the burghers of London were attached
are not, even in our own day, within our monstrous town; there are some at
Banstead and Bletchingley in Surrey, at Waltham and Thurrock in Essex. But in
every quarter we see this curious scheme. At Warwick the king has in his
demesne 113 houses, and his barons have 112[714]. Of the barons’ houses it is
Heterogeneous tenures in
be given. First we will look at Oxford. The king has the boroughs.
many houses; the Archbishop of Canterbury has 7; the
Bishop of Winchester 9; the Bishop of Bayeux 18; the
Bishop of Lincoln 30; the Bishop of Coutances 2; the Bishop of Hereford 3; the
Abbot of St Edmund’s 1; the Abbot of Abingdon 14; the Abbot of Eynsham 13.
And so with the worldly great:—the Count of Mortain has 10; Count Hugh has
7; the Count of Evreux 1; Robert of Ouilly 12; Roger of Ivry 15; Walter Giffard
17:—but we need not repeat the whole long list[711]. It is so at Wallingford;
King Edward had 8 virgates on which were 276 houses, and they paid him £11
rent; Bishop Walkelin of Winchester has 27, which pay 25 shillings; the Abbot
of Abingdon has two acres, on which are 7 houses paying 4 shillings; Milo
Crispin has 20 houses, which pay 12 shillings and 10 pence; and so forth[712].
Further, it is said that the Bishop’s 27 houses are valued in Brightwell; and,
turning to the account of Brightwell, there, sure enough, we find mention of the
25 shillings which these houses pay[713]. Milo’s 20 houses are said to ‘lie in’
Newnham; he has also in Wallingford 6 houses which are in Hazeley, 1 which
is in Stoke, 1 which is in Chalgrove, one acre with 6 houses which is in Sutton,
one acre with 11 houses which is in Bray; ‘all this land’ we are told ‘belongs to
Oxfordshire, but nevertheless it is in Wallingford.’ Yes, Milo’s manor of
Chalgrove lies five, his manor of Hazeley lies seven miles from Wallingford;
nevertheless, houses which are physically in Wallingford are constructively in
Chalgrove and Hazeley. That we are not dealing with a Norman novelty is in
this case extremely plain. Wallingford is a border town. We read first of the
Berkshire landowners who have burgesses within it. There follows a list of the
Oxfordshire ‘thegns’ who hold houses in Wallingford. Archbishop Lanfranc
and Count Hugh appear in this context as ‘thegns’ of Oxfordshire.
When we have obtained this clue, we soon begin to see
Examples of
that what is true of Oxford and Wallingford is true even heterogeneity.
of those towns of which no substantive description is
given us. Thus there are ‘haws’ or town-houses in
Winchester which are attached to manors in all corners of Hampshire, at
Wallop, Clatford, Basingstoke, Eversley, Candover, Strathfield, Minstead and
elsewhere. Some of the manors to which the burghers of London were attached
are not, even in our own day, within our monstrous town; there are some at
Banstead and Bletchingley in Surrey, at Waltham and Thurrock in Essex. But in
every quarter we see this curious scheme. At Warwick the king has in his
demesne 113 houses, and his barons have 112[714]. Of the barons’ houses it is
Page 185
written: ‘These houses belong to the lands which the barons hold outside the
borough and are valued there.’ Or turn we to a small town:—at Buckingham
the barons have 26 burgesses; no one of them has more than 5.[715] The page
that tells us this presents to us an admirable contrast between Buckingham and
its future rival. Aylesbury is just an ordinary royal manor and stands under the
rubric Terra Regis. Buckingham is a very petty townlet; but it is a borough, and
Count Hugh and the Bishop of Coutances, Robert of Ouilly, Roger of Ivry,
Arnulf of Hesdin and other mighty men have burgesses there. As a climax we
may mention the case of Winchcombe. The burgages in this little town were
held by many great people. About the year 1100 the king had 60; the Abbot of
Winchcombe 40; the Abbot of Evesham 2; the Bishop of Hereford 2; Robert of
Bellême 3; Robert Fitzhamon 5, and divers other persons of note had some 29
houses among them[716]. However poor, however small Winchcombe may have
been, it radically differed from the common manor and the common village.
We have seen above how in the Conqueror’s day the
Burgesses attached to
Abbey of Westminster had a manor at Staines[717] and manors.
how that manor included 48 burgesses who paid 40s. a
year. Were those burgesses really in Staines, and was
Staines a borough? No, they were in the city of London. The Confessor had
told his Middlesex thegns how he willed that St Peter and the brethren at
Westminster should have the manor (cotlif) of Staines with the land called
Staninghaw (mid ðam lande Stæningehaga) within London and all other things
that had belonged to Staines[718]. Is not the guess permissible that Staining
Lane in the City of London[719], wherein stood the church of St Mary, Staining,
was so called, not ‘because stainers lived in it,’ but because it once contained
the haws of the men of Staines? We must be careful before we find boroughs in
Domesday Book, for its language is deceptive. Perhaps we may believe that
really and physically there were forty-six burgesses in the vill of St Albans[720];
but, after what we have read of Staines, can we be quite sure that these
burgesses were not in London? The burgesses who de iure ‘are in’ one place are
often de facto in quite another place.
We may for a moment pass over two centuries and turn
Tenure of the borough and
to the detailed account of Cambridge given to us by the tenure of land within the
Hundred Rolls, the most elaborate description that we borough.
have of any medieval borough. Now in one sense the
‘vill’ or borough of Cambridge belongs to the king, and, under him, to the
burgesses, for they hold it of him in capite at a fee-farm rent. But this does not
borough and are valued there.’ Or turn we to a small town:—at Buckingham
the barons have 26 burgesses; no one of them has more than 5.[715] The page
that tells us this presents to us an admirable contrast between Buckingham and
its future rival. Aylesbury is just an ordinary royal manor and stands under the
rubric Terra Regis. Buckingham is a very petty townlet; but it is a borough, and
Count Hugh and the Bishop of Coutances, Robert of Ouilly, Roger of Ivry,
Arnulf of Hesdin and other mighty men have burgesses there. As a climax we
may mention the case of Winchcombe. The burgages in this little town were
held by many great people. About the year 1100 the king had 60; the Abbot of
Winchcombe 40; the Abbot of Evesham 2; the Bishop of Hereford 2; Robert of
Bellême 3; Robert Fitzhamon 5, and divers other persons of note had some 29
houses among them[716]. However poor, however small Winchcombe may have
been, it radically differed from the common manor and the common village.
We have seen above how in the Conqueror’s day the
Burgesses attached to
Abbey of Westminster had a manor at Staines[717] and manors.
how that manor included 48 burgesses who paid 40s. a
year. Were those burgesses really in Staines, and was
Staines a borough? No, they were in the city of London. The Confessor had
told his Middlesex thegns how he willed that St Peter and the brethren at
Westminster should have the manor (cotlif) of Staines with the land called
Staninghaw (mid ðam lande Stæningehaga) within London and all other things
that had belonged to Staines[718]. Is not the guess permissible that Staining
Lane in the City of London[719], wherein stood the church of St Mary, Staining,
was so called, not ‘because stainers lived in it,’ but because it once contained
the haws of the men of Staines? We must be careful before we find boroughs in
Domesday Book, for its language is deceptive. Perhaps we may believe that
really and physically there were forty-six burgesses in the vill of St Albans[720];
but, after what we have read of Staines, can we be quite sure that these
burgesses were not in London? The burgesses who de iure ‘are in’ one place are
often de facto in quite another place.
We may for a moment pass over two centuries and turn
Tenure of the borough and
to the detailed account of Cambridge given to us by the tenure of land within the
Hundred Rolls, the most elaborate description that we borough.
have of any medieval borough. Now in one sense the
‘vill’ or borough of Cambridge belongs to the king, and, under him, to the
burgesses, for they hold it of him in capite at a fee-farm rent. But this does not
Page 186
mean that each burgess holds his tenement of the corporation or communitas of
burgesses, which in its turn holds every yard of land of the king in chief. It does
not even mean that each burgess holds immediately of the king, the
communitas intervening as farmer of the king’s rents[721]. No, the titles of the
various burgesses go up to the king by many various routes. Some of them pay
rents to the officers of the borough who are the king’s farmers; but many of
them do not. The Chancellor and Masters of the University, for example, hold
three messuages in the vill of Cambridge; ‘but’ say the sworn burgesses ‘what
they pay for the same, we do not know and can not discover[722].’ How could it
be otherwise? Domesday Book shows us that the Count of Britanny had ten
burgesses in Cambridge[723]. Count Alan’s houses will never be held in chief of
the crown by any burgess: they will form part of the honour of Richmond to the
end of time. We may take another example which will show the permanence of
proprietary arrangements in the boroughs. From an account of Gloucester
which comes to us from the year 1100 or thereabouts we learn that there were
300 houses in the king’s demesne and 313 belonging to other lords. From the
year 1455 we have another account which tells of 310 tenements paying
landgavel to the king’s farmers and 346 which pay them nothing[724]
Perhaps no further examples are needed. But this
The king and other
tenurial heterogeneity seems to be an attribute of all or landlords.
nearly all the very ancient boroughs, the county towns.
In some cases the king was the landlord of far the
greater number of the burgesses. In other cases the bishop became in course of
time the lord of some large quarter of a town in which his cathedral stood. At
Canterbury and Rochester, at Winchester and Worcester, this process had been
at work from remote days; the bishops had been acquiring land and ‘haws’
within the walls[725]. But we can see that in Henry I.’s day there were still four
earls who were keeping up their interest in their burgesses at Winchester[726]. In
the later middle ages we may, if we will, call these places royal boroughs and
the king’s ‘demesne boroughs,’ for the burgesses derive their ‘liberties’ directly
from the king. But we must keep these ancient boroughs well apart from any
royal manors which the king has newly raised to burghal rank. In the latter he
will be the immediate landlord of every burgess; in the former a good deal of
rent will be paid, not to him, nor to the community as his farmers, but to those
who are filling the shoes of the thegns of the shire.
This said, we will turn back our thoughts to the oldest
The oldest burh.
days. The word that deserves our best attention is burh,
burgesses, which in its turn holds every yard of land of the king in chief. It does
not even mean that each burgess holds immediately of the king, the
communitas intervening as farmer of the king’s rents[721]. No, the titles of the
various burgesses go up to the king by many various routes. Some of them pay
rents to the officers of the borough who are the king’s farmers; but many of
them do not. The Chancellor and Masters of the University, for example, hold
three messuages in the vill of Cambridge; ‘but’ say the sworn burgesses ‘what
they pay for the same, we do not know and can not discover[722].’ How could it
be otherwise? Domesday Book shows us that the Count of Britanny had ten
burgesses in Cambridge[723]. Count Alan’s houses will never be held in chief of
the crown by any burgess: they will form part of the honour of Richmond to the
end of time. We may take another example which will show the permanence of
proprietary arrangements in the boroughs. From an account of Gloucester
which comes to us from the year 1100 or thereabouts we learn that there were
300 houses in the king’s demesne and 313 belonging to other lords. From the
year 1455 we have another account which tells of 310 tenements paying
landgavel to the king’s farmers and 346 which pay them nothing[724]
Perhaps no further examples are needed. But this
The king and other
tenurial heterogeneity seems to be an attribute of all or landlords.
nearly all the very ancient boroughs, the county towns.
In some cases the king was the landlord of far the
greater number of the burgesses. In other cases the bishop became in course of
time the lord of some large quarter of a town in which his cathedral stood. At
Canterbury and Rochester, at Winchester and Worcester, this process had been
at work from remote days; the bishops had been acquiring land and ‘haws’
within the walls[725]. But we can see that in Henry I.’s day there were still four
earls who were keeping up their interest in their burgesses at Winchester[726]. In
the later middle ages we may, if we will, call these places royal boroughs and
the king’s ‘demesne boroughs,’ for the burgesses derive their ‘liberties’ directly
from the king. But we must keep these ancient boroughs well apart from any
royal manors which the king has newly raised to burghal rank. In the latter he
will be the immediate landlord of every burgess; in the former a good deal of
rent will be paid, not to him, nor to the community as his farmers, but to those
who are filling the shoes of the thegns of the shire.
This said, we will turn back our thoughts to the oldest
The oldest burh.
days. The word that deserves our best attention is burh,
Page 187
the future borough, for little good would come of an attempt to found a theory
upon the Latin words, such as civitas, oppidum and urbs which occur in some
of those magniloquent land-books[727]. Now it seems fairly clear that for some
long time after the Germanic invasions the word burh meant merely a fastness,
a stronghold, and suggested no thick population nor any population at all. This
we might learn from the map of England. The hill-top that has been fortified is
a burh. Very often it has given its name to a neighbouring village[728]. But, to
say nothing of hamlets, we have full two hundred and fifty parishes whose
names end in burgh, borough or bury, and in many cases we see no sign in
them of an ancient camp or of an exceptionally dense population. It seems a
mere chance that they are not tons or hams, worths or thorpes. Then again, in
Essex and neighbouring shires it is common to find that in the village called X
there is a squire’s mansion or a cluster of houses called X-bury. Further, we can
see plainly from our oldest laws that the palisade or entrenchment around a
great man’s house is a burh. Thus Alfred: The king’s burh-bryce (the sum to be
paid for breaking his burh) is 120 shillings, an archbishop’s 90 shillings,
another bishop’s 60 shillings, a twelve-hundred man’s 30 shillings, a six-
hundred-man’s 15 shillings, a ceorl’s edor-bryce (the sum to be paid for
breaking his hedge) 5 shillings[729]. The ceorl, whose wer is 200 shillings, will
not have a burh, he will only have a hedge round his house; but the man whose
wer is 600 shillings will probably have some stockade, some rude rampart; he
will have a burh
We observe the heavy bót of 120 shillings which
The king’s burh.
protects the king’s burh. May we not see here the very
first stage in the legal history of our boroughs? We pass
over some centuries and we read in a statement of the Londoners’ customs that
a man who is guilty of unlawful violence must pay the king’s burh-bryce of
five pounds[730]. And then the Domesday surveyors tell us how at Canterbury
every crime committed in those streets which run right through the city is a
crime against the king, and so it is if committed upon the high-roads outside the
city for the space of one league, three perches and three feet[731]. This curious
accuracy over perches and feet sends us to another ancient document:—‘Thus
far shall the king’s peace (grið) extend from his burhgeat where he is sitting
towards all four quarters, namely, three miles, three furlongs, three acre-
breadths, nine feet, nine hand-breadths, nine barley-corns[732].’ And then we
remember how Fleta tells us that the verge of the king’s palace is twelve
leagues in circumference, and how within that ambit the palace court, the
king’s most private court, has jurisdiction[733]
upon the Latin words, such as civitas, oppidum and urbs which occur in some
of those magniloquent land-books[727]. Now it seems fairly clear that for some
long time after the Germanic invasions the word burh meant merely a fastness,
a stronghold, and suggested no thick population nor any population at all. This
we might learn from the map of England. The hill-top that has been fortified is
a burh. Very often it has given its name to a neighbouring village[728]. But, to
say nothing of hamlets, we have full two hundred and fifty parishes whose
names end in burgh, borough or bury, and in many cases we see no sign in
them of an ancient camp or of an exceptionally dense population. It seems a
mere chance that they are not tons or hams, worths or thorpes. Then again, in
Essex and neighbouring shires it is common to find that in the village called X
there is a squire’s mansion or a cluster of houses called X-bury. Further, we can
see plainly from our oldest laws that the palisade or entrenchment around a
great man’s house is a burh. Thus Alfred: The king’s burh-bryce (the sum to be
paid for breaking his burh) is 120 shillings, an archbishop’s 90 shillings,
another bishop’s 60 shillings, a twelve-hundred man’s 30 shillings, a six-
hundred-man’s 15 shillings, a ceorl’s edor-bryce (the sum to be paid for
breaking his hedge) 5 shillings[729]. The ceorl, whose wer is 200 shillings, will
not have a burh, he will only have a hedge round his house; but the man whose
wer is 600 shillings will probably have some stockade, some rude rampart; he
will have a burh
We observe the heavy bót of 120 shillings which
The king’s burh.
protects the king’s burh. May we not see here the very
first stage in the legal history of our boroughs? We pass
over some centuries and we read in a statement of the Londoners’ customs that
a man who is guilty of unlawful violence must pay the king’s burh-bryce of
five pounds[730]. And then the Domesday surveyors tell us how at Canterbury
every crime committed in those streets which run right through the city is a
crime against the king, and so it is if committed upon the high-roads outside the
city for the space of one league, three perches and three feet[731]. This curious
accuracy over perches and feet sends us to another ancient document:—‘Thus
far shall the king’s peace (grið) extend from his burhgeat where he is sitting
towards all four quarters, namely, three miles, three furlongs, three acre-
breadths, nine feet, nine hand-breadths, nine barley-corns[732].’ And then we
remember how Fleta tells us that the verge of the king’s palace is twelve
leagues in circumference, and how within that ambit the palace court, the
king’s most private court, has jurisdiction[733]
Page 188
Has not legal fiction been at work since an early time?
The special peace of the
Has not the sanctity of the king’s house extended itself burh.
over a group of houses? The term burh seems to spread
outwards from the defensible house of the king and
with it the sphere of his burh-bryce is amplified. Within the borough there
reigns a special peace. This has a double meaning:—not only do acts which
would be illegal anywhere become more illegal when they are done within the
borough, but acts which would be legal elsewhere, are illegal there. King
Edmund legislating against the blood-feud makes his burh as sacred as a
church; it is a sanctuary where the feud may not be prosecuted[734]. If in
construing such a passage we doubt how to translate burh, whether by house or
by borough, we are admitting that the language of the law does not distinguish
between the two. The Englishman’s house is his castle, or, to use an older term,
his burh; the king’s borough is the king’s house, for his house-peace prevails in
its streets[735]
Our oldest laws seem to know no burh other than the
The town and the burh.
strong house of a great (but he need not be a very great)
man. Early in the tenth century, however, the word had
already acquired a new meaning. In Æthelstan’s day it seems to be supposed by
the legislator that a moot will usually be held in a burh. If a man neglects three
summonses to a moot, the oldest men of the burh are to ride to his place and
seize his goods[736]. Already a burh will have many men in it. Some of them
will be elder-men, aldermen. A moot will be held in it. Very possibly this will
be the shire-moot, for, since there is riding to be done, we see that the person
who ought to have come to the moot may live at a distance[737]. A little later the
burh certainly has a moot of its own. Edgar bids his subjects seek the burh-
gemót as well as the scyr-gemót and the hundred-gemót. The borough-moot is
to be held thrice a year[738]. At least from this time forward, the borough has a
court. An important line is thus drawn between the borough and the mere tún.
The borough has a court; the village has none, or, if the villages are getting
courts, this is due to the action of lords who have sake and soke and is not
commanded by national law. National law commands that there shall be a moot
thrice a year in every burh
The extension of the term burh from a fortified house
The building of boroughs.
to a fortified group of houses must be explained by
those who are skilled in the history of military affairs.
It is for them to tell us, for example, how much use the Angles and Saxons in
The special peace of the
Has not the sanctity of the king’s house extended itself burh.
over a group of houses? The term burh seems to spread
outwards from the defensible house of the king and
with it the sphere of his burh-bryce is amplified. Within the borough there
reigns a special peace. This has a double meaning:—not only do acts which
would be illegal anywhere become more illegal when they are done within the
borough, but acts which would be legal elsewhere, are illegal there. King
Edmund legislating against the blood-feud makes his burh as sacred as a
church; it is a sanctuary where the feud may not be prosecuted[734]. If in
construing such a passage we doubt how to translate burh, whether by house or
by borough, we are admitting that the language of the law does not distinguish
between the two. The Englishman’s house is his castle, or, to use an older term,
his burh; the king’s borough is the king’s house, for his house-peace prevails in
its streets[735]
Our oldest laws seem to know no burh other than the
The town and the burh.
strong house of a great (but he need not be a very great)
man. Early in the tenth century, however, the word had
already acquired a new meaning. In Æthelstan’s day it seems to be supposed by
the legislator that a moot will usually be held in a burh. If a man neglects three
summonses to a moot, the oldest men of the burh are to ride to his place and
seize his goods[736]. Already a burh will have many men in it. Some of them
will be elder-men, aldermen. A moot will be held in it. Very possibly this will
be the shire-moot, for, since there is riding to be done, we see that the person
who ought to have come to the moot may live at a distance[737]. A little later the
burh certainly has a moot of its own. Edgar bids his subjects seek the burh-
gemót as well as the scyr-gemót and the hundred-gemót. The borough-moot is
to be held thrice a year[738]. At least from this time forward, the borough has a
court. An important line is thus drawn between the borough and the mere tún.
The borough has a court; the village has none, or, if the villages are getting
courts, this is due to the action of lords who have sake and soke and is not
commanded by national law. National law commands that there shall be a moot
thrice a year in every burh
The extension of the term burh from a fortified house
The building of boroughs.
to a fortified group of houses must be explained by
those who are skilled in the history of military affairs.
It is for them to tell us, for example, how much use the Angles and Saxons in
Page 189
the oldest days made of the entrenched hill-tops, and whether the walls of the
Roman towns were continuously repaired[739]. Howbeit, a time seems to have
come, at latest in the struggle between the Danish invaders and the West-Saxon
kings, when the establishment and maintenance of what we might call fortified
towns was seen to be a matter of importance. There was to be a cluster of
inhabited dwellings which as a whole was to be made defensible by ditch and
mound, by palisade or wall. Edward the Elder and the Lady of the Mercians
were active in this work. Within the course of a few years burgs were
‘wrought’ or ‘timbered’ at Worcester, Chester, Hertford, Witham in Essex,
Bridgnorth, Tamworth, Stafford, Warwick, Eddisbury, Warbury, Runcorn,
Buckingham, Towcester, Maldon, Huntingdon[740]. Whatever may be meant by
the duty of repairing burgs when it is mentioned in charters coming from a
somewhat earlier time, it must for the future be that of upholding those walls
and mounds that the king and the lady are rearing. The land was to be burdened
with the maintenance of strongholds. The land, we say. That is the style of the
land-books. Land, even though given to a church, is not to be free (unless by
exceptional favour) of army-service, bridge-work and borough-bettering or
borough-fastening. Wall-work[741] is coupled with bridge-work; to the duty of
maintaining the county bridges is joined the duty of constructing and repairing
the boroughs. Shall we say the ‘county boroughs’
Let us ask ourselves how the burden that is known as
The shire and its borough.
burh-bót, the duty that the Latin charters call
constructio, munitio, restauratio, defensio, arcis (for
arx is the common term) will really be borne. Is it not highly probable, almost
certain, that each particular tract of land will be ascript to some particular arx
or castellum[742], and that if, for instance, there is but one burh in a shire, all the
lands in that shire must help to better that burh. Apportionment will very likely
go further. The man with five hides will know how much of the mound or the
wall he must maintain, how much ‘wall-work’ he must do. We see how the old
bridge-work becomes a burden on the estates of the county landowners. From
century to century the Cambridgeshire landowners contribute according to their
hidage to repair the most important bridge of their county, a bridge which lies
in the middle of the borough of Cambridge. Newer arrangements, the rise of
castles and of borough communities, have relieved them from the duty of
‘borough-fastening;’ but the bridge-work is apportioned on their lands.
The exceedingly neat and artificial scheme of political
Military geography.
geography that we find in the midlands, in the country
Roman towns were continuously repaired[739]. Howbeit, a time seems to have
come, at latest in the struggle between the Danish invaders and the West-Saxon
kings, when the establishment and maintenance of what we might call fortified
towns was seen to be a matter of importance. There was to be a cluster of
inhabited dwellings which as a whole was to be made defensible by ditch and
mound, by palisade or wall. Edward the Elder and the Lady of the Mercians
were active in this work. Within the course of a few years burgs were
‘wrought’ or ‘timbered’ at Worcester, Chester, Hertford, Witham in Essex,
Bridgnorth, Tamworth, Stafford, Warwick, Eddisbury, Warbury, Runcorn,
Buckingham, Towcester, Maldon, Huntingdon[740]. Whatever may be meant by
the duty of repairing burgs when it is mentioned in charters coming from a
somewhat earlier time, it must for the future be that of upholding those walls
and mounds that the king and the lady are rearing. The land was to be burdened
with the maintenance of strongholds. The land, we say. That is the style of the
land-books. Land, even though given to a church, is not to be free (unless by
exceptional favour) of army-service, bridge-work and borough-bettering or
borough-fastening. Wall-work[741] is coupled with bridge-work; to the duty of
maintaining the county bridges is joined the duty of constructing and repairing
the boroughs. Shall we say the ‘county boroughs’
Let us ask ourselves how the burden that is known as
The shire and its borough.
burh-bót, the duty that the Latin charters call
constructio, munitio, restauratio, defensio, arcis (for
arx is the common term) will really be borne. Is it not highly probable, almost
certain, that each particular tract of land will be ascript to some particular arx
or castellum[742], and that if, for instance, there is but one burh in a shire, all the
lands in that shire must help to better that burh. Apportionment will very likely
go further. The man with five hides will know how much of the mound or the
wall he must maintain, how much ‘wall-work’ he must do. We see how the old
bridge-work becomes a burden on the estates of the county landowners. From
century to century the Cambridgeshire landowners contribute according to their
hidage to repair the most important bridge of their county, a bridge which lies
in the middle of the borough of Cambridge. Newer arrangements, the rise of
castles and of borough communities, have relieved them from the duty of
‘borough-fastening;’ but the bridge-work is apportioned on their lands.
The exceedingly neat and artificial scheme of political
Military geography.
geography that we find in the midlands, in the country
Page 190
of the true ‘shires,’ forcibly suggests deliberate delimitation for military
purposes. Each shire is to have its borough in its middle. Each shire takes its
name from its borough. We must leave it for others to say in every particular
case whether and in what sense the shire is older than the borough or the
borough than the shire: whether an old Roman chester was taken as a centre or
whether the struggles between Germanic tribes had fixed a circumference. But
a policy, a plan, there has been, and the outcome of it is that the shire maintains
the borough[743]. There has come down to us in a sadly degenerate form a
document which we shall hereafter call ‘The Burghal Hidage[744].’ It sets forth,
so we believe, certain arrangements made early in the tenth century for the
defence of Wessex against Danish inroads. It names divers strongholds, and
assigns to each a large number of hides. A few of the places that it mentions we
have not yet found on the map. Beginning in the east of Sussex and following
the order of the list, we seem to see Hastings, Lewes, Burpham (near Arundel),
Chichester, Porchester, Southampton, Winchester, Wilton, Tisbury (or perhaps
Chisenbury), Shaftesbury, Twyneham, Wareham, Bredy, Exeter, Halwell near
Totness, Lidford, Barnstaple, Watchet, Axbridge; then Langport and Lyng
(which defend the isle of Athelney), Bath, Malmesbury, Cricklade, Oxford,
Wallingford, Buckingham, Eastling near Guildford, and Southwark. Corrupt
and enigmatical though this catalogue may be, it is of the highest importance. It
shows how in the great age of burg-building the strongholds had wide
provinces which in some manner or another were appurtenant to them, and it
may also give us some precious hints about places in Wessex which once were
national burgs but which forfeited their burghal character in the tenth century.
Guildford seems to have risen at the expense of Eastling and Totness at the
expense of Halwell, while Tisbury, Bredy and Watchet (if we are right in
fancying that they are mentioned) soon lost caste. Lyng is not a place which we
should have named among the oldest of England’s burgs, and yet we have all
read how Alfred wrought a ‘work’ at Athelney. In Wessex burgs rise and fall
somewhat rapidly. North of the Thames the system is more stable. Also it is
more artificial, for north of the Thames civil and military geography coincide.
Let us now look once more at the Oxford of Domesday
The shire’s wall-work.
Book. The king has twenty ‘mural houses[745]’ which
belonged to Earl Ælfgar; they pay 13s. 2d. He has a
house of 6d. which is constructively at Shipton; one of 4d. at Bloxham; one of
30d. at Risborough and two of 4d. at Twyford in Buckinghamshire. ‘They are
called mural houses because, if there be need and the king gives order, they
shall repair the wall.’ There follows a list of the noble houseowners, an
purposes. Each shire is to have its borough in its middle. Each shire takes its
name from its borough. We must leave it for others to say in every particular
case whether and in what sense the shire is older than the borough or the
borough than the shire: whether an old Roman chester was taken as a centre or
whether the struggles between Germanic tribes had fixed a circumference. But
a policy, a plan, there has been, and the outcome of it is that the shire maintains
the borough[743]. There has come down to us in a sadly degenerate form a
document which we shall hereafter call ‘The Burghal Hidage[744].’ It sets forth,
so we believe, certain arrangements made early in the tenth century for the
defence of Wessex against Danish inroads. It names divers strongholds, and
assigns to each a large number of hides. A few of the places that it mentions we
have not yet found on the map. Beginning in the east of Sussex and following
the order of the list, we seem to see Hastings, Lewes, Burpham (near Arundel),
Chichester, Porchester, Southampton, Winchester, Wilton, Tisbury (or perhaps
Chisenbury), Shaftesbury, Twyneham, Wareham, Bredy, Exeter, Halwell near
Totness, Lidford, Barnstaple, Watchet, Axbridge; then Langport and Lyng
(which defend the isle of Athelney), Bath, Malmesbury, Cricklade, Oxford,
Wallingford, Buckingham, Eastling near Guildford, and Southwark. Corrupt
and enigmatical though this catalogue may be, it is of the highest importance. It
shows how in the great age of burg-building the strongholds had wide
provinces which in some manner or another were appurtenant to them, and it
may also give us some precious hints about places in Wessex which once were
national burgs but which forfeited their burghal character in the tenth century.
Guildford seems to have risen at the expense of Eastling and Totness at the
expense of Halwell, while Tisbury, Bredy and Watchet (if we are right in
fancying that they are mentioned) soon lost caste. Lyng is not a place which we
should have named among the oldest of England’s burgs, and yet we have all
read how Alfred wrought a ‘work’ at Athelney. In Wessex burgs rise and fall
somewhat rapidly. North of the Thames the system is more stable. Also it is
more artificial, for north of the Thames civil and military geography coincide.
Let us now look once more at the Oxford of Domesday
The shire’s wall-work.
Book. The king has twenty ‘mural houses[745]’ which
belonged to Earl Ælfgar; they pay 13s. 2d. He has a
house of 6d. which is constructively at Shipton; one of 4d. at Bloxham; one of
30d. at Risborough and two of 4d. at Twyford in Buckinghamshire. ‘They are
called mural houses because, if there be need and the king gives order, they
shall repair the wall.’ There follows a list of the noble houseowners, an
Page 191
archbishop, six bishops, three earls and so forth. ‘All the above hold these
houses free because of the reparation of the wall. All the houses that are called
“mural” were in King Edward’s time free of everything except army service
and wall-work.’ Then of Chester we read this[746]:—‘To repair the wall and the
bridge, the reeve called out one man from every hide in the county, and the lord
whose man did not come paid 40s. to the king and earl.’ The duty of
maintaining the bulwark of the county’s borough is incumbent on the magnates
of the county. They discharge it by keeping haws in the borough and burgesses
in those haws[747]
We may doubt whether the duty of the county to its
Henry the Fowler and the
borough has gone no farther than mere ‘wall-work.’ A German burgs.
tale from the older Saxony may come in well at this
point. When the German king Henry the Fowler was
building burgs in Saxony and was playing the part that had lately been played
in England by Edward and Æthelflæd, he chose, we are told, the ninth man
from among the agrarii milites; these chosen men were to live in the burgs;
they were to build dwellings there for their fellows (confamiliares) who were to
remain in the country tilling the soil and carrying a third of the produce to the
burgs, and in these burgs all concilia and conventus and convivia were to be
held[748]. Modern historians have found in this story some difficulties which
need not be noticed here. Only the core of it interests us. Certain men are
clubbed together into groups of nine for the purpose of maintaining the burg as
a garrisoned and victualled stronghold in which all will find room in case a
hostile inroad be made.
houses free because of the reparation of the wall. All the houses that are called
“mural” were in King Edward’s time free of everything except army service
and wall-work.’ Then of Chester we read this[746]:—‘To repair the wall and the
bridge, the reeve called out one man from every hide in the county, and the lord
whose man did not come paid 40s. to the king and earl.’ The duty of
maintaining the bulwark of the county’s borough is incumbent on the magnates
of the county. They discharge it by keeping haws in the borough and burgesses
in those haws[747]
We may doubt whether the duty of the county to its
Henry the Fowler and the
borough has gone no farther than mere ‘wall-work.’ A German burgs.
tale from the older Saxony may come in well at this
point. When the German king Henry the Fowler was
building burgs in Saxony and was playing the part that had lately been played
in England by Edward and Æthelflæd, he chose, we are told, the ninth man
from among the agrarii milites; these chosen men were to live in the burgs;
they were to build dwellings there for their fellows (confamiliares) who were to
remain in the country tilling the soil and carrying a third of the produce to the
burgs, and in these burgs all concilia and conventus and convivia were to be
held[748]. Modern historians have found in this story some difficulties which
need not be noticed here. Only the core of it interests us. Certain men are
clubbed together into groups of nine for the purpose of maintaining the burg as
a garrisoned and victualled stronghold in which all will find room in case a
hostile inroad be made.
Page 192
Turning to England we shall not forget how in the
The shire thegns and
year 894 Alfred divided his forces into two halves; their town houses.
half were to take the field, half to remain at home,
besides the men who were to hold the burgs[749]; but
at all events we shall hardly go astray if we suggest that the thegns of the
shire have been bound to keep houses and retainers in the borough of their
shire and that this duty has been apportioned among the great estates[750].
We find that the baron of Domesday Book has a few burgesses in the
borough and that these few burgesses ‘belong’ in some sense or another to
his various rural manors. Why should he keep a few burgesses in the
borough and in what sense can these men belong some to this manor and
some to that? To all appearance this arrangement is not modern. King
Edmund conveyed to his thegn Æthelweard an estate of seven hides at
Tistead in Hampshire and therewith the haws within the burg of Winchester
that belonged to those seven hides[751]. When the Bishop of Worcester
loaned out lands to his thegns, the lands carried with them haws in the
‘port’ of Worcester[752]. We have all read of the ceorl who ‘throve to thegn-
right.’ He had five hides of his own land, a church and a kitchen, a bell-
tower and a burh-geat-setl, which, to our thinking, is just a house in the
‘gate,’ the street of the burh[753]. He did not acquire a town-house in order
that he might enjoy the pleasures of the town. He acquired it because, if he
was to be one of the great men of the county, he was bound to keep in the
county’s burh retainers who would do the wall-work and hoard provisions
sent in to meet the evil day when all men would wish to be behind the walls
of a burh
We have it in our modern heads that the medieval
The knights in the
borough is a sanctuary of peace, an oasis of borough.
‘industrialism’ in the wilderness of ‘militancy.’ Now
a sanctuary of peace the borough is from the very
first. An exceptional and exalted peace reigns over it. If you break that
peace you incur the king’s burh-bryce. But we may strongly suspect that the
first burg-men, the first burgenses, were not an exceptionally peaceful folk.
Those burhwaras of London who thrashed Swegen[754] and chose kings
were no sleek traders; nor must we speak contemptuously of ‘trained bands
of apprentices’ or of ‘the civic militia.’ In all probability these burg-men
were of all men in the realm the most professionally warlike. Were we to
The shire thegns and
year 894 Alfred divided his forces into two halves; their town houses.
half were to take the field, half to remain at home,
besides the men who were to hold the burgs[749]; but
at all events we shall hardly go astray if we suggest that the thegns of the
shire have been bound to keep houses and retainers in the borough of their
shire and that this duty has been apportioned among the great estates[750].
We find that the baron of Domesday Book has a few burgesses in the
borough and that these few burgesses ‘belong’ in some sense or another to
his various rural manors. Why should he keep a few burgesses in the
borough and in what sense can these men belong some to this manor and
some to that? To all appearance this arrangement is not modern. King
Edmund conveyed to his thegn Æthelweard an estate of seven hides at
Tistead in Hampshire and therewith the haws within the burg of Winchester
that belonged to those seven hides[751]. When the Bishop of Worcester
loaned out lands to his thegns, the lands carried with them haws in the
‘port’ of Worcester[752]. We have all read of the ceorl who ‘throve to thegn-
right.’ He had five hides of his own land, a church and a kitchen, a bell-
tower and a burh-geat-setl, which, to our thinking, is just a house in the
‘gate,’ the street of the burh[753]. He did not acquire a town-house in order
that he might enjoy the pleasures of the town. He acquired it because, if he
was to be one of the great men of the county, he was bound to keep in the
county’s burh retainers who would do the wall-work and hoard provisions
sent in to meet the evil day when all men would wish to be behind the walls
of a burh
We have it in our modern heads that the medieval
The knights in the
borough is a sanctuary of peace, an oasis of borough.
‘industrialism’ in the wilderness of ‘militancy.’ Now
a sanctuary of peace the borough is from the very
first. An exceptional and exalted peace reigns over it. If you break that
peace you incur the king’s burh-bryce. But we may strongly suspect that the
first burg-men, the first burgenses, were not an exceptionally peaceful folk.
Those burhwaras of London who thrashed Swegen[754] and chose kings
were no sleek traders; nor must we speak contemptuously of ‘trained bands
of apprentices’ or of ‘the civic militia.’ In all probability these burg-men
were of all men in the realm the most professionally warlike. Were we to
Page 193
say that in the boroughs the knightly element was strong we might mislead,
for the word knight has had chivalrous adventures. However, we may
believe that the burgensis of the tenth century very often was a cniht, a
great man’s cniht, and that if not exactly a professional soldier (professional
militancy was but beginning) he was kept in the borough for a military
purpose and was perhaps being fed by the manor to which he belonged.
These knights formed gilds for religious and convivial purposes. At
Cambridge there was a gild of thegns, who were united in blood-
brotherhood. We can not be certain that all these thegns habitually lived in
Cambridge. Perhaps we should rather say that already a Cambridgeshire
club had its head-quarters in Cambridge and there held its ‘morning-
speeches’ and its drinking bouts. These thegns had ‘knights’ who seem to
have been in some sort inferior members of the gild and to have been bound
by its rules[755]. Then we hear of ‘knight-gilds’ at London and Canterbury
and Winchester[756]. Such gilds would be models for the merchant-gilds of
after-days, and indeed when not long after the Conquest we catch at
Canterbury our first glimpse of a merchant-gild, its members are calling
themselves knights: knights of the chapman-gild[757]. Among the knights
who dwelt in the burg such voluntary societies were the more needful,
because these men had not grown up together as members of a community.
They came from different districts and had different lords. In this
heterogeneity we may also see one reason why a very stringent peace, the
king’s own house-peace, should be maintained, and why the borough
should have a moot of its own. When compared with a village there is
something artificial about the borough.
This artificiality exercised an influence over the later
Buhr-bót and castle-
fate of the boroughs. The ground had been cleared guard.
for the growth of a new kind of community, one
whose members were not bound together by feudal,
proprietary, agricultural ties. But the strand that we have been endeavouring
to trace is broken at the Conquest. The castle arises. It is garrisoned by
knights who are more heavily armed and more professionally militant than
were their predecessors. The castle is now what wants defending; the
knights who defend it form no part of the burghal community, and perhaps
‘the castle fee’ is in law no part of the borough. And yet let us see how in
the twelfth century the king’s castle at Norwich was manned. It was manned
for the word knight has had chivalrous adventures. However, we may
believe that the burgensis of the tenth century very often was a cniht, a
great man’s cniht, and that if not exactly a professional soldier (professional
militancy was but beginning) he was kept in the borough for a military
purpose and was perhaps being fed by the manor to which he belonged.
These knights formed gilds for religious and convivial purposes. At
Cambridge there was a gild of thegns, who were united in blood-
brotherhood. We can not be certain that all these thegns habitually lived in
Cambridge. Perhaps we should rather say that already a Cambridgeshire
club had its head-quarters in Cambridge and there held its ‘morning-
speeches’ and its drinking bouts. These thegns had ‘knights’ who seem to
have been in some sort inferior members of the gild and to have been bound
by its rules[755]. Then we hear of ‘knight-gilds’ at London and Canterbury
and Winchester[756]. Such gilds would be models for the merchant-gilds of
after-days, and indeed when not long after the Conquest we catch at
Canterbury our first glimpse of a merchant-gild, its members are calling
themselves knights: knights of the chapman-gild[757]. Among the knights
who dwelt in the burg such voluntary societies were the more needful,
because these men had not grown up together as members of a community.
They came from different districts and had different lords. In this
heterogeneity we may also see one reason why a very stringent peace, the
king’s own house-peace, should be maintained, and why the borough
should have a moot of its own. When compared with a village there is
something artificial about the borough.
This artificiality exercised an influence over the later
Buhr-bót and castle-
fate of the boroughs. The ground had been cleared guard.
for the growth of a new kind of community, one
whose members were not bound together by feudal,
proprietary, agricultural ties. But the strand that we have been endeavouring
to trace is broken at the Conquest. The castle arises. It is garrisoned by
knights who are more heavily armed and more professionally militant than
were their predecessors. The castle is now what wants defending; the
knights who defend it form no part of the burghal community, and perhaps
‘the castle fee’ is in law no part of the borough. And yet let us see how in
the twelfth century the king’s castle at Norwich was manned. It was manned
Page 194
by the knights of the Abbot of St Edmund’s. One troop served there for
three months and then was relieved by another, and those who were thus set
free went home to the manors with which the abbot had enfeoffed them and
which they held by the service of castle-guard[758]. Much in this
arrangement is new; the castle itself is new; but it is no new thing, we take
it, that the burh should be garrisoned by the knights of abbots or earls. And
who built the castles, who built the Tower of London? Let us read what the
chronicler says of the year 1097:—Also many shires which belonged to
London for work[759] were sorely harassed by the wall that they wrought
around the tower, and by the bridge, which had been nearly washed away,
and by the work of the king’s hall that was wrought at Westminster. There
were shires or districts which from of old owed this work or work of this
kind to London-bury[760]
Long before the Conquest, however, a force had
Borough and market.
begun to play which was to give to the boroughs
their most permanent characteristic. They were to be
centres of trade. We must not exclude the hypothesis that some places were
fortified and converted into burgs because they were already the focuses of
such commerce as there was. But the general logic of the process we take to
have been this:—The king’s burh enjoys a special peace: Even the men who
are going to or coming from it are under royal protection: Therefore within
its walls men can meet together to buy and sell in safety: Also laws which
are directed against theft command that men shall not buy and sell
elsewhere: Thus a market is established: Traders begin to build booths
round the market-place and to live in the borough. A theory has indeed been
brilliantly urged which would find the legal germ of the borough rather in a
market-peace than in the peace of a burg[761]. But this doctrine has
difficulties to meet. A market-peace is essentially temporary, while the
borough’s peace is eternal. A market court, if it arises, will have a
jurisdiction only over bargains made and offences committed on market-
days, whereas the borough court has a general competence and hears pleas
relating to the property in houses and lands. Here in England during the
Angevin time the ‘franchise,’ or royally granted right, of holding a market is
quite distinct from the legal essence of the borough. Lawful markets are
held in many places that are not boroughs; indeed in the end by calling a
place ‘a mere market-town’ we should imply that it was no borough.
three months and then was relieved by another, and those who were thus set
free went home to the manors with which the abbot had enfeoffed them and
which they held by the service of castle-guard[758]. Much in this
arrangement is new; the castle itself is new; but it is no new thing, we take
it, that the burh should be garrisoned by the knights of abbots or earls. And
who built the castles, who built the Tower of London? Let us read what the
chronicler says of the year 1097:—Also many shires which belonged to
London for work[759] were sorely harassed by the wall that they wrought
around the tower, and by the bridge, which had been nearly washed away,
and by the work of the king’s hall that was wrought at Westminster. There
were shires or districts which from of old owed this work or work of this
kind to London-bury[760]
Long before the Conquest, however, a force had
Borough and market.
begun to play which was to give to the boroughs
their most permanent characteristic. They were to be
centres of trade. We must not exclude the hypothesis that some places were
fortified and converted into burgs because they were already the focuses of
such commerce as there was. But the general logic of the process we take to
have been this:—The king’s burh enjoys a special peace: Even the men who
are going to or coming from it are under royal protection: Therefore within
its walls men can meet together to buy and sell in safety: Also laws which
are directed against theft command that men shall not buy and sell
elsewhere: Thus a market is established: Traders begin to build booths
round the market-place and to live in the borough. A theory has indeed been
brilliantly urged which would find the legal germ of the borough rather in a
market-peace than in the peace of a burg[761]. But this doctrine has
difficulties to meet. A market-peace is essentially temporary, while the
borough’s peace is eternal. A market court, if it arises, will have a
jurisdiction only over bargains made and offences committed on market-
days, whereas the borough court has a general competence and hears pleas
relating to the property in houses and lands. Here in England during the
Angevin time the ‘franchise,’ or royally granted right, of holding a market is
quite distinct from the legal essence of the borough. Lawful markets are
held in many places that are not boroughs; indeed in the end by calling a
place ‘a mere market-town’ we should imply that it was no borough.
Page 195
Already in Domesday Book this seems to be the case. Markets are being
held and market-tolls are being taken in many vills which are not of burghal
rank[762]. Perhaps also we may see the borough-peace and the market-peace
lying side by side. In the Wallingford of the Confessor’s day there were
many persons who had sake and soke within their houses. If any one spilt
blood and escaped into one of those houses before he was attached, the
owner received the blood-wite. But it was not so on Saturdays, for then the
money went to the king ‘because of the market[763].’ Thus the king’s
borough-peace seems to be intensified on market-days; on those days it will
even penetrate the houses of the immunists. So at Dover some unwonted
peace or ‘truce’ prevailed in the town from St. Michael’s Day to St.
Andrew’s: that is to say, during the herring season[764].
The establishment of a market is not one of those
Establishment of
indefinite phenomena which the historian of law markets.
must make over to the historian of economic
processes. It is a definite and a legal act. The market
is established by law. It is established by law which prohibits men from
buying and selling elsewhere than in a duly constituted market. To prevent
an easy disposal of stolen goods is the aim of this prohibition. Our
legislators are always thinking of the cattle-lifter. At times they seem to go
the full length of decreeing that only in a ‘port’ may anything be bought or
sold, unless it be of trifling value; but other dooms would also sanction a
purchase concluded before the hundred court. He who buys elsewhere runs
a risk of being treated as a thief if he happens to buy stolen goods[765].
Official witnesses are to be appointed for this purpose in every hundred and
in every burh: twelve in every hundred and small burh, thirty-three in a
large burh[766]. Here once more we see the burh co-ordinated with the
hundred. A by-motive favours this establishment of markets. Those who
traffic in the safety of the king’s burh may fairly be asked to pay some toll
to the king. They enjoy his peace; perhaps also the use of royal weights and
measures, known and trustworthy, is another part of the valuable
consideration that they receive. First and last throughout the history of the
boroughs toll is a matter of importance[767]. It gives the king a revenue from
the borough, a revenue that he can let to farm. Also, though we do not think
that the borough court was in its origin a mere market court, the disputes of
the market-place will provide the borough court with plentiful litigation,
held and market-tolls are being taken in many vills which are not of burghal
rank[762]. Perhaps also we may see the borough-peace and the market-peace
lying side by side. In the Wallingford of the Confessor’s day there were
many persons who had sake and soke within their houses. If any one spilt
blood and escaped into one of those houses before he was attached, the
owner received the blood-wite. But it was not so on Saturdays, for then the
money went to the king ‘because of the market[763].’ Thus the king’s
borough-peace seems to be intensified on market-days; on those days it will
even penetrate the houses of the immunists. So at Dover some unwonted
peace or ‘truce’ prevailed in the town from St. Michael’s Day to St.
Andrew’s: that is to say, during the herring season[764].
The establishment of a market is not one of those
Establishment of
indefinite phenomena which the historian of law markets.
must make over to the historian of economic
processes. It is a definite and a legal act. The market
is established by law. It is established by law which prohibits men from
buying and selling elsewhere than in a duly constituted market. To prevent
an easy disposal of stolen goods is the aim of this prohibition. Our
legislators are always thinking of the cattle-lifter. At times they seem to go
the full length of decreeing that only in a ‘port’ may anything be bought or
sold, unless it be of trifling value; but other dooms would also sanction a
purchase concluded before the hundred court. He who buys elsewhere runs
a risk of being treated as a thief if he happens to buy stolen goods[765].
Official witnesses are to be appointed for this purpose in every hundred and
in every burh: twelve in every hundred and small burh, thirty-three in a
large burh[766]. Here once more we see the burh co-ordinated with the
hundred. A by-motive favours this establishment of markets. Those who
traffic in the safety of the king’s burh may fairly be asked to pay some toll
to the king. They enjoy his peace; perhaps also the use of royal weights and
measures, known and trustworthy, is another part of the valuable
consideration that they receive. First and last throughout the history of the
boroughs toll is a matter of importance[767]. It gives the king a revenue from
the borough, a revenue that he can let to farm. Also, though we do not think
that the borough court was in its origin a mere market court, the disputes of
the market-place will provide the borough court with plentiful litigation,
Page 196
and in this quarter also the king will find a new source of income. Among
the old land-books that which speaks most expressly of the profits of
jurisdiction as the subject-matter of a gift is a charter which concerns the
town of Worcester. Æthelred and Æthelflæd, the ealdorman and lady of the
Mercians, have, at the request of the bishop, built a burh at Worcester, and
they declare that of all the rights that appertain to their lordship both in
market (on ceapstowe) and in street, within the burh and without, they have
given half to God and St. Peter, with the witness of King Alfred and all the
wise of Mercia. The lord of the church is to have half of all, be it land-fee,
or fiht-wite, stealing, wohceapung (fines for buying or selling contrary to
the rules of the market) or borough-wall-scotting[768]. Quite apart from the
rent of houses, there is a revenue to be gained from the borough.
Another rule has helped to define the borough, and
Moneyers in the burh.
this rule also has its root among the regalia. No one,
says King Æthelstan, is to coin money except in a
port; in Canterbury there may be seven moneyers, four of the king, two of
the bishop, one of the abbot; in Rochester three, two of the king, one of the
bishop; in London-borough eight; in Winchester six; in Lewes two; in
Hastings one; in Chichester one; in Hampton two; in Wareham two; in
Exeter two; in Shaftesbury two, and in each of the other boroughs one[769].
Already, then, a burh is an entity known to the law: every burh is to have its
moneyer.
We have thus to consider the burh (1) as a
Burh and port.
stronghold, a place of refuge, a military centre: (2) as
a place which has a moot that is a unit in the general,
national system of moots: (3) as a place in which a market is held. When in
the laws this third feature is to be made prominent, the burh is spoken of as
a port, and perhaps from the first there might be a port which was not a
burh[770]. The word port was applied to inland towns. To this usage of it the
portmoot or portmanmoot that in after days we may find in boroughs far
from the coast bears abiding testimony. On the other hand, except on the
seaside, this word has not become a part of many English place names[771].
If, as seems probable, it is the Latin portus, we apparently learn from the
use made of it that at one time the havens (and some of those havens may
not have been in England) were the only known spots where there was
much buying and selling. But be it remembered that a market-place, a ceap-
the old land-books that which speaks most expressly of the profits of
jurisdiction as the subject-matter of a gift is a charter which concerns the
town of Worcester. Æthelred and Æthelflæd, the ealdorman and lady of the
Mercians, have, at the request of the bishop, built a burh at Worcester, and
they declare that of all the rights that appertain to their lordship both in
market (on ceapstowe) and in street, within the burh and without, they have
given half to God and St. Peter, with the witness of King Alfred and all the
wise of Mercia. The lord of the church is to have half of all, be it land-fee,
or fiht-wite, stealing, wohceapung (fines for buying or selling contrary to
the rules of the market) or borough-wall-scotting[768]. Quite apart from the
rent of houses, there is a revenue to be gained from the borough.
Another rule has helped to define the borough, and
Moneyers in the burh.
this rule also has its root among the regalia. No one,
says King Æthelstan, is to coin money except in a
port; in Canterbury there may be seven moneyers, four of the king, two of
the bishop, one of the abbot; in Rochester three, two of the king, one of the
bishop; in London-borough eight; in Winchester six; in Lewes two; in
Hastings one; in Chichester one; in Hampton two; in Wareham two; in
Exeter two; in Shaftesbury two, and in each of the other boroughs one[769].
Already, then, a burh is an entity known to the law: every burh is to have its
moneyer.
We have thus to consider the burh (1) as a
Burh and port.
stronghold, a place of refuge, a military centre: (2) as
a place which has a moot that is a unit in the general,
national system of moots: (3) as a place in which a market is held. When in
the laws this third feature is to be made prominent, the burh is spoken of as
a port, and perhaps from the first there might be a port which was not a
burh[770]. The word port was applied to inland towns. To this usage of it the
portmoot or portmanmoot that in after days we may find in boroughs far
from the coast bears abiding testimony. On the other hand, except on the
seaside, this word has not become a part of many English place names[771].
If, as seems probable, it is the Latin portus, we apparently learn from the
use made of it that at one time the havens (and some of those havens may
not have been in England) were the only known spots where there was
much buying and selling. But be it remembered that a market-place, a ceap-
Page 197
stow, does not imply a resident population of buyers and sellers; it does not
imply the existence of retailers[772]
We can not analyse the borough population; we can
Military and commercial
not weigh the commercial element implied by port elements in the borough.
or the military element implied by burh; but to all
seeming the former had been rapidly getting the
upper hand during the century which preceded the making of Domesday
Book. If we are on the right track, there was a time when the thegns of the
shire must have regarded their borough haws rather as a burden than as a
source of revenue. They kept those haws because they were bound to keep
them. On the other hand, the barons of the Conqueror’s day are deriving
some income from these houses. Often it is very small. Count Hugh, for
example, has just one burgess at Buckingham who pays him twenty-six
pence a year[773]. All too soon, it may be, had the boroughs put off their
militancy. Had they retained it, England might never have been conquered.
Houses which should have been occupied by ‘knights,’ were occupied by
chapmen.
But this is not the whole difficulty. Even if we could
The borough and
closely watch the change which substitutes a agriculture.
merchant or shopkeeper for a ‘knight’ as the typical
burg-man or burgess, we should still have to
investigate an agrarian problem. Very likely we ought to think that even on
the eve of the Conquest the group of men which dwells within the walls is
often a group which by tilling the soil produces a great part of its own food,
though some men may be living by handicraft or trade and some may still
be supported by those manors to which they ‘belong.’ In one case the
institutions that are characteristic of burh and port may have been
superimposed upon those of an ancient village which had common fields. In
another an almost uninhabited spot may have been chosen as the site for a
stronghold. In the former and, as we should fancy, the commoner case a
large choice is open to the constructive historian, for he may suppose that
the selected village was full of serfs or full of free proprietors, that the soil
was royal demesne or had various landlords. In one instance he may think
that he sees the coalescence of several little communities that were once
distinct; in another the gradual occupation of a space marked out by Roman
walls. The one strong hint that is given to us by Domesday Book and later
imply the existence of retailers[772]
We can not analyse the borough population; we can
Military and commercial
not weigh the commercial element implied by port elements in the borough.
or the military element implied by burh; but to all
seeming the former had been rapidly getting the
upper hand during the century which preceded the making of Domesday
Book. If we are on the right track, there was a time when the thegns of the
shire must have regarded their borough haws rather as a burden than as a
source of revenue. They kept those haws because they were bound to keep
them. On the other hand, the barons of the Conqueror’s day are deriving
some income from these houses. Often it is very small. Count Hugh, for
example, has just one burgess at Buckingham who pays him twenty-six
pence a year[773]. All too soon, it may be, had the boroughs put off their
militancy. Had they retained it, England might never have been conquered.
Houses which should have been occupied by ‘knights,’ were occupied by
chapmen.
But this is not the whole difficulty. Even if we could
The borough and
closely watch the change which substitutes a agriculture.
merchant or shopkeeper for a ‘knight’ as the typical
burg-man or burgess, we should still have to
investigate an agrarian problem. Very likely we ought to think that even on
the eve of the Conquest the group of men which dwells within the walls is
often a group which by tilling the soil produces a great part of its own food,
though some men may be living by handicraft or trade and some may still
be supported by those manors to which they ‘belong.’ In one case the
institutions that are characteristic of burh and port may have been
superimposed upon those of an ancient village which had common fields. In
another an almost uninhabited spot may have been chosen as the site for a
stronghold. In the former and, as we should fancy, the commoner case a
large choice is open to the constructive historian, for he may suppose that
the selected village was full of serfs or full of free proprietors, that the soil
was royal demesne or had various landlords. In one instance he may think
that he sees the coalescence of several little communities that were once
distinct; in another the gradual occupation of a space marked out by Roman
walls. The one strong hint that is given to us by Domesday Book and later
Page 198
documents is that our generalities should be few and that, were this
possible, each borough should be separately studied.
As a rule, quite half of the burgesses in any of those
Burgesses as cultivators.
county towns that are fully described in the survey
are the king’s own burgesses, and in some cases his
share is very large. This suggests that the land on which the borough stands
has been royal land and that the king provided the shire thegns with sites for
their haws. For their haws they have sometimes been paying him small
rents. On the other hand, at Leicester, though the king has some 40 houses,
the great majority belong to Hugh of Grantmesnil. He has about 80 houses
which pertain to 17 different manors and which may in the past have been
held by many different thegns; but he also holds 110 houses which are not
allotted to manors and which have probably come to him as the
representative of the earls and ealdormen of an older time[774]. This looks as
if in this case the soil had been not royal but ‘comital’ land at the time when
the place was fortified and when the landowners of the shire, including
perhaps the king, were obliged to build houses within the wall. But though
we fully admit that each of our boroughs has lived its own life, our evidence
seems to point to the conclusion that in those truly ancient boroughs of
which we have been speaking, though there might be many inhabitants who
held and who cultivated arable land lying without the walls, there were
from a remote time other burgesses who were not landowners and were not
agriculturists and yet were men of importance in the borough. If we look,
for example, at the elaborate account of Colchester we shall first read the
names of the king’s burgesses. ‘Of these 276 burgesses of the king, the
majority have one house and a plot of land of from one to twenty-five acres;
some possess more than one house and some have none; they had in all 355
houses and held 1296 acres of land[775]’. But these were not the only
burgesses. Various magnates had houses which were annexed to their rural
manors. Count Eustace (to name a few) had 12, Geoffrey de Mandeville 2,
the Abbot of Westminster 4, the Abbess of Barking 3, and seemingly to
these houses no strips in the arable fields were attached[776]. Thus, though
many of the burgesses may till the soil, the borough community is not an
agrarian community. We can not treat it as a village community that has
prospered and slowly changed its habits. A new principle has been
introduced, an element of heterogeneity. The men who meet each other in
possible, each borough should be separately studied.
As a rule, quite half of the burgesses in any of those
Burgesses as cultivators.
county towns that are fully described in the survey
are the king’s own burgesses, and in some cases his
share is very large. This suggests that the land on which the borough stands
has been royal land and that the king provided the shire thegns with sites for
their haws. For their haws they have sometimes been paying him small
rents. On the other hand, at Leicester, though the king has some 40 houses,
the great majority belong to Hugh of Grantmesnil. He has about 80 houses
which pertain to 17 different manors and which may in the past have been
held by many different thegns; but he also holds 110 houses which are not
allotted to manors and which have probably come to him as the
representative of the earls and ealdormen of an older time[774]. This looks as
if in this case the soil had been not royal but ‘comital’ land at the time when
the place was fortified and when the landowners of the shire, including
perhaps the king, were obliged to build houses within the wall. But though
we fully admit that each of our boroughs has lived its own life, our evidence
seems to point to the conclusion that in those truly ancient boroughs of
which we have been speaking, though there might be many inhabitants who
held and who cultivated arable land lying without the walls, there were
from a remote time other burgesses who were not landowners and were not
agriculturists and yet were men of importance in the borough. If we look,
for example, at the elaborate account of Colchester we shall first read the
names of the king’s burgesses. ‘Of these 276 burgesses of the king, the
majority have one house and a plot of land of from one to twenty-five acres;
some possess more than one house and some have none; they had in all 355
houses and held 1296 acres of land[775]’. But these were not the only
burgesses. Various magnates had houses which were annexed to their rural
manors. Count Eustace (to name a few) had 12, Geoffrey de Mandeville 2,
the Abbot of Westminster 4, the Abbess of Barking 3, and seemingly to
these houses no strips in the arable fields were attached[776]. Thus, though
many of the burgesses may till the soil, the borough community is not an
agrarian community. We can not treat it as a village community that has
prospered and slowly changed its habits. A new principle has been
introduced, an element of heterogeneity. The men who meet each other in
Page 199
court and market, the men who will hereafter farm the court and market, are
not the shareholders in an agricultural concern.
That tenurial heterogeneity of which we have been
Burgage tenure.
speaking had another important effect. When in later
days a rural manor is being raised to the rank of a
liber burgus, the introduction of ‘burgage tenure’ seems to be regarded as
the very essence of the enfranchisement[777]. Probably this feature had
appeared in many boroughs at an early date. The lord with lands in
Oxfordshire may have been bound to keep a few houses and retainers in
Oxford. If, however, the commercial element in the town began to get the
better of the military element, if Oxford became a centre of trade, then a
house in Oxford could be let for a money rent. In Domesday Book the
barons are drawing rents from their borough houses. If any return is to be
made by the occupier to the owner it will take the form of a money rent; it
can hardly take another form. Thus tenure at a money rent would become
the typical tenure of a burgage tenement. It will be a securely heritable
tenure, because the landlord is an absentee and has too few tenants in the
town to require the care of a resident reeve. But there may have been many
dwellers in some of the boroughs who were bound to help in the cultivation
of a stretch of royal or episcopal demesne that lay close to the walls. In the
west some of the king’s burgesses seem to have been holding under onerous
terms. At Shrewsbury, which lies near the border of Wales where every
girl’s marriage gave rise to an amobyr, a maid had to pay ten, a widow
twenty shillings when she took a husband, and a relief of ten shillings was
due when a burgess died[778]. At Hereford the reeve’s consent was
necessary when a burgage was to be sold, and he took a third of the price.
When a burgess died the king got his horse and arms (these Hereford
burgesses were fighting men); if he had no horse, then ten shillings ‘or his
land with the houses.’ Any one who was too poor to do his service might
abandon his tenement to the reeve without having to pay for it. Such an
entry as this seems to tell us that the services were no trivial return for the
tenement[779]
On the other hand, we may see at Stamford what
Eastern and western
seem to be the remains of a very free group of boroughs.
settlers, presumably Danes. The town contains
among other houses 77 houses of sokemen ‘who
not the shareholders in an agricultural concern.
That tenurial heterogeneity of which we have been
Burgage tenure.
speaking had another important effect. When in later
days a rural manor is being raised to the rank of a
liber burgus, the introduction of ‘burgage tenure’ seems to be regarded as
the very essence of the enfranchisement[777]. Probably this feature had
appeared in many boroughs at an early date. The lord with lands in
Oxfordshire may have been bound to keep a few houses and retainers in
Oxford. If, however, the commercial element in the town began to get the
better of the military element, if Oxford became a centre of trade, then a
house in Oxford could be let for a money rent. In Domesday Book the
barons are drawing rents from their borough houses. If any return is to be
made by the occupier to the owner it will take the form of a money rent; it
can hardly take another form. Thus tenure at a money rent would become
the typical tenure of a burgage tenement. It will be a securely heritable
tenure, because the landlord is an absentee and has too few tenants in the
town to require the care of a resident reeve. But there may have been many
dwellers in some of the boroughs who were bound to help in the cultivation
of a stretch of royal or episcopal demesne that lay close to the walls. In the
west some of the king’s burgesses seem to have been holding under onerous
terms. At Shrewsbury, which lies near the border of Wales where every
girl’s marriage gave rise to an amobyr, a maid had to pay ten, a widow
twenty shillings when she took a husband, and a relief of ten shillings was
due when a burgess died[778]. At Hereford the reeve’s consent was
necessary when a burgage was to be sold, and he took a third of the price.
When a burgess died the king got his horse and arms (these Hereford
burgesses were fighting men); if he had no horse, then ten shillings ‘or his
land with the houses.’ Any one who was too poor to do his service might
abandon his tenement to the reeve without having to pay for it. Such an
entry as this seems to tell us that the services were no trivial return for the
tenement[779]
On the other hand, we may see at Stamford what
Eastern and western
seem to be the remains of a very free group of boroughs.
settlers, presumably Danes. The town contains
among other houses 77 houses of sokemen ‘who
Page 200
hold their lands in demesne and seek lords wherever they please, and over
whom the king has nothing but wite and heriot and toll.’ These may be the
same persons who hold 272 acres of land and pay no rent for it[780]. At
Norwich, again, we seem to hear of a time when the burgesses were free to
commend themselves to whomever they would, and were therefore living in
houses which were all their own, and for which they paid no rent[781]. It is
very possible that, so far as landlordly rights are concerned, there was as
much difference between the eastern and the western towns as there was
between the eastern and the western villages. Still if we look at borough
after borough, tenure at a money rent is the tenure of the burgage houses
that we expect to find, and such a tenure, even if in its origin it has been
precarious, is likely to become heritable and secure. As to the shire thegns,
they have in some cases paid to the king small rents for their haws; but in
others, for example at Oxford, tenure by wall-work has been their tenure,
and when in other towns we find them paying rent to the king we may
perhaps see commuted wall-work.
Traces are few in Domesday Book of any property
Common property of the
that can be regarded as the property of a nascent burgesses.
municipal corporation, and even of any that can be
called the joint or common property of the
burgesses. In general each burgess holds his house in the town of the king
or of some other lord by a several title, and, if he has land in the
neighbouring fields, this also he holds by a several title. ‘In the borough of
Nottingham there were in King Edward’s day 183 burgesses and 19 villani.
To this borough belong 6 carucates of land for the king’s geld and one
meadow and certain small woods ... This land was divided between 38
burgesses and [the king] received 75s. 7d. from the rent of the land and the
works of the burgesses.’ ‘In the borough of Derby there were in King
Edward’s day 243 resident burgesses.... To this borough belong 12 carucates
of land for the geld, but they might be ploughed by 8 teams. This land was
divided among 41 burgesses who had 12 teams[782].’ In these cases we see
plainly enough that such arable land as is in any way connected with the
borough has been held by but a few out of the total number of the
burgesses. Therefore we must deal cautiously with entries that are less
explicit. When, for example, in the description of
The community as
Stamford we read ‘Lagemanni et burgenses habent landholders.
whom the king has nothing but wite and heriot and toll.’ These may be the
same persons who hold 272 acres of land and pay no rent for it[780]. At
Norwich, again, we seem to hear of a time when the burgesses were free to
commend themselves to whomever they would, and were therefore living in
houses which were all their own, and for which they paid no rent[781]. It is
very possible that, so far as landlordly rights are concerned, there was as
much difference between the eastern and the western towns as there was
between the eastern and the western villages. Still if we look at borough
after borough, tenure at a money rent is the tenure of the burgage houses
that we expect to find, and such a tenure, even if in its origin it has been
precarious, is likely to become heritable and secure. As to the shire thegns,
they have in some cases paid to the king small rents for their haws; but in
others, for example at Oxford, tenure by wall-work has been their tenure,
and when in other towns we find them paying rent to the king we may
perhaps see commuted wall-work.
Traces are few in Domesday Book of any property
Common property of the
that can be regarded as the property of a nascent burgesses.
municipal corporation, and even of any that can be
called the joint or common property of the
burgesses. In general each burgess holds his house in the town of the king
or of some other lord by a several title, and, if he has land in the
neighbouring fields, this also he holds by a several title. ‘In the borough of
Nottingham there were in King Edward’s day 183 burgesses and 19 villani.
To this borough belong 6 carucates of land for the king’s geld and one
meadow and certain small woods ... This land was divided between 38
burgesses and [the king] received 75s. 7d. from the rent of the land and the
works of the burgesses.’ ‘In the borough of Derby there were in King
Edward’s day 243 resident burgesses.... To this borough belong 12 carucates
of land for the geld, but they might be ploughed by 8 teams. This land was
divided among 41 burgesses who had 12 teams[782].’ In these cases we see
plainly enough that such arable land as is in any way connected with the
borough has been held by but a few out of the total number of the
burgesses. Therefore we must deal cautiously with entries that are less
explicit. When, for example, in the description of
The community as
Stamford we read ‘Lagemanni et burgenses habent landholders.
Page 201
cclxxii. acras sine omni consuetudine[783],’ we must not at once decide that
there is any ownership by the burgesses as a corporation, or any joint
ownership, or even that all the burgesses have strips in these fields, though
apparently the burgesses who have strips pay no rent for them. This is the
fact and the only fact that the commissioners desire to record. They do not
care whether every burgess has a piece, or whether (as was certainly the
case elsewhere) only some of them held land outside the walls. When of
Norwich we read ‘et in burgo tenent burgenses xliii. capellas[784],’ we do
not suppose that all the Norwich burghers have chapels, still less that they
hold the forty-three chapels as co-owners, still less that these chapels
belong to a corporation. We remember that the Latin language has neither a
definite nor an indefinite article. Therefore when of 80 acres at Canterbury,
which are now held by Ralph de Colombiers, we read ‘quas tenebant
burgenses in alodia de rege,’ we need not suppose that these acres had
belonged to the (i.e. to all the) burgesses of Canterbury[785]. So of Exeter it
is written: ‘Burgenses Exoniae urbis habent extra civitatem terram xii.
caruc[arum] quae nullam consuetudinem reddunt nisi ad ipsam civitatem.’
This, though another interpretation is possible, may only mean that there are
outside the city twelve plough-lands which are held by burgesses whose
rents go to make up that sum of £18 which is paid to the king, or rather in
part to the sheriff and in part to the queen dowager, as the ferm of the
city[786]. Concerning Colchester there is an entry which perhaps ascribes to
the community of burgesses the ownership or the tenancy of fourscore acres
of land and of a strip eight perches in width surrounding the town wall; but
this entry is exceedingly obscure[787]. Another dark case occurs at
Canterbury. We are told that the burgesses or certain burgesses used to hold
land of the king ‘in their gild[788].’ Along with this we must read another
passage which states how in the same city the Archbishop has twelve
burgesses and thirty-two houses which ‘the clerks of the vill hold in their
gild.’ Apparently in this last case we have a clerical club or fraternity
holding land, and the burgher’s gild may be of much the same nature, a
voluntary association. Not very long after the date of Domesday, for
Anselm was still alive, an exchange of lands was made between the convent
(hired, familia) of Christ Church and the ‘cnihts’ of the chapman gild of
Canterbury. The transaction takes place between the ‘hired’ on the one
hand, the ‘heap’ (for such is the word employed) on the other. The
witnesses to this transaction are Archbishop Anselm and the ‘hired’ on the
there is any ownership by the burgesses as a corporation, or any joint
ownership, or even that all the burgesses have strips in these fields, though
apparently the burgesses who have strips pay no rent for them. This is the
fact and the only fact that the commissioners desire to record. They do not
care whether every burgess has a piece, or whether (as was certainly the
case elsewhere) only some of them held land outside the walls. When of
Norwich we read ‘et in burgo tenent burgenses xliii. capellas[784],’ we do
not suppose that all the Norwich burghers have chapels, still less that they
hold the forty-three chapels as co-owners, still less that these chapels
belong to a corporation. We remember that the Latin language has neither a
definite nor an indefinite article. Therefore when of 80 acres at Canterbury,
which are now held by Ralph de Colombiers, we read ‘quas tenebant
burgenses in alodia de rege,’ we need not suppose that these acres had
belonged to the (i.e. to all the) burgesses of Canterbury[785]. So of Exeter it
is written: ‘Burgenses Exoniae urbis habent extra civitatem terram xii.
caruc[arum] quae nullam consuetudinem reddunt nisi ad ipsam civitatem.’
This, though another interpretation is possible, may only mean that there are
outside the city twelve plough-lands which are held by burgesses whose
rents go to make up that sum of £18 which is paid to the king, or rather in
part to the sheriff and in part to the queen dowager, as the ferm of the
city[786]. Concerning Colchester there is an entry which perhaps ascribes to
the community of burgesses the ownership or the tenancy of fourscore acres
of land and of a strip eight perches in width surrounding the town wall; but
this entry is exceedingly obscure[787]. Another dark case occurs at
Canterbury. We are told that the burgesses or certain burgesses used to hold
land of the king ‘in their gild[788].’ Along with this we must read another
passage which states how in the same city the Archbishop has twelve
burgesses and thirty-two houses which ‘the clerks of the vill hold in their
gild.’ Apparently in this last case we have a clerical club or fraternity
holding land, and the burgher’s gild may be of much the same nature, a
voluntary association. Not very long after the date of Domesday, for
Anselm was still alive, an exchange of lands was made between the convent
(hired, familia) of Christ Church and the ‘cnihts’ of the chapman gild of
Canterbury. The transaction takes place between the ‘hired’ on the one
hand, the ‘heap’ (for such is the word employed) on the other. The
witnesses to this transaction are Archbishop Anselm and the ‘hired’ on the
Page 202
one hand, Calveal the portreeve and ‘the eldest men of the heap’ on the
other[789]. But to see a municipal corporation in the burghers’ gild of
Domesday Book would be very rash. We do not know that all the burghers
belonged to it or that it had any governmental functions[790]
We may of course find that a group of burgesses has
Rights of common.
‘rights of common;’ but rights of common, though
they are rights which are to be enjoyed in common,
are apt to be common rights in no other sense, for each commoner has a
several title to send his beasts onto the pasture. Thus ‘all the burgesses of
Oxford have pasture in common outside the wall which brings in [to the
king] 6s. 8d[791].’ The soil is the king’s; the burgesses pay for the right of
grazing it. The roundness of the sum that they pay seems indeed to hint at
some arrangement between the king and the burgesses taken in mass; but
probably each burgess, and the lord of each burgess, regards a right of
pasture as appurtenant to a burgage tenement. The case is striking, for we
have seen how heterogeneous a group these Oxford burgesses were[792]. No
less than nine prelates, to say nothing of earls and barons, had burgesses in
the city. We must greatly doubt whether there is any power in any assembly
of the burgesses to take from the Bishop of Winchester or the Count of
Mortain the customary rights of pasture that have been enjoyed by the
tenants of his tenements.
We might perhaps have guessed that the boroughs
Absence of
would be the places of all others in which such communalism in the
communalism as there was in the ancient village boroughs.
community would maintain and develop itself, until
in course of time the borough corporation, the ideal borough, would stand
out as the owner of lands which lay within and without the wall. But, if we
have not been going astray, we may see why this did not happen, at least in
what we may call the old national boroughs. The burgensic group was not
homogeneous enough. We may suppose that some members of it had
inherited arable strips and pasture rights from the original settlers; but
others were ‘knights’ who had been placed in the haws of the shire-thegns,
or were merchants and craftsmen who had been attracted by the market, and
for them there would be no room in an old agrarian scheme. Indeed it is not
improbable that, even as regards rights of pasture, there was more
difference between burgess and burgess than there was between villager and
other[789]. But to see a municipal corporation in the burghers’ gild of
Domesday Book would be very rash. We do not know that all the burghers
belonged to it or that it had any governmental functions[790]
We may of course find that a group of burgesses has
Rights of common.
‘rights of common;’ but rights of common, though
they are rights which are to be enjoyed in common,
are apt to be common rights in no other sense, for each commoner has a
several title to send his beasts onto the pasture. Thus ‘all the burgesses of
Oxford have pasture in common outside the wall which brings in [to the
king] 6s. 8d[791].’ The soil is the king’s; the burgesses pay for the right of
grazing it. The roundness of the sum that they pay seems indeed to hint at
some arrangement between the king and the burgesses taken in mass; but
probably each burgess, and the lord of each burgess, regards a right of
pasture as appurtenant to a burgage tenement. The case is striking, for we
have seen how heterogeneous a group these Oxford burgesses were[792]. No
less than nine prelates, to say nothing of earls and barons, had burgesses in
the city. We must greatly doubt whether there is any power in any assembly
of the burgesses to take from the Bishop of Winchester or the Count of
Mortain the customary rights of pasture that have been enjoyed by the
tenants of his tenements.
We might perhaps have guessed that the boroughs
Absence of
would be the places of all others in which such communalism in the
communalism as there was in the ancient village boroughs.
community would maintain and develop itself, until
in course of time the borough corporation, the ideal borough, would stand
out as the owner of lands which lay within and without the wall. But, if we
have not been going astray, we may see why this did not happen, at least in
what we may call the old national boroughs. The burgensic group was not
homogeneous enough. We may suppose that some members of it had
inherited arable strips and pasture rights from the original settlers; but
others were ‘knights’ who had been placed in the haws of the shire-thegns,
or were merchants and craftsmen who had been attracted by the market, and
for them there would be no room in an old agrarian scheme. Indeed it is not
improbable that, even as regards rights of pasture, there was more
difference between burgess and burgess than there was between villager and
Page 203
villager. In modern times it is not unknown that some of the burgesses will
have pasture rights, while others will have none, and in those who are thus
favoured we may fancy that we see the successors in title of the king’s
tenants who turned out their beasts on the king’s land[793]
We have seen that in the boroughs a group of men is
The borough community
formed whose principle of cohesion is not to be and its lord.
found in land tenure. The definition of a burgess may
involve the possession of a house within or hard by
the walls; but the burgesses do not coalesce as being the tenants or the men
of one lord; and yet coalesce they will. They are united in and by the moot
and the market-place, united under the king in whose peace they traffic; and
then they are soon united over against the king, who exacts toll from them
and has favours to grant them. They aspire to farm their own tolls, to
manage their own market and their own court. The king’s rights are
pecuniary rights; he is entitled to collect numerous small sums. Instead of
these he may be willing to take a fixed sum every year, or, in other words,
to let his rights to farm.
This step seems to have been very generally taken
The farm of the borough.
before the Conquest. Already the boroughs were
farmed. Now the sums which the king would draw
from a borough would be of several different kinds. In the first place, there
would be the profits of the market and of the borough court. In the second
place, there would be the gafol, the ‘haw-gavel’ and ‘land-gavel’ arising
from tenements belonging to the king and occupied by burgesses. In the
third place, there might be the danegeld; but the danegeld was a tax, an
occasional tax, and for the moment we may leave it out of our
consideration. Now the profits of the market and court seem to have been
farmed. The sums that they bring in to the king are round sums. The farmer
seems to have been the sheriff or in some cases the king’s portreeve. We can
find no case in which it is absolutely clear to our minds that the borough
itself, the communitas burgi, is reckoned to be the king’s farmer. Again, the
king’s gafol, that is his burgage rents, may be farmed: they are computed at
a round sum. Thus at Huntingdon ten pounds are paid by way of land-gafol,
and we may be fairly certain that the sum of the rents of the individual
burgesses who held their tenements immediately of the king (there were
other burgesses who belonged to the Abbot of Ramsey) did not exactly
have pasture rights, while others will have none, and in those who are thus
favoured we may fancy that we see the successors in title of the king’s
tenants who turned out their beasts on the king’s land[793]
We have seen that in the boroughs a group of men is
The borough community
formed whose principle of cohesion is not to be and its lord.
found in land tenure. The definition of a burgess may
involve the possession of a house within or hard by
the walls; but the burgesses do not coalesce as being the tenants or the men
of one lord; and yet coalesce they will. They are united in and by the moot
and the market-place, united under the king in whose peace they traffic; and
then they are soon united over against the king, who exacts toll from them
and has favours to grant them. They aspire to farm their own tolls, to
manage their own market and their own court. The king’s rights are
pecuniary rights; he is entitled to collect numerous small sums. Instead of
these he may be willing to take a fixed sum every year, or, in other words,
to let his rights to farm.
This step seems to have been very generally taken
The farm of the borough.
before the Conquest. Already the boroughs were
farmed. Now the sums which the king would draw
from a borough would be of several different kinds. In the first place, there
would be the profits of the market and of the borough court. In the second
place, there would be the gafol, the ‘haw-gavel’ and ‘land-gavel’ arising
from tenements belonging to the king and occupied by burgesses. In the
third place, there might be the danegeld; but the danegeld was a tax, an
occasional tax, and for the moment we may leave it out of our
consideration. Now the profits of the market and court seem to have been
farmed. The sums that they bring in to the king are round sums. The farmer
seems to have been the sheriff or in some cases the king’s portreeve. We can
find no case in which it is absolutely clear to our minds that the borough
itself, the communitas burgi, is reckoned to be the king’s farmer. Again, the
king’s gafol, that is his burgage rents, may be farmed: they are computed at
a round sum. Thus at Huntingdon ten pounds are paid by way of land-gafol,
and we may be fairly certain that the sum of the rents of the individual
burgesses who held their tenements immediately of the king (there were
other burgesses who belonged to the Abbot of Ramsey) did not exactly
Page 204
make up this neat sum[794]. In this case, however, the sum due to the king
from his farmer, probably the sheriff, in respect of the land-gafol is
expressly distinguished from the sum that he has to pay for the farm of the
borough (firma burgi):—at least in its narrowest sense, the burgus which is
farmed is not a mass of lands and houses, it is a market and a court[795].
But, though we find no case in which the community of the borough is
unambiguously treated as the king’s farmer, there are cases in which it
seems to come before us as the sheriff’s farmer. ‘The burgesses’ of
Northampton pay to the sheriff £30. 10s. per annum:—‘this belongs to his
farm[796].’ The sheriff of Northamptonshire is liable to the king for a round
sum as the farm of the shire, but ‘the burgesses’ of Northampton are liable
to the sheriff for a round sum. This may mean that for this round sum they
are jointly and severally liable, while, on the other hand, they collect the
tolls and fines, perhaps also the king’s burgage rents, and have an
opportunity of making profit by the transaction.
We must not be in haste to expel the sheriff from the
The sheriff and the
boroughs of the shire, or to bring the burgesses into borough’s farm.
immediate contact with the king’s treasury. We must
remember that at the beginning of Henry II.’s reign
there is scarcely an exception to the rule that the boroughs of the shire are in
the eyes of auditors at the Exchequer simply parts of that county which the
sheriff farms. So far as the farm is concerned, the royal treasury knows
nothing of any boroughs[797]. The sheriff of Gloucestershire, for example,
accounts for a round sum which is the farm of his county; neither he nor
any one else accounts to the king for any farm of the borough of Gloucester.
If, as is most probable, the borough is being farmed, it is being farmed by
some person or persons to whom, not the king, but the sheriff has let it for a
longer or shorter period at a fixed rent. Here, again, we see the likeness
between a borough and a hundred. The king lets the shire to farm; the shire
includes hundreds and boroughs; the sheriff ‘lets the hundreds to farm; the
sheriff lets the boroughs to farm.’ A few years later a new arrangement is
made. The king begins to let the borough of Gloucester to farm. A sum of
£50 (blanch) is now deducted from the rent that the sheriff has been paying
for his shire, and, on the other hand, Osmund the reeve accounts for £55,
which is the rent of the borough. We must not antedate a change which is
taking place very gradually in the middle of the twelfth century. Nor must
from his farmer, probably the sheriff, in respect of the land-gafol is
expressly distinguished from the sum that he has to pay for the farm of the
borough (firma burgi):—at least in its narrowest sense, the burgus which is
farmed is not a mass of lands and houses, it is a market and a court[795].
But, though we find no case in which the community of the borough is
unambiguously treated as the king’s farmer, there are cases in which it
seems to come before us as the sheriff’s farmer. ‘The burgesses’ of
Northampton pay to the sheriff £30. 10s. per annum:—‘this belongs to his
farm[796].’ The sheriff of Northamptonshire is liable to the king for a round
sum as the farm of the shire, but ‘the burgesses’ of Northampton are liable
to the sheriff for a round sum. This may mean that for this round sum they
are jointly and severally liable, while, on the other hand, they collect the
tolls and fines, perhaps also the king’s burgage rents, and have an
opportunity of making profit by the transaction.
We must not be in haste to expel the sheriff from the
The sheriff and the
boroughs of the shire, or to bring the burgesses into borough’s farm.
immediate contact with the king’s treasury. We must
remember that at the beginning of Henry II.’s reign
there is scarcely an exception to the rule that the boroughs of the shire are in
the eyes of auditors at the Exchequer simply parts of that county which the
sheriff farms. So far as the farm is concerned, the royal treasury knows
nothing of any boroughs[797]. The sheriff of Gloucestershire, for example,
accounts for a round sum which is the farm of his county; neither he nor
any one else accounts to the king for any farm of the borough of Gloucester.
If, as is most probable, the borough is being farmed, it is being farmed by
some person or persons to whom, not the king, but the sheriff has let it for a
longer or shorter period at a fixed rent. Here, again, we see the likeness
between a borough and a hundred. The king lets the shire to farm; the shire
includes hundreds and boroughs; the sheriff ‘lets the hundreds to farm; the
sheriff lets the boroughs to farm.’ A few years later a new arrangement is
made. The king begins to let the borough of Gloucester to farm. A sum of
£50 (blanch) is now deducted from the rent that the sheriff has been paying
for his shire, and, on the other hand, Osmund the reeve accounts for £55,
which is the rent of the borough. We must not antedate a change which is
taking place very gradually in the middle of the twelfth century. Nor must
Page 205
we at once reject the inference that, as the bailiffs to whom the sheriff lets
the hundreds are chosen by him, so also the bailiffs or portreeves to whom
he lets the boroughs are or have been chosen by him. It seems very possible
that one of the first steps towards independence that a borough takes is that
its burgesses induce the sheriff to accept their nominee as his farmer of the
town if they in mass will make themselves jointly and severally liable for
the rent. These movements take place in the dark and we can not date them;
but to antedate them would be easy.
We also see that the ‘geld’ that the borough has to
The community and the
pay is a round sum that remains constant from year geld.
to year. Cambridge, for example, is assessed at a
hundred hides, Bedford at half a hundred[798]. Now
we have good reason to believe that, in the open country also, a round sum
of geld or (and this is the same thing) a round number of hides had been
thrown upon the hundreds, that the sum thrown upon a hundred was then
partitioned among the vills, and that the sum thrown upon a vill was
partitioned among the persons who held land in the vill. In the open
country, however, when once the partition had been made, the number of
hides that was cast upon the land of any one proprietor seems to have been
fixed for good and all[799]. If we suppose, for example, that a vill had been
assessed at ten hides and that five of those units had been assigned to a
certain Edward, then Edward or his successors in title would always have to
pay for five hides, and would have to pay for no more although the other
proprietors in the vill obtained an exemption from the tax or were insolvent.
In short, the tax though originally distributed by a partitionary method was
not repartitionable. On the other hand, in the boroughs a more communal
arrangement seems to have prevailed. In some sense or another, the whole
borough, no matter what its fortunes might be, remained answerable for the
twenty, fifty or a hundred hides that had been imposed upon it. Such a
difference would naturally arise. In the open country the taxational hidation
was supposed to represent and did represent, albeit rudely, a state of facts
that had once existed. The man who was charged with a hide ought in truth
to have had one of those agrarian units that were commonly known as
hides. But when a borough was charged with hides, a method of taxation
that was adapted to and suggested by rural arrangements was being
inappropriately applied to what had become or would soon become an
the hundreds are chosen by him, so also the bailiffs or portreeves to whom
he lets the boroughs are or have been chosen by him. It seems very possible
that one of the first steps towards independence that a borough takes is that
its burgesses induce the sheriff to accept their nominee as his farmer of the
town if they in mass will make themselves jointly and severally liable for
the rent. These movements take place in the dark and we can not date them;
but to antedate them would be easy.
We also see that the ‘geld’ that the borough has to
The community and the
pay is a round sum that remains constant from year geld.
to year. Cambridge, for example, is assessed at a
hundred hides, Bedford at half a hundred[798]. Now
we have good reason to believe that, in the open country also, a round sum
of geld or (and this is the same thing) a round number of hides had been
thrown upon the hundreds, that the sum thrown upon a hundred was then
partitioned among the vills, and that the sum thrown upon a vill was
partitioned among the persons who held land in the vill. In the open
country, however, when once the partition had been made, the number of
hides that was cast upon the land of any one proprietor seems to have been
fixed for good and all[799]. If we suppose, for example, that a vill had been
assessed at ten hides and that five of those units had been assigned to a
certain Edward, then Edward or his successors in title would always have to
pay for five hides, and would have to pay for no more although the other
proprietors in the vill obtained an exemption from the tax or were insolvent.
In short, the tax though originally distributed by a partitionary method was
not repartitionable. On the other hand, in the boroughs a more communal
arrangement seems to have prevailed. In some sense or another, the whole
borough, no matter what its fortunes might be, remained answerable for the
twenty, fifty or a hundred hides that had been imposed upon it. Such a
difference would naturally arise. In the open country the taxational hidation
was supposed to represent and did represent, albeit rudely, a state of facts
that had once existed. The man who was charged with a hide ought in truth
to have had one of those agrarian units that were commonly known as
hides. But when a borough was charged with hides, a method of taxation
that was adapted to and suggested by rural arrangements was being
inappropriately applied to what had become or would soon become an
Page 206
urban district. Thus the gross sum that is cast upon the borough does not
split itself once and for all into many small sums each of which takes root in
a particular tenement. The whole sum is exigible from the whole borough
every time a geld is imposed. It is repartitionable.
For all this, however, we must be careful not to see
Partition of taxes.
more communalism or more local self-government
than really exists. At first sight we may think that we
detect a communal or a joint liability of all the burgesses for the whole sum
that is due from the borough in any one year. ‘The English born’ burgesses
of Shrewsbury send up a piteous wail[800]. They still have to pay the whole
geld as they paid it in the Confessor’s day, although the earl has taken for
his castle the sites of fifty-one houses, and other fifty houses are waste, and
forty-three French burgesses hold houses which used to pay geld, and the
earl has given to the abbey, which he has founded, thirty-nine burgesses
who used to pay geld along with the others. But, when we examine the
matter more closely, we may doubt whether there is here any joint and
several (to say nothing of any corporate) liability. Very various are the
modes in which a land-tax or house-tax may be assessed and levied.
Suppose a tax of £100 imposed upon a certain district in which there are a
hundred houses. Suppose it also to be law that, though some of these houses
come to the hands of elemosynary corporations (which we will imagine to
enjoy an immunity from taxation) still the whole £100 must be raised
annually from the householders of the district. For all this, we have not as
yet decided that any householder will ever be liable, even in the first
instance, for more than his own particular share of the £100. A readjustment
of taxation there must be. It may take one of many forms. There may be a
revaluation of the district, and the £100 may be newly apportioned by some
meeting of householders or some government officer. But, again, the
readjustment may be automatic. Formerly there were 100 houses to pay
£100. Now there are 90 houses to pay £100. That each of the 90 must pay
ten-ninths of a pound is a conclusion that the rule of three draws for us. In
the middle ages an automatic readjustment was all the easier because of the
common assumption that the value of lands and houses was known to every
one and that one virgate in a manor was as good as another, one ‘haw’ in a
borough as good as another[801]. We do not say that the complaint of the
burgesses at Shrewsbury points to no more than an automatic readjustment
split itself once and for all into many small sums each of which takes root in
a particular tenement. The whole sum is exigible from the whole borough
every time a geld is imposed. It is repartitionable.
For all this, however, we must be careful not to see
Partition of taxes.
more communalism or more local self-government
than really exists. At first sight we may think that we
detect a communal or a joint liability of all the burgesses for the whole sum
that is due from the borough in any one year. ‘The English born’ burgesses
of Shrewsbury send up a piteous wail[800]. They still have to pay the whole
geld as they paid it in the Confessor’s day, although the earl has taken for
his castle the sites of fifty-one houses, and other fifty houses are waste, and
forty-three French burgesses hold houses which used to pay geld, and the
earl has given to the abbey, which he has founded, thirty-nine burgesses
who used to pay geld along with the others. But, when we examine the
matter more closely, we may doubt whether there is here any joint and
several (to say nothing of any corporate) liability. Very various are the
modes in which a land-tax or house-tax may be assessed and levied.
Suppose a tax of £100 imposed upon a certain district in which there are a
hundred houses. Suppose it also to be law that, though some of these houses
come to the hands of elemosynary corporations (which we will imagine to
enjoy an immunity from taxation) still the whole £100 must be raised
annually from the householders of the district. For all this, we have not as
yet decided that any householder will ever be liable, even in the first
instance, for more than his own particular share of the £100. A readjustment
of taxation there must be. It may take one of many forms. There may be a
revaluation of the district, and the £100 may be newly apportioned by some
meeting of householders or some government officer. But, again, the
readjustment may be automatic. Formerly there were 100 houses to pay
£100. Now there are 90 houses to pay £100. That each of the 90 must pay
ten-ninths of a pound is a conclusion that the rule of three draws for us. In
the middle ages an automatic readjustment was all the easier because of the
common assumption that the value of lands and houses was known to every
one and that one virgate in a manor was as good as another, one ‘haw’ in a
borough as good as another[801]. We do not say that the complaint of the
burgesses at Shrewsbury points to no more than an automatic readjustment
Page 207
of taxation which all along has been a taxation of individuals; still the
warning is needful that the exaction at regular or irregular intervals of a
fixed amount from a district, or from the householders or inhabitants of a
district, an amount which remains constant though certain portions of the
district obtain immunity from the impost, does not of necessity point to any
kind of liability that is not the liability of one single individual for specific
sums which he and he only has to pay; nor does it of necessity point to any
self-governing or self-assessing assembly of inhabitants[802]
Returning, however, to the case of Northampton, it
No corporation implied
certainly seems to tell us of a composition, not by the farming of the
indeed between the burgesses and the king, but borough.
between the burgesses and the sheriff. ‘The
burgesses of Northampton pay to the sheriff £30. 10s.’ We may believe that
‘the burgesses’ who pay this sum have a chance of making a profit. If so,
‘the burgesses’ are already beginning to farm ‘the borough.’ From this,
nevertheless, we must not leap to corporate liability or corporate property.
Very likely the sheriff regards every burgess of Northampton as liable to
him for the whole £30. 10s.; very certainly, as we think, he does not look
for payment merely to property which belongs, not to any individual
burgess nor to any sum of individual burgesses, but to ‘the borough’ of
Northampton. Nor if the burgesses make profit out of tolls and fines, does it
follow that they have a permanent common purse; they may divide the
surplus every year[803], or we may suspect them of drinking the profits as
soon as they are made.
Entries which describe the limits that are set to the
Borough and county
duty of military or of naval service may seem more organization.
eloquent. Thus of Dover we are told that the
burgesses used to supply twenty ships for fifteen
days in the year with twenty-one men in each ship, and that they did this
because the king had released to them his sake and soke[804]. Here we seem
to read of a definite transaction between the king of the one part and the
borough of the other part, and one which implies a good deal of
governmental organization in the borough. We would say nothing to lessen
the just force of such a passage, which does not stand alone[805]; but still
there need be but little more organization in the borough of Dover than
there is in Berkshire. It was the custom of that county that, when the king
warning is needful that the exaction at regular or irregular intervals of a
fixed amount from a district, or from the householders or inhabitants of a
district, an amount which remains constant though certain portions of the
district obtain immunity from the impost, does not of necessity point to any
kind of liability that is not the liability of one single individual for specific
sums which he and he only has to pay; nor does it of necessity point to any
self-governing or self-assessing assembly of inhabitants[802]
Returning, however, to the case of Northampton, it
No corporation implied
certainly seems to tell us of a composition, not by the farming of the
indeed between the burgesses and the king, but borough.
between the burgesses and the sheriff. ‘The
burgesses of Northampton pay to the sheriff £30. 10s.’ We may believe that
‘the burgesses’ who pay this sum have a chance of making a profit. If so,
‘the burgesses’ are already beginning to farm ‘the borough.’ From this,
nevertheless, we must not leap to corporate liability or corporate property.
Very likely the sheriff regards every burgess of Northampton as liable to
him for the whole £30. 10s.; very certainly, as we think, he does not look
for payment merely to property which belongs, not to any individual
burgess nor to any sum of individual burgesses, but to ‘the borough’ of
Northampton. Nor if the burgesses make profit out of tolls and fines, does it
follow that they have a permanent common purse; they may divide the
surplus every year[803], or we may suspect them of drinking the profits as
soon as they are made.
Entries which describe the limits that are set to the
Borough and county
duty of military or of naval service may seem more organization.
eloquent. Thus of Dover we are told that the
burgesses used to supply twenty ships for fifteen
days in the year with twenty-one men in each ship, and that they did this
because the king had released to them his sake and soke[804]. Here we seem
to read of a definite transaction between the king of the one part and the
borough of the other part, and one which implies a good deal of
governmental organization in the borough. We would say nothing to lessen
the just force of such a passage, which does not stand alone[805]; but still
there need be but little more organization in the borough of Dover than
there is in Berkshire. It was the custom of that county that, when the king
Page 208
summoned his host, only one soldier went from every five hides, while each
hide provided him with four shillings for his equipment and wages[806]. We
may guess that in a county such a scheme very rapidly ‘realized’ itself and
took root in the soil, that in a borough there was less ‘realism,’ that there
were more frequent readjustments of the burden; but the difference is a
difference of degree.
Of anything that could be called the constitution of
Government of the
the boroughs, next to nothing can we learn. We may boroughs.
take it that in most cases the king’s farmer was the
sheriff of the shire; in some few cases, as for
example at Hereford, the reeve of the borough may have been directly
accountable to the king[807]. We know no proof that in any case the reeve
was an elected officer. Probably in each borough a court was held which
was a court for the borough; probably it was, at least as a general rule, co-
ordinate with a hundred court, and indeed at starting the borough seems to
be regarded as a vill which is also a hundred[808]. The action of this court,
however, like the action of other hundred courts, must as time went on have
been hampered by the growth of seignorial justice. The sake and soke
which a lord might have over his men and over his lands were certainly not
excluded by the borough walls. He had sometimes been expressly told that
he might enjoy these rights ‘within borough and without borough.’ It is
difficult for us to realize the exact meaning that ‘sake and soke’ would bear
when ascribed to a prelate or thegn who had but two or three houses within
the town. Perhaps in such cases the town houses were for jurisdictional
purposes deemed to be situate within some rural manor of their lord. But in
a borough a lord might have a compact group of tenants quite large enough
to form a petty court. In such a case the borough court would have the
seignorial courts as rivals, and many a dispute would there be. At Lincoln
one Tochi had a hall which undoubtedly was free ‘from all custom’; but he
had also thirty houses over which the king had toll and forfeiture. So the
burgesses swore; but a certain priest was ready to prove by ordeal that they
swore falsely[809]. In these cases the lord’s territory would appear in later
times as a little ‘liberty’ lying within the borough walls. The middle ages
were far spent before such liberties had become mere petty nuisances[810].
In the old cathedral towns, such as Canterbury and Winchester, the bishop’s
jurisdictional powers and immunities were serious affairs, for the bishop’s
hide provided him with four shillings for his equipment and wages[806]. We
may guess that in a county such a scheme very rapidly ‘realized’ itself and
took root in the soil, that in a borough there was less ‘realism,’ that there
were more frequent readjustments of the burden; but the difference is a
difference of degree.
Of anything that could be called the constitution of
Government of the
the boroughs, next to nothing can we learn. We may boroughs.
take it that in most cases the king’s farmer was the
sheriff of the shire; in some few cases, as for
example at Hereford, the reeve of the borough may have been directly
accountable to the king[807]. We know no proof that in any case the reeve
was an elected officer. Probably in each borough a court was held which
was a court for the borough; probably it was, at least as a general rule, co-
ordinate with a hundred court, and indeed at starting the borough seems to
be regarded as a vill which is also a hundred[808]. The action of this court,
however, like the action of other hundred courts, must as time went on have
been hampered by the growth of seignorial justice. The sake and soke
which a lord might have over his men and over his lands were certainly not
excluded by the borough walls. He had sometimes been expressly told that
he might enjoy these rights ‘within borough and without borough.’ It is
difficult for us to realize the exact meaning that ‘sake and soke’ would bear
when ascribed to a prelate or thegn who had but two or three houses within
the town. Perhaps in such cases the town houses were for jurisdictional
purposes deemed to be situate within some rural manor of their lord. But in
a borough a lord might have a compact group of tenants quite large enough
to form a petty court. In such a case the borough court would have the
seignorial courts as rivals, and many a dispute would there be. At Lincoln
one Tochi had a hall which undoubtedly was free ‘from all custom’; but he
had also thirty houses over which the king had toll and forfeiture. So the
burgesses swore; but a certain priest was ready to prove by ordeal that they
swore falsely[809]. In these cases the lord’s territory would appear in later
times as a little ‘liberty’ lying within the borough walls. The middle ages
were far spent before such liberties had become mere petty nuisances[810].
In the old cathedral towns, such as Canterbury and Winchester, the bishop’s
jurisdictional powers and immunities were serious affairs, for the bishop’s
Page 209
tenants were numerous[811]. Nevertheless, in the great and ancient boroughs,
the boroughs which stand out as types and models, there was from a very
remote time a court, a borough-moot or portman-moot, which was not
seignorial, a court which was a unit in a national system of courts.
Of the form that the borough court took we can say
The borough court.
little. Perhaps at first it would be an assembly of all
the free burg-men or port-men. As its business
increased in the large boroughs, as it began to sit once a week instead of
thrice a year, a set of persons bound to serve as doomsmen may have been
formed, a set of aldermen or lawmen whose offices might or might not be
hereditary, might or might not ‘run with’ the possession of certain specific
tenements. A ‘husting’ might be formed, that is, a house-thing as distinct
from a ‘thing’ or court held in the open air. Law required that there should
be standing witnesses in a borough, before whom bargains and sales should
take place. Such a demand might hasten the formation of a small body of
doomsmen. In Cambridge there were lawmen of thegnly rank[812]; in
Lincoln there were twelve lawmen[813]; in Stamford there had been twelve,
though at the date of Domesday Book there were but nine[814]; we read of
four iudices in York[815], and of twelve iudices in Chester[816]. So late as
1275 the twelve lawmen of Stamford lived on in the persons of their heirs
or successors. There are, said a jury, twelve men in Stamford who are called
lawmen because their ancestors were in old time the judges of the laws
(iudices legum) in the said town; they hold of the king in chief; by what
service we do not know; but you can find out from Domesday Book[817].
Over the bodies of these, presumably Danish, lawmen there has been much
disputation. We know that taken individually the lawmen of Lincoln were
holders of heritable franchises, of sake and soke. We know that among the
twelve iudices of Chester were men of the king, men of the earl, men of the
bishop; they had to attend the ‘hundred,’ that is, we take it, the borough
court. We know no more; but it seems likely that we have to deal with
persons who collectively form a group of doomsmen, while individually
each of them is a great man, of thegnly rank, with sake and soke over his
men and his lands; his office passes to his heir[818]. On the whole, however,
we must doubt whether the generality of English boroughs had arrived at
even this somewhat rudimentary stage of organization. In 1200 the men of
Ipswich, having received a charter from King John, decided that there
the boroughs which stand out as types and models, there was from a very
remote time a court, a borough-moot or portman-moot, which was not
seignorial, a court which was a unit in a national system of courts.
Of the form that the borough court took we can say
The borough court.
little. Perhaps at first it would be an assembly of all
the free burg-men or port-men. As its business
increased in the large boroughs, as it began to sit once a week instead of
thrice a year, a set of persons bound to serve as doomsmen may have been
formed, a set of aldermen or lawmen whose offices might or might not be
hereditary, might or might not ‘run with’ the possession of certain specific
tenements. A ‘husting’ might be formed, that is, a house-thing as distinct
from a ‘thing’ or court held in the open air. Law required that there should
be standing witnesses in a borough, before whom bargains and sales should
take place. Such a demand might hasten the formation of a small body of
doomsmen. In Cambridge there were lawmen of thegnly rank[812]; in
Lincoln there were twelve lawmen[813]; in Stamford there had been twelve,
though at the date of Domesday Book there were but nine[814]; we read of
four iudices in York[815], and of twelve iudices in Chester[816]. So late as
1275 the twelve lawmen of Stamford lived on in the persons of their heirs
or successors. There are, said a jury, twelve men in Stamford who are called
lawmen because their ancestors were in old time the judges of the laws
(iudices legum) in the said town; they hold of the king in chief; by what
service we do not know; but you can find out from Domesday Book[817].
Over the bodies of these, presumably Danish, lawmen there has been much
disputation. We know that taken individually the lawmen of Lincoln were
holders of heritable franchises, of sake and soke. We know that among the
twelve iudices of Chester were men of the king, men of the earl, men of the
bishop; they had to attend the ‘hundred,’ that is, we take it, the borough
court. We know no more; but it seems likely that we have to deal with
persons who collectively form a group of doomsmen, while individually
each of them is a great man, of thegnly rank, with sake and soke over his
men and his lands; his office passes to his heir[818]. On the whole, however,
we must doubt whether the generality of English boroughs had arrived at
even this somewhat rudimentary stage of organization. In 1200 the men of
Ipswich, having received a charter from King John, decided that there
Page 210
should be in their borough twelve chief portmen, ‘as there were in the other
free boroughs in England,’ who should have full power to govern and
maintain the town and to render the judgments of its court[819]. Now
Ipswich has a right to be placed in the class of ancient boroughs, of county
towns, and yet to all appearance it had no definite class of chief men or
doomsmen until the year 1200. Still we ought not to infer from this that the
town moot had been in practice a democratic institution. There may be a
great deal of oligarchy, and oligarchy of an oppressive kind, though the
ruling class has never been defined by law. Domesday Book allows us to
see in various towns a large number of poor folk who can not pay taxes or
can only pay a poll tax. We must be chary of conceding to this crowd any
share in the dooms of the court[820]
But what concerns the government of the boroughs
Definition of the
has for the time been sufficiently said by others. In borough.
our few last words we will return to our first theme,
the difference between the borough and the mere
township.
We have seen that in Domesday Book a prominent
Mediatized boroughs.
position is conceded to certain towns. They are not
brought under any rubric which would place them
upon the king’s or any other person’s land. It must now be confessed that
there are some other towns that are not thus treated and that none the less
are called boroughs. If, however, we remember that burgesses often are in
law where they are not in fact, the list that we shall make of these boroughs
will not be long. Still such boroughs exist and a few words should be said
about them. They seem to fall into two classes, for they are described as
being on the king’s land or on the land of some noble or prelate. Of the
latter class we will speak first. It does not contain many members and in
some cases we can be certain that in the Confessor’s day the borough in
question had no other lord than the king. Totness is a case in point. It now
falls under the title Terra Judhel de Tottenais; but we are told that King
Edward held it in demesne[821]. In Sussex we see that Steyning, Pevensey
and Lewes are called burgi[822], Steyning is placed on the land of the Abbot
of Fécamp, Pevensey on that of the Count of Mortain and Lewes on that of
William of Warenne; but at Lewes there have been many haws appurtenant
to the rural manors of the shire thegns[823]. In Kent the borough of Hythe
free boroughs in England,’ who should have full power to govern and
maintain the town and to render the judgments of its court[819]. Now
Ipswich has a right to be placed in the class of ancient boroughs, of county
towns, and yet to all appearance it had no definite class of chief men or
doomsmen until the year 1200. Still we ought not to infer from this that the
town moot had been in practice a democratic institution. There may be a
great deal of oligarchy, and oligarchy of an oppressive kind, though the
ruling class has never been defined by law. Domesday Book allows us to
see in various towns a large number of poor folk who can not pay taxes or
can only pay a poll tax. We must be chary of conceding to this crowd any
share in the dooms of the court[820]
But what concerns the government of the boroughs
Definition of the
has for the time been sufficiently said by others. In borough.
our few last words we will return to our first theme,
the difference between the borough and the mere
township.
We have seen that in Domesday Book a prominent
Mediatized boroughs.
position is conceded to certain towns. They are not
brought under any rubric which would place them
upon the king’s or any other person’s land. It must now be confessed that
there are some other towns that are not thus treated and that none the less
are called boroughs. If, however, we remember that burgesses often are in
law where they are not in fact, the list that we shall make of these boroughs
will not be long. Still such boroughs exist and a few words should be said
about them. They seem to fall into two classes, for they are described as
being on the king’s land or on the land of some noble or prelate. Of the
latter class we will speak first. It does not contain many members and in
some cases we can be certain that in the Confessor’s day the borough in
question had no other lord than the king. Totness is a case in point. It now
falls under the title Terra Judhel de Tottenais; but we are told that King
Edward held it in demesne[821]. In Sussex we see that Steyning, Pevensey
and Lewes are called burgi[822], Steyning is placed on the land of the Abbot
of Fécamp, Pevensey on that of the Count of Mortain and Lewes on that of
William of Warenne; but at Lewes there have been many haws appurtenant
to the rural manors of the shire thegns[823]. In Kent the borough of Hythe
Page 211
seems to be completely under the archbishop[824]. He has burgesses at
Romney over whom he has justiciary rights, but they serve the king[825].
The ‘little borough called Fordwich’ belonged to the Abbot of St Augustin.
But of this we know the history. The Confessor gave him the royal two-
thirds, while the bishop of Bayeux as the successor of Earl Godwin gave
him the comital one-third[826]. Further north, Louth in Lincolnshire and
Newark in Nottinghamshire seem to be accounted boroughs; they both
belong to the bishop of Lincoln; but in the case of Newark (which was
probably an old burh) we may doubt whether his title is very ancient[827].
We are told that at Tatteshall, the Pontefract of later days[828], there are sixty
‘minute burgesses,’ that is, we take it, burgesses in a small way. Ilbert de
Lacy is now their lord; but here again we may suspect a recent act of
mediatization[829]. Grantham in Lincolnshire is placed on the Terra Regis; it
had belonged to Queen Edith; there were, however, seventy-seven tofts in it
which belonged to ‘the sokemen of the thegns,’ that is, to the sokemen of
the thegns of the shire[830]. Then in Suffolk we see that Ipswich is described
at the end of the section which deals with the royal estates; a similar place is
found for Norwich, Yarmouth and Thetford in the survey of Norfolk[831].
But for Dunwich we must look elsewhere. There were burgesses at
Dunwich; but to all seeming the royal rights over the town had passed into
the hands of Eadric of Laxfield[832]. The successor of the same Eadric has
burgesses among his tenants at Eye[833]. There are burgesses at Clare,
though Clare belongs altogether to the progenitor of the lordly race which
will take its name from this little town[834]. But at least in this last case, the
burgesses may be new-comers, or rather perhaps we may see that an old
idea is giving way to a newer idea of a borough, and that if men engaged in
trade or handicraft settle round a market-place and pay money-rents to a
lord they will be called burgesses, though the town is no national fortress.
At Berkhampstead 52 burgesses are collected in a burbium, but they may be
as new as the two arpents of vineyard[835]. We must not say dogmatically
that never in the days before the Conquest had a village become a borough
while it had for its one and only landlord some person other than the king,
some bishop, or some thegn. This may have happened at Taunton. In 1086
there were burgesses at Taunton and it enjoyed ‘burh-riht,’ and yet from a
very remote time it had belonged to the bishops of Winchester. But the
cases in which we may suppose that a village in private hands became a
burgus and that this change took place before the Norman invasion seem to
Romney over whom he has justiciary rights, but they serve the king[825].
The ‘little borough called Fordwich’ belonged to the Abbot of St Augustin.
But of this we know the history. The Confessor gave him the royal two-
thirds, while the bishop of Bayeux as the successor of Earl Godwin gave
him the comital one-third[826]. Further north, Louth in Lincolnshire and
Newark in Nottinghamshire seem to be accounted boroughs; they both
belong to the bishop of Lincoln; but in the case of Newark (which was
probably an old burh) we may doubt whether his title is very ancient[827].
We are told that at Tatteshall, the Pontefract of later days[828], there are sixty
‘minute burgesses,’ that is, we take it, burgesses in a small way. Ilbert de
Lacy is now their lord; but here again we may suspect a recent act of
mediatization[829]. Grantham in Lincolnshire is placed on the Terra Regis; it
had belonged to Queen Edith; there were, however, seventy-seven tofts in it
which belonged to ‘the sokemen of the thegns,’ that is, to the sokemen of
the thegns of the shire[830]. Then in Suffolk we see that Ipswich is described
at the end of the section which deals with the royal estates; a similar place is
found for Norwich, Yarmouth and Thetford in the survey of Norfolk[831].
But for Dunwich we must look elsewhere. There were burgesses at
Dunwich; but to all seeming the royal rights over the town had passed into
the hands of Eadric of Laxfield[832]. The successor of the same Eadric has
burgesses among his tenants at Eye[833]. There are burgesses at Clare,
though Clare belongs altogether to the progenitor of the lordly race which
will take its name from this little town[834]. But at least in this last case, the
burgesses may be new-comers, or rather perhaps we may see that an old
idea is giving way to a newer idea of a borough, and that if men engaged in
trade or handicraft settle round a market-place and pay money-rents to a
lord they will be called burgesses, though the town is no national fortress.
At Berkhampstead 52 burgesses are collected in a burbium, but they may be
as new as the two arpents of vineyard[835]. We must not say dogmatically
that never in the days before the Conquest had a village become a borough
while it had for its one and only landlord some person other than the king,
some bishop, or some thegn. This may have happened at Taunton. In 1086
there were burgesses at Taunton and it enjoyed ‘burh-riht,’ and yet from a
very remote time it had belonged to the bishops of Winchester. But the
cases in which we may suppose that a village in private hands became a
burgus and that this change took place before the Norman invasion seem to
Page 212
be extremely few. In these few the cause of the change may have been that
the king by way of special favour imposed his burhgrið upon the town and
thereby augmented the revenue of its lord[836].
As to the boroughs that are regarded as standing on
Boroughs on the king’s
the king’s land, these also seem to be few and for the land.
more part they are small. There are burgesses at
Maldon[837]; but Maldon is not placed by the side of
Colchester[838]; it is described among the royal estates. There are burgesses
at Bristol[839]; but Bristol is not placed beside Gloucester and Winchcombe.
Perhaps we should have heard more of it, if it had not, like Tamworth, stood
on the border of two counties. In the south-west the king’s officials seem to
be grappling with difficulties as best they may. In Dorset they place
Dorchester, Bridport, Wareham and Shaftesbury above the rubric Terra
Regis[840], and we can not find that they reckon any other place as a
borough. In Devonshire we see Exeter above the line; Lidford and
Barnstaple, however, are called boroughs though they are assigned to the
king’s land, and (as already said) Totness is a borough, though it is
mediatized and is described among the estates of its Breton lord[841]. No
borough in Somerset is placed above the line, though we learn that the king
has 107 burgesses in Ilchester who pay him 20 shillings[842], and that he and
others have burgesses at Bath[843]. Perhaps the space that stands vacant
before the list of the tenants in chief should have been filled with some
words about these two towns. Axbridge, Langport and Milborne seem to be
boroughs; Axbridge and Langport occur in that list of ancient fortresses
which we have called The Burghal Hidage[844]. Wells was an episcopal,
Somerton a royal manor; we have no reason for calling either of them a
borough. In Hampshire another of the ancient fortresses, Twyneham (the
modern Christ Church) is still called burgus, but seems to be finding its
level among the royal manors[845]. In Wiltshire Malmesbury and
Marlborough are placed above the line. We learn that the king receives £50
from the burgus of Wilton[846], and we also learn incidentally that various
lords have burgesses in that town; for example, the bishop of Salisbury has
burgesses in Wilton who belong to his manor of Salisbury[847]. Old
Salisbury (‘old Sarum’ as we foolishly call it) seems to be a mere manor
belonging to the bishop; but the king receives its third penny. He receives
also the third penny of Cricklade, which we have named before now as one
the king by way of special favour imposed his burhgrið upon the town and
thereby augmented the revenue of its lord[836].
As to the boroughs that are regarded as standing on
Boroughs on the king’s
the king’s land, these also seem to be few and for the land.
more part they are small. There are burgesses at
Maldon[837]; but Maldon is not placed by the side of
Colchester[838]; it is described among the royal estates. There are burgesses
at Bristol[839]; but Bristol is not placed beside Gloucester and Winchcombe.
Perhaps we should have heard more of it, if it had not, like Tamworth, stood
on the border of two counties. In the south-west the king’s officials seem to
be grappling with difficulties as best they may. In Dorset they place
Dorchester, Bridport, Wareham and Shaftesbury above the rubric Terra
Regis[840], and we can not find that they reckon any other place as a
borough. In Devonshire we see Exeter above the line; Lidford and
Barnstaple, however, are called boroughs though they are assigned to the
king’s land, and (as already said) Totness is a borough, though it is
mediatized and is described among the estates of its Breton lord[841]. No
borough in Somerset is placed above the line, though we learn that the king
has 107 burgesses in Ilchester who pay him 20 shillings[842], and that he and
others have burgesses at Bath[843]. Perhaps the space that stands vacant
before the list of the tenants in chief should have been filled with some
words about these two towns. Axbridge, Langport and Milborne seem to be
boroughs; Axbridge and Langport occur in that list of ancient fortresses
which we have called The Burghal Hidage[844]. Wells was an episcopal,
Somerton a royal manor; we have no reason for calling either of them a
borough. In Hampshire another of the ancient fortresses, Twyneham (the
modern Christ Church) is still called burgus, but seems to be finding its
level among the royal manors[845]. In Wiltshire Malmesbury and
Marlborough are placed above the line. We learn that the king receives £50
from the burgus of Wilton[846], and we also learn incidentally that various
lords have burgesses in that town; for example, the bishop of Salisbury has
burgesses in Wilton who belong to his manor of Salisbury[847]. Old
Salisbury (‘old Sarum’ as we foolishly call it) seems to be a mere manor
belonging to the bishop; but the king receives its third penny. He receives
also the third penny of Cricklade, which we have named before now as one
Page 213
of the old Wessex strongholds, and several of the county magnates had
burgesses there. On the other hand Calne, Bedwind and Warminster are
reckoned to be manors on the king’s land. Burgesses belong to them; but
whether those burgesses are really resident in them may not be quite
certain[848]. Devizes we can not find. That puzzles should occur in this
quarter is what our general theory might lead us to expect. In the old home
of the West-Saxon kings there may well have been towns which had long
ago secured the name and the peace of royal burgs, though they manifested
none of that tenurial heterogeneity which is the common mark of a borough.
A town, a village, which not only belonged to the king but contained a
palace or house in which he often dwelt, would enjoy his special peace, and
might maintain its burghal dignity long after there was little, if any, real
difference between it and other manors or villages of which the king was
the immediate landlord. Already in 1086 there may have been ‘rotten
boroughs,’ boroughs that were rotten before they were ripe[849]
A borough belongs to the genus villa (tún). In age
Attributes of the
after age our task is to discover its differentia, and borough.
the task is hard because, as age succeeds age,
changes in law and changes in fact are making the
old distinctions obsolete while others are becoming important. Let us
observe, then, that already when Domesday Book was in the making those
ancient attributes of which we have been speaking were disappearing or
were fated soon to disappear. We have thought of the typical borough as a
fortified town maintained by a district for military purposes. But already the
shire thegns have been letting their haws at a rent and probably have been
letting them to craftsmen and traders. Also the time has come for knight-
service and castles and castle-guard. We have thought of the typical
borough as the sphere of a special peace. But the day is at hand when a
revolution in the criminal law will destroy the old system of wer and wíte
and bót, and the king’s peace will reign always and everywhere[850]. We
have thought of the typical borough as a town which has a court. But the
day is at hand when almost every village will have its court, its manorial
court. New contrasts, however, are emerging as the old contrasts fade away.
Against a background of villeinage and week-work, the borough begins to
stand out as the scene of burgage tenure. The service by which the burgess
holds his tenement is a money rent. This may lead to a large increase in the
burgesses there. On the other hand Calne, Bedwind and Warminster are
reckoned to be manors on the king’s land. Burgesses belong to them; but
whether those burgesses are really resident in them may not be quite
certain[848]. Devizes we can not find. That puzzles should occur in this
quarter is what our general theory might lead us to expect. In the old home
of the West-Saxon kings there may well have been towns which had long
ago secured the name and the peace of royal burgs, though they manifested
none of that tenurial heterogeneity which is the common mark of a borough.
A town, a village, which not only belonged to the king but contained a
palace or house in which he often dwelt, would enjoy his special peace, and
might maintain its burghal dignity long after there was little, if any, real
difference between it and other manors or villages of which the king was
the immediate landlord. Already in 1086 there may have been ‘rotten
boroughs,’ boroughs that were rotten before they were ripe[849]
A borough belongs to the genus villa (tún). In age
Attributes of the
after age our task is to discover its differentia, and borough.
the task is hard because, as age succeeds age,
changes in law and changes in fact are making the
old distinctions obsolete while others are becoming important. Let us
observe, then, that already when Domesday Book was in the making those
ancient attributes of which we have been speaking were disappearing or
were fated soon to disappear. We have thought of the typical borough as a
fortified town maintained by a district for military purposes. But already the
shire thegns have been letting their haws at a rent and probably have been
letting them to craftsmen and traders. Also the time has come for knight-
service and castles and castle-guard. We have thought of the typical
borough as the sphere of a special peace. But the day is at hand when a
revolution in the criminal law will destroy the old system of wer and wíte
and bót, and the king’s peace will reign always and everywhere[850]. We
have thought of the typical borough as a town which has a court. But the
day is at hand when almost every village will have its court, its manorial
court. New contrasts, however, are emerging as the old contrasts fade away.
Against a background of villeinage and week-work, the borough begins to
stand out as the scene of burgage tenure. The service by which the burgess
holds his tenement is a money rent. This may lead to a large increase in the
Page 214
number of boroughs. If a lord enfranchises a manor, abolishes villein
customs, takes money rents, allows his tenants to farm the court and
perhaps also to farm a market that he has acquired from the king, he will be
said to create a liber burgus[851]. Merchant gilds, elected bailiffs, elected
mayors and common seals will appear and will complicate the question.
There will follow a time of uncertainty and confusion when the sheriffs will
decide as suits them best which of the smaller towns are boroughs and
which are not.
If the theory that we have been suggesting is true, all
Classification of
or very nearly all our ancient boroughs (and we will boroughs.
draw the line of ancientry at the Conquest) are in
their inception royal boroughs. The group of
burgesses when taken as a whole had no superior other than the king. His
was the peace that prevailed in the streets; the profits of the court and of the
market were his, though they were farmed by a reeve. Rarely, however, was
he the landlord of all the burgesses. In general not a few of them lived in
houses that belonged to the thegns of the shire. We must be careful
therefore before we speak of these towns as ‘boroughs on the royal
demesne.’ For the more part, the compilers of Domesday Book have refused
to place them on the Terra Regis. In course of time some of them will be
currently spoken of as boroughs on or of the royal demesne. The rights of
those who represent the thegns of the shire will have become mere rights to
rent, and, their origin being forgotten, they will even be treated as mere
rent-charges[852]. The great majority of the burgesses will in many instances
be the king’s immediate tenants and he will be the only lord of that
incorporeal thing, ‘the borough,’ the only man who can grant it a charter or
let it to farm. But we must distinguish between these towns and those which
at the Conquest were manors on the king’s land. These latter, if he
enfranchises them, will be boroughs on the royal demesne in an exacter
sense. So, again, we must distinguish between those ancient boroughs
which the king has mediatized and those manors of mesne lords which are
raised to the rank of boroughs. We have seen that from the ancient borough
the king received a revenue of tolls and fines. Therefore he had something
to give away. He could mediatize the borough. Domesday Book shows us
that this had already been done in a few instances[853]. At a later time some
even of the county towns passed out of the king’s hands into the hands of
customs, takes money rents, allows his tenants to farm the court and
perhaps also to farm a market that he has acquired from the king, he will be
said to create a liber burgus[851]. Merchant gilds, elected bailiffs, elected
mayors and common seals will appear and will complicate the question.
There will follow a time of uncertainty and confusion when the sheriffs will
decide as suits them best which of the smaller towns are boroughs and
which are not.
If the theory that we have been suggesting is true, all
Classification of
or very nearly all our ancient boroughs (and we will boroughs.
draw the line of ancientry at the Conquest) are in
their inception royal boroughs. The group of
burgesses when taken as a whole had no superior other than the king. His
was the peace that prevailed in the streets; the profits of the court and of the
market were his, though they were farmed by a reeve. Rarely, however, was
he the landlord of all the burgesses. In general not a few of them lived in
houses that belonged to the thegns of the shire. We must be careful
therefore before we speak of these towns as ‘boroughs on the royal
demesne.’ For the more part, the compilers of Domesday Book have refused
to place them on the Terra Regis. In course of time some of them will be
currently spoken of as boroughs on or of the royal demesne. The rights of
those who represent the thegns of the shire will have become mere rights to
rent, and, their origin being forgotten, they will even be treated as mere
rent-charges[852]. The great majority of the burgesses will in many instances
be the king’s immediate tenants and he will be the only lord of that
incorporeal thing, ‘the borough,’ the only man who can grant it a charter or
let it to farm. But we must distinguish between these towns and those which
at the Conquest were manors on the king’s land. These latter, if he
enfranchises them, will be boroughs on the royal demesne in an exacter
sense. So, again, we must distinguish between those ancient boroughs
which the king has mediatized and those manors of mesne lords which are
raised to the rank of boroughs. We have seen that from the ancient borough
the king received a revenue of tolls and fines. Therefore he had something
to give away. He could mediatize the borough. Domesday Book shows us
that this had already been done in a few instances[853]. At a later time some
even of the county towns passed out of the king’s hands into the hands of
Page 215
earls. This happened at Leicester and at Warwick. The earl succeeded to the
king’s rights, and the burgesses had to go to the earl for their liberties and
their charters. But such cases are very distinct from those in which a mesne
lord grants an enfranchising charter to the men of a place which has hitherto
been one of his manors, and by speaking of boroughs which are ‘on the land
of mesne lords’ we must not confuse two classes of towns which have long
had different histories. In the ancient boroughs there is from the first an
element that we must call both artificial and national. The borough does not
grow up spontaneously; it is made; it is ‘wrought’; it is ‘timbered.’ It has a
national purpose; it is maintained ‘at the cost of the nation’ by the duty that
the shire owes to it. This trait may soon have disappeared, may soon have
been forgotten, but a great work had been done. In these nationally
supported and heterogeneously peopled towns a new kind of community
might wax and thrive.
king’s rights, and the burgesses had to go to the earl for their liberties and
their charters. But such cases are very distinct from those in which a mesne
lord grants an enfranchising charter to the men of a place which has hitherto
been one of his manors, and by speaking of boroughs which are ‘on the land
of mesne lords’ we must not confuse two classes of towns which have long
had different histories. In the ancient boroughs there is from the first an
element that we must call both artificial and national. The borough does not
grow up spontaneously; it is made; it is ‘wrought’; it is ‘timbered.’ It has a
national purpose; it is maintained ‘at the cost of the nation’ by the duty that
the shire owes to it. This trait may soon have disappeared, may soon have
been forgotten, but a great work had been done. In these nationally
supported and heterogeneously peopled towns a new kind of community
might wax and thrive.
Page 216
Page 217
ESSAY II.
ENGLAND BEFORE THE CONQUEST.
No one can spend patient hours in examining the
Object of this Essay.
complex web disclosed by Domesday Book without
making some theories, at least some guesses, about
the political, social and economic threads of which that web has been
woven. But if we here venture to fashion and state a few such theories or
such guesses, it is with no hope that they will be a complete explanation of
old English history. For, in the first place, we are to speak mainly of the
things of the law, of legal ideas and legal forms, and once for all we may
protest that we have no wish to overestimate their importance. The
elaborate and long continued development to which we point when we
speak of ‘feudalism,’ can not be fully explained by any discussion of legal
ideas and legal forms. On the other hand, it can not be fully explained
without such discussion, for almost all that we can know about it is to be
found in legal documents. In the second place, we are to make a selection.
Certain phases of our oldest legal history, notably those which are called
‘constitutional,’ have been so fully treated by classical books, that at the
present moment there is no good reason why we should traverse the ground
that has been covered. Therefore if, for example, we say little or nothing of
the ancient Germanic comitatus or of the relationship between lord and man
in so far as it is a merely personal relationship, this will not be because we
have overlooked these matters; it will be because there is nothing to be
gained by our repeating what has been well and sufficiently said by Dr
Konrad Maurer, Dr Reinhold Schmid, Dr Stubbs and others. And if, again,
we lay great stress on what may be called the ecclesiastical phase of the
feudalizing process, this will not be because we think it the only phase, it
will be because we think that too little attention has been paid by English
writers to the influence which the churches exercised upon temporal affairs
by means of their endowments. The day for an artistically proportioned
picture of the growth of feudalism has not yet come; the day for a
quantitative analysis of the elements of feudalism may never come; for the
present we must be content if we can bring out a few new truths or set a few
ENGLAND BEFORE THE CONQUEST.
No one can spend patient hours in examining the
Object of this Essay.
complex web disclosed by Domesday Book without
making some theories, at least some guesses, about
the political, social and economic threads of which that web has been
woven. But if we here venture to fashion and state a few such theories or
such guesses, it is with no hope that they will be a complete explanation of
old English history. For, in the first place, we are to speak mainly of the
things of the law, of legal ideas and legal forms, and once for all we may
protest that we have no wish to overestimate their importance. The
elaborate and long continued development to which we point when we
speak of ‘feudalism,’ can not be fully explained by any discussion of legal
ideas and legal forms. On the other hand, it can not be fully explained
without such discussion, for almost all that we can know about it is to be
found in legal documents. In the second place, we are to make a selection.
Certain phases of our oldest legal history, notably those which are called
‘constitutional,’ have been so fully treated by classical books, that at the
present moment there is no good reason why we should traverse the ground
that has been covered. Therefore if, for example, we say little or nothing of
the ancient Germanic comitatus or of the relationship between lord and man
in so far as it is a merely personal relationship, this will not be because we
have overlooked these matters; it will be because there is nothing to be
gained by our repeating what has been well and sufficiently said by Dr
Konrad Maurer, Dr Reinhold Schmid, Dr Stubbs and others. And if, again,
we lay great stress on what may be called the ecclesiastical phase of the
feudalizing process, this will not be because we think it the only phase, it
will be because we think that too little attention has been paid by English
writers to the influence which the churches exercised upon temporal affairs
by means of their endowments. The day for an artistically proportioned
picture of the growth of feudalism has not yet come; the day for a
quantitative analysis of the elements of feudalism may never come; for the
present we must be content if we can bring out a few new truths or set a few
Page 218
old truths in a new light. The vast and intricate subject may be approached
from many different quarters. If we can make some little progress along our
chosen path, we shall be all the more willing to admit that progress along
other paths is possible.
It can not but be, however, that this part of our work
Fundamental
should be controversial, though it need not be controversies as to
polemical. We are told that ‘in spite of all the labour Anglo-Saxon history.
that has been spent on the early history of England,
scholars are still at variance upon the most fundamental of questions: the
question whether that history began with a population of independent
freemen or with a population of dependent serfs[854]’. Some exception may
be taken to this statement. No one denies that for the purposes of English
history slavery is a primitive institution, nor that in the seventh and eighth
centuries there were many slaves in England. On the other hand, no one will
assert that we can ascertain, even approximately, the ratio that the number
of slaves bore to the number of free men. Moreover such terms as
‘dependent’ and ‘independent’ are not words that we can profitably quarrel
over, since they are inexact and ambiguous. For all this, however, it may
well be said that there are two main theories before the world. The one
would trace the English manor back to the Roman villa, would think of the
soil of England as being tilled from the first mainly by men who, when they
were not mere slaves, were coloni ascript to the land. The other would
postulate the existence of a large number of free men who with their own
labour tilled their own soil, of men who might fairly be called free ‘peasant
proprietors’ since they were far from rich and had few slaves or servants,
and yet who were no mere peasants since they habitually bore arms in the
national host. What may be considered for the moment as a variant on this
latter doctrine would place the ownership of the soil, or of large tracts of the
soil, not in these free peasants taken as individuals, but in free village
communities.
Now we will say at once that the first of these
The Romanesque theory
theories we can not accept if it be put forward in a unacceptable.
general form, if it be applied to the whole or
anything like the whole of England. Certainly we are
not in a position to deny that in some cases, a Roman villa having come into
the hands of a Saxon chieftain, he treated the slaves and coloni that he
from many different quarters. If we can make some little progress along our
chosen path, we shall be all the more willing to admit that progress along
other paths is possible.
It can not but be, however, that this part of our work
Fundamental
should be controversial, though it need not be controversies as to
polemical. We are told that ‘in spite of all the labour Anglo-Saxon history.
that has been spent on the early history of England,
scholars are still at variance upon the most fundamental of questions: the
question whether that history began with a population of independent
freemen or with a population of dependent serfs[854]’. Some exception may
be taken to this statement. No one denies that for the purposes of English
history slavery is a primitive institution, nor that in the seventh and eighth
centuries there were many slaves in England. On the other hand, no one will
assert that we can ascertain, even approximately, the ratio that the number
of slaves bore to the number of free men. Moreover such terms as
‘dependent’ and ‘independent’ are not words that we can profitably quarrel
over, since they are inexact and ambiguous. For all this, however, it may
well be said that there are two main theories before the world. The one
would trace the English manor back to the Roman villa, would think of the
soil of England as being tilled from the first mainly by men who, when they
were not mere slaves, were coloni ascript to the land. The other would
postulate the existence of a large number of free men who with their own
labour tilled their own soil, of men who might fairly be called free ‘peasant
proprietors’ since they were far from rich and had few slaves or servants,
and yet who were no mere peasants since they habitually bore arms in the
national host. What may be considered for the moment as a variant on this
latter doctrine would place the ownership of the soil, or of large tracts of the
soil, not in these free peasants taken as individuals, but in free village
communities.
Now we will say at once that the first of these
The Romanesque theory
theories we can not accept if it be put forward in a unacceptable.
general form, if it be applied to the whole or
anything like the whole of England. Certainly we are
not in a position to deny that in some cases, a Roman villa having come into
the hands of a Saxon chieftain, he treated the slaves and coloni that he
Page 219
found upon it in much the same way as that in which they had been
theretofore treated, though even in such a case the change was in all
probability momentous, since large commerce and all that large commerce
implies had perished. But against the hypothesis that this was the general
case the English language and the names of our English villages are the
unanswered protest. It seems incredible that the bulk of the population
should have been of Celtic blood and yet that the Celtic language should not
merely have disappeared, but have stamped few traces of itself upon the
speech of the conquerors.[855] This we regard as an objection which goes to
the root of the whole matter and which throws upon those who would make
the English nation in the main a nation of Celtic bondmen, the burden of
strictly proving their thesis. The German invaders must have been
numerous. The Britons were no cowards. They contested the soil inch by
inch. The struggle was long and arduous. What then, we must ask, became
of the mass of the victors? Surely it is impossible that they at once settled
down as the ‘dependent serfs’ of their chieftains. Again, though it is very
likely that where we find a land of scattered steads and of isolated hamlets,
there the Germanic conquerors have spared or have been unable to subdue
the Britons or have adapted their own arrangements to the exterior
framework that was provided by Celtic or Roman agriculture, still, until
Meitzen[856] has been refuted, we are compelled to say that our true
villages, the nucleated villages with large ‘open fields,’ are not Celtic, are
not Roman, but are very purely and typically German. But this is not all.
Hereafter we shall urge some other objections. The doctrine in question will
give no rational explanation of the state of things that is revealed to us by
the Domesday Survey of the northern and eastern counties and it will give
no rational explanation of seignorial justice. This being so, we seem bound
to suppose that at one time there was a large class of peasant proprietors,
that is, of free men who tilled the soil that they owned, and to discuss the
process which substitutes for peasant proprietorship the manorial
organization.
Though we can not deal at any length with a matter
Feudalism as a normal
which lies outside the realm of legal history, we stage.
ought at once to explain that we need not regard this
change as a retrogression. There are indeed
historians who have not yet abandoned the habit of speaking of feudalism
theretofore treated, though even in such a case the change was in all
probability momentous, since large commerce and all that large commerce
implies had perished. But against the hypothesis that this was the general
case the English language and the names of our English villages are the
unanswered protest. It seems incredible that the bulk of the population
should have been of Celtic blood and yet that the Celtic language should not
merely have disappeared, but have stamped few traces of itself upon the
speech of the conquerors.[855] This we regard as an objection which goes to
the root of the whole matter and which throws upon those who would make
the English nation in the main a nation of Celtic bondmen, the burden of
strictly proving their thesis. The German invaders must have been
numerous. The Britons were no cowards. They contested the soil inch by
inch. The struggle was long and arduous. What then, we must ask, became
of the mass of the victors? Surely it is impossible that they at once settled
down as the ‘dependent serfs’ of their chieftains. Again, though it is very
likely that where we find a land of scattered steads and of isolated hamlets,
there the Germanic conquerors have spared or have been unable to subdue
the Britons or have adapted their own arrangements to the exterior
framework that was provided by Celtic or Roman agriculture, still, until
Meitzen[856] has been refuted, we are compelled to say that our true
villages, the nucleated villages with large ‘open fields,’ are not Celtic, are
not Roman, but are very purely and typically German. But this is not all.
Hereafter we shall urge some other objections. The doctrine in question will
give no rational explanation of the state of things that is revealed to us by
the Domesday Survey of the northern and eastern counties and it will give
no rational explanation of seignorial justice. This being so, we seem bound
to suppose that at one time there was a large class of peasant proprietors,
that is, of free men who tilled the soil that they owned, and to discuss the
process which substitutes for peasant proprietorship the manorial
organization.
Though we can not deal at any length with a matter
Feudalism as a normal
which lies outside the realm of legal history, we stage.
ought at once to explain that we need not regard this
change as a retrogression. There are indeed
historians who have not yet abandoned the habit of speaking of feudalism
Page 220
as though it were a disease of the body politic. Now the word ‘feudalism’ is
and always will be an inexact term, and, no doubt, at various times and
places there emerge phenomena which may with great propriety be called
feudal and which come of evil and make for evil. But if we use the term,
and often we do, in a very wide sense, if we describe several centuries as
feudal, then feudalism will appear to us as a natural and even a necessary
stage in our history: that is to say, if we would have the England of the
sixteenth century arise out of the England of the eighth without passing
through a period of feudalism, we must suppose many immense and
fundamental changes in the nature of man and his surroundings. If we use
the term in this wide sense, then (the barbarian conquests being given us as
an unalterable fact) feudalism means civilization, the separation of
employments, the division of labor, the possibility of national defence, the
possibility of art, science, literature and learned leisure; the cathedral, the
scriptorium, the library, are as truly the work of feudalism as is the baronial
castle. When therefore we speak, as we shall have to speak, of forces which
make for the subjection of the peasantry to seignorial justice and which
substitute the manor with its villeins for the free village, we shall—so at
least it seems to us—be speaking not of abnormal forces, not of
retrogression, not of disease, but in the main of normal and healthy growth.
Far from us indeed is the cheerful optimism which refuses to see that the
process of civilization is often a cruel process; but the England of the
eleventh century is nearer to the England of the nineteenth than is the
England of the seventh—nearer by just four hundred years.
This leads to a remark which concerns us more
Feudalism as progress
deeply. As regards the legal ideas in which feudalism and as retrogress.
is expressed a general question may be raised. If we
approach them from the standpoint of modern law, if
we approach them from the standpoint of the classical Roman law, they are
confused ideas. In particular no clear line is drawn between public and
private law. Ownership is dominium; but governmental power, jurisdictional
power, these also are dominium. Office is property; taxes are rents;
governmental relationships arise ex contractu. Then within the province of
private law the ideas are few; these few have hard work to do; their outlines
are blurred. One dominium rises above another dominium, one seisin over
another seisin. Efforts after precision made in comparatively recent times
and always will be an inexact term, and, no doubt, at various times and
places there emerge phenomena which may with great propriety be called
feudal and which come of evil and make for evil. But if we use the term,
and often we do, in a very wide sense, if we describe several centuries as
feudal, then feudalism will appear to us as a natural and even a necessary
stage in our history: that is to say, if we would have the England of the
sixteenth century arise out of the England of the eighth without passing
through a period of feudalism, we must suppose many immense and
fundamental changes in the nature of man and his surroundings. If we use
the term in this wide sense, then (the barbarian conquests being given us as
an unalterable fact) feudalism means civilization, the separation of
employments, the division of labor, the possibility of national defence, the
possibility of art, science, literature and learned leisure; the cathedral, the
scriptorium, the library, are as truly the work of feudalism as is the baronial
castle. When therefore we speak, as we shall have to speak, of forces which
make for the subjection of the peasantry to seignorial justice and which
substitute the manor with its villeins for the free village, we shall—so at
least it seems to us—be speaking not of abnormal forces, not of
retrogression, not of disease, but in the main of normal and healthy growth.
Far from us indeed is the cheerful optimism which refuses to see that the
process of civilization is often a cruel process; but the England of the
eleventh century is nearer to the England of the nineteenth than is the
England of the seventh—nearer by just four hundred years.
This leads to a remark which concerns us more
Feudalism as progress
deeply. As regards the legal ideas in which feudalism and as retrogress.
is expressed a general question may be raised. If we
approach them from the standpoint of modern law, if
we approach them from the standpoint of the classical Roman law, they are
confused ideas. In particular no clear line is drawn between public and
private law. Ownership is dominium; but governmental power, jurisdictional
power, these also are dominium. Office is property; taxes are rents;
governmental relationships arise ex contractu. Then within the province of
private law the ideas are few; these few have hard work to do; their outlines
are blurred. One dominium rises above another dominium, one seisin over
another seisin. Efforts after precision made in comparatively recent times
Page 221
by romanizing lawyers serve only to show how vague was the subject-
matter with which they had to deal. They would give the lord a dominium
directum, the vassal a dominium utile; but then, when there has been further
subinfeudation, this vassal will have a dominium utile as regards the lord
paramount, but a dominium directum as regards the sub-vassal. So again, as
we shall see hereafter, the gift of land shades off into the ‘loan’ of land, the
‘loan’ into the gift. The question then occurs whether we are right in
applying to this state of things such a word as ‘confusion,’ a word which
implies that things that once were distinct have wrongfully or unfortunately
been mixed up with each other, a word which implies error or retrogression.
Now, no doubt, from one point of view, namely that
Progress and retrogress
of universal history, we do see confusion and in the history of legal
retrogression. Ideal possessions which have been ideas.
won for mankind by the thought of Roman lawyers
are lost for a long while and must be recovered painfully. Lines that have
been traced with precision are smudged out, and then they must be traced
once more. If we regard western Europe as a whole, this retrogression
appears as a slow change. How slow—that is a much controverted question.
There are, for example, historians who would have us think of the Gaul of
Merovingian times as being in the main governed by Roman ideas and
institutions, which have indeed been sadly debased, but still are the old
ideas and institutions. There are other historians who can discover in this
same Gaul little that is not genuinely German and barbarous. But at any
rate, it must be admitted that somehow or another a retrogression takes
place, that the best legal ideas of the ninth and tenth centuries are not so
good, so modern, as those of the third and fourth. If, however, we take a
narrower view and fix our eyes upon the barbarian hordes which invade a
Roman province, shall we say that their legal thought gradually goes to the
bad, and loses distinctions which it has once apprehended? To turn to our
own case—Shall we say that Englishmen of the eighth century mark the
line that divides public from private law, while Englishmen of the eleventh
century can not perceive it.
No one perhaps to such a question would boldly say:
The contact of barbarism
Yes. And yet, when it comes to a treatment of and civilization.
particulars, an affirmative answer seems to be
implied in much that has been written even by
matter with which they had to deal. They would give the lord a dominium
directum, the vassal a dominium utile; but then, when there has been further
subinfeudation, this vassal will have a dominium utile as regards the lord
paramount, but a dominium directum as regards the sub-vassal. So again, as
we shall see hereafter, the gift of land shades off into the ‘loan’ of land, the
‘loan’ into the gift. The question then occurs whether we are right in
applying to this state of things such a word as ‘confusion,’ a word which
implies that things that once were distinct have wrongfully or unfortunately
been mixed up with each other, a word which implies error or retrogression.
Now, no doubt, from one point of view, namely that
Progress and retrogress
of universal history, we do see confusion and in the history of legal
retrogression. Ideal possessions which have been ideas.
won for mankind by the thought of Roman lawyers
are lost for a long while and must be recovered painfully. Lines that have
been traced with precision are smudged out, and then they must be traced
once more. If we regard western Europe as a whole, this retrogression
appears as a slow change. How slow—that is a much controverted question.
There are, for example, historians who would have us think of the Gaul of
Merovingian times as being in the main governed by Roman ideas and
institutions, which have indeed been sadly debased, but still are the old
ideas and institutions. There are other historians who can discover in this
same Gaul little that is not genuinely German and barbarous. But at any
rate, it must be admitted that somehow or another a retrogression takes
place, that the best legal ideas of the ninth and tenth centuries are not so
good, so modern, as those of the third and fourth. If, however, we take a
narrower view and fix our eyes upon the barbarian hordes which invade a
Roman province, shall we say that their legal thought gradually goes to the
bad, and loses distinctions which it has once apprehended? To turn to our
own case—Shall we say that Englishmen of the eighth century mark the
line that divides public from private law, while Englishmen of the eleventh
century can not perceive it.
No one perhaps to such a question would boldly say:
The contact of barbarism
Yes. And yet, when it comes to a treatment of and civilization.
particulars, an affirmative answer seems to be
implied in much that has been written even by
Page 222
modern historians. They begin at the beginning and attribute precise ideas
and well-defined law to the German conquerors of Britain. If they began
with the eleventh century and thence turned to the earlier time, they might
come to another opinion, to the opinion that in the beginning all was very
vague, and that such clearness and precision as legal thought has attained in
the days of the Norman Conquest has been very gradually attained and is
chiefly due to the influence which the old heathen world working through
the Roman church has exercised upon the new. The process that is started
when barbarism is brought into contact with civilization is not simple. The
hitherto naked savage may at once assume some part of the raiment,
perhaps the hat, of the white man. When after a while he puts these things
aside and learns to make for himself clothes suitable to the climate in which
he lives and the pursuits in which he is engaged, we see in this an advance,
not a relapse; and yet he has abandoned some things that belong to the
white man. Even so when our kings of the eighth century set their hands to
documents written in Latin and bristling with the technical terms of Roman
law, to documents which at first sight seem to express clear enough ideas of
ownership and alienation, we must not at once assume that they have
grasped these ideas. In course of time men will evolve formulas which will
aptly fit their thought, for example, the ‘feudal’ charter of feoffment with its
tenendum de me and its reddendo mihi. Externally it will not be so Roman
or (we may say it) so modern a document as was the land-book of the
eighth century, and yet in truth there has been progress not retrogress.
Words that Roman lawyers would have understood give way before words
which would have been nonsense to them, feoffamentum, liberatio seisinae
and the like. This is as it should be. Men are learning to say what they really
mean.
And now let us remember that our materials for the
Our materials.
legal history of the long age which lies behind
Domesday Book are scanty. A long age it is, even if
we measure it only from the date of Augustin’s mission. The Conqueror
stands midway between Æthelbert and Elizabeth. To illustrate five hundred
years of legal history we have only the dooms and the land-books. The
dooms are so much taken up with the work of keeping the peace and
punishing theft that they tell us little of the structure of society or of the
feudalizing process, while as to what they imply it is but too easy for
and well-defined law to the German conquerors of Britain. If they began
with the eleventh century and thence turned to the earlier time, they might
come to another opinion, to the opinion that in the beginning all was very
vague, and that such clearness and precision as legal thought has attained in
the days of the Norman Conquest has been very gradually attained and is
chiefly due to the influence which the old heathen world working through
the Roman church has exercised upon the new. The process that is started
when barbarism is brought into contact with civilization is not simple. The
hitherto naked savage may at once assume some part of the raiment,
perhaps the hat, of the white man. When after a while he puts these things
aside and learns to make for himself clothes suitable to the climate in which
he lives and the pursuits in which he is engaged, we see in this an advance,
not a relapse; and yet he has abandoned some things that belong to the
white man. Even so when our kings of the eighth century set their hands to
documents written in Latin and bristling with the technical terms of Roman
law, to documents which at first sight seem to express clear enough ideas of
ownership and alienation, we must not at once assume that they have
grasped these ideas. In course of time men will evolve formulas which will
aptly fit their thought, for example, the ‘feudal’ charter of feoffment with its
tenendum de me and its reddendo mihi. Externally it will not be so Roman
or (we may say it) so modern a document as was the land-book of the
eighth century, and yet in truth there has been progress not retrogress.
Words that Roman lawyers would have understood give way before words
which would have been nonsense to them, feoffamentum, liberatio seisinae
and the like. This is as it should be. Men are learning to say what they really
mean.
And now let us remember that our materials for the
Our materials.
legal history of the long age which lies behind
Domesday Book are scanty. A long age it is, even if
we measure it only from the date of Augustin’s mission. The Conqueror
stands midway between Æthelbert and Elizabeth. To illustrate five hundred
years of legal history we have only the dooms and the land-books. The
dooms are so much taken up with the work of keeping the peace and
punishing theft that they tell us little of the structure of society or of the
feudalizing process, while as to what they imply it is but too easy for
Page 223
different men to form different opinions. Some twelve hundred land-books
or charters, genuine and spurious, are our best, almost our only, evidence,
and it must needs be that they will give us but a partial and one-sided view
of intricate and many-sided facts[857].
or charters, genuine and spurious, are our best, almost our only, evidence,
and it must needs be that they will give us but a partial and one-sided view
of intricate and many-sided facts[857].
Page 224
Page 225
§ 1. Book-land and the Land-book.
Now these charters or land-books are, with hardly
The lands of the
any exceptions, ecclesiastical title-deeds. Most of churches.
them are deeds whereby lands were conveyed to the
churches; some are deeds whereby lands were
conveyed to men who conveyed them to the churches. Partial, one-sided
and in details untrustworthy though the testimony that they bear may be,
there is still one general question that they ought to answer and we ought to
ask. Domesday Book shows us many of the churches as the lords of wide
and continuous tracts of land. Now about this important element in the
feudal structure the land-books ought to tell us something. They ought to
tell us how the churches acquired their territories; they ought to tell us what
class of men made gifts of land to the churches; they ought to tell us
whether those gifts were of big tracts or of small pieces. For example, let us
remember how Domesday Book shows us that four minsters, Worcester,
Evesham, Pershore and Westminster, were lords of seven-twelfths of
Worcestershire, that the church of Worcester was lord of one quarter of that
shire and lord of the triple hundred of Oswaldslaw. How did that church
become the owner of a quarter of a county, to say nothing of lands in other
shires? We ought to be able to answer this question in general terms, for
among the charters that have come down to us there is no series which is
longer, there is hardly a long series which is of better repute, than the line of
the land-books which belonged to the church of Worcester. They come to us
for the more part in the form of a cartulary compiled not long after the
Conquest by the monk Heming at the instance of Bishop Wulfstan[858].
Now the answer that they give to our question is
How the churches
this:—With but few exceptions, the donors of these acquired their lands.
lands were kings or under-kings, kings or under-
kings of the Mercians, kings of the English, and the
gifts were large gifts. Very often the charter comprised a tract of land which
in Domesday Book appears as a whole vill or as several contiguous vills.
Seldom indeed is the subject-matter of the gift described as being a villa or
Now these charters or land-books are, with hardly
The lands of the
any exceptions, ecclesiastical title-deeds. Most of churches.
them are deeds whereby lands were conveyed to the
churches; some are deeds whereby lands were
conveyed to men who conveyed them to the churches. Partial, one-sided
and in details untrustworthy though the testimony that they bear may be,
there is still one general question that they ought to answer and we ought to
ask. Domesday Book shows us many of the churches as the lords of wide
and continuous tracts of land. Now about this important element in the
feudal structure the land-books ought to tell us something. They ought to
tell us how the churches acquired their territories; they ought to tell us what
class of men made gifts of land to the churches; they ought to tell us
whether those gifts were of big tracts or of small pieces. For example, let us
remember how Domesday Book shows us that four minsters, Worcester,
Evesham, Pershore and Westminster, were lords of seven-twelfths of
Worcestershire, that the church of Worcester was lord of one quarter of that
shire and lord of the triple hundred of Oswaldslaw. How did that church
become the owner of a quarter of a county, to say nothing of lands in other
shires? We ought to be able to answer this question in general terms, for
among the charters that have come down to us there is no series which is
longer, there is hardly a long series which is of better repute, than the line of
the land-books which belonged to the church of Worcester. They come to us
for the more part in the form of a cartulary compiled not long after the
Conquest by the monk Heming at the instance of Bishop Wulfstan[858].
Now the answer that they give to our question is
How the churches
this:—With but few exceptions, the donors of these acquired their lands.
lands were kings or under-kings, kings or under-
kings of the Mercians, kings of the English, and the
gifts were large gifts. Very often the charter comprised a tract of land which
in Domesday Book appears as a whole vill or as several contiguous vills.
Seldom indeed is the subject-matter of the gift described as being a villa or
Page 226
a vicus:—the king merely says that he gives so many manses or the land of
so many manentes at a certain place. Still, if we compare these charters with
Domesday Book, we shall become convinced that very often the land given
was of wide extent. For example, Domesday Book tells us that the church
of Worcester holds Sedgebarrow (Seggesbarue) where it has four hides for
geld, but eight plough teams. How was this acquired? The monks answer
that three centuries ago, in 777, Aldred the under-king of the Hwiccas gave
them viculum qui nuncupatur aet Segcesbaruue iiii. mansiones, that land
having been giving to him by Offa king of the Mercians in order that the
soul of the subregulus might have something done for it[859]. In the
Conqueror’s reign the Archbishop of Canterbury held a great estate in
Middlesex of which Harrow was the centre, and which contained no less
than 100 hides. Already in 832 the archbishop or his church had 104 hides
at Harrow[860]. Here we will state our belief, its grounds will appear in
another essay, that the ‘manses’ that the kings throw about by fives and tens
and twenties, are no small holdings, but hides each of which contains, or is
for fiscal purposes deemed to contain, some 120 acres of arable land
together with stretches, often wide stretches, of wood, meadow and waste,
the extent of which varies from case to case. From the seventh century
onwards the kings are giving large territories to the churches. One instance
is beyond suspicion, for Bede attests it. In 686 or thereabouts Æthelwealh
king of the South Saxons gave to Bishop Wilfrid the land of eighty-seven
families in the promontory of Selsey, and among its inhabitants were two
hundred and fifty male and female slaves[861]. This gift comprised a
spacious tract of country; it comprised what then were, or what afterwards
became, the sites of many villages[862]. But to whichever of our oldest
churches we turn, the story that it proclaims in its title-deeds is always the
same:—We obtained our lands by means of royal grants; we obtained them
not in little pieces, here a few acres and there a few, but in great pieces.
Canterbury and Winchester echo the tale that is told by Worcester. Another
example may be given. It is one that has been carefully examined of late. In
739 King Æthelheard of Wessex gave to Forthhere bishop of Sherborne
twenty cassati at the place called ‘Cridie.’ Thereby he disposed of what
now are ‘the parishes of Crediton, Newton St. Cyres, Upton Pyne,
Brampford Speke, Hittesleigh, Drewsteignton, Colebrooke, Morchard
Bishop, Sandford, Kennerleigh and the modern parish of Sherwood, part of
Cheriton Bishop, and possibly the whole of Clannaborough.’ He disposed of
so many manentes at a certain place. Still, if we compare these charters with
Domesday Book, we shall become convinced that very often the land given
was of wide extent. For example, Domesday Book tells us that the church
of Worcester holds Sedgebarrow (Seggesbarue) where it has four hides for
geld, but eight plough teams. How was this acquired? The monks answer
that three centuries ago, in 777, Aldred the under-king of the Hwiccas gave
them viculum qui nuncupatur aet Segcesbaruue iiii. mansiones, that land
having been giving to him by Offa king of the Mercians in order that the
soul of the subregulus might have something done for it[859]. In the
Conqueror’s reign the Archbishop of Canterbury held a great estate in
Middlesex of which Harrow was the centre, and which contained no less
than 100 hides. Already in 832 the archbishop or his church had 104 hides
at Harrow[860]. Here we will state our belief, its grounds will appear in
another essay, that the ‘manses’ that the kings throw about by fives and tens
and twenties, are no small holdings, but hides each of which contains, or is
for fiscal purposes deemed to contain, some 120 acres of arable land
together with stretches, often wide stretches, of wood, meadow and waste,
the extent of which varies from case to case. From the seventh century
onwards the kings are giving large territories to the churches. One instance
is beyond suspicion, for Bede attests it. In 686 or thereabouts Æthelwealh
king of the South Saxons gave to Bishop Wilfrid the land of eighty-seven
families in the promontory of Selsey, and among its inhabitants were two
hundred and fifty male and female slaves[861]. This gift comprised a
spacious tract of country; it comprised what then were, or what afterwards
became, the sites of many villages[862]. But to whichever of our oldest
churches we turn, the story that it proclaims in its title-deeds is always the
same:—We obtained our lands by means of royal grants; we obtained them
not in little pieces, here a few acres and there a few, but in great pieces.
Canterbury and Winchester echo the tale that is told by Worcester. Another
example may be given. It is one that has been carefully examined of late. In
739 King Æthelheard of Wessex gave to Forthhere bishop of Sherborne
twenty cassati at the place called ‘Cridie.’ Thereby he disposed of what
now are ‘the parishes of Crediton, Newton St. Cyres, Upton Pyne,
Brampford Speke, Hittesleigh, Drewsteignton, Colebrooke, Morchard
Bishop, Sandford, Kennerleigh and the modern parish of Sherwood, part of
Cheriton Bishop, and possibly the whole of Clannaborough.’ He disposed of
Page 227
the whole and more than the whole of the modern ‘hundred’ of
Crediton[863]. Then, to choose one last instance, it is said that already in 679
Osric of the Hwiccas gave to an abbess centum manentes qui adiacent
civitati quae vocatur Hát Bathu[864]. It is not unlikely that this means that a
king newly converted to Christianity disposed by one deed of many square
leagues of land, namely, of the hundred of Bath[865]. The kingdom of the
Hwiccas was not boundless. If Osric executed a few more charters of this
kind he would soon have ‘booked’ it all.
Let us then examine with some care the charters that
The earliest books.
come to us from the earliest period, a period which
shall begin with the year 600 and end with the year
750. From this time we have some forty charters sufficiently genuine for
our present purpose. With hardly an exception the grantor is a king or an
under-king, while the grantee is a dead saint, a church, a bishop, an abbot,
or a body of monks. If the grantee is a layman, the gift is made to him in
order that he may found a minster. If this purpose is not expressed, it is to
be understood. Thus in 674 or thereabouts Wulfhere king of the Mercians
gives five manses to his kinsman Berhtferth as a perpetual inheritance.
Berhtferth is to have full power to give them to whom he pleases, and we
are not told that he proposes to devote them to pious uses. Nevertheless, the
king makes the gift ‘for the love of Almighty God and of his faithful servant
St. Peter[866].’ In other cases the lay donee is to hold the land ‘by church
right’ or ‘by minster right[867].’ Indeed there seems to be no single deed of
this period which does not purport upon its face to be in some sort an
ecclesiastical act, an act done for the good of the church[868].
These charters are documents of ecclesiastical
Exotic character of the
origin; they are also documents of foreign origin. book.
The bishops and abbots have brought or have
imported models from abroad. The ‘books’ that they
induce the kings to sign are full of technical phrases which already have an
ancient history. By way of illustration we will notice one point at which
there is an instructive resemblance and an instructive contrast. On the
Continent a grantor of lands ends his conveyance with a ‘penal stipulation.’
If an heir of his controverts the deed, he is to pay a certain sum, and none
the less the conveyance is to remain in full force. In England we can not
thus stipulate for a pecuniary penalty; the land-book is still so purely an
Crediton[863]. Then, to choose one last instance, it is said that already in 679
Osric of the Hwiccas gave to an abbess centum manentes qui adiacent
civitati quae vocatur Hát Bathu[864]. It is not unlikely that this means that a
king newly converted to Christianity disposed by one deed of many square
leagues of land, namely, of the hundred of Bath[865]. The kingdom of the
Hwiccas was not boundless. If Osric executed a few more charters of this
kind he would soon have ‘booked’ it all.
Let us then examine with some care the charters that
The earliest books.
come to us from the earliest period, a period which
shall begin with the year 600 and end with the year
750. From this time we have some forty charters sufficiently genuine for
our present purpose. With hardly an exception the grantor is a king or an
under-king, while the grantee is a dead saint, a church, a bishop, an abbot,
or a body of monks. If the grantee is a layman, the gift is made to him in
order that he may found a minster. If this purpose is not expressed, it is to
be understood. Thus in 674 or thereabouts Wulfhere king of the Mercians
gives five manses to his kinsman Berhtferth as a perpetual inheritance.
Berhtferth is to have full power to give them to whom he pleases, and we
are not told that he proposes to devote them to pious uses. Nevertheless, the
king makes the gift ‘for the love of Almighty God and of his faithful servant
St. Peter[866].’ In other cases the lay donee is to hold the land ‘by church
right’ or ‘by minster right[867].’ Indeed there seems to be no single deed of
this period which does not purport upon its face to be in some sort an
ecclesiastical act, an act done for the good of the church[868].
These charters are documents of ecclesiastical
Exotic character of the
origin; they are also documents of foreign origin. book.
The bishops and abbots have brought or have
imported models from abroad. The ‘books’ that they
induce the kings to sign are full of technical phrases which already have an
ancient history. By way of illustration we will notice one point at which
there is an instructive resemblance and an instructive contrast. On the
Continent a grantor of lands ends his conveyance with a ‘penal stipulation.’
If an heir of his controverts the deed, he is to pay a certain sum, and none
the less the conveyance is to remain in full force. In England we can not
thus stipulate for a pecuniary penalty; the land-book is still so purely an
Page 228
ecclesiastical affair that the punishment of its violator must be left to the
church and to God. So instead of stipulating that he shall pay money, we
stipulate that he shall be excommunicated and, if impenitent, damned, but
we do not forget to add that none the less the conveyance shall remain as
valid and effectual as ever. ‘If anyone,’ says Eadric of Kent, ‘shall attempt
to go against this gift, let him be separated from all Christianity and the
body and blood of Jesus Christ, manentem hanc donationis chartulam[869]
in sua nihilominus firmitate.’ Such words may look somewhat out of place
in their new surroundings; but they are part of a venerable formula[870].
But what is the model to which in the last resort
The book purports to
these documents go back? A conveyance by a confer ownership.
Roman landowner. He has in the land full and
absolute dominium and is going to transfer this to
another. Let us observe that the recorded motive which prompts a king to
set his cross, or rather Christ’s cross, to a land-book is a purely personal
motive. He wishes to save his soul, he desires pardon for his crimes[871]. Of
the welfare of his realm he says nothing; but his soul must be saved.
Sometimes he will give land to an under-king or to an ealdorman, for they
also have souls and may desire salvation[872]. He is acting as a private
landowner might act. Then he uses terms and phrases which belong to the
realm of pure private law. He asserts in the most energetic of all the words
that the law of the lower empire could provide that he is a landowner and
that he is going to transfer landownership. The land in question is tellus
mea[873] or it is terra iuris mei[874]. Then it is the very land itself that he
gives, the land of so many manses, ‘with all the appurtenances, fields,
pastures, woods, marshes.’ It is no mere right over the land that he gives,
but the very soil itself. Next let us observe the terms in which the act of
conveyance is stated:—perpetualiter trado et de meo iure in tuo transscribo
terram ... ut tam tu quam posteri tui teneatis, possideatis et quaecunque
volueris de eadem terra facere liberam habeatis potestatem[875]. The Latin
language of the time had no terms more potent or precise than these. Or
again: aliquantulam agri partem ... Waldhario episcopo in dominio donare
decrevimus[876]. Or again: aeternaliter et perseverabiliter possideat abendi
vel dandi cuicumque eligere voluerit[877]. But it is needless to multiply
examples.
church and to God. So instead of stipulating that he shall pay money, we
stipulate that he shall be excommunicated and, if impenitent, damned, but
we do not forget to add that none the less the conveyance shall remain as
valid and effectual as ever. ‘If anyone,’ says Eadric of Kent, ‘shall attempt
to go against this gift, let him be separated from all Christianity and the
body and blood of Jesus Christ, manentem hanc donationis chartulam[869]
in sua nihilominus firmitate.’ Such words may look somewhat out of place
in their new surroundings; but they are part of a venerable formula[870].
But what is the model to which in the last resort
The book purports to
these documents go back? A conveyance by a confer ownership.
Roman landowner. He has in the land full and
absolute dominium and is going to transfer this to
another. Let us observe that the recorded motive which prompts a king to
set his cross, or rather Christ’s cross, to a land-book is a purely personal
motive. He wishes to save his soul, he desires pardon for his crimes[871]. Of
the welfare of his realm he says nothing; but his soul must be saved.
Sometimes he will give land to an under-king or to an ealdorman, for they
also have souls and may desire salvation[872]. He is acting as a private
landowner might act. Then he uses terms and phrases which belong to the
realm of pure private law. He asserts in the most energetic of all the words
that the law of the lower empire could provide that he is a landowner and
that he is going to transfer landownership. The land in question is tellus
mea[873] or it is terra iuris mei[874]. Then it is the very land itself that he
gives, the land of so many manses, ‘with all the appurtenances, fields,
pastures, woods, marshes.’ It is no mere right over the land that he gives,
but the very soil itself. Next let us observe the terms in which the act of
conveyance is stated:—perpetualiter trado et de meo iure in tuo transscribo
terram ... ut tam tu quam posteri tui teneatis, possideatis et quaecunque
volueris de eadem terra facere liberam habeatis potestatem[875]. The Latin
language of the time had no terms more potent or precise than these. Or
again: aliquantulam agri partem ... Waldhario episcopo in dominio donare
decrevimus[876]. Or again: aeternaliter et perseverabiliter possideat abendi
vel dandi cuicumque eligere voluerit[877]. But it is needless to multiply
examples.
Page 229
No doubt then, if we bring to the interpretation of
Does the book really
these instruments the ideas of an earlier or of a later confer ownership?
time, the ideas of ancient Rome or of modern
Europe, we see the king as a landowner conferring
on the churches landownership pure and simple. The fact on which our
constitutional historians have laid stress, namely, that sometimes (for we
must not overstate the case) the king says that the bishops and his great men
are consenting to his deed, important though it may be in other contexts, is
of little moment here. The king is put before us as the owner of the land
conveyed; it is, he says, terra mea, terra iuris mei. The rule, if rule it be,
that he must not give away his land without the consent of bishops and
nobles in no way denies his ownership. However, we are at the moment
more concerned with the fact, or seeming fact, that what he gives to the
churches is ownership and nothing less.
But if we loyally accept this seeming fact and think
The book really conveys
it over, to what conclusions shall we not be brought, a superiority.
when we remember how wide were the lands which
the churches acquired from the kings, when we think
once more how by virtue of royal gifts the church of Worcester acquired a
quarter of a county? When these lands were given to the church were they
waste lands? It is plain that this was not the common case. Already there
were manses, there were arable fields, there were meadows, there were
tillers of the soil. One of two conclusions seems to follow. Either the king
really did own these large districts, and the tillers of the soil were merely
his slaves or coloni, who were conveyed along with the soil, or else the
clear and emphatic language of the charters sadly needs explanation. Now if
we hold by the letter of the charters, if we say that the king really does
confer landownership upon the churches, there will be small room left for
any landowners in England save the kings, the churches and perhaps a few
great nobles. This is a theory which for many reasons we can not adopt; no
one can adopt it who is not prepared to believe that Britain was conquered
by a handful of chieftains without followers. The only alternative course
seems that of saying that many of the land-books even of the earliest period,
despite their language, convey not the ownership of land, but (the term must
be allowed us) a ‘superiority’ over land and over free men.
Does the book really
these instruments the ideas of an earlier or of a later confer ownership?
time, the ideas of ancient Rome or of modern
Europe, we see the king as a landowner conferring
on the churches landownership pure and simple. The fact on which our
constitutional historians have laid stress, namely, that sometimes (for we
must not overstate the case) the king says that the bishops and his great men
are consenting to his deed, important though it may be in other contexts, is
of little moment here. The king is put before us as the owner of the land
conveyed; it is, he says, terra mea, terra iuris mei. The rule, if rule it be,
that he must not give away his land without the consent of bishops and
nobles in no way denies his ownership. However, we are at the moment
more concerned with the fact, or seeming fact, that what he gives to the
churches is ownership and nothing less.
But if we loyally accept this seeming fact and think
The book really conveys
it over, to what conclusions shall we not be brought, a superiority.
when we remember how wide were the lands which
the churches acquired from the kings, when we think
once more how by virtue of royal gifts the church of Worcester acquired a
quarter of a county? When these lands were given to the church were they
waste lands? It is plain that this was not the common case. Already there
were manses, there were arable fields, there were meadows, there were
tillers of the soil. One of two conclusions seems to follow. Either the king
really did own these large districts, and the tillers of the soil were merely
his slaves or coloni, who were conveyed along with the soil, or else the
clear and emphatic language of the charters sadly needs explanation. Now if
we hold by the letter of the charters, if we say that the king really does
confer landownership upon the churches, there will be small room left for
any landowners in England save the kings, the churches and perhaps a few
great nobles. This is a theory which for many reasons we can not adopt; no
one can adopt it who is not prepared to believe that Britain was conquered
by a handful of chieftains without followers. The only alternative course
seems that of saying that many of the land-books even of the earliest period,
despite their language, convey not the ownership of land, but (the term must
be allowed us) a ‘superiority’ over land and over free men.
Page 230
Let us for a moment remember that the wording of a
A modern analogy.
modern English conveyance might easily delude a
layman or a foreigner. An impecunious earl, we will
say, sells his ancient family estate. We look at the deed whereby this sale is
perfected. The Earl of A. grants unto B. C. and his heirs all the land
delineated on a certain map and described in a certain schedule. That in
substance is all that the deed tells us. We look at the map; we see a tract of
many thousand acres, which, besides a grand mansion, has farm-houses,
cottages, perhaps, entire villages upon it. The schedule tells us the names of
the fields and of the farm-houses. Like enough no word will hint that any
one lives in the houses and cottages, or that any one, save the seller, has any
right of any kind in any part of this wide territory. But what is the truth?
Perhaps a hundred different men, farmers and cottagers, have rights of
different kinds in various portions of the tract. Some have leases, some have
‘agreements for leases,’ some hold for terms of years, some hold from year
to year, some hold at will. The rights of these tenants stand, as it were,
between the purchaser and the land that he has bought. He has bought the
benefit, and the burden also, of a large mass of contracts. But of these
things his conveyance says nothing[878]. And so again, in the brief charters
of the thirteenth century a feoffor will say no more than that he has given
manerium meum de Westona, as though the manor of Weston were some
simple physical object like a black horse, and yet under analysis this
manerium turns out to be a complex tangle of rights in which many men,
free and villein, are concerned.
But it will be said that all this is the result of
Conveyance of
‘feudalism.’ It implies just that dismemberment of superiority in early
the dominium which is one of feudalism’s main times.
characteristics. Undoubtedly in the twelfth century
the free tenant in fee simple who holds land ‘in demesne’ can have, must
have, a lord above him, who also holds and is seised of that land and who
will speak of the land as his. But we are now in the age before feudalism, in
the seventh and eighth centuries. Are we to believe that the free owner of
Kemble’s ‘ethel, hid, or alod’ might have above him, perhaps always had
above him, not merely a lord (for a personal relation of patronage between
lord and man is not to the point), but a landlord: one who would speak of
that ‘ethel, hid or alod’ as terra iuris mei: one who to save his soul would
A modern analogy.
modern English conveyance might easily delude a
layman or a foreigner. An impecunious earl, we will
say, sells his ancient family estate. We look at the deed whereby this sale is
perfected. The Earl of A. grants unto B. C. and his heirs all the land
delineated on a certain map and described in a certain schedule. That in
substance is all that the deed tells us. We look at the map; we see a tract of
many thousand acres, which, besides a grand mansion, has farm-houses,
cottages, perhaps, entire villages upon it. The schedule tells us the names of
the fields and of the farm-houses. Like enough no word will hint that any
one lives in the houses and cottages, or that any one, save the seller, has any
right of any kind in any part of this wide territory. But what is the truth?
Perhaps a hundred different men, farmers and cottagers, have rights of
different kinds in various portions of the tract. Some have leases, some have
‘agreements for leases,’ some hold for terms of years, some hold from year
to year, some hold at will. The rights of these tenants stand, as it were,
between the purchaser and the land that he has bought. He has bought the
benefit, and the burden also, of a large mass of contracts. But of these
things his conveyance says nothing[878]. And so again, in the brief charters
of the thirteenth century a feoffor will say no more than that he has given
manerium meum de Westona, as though the manor of Weston were some
simple physical object like a black horse, and yet under analysis this
manerium turns out to be a complex tangle of rights in which many men,
free and villein, are concerned.
But it will be said that all this is the result of
Conveyance of
‘feudalism.’ It implies just that dismemberment of superiority in early
the dominium which is one of feudalism’s main times.
characteristics. Undoubtedly in the twelfth century
the free tenant in fee simple who holds land ‘in demesne’ can have, must
have, a lord above him, who also holds and is seised of that land and who
will speak of the land as his. But we are now in the age before feudalism, in
the seventh and eighth centuries. Are we to believe that the free owner of
Kemble’s ‘ethel, hid, or alod’ might have above him, perhaps always had
above him, not merely a lord (for a personal relation of patronage between
lord and man is not to the point), but a landlord: one who would speak of
that ‘ethel, hid or alod’ as terra iuris mei: one who to save his soul would
Page 231
give lsquo;that land to a church and tell the bishop or abbot to do whatever
he pleased with it? If we believe this, shall we not be believing that so far as
English history can be carried there is no age before ‘feudalism’.
We will glance for a moment at two transactions
Illustrations.
which took place near the end of the seventh century.
Bede tells how Æthelwealh king of the South Saxons
was persuaded to become a Christian by Wulfhere king of the Mercians.
The Mercian received the South Saxon as his godson and by way of
christening-gift gave him two provinces, namely the Isle of Wight and the
territory of the Meanwari in Wessex, perhaps the hundreds of Meon in
Hampshire[879]. Then the same Bede tells us that the same Æthelwealh gave
to Bishop Wilfrid a land of eighty-seven families, to wit, the promontory of
Selsey: he gave it with its fields and its men, among whom were two
hundred and fifty male and female slaves[880]. A modern reader will perhaps
see here two very different transactions. In the one case he sees ‘the cession
of a province’ by one king to another, and possibly he thinks how Queen
Victoria ceded Heligoland to her imperial grandson:—the act is an act of
public law, a transfer of sovereignty. In the other case he sees a private act,
the gift of an estate for pious uses. But Bede and his translator saw little, if
any, difference between the two gifts: in each case Bede says ‘donavit’; the
translator in the one case says ‘forgeaf,’ in the other ‘geaf and sealde.’ Now
it will hardly be supposed that the Isle of Wight had no inhabitants who
were not the slaves or the coloni of the king, and, that being so, we are not
bound to suppose that there were no free landowners in the promontory of
Selsey. May it not be that what Æthelwealh had to give and gave to Wilfrid
was what in our eyes would be far rather political power than private
property.
But over the free land of free landowners what rights
What had the king to
had the king which he could cede to another king or give?
to a prelate, saying withal that the subject of his gift
was land? He had, as we think, rights of two kinds
that were thus alienable; we may call them fiscal rights and justiciary rights,
though such terms must be somewhat too precise when applied to the vague
thought of the seventh and eighth centuries. Of justiciary rights we shall
speak below. As to the rights that we call fiscal, we find that the king is
entitled to something that he calls tributum, vectigal, to something that he
he pleased with it? If we believe this, shall we not be believing that so far as
English history can be carried there is no age before ‘feudalism’.
We will glance for a moment at two transactions
Illustrations.
which took place near the end of the seventh century.
Bede tells how Æthelwealh king of the South Saxons
was persuaded to become a Christian by Wulfhere king of the Mercians.
The Mercian received the South Saxon as his godson and by way of
christening-gift gave him two provinces, namely the Isle of Wight and the
territory of the Meanwari in Wessex, perhaps the hundreds of Meon in
Hampshire[879]. Then the same Bede tells us that the same Æthelwealh gave
to Bishop Wilfrid a land of eighty-seven families, to wit, the promontory of
Selsey: he gave it with its fields and its men, among whom were two
hundred and fifty male and female slaves[880]. A modern reader will perhaps
see here two very different transactions. In the one case he sees ‘the cession
of a province’ by one king to another, and possibly he thinks how Queen
Victoria ceded Heligoland to her imperial grandson:—the act is an act of
public law, a transfer of sovereignty. In the other case he sees a private act,
the gift of an estate for pious uses. But Bede and his translator saw little, if
any, difference between the two gifts: in each case Bede says ‘donavit’; the
translator in the one case says ‘forgeaf,’ in the other ‘geaf and sealde.’ Now
it will hardly be supposed that the Isle of Wight had no inhabitants who
were not the slaves or the coloni of the king, and, that being so, we are not
bound to suppose that there were no free landowners in the promontory of
Selsey. May it not be that what Æthelwealh had to give and gave to Wilfrid
was what in our eyes would be far rather political power than private
property.
But over the free land of free landowners what rights
What had the king to
had the king which he could cede to another king or give?
to a prelate, saying withal that the subject of his gift
was land? He had, as we think, rights of two kinds
that were thus alienable; we may call them fiscal rights and justiciary rights,
though such terms must be somewhat too precise when applied to the vague
thought of the seventh and eighth centuries. Of justiciary rights we shall
speak below. As to the rights that we call fiscal, we find that the king is
entitled to something that he calls tributum, vectigal, to something that he
Page 232
calls pastus, victus, the king’s feorm; also there is military service to be
done, and the king, when making a gift, may have a word to say about this.
Now it must at once be confessed that the charters of
The king’s alienable
this early period seldom suggest any such confusion rights.
between political power and ownership as that which
we postulate. Still from time to time hints are given
to us that should not be ignored. Thus a Kentish king shortly after the
middle of the eighth century gave to the church of Rochester twenty
ploughlands, not only ‘with the fields, woods, meadows, pastures, marshes
and waters thereto pertaining,’ but also ‘with the tributum which was paid
thence to the king[881].’ Such a phrase would hardly be appropriate if the
king were giving land of which he was the absolute owner, land cultivated
for him by his slaves.
A little more light is thrown on the matter by the first
Military service as a
rude specimens of a clause that is to become burden on land.
common in after times, the clause of immunity.
Already in the seventh century Wulfhere of Mercia,
having made a gift of five manses, adds: ‘Let this land remain free to all
who have it, from all earthly hardships, known or unknown, except fastness
and bridge and the common host[882].’ So in 732 a king of Kent says: ‘And
no royal due shall be found in it henceforth, saving such as is common to all
church lands in this Kent[883].’ Æthelbald of Mercia says: ‘By my royal
power I decree that it be free for ever from all tribute of secular payments,
labours and burdens, so that the said land may render service to none but
Almighty God and the church[884].’ Yet more instructive, if we may rely
upon it, is the foundation charter of Evesham Abbey. Æthelweard has given
twelve manses: he then says, ‘I decree that for the future this land be free
from all public tribute, purveyance, royal works, military service (ab omni
publico vectigali, a victu, ab expeditione, ab opere regio) so that all things
in that place which are valuable and useful may serve the church of St.
Mary, that is to say, the brethren serving [God] there; save this, that if in the
island belonging to the said land there shall chance to be an unusual supply
of mast, the king may have pasture for fattening one herd of pigs, but
beyond this no pasture shall be set out for any prince or potentate[885].’ Now
in the first place, these charters speak as though military service is due from
land:—I (says the king) declare this land to be free from the ‘fyrd,’ from the
done, and the king, when making a gift, may have a word to say about this.
Now it must at once be confessed that the charters of
The king’s alienable
this early period seldom suggest any such confusion rights.
between political power and ownership as that which
we postulate. Still from time to time hints are given
to us that should not be ignored. Thus a Kentish king shortly after the
middle of the eighth century gave to the church of Rochester twenty
ploughlands, not only ‘with the fields, woods, meadows, pastures, marshes
and waters thereto pertaining,’ but also ‘with the tributum which was paid
thence to the king[881].’ Such a phrase would hardly be appropriate if the
king were giving land of which he was the absolute owner, land cultivated
for him by his slaves.
A little more light is thrown on the matter by the first
Military service as a
rude specimens of a clause that is to become burden on land.
common in after times, the clause of immunity.
Already in the seventh century Wulfhere of Mercia,
having made a gift of five manses, adds: ‘Let this land remain free to all
who have it, from all earthly hardships, known or unknown, except fastness
and bridge and the common host[882].’ So in 732 a king of Kent says: ‘And
no royal due shall be found in it henceforth, saving such as is common to all
church lands in this Kent[883].’ Æthelbald of Mercia says: ‘By my royal
power I decree that it be free for ever from all tribute of secular payments,
labours and burdens, so that the said land may render service to none but
Almighty God and the church[884].’ Yet more instructive, if we may rely
upon it, is the foundation charter of Evesham Abbey. Æthelweard has given
twelve manses: he then says, ‘I decree that for the future this land be free
from all public tribute, purveyance, royal works, military service (ab omni
publico vectigali, a victu, ab expeditione, ab opere regio) so that all things
in that place which are valuable and useful may serve the church of St.
Mary, that is to say, the brethren serving [God] there; save this, that if in the
island belonging to the said land there shall chance to be an unusual supply
of mast, the king may have pasture for fattening one herd of pigs, but
beyond this no pasture shall be set out for any prince or potentate[885].’ Now
in the first place, these charters speak as though military service is due from
land:—I (says the king) declare this land to be free from the ‘fyrd,’ from the
Page 233
expeditio—or—I declare that it is free from all earthly burdens, except
military service and the duty of repairing bridge and burh. We are not
saying that there is already military tenure, but we do say that already the
‘fyrd’ is conceived as a burden on land, in so much that the phrase ‘This
land is—or is not—to be free of military service’ has a meaning. But after
all, land never fights: men fight. Of what men then is the king speaking
when he says that the land is, or is not, free from the expeditio? Not of the
donees themselves, for they are bishops and monks and serve in no army
but God’s. Not of the slaves who are on the land, for they are not ‘fyrd-
worthy.’ He is speaking of free men who live on the land; he is declaring
that when he has, if so modern a term be suffered, ‘attorned’ them to the
church, they will still have to serve in warfare, or he is declaring that they
will be free even from this duty to the state in order that the land may be the
more absolutely at the service of God and His stewards.
Then military service, along with the duty of
The king’s feorm.
repairing bridges and fastnesses, belongs to a genus
of dues, of which unfortunately we get but a vague
description. There are vectigalia publica, opera regia, onera saecularia,
there is tributum, there is victus. How much of the information that we get
about these matters from later days we may carry back with us to the
earliest period it is difficult to say. Apparently the king, the under-king,
even the ealdorman, has a certain right of living at the expense of his
subjects, of making a progress through the villages and quartering himself,
his courtiers, his huntsmen, his dogs and horses upon the folk of the
townships, of exacting a ‘one night’s farm’ from this village, a ‘two nights’
farm’ from that. The men who have to bear these exactions may well be free
men and free landowners; still over them the king has certain rights and
rights that he can give away. According to our interpretation of the charters,
it is often enough such rights as these that the king is giving when he says
that he is giving terram iuris mei. He declares, it will be observed, that the
land is to be free from vectigalia and opera to which it has heretofore been
subject. But does he mean by this to benefit the occupiers of the soil? No,
he has no care whatever to relieve them. Bent on saving his soul, his care is
that the land shall be wholly devoted to the service of God. As we
understand the matter, whatever vectigalia and opera the king has hitherto
military service and the duty of repairing bridge and burh. We are not
saying that there is already military tenure, but we do say that already the
‘fyrd’ is conceived as a burden on land, in so much that the phrase ‘This
land is—or is not—to be free of military service’ has a meaning. But after
all, land never fights: men fight. Of what men then is the king speaking
when he says that the land is, or is not, free from the expeditio? Not of the
donees themselves, for they are bishops and monks and serve in no army
but God’s. Not of the slaves who are on the land, for they are not ‘fyrd-
worthy.’ He is speaking of free men who live on the land; he is declaring
that when he has, if so modern a term be suffered, ‘attorned’ them to the
church, they will still have to serve in warfare, or he is declaring that they
will be free even from this duty to the state in order that the land may be the
more absolutely at the service of God and His stewards.
Then military service, along with the duty of
The king’s feorm.
repairing bridges and fastnesses, belongs to a genus
of dues, of which unfortunately we get but a vague
description. There are vectigalia publica, opera regia, onera saecularia,
there is tributum, there is victus. How much of the information that we get
about these matters from later days we may carry back with us to the
earliest period it is difficult to say. Apparently the king, the under-king,
even the ealdorman, has a certain right of living at the expense of his
subjects, of making a progress through the villages and quartering himself,
his courtiers, his huntsmen, his dogs and horses upon the folk of the
townships, of exacting a ‘one night’s farm’ from this village, a ‘two nights’
farm’ from that. The men who have to bear these exactions may well be free
men and free landowners; still over them the king has certain rights and
rights that he can give away. According to our interpretation of the charters,
it is often enough such rights as these that the king is giving when he says
that he is giving terram iuris mei. He declares, it will be observed, that the
land is to be free from vectigalia and opera to which it has heretofore been
subject. But does he mean by this to benefit the occupiers of the soil? No,
he has no care whatever to relieve them. Bent on saving his soul, his care is
that the land shall be wholly devoted to the service of God. As we
understand the matter, whatever vectigalia and opera the king has hitherto
Page 234
exacted from these men the church will now exact. The king has conveyed
what he had to convey, a superiority over free landowners.
It is permissible to doubt whether modern historians
Nature of the feorm.
have fully realized the extent of the rights which the
king had over the land of free landowners. In the
middle of Ine’s laws, which follow each other in no rational order, we
suddenly come upon an isolated text, which says this: ‘For 10 hides “to
foster” 10 vessels of honey, 300 loaves, 12 ambers of Welsh ale, 30 of clear
[ale], 2 old [i.e. full grown] oxen or 10 wethers, 10 geese, 20 hens, 10
cheeses, an amber full of butter, 5 salmon, 20 poundsweight of fodder and a
hundred eels[886].’ The context throws no light upon the sentence; but in
truth no sentence in Ine’s laws has a context. What is its meaning? We can
not but think that this foster is the king’s victus[887]. Once a year from every
ten hides he is entitled to this feorm. Perhaps it is a ‘one night’s feorm’; for
it may be enough to support a king of the seventh century and a modest
retinue during twenty-four hours. Still it will be no trifling burden upon the
land, even if we suppose the hide to have 120 arable acres or thereabouts.
Suppose that the king transfers his right over a single hide to some bishop
or abbot, the donee will be entitled to receive from that hide a rent which
can not be called insignificant. We dare not argue that this law is a general
law for the whole of Wessex. It may refer only to some newly settled and
allotted districts. There are other hints in these laws of Ine of some large
land-settlement, an allotment of land among great men who have become
bound to bring under cultivation a district theretofore waste[888]. But it is
difficult to dissociate the foster of these laws from the victus of the charters,
and, quite apart from this disputable passage, we have plenty of proof that
the king’s victus was an incumbrance which pressed heavily upon the lands
of free landowners[889]. If in England the duty of feeding the king as he
journeys through the country developed into a regular tax or rent this would
not stand alone. That duty plays a considerable part in the Scandinavian
law-books, and in the Denmark of the thirteenth century we may find
arrangements which are very like that set forth in Ine’s law. Every hundred
(herad), taken as a whole, has to contribute something towards the king’s
support. Often it is a round sum of money; but often it will consist of
provisions necessary to maintain the king’s household during a night or two
or three nights (servicium unius noctis, servicium duarum noctium). Then
what he had to convey, a superiority over free landowners.
It is permissible to doubt whether modern historians
Nature of the feorm.
have fully realized the extent of the rights which the
king had over the land of free landowners. In the
middle of Ine’s laws, which follow each other in no rational order, we
suddenly come upon an isolated text, which says this: ‘For 10 hides “to
foster” 10 vessels of honey, 300 loaves, 12 ambers of Welsh ale, 30 of clear
[ale], 2 old [i.e. full grown] oxen or 10 wethers, 10 geese, 20 hens, 10
cheeses, an amber full of butter, 5 salmon, 20 poundsweight of fodder and a
hundred eels[886].’ The context throws no light upon the sentence; but in
truth no sentence in Ine’s laws has a context. What is its meaning? We can
not but think that this foster is the king’s victus[887]. Once a year from every
ten hides he is entitled to this feorm. Perhaps it is a ‘one night’s feorm’; for
it may be enough to support a king of the seventh century and a modest
retinue during twenty-four hours. Still it will be no trifling burden upon the
land, even if we suppose the hide to have 120 arable acres or thereabouts.
Suppose that the king transfers his right over a single hide to some bishop
or abbot, the donee will be entitled to receive from that hide a rent which
can not be called insignificant. We dare not argue that this law is a general
law for the whole of Wessex. It may refer only to some newly settled and
allotted districts. There are other hints in these laws of Ine of some large
land-settlement, an allotment of land among great men who have become
bound to bring under cultivation a district theretofore waste[888]. But it is
difficult to dissociate the foster of these laws from the victus of the charters,
and, quite apart from this disputable passage, we have plenty of proof that
the king’s victus was an incumbrance which pressed heavily upon the lands
of free landowners[889]. If in England the duty of feeding the king as he
journeys through the country developed into a regular tax or rent this would
not stand alone. That duty plays a considerable part in the Scandinavian
law-books, and in the Denmark of the thirteenth century we may find
arrangements which are very like that set forth in Ine’s law. Every hundred
(herad), taken as a whole, has to contribute something towards the king’s
support. Often it is a round sum of money; but often it will consist of
provisions necessary to maintain the king’s household during a night or two
or three nights (servicium unius noctis, servicium duarum noctium). Then
Page 235
the ‘service of two nights’ is accurately defined. It consists of, among other
things, 26 salted pigs, 14 live pigs, 16 salted oxen, 16 salted sheep, 360
fowls, 180 geese, 360 cheeses, corn, malt, fodder, butter, herrings, stock-
fish, pepper and salt. This revenue stands apart from the revenue derived
from the crown lands; it is regarded as a tax rather than a rent; but it is to
this extent rooted in the soil, that the amount due from each hundred
(herad) is fixed[890]. There is a great deal to make us think that at a quite
early time in England such arrangements as this had been made. If we look
at the charters we find that the king is always giving away manses in fives
and tens, fifteens and twenties. This symmetry, this prevalence of a decimal
system, we take to be artificial; already the manse, or hide, is a fiscal unit, a
fraction of a district which has to supply the king with food or with money
in lieu of food[891]
Whatever be the origin of the king’s feorm—and if
Tribute and rent.
we find it in the voluntary gifts which yet barbarous
Germans make to their kings, we may none the less
have to admit that it has been touched by the influence of the Roman
tributum—it becomes either a rent or a tax. We may call it the one, or we
may call it the other, for so long as the recipient of it is the king, the law of
the seventh and eighth centuries will hardly be able to tell which it is[892].
The king begins to give it away: in the hands of his donees, in the hands of
the churches, it becomes a rent. This is not all, however, that the king has to
give, or that the king does give, when he says that he is giving land. That he
may be giving away the profits of justice, that he may be giving jurisdiction
itself, we shall argue hereafter. But probably he has even in early days yet
other things to give, and at any rate in course of time he discovers that such
is the case. He can give the right to take toll, he can give market rights[893].
It is by no means impossible that he has forest rights, some general claim to
place uncultivated land under his ban, if he would hunt therein, and some
general claim to the nobler kinds of fish[894]. Then again, in the eleventh
century we find men owing services to the king which he still receives
rather as king than as landlord, and the sporadic distribution of these
services seems to show that they are not of modern origin. Such are, for
example, the ‘inwards’ and the ‘averages’ which are done by the free men
of Cambridgeshire[895]. We are told in a general way that the thegn owes
fyrdfare, burh-bót and lang="ang" xml:lang="ang">brycg-bót, but that from
things, 26 salted pigs, 14 live pigs, 16 salted oxen, 16 salted sheep, 360
fowls, 180 geese, 360 cheeses, corn, malt, fodder, butter, herrings, stock-
fish, pepper and salt. This revenue stands apart from the revenue derived
from the crown lands; it is regarded as a tax rather than a rent; but it is to
this extent rooted in the soil, that the amount due from each hundred
(herad) is fixed[890]. There is a great deal to make us think that at a quite
early time in England such arrangements as this had been made. If we look
at the charters we find that the king is always giving away manses in fives
and tens, fifteens and twenties. This symmetry, this prevalence of a decimal
system, we take to be artificial; already the manse, or hide, is a fiscal unit, a
fraction of a district which has to supply the king with food or with money
in lieu of food[891]
Whatever be the origin of the king’s feorm—and if
Tribute and rent.
we find it in the voluntary gifts which yet barbarous
Germans make to their kings, we may none the less
have to admit that it has been touched by the influence of the Roman
tributum—it becomes either a rent or a tax. We may call it the one, or we
may call it the other, for so long as the recipient of it is the king, the law of
the seventh and eighth centuries will hardly be able to tell which it is[892].
The king begins to give it away: in the hands of his donees, in the hands of
the churches, it becomes a rent. This is not all, however, that the king has to
give, or that the king does give, when he says that he is giving land. That he
may be giving away the profits of justice, that he may be giving jurisdiction
itself, we shall argue hereafter. But probably he has even in early days yet
other things to give, and at any rate in course of time he discovers that such
is the case. He can give the right to take toll, he can give market rights[893].
It is by no means impossible that he has forest rights, some general claim to
place uncultivated land under his ban, if he would hunt therein, and some
general claim to the nobler kinds of fish[894]. Then again, in the eleventh
century we find men owing services to the king which he still receives
rather as king than as landlord, and the sporadic distribution of these
services seems to show that they are not of modern origin. Such are, for
example, the ‘inwards’ and the ‘averages’ which are done by the free men
of Cambridgeshire[895]. We are told in a general way that the thegn owes
fyrdfare, burh-bót and lang="ang" xml:lang="ang">brycg-bót, but that from
Page 236
many lands—the lands comprised within no privilege, no franchise—‘a
greater land-right arises at the king’s ban’; for there is the king’s deer-hedge
to be made, there are warships to be provided, there are sea-ward and head-
ward[896]. Every increase in the needs of the state, in the power of the state,
gives the king new rights in the land, consolidates his seignory over the
land. If a fleet be formed to resist the Danes, the king has something to
dispose of, a new immunity for sale. If a geld be levied to buy off the
Danes, the king can sell a freedom from this tax, or he can tell the monks of
St. Edmundsbury that they may levy the tax from their men and keep it for
their own use[897]. This, we argue, is not a new abuse, a phenomenon which
first appears in the evil feudal time when men began to confuse imperium
with dominium, kingship with landlordship, office with property, tax with
rent. On the contrary, we must begin with confusion. In some of the very
earliest land-books that have come down to us what the king really gives,
when he says that he is giving land, is far rather his kingly superiority over
land and landowners than anything that we dare call ownership[898]
Not that this is always the case. Very possible is it
Mixture of ownership
that from the first the king had villages which were and superiority.
peopled mainly by his theows and læts, and
intertribal warfare may have increased their number.
But the charters, for all their apparent precision, will not enable us to
distinguish between these cases and others in which the villages are full of
free landowners and their slaves. The charters are not engendered by the
English facts; they are foreign, ecclesiastical, Roman. By such documents,
to our thinking, the king gives what he has to give. In one case it may be a
full ownership of a village or of some scattered steads; in another it may be
a superiority, which when analyzed will turn out to be a right of exacting
supplies of provender from the men of the village; in a third, and perhaps a
common case, the same village will contain the mansi serviles of the king’s
slaves and the mansi ingenuiles of free landowners. He no more thinks of
distinguishing by the words of his charter his governmental power over free
men and their land from his ownership of his slaves and the land that they
are tilling, than his successor of the eleventh or twelfth century will think of
making similar distinctions when he bestows a ‘manor’ or an ‘honour.’
We have been suggesting and shall continue to suggest that at a very early
time, a time beyond which our land-books will not carry us, the king is
greater land-right arises at the king’s ban’; for there is the king’s deer-hedge
to be made, there are warships to be provided, there are sea-ward and head-
ward[896]. Every increase in the needs of the state, in the power of the state,
gives the king new rights in the land, consolidates his seignory over the
land. If a fleet be formed to resist the Danes, the king has something to
dispose of, a new immunity for sale. If a geld be levied to buy off the
Danes, the king can sell a freedom from this tax, or he can tell the monks of
St. Edmundsbury that they may levy the tax from their men and keep it for
their own use[897]. This, we argue, is not a new abuse, a phenomenon which
first appears in the evil feudal time when men began to confuse imperium
with dominium, kingship with landlordship, office with property, tax with
rent. On the contrary, we must begin with confusion. In some of the very
earliest land-books that have come down to us what the king really gives,
when he says that he is giving land, is far rather his kingly superiority over
land and landowners than anything that we dare call ownership[898]
Not that this is always the case. Very possible is it
Mixture of ownership
that from the first the king had villages which were and superiority.
peopled mainly by his theows and læts, and
intertribal warfare may have increased their number.
But the charters, for all their apparent precision, will not enable us to
distinguish between these cases and others in which the villages are full of
free landowners and their slaves. The charters are not engendered by the
English facts; they are foreign, ecclesiastical, Roman. By such documents,
to our thinking, the king gives what he has to give. In one case it may be a
full ownership of a village or of some scattered steads; in another it may be
a superiority, which when analyzed will turn out to be a right of exacting
supplies of provender from the men of the village; in a third, and perhaps a
common case, the same village will contain the mansi serviles of the king’s
slaves and the mansi ingenuiles of free landowners. He no more thinks of
distinguishing by the words of his charter his governmental power over free
men and their land from his ownership of his slaves and the land that they
are tilling, than his successor of the eleventh or twelfth century will think of
making similar distinctions when he bestows a ‘manor’ or an ‘honour.’
We have been suggesting and shall continue to suggest that at a very early
time, a time beyond which our land-books will not carry us, the king is
Page 237
beginning to discover that the whole land which he
The king’s superiority.
rules is in a certain and a profitable sense his land.
He can give it away; he can barter it in exchange for
spiritual benefits, and this he can do without wronging the free landholders
who are in possession of that land, for what he really gives is the dues (it is
too early to say the ‘service’) that they have owed to him and will
henceforth owe to his donee. Let us remember that his successors will
undoubtedly be able to do this. In a certain sense, Henry II., for example,
will have all England to give away. If we were to put an extreme case, we
might have to reckon with possible rebellions; but every single hide of
England Henry can give without wronging any one. Suppose that C has
been holding a tract as the king’s tenant in chief by service worth £5 a year,
Henry can make a grant of that land to B, and by this grant C will not be
wronged. Henceforth C will hold of B, and B of the king. Suppose that, on
the occasion of this grant, services worth £2 a year are reserved, then the
king has it in his power to grant the land yet once more: to grant it, let us
say, to the Abbot of A, who is to hold in frankalmoin; C will not be
wronged, B will not be wronged. What the king has done with one hide he
can do with every hide in England; piece by piece he can give all England
away. We have been suggesting and shall continue to suggest that at a very
early time, even in the first days of English Christianity, the king is
beginning to discover that he has some such power as that which his
successors will exercise. This barbarous chieftain learns that his political
sway over the folk involves a proprietary and alienable element of which he
can make profit. It involves a right to feorm and a right to wites. The beef
and the cheese and the Welsh ale that he might have levied from a district
he invests, if we may so speak, in what he is being taught to regard as the
safest and most profitable of all securities. He obtains not only remission of
his sins, but also the friendship and aid of bishops and clergy. And so large
stretches of land are ‘booked’ to the churches. It is to be feared that if the
England of the sixth century had been visited by modern Englishmen, the
Saxon chieftains would have been awakened to a consciousness of their
‘booking’ powers by offers of gin and rifles.
In its original form and when put to its original
Book-land and church
purpose the land-book is no mere deed of gift; it is a right.
dedication. Under the sanction of a solemn
The king’s superiority.
rules is in a certain and a profitable sense his land.
He can give it away; he can barter it in exchange for
spiritual benefits, and this he can do without wronging the free landholders
who are in possession of that land, for what he really gives is the dues (it is
too early to say the ‘service’) that they have owed to him and will
henceforth owe to his donee. Let us remember that his successors will
undoubtedly be able to do this. In a certain sense, Henry II., for example,
will have all England to give away. If we were to put an extreme case, we
might have to reckon with possible rebellions; but every single hide of
England Henry can give without wronging any one. Suppose that C has
been holding a tract as the king’s tenant in chief by service worth £5 a year,
Henry can make a grant of that land to B, and by this grant C will not be
wronged. Henceforth C will hold of B, and B of the king. Suppose that, on
the occasion of this grant, services worth £2 a year are reserved, then the
king has it in his power to grant the land yet once more: to grant it, let us
say, to the Abbot of A, who is to hold in frankalmoin; C will not be
wronged, B will not be wronged. What the king has done with one hide he
can do with every hide in England; piece by piece he can give all England
away. We have been suggesting and shall continue to suggest that at a very
early time, even in the first days of English Christianity, the king is
beginning to discover that he has some such power as that which his
successors will exercise. This barbarous chieftain learns that his political
sway over the folk involves a proprietary and alienable element of which he
can make profit. It involves a right to feorm and a right to wites. The beef
and the cheese and the Welsh ale that he might have levied from a district
he invests, if we may so speak, in what he is being taught to regard as the
safest and most profitable of all securities. He obtains not only remission of
his sins, but also the friendship and aid of bishops and clergy. And so large
stretches of land are ‘booked’ to the churches. It is to be feared that if the
England of the sixth century had been visited by modern Englishmen, the
Saxon chieftains would have been awakened to a consciousness of their
‘booking’ powers by offers of gin and rifles.
In its original form and when put to its original
Book-land and church
purpose the land-book is no mere deed of gift; it is a right.
dedication. Under the sanction of a solemn
Page 238
anathema, a tract of land is devoted to the service of God. A very full power
of disposing of it is given to the bishop or the abbot, who is God’s servant.
As yet the law has none of those subtle ideas which in after ages will enable
it to treat him as ‘a corporation sole’ or as ‘a trustee,’ nor can the folk-law
meddle much with the affairs of God. The bishop or abbot must be able to
leave the land to whom he pleases, to institute an heir. Thus ‘book-land’
stands, as it were, outside the realm of the folk-law. In all probability the
folk-law of this early period knows no such thing as testamentary power.
Testamentary power can only be created by the words of a book, by an
anathema. But laymen are not slow to see that they can make use of this
new institution for purposes of their own, which are not always very pious
purposes. By a pretext that he is going to construct a minster, a man will
obtain a book garnished with the crosses of bishops. One day calling
himself an abbot and the next day calling himself a king’s thegn, a layman
among ecclesiastics, an ecclesiastic among laymen, he will shirk all duties
that are owed to state and church. Already Bede complains of this in a wise
and famous letter. He advocates a resumption of these inconsiderate and
misplaced gifts, and reproves the prelates for subscribing the books[899]. His
letter may have done good; but laymen still obtained books which
authorized them to hold land ‘by church right.’ Thus Offa of Mercia gave to
an under-king lands at Sedgebarrow ‘in such wise that he might have them
during his life, and in exercise of full power might leave them to be
possessed by church right[900].’ Thereupon the subregulus, as a modern
English lawyer might say, executed this power of appointment in favour of
the church of Worcester. The same Offa gave land to his thegn Dudda so
that by church right he might enjoy it during his life and leave it on his
death to whom he would[901]
We must wait for a later age before we shall find the
Book-land and
kings freely booking lands to their thegns without testament.
any allusion to ecclesiastical purposes. Indeed it may
be said that the Anglo-Saxon land-book never ceases
to be an ecclesiastical instrument. True that in the tenth century the kings
are booking lands to their thegns with great liberality; true also that there is
no longer any pretence that the land so booked will go to endow a church;
but let us observe these books and let us not ignore the recitals that they
contain. Why does the king make these grants? He says that it is because he
of disposing of it is given to the bishop or the abbot, who is God’s servant.
As yet the law has none of those subtle ideas which in after ages will enable
it to treat him as ‘a corporation sole’ or as ‘a trustee,’ nor can the folk-law
meddle much with the affairs of God. The bishop or abbot must be able to
leave the land to whom he pleases, to institute an heir. Thus ‘book-land’
stands, as it were, outside the realm of the folk-law. In all probability the
folk-law of this early period knows no such thing as testamentary power.
Testamentary power can only be created by the words of a book, by an
anathema. But laymen are not slow to see that they can make use of this
new institution for purposes of their own, which are not always very pious
purposes. By a pretext that he is going to construct a minster, a man will
obtain a book garnished with the crosses of bishops. One day calling
himself an abbot and the next day calling himself a king’s thegn, a layman
among ecclesiastics, an ecclesiastic among laymen, he will shirk all duties
that are owed to state and church. Already Bede complains of this in a wise
and famous letter. He advocates a resumption of these inconsiderate and
misplaced gifts, and reproves the prelates for subscribing the books[899]. His
letter may have done good; but laymen still obtained books which
authorized them to hold land ‘by church right.’ Thus Offa of Mercia gave to
an under-king lands at Sedgebarrow ‘in such wise that he might have them
during his life, and in exercise of full power might leave them to be
possessed by church right[900].’ Thereupon the subregulus, as a modern
English lawyer might say, executed this power of appointment in favour of
the church of Worcester. The same Offa gave land to his thegn Dudda so
that by church right he might enjoy it during his life and leave it on his
death to whom he would[901]
We must wait for a later age before we shall find the
Book-land and
kings freely booking lands to their thegns without testament.
any allusion to ecclesiastical purposes. Indeed it may
be said that the Anglo-Saxon land-book never ceases
to be an ecclesiastical instrument. True that in the tenth century the kings
are booking lands to their thegns with great liberality; true also that there is
no longer any pretence that the land so booked will go to endow a church;
but let us observe these books and let us not ignore the recitals that they
contain. Why does the king make these grants? He says that it is because he
Page 239
hopes for an eternal reward in the everlasting mansions. This has perhaps
become an empty phrase: but it has a history. Also it is needed in order to
make the deed a logical whole. Let us observe the sequence of the clauses:
—‘Whereas the fashion of this world passeth away but the joys of heaven
are eternal; therefore I give land to my thegn so that he may enjoy it during
his life and leave it on his death to whomsoever he pleases, and if any one
shall come against this charter may he perish for ever; I have confirmed this
gift with the sign of Christ’s holy cross[902].’ Some piety in the harangue
(arenga) is necessary in order to lead up to the anathema and the cross; it
justifies the intervention of the bishops, who also will make crosses and
thereby will be denouncing the church’s ban against any one who violates
the charter. And who, we may ask, is likely to violate the charter? The
donee’s kinsfolk may be tempted to do this if the donee makes use of that
testamentary power which has been granted to him (as, for instance, by
leaving the land to a church) more especially because it may be very
doubtful whether in impeaching such a testament they will not have the
folk-law on their side. Such in brief outline is—so we think—the history of
book-land. It is land (or rather in many cases a superiority) held by royal
privilege[903] under the sanction of the anathema.
become an empty phrase: but it has a history. Also it is needed in order to
make the deed a logical whole. Let us observe the sequence of the clauses:
—‘Whereas the fashion of this world passeth away but the joys of heaven
are eternal; therefore I give land to my thegn so that he may enjoy it during
his life and leave it on his death to whomsoever he pleases, and if any one
shall come against this charter may he perish for ever; I have confirmed this
gift with the sign of Christ’s holy cross[902].’ Some piety in the harangue
(arenga) is necessary in order to lead up to the anathema and the cross; it
justifies the intervention of the bishops, who also will make crosses and
thereby will be denouncing the church’s ban against any one who violates
the charter. And who, we may ask, is likely to violate the charter? The
donee’s kinsfolk may be tempted to do this if the donee makes use of that
testamentary power which has been granted to him (as, for instance, by
leaving the land to a church) more especially because it may be very
doubtful whether in impeaching such a testament they will not have the
folk-law on their side. Such in brief outline is—so we think—the history of
book-land. It is land (or rather in many cases a superiority) held by royal
privilege[903] under the sanction of the anathema.
Page 240
Page 241
§ 2. Book-land and Folk-land.
With ‘book-land’ is contrasted ‘folk-land.’ Therefore
What is folk-land?
of folk-land a few words must be said. What is folk-
land? A few years ago the answer that historians
gave to this question was this: It is the land of the folk, the land belonging
to the folk. Dr Vinogradoff has argued that this is not the right answer[904].
His argument has convinced us; but, as it is still new, we will take leave to
repeat it with some few additions of our own.
The term ‘folk-land’ occurs but thrice in our texts. It
Folk-land in the texts.
occurs in one law and in two charters. The one law
comes from Edward the Elder[905] and all that it tells
us is that folk-land is the great contrast to book-land. Folk-land and book-
land seem to cover the whole field of land tenure. Possibly this law tells us
also that while a dispute about folk-land will, a dispute about book-land will
not, come before the shiremoot:—but we hardly obtain even this
information[906]. Then we have the two charters. Of these the earlier is a
deed of Æthelbert of Kent dated in 858[907]. The king with the consent of
his great men and of the prelates gives to his thegn Wulflaf five plough-
lands at Washingwell (aliquam partem terrae iuris mei) in exchange for
land at Marsham. He declares that the land at Washingwell is to be free
from all burdens save the three usually excepted, the land at Marsham
having enjoyed a similar immunity. The boundaries of Washingwell are
then stated. On the west it is bounded by the king’s folk-land (cyninges
folcland) which Wighelm and Wulflaf have. So much for the deed itself. On
its back there is an endorsement to the following effect: ‘This is the land-
book for Washingwell that Æthelbert the king granted to Wulflaf his thegn
in exchange for an equal amount of other land at Marsham; the king granted
and booked to Wulflaf five sullungs of land at Washingwell for the five
sullungs at Marsham and the king made that land at Marsham his folk-land
(“did it him to folk-land”) when they had exchanged the lands, save the
marshes and the salterns at Faversham and the woods that belong to the
salterns.’ Now this deed teaches us that there was land which was known as
With ‘book-land’ is contrasted ‘folk-land.’ Therefore
What is folk-land?
of folk-land a few words must be said. What is folk-
land? A few years ago the answer that historians
gave to this question was this: It is the land of the folk, the land belonging
to the folk. Dr Vinogradoff has argued that this is not the right answer[904].
His argument has convinced us; but, as it is still new, we will take leave to
repeat it with some few additions of our own.
The term ‘folk-land’ occurs but thrice in our texts. It
Folk-land in the texts.
occurs in one law and in two charters. The one law
comes from Edward the Elder[905] and all that it tells
us is that folk-land is the great contrast to book-land. Folk-land and book-
land seem to cover the whole field of land tenure. Possibly this law tells us
also that while a dispute about folk-land will, a dispute about book-land will
not, come before the shiremoot:—but we hardly obtain even this
information[906]. Then we have the two charters. Of these the earlier is a
deed of Æthelbert of Kent dated in 858[907]. The king with the consent of
his great men and of the prelates gives to his thegn Wulflaf five plough-
lands at Washingwell (aliquam partem terrae iuris mei) in exchange for
land at Marsham. He declares that the land at Washingwell is to be free
from all burdens save the three usually excepted, the land at Marsham
having enjoyed a similar immunity. The boundaries of Washingwell are
then stated. On the west it is bounded by the king’s folk-land (cyninges
folcland) which Wighelm and Wulflaf have. So much for the deed itself. On
its back there is an endorsement to the following effect: ‘This is the land-
book for Washingwell that Æthelbert the king granted to Wulflaf his thegn
in exchange for an equal amount of other land at Marsham; the king granted
and booked to Wulflaf five sullungs of land at Washingwell for the five
sullungs at Marsham and the king made that land at Marsham his folk-land
(“did it him to folk-land”) when they had exchanged the lands, save the
marshes and the salterns at Faversham and the woods that belong to the
salterns.’ Now this deed teaches us that there was land which was known as
Page 242
‘the king’s folk-land,’ and that it was in the occupation of two men called
Wighelm and Wulflaf, the latter of whom may well have been the Wulflaf
who made an exchange with the king. The endorsement tells us that when
the king received the land at Marsham he made it his folk-land, ‘he did it
him to folk-land.’
The other charter is of greater value. It is the will of
The will of Alfred the
the Ealdorman Alfred and comes from some year Ealdorman.
late in the ninth century[908]. He desires in the first
place to state who are the persons to whom he gives
his inheritance and his book-land. He then gives somewhat more than 100
hides, including 6 at Lingfield and 10 at Horsley, to his wife for her life,
‘with remainder,’ as we should say, to their daughter. More than once he
calls this daughter ‘our common bairn,’ thus drawing attention to the fact
that she is not merely his daughter, but also his wife’s daughter. This is of
importance, for in a later clause we hear of a son. ‘I give to my son
Æthelwald three hides of book-land: two hides on Hwætedune [Waddon],
and one at Gatatune [Gatton] and therewith 100 swine, and, if the king will
grant him the folk-land with the book-land, then let him have and enjoy it:
but if this may not be, then let her [my wife] grant to him whichever she
will, either the land at Horsley or the land at Lingfield.’ Such are the
materials which must provide us with our knowledge of folk-land.
We must examine Alfred’s will somewhat carefully.
Comment on Alfred’s
The testator has a wife, a son, a daughter. He leaves will.
the bulk of his book-land to his wife for life with
remainder to his daughter. For his son he makes a
small provision (only three hides) out of his book-land, but he expresses a
wish that the king will let that son have the folk-land, and, if this wish be
not fulfilled, then that son is to have either ten or else six hides out of the
book-land previously given to the wife and daughter. We see that, even if he
gets these few hides, the son will obtain but a small part of a handsome
fortune. ‘If the king will grant him the folk-land’—this may suggest that a
man’s folk-land will not descend to his heir. But another, and, as it seems to
us, a far more probable explanation is open. The son is ‘my son,’ the
daughter is ‘our common bairn.’ May not the son be illegitimate, or may not
his legitimacy be doubtful, for legitimacy is somewhat a matter of degree?
The ealdorman may have contracted a dubious or a morganatic marriage.
Wighelm and Wulflaf, the latter of whom may well have been the Wulflaf
who made an exchange with the king. The endorsement tells us that when
the king received the land at Marsham he made it his folk-land, ‘he did it
him to folk-land.’
The other charter is of greater value. It is the will of
The will of Alfred the
the Ealdorman Alfred and comes from some year Ealdorman.
late in the ninth century[908]. He desires in the first
place to state who are the persons to whom he gives
his inheritance and his book-land. He then gives somewhat more than 100
hides, including 6 at Lingfield and 10 at Horsley, to his wife for her life,
‘with remainder,’ as we should say, to their daughter. More than once he
calls this daughter ‘our common bairn,’ thus drawing attention to the fact
that she is not merely his daughter, but also his wife’s daughter. This is of
importance, for in a later clause we hear of a son. ‘I give to my son
Æthelwald three hides of book-land: two hides on Hwætedune [Waddon],
and one at Gatatune [Gatton] and therewith 100 swine, and, if the king will
grant him the folk-land with the book-land, then let him have and enjoy it:
but if this may not be, then let her [my wife] grant to him whichever she
will, either the land at Horsley or the land at Lingfield.’ Such are the
materials which must provide us with our knowledge of folk-land.
We must examine Alfred’s will somewhat carefully.
Comment on Alfred’s
The testator has a wife, a son, a daughter. He leaves will.
the bulk of his book-land to his wife for life with
remainder to his daughter. For his son he makes a
small provision (only three hides) out of his book-land, but he expresses a
wish that the king will let that son have the folk-land, and, if this wish be
not fulfilled, then that son is to have either ten or else six hides out of the
book-land previously given to the wife and daughter. We see that, even if he
gets these few hides, the son will obtain but a small part of a handsome
fortune. ‘If the king will grant him the folk-land’—this may suggest that a
man’s folk-land will not descend to his heir. But another, and, as it seems to
us, a far more probable explanation is open. The son is ‘my son,’ the
daughter is ‘our common bairn.’ May not the son be illegitimate, or may not
his legitimacy be doubtful, for legitimacy is somewhat a matter of degree?
The ealdorman may have contracted a dubious or a morganatic marriage.
Page 243
We can see that he does not feel called upon to do very much for this son of
his. He expresses a hope that the king as supreme judge will hold the son to
be legitimate, or sufficiently legitimate to inherit the folk-land, which he
does not endeavour to bequeath.
The king like other persons can have both folk-land,
The king booking land to
and book-land. We have just heard of ‘the king’s himself.
folk-land’: we turn to the important deed whereby
King Æthelwulf booked land to himself[909]. Alms, it
says, are the most perdurable of possessions; one ought to minister to the
necessities of others and so make to oneself friends of the mammon of
unrighteousness; therefore I King Æthelwulf with the consent and leave of
my bishops and great men have booked to myself twenty manses so that I
may enjoy them and leave them after my death to whomsoever I please in
perpetuity: the land is to be free from all tribute and the like, save military
service and the repair of bridges. Then the description of the land thus
booked is preceded by the statement: ‘These are the lands which his wise
men (senatores) conceded to Æthelwulf.’ Now the full meaning of this
famous instrument we can not yet discuss. To put it briefly, our explanation
will be that over his book-land the king will have powers which he will not
have over his folk-land; in particular he will have that testamentary power
which will enable him to become friendly with the mammon of
unrighteousness and secure those eternal mansions that he desires. But we
have introduced this charter here because, though it says no word of folk-
land, it forms an important part of the case of those who contend that folk-
land is land belonging to the people[910]
Another weighty argument is derived from the fact
The consent of the witan.
that there are but very few charters of the kings
which do not in some formula or another profess that
many illustrious persons have consented to or have witnessed the making of
the deed. We have no desire to detract from the significance of this fact, still
we ought to examine our documents with care. Such words as a charter has
about ‘consent’ may occur in two different contexts. They may occur in
close connexion with the words of gift, ‘the operative words,’ as our
conveyancers say, or they may occur in the eschatocol, the clause which
deals with the execution and attestation of the instrument. If we come
across two deeds, one of which tells us how ‘I king Æthelwulf with the
his. He expresses a hope that the king as supreme judge will hold the son to
be legitimate, or sufficiently legitimate to inherit the folk-land, which he
does not endeavour to bequeath.
The king like other persons can have both folk-land,
The king booking land to
and book-land. We have just heard of ‘the king’s himself.
folk-land’: we turn to the important deed whereby
King Æthelwulf booked land to himself[909]. Alms, it
says, are the most perdurable of possessions; one ought to minister to the
necessities of others and so make to oneself friends of the mammon of
unrighteousness; therefore I King Æthelwulf with the consent and leave of
my bishops and great men have booked to myself twenty manses so that I
may enjoy them and leave them after my death to whomsoever I please in
perpetuity: the land is to be free from all tribute and the like, save military
service and the repair of bridges. Then the description of the land thus
booked is preceded by the statement: ‘These are the lands which his wise
men (senatores) conceded to Æthelwulf.’ Now the full meaning of this
famous instrument we can not yet discuss. To put it briefly, our explanation
will be that over his book-land the king will have powers which he will not
have over his folk-land; in particular he will have that testamentary power
which will enable him to become friendly with the mammon of
unrighteousness and secure those eternal mansions that he desires. But we
have introduced this charter here because, though it says no word of folk-
land, it forms an important part of the case of those who contend that folk-
land is land belonging to the people[910]
Another weighty argument is derived from the fact
The consent of the witan.
that there are but very few charters of the kings
which do not in some formula or another profess that
many illustrious persons have consented to or have witnessed the making of
the deed. We have no desire to detract from the significance of this fact, still
we ought to examine our documents with care. Such words as a charter has
about ‘consent’ may occur in two different contexts. They may occur in
close connexion with the words of gift, ‘the operative words,’ as our
conveyancers say, or they may occur in the eschatocol, the clause which
deals with the execution and attestation of the instrument. If we come
across two deeds, one of which tells us how ‘I king Æthelwulf with the
Page 244
consent and leave of my bishops and great men give land to a church or a
thegn,’ while the other says nothing of consent until it tells us how ‘This
charter was written on such a day his testibus consentientibus,’ we must not
at once treat them as saying the same thing in two different ways.
For this purpose we may divide our charters into
Consent and witness in
three periods. The first begins with the few genuine the land-books.
charters of the seventh century and ends in the reign
of Egbert, the second endures until the reign of
Edward the Elder, the third until the Norman Conquest. It will be well
understood that we draw no hard line; each period has its penumbra; but the
years 800 and 900 or 925 may serve to mark very rudely the two limits of
the middle period. Now a clause in the body of the deed stating that the gift
is made by the consent of the witan is characteristic of this middle period.
Any one who wishes to forge a royal land-book of the ninth century should
insert this clause; any one who wishes to forge a deed of the tenth or of the
eighth century should think twice before he makes use of it. To be more
exact, it becomes a common form under Cenwulf of Mercia and Egbert of
Wessex; it grows very rare under Æthelstan[911]. In the meanwhile it serves
as a common form, and it appears in deeds wherein the king says in forcible
terms that he is disposing of his land and his inheritance[912]. During the last
of our three periods all that is ascribed to the great men whose crosses
follow the king’s cross is little, if anything, more than the function of
witnesses. A deed of Æthelstan’s day will end with some such formula as
the following: ‘this book was written at such a place and time, and its
authority was confirmed by the witnesses whose names are written below.’
But very often there is no such concluding formula: we have simply the list
of witnesses and their crosses, and of each of them it is said that he
consented and subscribed. Later in the tenth century the formula which
introduces the names of the witnesses will hardly admit that they in any
sense confirmed the transaction; it will say merely, ‘This book was written
on such a day his testibus consentientibus quorum nomina inferius
caraxantur.’ On this will follow the names and crosses; and of each bishop
—but not as a general rule of any other witness—it will be said that he has
done something for the stability of the deed. To convey this information, the
scribe rings the changes on a score of Latin words—subscripsi, consensi,
consolidavi, corroboravi, confirmavi, conscripsi, consignavi, adquievi,
thegn,’ while the other says nothing of consent until it tells us how ‘This
charter was written on such a day his testibus consentientibus,’ we must not
at once treat them as saying the same thing in two different ways.
For this purpose we may divide our charters into
Consent and witness in
three periods. The first begins with the few genuine the land-books.
charters of the seventh century and ends in the reign
of Egbert, the second endures until the reign of
Edward the Elder, the third until the Norman Conquest. It will be well
understood that we draw no hard line; each period has its penumbra; but the
years 800 and 900 or 925 may serve to mark very rudely the two limits of
the middle period. Now a clause in the body of the deed stating that the gift
is made by the consent of the witan is characteristic of this middle period.
Any one who wishes to forge a royal land-book of the ninth century should
insert this clause; any one who wishes to forge a deed of the tenth or of the
eighth century should think twice before he makes use of it. To be more
exact, it becomes a common form under Cenwulf of Mercia and Egbert of
Wessex; it grows very rare under Æthelstan[911]. In the meanwhile it serves
as a common form, and it appears in deeds wherein the king says in forcible
terms that he is disposing of his land and his inheritance[912]. During the last
of our three periods all that is ascribed to the great men whose crosses
follow the king’s cross is little, if anything, more than the function of
witnesses. A deed of Æthelstan’s day will end with some such formula as
the following: ‘this book was written at such a place and time, and its
authority was confirmed by the witnesses whose names are written below.’
But very often there is no such concluding formula: we have simply the list
of witnesses and their crosses, and of each of them it is said that he
consented and subscribed. Later in the tenth century the formula which
introduces the names of the witnesses will hardly admit that they in any
sense confirmed the transaction; it will say merely, ‘This book was written
on such a day his testibus consentientibus quorum nomina inferius
caraxantur.’ On this will follow the names and crosses; and of each bishop
—but not as a general rule of any other witness—it will be said that he has
done something for the stability of the deed. To convey this information, the
scribe rings the changes on a score of Latin words—subscripsi, consensi,
consolidavi, corroboravi, confirmavi, conscripsi, consignavi, adquievi,
Page 245
praepinxi, praepunxi, praenotavi, and so forth, thereby showing that he has
no very clear notion as to what it really is that the bishop does. But this
degradation of what seems to be a formula of assent into a formula of
attestation has been noticed by others[913], and it is more to our purpose to
examine the charters of the earliest period, for then, if at any time, the folk-
land should have appeared in its true character as the land of the people.
Now during our earliest period instruments which
Attestation of the earliest
contain in conjunction with their operative words books.
any allusion to the consent of the great men of the
realm are exceedingly rare[914]. A commoner case is
that in which the eschatocol says something about consent. We will collect a
few examples.
no very clear notion as to what it really is that the bishop does. But this
degradation of what seems to be a formula of assent into a formula of
attestation has been noticed by others[913], and it is more to our purpose to
examine the charters of the earliest period, for then, if at any time, the folk-
land should have appeared in its true character as the land of the people.
Now during our earliest period instruments which
Attestation of the earliest
contain in conjunction with their operative words books.
any allusion to the consent of the great men of the
realm are exceedingly rare[914]. A commoner case is
that in which the eschatocol says something about consent. We will collect a
few examples.
Page 246
I have confirmed this with the sign of the holy cross with the counsel
of Laurence the bishop and of all my principes and have requested
them to do the like[915].
I have impressed the sign of the holy cross and requested fit and proper
witnesses to subscribe[916].
I have confirmed this gift with my own hand and have caused fit and
proper witnesses, my companions (commites), to confirm and
subscribe[917].
This formula, undoubtedly of foreign origin, was common in Kent[918].
From Wessex and the middle of the eighth century, we twice obtain a fuller
form.
These things were done in such a year; and that my munificent gift
may be the more firmly established (firmius roboretur) we have
associated with ourselves the fit and proper witnesses and
‘adstipulators’ whose names and descriptions are set forth below to
subscribe and confirm this privilege of the aforesaid estate (praedictae
possessionis privilegium[919]).
More frequently however the document has nothing that can be called a
clause of attestation. It simply gives us the names and the crosses of the
witnesses. Occasionally over against each name, or each of the most
important names, is set some word or phrase describing this witness’s act.
He has subscribed, or he has consented, or he has consented and subscribed,
or perhaps he has confirmed[920].
Now we ought not to draw inferences from these
Confirmation and
phrases without knowing that in the Latin of this attestation.
period such words as confirmare, corroborare,
adstipulari are the proper words whereby to describe
the act of those who become witnesses to the execution of a deed[921]. Our
kings are making use, though it is a lax use, of foreign formulas; what is
more, they are adopting the formulas of private deeds. They have no
chancellor, as the Frankish kings have, and they do not, as the Frankish
kings do, dispense with that rogatio testium which is one of the usual forms
of private law[922]. On the continent of Europe all this talk about
of Laurence the bishop and of all my principes and have requested
them to do the like[915].
I have impressed the sign of the holy cross and requested fit and proper
witnesses to subscribe[916].
I have confirmed this gift with my own hand and have caused fit and
proper witnesses, my companions (commites), to confirm and
subscribe[917].
This formula, undoubtedly of foreign origin, was common in Kent[918].
From Wessex and the middle of the eighth century, we twice obtain a fuller
form.
These things were done in such a year; and that my munificent gift
may be the more firmly established (firmius roboretur) we have
associated with ourselves the fit and proper witnesses and
‘adstipulators’ whose names and descriptions are set forth below to
subscribe and confirm this privilege of the aforesaid estate (praedictae
possessionis privilegium[919]).
More frequently however the document has nothing that can be called a
clause of attestation. It simply gives us the names and the crosses of the
witnesses. Occasionally over against each name, or each of the most
important names, is set some word or phrase describing this witness’s act.
He has subscribed, or he has consented, or he has consented and subscribed,
or perhaps he has confirmed[920].
Now we ought not to draw inferences from these
Confirmation and
phrases without knowing that in the Latin of this attestation.
period such words as confirmare, corroborare,
adstipulari are the proper words whereby to describe
the act of those who become witnesses to the execution of a deed[921]. Our
kings are making use, though it is a lax use, of foreign formulas; what is
more, they are adopting the formulas of private deeds. They have no
chancellor, as the Frankish kings have, and they do not, as the Frankish
kings do, dispense with that rogatio testium which is one of the usual forms
of private law[922]. On the continent of Europe all this talk about
Page 247
confirmation, corroboration and consent would by no means imply that the
witnesses were more than witnesses. The line which divides attestation
from participation is really somewhat fine, and though well enough
apprehended by modern lawyers, would not easily be explained to a
barbarian ealdorman. A witness does consent to the execution of the
instrument which he attests, though he may be utterly ignorant of its import,
and, if the law demands that such an instrument shall be attested, then it
may well be said of the witness that by attesting it he makes it firm, he
confirms it. Until he attested it, it was not a valid instrument[923]. Now we
are not saying that the magnates, more especially the bishops, who attested
these ancient charters thought of themselves as mere witnesses. Had that
been so, a clause expressing the consent of the whole body of great men
would hardly have crept into the charters; and it does creep in gradually
during the last half of the eighth century[924]. A similar development has
been noticed in the charters of the German kings. A clause expressing the
consent of the great folk rarely occurs in the Merovingian or the early
Carolingian charters, unless they belong to certain exceptional classes. It is
said to become common under the weak rule of Lewis the Child; then for a
while it becomes rare again, and then once more common under Henry III
and Henry IV, though consent and witness are hardly to be
distinguished[925]
Perhaps from the first in England the cross of at least
Function of the witan.
one bishop was much to be desired or was almost
indispensable, for the anathema which the charter
pronounces will be a solemn sentence of excommunication when it comes
from a bishop, while it will be at best a pious wish if it comes from the
king; and it is well to have the cross of every bishop, so that the breaker of
the charter may find himself excommunicated in every diocese. This is not
all; we may well believe that from the first the king was more or less bound
to consult with his great men before he alienated his land. The notion that
land could be alienated at all may not have been very ancient, and the king
when giving land away may have been expected to pay some regard to the
welfare of his realm[926]. The discovery that he had an alienable superiority
over free land and free landowners would sharpen this rule. Some of these
early donations are to our minds more like cessions of political power than
gifts of land; they make over to bishops and abbots rights which the king
witnesses were more than witnesses. The line which divides attestation
from participation is really somewhat fine, and though well enough
apprehended by modern lawyers, would not easily be explained to a
barbarian ealdorman. A witness does consent to the execution of the
instrument which he attests, though he may be utterly ignorant of its import,
and, if the law demands that such an instrument shall be attested, then it
may well be said of the witness that by attesting it he makes it firm, he
confirms it. Until he attested it, it was not a valid instrument[923]. Now we
are not saying that the magnates, more especially the bishops, who attested
these ancient charters thought of themselves as mere witnesses. Had that
been so, a clause expressing the consent of the whole body of great men
would hardly have crept into the charters; and it does creep in gradually
during the last half of the eighth century[924]. A similar development has
been noticed in the charters of the German kings. A clause expressing the
consent of the great folk rarely occurs in the Merovingian or the early
Carolingian charters, unless they belong to certain exceptional classes. It is
said to become common under the weak rule of Lewis the Child; then for a
while it becomes rare again, and then once more common under Henry III
and Henry IV, though consent and witness are hardly to be
distinguished[925]
Perhaps from the first in England the cross of at least
Function of the witan.
one bishop was much to be desired or was almost
indispensable, for the anathema which the charter
pronounces will be a solemn sentence of excommunication when it comes
from a bishop, while it will be at best a pious wish if it comes from the
king; and it is well to have the cross of every bishop, so that the breaker of
the charter may find himself excommunicated in every diocese. This is not
all; we may well believe that from the first the king was more or less bound
to consult with his great men before he alienated his land. The notion that
land could be alienated at all may not have been very ancient, and the king
when giving land away may have been expected to pay some regard to the
welfare of his realm[926]. The discovery that he had an alienable superiority
over free land and free landowners would sharpen this rule. Some of these
early donations are to our minds more like cessions of political power than
gifts of land; they make over to bishops and abbots rights which the king
Page 248
has exercised rather as king than as landowner. A wholesome practice
grows up which is embodied in the clause that states the consent of the
witan, and, even when this clause has disappeared, still it is in the presence
and with the witness of his councillors that the king makes his grants. This
is no purely English phenomenon. When a Norman duke hands his charter
to be roborated and confirmed by his fideles, we do not infer that he is
disposing of land that is not his[927]. But it is very remarkable that in the
earliest English charters the consent of an overlord is treated as a far more
serious thing than the consent of the nobles[928]
Of some value though this ‘constitutional check’
The king and the
may have been, we can not regard it as a relic of a people’s land.
time when there was land which in any accurate
sense of the term was owned by the people. The
recorded action of the witan in relation to the king’s grants does not become
more prominent, it becomes less prominent, as we go backwards and reach
the heptarchic days. But that is not all. Is it not marvellous that there should
be land owned by the people and yet that we should have to discover this
momentous fact from a few casual phrases occurring in three documents of
the ninth and tenth centuries? Are we to suppose that whenever the king is
giving away land, this land is the land of the people? Why do not the
charters say so? Repeatedly the king speaks of the land that he gives as ‘my
land’ (terram iuris mei), and this too in charters which state that the witan
give their consent to the grant. Never by any chance does a scribe slip into
any such phrase as terram gentis meae, terram gentis Merciorum or the
like. And how came it about that from the very earliest time the king could
devote the people’s land to the salvation of his own peculiar soul? But, it
will be said, no doubt the king had private estates besides having a power
over ‘the unallotted lands of the nation,’ and those private estates he could
give away as he pleased. But then, how are we to distinguish between those
charters whereby he disposed of his own and those whereby he disposed of
national lands? The formula which expresses the consent of the wise will
certainly not serve our turn. It leads, as we have seen, to a distinction
between different ages, not to a classification of the various charters of one
and the same king.
Some historians have supposed that at the outset
King’s land and crown
there was a clear distinction between the king’s
grows up which is embodied in the clause that states the consent of the
witan, and, even when this clause has disappeared, still it is in the presence
and with the witness of his councillors that the king makes his grants. This
is no purely English phenomenon. When a Norman duke hands his charter
to be roborated and confirmed by his fideles, we do not infer that he is
disposing of land that is not his[927]. But it is very remarkable that in the
earliest English charters the consent of an overlord is treated as a far more
serious thing than the consent of the nobles[928]
Of some value though this ‘constitutional check’
The king and the
may have been, we can not regard it as a relic of a people’s land.
time when there was land which in any accurate
sense of the term was owned by the people. The
recorded action of the witan in relation to the king’s grants does not become
more prominent, it becomes less prominent, as we go backwards and reach
the heptarchic days. But that is not all. Is it not marvellous that there should
be land owned by the people and yet that we should have to discover this
momentous fact from a few casual phrases occurring in three documents of
the ninth and tenth centuries? Are we to suppose that whenever the king is
giving away land, this land is the land of the people? Why do not the
charters say so? Repeatedly the king speaks of the land that he gives as ‘my
land’ (terram iuris mei), and this too in charters which state that the witan
give their consent to the grant. Never by any chance does a scribe slip into
any such phrase as terram gentis meae, terram gentis Merciorum or the
like. And how came it about that from the very earliest time the king could
devote the people’s land to the salvation of his own peculiar soul? But, it
will be said, no doubt the king had private estates besides having a power
over ‘the unallotted lands of the nation,’ and those private estates he could
give away as he pleased. But then, how are we to distinguish between those
charters whereby he disposed of his own and those whereby he disposed of
national lands? The formula which expresses the consent of the wise will
certainly not serve our turn. It leads, as we have seen, to a distinction
between different ages, not to a classification of the various charters of one
and the same king.
Some historians have supposed that at the outset
King’s land and crown
there was a clear distinction between the king’s
Page 249
private estates and those national lands which were land.
becoming the domains of the crown. Now a vague
distinction between what belonged to the king as king and what belonged to
him—if we may use so modern a phrase—in his private capacity, we may
admit, while at the same time we gravely doubt whether the language or the
thought of the eighth or ninth century had any forms in which this
distinction could be precisely expressed. Even within the ecclesiastical
sphere, where traditions of Roman law may have lingered and where dead
saints presented themselves as persons capable of acquiring land, it was by
no means easy to distinguish the bishop’s property from his church’s
property. We may find a deed whereby some king for the love of God or the
salvation of his soul gives land to a certain bishop, and states in strong,
clear words that the donee is to have the most absolute power of giving and
selling and even, for this sometimes occurs, of bequeathing the land[929].
We shall probably believe that the king intends that this land shall go to
increase the territory of the church, and yet we dare not make the bishop
either ‘a trustee’ or ‘a corporation sole.
As to the king, it would be on his death that the
Fate of the king’s land
necessity of drawing some distinction between his on his death.
two capacities would first present itself. Perhaps a
brother of his would be elected to the kingdom and
his children would be passed by. Clearly this brother should have those
lands which have supplied the king with the main part of his revenue, and
yet it would be hard that the dead man’s children should be portionless.
However, we may strongly suspect that in the earliest time cases of this
nature were settled as they arose without the establishment of any general
rule, and that even on the eve of the Norman Conquest no definite
classification of the king’s estates had been framed. We dare not expect the
rule to be more definite than that which settled the title to the kingship, and
how exceedingly indefinite the latter was the historians of our constitution
have explained. Hereditary and elective elements were mixed up in the title;
we can define neither the one nor the other. That ‘superiority’ over all the
land of his kingdom of which we have spoken above, though it might be
alienated piecemeal among the living, would pass from the dead king to his
elected successor. On the other hand, some kings were careful to have
certain lands booked to themselves and to obtain from their nobles ‘an
becoming the domains of the crown. Now a vague
distinction between what belonged to the king as king and what belonged to
him—if we may use so modern a phrase—in his private capacity, we may
admit, while at the same time we gravely doubt whether the language or the
thought of the eighth or ninth century had any forms in which this
distinction could be precisely expressed. Even within the ecclesiastical
sphere, where traditions of Roman law may have lingered and where dead
saints presented themselves as persons capable of acquiring land, it was by
no means easy to distinguish the bishop’s property from his church’s
property. We may find a deed whereby some king for the love of God or the
salvation of his soul gives land to a certain bishop, and states in strong,
clear words that the donee is to have the most absolute power of giving and
selling and even, for this sometimes occurs, of bequeathing the land[929].
We shall probably believe that the king intends that this land shall go to
increase the territory of the church, and yet we dare not make the bishop
either ‘a trustee’ or ‘a corporation sole.
As to the king, it would be on his death that the
Fate of the king’s land
necessity of drawing some distinction between his on his death.
two capacities would first present itself. Perhaps a
brother of his would be elected to the kingdom and
his children would be passed by. Clearly this brother should have those
lands which have supplied the king with the main part of his revenue, and
yet it would be hard that the dead man’s children should be portionless.
However, we may strongly suspect that in the earliest time cases of this
nature were settled as they arose without the establishment of any general
rule, and that even on the eve of the Norman Conquest no definite
classification of the king’s estates had been framed. We dare not expect the
rule to be more definite than that which settled the title to the kingship, and
how exceedingly indefinite the latter was the historians of our constitution
have explained. Hereditary and elective elements were mixed up in the title;
we can define neither the one nor the other. That ‘superiority’ over all the
land of his kingdom of which we have spoken above, though it might be
alienated piecemeal among the living, would pass from the dead king to his
elected successor. On the other hand, some kings were careful to have
certain lands booked to themselves and to obtain from their nobles ‘an
Page 250
express power of testamentary appointment.’ But very possibly there was a
wide fringe of disputable matter. King Alfred’s will, with all that he says
about what had been done by himself, his father and his brothers, seems to
tell us that a prudent king would obtain the consent of his councillors to any
disposition that he made of land that was in any sort his. Also it seems to
bear witness to a strong feeling that the reigning king should enjoy at any
rate the bulk of the lands that his predecessor had enjoyed[930]
In one of his charters Æthelred the Unready is made
The new king and the
to tell a long and curious story[931]:—‘My father, old king’s heir.
king Edgar, gave certain lands to the minster at
Abingdon. On his death the wise men elected as king
my brother Edward, and put me in possession of the lands which belonged
to the king’s sons. Among these were the lands given to Abingdon; they
were forcibly taken from the monks. Whether this was lawful or unlawful
those wise men know best. Then my brother Edward died and I became
possessed, not only of the lands which belonged to the king’s sons, but also
of the royal lands. I do not wish to incur my father’s curse, and therefore I
intend to substitute for his gift a compensation out of my own proper
inheritance. The land that I am now going to dispose of I acquired by gift
from certain persons whose names I state.’—We seem to see here three
kinds of land, the regales terrae which pass from king to king, the lands
‘entailed,’ if we may use that term, on the king’s family (regii pueri), and
lands which come to a king by way of gift or the like and constitute his
propria hereditas. But the wise men seem to have violated three solemn
books which they themselves or their predecessors had attested, and we can
but say with king Æthelred ‘quam rem si iuste aut iniuste fecerint ipsi
sciant[932].’ There can be but little law about such matters so long as the
title to the kingship is indefinable[933]
This distinction between the lands which would pass
Ancient demesne and its
from king to king and the lands which would pass immunity.
from the king to his heirs or to his devisees may
have been complicated with another distinction.
Domesday Book tells us that some, but by no means all, of the lands held
by the Confessor were and had always been free of geld, and this freedom
from taxation may imply other immunities. It is possible that, as in later
times, certain ‘ancient demesnes of the crown’ already stood outside the
wide fringe of disputable matter. King Alfred’s will, with all that he says
about what had been done by himself, his father and his brothers, seems to
tell us that a prudent king would obtain the consent of his councillors to any
disposition that he made of land that was in any sort his. Also it seems to
bear witness to a strong feeling that the reigning king should enjoy at any
rate the bulk of the lands that his predecessor had enjoyed[930]
In one of his charters Æthelred the Unready is made
The new king and the
to tell a long and curious story[931]:—‘My father, old king’s heir.
king Edgar, gave certain lands to the minster at
Abingdon. On his death the wise men elected as king
my brother Edward, and put me in possession of the lands which belonged
to the king’s sons. Among these were the lands given to Abingdon; they
were forcibly taken from the monks. Whether this was lawful or unlawful
those wise men know best. Then my brother Edward died and I became
possessed, not only of the lands which belonged to the king’s sons, but also
of the royal lands. I do not wish to incur my father’s curse, and therefore I
intend to substitute for his gift a compensation out of my own proper
inheritance. The land that I am now going to dispose of I acquired by gift
from certain persons whose names I state.’—We seem to see here three
kinds of land, the regales terrae which pass from king to king, the lands
‘entailed,’ if we may use that term, on the king’s family (regii pueri), and
lands which come to a king by way of gift or the like and constitute his
propria hereditas. But the wise men seem to have violated three solemn
books which they themselves or their predecessors had attested, and we can
but say with king Æthelred ‘quam rem si iuste aut iniuste fecerint ipsi
sciant[932].’ There can be but little law about such matters so long as the
title to the kingship is indefinable[933]
This distinction between the lands which would pass
Ancient demesne and its
from king to king and the lands which would pass immunity.
from the king to his heirs or to his devisees may
have been complicated with another distinction.
Domesday Book tells us that some, but by no means all, of the lands held
by the Confessor were and had always been free of geld, and this freedom
from taxation may imply other immunities. It is possible that, as in later
times, certain ‘ancient demesnes of the crown’ already stood outside the
Page 251
national system of taxation, justice and police, that the ealdorman of the
shire and the shire-moot had no jurisdiction over them, and that they were
administered by reeves yet more personally dependent on the king than was
the shire-reeve. It is possible, however, that the two distinctions cut each
other, for when the king booked land to himself he, at all events on some
occasions, inserted in the charter a clause of immunity, the very object of
which was to put the land outside the general, national system. To this
distinction the famous exchange which Æthelbert effected with his thegn
Wulflaf may point. It says that when, instead of Washingwell, the king
accepted Marsham, ‘he did it him to folk-land.’ The land at Marsham was
no longer to enjoy that immunity which it had enjoyed while it was in the
hands of the thegn, it was to come under the sway of the sheriff and of the
national courts. However, it is much easier for us to dream dreams about
such a transaction than to discover the truth.
If the folk-land was the land of the people and if the
Rights of individuals in
king when he booked land to a church or a thegn was national land.
usually booking folk-land and converting it into
book-land, how are we to think of the land that still
is folk-land? Is it land that has not yet been brought into cultivation; is it
land in which no proprietary interests, save that of the folk, exist? Now we
are far from saying that the king never grants land that is waste and void of
inhabitants; but it is plain enough that this is not the common case. The
charter deals in the first instance with manses, villae, vici, houses, túns, with
cultivated fields and meadows. Waste land (it may be) is given in large
quantities, but merely as appurtenant to the profitable core of the gift. We
see too that individual men have rights in the folk-land; Alfred the
ealdorman has folk-land and hopes that on his death it will pass to his son;
King Æthelbert has folk-land and it is occupied by Wighelm and Wulflaf;
King Edward the Elder supposes that the title to folk-land may be in dispute
between two persons and that this dispute will come before the sheriff.
What then the folk owns, if it owns anything at all, is not (if we may
introduce such feudal terms) ‘land in demesne’ but ‘land in service,’ in
other words, a superiority or seignory over land. We must add that it is a
superiority over free men and over men who have titles that can be the
subject of law-suits in the county court. And now we must ask, What profit
does the nation get out of this superiority? Shall we say that the tributum,
shire and the shire-moot had no jurisdiction over them, and that they were
administered by reeves yet more personally dependent on the king than was
the shire-reeve. It is possible, however, that the two distinctions cut each
other, for when the king booked land to himself he, at all events on some
occasions, inserted in the charter a clause of immunity, the very object of
which was to put the land outside the general, national system. To this
distinction the famous exchange which Æthelbert effected with his thegn
Wulflaf may point. It says that when, instead of Washingwell, the king
accepted Marsham, ‘he did it him to folk-land.’ The land at Marsham was
no longer to enjoy that immunity which it had enjoyed while it was in the
hands of the thegn, it was to come under the sway of the sheriff and of the
national courts. However, it is much easier for us to dream dreams about
such a transaction than to discover the truth.
If the folk-land was the land of the people and if the
Rights of individuals in
king when he booked land to a church or a thegn was national land.
usually booking folk-land and converting it into
book-land, how are we to think of the land that still
is folk-land? Is it land that has not yet been brought into cultivation; is it
land in which no proprietary interests, save that of the folk, exist? Now we
are far from saying that the king never grants land that is waste and void of
inhabitants; but it is plain enough that this is not the common case. The
charter deals in the first instance with manses, villae, vici, houses, túns, with
cultivated fields and meadows. Waste land (it may be) is given in large
quantities, but merely as appurtenant to the profitable core of the gift. We
see too that individual men have rights in the folk-land; Alfred the
ealdorman has folk-land and hopes that on his death it will pass to his son;
King Æthelbert has folk-land and it is occupied by Wighelm and Wulflaf;
King Edward the Elder supposes that the title to folk-land may be in dispute
between two persons and that this dispute will come before the sheriff.
What then the folk owns, if it owns anything at all, is not (if we may
introduce such feudal terms) ‘land in demesne’ but ‘land in service,’ in
other words, a superiority or seignory over land. We must add that it is a
superiority over free men and over men who have titles that can be the
subject of law-suits in the county court. And now we must ask, What profit
does the nation get out of this superiority? Shall we say that the tributum,
Page 252
the vectigal paid to the king is to be regarded as rent paid to the nation, that
the opera regia, the victus, the pastus, are services rendered by the tenant to
the people, or shall we say that the folk’s right over this land is proved by
its serving as the fund whereon the king can draw when he desires to save
his soul? Then, if on the other hand we make the tillers of the folk-land
mere tenants at will, there will be little room left for any landowners, for
any ‘peasant proprietors.’ To meet this difficulty it has been supposed that,
at all events at a remote time, there was much land that was neither folk-
land nor book-land. The allotments which the original settlers received were
neither folk-land nor book-land.
In order to describe those allotments the words alod
The alod.
and ethel have been used, and other terms, such as
‘family land’ and ‘heir land,’ have been invented.
But in the laws and the charters we do not meet with these phrases. The law
of Edward the Elder seems to set before us book-land and folk-land as
exhausting the kinds of land. ‘He who deforces any one of his right, be it in
book-land, be it in ‘folk-land’ must pay a penalty.’ It is difficult to believe
that this law says nothing of one very common kind of land, still more
difficult to believe that already in the first half of the ninth century the
amount of the so-called alod, ethel, or ‘heir-land,’ had become so small that
it might be neglected. So far as we can see, book-land from first to last was
only held by the churches and by very great men. The books that we have,
more especially the later books, are with hardly any exceptions furnished
with clauses of immunity, clauses which put the land outside the national
system of police, and, as we think, of justice also. It is not to be imagined
for one moment that the numerous liberi homines who even in the
Conqueror’s reign held land in Essex and East Anglia had books. To say
that book-land had consumed the ancient alod or ethel, is in truth to say that
all land was privileged.
We turn once more to Edward’s law. Land, it would
Book-land and privilege.
seem, is either book-land or folk-land. Book-land is
land held by book, by a royal and ecclesiastical
privilegium. Folk-land is land held without book, by unwritten title, by the
folk-law. ‘Folk-land’ is the term which modern historians have rejected in
favour of the outlandish alod. The holder of folk-land is a free landowner,
though at an early date the king discovers that over him and his land there
the opera regia, the victus, the pastus, are services rendered by the tenant to
the people, or shall we say that the folk’s right over this land is proved by
its serving as the fund whereon the king can draw when he desires to save
his soul? Then, if on the other hand we make the tillers of the folk-land
mere tenants at will, there will be little room left for any landowners, for
any ‘peasant proprietors.’ To meet this difficulty it has been supposed that,
at all events at a remote time, there was much land that was neither folk-
land nor book-land. The allotments which the original settlers received were
neither folk-land nor book-land.
In order to describe those allotments the words alod
The alod.
and ethel have been used, and other terms, such as
‘family land’ and ‘heir land,’ have been invented.
But in the laws and the charters we do not meet with these phrases. The law
of Edward the Elder seems to set before us book-land and folk-land as
exhausting the kinds of land. ‘He who deforces any one of his right, be it in
book-land, be it in ‘folk-land’ must pay a penalty.’ It is difficult to believe
that this law says nothing of one very common kind of land, still more
difficult to believe that already in the first half of the ninth century the
amount of the so-called alod, ethel, or ‘heir-land,’ had become so small that
it might be neglected. So far as we can see, book-land from first to last was
only held by the churches and by very great men. The books that we have,
more especially the later books, are with hardly any exceptions furnished
with clauses of immunity, clauses which put the land outside the national
system of police, and, as we think, of justice also. It is not to be imagined
for one moment that the numerous liberi homines who even in the
Conqueror’s reign held land in Essex and East Anglia had books. To say
that book-land had consumed the ancient alod or ethel, is in truth to say that
all land was privileged.
We turn once more to Edward’s law. Land, it would
Book-land and privilege.
seem, is either book-land or folk-land. Book-land is
land held by book, by a royal and ecclesiastical
privilegium. Folk-land is land held without book, by unwritten title, by the
folk-law. ‘Folk-land’ is the term which modern historians have rejected in
favour of the outlandish alod. The holder of folk-land is a free landowner,
though at an early date the king discovers that over him and his land there
Page 253
exists an alienable superiority. Partly by alienations of this superiority,
partly perhaps by gifts of land of which the king is himself the owner, book-
land is created.
Edward’s law speaks as though it were dealing with
Kinds of land and kinds
two different kinds of land. But really it is dealing of right.
with two different kinds of title. We, and even our
statutes, habitually speak of freehold land, copyhold
land, leasehold land, yet we know that the same piece of land may be at one
and the same time freehold, copyhold and leasehold. All land is freehold
land; every rood has its freeholder. Bracton habitually spoke of land held by
frankalmoin, land held by knight’s service, land held in socage, but he knew
well enough that a single acre might be held at one and the same time by
many different tenures. Just so, we take it, the same land might be both
book-land and folk-land, the book-land of the minster, the folk-land of the
free men who were holding—not indeed ‘of’—but still ‘under’ the minster.
They or their ancestors had held under the king, but the king had booked
their land (which also in a certain sense was his land) to a church. The
mental effort, the abstraction, that would be required of us were we to speak
of various ‘estates, rights and titles,’ we try to avoid by speaking as though
the distinction that was to be indicated were a distinction between various
material things, and as though a freehold or copyhold quality were, like
fertility or sterility, an attribute of the soil. Even so abstract a term as
‘estate’ is soon debased by the vulgar mouth: estates are ploughed; men
‘shoot over’ their estates. ‘Book-land’ is a briefer term than ‘land held by
book-right’; ‘folk-land’ is a briefer term than ‘land held by folk-right.’ The
same piece of land may be held by book-right and by folk-right; it may be
book-land and folk-land too.
And now we must turn to consider another element in the king’s alienable
superiority. We must speak of jurisdiction.
partly perhaps by gifts of land of which the king is himself the owner, book-
land is created.
Edward’s law speaks as though it were dealing with
Kinds of land and kinds
two different kinds of land. But really it is dealing of right.
with two different kinds of title. We, and even our
statutes, habitually speak of freehold land, copyhold
land, leasehold land, yet we know that the same piece of land may be at one
and the same time freehold, copyhold and leasehold. All land is freehold
land; every rood has its freeholder. Bracton habitually spoke of land held by
frankalmoin, land held by knight’s service, land held in socage, but he knew
well enough that a single acre might be held at one and the same time by
many different tenures. Just so, we take it, the same land might be both
book-land and folk-land, the book-land of the minster, the folk-land of the
free men who were holding—not indeed ‘of’—but still ‘under’ the minster.
They or their ancestors had held under the king, but the king had booked
their land (which also in a certain sense was his land) to a church. The
mental effort, the abstraction, that would be required of us were we to speak
of various ‘estates, rights and titles,’ we try to avoid by speaking as though
the distinction that was to be indicated were a distinction between various
material things, and as though a freehold or copyhold quality were, like
fertility or sterility, an attribute of the soil. Even so abstract a term as
‘estate’ is soon debased by the vulgar mouth: estates are ploughed; men
‘shoot over’ their estates. ‘Book-land’ is a briefer term than ‘land held by
book-right’; ‘folk-land’ is a briefer term than ‘land held by folk-right.’ The
same piece of land may be held by book-right and by folk-right; it may be
book-land and folk-land too.
And now we must turn to consider another element in the king’s alienable
superiority. We must speak of jurisdiction.
Page 254
Page 255
§ 3. Sake and Soke.
Of all the phenomena of feudalism none seems more
Importance of seignorial
essential than seignorial justice. In times gone by justice.
English lawyers and historians have been apt to treat
it lightly and to concentrate their attention on
military tenure. For them ‘the introduction of the military tenures’ has been
‘the establishment of the feudal system.’ But when compared with
seignorial justice, military tenure is a superficial matter, one out of many
effects rather than a deep-seated cause. Seignorial justice is a deep-seated
cause of many effects, a principle which when once introduced is capable of
transfiguring a nation. Of the origin and antiquity of this principle, however,
some even of our most illustrious historians have spoken with great
hesitation and therefore we shall spend some time in examining the texts
which reveal what can be known about it, admitting once for all that they
leave much room for differences of opinion.
Since the doctrine to which we have come would
Theory of the modern
trace seignorial justice back to a remote time, we origin of seignorial
shall do well to state at the outset an extreme version justice.
of the opposite doctrine, a version which has been
elaborately set forth in a learned and spirited essay[934].—On the eve of the
battle of Hastings a seignorial court was still a new thing in England. It was
a Norman precursor of the Norman Conquest. England owes it to Edward
the Confessor, who was ‘half-Norman by birth and wholly Norman by
education and sympathies.’ It came to us with ‘a new theory of
constitutional law.’ From the reign of no older king can any evidence be
produced of the existence—at any rate of the legalized existence—of
private courts. True, there are charters that give to the holders of great
estates the profits of jurisdiction; but a grant of the profits of jurisdiction is
one thing, jurisdiction itself is another. True, that one man might have soke
over another, but this does not mean that he had jurisdiction; at the most it
means that he was entitled to the profits of justice, to wites, to fines and
amercements. ‘No instance can be found before the Norman times in which
Of all the phenomena of feudalism none seems more
Importance of seignorial
essential than seignorial justice. In times gone by justice.
English lawyers and historians have been apt to treat
it lightly and to concentrate their attention on
military tenure. For them ‘the introduction of the military tenures’ has been
‘the establishment of the feudal system.’ But when compared with
seignorial justice, military tenure is a superficial matter, one out of many
effects rather than a deep-seated cause. Seignorial justice is a deep-seated
cause of many effects, a principle which when once introduced is capable of
transfiguring a nation. Of the origin and antiquity of this principle, however,
some even of our most illustrious historians have spoken with great
hesitation and therefore we shall spend some time in examining the texts
which reveal what can be known about it, admitting once for all that they
leave much room for differences of opinion.
Since the doctrine to which we have come would
Theory of the modern
trace seignorial justice back to a remote time, we origin of seignorial
shall do well to state at the outset an extreme version justice.
of the opposite doctrine, a version which has been
elaborately set forth in a learned and spirited essay[934].—On the eve of the
battle of Hastings a seignorial court was still a new thing in England. It was
a Norman precursor of the Norman Conquest. England owes it to Edward
the Confessor, who was ‘half-Norman by birth and wholly Norman by
education and sympathies.’ It came to us with ‘a new theory of
constitutional law.’ From the reign of no older king can any evidence be
produced of the existence—at any rate of the legalized existence—of
private courts. True, there are charters that give to the holders of great
estates the profits of jurisdiction; but a grant of the profits of jurisdiction is
one thing, jurisdiction itself is another. True, that one man might have soke
over another, but this does not mean that he had jurisdiction; at the most it
means that he was entitled to the profits of justice, to wites, to fines and
amercements. ‘No instance can be found before the Norman times in which
Page 256
sócn means jurisdiction. Sócn had a technical meaning of its own which is
always rigorously observed. The idea of jurisdiction, on the other hand, was
expressed by an equally technical word, the meaning of which is also
rigorously observed. This is sacu, a word which has strangely vanished
from our legal vocabulary, but is still preserved, even in its technical sense,
by the German sache[935].’
Now it will not be disputed that in Domesday Book
Sake and soke in the
and the Leges Henrici this distinction is obliterated. Norman age.
Soke means jurisdiction and ‘sake and soke’ is but a
pleonastic phrase, which means no more than
soke[936]. Nor is it disputable that on the vigil of the Conquest a great deal
of jurisdiction was wielded by the lords. Not a few of the ‘hundreds’ were
in private hands, and, apart from hundredal jurisdiction, a lord might have
and often had sake and soke over his own lands. It is not denied that
Edward the Confessor had freely granted to churches and other lords large
rights of justice,—not merely rights to the profits of jurisdiction, but
jurisdiction itself. The question is whether what he did was new.
For one moment longer we may dwell on the
The Confessor’s writs.
indisputable fact that he dealt out jurisdictional
rights with a lavish hand. This we gather, not so
much from his Latin land-books, as from English writs in which he
announces to the bishop, earl, sheriff and great men of a county that he has
given land in that county to some church ‘with sake and soke and toll and
team’; sometimes he adds ‘with infangennethef, grithbrice, foresteal,
hamsocn, flymena-fyrmth,’ and so forth. Sometimes the donees are to have
these rights in all their own lands. Sometimes he gives them the hundredal
jurisdiction over lands that are not their own. Thus to St. Benet of Ramsey
he gives soken over all the men in a hundred and a half—over all the men
who are ‘moot-worthy, fyrd-worthy, and fold-worthy,’ whosesoever men
they may be: that is to say (as we understand it) he gives a jurisdiction over
all the free men of the district, the men who attend the moots, who attend
the host and who are not compelled by any soca faldae to send their sheep
to a seignorial fold, and this although those men be bound to St. Benet
neither by tenure nor by personal commendation[937]. Again, he concedes
that the donee’s tenants shall be quit of shires and hundreds[938]. Again, he
gives the favoured church taxational power: whenever the king takes a geld,
always rigorously observed. The idea of jurisdiction, on the other hand, was
expressed by an equally technical word, the meaning of which is also
rigorously observed. This is sacu, a word which has strangely vanished
from our legal vocabulary, but is still preserved, even in its technical sense,
by the German sache[935].’
Now it will not be disputed that in Domesday Book
Sake and soke in the
and the Leges Henrici this distinction is obliterated. Norman age.
Soke means jurisdiction and ‘sake and soke’ is but a
pleonastic phrase, which means no more than
soke[936]. Nor is it disputable that on the vigil of the Conquest a great deal
of jurisdiction was wielded by the lords. Not a few of the ‘hundreds’ were
in private hands, and, apart from hundredal jurisdiction, a lord might have
and often had sake and soke over his own lands. It is not denied that
Edward the Confessor had freely granted to churches and other lords large
rights of justice,—not merely rights to the profits of jurisdiction, but
jurisdiction itself. The question is whether what he did was new.
For one moment longer we may dwell on the
The Confessor’s writs.
indisputable fact that he dealt out jurisdictional
rights with a lavish hand. This we gather, not so
much from his Latin land-books, as from English writs in which he
announces to the bishop, earl, sheriff and great men of a county that he has
given land in that county to some church ‘with sake and soke and toll and
team’; sometimes he adds ‘with infangennethef, grithbrice, foresteal,
hamsocn, flymena-fyrmth,’ and so forth. Sometimes the donees are to have
these rights in all their own lands. Sometimes he gives them the hundredal
jurisdiction over lands that are not their own. Thus to St. Benet of Ramsey
he gives soken over all the men in a hundred and a half—over all the men
who are ‘moot-worthy, fyrd-worthy, and fold-worthy,’ whosesoever men
they may be: that is to say (as we understand it) he gives a jurisdiction over
all the free men of the district, the men who attend the moots, who attend
the host and who are not compelled by any soca faldae to send their sheep
to a seignorial fold, and this although those men be bound to St. Benet
neither by tenure nor by personal commendation[937]. Again, he concedes
that the donee’s tenants shall be quit of shires and hundreds[938]. Again, he
gives the favoured church taxational power: whenever the king takes a geld,
Page 257
be it army-geld, or ship-geld, the monks may impose a similar tax upon the
township and keep the proceeds to their own use[939]. In short, it seems not
too much to say that any delegation and appropriation of justice of which
our Norman kings were guilty had an ample warrant in the practice of St.
Edward.
Now the theory which would make him an innovator
Cnut’s practice.
in this matter receives a rude shock from a writ of
Cnut[940]. The king announces that the Archbishop of
Canterbury is to be worthy throughout his lands of his sake and soke and
grithbrice, hamsocn, foresteal, infangennethef and flymena-fyrmth. Until
the genuineness of this writ, which does not stand quite alone[941], be
disproved, the charge that has been brought against Edward fails. He was
but following in the steps of the great Dane, though it may be that he rushed
forward where his predecessor had trod cautiously.
Having seen what Cnut could do upon occasion, we
Cnut’s law.
turn to the famous passage in his dooms which
declares what ‘rights the king has over all men[942].’
In Wessex and Mercia (in the Danelaw the list is somewhat different) he has
hamsocn, foresteal, flymena-fyrmth and fyrd-wite ‘unless he will honour a
man yet further and grant him this worship.’ Now if we had not before us
his writ for the archbishop, we might perhaps argue that this law merely
decreed that the profits of certain pleas were not to be covered by the
‘farms’ paid to the king by the sheriffs and other national officers. But in the
writ we see that Cnut allows to the archbishop just the excepted rights, just
that ‘worship’ which men are not to have as a general rule. Nor surely can
we say that what is conceded is, not jurisdiction itself, but merely the profits
of jurisdiction. The archbishop is to have sake as well as soke, and those
who have contended for the strictest interpretation of royal grants have not
contended that the former of these words can mean anything but ‘causes,’
‘pleas,’ ‘jurisdiction.’ Therefore when it is interpreted by the aid of this writ,
Cnut’s law seems to imply that private jurisdiction is a common thing. The
king is already compelled to protest that there are certain pleas of the crown
that are not covered by vague and general words.
Now express grants of sake and soke first become
The book and the writ.
apparent to us in documents of a certain class, a class
township and keep the proceeds to their own use[939]. In short, it seems not
too much to say that any delegation and appropriation of justice of which
our Norman kings were guilty had an ample warrant in the practice of St.
Edward.
Now the theory which would make him an innovator
Cnut’s practice.
in this matter receives a rude shock from a writ of
Cnut[940]. The king announces that the Archbishop of
Canterbury is to be worthy throughout his lands of his sake and soke and
grithbrice, hamsocn, foresteal, infangennethef and flymena-fyrmth. Until
the genuineness of this writ, which does not stand quite alone[941], be
disproved, the charge that has been brought against Edward fails. He was
but following in the steps of the great Dane, though it may be that he rushed
forward where his predecessor had trod cautiously.
Having seen what Cnut could do upon occasion, we
Cnut’s law.
turn to the famous passage in his dooms which
declares what ‘rights the king has over all men[942].’
In Wessex and Mercia (in the Danelaw the list is somewhat different) he has
hamsocn, foresteal, flymena-fyrmth and fyrd-wite ‘unless he will honour a
man yet further and grant him this worship.’ Now if we had not before us
his writ for the archbishop, we might perhaps argue that this law merely
decreed that the profits of certain pleas were not to be covered by the
‘farms’ paid to the king by the sheriffs and other national officers. But in the
writ we see that Cnut allows to the archbishop just the excepted rights, just
that ‘worship’ which men are not to have as a general rule. Nor surely can
we say that what is conceded is, not jurisdiction itself, but merely the profits
of jurisdiction. The archbishop is to have sake as well as soke, and those
who have contended for the strictest interpretation of royal grants have not
contended that the former of these words can mean anything but ‘causes,’
‘pleas,’ ‘jurisdiction.’ Therefore when it is interpreted by the aid of this writ,
Cnut’s law seems to imply that private jurisdiction is a common thing. The
king is already compelled to protest that there are certain pleas of the crown
that are not covered by vague and general words.
Now express grants of sake and soke first become
The book and the writ.
apparent to us in documents of a certain class, a class
Page 258
that we do not get before the last years of the tenth century. It is necessary
therefore that we should make a short digression into the region of
‘diplomatics.’ The instruments of the Confessor’s reign, and we may add of
the Norman reigns, which we loosely call royal charters or royal land-books
divide themselves somewhat easily into two main classes, which we will
call respectively (1) charters and (2) writs. These names are not very happy,
still they are the best that occur to us. If we have regard to the form of the
instrument, the distinction is evident. The charter is with rare exceptions in
Latin. It begins with an invocation of the Triune God or perhaps with a
sacred monogram. On the other hand, there is no address to mortal men;
there is no salutation. There follow a pious arenga setting forth how good a
thing it is to make gifts, how desirable it is, since men are very wicked, that
transactions should be put into writing. Then the king states that he gives, or
has given, or will give—the use of the future tense is not uncommon—
certain land to a certain person. Then comes a clause which we shall
hereafter call ‘the clause of immunity’:—the land is to be free from certain
burdens. Then comes the anathema or damnatory clause, threatening all
breakers of the charter with excommunication here and torment hereafter.
Then in the charters of the time before the Conquest the boundaries of the
land are described in English. Then comes the sign of the cross touched by
the king’s hand and the crosses of the witan or nobles who ‘attest’ or ‘attest
and consent to’ the grant. In the writ all is otherwise. In the Confessor’s day
it is usually, in the Norman reigns it is sometimes, an English document. It
begins, not with an invocation, but with a salutation;—the king greets his
subjects or some class of his subjects: King Edward greets ‘Herman bishop
and Harold earl and all my thegns in Dorset,’ or ‘Leofwin bishop and Edwin
earl and all my thegns in Staffordshire’:—and then he tells them something.
He tells them that he has granted lands or liberties to a certain person. There
follows a command or a threat—‘I command and firmly enjoin that none
shall disturb the grantee,’ ‘I will not suffer that any man wrong the grantee.’
The boundaries are not described. There is seldom any curse. The king
makes no cross. If any witnesses are mentioned, they are few and they do
not make crosses.
Now these formal differences correspond more or
Differences between
less exactly to a substantial difference. As every book and writ.
modern lawyer knows, a written document may
therefore that we should make a short digression into the region of
‘diplomatics.’ The instruments of the Confessor’s reign, and we may add of
the Norman reigns, which we loosely call royal charters or royal land-books
divide themselves somewhat easily into two main classes, which we will
call respectively (1) charters and (2) writs. These names are not very happy,
still they are the best that occur to us. If we have regard to the form of the
instrument, the distinction is evident. The charter is with rare exceptions in
Latin. It begins with an invocation of the Triune God or perhaps with a
sacred monogram. On the other hand, there is no address to mortal men;
there is no salutation. There follow a pious arenga setting forth how good a
thing it is to make gifts, how desirable it is, since men are very wicked, that
transactions should be put into writing. Then the king states that he gives, or
has given, or will give—the use of the future tense is not uncommon—
certain land to a certain person. Then comes a clause which we shall
hereafter call ‘the clause of immunity’:—the land is to be free from certain
burdens. Then comes the anathema or damnatory clause, threatening all
breakers of the charter with excommunication here and torment hereafter.
Then in the charters of the time before the Conquest the boundaries of the
land are described in English. Then comes the sign of the cross touched by
the king’s hand and the crosses of the witan or nobles who ‘attest’ or ‘attest
and consent to’ the grant. In the writ all is otherwise. In the Confessor’s day
it is usually, in the Norman reigns it is sometimes, an English document. It
begins, not with an invocation, but with a salutation;—the king greets his
subjects or some class of his subjects: King Edward greets ‘Herman bishop
and Harold earl and all my thegns in Dorset,’ or ‘Leofwin bishop and Edwin
earl and all my thegns in Staffordshire’:—and then he tells them something.
He tells them that he has granted lands or liberties to a certain person. There
follows a command or a threat—‘I command and firmly enjoin that none
shall disturb the grantee,’ ‘I will not suffer that any man wrong the grantee.’
The boundaries are not described. There is seldom any curse. The king
makes no cross. If any witnesses are mentioned, they are few and they do
not make crosses.
Now these formal differences correspond more or
Differences between
less exactly to a substantial difference. As every book and writ.
modern lawyer knows, a written document may
Page 259
stand in one of two relations to a legal transaction. On the one hand it may
itself be the transaction: that is to say, the act of signing, or of signing and
delivering, the document may be the act by which certain rights are created
or transferred. On the other hand, the instrument may be but evidence of the
transaction. Perhaps the law may say that of such a transaction it will
receive no evidence save a document written and signed; perhaps it may say
that the testimony of documents is not to be contradicted by word of mouth;
but still the document is only evidence, though it may be incontrovertible
evidence, of the transaction; the transaction may have been complete before
the document was signed[943]. This material distinction is likely to express
itself in points of form; for instance, such a phrase as ‘I hereby give’ is
natural in the one case; such a phrase as ‘Know all men by this writing that
I have given’ is appropriate in the other. Instruments of both kinds were
well enough known in the Frankish kingdom; their history has been traced
back into the history of Roman conveyancing[944]. It would be out of place
were we here to discuss the question whether the Anglo-Saxon land-book
was a dispositive or merely an evidential document; suffice it to say that
with rare exceptions the instruments that are of earlier date than the
Confessor’s reign are in form charters and not writs. On the other hand, the
documents of the Angevin kings which treat of gifts of lands and liberties,
though we call them charters, are in form (if we adopt the classification
here made) not charters but writs. In form they are evidential rather than
dispositive; they are addressed to certain persons—all the king’s lieges or a
class of the lieges—bidding them take notice that the king has done
something, has given lands, and then adding some command or some threat.
This command or threat makes them more than evidential documents; the
Sciatis me dedisse is followed by a Quare volo et firmiter praecipio; it is
not for no purpose that the king informs his officers or his subjects of his
having made a gift; still in form they are letters, open letters, ‘letters
patent,’ and the points of difference between the Angevin charter and the
Angevin ‘letters patent’ (strictly and properly so called) are few, technical
and unimportant when compared with the points of difference which mark
off these two classes of documents from the ancient land-book[945]. In short
before the end of the twelfth century, the writ-form or letter-form with its
salutation, its ‘Know ye,’ its air of conveying information coupled with
commands, has entirely supplanted the true charter-form with its dispositive
words and its air of not merely witnessing, but actually being, a gift of land.
itself be the transaction: that is to say, the act of signing, or of signing and
delivering, the document may be the act by which certain rights are created
or transferred. On the other hand, the instrument may be but evidence of the
transaction. Perhaps the law may say that of such a transaction it will
receive no evidence save a document written and signed; perhaps it may say
that the testimony of documents is not to be contradicted by word of mouth;
but still the document is only evidence, though it may be incontrovertible
evidence, of the transaction; the transaction may have been complete before
the document was signed[943]. This material distinction is likely to express
itself in points of form; for instance, such a phrase as ‘I hereby give’ is
natural in the one case; such a phrase as ‘Know all men by this writing that
I have given’ is appropriate in the other. Instruments of both kinds were
well enough known in the Frankish kingdom; their history has been traced
back into the history of Roman conveyancing[944]. It would be out of place
were we here to discuss the question whether the Anglo-Saxon land-book
was a dispositive or merely an evidential document; suffice it to say that
with rare exceptions the instruments that are of earlier date than the
Confessor’s reign are in form charters and not writs. On the other hand, the
documents of the Angevin kings which treat of gifts of lands and liberties,
though we call them charters, are in form (if we adopt the classification
here made) not charters but writs. In form they are evidential rather than
dispositive; they are addressed to certain persons—all the king’s lieges or a
class of the lieges—bidding them take notice that the king has done
something, has given lands, and then adding some command or some threat.
This command or threat makes them more than evidential documents; the
Sciatis me dedisse is followed by a Quare volo et firmiter praecipio; it is
not for no purpose that the king informs his officers or his subjects of his
having made a gift; still in form they are letters, open letters, ‘letters
patent,’ and the points of difference between the Angevin charter and the
Angevin ‘letters patent’ (strictly and properly so called) are few, technical
and unimportant when compared with the points of difference which mark
off these two classes of documents from the ancient land-book[945]. In short
before the end of the twelfth century, the writ-form or letter-form with its
salutation, its ‘Know ye,’ its air of conveying information coupled with
commands, has entirely supplanted the true charter-form with its dispositive
words and its air of not merely witnessing, but actually being, a gift of land.
Page 260
But to represent this as a contrast between English
Anglo-Saxon writs.
instruments and Norman or French instruments
would be a mistake. In the first place, we have a few
documents in writ-form that are older than the days of the Norman-hearted
Edward. As already said, we have a writ from Cnut and it has all those
features of Edward’s writs which have been considered distinctively
foreign. We have another writ from the same king. The king addresses
Archbishop Lyfing, Abbot Ælfmær, Æthelric the shireman ‘and all my
thegns twelvehinde and twihinde.’ He tells them that he has confirmed the
archbishop’s liberties and threatens with the pains of hell any one who
infringes them[946]. We have a writ from Æthelred the Unready, and a
remarkable writ it is. He addresses Ælfric the ealdorman, Wulfmær and
Æthelweard and all the thegns in Hampshire and tells them how he has
confirmed the liberties of bishop Ælfheah and how large tracts of land are
to be reckoned as but one hide—an early example of ‘beneficial
hidation[947].’ Secondly, the solemn charter with its invocation, its pious
harangue, its dispositive words, its religious sanction, its numerous crosses,
its crowd of attesting and consenting witnesses, was in use in Normandy
before and after the conquest of England. Thirdly, the Norman kings of
England used it upon occasion. Much they did by writ. The vast tracts of
land that they had at their disposal would naturally favour the conciser
form; but some of the religious houses thought it well to obtain genuine
land-books of the old English, and (we must add) of the old Frankish type.
The king’s seal was not good enough for them; they would have the king’s
cross and the crosses of his wife, sons, prelates and barons. The ultimately
complete victory of what we have called the writ-form over what we have
called the charter-form may perhaps be rightly described as a result of the
Conquest, an outcome, that is, of the strong monarchy founded by William
of Normandy and consolidated by Henry of Anjou, but it can not be rightly
described as the victory of a French form over an English form; and a very
similar change was taking place in the chancery of the French kings[948].
We may say then that the appearance of words
Sake and soke appear
clearly and indisputably conceding jurisdictional when writs appear.
rights is contemporaneous with the appearance of a
new class of diplomata, namely royal writs as
contrasted with royal charters or land-books. We may add that it is
Anglo-Saxon writs.
instruments and Norman or French instruments
would be a mistake. In the first place, we have a few
documents in writ-form that are older than the days of the Norman-hearted
Edward. As already said, we have a writ from Cnut and it has all those
features of Edward’s writs which have been considered distinctively
foreign. We have another writ from the same king. The king addresses
Archbishop Lyfing, Abbot Ælfmær, Æthelric the shireman ‘and all my
thegns twelvehinde and twihinde.’ He tells them that he has confirmed the
archbishop’s liberties and threatens with the pains of hell any one who
infringes them[946]. We have a writ from Æthelred the Unready, and a
remarkable writ it is. He addresses Ælfric the ealdorman, Wulfmær and
Æthelweard and all the thegns in Hampshire and tells them how he has
confirmed the liberties of bishop Ælfheah and how large tracts of land are
to be reckoned as but one hide—an early example of ‘beneficial
hidation[947].’ Secondly, the solemn charter with its invocation, its pious
harangue, its dispositive words, its religious sanction, its numerous crosses,
its crowd of attesting and consenting witnesses, was in use in Normandy
before and after the conquest of England. Thirdly, the Norman kings of
England used it upon occasion. Much they did by writ. The vast tracts of
land that they had at their disposal would naturally favour the conciser
form; but some of the religious houses thought it well to obtain genuine
land-books of the old English, and (we must add) of the old Frankish type.
The king’s seal was not good enough for them; they would have the king’s
cross and the crosses of his wife, sons, prelates and barons. The ultimately
complete victory of what we have called the writ-form over what we have
called the charter-form may perhaps be rightly described as a result of the
Conquest, an outcome, that is, of the strong monarchy founded by William
of Normandy and consolidated by Henry of Anjou, but it can not be rightly
described as the victory of a French form over an English form; and a very
similar change was taking place in the chancery of the French kings[948].
We may say then that the appearance of words
Sake and soke appear
clearly and indisputably conceding jurisdictional when writs appear.
rights is contemporaneous with the appearance of a
new class of diplomata, namely royal writs as
contrasted with royal charters or land-books. We may add that it is
Page 261
contemporaneous with the appearance of royal diplomata couched in the
vernacular language. This may well lead us to two speculations. In the first
place, is it not very possible that many ancient writs have been lost? The
writ was a far less solemn instrument than the land-book, and it is by no
means certain that the writs of the Confessor were intended to serve as title-
deeds or to come to the custody of those for whose benefit they were issued.
King Edward greets the bishop of London, Earl Harold, the sheriff and all
the thegns of Middlesex and tells them how he has given land to St. Peter
and the monks of Westminster, and how he wills that they enjoy their sake
and soke. The original document is presented to the bishop, the earl, or the
sheriff (to all of them perhaps as they sit in their shire moot) and we can not
be certain that after this the monks ought to have that document in their
possession, that it ought not to be kept by the sheriff, or perhaps returned to
the king with an indorsement expressive of obedience. Many hundred writs
must King William have issued in favour of his barons—this is plain from
Domesday Book—and what would we not give for a dozen of them?
Secondly, it is well worth notice that ‘sake and soke’ begin to appear so
soon as royal diplomata written in English become common, and when we
observe the formulas which enshrine these words we find some difficulty in
believing that such formulas are new or foreign. Let us listen to one.
saca and socne
toll and team
griðbrice and hamsocne
and foresteal
and alle oðre gerihte
inne tid and ut of tide
binnan burh and butan burh
on stræte and of stræte.
Surely this alliteration and this rude rhythm tell us that the clause has long
been fashioning itself in the minds and mouths of the people and is no piece
of a new-fangled ‘chancery-style[949].’ And one other remark about
language will occur to us. In many respects the law Latin of the middle ages
went on becoming a better and better language until, in the thirteenth
century, it became a very good, useful and accurate form of speech. But it
gained this excellence by frankly renouncing all attempts after classicality,
all thought of the golden or the silver age, and by freely borrowing from
vernacular language. This may well lead us to two speculations. In the first
place, is it not very possible that many ancient writs have been lost? The
writ was a far less solemn instrument than the land-book, and it is by no
means certain that the writs of the Confessor were intended to serve as title-
deeds or to come to the custody of those for whose benefit they were issued.
King Edward greets the bishop of London, Earl Harold, the sheriff and all
the thegns of Middlesex and tells them how he has given land to St. Peter
and the monks of Westminster, and how he wills that they enjoy their sake
and soke. The original document is presented to the bishop, the earl, or the
sheriff (to all of them perhaps as they sit in their shire moot) and we can not
be certain that after this the monks ought to have that document in their
possession, that it ought not to be kept by the sheriff, or perhaps returned to
the king with an indorsement expressive of obedience. Many hundred writs
must King William have issued in favour of his barons—this is plain from
Domesday Book—and what would we not give for a dozen of them?
Secondly, it is well worth notice that ‘sake and soke’ begin to appear so
soon as royal diplomata written in English become common, and when we
observe the formulas which enshrine these words we find some difficulty in
believing that such formulas are new or foreign. Let us listen to one.
saca and socne
toll and team
griðbrice and hamsocne
and foresteal
and alle oðre gerihte
inne tid and ut of tide
binnan burh and butan burh
on stræte and of stræte.
Surely this alliteration and this rude rhythm tell us that the clause has long
been fashioning itself in the minds and mouths of the people and is no piece
of a new-fangled ‘chancery-style[949].’ And one other remark about
language will occur to us. In many respects the law Latin of the middle ages
went on becoming a better and better language until, in the thirteenth
century, it became a very good, useful and accurate form of speech. But it
gained this excellence by frankly renouncing all attempts after classicality,
all thought of the golden or the silver age, and by freely borrowing from
Page 262
English whatever words it wanted and making them Latin by a suffix. The
Latin of the Anglo-Saxon land-books is for all practical purposes a far
worse language, just because it strives to be far better. It wanted to be good
Latin, and even at times good Greek. The scribe of the ninth or tenth
century would have been shocked by such words as tainus, dreinus,
smalemannus, sochemannus which enabled his successors to say precisely
what they wanted. He gives us provincia instead of scira, satrapes instead
of aldermanni, and we read of tributum and census when we would much
rather have read of geldum and gablum. It was out of the question that he
should be guilty of such barbarisms as saca et soca. If he is to speak to us
of these things, he will do so in some phrase which he thinks would not
have disgraced a Roman orator—in a phrase, that is, which will not really
fit his thought.
The traditions, the legends, current in later times, can
Traditional evidence of
not be altogether neglected. The prelates of the sake and soke.
thirteenth century often asserted that some of their
franchises, and in particular their hundred courts,
had been given to their predecessors in an extremely remote age. Thus the
bishop of Salisbury claimed the hundred of Ramsbury in Wiltshire by grant
of King Offa of Mercia[950]; the Abbot of Ramsey claimed the hundred of
Clackclose in Norfolk by grant of King Edgar[951]. On such claims we can
lay but very little stress, for if the church had held its ‘liberties’ from before
the Conquest, the exact date at which it had acquired them was of little
importance and their origin would easily become the sport of guess-work
and myth. But occasionally we can say that there must in all probability be
some truth in the tale. Such is the case with the famous hundred of
Oswaldslaw in Worcestershire. When the Domesday survey was made this
hundred belonged to the church of Worcester. Worcestershire was deemed
to comprise twelve hundreds and Oswaldslaw counted for three of
them[952]. Oswaldslaw contained 300 hides, and to all seeming the whole
shire contained 1200 hides or thereabouts. Even in the thirteenth century a
certain tripleness seems to be displayed by this hundred; the bishop holds
his hundred court in three different places, namely, outside the city of
Worcester, at Dryhurst and at Wimborntree[953]. Now the story current in St.
Mary’s convent was that this triple hundred of Oswaldslaw received its
name from Oswald, the saintly bishop who ruled the church of Worcester
Latin of the Anglo-Saxon land-books is for all practical purposes a far
worse language, just because it strives to be far better. It wanted to be good
Latin, and even at times good Greek. The scribe of the ninth or tenth
century would have been shocked by such words as tainus, dreinus,
smalemannus, sochemannus which enabled his successors to say precisely
what they wanted. He gives us provincia instead of scira, satrapes instead
of aldermanni, and we read of tributum and census when we would much
rather have read of geldum and gablum. It was out of the question that he
should be guilty of such barbarisms as saca et soca. If he is to speak to us
of these things, he will do so in some phrase which he thinks would not
have disgraced a Roman orator—in a phrase, that is, which will not really
fit his thought.
The traditions, the legends, current in later times, can
Traditional evidence of
not be altogether neglected. The prelates of the sake and soke.
thirteenth century often asserted that some of their
franchises, and in particular their hundred courts,
had been given to their predecessors in an extremely remote age. Thus the
bishop of Salisbury claimed the hundred of Ramsbury in Wiltshire by grant
of King Offa of Mercia[950]; the Abbot of Ramsey claimed the hundred of
Clackclose in Norfolk by grant of King Edgar[951]. On such claims we can
lay but very little stress, for if the church had held its ‘liberties’ from before
the Conquest, the exact date at which it had acquired them was of little
importance and their origin would easily become the sport of guess-work
and myth. But occasionally we can say that there must in all probability be
some truth in the tale. Such is the case with the famous hundred of
Oswaldslaw in Worcestershire. When the Domesday survey was made this
hundred belonged to the church of Worcester. Worcestershire was deemed
to comprise twelve hundreds and Oswaldslaw counted for three of
them[952]. Oswaldslaw contained 300 hides, and to all seeming the whole
shire contained 1200 hides or thereabouts. Even in the thirteenth century a
certain tripleness seems to be displayed by this hundred; the bishop holds
his hundred court in three different places, namely, outside the city of
Worcester, at Dryhurst and at Wimborntree[953]. Now the story current in St.
Mary’s convent was that this triple hundred of Oswaldslaw received its
name from Oswald, the saintly bishop who ruled the church of Worcester
Page 263
from 960 to 992. A charter was produced, perhaps the most celebrated of all
land-books, that Altitonantis Dei largiflua clementia, which, after many
centuries, was to prove the King of England’s dominion over the narrow
seas[954]. According to this charter Edgar, Oswald’s patron, threw together
three old hundreds, Cuthbertslaw, Wolfhereslaw, and Wimborntree to form
a domain for the bishop and his monks[955]. Could we accept the would-be
charter as genuine, could we even accept it as a true copy of a genuine book
(and this we can hardly do)[956], there would be an end of all controversy as
to the existence of seignorial justice in the year 964, for undoubtedly it
contains words which confer jurisdiction[957]. Upon these we will not rely:
the fact remains that in Domesday Book there appears this hundred of
Oswaldslaw, that it is treated as a triple hundred, as three hundreds, that the
bishop has jurisdiction over it, that the sheriff has no rights within it, that it
looks like a very artificial aggregate of land, for pieces of it lie intermixed
with other hundreds and pieces of it lie surrounded by Gloucestershire. In
1086 the church of Worcester had to all appearance just those rights which
the Altitonantis professed to grant to her; already they were associated with
the name of Oswald; already they were regarded as ancient privileges.
‘Saint Mary of Worcester has a hundred called Oswaldslaw, in which lie
300 hides, from which the bishop of the said church, by a constitution of
ancient times, has the profits of all sokes and all the customs which belong
thereto for his own board and for the king’s service and his own, so that no
sheriff can make any claim for any plea or for any other cause:—this the
whole county witnesses[958].’ Surely the whole county would not have
spoken thus of some newfangled device of the half-Norman Edward. Such a
case as this, so great a matter as the utter exclusion of the sheriff from one
quarter of the shire, we shall hardly attempt to explain by hypothetical
usurpations. These liberties were granted by some king or other. If they
were granted by the Confessor, why was not a charter of the Confessor
produced? Why instead was a charter of Edgar produced, perhaps rewritten
and revised, perhaps concocted? The easiest answer to this question seems
to be that, whatever may be the truth about this detail or that, the
Altitonantis tells a story that in the main is true. The diplomatist’s
scepticism should in this and other instances be held in check by the
reflexion that kings and sheriffs did not permit themselves to be cheated
wholesale out of valuable rights, when the true state of the facts must have
land-books, that Altitonantis Dei largiflua clementia, which, after many
centuries, was to prove the King of England’s dominion over the narrow
seas[954]. According to this charter Edgar, Oswald’s patron, threw together
three old hundreds, Cuthbertslaw, Wolfhereslaw, and Wimborntree to form
a domain for the bishop and his monks[955]. Could we accept the would-be
charter as genuine, could we even accept it as a true copy of a genuine book
(and this we can hardly do)[956], there would be an end of all controversy as
to the existence of seignorial justice in the year 964, for undoubtedly it
contains words which confer jurisdiction[957]. Upon these we will not rely:
the fact remains that in Domesday Book there appears this hundred of
Oswaldslaw, that it is treated as a triple hundred, as three hundreds, that the
bishop has jurisdiction over it, that the sheriff has no rights within it, that it
looks like a very artificial aggregate of land, for pieces of it lie intermixed
with other hundreds and pieces of it lie surrounded by Gloucestershire. In
1086 the church of Worcester had to all appearance just those rights which
the Altitonantis professed to grant to her; already they were associated with
the name of Oswald; already they were regarded as ancient privileges.
‘Saint Mary of Worcester has a hundred called Oswaldslaw, in which lie
300 hides, from which the bishop of the said church, by a constitution of
ancient times, has the profits of all sokes and all the customs which belong
thereto for his own board and for the king’s service and his own, so that no
sheriff can make any claim for any plea or for any other cause:—this the
whole county witnesses[958].’ Surely the whole county would not have
spoken thus of some newfangled device of the half-Norman Edward. Such a
case as this, so great a matter as the utter exclusion of the sheriff from one
quarter of the shire, we shall hardly attempt to explain by hypothetical
usurpations. These liberties were granted by some king or other. If they
were granted by the Confessor, why was not a charter of the Confessor
produced? Why instead was a charter of Edgar produced, perhaps rewritten
and revised, perhaps concocted? The easiest answer to this question seems
to be that, whatever may be the truth about this detail or that, the
Altitonantis tells a story that in the main is true. The diplomatist’s
scepticism should in this and other instances be held in check by the
reflexion that kings and sheriffs did not permit themselves to be cheated
wholesale out of valuable rights, when the true state of the facts must have
Page 264
been patent to hundreds of men, patent to all the men of Oswaldslaw and to
‘the whole county’ of Worcester[959]
We may now turn to the genuine books of an earlier
Criticism of the earlier
time and patiently examine their words. It is well books.
known that an Anglo-Saxon land-book proceeding
from the king very commonly, though not always,
contains a clause of immunity. Sometimes a grant of immunity is the
essence of the book; the land in question already belongs to a church, and
the bishop or abbot now succeeds in getting it set free from burdens to
which it has hitherto been subject. What is now granted to him is ‘freedom,’
‘liberty,’ ‘freóls’; the book is a freóls-bóc[960]; it may be that he is willing to
pay money, to give land, to promise prayers in return for this franchise, this
libertas[961]. Thus, for example, King Ceolwulf of Mercia grants a libertas
to the Bishop of Worcester, freeing all his land from the burden of feeding
the king’s horses, and in consideration of this grant the bishop gives to the
king five hides of land for four lives and agrees that prayers shall be said for
him every Sunday[962]
Now in an ordinary case the clause of immunity will
The clause of immunity.
first contain some general words declaring the land
to be free of burdens in general, and then some
exceptive words declaring that it is not to be free from certain specified
burdens[963]. Both parts of the clause demand our attention. The burdens
from which the land is to be free are described by a large phrase. Usually
both a substantive and an adjective are employed for the purpose; they are
to be freed ab omni terrenae servitutis iugo—saecularibus negotiis—
mundiali obstaculo—mundialibus causis—saecularibus curis—mundialibus
coangustiis—cunctis laboribus vitae mortalium. The adjectives are
remarkable, for they seem to suggest a contrast. The land is freed from all
earthly, worldly, secular, temporal services. Does this not mean that it is
devoted to services that are heavenly, sacred, spiritual[964]? True, that in
course of time we may find this same formula used when the king is giving
land, not to a church, but to one of his thegns; but still in its origin the land-
book is ecclesiastical; ‘book-right’ is the right of the church, ius
ecclesiasticum[965], and we may well believe that the phraseology of the
books, which in substance remains unaltered from century to century, was
primarily adapted to pious gifts. It is by no means improbable that in the
‘the whole county’ of Worcester[959]
We may now turn to the genuine books of an earlier
Criticism of the earlier
time and patiently examine their words. It is well books.
known that an Anglo-Saxon land-book proceeding
from the king very commonly, though not always,
contains a clause of immunity. Sometimes a grant of immunity is the
essence of the book; the land in question already belongs to a church, and
the bishop or abbot now succeeds in getting it set free from burdens to
which it has hitherto been subject. What is now granted to him is ‘freedom,’
‘liberty,’ ‘freóls’; the book is a freóls-bóc[960]; it may be that he is willing to
pay money, to give land, to promise prayers in return for this franchise, this
libertas[961]. Thus, for example, King Ceolwulf of Mercia grants a libertas
to the Bishop of Worcester, freeing all his land from the burden of feeding
the king’s horses, and in consideration of this grant the bishop gives to the
king five hides of land for four lives and agrees that prayers shall be said for
him every Sunday[962]
Now in an ordinary case the clause of immunity will
The clause of immunity.
first contain some general words declaring the land
to be free of burdens in general, and then some
exceptive words declaring that it is not to be free from certain specified
burdens[963]. Both parts of the clause demand our attention. The burdens
from which the land is to be free are described by a large phrase. Usually
both a substantive and an adjective are employed for the purpose; they are
to be freed ab omni terrenae servitutis iugo—saecularibus negotiis—
mundiali obstaculo—mundialibus causis—saecularibus curis—mundialibus
coangustiis—cunctis laboribus vitae mortalium. The adjectives are
remarkable, for they seem to suggest a contrast. The land is freed from all
earthly, worldly, secular, temporal services. Does this not mean that it is
devoted to services that are heavenly, sacred, spiritual[964]? True, that in
course of time we may find this same formula used when the king is giving
land, not to a church, but to one of his thegns; but still in its origin the land-
book is ecclesiastical; ‘book-right’ is the right of the church, ius
ecclesiasticum[965], and we may well believe that the phraseology of the
books, which in substance remains unaltered from century to century, was
primarily adapted to pious gifts. It is by no means improbable that in the
Page 265
middle of the eighth century Æthelbald of Mercia by a general decree
conceded to all the churches of his kingdom just that freedom from all
burdens, save the trinoda necessitas, that was usually granted by the clause
of immunity contained in the land-books, and we can hardly say with
certainty that half a century before this time Wihtræd had not granted to all
the churches of Kent a yet larger measure of liberty, a liberty which
absolved them even from the trinoda necessitas[966]. Turning from the
adjectives to the substantives that are used, we find them to be wide and
indefinite words; the lands are to be free from all worldly services, burdens,
troubles, annoyances, affairs, business, causes, matters and things.
Sometimes a more definite word is added such as tributum, vectigal,
census, and clearly one main object of the clause is to declare that the land
is to pay nothing to the king or his officers; it is to be free of rent and taxes,
scotfree and gafolfree[967]. Occasionally particular mention is made of a
duty of entertaining the king, his court, his officers, his huntsmen, dogs and
horses, also of a duty of entertaining his messengers and forwarding them
on their way[968]. Thus, for example, Taunton, which belonged to the bishop
of Winchester, had been bound to provide one night’s entertainment for the
king and nine nights’ entertainment for his falconers and to support eight
dogs and a dog-ward, to carry with horses and carts to Curry and to Williton
whatever the king might need, and to conduct wayfarers to the
neighbouring royal vills. To obtain immunity from these burdens the bishop
had to give the king sixty hides of land[969]
No doubt it is a sound canon of criticism that, when
Discussion of the words
in a grant precise are followed by vague words, the of immunity.
former should be taken to explain, and, it may be, to
restrain the latter. If, for example, land be freed
‘from taxes and all other secular burdens,’ we may well urge that the ‘other
secular burdens’ which the writer has in his mind are burdens akin to taxes.
And of course it is fair to say that in our days a grant of private justice
would be an extremely different thing from a grant of freedom from fiscal
dues. But what, we must ask, does this freedom from fiscal dues really
mean when it is granted by an Anglo-Saxon land-book? When the monks or
canons obtain a charter freeing this territory from all tributum and census,
from all pastiones and so forth, is it intended that the occupiers of the soil
shall have the benefit of this grant? Not so. The religious have been
conceded to all the churches of his kingdom just that freedom from all
burdens, save the trinoda necessitas, that was usually granted by the clause
of immunity contained in the land-books, and we can hardly say with
certainty that half a century before this time Wihtræd had not granted to all
the churches of Kent a yet larger measure of liberty, a liberty which
absolved them even from the trinoda necessitas[966]. Turning from the
adjectives to the substantives that are used, we find them to be wide and
indefinite words; the lands are to be free from all worldly services, burdens,
troubles, annoyances, affairs, business, causes, matters and things.
Sometimes a more definite word is added such as tributum, vectigal,
census, and clearly one main object of the clause is to declare that the land
is to pay nothing to the king or his officers; it is to be free of rent and taxes,
scotfree and gafolfree[967]. Occasionally particular mention is made of a
duty of entertaining the king, his court, his officers, his huntsmen, dogs and
horses, also of a duty of entertaining his messengers and forwarding them
on their way[968]. Thus, for example, Taunton, which belonged to the bishop
of Winchester, had been bound to provide one night’s entertainment for the
king and nine nights’ entertainment for his falconers and to support eight
dogs and a dog-ward, to carry with horses and carts to Curry and to Williton
whatever the king might need, and to conduct wayfarers to the
neighbouring royal vills. To obtain immunity from these burdens the bishop
had to give the king sixty hides of land[969]
No doubt it is a sound canon of criticism that, when
Discussion of the words
in a grant precise are followed by vague words, the of immunity.
former should be taken to explain, and, it may be, to
restrain the latter. If, for example, land be freed
‘from taxes and all other secular burdens,’ we may well urge that the ‘other
secular burdens’ which the writer has in his mind are burdens akin to taxes.
And of course it is fair to say that in our days a grant of private justice
would be an extremely different thing from a grant of freedom from fiscal
dues. But what, we must ask, does this freedom from fiscal dues really
mean when it is granted by an Anglo-Saxon land-book? When the monks or
canons obtain a charter freeing this territory from all tributum and census,
from all pastiones and so forth, is it intended that the occupiers of the soil
shall have the benefit of this grant? Not so. The religious have been
Page 266
stipulating for themselves and not for their men. The land has been freed
from service to the king in order that it may serve the church[970]; the
church will take what the king has hitherto taken or it will take an
equivalent. In a writ of Edward the Confessor this appears very plainly.
Whenever men pay a geld to the king, be it an army-geld or a ship-geld, the
men of St. Edmund are to pay a like geld to the abbot and the monks[971].
Probably this principle has been at work all along. The king has had no
mind to free the manentes, casati, tributarii of the church from any
tributum or vectigal. What has hitherto been paid to him, or some
equivalent for it, will now go to the treasury of the church. Thus, even
within the purely fiscal region, we see that the object of the immunity is to
give the church a grip on those who dwell upon the land. But we must read
the clause to its end.
As is well known, it usually proceeds to except
The trinoda necessitas.
certain burdens, to declare that the land is not to be
free from them. These burdens, three in number, are
on a few occasions spoken of as the trinoda necessitas. That term has
become common in our own day and is useful. The land is not to be free
from the duty of army-service, the duty of repairing strongholds, the duty of
repairing bridges. An express exception of this trinoda necessitas out of the
general words of immunity is extremely common. Moreover there are
charters which speak as though no lands could ever be free from the triple
charge[972], and a critic should look with some suspicion upon any would-
be land-book which expressly purports to break this broad rule. But besides
some books which do expressly purport to free land from the trinoda
necessitas[973], we have a considerable number of others which grant
immunity in wide terms and make no exception of army-service, bridge-
bote or burh-bote[974], and we are hardly entitled to reject them all merely
because they do not conform to the general principle[975]. More to our
purpose is it to notice that, though a grant of jurisdictional powers would be
an extremely different thing from a grant of immunity from army-service,
the duty of attending the national or communal courts is extremely like the
duty of attending the host, and it would not be extravagant to argue that
when the king says ‘I free this land from all secular burdens except those of
fyrd-fare, burh-bote and bridge-bote,’ he says by implication ‘I free this
land from suit to shires and hundreds.’
from service to the king in order that it may serve the church[970]; the
church will take what the king has hitherto taken or it will take an
equivalent. In a writ of Edward the Confessor this appears very plainly.
Whenever men pay a geld to the king, be it an army-geld or a ship-geld, the
men of St. Edmund are to pay a like geld to the abbot and the monks[971].
Probably this principle has been at work all along. The king has had no
mind to free the manentes, casati, tributarii of the church from any
tributum or vectigal. What has hitherto been paid to him, or some
equivalent for it, will now go to the treasury of the church. Thus, even
within the purely fiscal region, we see that the object of the immunity is to
give the church a grip on those who dwell upon the land. But we must read
the clause to its end.
As is well known, it usually proceeds to except
The trinoda necessitas.
certain burdens, to declare that the land is not to be
free from them. These burdens, three in number, are
on a few occasions spoken of as the trinoda necessitas. That term has
become common in our own day and is useful. The land is not to be free
from the duty of army-service, the duty of repairing strongholds, the duty of
repairing bridges. An express exception of this trinoda necessitas out of the
general words of immunity is extremely common. Moreover there are
charters which speak as though no lands could ever be free from the triple
charge[972], and a critic should look with some suspicion upon any would-
be land-book which expressly purports to break this broad rule. But besides
some books which do expressly purport to free land from the trinoda
necessitas[973], we have a considerable number of others which grant
immunity in wide terms and make no exception of army-service, bridge-
bote or burh-bote[974], and we are hardly entitled to reject them all merely
because they do not conform to the general principle[975]. More to our
purpose is it to notice that, though a grant of jurisdictional powers would be
an extremely different thing from a grant of immunity from army-service,
the duty of attending the national or communal courts is extremely like the
duty of attending the host, and it would not be extravagant to argue that
when the king says ‘I free this land from all secular burdens except those of
fyrd-fare, burh-bote and bridge-bote,’ he says by implication ‘I free this
land from suit to shires and hundreds.’
Page 267
But yet more important is it to notice that charters of
The ángild.
the ninth century frequently except out of the words
of immunity not three burdens, but four. In addition
to the trinoda necessitas, some fourth matter is mentioned. Its nature is
never very fully described, but it is hinted at by the terms ángild, singulare
pretium, pretium pro pretio. In connexion with these charters we must read
others which exempt the land from ‘penal causes,’ or wíte-rǽden and others
which expressly grant to the donee the ‘wites’ or certain ‘wites’ issuing
from the land; also we shall have to notice that there are dooms which
decree that certain ‘wites’ are to be paid to the land-lord or land-ríca. Now
ángild (singulare pretium) is a technical term in common use[976]. When a
crime has been committed—theft is the typical crime which the legislators
have ever before their eyes—the ángild is the money compensation that the
person who has been wronged is entitled to receive, as contrasted with any
wite or fine that is payable to the king. We find, then, a charter saying that
certain land—not certain persons, but certain land—is to be free from all
secular burdens save the ángild, and in some cases it will be added that the
land is to pay nothing, not one farthing, by way of wite, or that nothing is
‘to go out to wite[977].’ Of the various interpretations that might possibly be
put upon such words one may be at once rejected. It is not the intention of
the king who makes or of the church which receives the grant that crimes
committed on this land shall go unpunished. No lord would wish his
territory to be a place where men might murder and steal with impunity. We
may be certain then that if a crime be committed, there is to be a wite; but it
is not to go outside the land; the lord himself is to have it. But how is the
lord to enforce his right to the wite,—must he sue for it in the national or
communal courts, or has he a court of his own.
This question is difficult. The ancient charters,
The right to wites and
however nearly they may go to telling us that the the right to a court.
donee will do justice within his territory, never go
quite that length. There is, however, a book granted
by Cenwulf of Mercia in 816 to the church of Worcester which adds to the
clause of immunity these words—‘and if a wicked man be three times
captured in open crime, let him be delivered up at the king’s tún (vicum
regalem)[978].’ This seems to tell us that only the worst offenders will be
delivered up to the royal or national officers and to imply that the bishop
The ángild.
the ninth century frequently except out of the words
of immunity not three burdens, but four. In addition
to the trinoda necessitas, some fourth matter is mentioned. Its nature is
never very fully described, but it is hinted at by the terms ángild, singulare
pretium, pretium pro pretio. In connexion with these charters we must read
others which exempt the land from ‘penal causes,’ or wíte-rǽden and others
which expressly grant to the donee the ‘wites’ or certain ‘wites’ issuing
from the land; also we shall have to notice that there are dooms which
decree that certain ‘wites’ are to be paid to the land-lord or land-ríca. Now
ángild (singulare pretium) is a technical term in common use[976]. When a
crime has been committed—theft is the typical crime which the legislators
have ever before their eyes—the ángild is the money compensation that the
person who has been wronged is entitled to receive, as contrasted with any
wite or fine that is payable to the king. We find, then, a charter saying that
certain land—not certain persons, but certain land—is to be free from all
secular burdens save the ángild, and in some cases it will be added that the
land is to pay nothing, not one farthing, by way of wite, or that nothing is
‘to go out to wite[977].’ Of the various interpretations that might possibly be
put upon such words one may be at once rejected. It is not the intention of
the king who makes or of the church which receives the grant that crimes
committed on this land shall go unpunished. No lord would wish his
territory to be a place where men might murder and steal with impunity. We
may be certain then that if a crime be committed, there is to be a wite; but it
is not to go outside the land; the lord himself is to have it. But how is the
lord to enforce his right to the wite,—must he sue for it in the national or
communal courts, or has he a court of his own.
This question is difficult. The ancient charters,
The right to wites and
however nearly they may go to telling us that the the right to a court.
donee will do justice within his territory, never go
quite that length. There is, however, a book granted
by Cenwulf of Mercia in 816 to the church of Worcester which adds to the
clause of immunity these words—‘and if a wicked man be three times
captured in open crime, let him be delivered up at the king’s tún (vicum
regalem)[978].’ This seems to tell us that only the worst offenders will be
delivered up to the royal or national officers and to imply that the bishop
Page 268
may do justice upon all others. Then there are two books in favour of the
church of Abingdon, the one granted by Cenwulf in 821, the other by
Egbert in 835, which, though their language is very obscure, seem to tell us
that if one of the ‘men of God’ (by which phrase are meant the ‘vassals’ of
the church of Abingdon) be accused of any crime, the overseer of the
church may swear away the charge by his own oath, and that, if he dare not
swear, he may pay the ángild to the plaintiff and, this done, will have justice
over the offender[979]. Another ancient book suggests that the lord of an
immunity, when he had to pay the ángild for one of his men, could not be
forced to cross the boundary of his land. On that boundary some mixed
tribunal would meet consisting partly of his men and partly of outsiders[980].
Then, again, there are the books which either give the lord the furis
comprehensio or else exempt his land from the furis comprehensio. Now
when a writ of Cnut or Edward the Confessor tells us that a lord is to have
infangennethef we do not doubt that he is to have the right which bore that
name in later days, the right to hold a court for and to hang thieves who are
caught in seisin of the stolen goods, and to the furis comprehensio of the
older books we can hardly give another meaning. And the apparent
equivalence of the two phrases ‘You shall hold this land with thief-catching’
and ‘You shall hold this land free of thief-catching’ illustrates our argument
that to exempt land from public or national justice is to create private or
seignorial justice[981]. We may see this in later days; a lord who holds land
‘free and quit of frankpledge’ assumes the right to hold a view of
frankpledge, and we can not say that he is wrong in so doing[982]
Lastly, in a book of fairly good repute we may read
The Taunton book.
of the grand liberties with which in 904 King
Edward endowed the Bishop of Winchester’s large
estate at Taunton—that estate which in subsequent centuries was to become
the classical example of colossal manors. ‘I have,’ says the king, ‘granted to
Christ that the men of the bishop, noble as well as non-noble, living on the
said land shall be worthy of the same right that is enjoyed by those who
dwell on the demesnes of the crown, and that jurisdiction in all secular
causes shall be exercised to the use of the bishops in the same manner as
that in which jurisdiction is exercised in matters pertaining to the king[983].’
This is the more important because it suggests, what like enough is true,
that the king himself is one of the first of all ‘immunists’; his own estates,
church of Abingdon, the one granted by Cenwulf in 821, the other by
Egbert in 835, which, though their language is very obscure, seem to tell us
that if one of the ‘men of God’ (by which phrase are meant the ‘vassals’ of
the church of Abingdon) be accused of any crime, the overseer of the
church may swear away the charge by his own oath, and that, if he dare not
swear, he may pay the ángild to the plaintiff and, this done, will have justice
over the offender[979]. Another ancient book suggests that the lord of an
immunity, when he had to pay the ángild for one of his men, could not be
forced to cross the boundary of his land. On that boundary some mixed
tribunal would meet consisting partly of his men and partly of outsiders[980].
Then, again, there are the books which either give the lord the furis
comprehensio or else exempt his land from the furis comprehensio. Now
when a writ of Cnut or Edward the Confessor tells us that a lord is to have
infangennethef we do not doubt that he is to have the right which bore that
name in later days, the right to hold a court for and to hang thieves who are
caught in seisin of the stolen goods, and to the furis comprehensio of the
older books we can hardly give another meaning. And the apparent
equivalence of the two phrases ‘You shall hold this land with thief-catching’
and ‘You shall hold this land free of thief-catching’ illustrates our argument
that to exempt land from public or national justice is to create private or
seignorial justice[981]. We may see this in later days; a lord who holds land
‘free and quit of frankpledge’ assumes the right to hold a view of
frankpledge, and we can not say that he is wrong in so doing[982]
Lastly, in a book of fairly good repute we may read
The Taunton book.
of the grand liberties with which in 904 King
Edward endowed the Bishop of Winchester’s large
estate at Taunton—that estate which in subsequent centuries was to become
the classical example of colossal manors. ‘I have,’ says the king, ‘granted to
Christ that the men of the bishop, noble as well as non-noble, living on the
said land shall be worthy of the same right that is enjoyed by those who
dwell on the demesnes of the crown, and that jurisdiction in all secular
causes shall be exercised to the use of the bishops in the same manner as
that in which jurisdiction is exercised in matters pertaining to the king[983].’
This is the more important because it suggests, what like enough is true,
that the king himself is one of the first of all ‘immunists’; his own estates,
Page 269
the ancient demesne of the crown, already stand outside the national system
of finance, justice and police[984]
But so careful must we be in drawing inferences
The immunist and the
from singular instances, so wary of forgeries, that in wite.
the end we can not dispense with arguments which
rest rather upon probabilities than upon recorded
facts. It is conceded that the ‘immunist’ (it is convenient to borrow a term
that French writers have coined) is entitled to many of the fines and
forfeitures that arise from offences committed within his territory. Is it, we
must ask, probable that any ealdorman or sheriff will be at pains to exact
and collect these fines and forfeitures for the immunist’s benefit? Now it is
true that in later days a few lords enjoyed a comparatively rare franchise
known as amerciamenta hominum. When their men were amerced in the
king’s court the amercements were paid into the exchequer, and then the
lord would petition to have them paid out to him[985]. But this was an
uncommon and an exalted franchise. As a general rule, the person in whose
name a court is held, be he king or lord, gets the profits of the court. No one
in the middle ages does justice for nothing, and in the ninth century the days
when national officers would be paid by salary were far distant. When the
king declares that nothing is to ‘go out’ of the immunist’s lands ‘by way of
wite,’ then to our thinking he declares that, save in exceptional cases, he and
his officers will neither meddle nor make with offences that are committed
within that territory. Again, though we may reject this charter and that, there
can be little doubt that before the end of the tenth century, the territory held
by a church sometimes coincided with a jurisdictional district, with a
hundred or group of hundreds. When this was so, and the church enjoyed a
full immunity, it was almost of necessity the lord of the court as well as the
lord of the land. Why should the sheriff hold that court, why should he
appoint a bailiff for that hundred, if never thereout could he get one penny
for his own or the king’s use.
We must once more remember that even in the days
Justice and jurisdiction.
of full grown feudalism the right to hold a court was
after all rather a fiscal than a jurisdictional right. We
call it jurisdictional, but still, at least normally, the lord was, neither in his
own person, nor yet in the person of his steward, the judge of the court[986].
His right was not in strictness a right ius dicendi, for the suitors made the
of finance, justice and police[984]
But so careful must we be in drawing inferences
The immunist and the
from singular instances, so wary of forgeries, that in wite.
the end we can not dispense with arguments which
rest rather upon probabilities than upon recorded
facts. It is conceded that the ‘immunist’ (it is convenient to borrow a term
that French writers have coined) is entitled to many of the fines and
forfeitures that arise from offences committed within his territory. Is it, we
must ask, probable that any ealdorman or sheriff will be at pains to exact
and collect these fines and forfeitures for the immunist’s benefit? Now it is
true that in later days a few lords enjoyed a comparatively rare franchise
known as amerciamenta hominum. When their men were amerced in the
king’s court the amercements were paid into the exchequer, and then the
lord would petition to have them paid out to him[985]. But this was an
uncommon and an exalted franchise. As a general rule, the person in whose
name a court is held, be he king or lord, gets the profits of the court. No one
in the middle ages does justice for nothing, and in the ninth century the days
when national officers would be paid by salary were far distant. When the
king declares that nothing is to ‘go out’ of the immunist’s lands ‘by way of
wite,’ then to our thinking he declares that, save in exceptional cases, he and
his officers will neither meddle nor make with offences that are committed
within that territory. Again, though we may reject this charter and that, there
can be little doubt that before the end of the tenth century, the territory held
by a church sometimes coincided with a jurisdictional district, with a
hundred or group of hundreds. When this was so, and the church enjoyed a
full immunity, it was almost of necessity the lord of the court as well as the
lord of the land. Why should the sheriff hold that court, why should he
appoint a bailiff for that hundred, if never thereout could he get one penny
for his own or the king’s use.
We must once more remember that even in the days
Justice and jurisdiction.
of full grown feudalism the right to hold a court was
after all rather a fiscal than a jurisdictional right. We
call it jurisdictional, but still, at least normally, the lord was, neither in his
own person, nor yet in the person of his steward, the judge of the court[986].
His right was not in strictness a right ius dicendi, for the suitors made the
Page 270
judgments. When analysed it was a right to preside over a court and to take
its profits. Very easy therefore is the transition from a right to ‘wites’ to
such ‘jurisdiction’ as the feudal lord enjoys. When once it is established that
all the fines of a hundred court are to go to a bishop, that no sheriff or bailiff
will get anything by going to hold that court, then the court already is ‘in
the bishop’s hands.’
This, however, can not be treated as a merely
The Frankish immunity.
English question. Parallel to the English fréols-bóc
runs the Frankish carta immunitatis, and, if the
former has given rise to the question whether it conceded jurisdictional
rights, the latter has given rise, not merely to the same question, but to
much learned controversy. Now it is highly probable that the English
‘immunity’ is not independent of the Merovingian ‘immunity’; still the
terms of the former do not seem to have been copied from those of the
latter, and it is a significant fact that two different formulas should be
equally open to the blame of not deciding just that most important question
which according to our ideas they ought to decide. The Frankish formula is
addressed by the king to his subordinates and declares that no public officer
(nullus iudex publicus) is to enter the land of the immunist for the purpose
of hearing causes, levying freda (which answer to our ‘wites’), making
distresses or exacting pledges; but, like our English formula, it says no
word of any court to be held or any jurisdiction to be exercised by the
immunist. It would be impertinent to give here any lengthy account of the
various opinions about this matter that have been held by foreign scholars,
still more impertinent to pronounce any judgment upon them, but even
those writers who seem most inclined to minimize the scope of the
immunity are forced to admit that, as a mere matter of fact, the immunist by
virtue of his immunity is enabled to hold a court for his territory. That
seignorial courts were growing up even in the Merovingian time, that such
courts there were even in the sixth century, there seems little or no doubt,
even though it be denied that they were the creatures of these clauses of
immunity. On the whole, to whichever side of the channel we look, we
seem compelled, alike by the words of the charters and by the controversies
which they have occasioned, to believe that in the eyes of the kings and the
immunists seignorial jurisdiction, that right to hold a court which seems to
us so strange a right, was not a matter of the first importance, not worth
its profits. Very easy therefore is the transition from a right to ‘wites’ to
such ‘jurisdiction’ as the feudal lord enjoys. When once it is established that
all the fines of a hundred court are to go to a bishop, that no sheriff or bailiff
will get anything by going to hold that court, then the court already is ‘in
the bishop’s hands.’
This, however, can not be treated as a merely
The Frankish immunity.
English question. Parallel to the English fréols-bóc
runs the Frankish carta immunitatis, and, if the
former has given rise to the question whether it conceded jurisdictional
rights, the latter has given rise, not merely to the same question, but to
much learned controversy. Now it is highly probable that the English
‘immunity’ is not independent of the Merovingian ‘immunity’; still the
terms of the former do not seem to have been copied from those of the
latter, and it is a significant fact that two different formulas should be
equally open to the blame of not deciding just that most important question
which according to our ideas they ought to decide. The Frankish formula is
addressed by the king to his subordinates and declares that no public officer
(nullus iudex publicus) is to enter the land of the immunist for the purpose
of hearing causes, levying freda (which answer to our ‘wites’), making
distresses or exacting pledges; but, like our English formula, it says no
word of any court to be held or any jurisdiction to be exercised by the
immunist. It would be impertinent to give here any lengthy account of the
various opinions about this matter that have been held by foreign scholars,
still more impertinent to pronounce any judgment upon them, but even
those writers who seem most inclined to minimize the scope of the
immunity are forced to admit that, as a mere matter of fact, the immunist by
virtue of his immunity is enabled to hold a court for his territory. That
seignorial courts were growing up even in the Merovingian time, that such
courts there were even in the sixth century, there seems little or no doubt,
even though it be denied that they were the creatures of these clauses of
immunity. On the whole, to whichever side of the channel we look, we
seem compelled, alike by the words of the charters and by the controversies
which they have occasioned, to believe that in the eyes of the kings and the
immunists seignorial jurisdiction, that right to hold a court which seems to
us so strange a right, was not a matter of the first importance, not worth
Page 271
conceding, not worth denying. Who is to have the profits of justice?—that
is a momentous question. But if it be decided that they are to go to the
bishop, then the king will have no further care for them:—the bishop may
and must get them for himself. As to the ‘justiciables,’ it may well be that
they are very indifferent about the matter, not impossible that the burden of
suit will be alleviated if the lord establishes a court of his own, or if an old
court passes into his hands[987]
One other question should be raised, even if we can
Seignorial and
find for it no certain answer. Is not seignorial ecclesiastical
jurisdiction very closely connected at its root with jurisdiction.
ecclesiastical jurisdiction? Of course in more recent
times the two are thoroughly distinct from each other. The bishop, besides
being a spiritual judge, will be a feudal lord with many manorial courts and
many chartered franchises; but any court that he holds as a lord will have
nothing to do with the court that he holds as a bishop. The constitution and
procedure of the one will differ at every point from the constitution and
procedure of the other. The one belongs to the temporal order and is subject
to the king’s court, the other belongs to the spiritual order and is in no sense
below the royal tribunal. Thus it is when feudal law and canon law have
reached their full stature. But even from the twelfth century we may get a
hint that the distinction has not always been so sharply marked. We may
read how in Henry I.’s day the Bishop of Bath ‘with his friends and barons’
heard a cause in which Modbert claimed lands that were held by the monks
of Bath. The proceedings took place under a royal writ and ought, we
should say, to have been in all respects temporal proceedings; but in
framing the judgment two bishops, three archdeacons and several ‘clerks
and chaplains’ took the leading part, while the lay tenants of the bishop
stood by as witnesses[988]. In this context we must remember that in the
twelfth century the clergy were contending that land given to a church in
frankalmoin is outside the sphere of secular justice[989], and, while this
contention was being urged, it was easily possible that a bishop should hold
an amphibious court:—Over the claim that Modbert is making the bishop
has jurisdiction, either because the monks are holding the land of him as his
tenants, or because that land has been given to God and the saints by an
ancient book which denounced the anathema against all who should violate
it. Going back yet further, we see, at all events in France, that the claim of
is a momentous question. But if it be decided that they are to go to the
bishop, then the king will have no further care for them:—the bishop may
and must get them for himself. As to the ‘justiciables,’ it may well be that
they are very indifferent about the matter, not impossible that the burden of
suit will be alleviated if the lord establishes a court of his own, or if an old
court passes into his hands[987]
One other question should be raised, even if we can
Seignorial and
find for it no certain answer. Is not seignorial ecclesiastical
jurisdiction very closely connected at its root with jurisdiction.
ecclesiastical jurisdiction? Of course in more recent
times the two are thoroughly distinct from each other. The bishop, besides
being a spiritual judge, will be a feudal lord with many manorial courts and
many chartered franchises; but any court that he holds as a lord will have
nothing to do with the court that he holds as a bishop. The constitution and
procedure of the one will differ at every point from the constitution and
procedure of the other. The one belongs to the temporal order and is subject
to the king’s court, the other belongs to the spiritual order and is in no sense
below the royal tribunal. Thus it is when feudal law and canon law have
reached their full stature. But even from the twelfth century we may get a
hint that the distinction has not always been so sharply marked. We may
read how in Henry I.’s day the Bishop of Bath ‘with his friends and barons’
heard a cause in which Modbert claimed lands that were held by the monks
of Bath. The proceedings took place under a royal writ and ought, we
should say, to have been in all respects temporal proceedings; but in
framing the judgment two bishops, three archdeacons and several ‘clerks
and chaplains’ took the leading part, while the lay tenants of the bishop
stood by as witnesses[988]. In this context we must remember that in the
twelfth century the clergy were contending that land given to a church in
frankalmoin is outside the sphere of secular justice[989], and, while this
contention was being urged, it was easily possible that a bishop should hold
an amphibious court:—Over the claim that Modbert is making the bishop
has jurisdiction, either because the monks are holding the land of him as his
tenants, or because that land has been given to God and the saints by an
ancient book which denounced the anathema against all who should violate
it. Going back yet further, we see, at all events in France, that the claim of
Page 272
the clergy to hold their lands and seignories exempt from all temporal
jurisdiction has been intimately connected with the claim of the clergy that
they themselves need not answer before a lay tribunal. A learned man has
said that the exemption of the clergy from the temporal courts was ‘the first
step towards the feudalization of justice[990].’ If our English documents do
not make this plain, if the relations between church and state were more
harmonious in England than elsewhere (and because more harmonious
therefore more indefinite and to the modern student more perplexing), still
we can see that the main idea of the English fréols-bóc is the liberation of a
tract of ground from all secular troubles, all temporal burdens, all earthly
service. The land is dedicated to God and the saints, or, if it is not dedicated
in the strictest sense, it is given for God’s sake and the welfare of the
donor’s soul; it is within the ban of the church. And so the men who sit
upon the land of the church of Abingdon, laymen though they be, are
homines Dei, the men of God[991]. As such, should they not be subject to the
jurisdiction of the church.
At this point we may profitably remember that the
Criminal justice of the
jurisdiction which in later days appears as the Church.
‘criminal jurisdiction’ of ecclesiastical tribunals (the
jurisdiction which, for example, those tribunals
exercise when they chastise a man for incest, fornication or perjury) was but
slowly disengaged from the general mass of penal jurisdiction that was
wielded by moots in which the bishop occupied a prominent seat.
Moreover, the bishop’s justice did not escape that fiscal taint which
pervaded the whole system of criminal law. As in some cases the king is
entitled to a wite, so in others the wite falls to the bishop. For instance, we
see traces of a rude concordat, which, when incest or adultery is committed,
subjects the woman to the bishop, the man to the king[992]; and then from
Domesday Book we learn that in the borough of Lewes the upshot of this
partition is that the king will get 8s. 4d. from the man while the adulteress
pays a like sum to the archbishop of Canterbury[993]. And so ecclesiastical
jurisdiction becomes a source of income, a matter to be fought for and
bargained for. The monks of Battle will claim that within the banlieu of
their abbey all the ‘forfeitures of Christianity’ belong to them and not to the
bishop of Chichester[994]. What is more, they will connect their claim to
purely temporal justice with their possession of ordeal pits, and here we
jurisdiction has been intimately connected with the claim of the clergy that
they themselves need not answer before a lay tribunal. A learned man has
said that the exemption of the clergy from the temporal courts was ‘the first
step towards the feudalization of justice[990].’ If our English documents do
not make this plain, if the relations between church and state were more
harmonious in England than elsewhere (and because more harmonious
therefore more indefinite and to the modern student more perplexing), still
we can see that the main idea of the English fréols-bóc is the liberation of a
tract of ground from all secular troubles, all temporal burdens, all earthly
service. The land is dedicated to God and the saints, or, if it is not dedicated
in the strictest sense, it is given for God’s sake and the welfare of the
donor’s soul; it is within the ban of the church. And so the men who sit
upon the land of the church of Abingdon, laymen though they be, are
homines Dei, the men of God[991]. As such, should they not be subject to the
jurisdiction of the church.
At this point we may profitably remember that the
Criminal justice of the
jurisdiction which in later days appears as the Church.
‘criminal jurisdiction’ of ecclesiastical tribunals (the
jurisdiction which, for example, those tribunals
exercise when they chastise a man for incest, fornication or perjury) was but
slowly disengaged from the general mass of penal jurisdiction that was
wielded by moots in which the bishop occupied a prominent seat.
Moreover, the bishop’s justice did not escape that fiscal taint which
pervaded the whole system of criminal law. As in some cases the king is
entitled to a wite, so in others the wite falls to the bishop. For instance, we
see traces of a rude concordat, which, when incest or adultery is committed,
subjects the woman to the bishop, the man to the king[992]; and then from
Domesday Book we learn that in the borough of Lewes the upshot of this
partition is that the king will get 8s. 4d. from the man while the adulteress
pays a like sum to the archbishop of Canterbury[993]. And so ecclesiastical
jurisdiction becomes a source of income, a matter to be fought for and
bargained for. The monks of Battle will claim that within the banlieu of
their abbey all the ‘forfeitures of Christianity’ belong to them and not to the
bishop of Chichester[994]. What is more, they will connect their claim to
purely temporal justice with their possession of ordeal pits, and here we
Page 273
may see another link between the hundred-moots and the churches[995]. The
churches have made money out of the ordeal. Long after the English
prelates had been forbidden to hold spiritual pleas in the hundred courts,
Alexander III. was compelled to speak sharply to the archbishop of
Canterbury touching the conduct of archdeacons who exacted thirty pence
from every man or woman who went to the fire or the water for
purgation[996].
No doubt the theory to which we have been led
Antiquity of seignorial
implies that in the eighth or even in the seventh courts.
century, there were in England ‘immunists’ who had
jurisdiction within their territories, and further it
implies that a royal grant of land in the ninth and tenth centuries generally
included, and this as a matter of ‘common form,’ a grant of jurisdiction. We
cannot see either in the history of England or in the history of the Frankish
Empire any reason why we should shrink from these conclusions. Further, it
must be admitted that if the clause of immunity conveys, or permits the
growth of, seignorial jurisdiction, this jurisdiction is of an exalted kind, for
no causes are excepted out of it, unless it be by the words about the ángild,
and even those words drop out from the charters in course of time. Those
words about the ángild imply, to our thinking, that the immunist will have
jurisdiction over any dispute which arises between two men of the
enfranchised territory, and also that if an action against one of these men be
brought by a ‘foreigner’ in a court outside the precinct, the immunist can
obtain ‘cognizance’ of the action by appearing in that court and paying the
ángild. When the words about the ángild disappear, this means that the
immunist is obtaining a yet further measure of ‘liberty’:—whenever one of
his men is sued he can ‘crave his court’ and need not, as a condition for
obtaining it, offer to pay what is due to the plaintiff. The highest criminal
jurisdiction was probably excepted from the grant. Being a grant of wites, it
will not extend to the ‘bootless’ the ‘unemendable’ crimes. But Cnut’s
attempt to save for himself certain pleas of the crown looks to us like the
effort of a strong king to recover what his predecessors have been
losing[997]. And then Cnut himself and the Confessor,—the latter with
reckless liberality—expressly grant to the churches just those very reserved
pleas of the crown. The result is that the well endowed immunist of St.
Edward’s day has jurisdiction as high as that which any palatine earl of after
churches have made money out of the ordeal. Long after the English
prelates had been forbidden to hold spiritual pleas in the hundred courts,
Alexander III. was compelled to speak sharply to the archbishop of
Canterbury touching the conduct of archdeacons who exacted thirty pence
from every man or woman who went to the fire or the water for
purgation[996].
No doubt the theory to which we have been led
Antiquity of seignorial
implies that in the eighth or even in the seventh courts.
century, there were in England ‘immunists’ who had
jurisdiction within their territories, and further it
implies that a royal grant of land in the ninth and tenth centuries generally
included, and this as a matter of ‘common form,’ a grant of jurisdiction. We
cannot see either in the history of England or in the history of the Frankish
Empire any reason why we should shrink from these conclusions. Further, it
must be admitted that if the clause of immunity conveys, or permits the
growth of, seignorial jurisdiction, this jurisdiction is of an exalted kind, for
no causes are excepted out of it, unless it be by the words about the ángild,
and even those words drop out from the charters in course of time. Those
words about the ángild imply, to our thinking, that the immunist will have
jurisdiction over any dispute which arises between two men of the
enfranchised territory, and also that if an action against one of these men be
brought by a ‘foreigner’ in a court outside the precinct, the immunist can
obtain ‘cognizance’ of the action by appearing in that court and paying the
ángild. When the words about the ángild disappear, this means that the
immunist is obtaining a yet further measure of ‘liberty’:—whenever one of
his men is sued he can ‘crave his court’ and need not, as a condition for
obtaining it, offer to pay what is due to the plaintiff. The highest criminal
jurisdiction was probably excepted from the grant. Being a grant of wites, it
will not extend to the ‘bootless’ the ‘unemendable’ crimes. But Cnut’s
attempt to save for himself certain pleas of the crown looks to us like the
effort of a strong king to recover what his predecessors have been
losing[997]. And then Cnut himself and the Confessor,—the latter with
reckless liberality—expressly grant to the churches just those very reserved
pleas of the crown. The result is that the well endowed immunist of St.
Edward’s day has jurisdiction as high as that which any palatine earl of after
Page 274
ages enjoyed. No crime, except possibly some direct attack upon the king’s
person, property or retainers, was too high for him. It is the reconstruction
of criminal justice in Henry II.’s time, the new learning of felonies, the
introduction of the novel and royal procedure of indictment, that reduce the
immunist’s powers and leave him with nothing better than an unintelligible
list of obsolete words[998]. In this matter of seignorial justice England had
little to learn from Normandy. On the contrary, the Norman counts and
barons were eager to secure the uncouth phrases which gave to the English
immunist his justice, ‘haute, moyenne et basse justice.’
Our next question must be whether in the days
Justice, vassalage and
before the Conquest a franchise or immunity was the tenure.
only root of private jurisdiction: in other words,
whether any jurisdiction was implied in the mere
relation between lord and man or between lord and tenant. This also is a
question which will hardly be finally answered if regard be had only to the
English documents. For France it is the question whether the senior, as
such, has jurisdiction over his vassus, or again, whether he has jurisdiction
over his vassus if, as is usually the case in the Carlovingian age, the vassus
holds a beneficium given to him by his senior. The English dooms which
deal with what we may call the justiciary relationship between lord and man
closely resemble in many respects the Frankish capitularies which touch the
same subject; both sets of documents seem to evade the simple question
that we put to them. But as regards the continent it may here be enough to
say that, though there have been many debates, the current of learning
seems to have set decidedly in favour of the doctrine that neither in
Merovingian nor yet in Carlovingian times had the senior, unless he was an
immunist, a jurisdiction over his men. Such a jurisdiction has not been
developed when the midnight hides everything from our view. When the
morning comes, feudal justice stands revealed, though nowhere perhaps is it
governed by that simple principle that ultimately prevailed in England,
namely, that any and every lord, no matter his personal rank or the rank of
his tenement, has civil justice over his tenants.
The possibility of debate about this matter is
The lord’s duty when his
afforded by texts of an earlier age, which at times man is accused.
seem to speak of the lord as ‘doing justice’ when a
charge is brought against any of his men[999]. Our
person, property or retainers, was too high for him. It is the reconstruction
of criminal justice in Henry II.’s time, the new learning of felonies, the
introduction of the novel and royal procedure of indictment, that reduce the
immunist’s powers and leave him with nothing better than an unintelligible
list of obsolete words[998]. In this matter of seignorial justice England had
little to learn from Normandy. On the contrary, the Norman counts and
barons were eager to secure the uncouth phrases which gave to the English
immunist his justice, ‘haute, moyenne et basse justice.’
Our next question must be whether in the days
Justice, vassalage and
before the Conquest a franchise or immunity was the tenure.
only root of private jurisdiction: in other words,
whether any jurisdiction was implied in the mere
relation between lord and man or between lord and tenant. This also is a
question which will hardly be finally answered if regard be had only to the
English documents. For France it is the question whether the senior, as
such, has jurisdiction over his vassus, or again, whether he has jurisdiction
over his vassus if, as is usually the case in the Carlovingian age, the vassus
holds a beneficium given to him by his senior. The English dooms which
deal with what we may call the justiciary relationship between lord and man
closely resemble in many respects the Frankish capitularies which touch the
same subject; both sets of documents seem to evade the simple question
that we put to them. But as regards the continent it may here be enough to
say that, though there have been many debates, the current of learning
seems to have set decidedly in favour of the doctrine that neither in
Merovingian nor yet in Carlovingian times had the senior, unless he was an
immunist, a jurisdiction over his men. Such a jurisdiction has not been
developed when the midnight hides everything from our view. When the
morning comes, feudal justice stands revealed, though nowhere perhaps is it
governed by that simple principle that ultimately prevailed in England,
namely, that any and every lord, no matter his personal rank or the rank of
his tenement, has civil justice over his tenants.
The possibility of debate about this matter is
The lord’s duty when his
afforded by texts of an earlier age, which at times man is accused.
seem to speak of the lord as ‘doing justice’ when a
charge is brought against any of his men[999]. Our
Page 275
English run parallel with the Frankish texts. The state in its organization of
justice and police does not treat the contract between man and lord, between
senior and vassus, as a matter of indifference, still less as a danger to
society. We must not think of feudalism or vassalism as of something which
from the very first is anti-national and anarchic. In its earliest stages it is
fostered by the state, by the king, by national law. The state demands that
the lordless man of whom no right can be had shall have a lord[1000]. It
makes the lord responsible for the appearance of his men in court to answer
accusations[1001]. It is not unlikely that the whole system of frankpledge
grows out of this requirement. In some instances the state may go further; it
may treat the lord, not merely as bound to produce his man, but as
responsible for his man’s evil deeds. But, at all events, any one who has a
charge to make against a lord’s man must in the first instance demand
justice of the lord. If without making such a demand, making it repeatedly,
he brings the charge before the king, he must pay the same fine that the lord
would have paid had he been guilty of a default of justice[1002]. ‘Of a
default of justice’ we say and are compelled to say. It is phrases such as this
that have occasioned controversy. To an ear attuned to the language of
feudalism they seem to imply a seignorial court in which the lord ‘does
justice’ or ‘holds full right’ to the demandant. But to all appearance they
have gradually changed their meaning. Originally a lord ‘does right’ to the
demandant by producing in a public court the man against whom the claim
is urged; or he does it by satisfying the claim, and in that case he seems
entitled to exact from his man, not merely a sum which will compensate the
outlay, but also the ‘wite’ or fine which in another case would have gone to
the king or some national officer. He has thus ‘done justice’ and may have
the usual profit that comes of doing justice. Probably we ought to
distinguish between a laxer and a stricter measure of responsibility, between
the lord’s responsibility for his men in general and his responsibility for
such of his men as form his familia, in the language of later days his
mainpast; but our texts do not lay much stress upon this distinction, and, as
a matter of remote history, the relation between lord and man may grow out
of the relation between the head of a household and the members of it[1003].
At any rate, in numberless cases the law begins to
Duty of the lord.
interpose a third person, namely, the wrong-doer’s
lord, between the wrong-doer and the wronged: it is
justice and police does not treat the contract between man and lord, between
senior and vassus, as a matter of indifference, still less as a danger to
society. We must not think of feudalism or vassalism as of something which
from the very first is anti-national and anarchic. In its earliest stages it is
fostered by the state, by the king, by national law. The state demands that
the lordless man of whom no right can be had shall have a lord[1000]. It
makes the lord responsible for the appearance of his men in court to answer
accusations[1001]. It is not unlikely that the whole system of frankpledge
grows out of this requirement. In some instances the state may go further; it
may treat the lord, not merely as bound to produce his man, but as
responsible for his man’s evil deeds. But, at all events, any one who has a
charge to make against a lord’s man must in the first instance demand
justice of the lord. If without making such a demand, making it repeatedly,
he brings the charge before the king, he must pay the same fine that the lord
would have paid had he been guilty of a default of justice[1002]. ‘Of a
default of justice’ we say and are compelled to say. It is phrases such as this
that have occasioned controversy. To an ear attuned to the language of
feudalism they seem to imply a seignorial court in which the lord ‘does
justice’ or ‘holds full right’ to the demandant. But to all appearance they
have gradually changed their meaning. Originally a lord ‘does right’ to the
demandant by producing in a public court the man against whom the claim
is urged; or he does it by satisfying the claim, and in that case he seems
entitled to exact from his man, not merely a sum which will compensate the
outlay, but also the ‘wite’ or fine which in another case would have gone to
the king or some national officer. He has thus ‘done justice’ and may have
the usual profit that comes of doing justice. Probably we ought to
distinguish between a laxer and a stricter measure of responsibility, between
the lord’s responsibility for his men in general and his responsibility for
such of his men as form his familia, in the language of later days his
mainpast; but our texts do not lay much stress upon this distinction, and, as
a matter of remote history, the relation between lord and man may grow out
of the relation between the head of a household and the members of it[1003].
At any rate, in numberless cases the law begins to
Duty of the lord.
interpose a third person, namely, the wrong-doer’s
lord, between the wrong-doer and the wronged: it is
Page 276
to this lord that the claimant should in the first instance address himself.
The lord who does his duty by the king and the nation is he who keeps a
tight hold on his men, who chooses them carefully, who dismisses them if
they are bad subjects, who ‘does justice’ and ‘holds full right’ if any of them
be accused. Then, on the other hand, he has the right and duty of
‘warranting’ his men. If, as will often happen, the bond between a lord and
his man is complicated with the bond between landlord and tenant, then, as
in later days, if the tenant’s title be impeached, he will vouch his lord to
warranty and the lord will defend the action. But, besides this, within limits
that are not well defined, the lord is the man’s defensor or tutor[1004]. It is
expected of him by morality, if not by law, that he will take upon himself
the responsibility for his man’s acts if they be not open crimes. He must
stand by his men and see them through all trouble[1005].
For a while the state approves all this. The
The state requires the
dangerous person is, not the lord, whose wide lands lord to ‘do right.’
are some security for his good behaviour, but the
lordless man of whom no right can be had.
Somehow or another theft must be suppressed. This is the determination of
our strongest kings, of our wisest ‘witan.’ That they are raising up over
against the state another power, the power of seignorial justice, they do not
see. And, after all, these ‘witan’ both laymen and clerks are themselves
great lords, and the king is the lordliest of them all. Thus the foundation for
a feudal jurisdiction is laid. Still between the lord’s duty of producing his
men and his right to hold a court of and for his men there is to our eyes a
great gulf. We have seen above that this gulf had not been bridged even in
the Confessor’s, even in the Conqueror’s day[1006]. Nor to our thinking
would it have been bridged but for the creation of ‘immunities’ upon a
grand scale. The first origin of the immunity we have sought in the efforts
of the clergy to obtain lands which should be utterly exempt from ‘all
earthly burdens,’ ‘all worldly business.’ But this effort unites with the
stream of tendency that we have now been watching. The state will be
grateful to the church if it will ‘hold all the men of God to right’ and do
judgment between them and upon them.
There is also a long series of dooms going back as
The land-ríca as
far as Æthelstan’s reign which give certain fines and immunist.
forfeitures to one who is described as the land-
The lord who does his duty by the king and the nation is he who keeps a
tight hold on his men, who chooses them carefully, who dismisses them if
they are bad subjects, who ‘does justice’ and ‘holds full right’ if any of them
be accused. Then, on the other hand, he has the right and duty of
‘warranting’ his men. If, as will often happen, the bond between a lord and
his man is complicated with the bond between landlord and tenant, then, as
in later days, if the tenant’s title be impeached, he will vouch his lord to
warranty and the lord will defend the action. But, besides this, within limits
that are not well defined, the lord is the man’s defensor or tutor[1004]. It is
expected of him by morality, if not by law, that he will take upon himself
the responsibility for his man’s acts if they be not open crimes. He must
stand by his men and see them through all trouble[1005].
For a while the state approves all this. The
The state requires the
dangerous person is, not the lord, whose wide lands lord to ‘do right.’
are some security for his good behaviour, but the
lordless man of whom no right can be had.
Somehow or another theft must be suppressed. This is the determination of
our strongest kings, of our wisest ‘witan.’ That they are raising up over
against the state another power, the power of seignorial justice, they do not
see. And, after all, these ‘witan’ both laymen and clerks are themselves
great lords, and the king is the lordliest of them all. Thus the foundation for
a feudal jurisdiction is laid. Still between the lord’s duty of producing his
men and his right to hold a court of and for his men there is to our eyes a
great gulf. We have seen above that this gulf had not been bridged even in
the Confessor’s, even in the Conqueror’s day[1006]. Nor to our thinking
would it have been bridged but for the creation of ‘immunities’ upon a
grand scale. The first origin of the immunity we have sought in the efforts
of the clergy to obtain lands which should be utterly exempt from ‘all
earthly burdens,’ ‘all worldly business.’ But this effort unites with the
stream of tendency that we have now been watching. The state will be
grateful to the church if it will ‘hold all the men of God to right’ and do
judgment between them and upon them.
There is also a long series of dooms going back as
The land-ríca as
far as Æthelstan’s reign which give certain fines and immunist.
forfeitures to one who is described as the land-
Page 277
hláford or the land-ríca. Remarkable they are, for they seem to assume that
wherever a crime is committed there will be forthcoming some-one who
will answer to the title ‘the land-lord’ or ‘the territorial magnate.’ In some
sense or another they presuppose that there is Nulle terre sans seigneur. But
who is this ‘landlord’? According to our thinking, he is the lord of the
hundred or else the lord who has a charter of immunity comprehending the
land in question, and, if there be no person answering to this description,
then he is the king. In the first place, in certain dooms relating to London
we are told that, when a thief is caught and slain, his property is to be
divided into two parts, of which his wife takes one, while the other is
divided between the king and ‘the association’ (perhaps we may say ‘the
gild’) which was engaged in the pursuit and capture; ‘but if it be book-land
or bishop’s-land, the landlord takes half with the association in
common[1007].’ This seems to mean that there will be a lord to share in the
proceeds of the forfeiture if, but only if, the scene of the capture be land that
is within an immunity. It is assumed, not without warrant in the land-books,
that the man who has book-land always, or almost always, enjoys an
immunity, while as to the bishop’s-land, whether the bishop be holding it in
demesne or have granted it out to his thegns, that no doubt will be protected
by an ample charter. So again, in another law ‘the lord’ receives the thief’s
wer ‘if he [the lord] is worthy of his wite[1008]’: that is to say, the lord
receives it if he is in enjoyment of an immunity which confers upon him a
right to ‘wites.’ Then again, in several cases we find that the land-lord or
land-ríca shares the proceeds of a fine with the hundred or wapentake[1009].
This, as we think, points to the fact that the hundreds and wapentakes are
passing into private hands. These laws are severe laws against criminals.
They urge all men to the pursuit of the flying thief and they hold out a
reward to those who are active in this duty. The men of the hundred are to
have half the thief’s property, while the lord (who in many cases will be the
lord of the hundred) is to have the other half. He is to have no more, even
though his charter may seem to give him more. So again, in certain cases an
accused person must find security that he will stand a trial, and the gage is
to be given ‘half to the land-ríca, half to the wapentake[1010].’ This land-
ríca is the lord of the wapentake. In another instance the gage must be given
half to the land-ríca and half to the king’s port-reeve[1011]. Then there are
cases in which the ‘land-lord’ is to take possession of cattle that have been
irregularly acquired and are presumably stolen, and is to preserve them until
wherever a crime is committed there will be forthcoming some-one who
will answer to the title ‘the land-lord’ or ‘the territorial magnate.’ In some
sense or another they presuppose that there is Nulle terre sans seigneur. But
who is this ‘landlord’? According to our thinking, he is the lord of the
hundred or else the lord who has a charter of immunity comprehending the
land in question, and, if there be no person answering to this description,
then he is the king. In the first place, in certain dooms relating to London
we are told that, when a thief is caught and slain, his property is to be
divided into two parts, of which his wife takes one, while the other is
divided between the king and ‘the association’ (perhaps we may say ‘the
gild’) which was engaged in the pursuit and capture; ‘but if it be book-land
or bishop’s-land, the landlord takes half with the association in
common[1007].’ This seems to mean that there will be a lord to share in the
proceeds of the forfeiture if, but only if, the scene of the capture be land that
is within an immunity. It is assumed, not without warrant in the land-books,
that the man who has book-land always, or almost always, enjoys an
immunity, while as to the bishop’s-land, whether the bishop be holding it in
demesne or have granted it out to his thegns, that no doubt will be protected
by an ample charter. So again, in another law ‘the lord’ receives the thief’s
wer ‘if he [the lord] is worthy of his wite[1008]’: that is to say, the lord
receives it if he is in enjoyment of an immunity which confers upon him a
right to ‘wites.’ Then again, in several cases we find that the land-lord or
land-ríca shares the proceeds of a fine with the hundred or wapentake[1009].
This, as we think, points to the fact that the hundreds and wapentakes are
passing into private hands. These laws are severe laws against criminals.
They urge all men to the pursuit of the flying thief and they hold out a
reward to those who are active in this duty. The men of the hundred are to
have half the thief’s property, while the lord (who in many cases will be the
lord of the hundred) is to have the other half. He is to have no more, even
though his charter may seem to give him more. So again, in certain cases an
accused person must find security that he will stand a trial, and the gage is
to be given ‘half to the land-ríca, half to the wapentake[1010].’ This land-
ríca is the lord of the wapentake. In another instance the gage must be given
half to the land-ríca and half to the king’s port-reeve[1011]. Then there are
cases in which the ‘land-lord’ is to take possession of cattle that have been
irregularly acquired and are presumably stolen, and is to preserve them until
Page 278
their true owner shall make his appearance[1012]. These provisions, which
seem the foundation of the ‘franchise of waif and stray,’ suggest that the
‘land-lord’ is the president of the court into which the owner must go when
he wishes to prove his title; were this not so, the king’s reeve would be the
person who would have the custody of the unclaimed beasts. Certainly our
explanation of these passages assumes that a hundred is often in private
hands and it assumes that, when this is not the case, then the king is
regarded as the lord of the hundred. But in so doing it merely assumes that
the state of things revealed by Domesday Book is about a century old.
When in that record we read that the soke of four and a half hundreds in
Oxfordshire ‘belongs to’ the royal manor of Bensington, that the soke of
two hundreds ‘belongs to’ the royal manor of Headington, that the soke of
other two hundreds ‘belongs to’ the royal manor of Bampton, we see that
the king is the lord, the proprietor, of those hundreds which have no other
lord[1013]. From the laws now before us we infer that this is no very new
arrangement. But of course it is possible that those laws have divers cases
in view. It may be that within the hundred there is an immunity, a privileged
township or manor, and that a thief is caught there. Who is to have the
profits which arise from the crime and condemnation? The answer is: Half
shall go to the hundred, half to the land-ríca, that is to say, half goes to the
doomsmen, or perhaps to the lord, of the hundred court, half to the
immunist. The lord under the general words of his charter might perchance
claim the whole; but, in order that all the hundredors may have an interest
in the pursuit of thieves, it is otherwise decreed. But where is justice to be
done, in the hundred court or in the court of the immunist? That is a
question of secondary importance to which our laws do not address
themselves. Very probably justice will be done in the hundred court, or
again it is not impossible that a mixed tribunal consisting partly of the men
of ‘the franchise,’ partly of the men of ‘the geldable’ will meet upon the
boundary of the immunist’s land[1014]. Our main point must be that the land-
lord or land-ríca of these laws is an immunist, or is the king, who, where
there is no immunity, occupies the position of an immunist.
We see too that the immunist’s rights extend over
The immunist’s rights
free men and over free landowners. If a man is guilty over free men.
of heathenry he must, if he be a king’s thegn, pay ten
half-marks, half to Christ and half to the king, but if
seem the foundation of the ‘franchise of waif and stray,’ suggest that the
‘land-lord’ is the president of the court into which the owner must go when
he wishes to prove his title; were this not so, the king’s reeve would be the
person who would have the custody of the unclaimed beasts. Certainly our
explanation of these passages assumes that a hundred is often in private
hands and it assumes that, when this is not the case, then the king is
regarded as the lord of the hundred. But in so doing it merely assumes that
the state of things revealed by Domesday Book is about a century old.
When in that record we read that the soke of four and a half hundreds in
Oxfordshire ‘belongs to’ the royal manor of Bensington, that the soke of
two hundreds ‘belongs to’ the royal manor of Headington, that the soke of
other two hundreds ‘belongs to’ the royal manor of Bampton, we see that
the king is the lord, the proprietor, of those hundreds which have no other
lord[1013]. From the laws now before us we infer that this is no very new
arrangement. But of course it is possible that those laws have divers cases
in view. It may be that within the hundred there is an immunity, a privileged
township or manor, and that a thief is caught there. Who is to have the
profits which arise from the crime and condemnation? The answer is: Half
shall go to the hundred, half to the land-ríca, that is to say, half goes to the
doomsmen, or perhaps to the lord, of the hundred court, half to the
immunist. The lord under the general words of his charter might perchance
claim the whole; but, in order that all the hundredors may have an interest
in the pursuit of thieves, it is otherwise decreed. But where is justice to be
done, in the hundred court or in the court of the immunist? That is a
question of secondary importance to which our laws do not address
themselves. Very probably justice will be done in the hundred court, or
again it is not impossible that a mixed tribunal consisting partly of the men
of ‘the franchise,’ partly of the men of ‘the geldable’ will meet upon the
boundary of the immunist’s land[1014]. Our main point must be that the land-
lord or land-ríca of these laws is an immunist, or is the king, who, where
there is no immunity, occupies the position of an immunist.
We see too that the immunist’s rights extend over
The immunist’s rights
free men and over free landowners. If a man is guilty over free men.
of heathenry he must, if he be a king’s thegn, pay ten
half-marks, half to Christ and half to the king, but if
Page 279
he be another ‘landowning man’ then he pays six half-marks, half to Christ
and half to the land-ríca[1015]. The landowner normally has a land-lord
above him. We see also that the lord is made liable for the payment of dues
which are ultimately exigible from those who are dwelling within his
territory. ‘If a king’s thegn or other land-ríca makes default in paying
Peter’s pence, he must pay ten half-marks, half to Christ and half to the
king; if a “towns-man” makes a similar default, the land-ríca must pay the
penny and take an ox from the defaulter, and if the land-ríca neglects to do
this, then Christ and the king shall receive the full bót of twelve ores[1016].’
Such is the manner in which the lord’s power is consolidated. He begins to
stand between his free men and the state, between his free men and the
church.
Another consequence of the argument in which we
Delegation of justiciary
have been engaged is that, at least a century before rights.
the Conquest, the great immunists were granting
immunities to their dependants. From this
consequence we shall not flinch. Bishop Oswald, for example, was an
immunist on a splendid scale, and when he loaned land to a knight and said
that the land was to be ‘free from all secular service’ save the trinoda
necessitas, he loaned not merely land, but immunity and jurisdiction. On
one occasion, adopting a formula that has lately come before us, he said that
nothing was to go out of the land by way of wite[1017]. By this we
understand that he gave to his thegn any wites which might thereafter be
incurred by the inhabitants of the manses which were comprised in the loan,
and further that he gave him the right to hold a court. Domesday Book
requires us to believe that such transactions had not been uncommon[1018].
Will our attempt to explain the land-books create too
Number of immunists.
many holders of sake and soke? We do not think so,
for we do not think that the number of land-books
should be indefinitely multiplied by our imaginations. If we look in
Domesday Book at the counties which lie south of the Thames, we shall
indeed see that the total amount of land of which the churches are tenants in
chief is very large. But the number of these landowning churches is small.
When we have named seven episcopal and a dozen abbatial minsters we
have disposed of by far the greater bulk of the church lands in this district,
and these minsters are as a general rule just those which have transmitted to
and half to the land-ríca[1015]. The landowner normally has a land-lord
above him. We see also that the lord is made liable for the payment of dues
which are ultimately exigible from those who are dwelling within his
territory. ‘If a king’s thegn or other land-ríca makes default in paying
Peter’s pence, he must pay ten half-marks, half to Christ and half to the
king; if a “towns-man” makes a similar default, the land-ríca must pay the
penny and take an ox from the defaulter, and if the land-ríca neglects to do
this, then Christ and the king shall receive the full bót of twelve ores[1016].’
Such is the manner in which the lord’s power is consolidated. He begins to
stand between his free men and the state, between his free men and the
church.
Another consequence of the argument in which we
Delegation of justiciary
have been engaged is that, at least a century before rights.
the Conquest, the great immunists were granting
immunities to their dependants. From this
consequence we shall not flinch. Bishop Oswald, for example, was an
immunist on a splendid scale, and when he loaned land to a knight and said
that the land was to be ‘free from all secular service’ save the trinoda
necessitas, he loaned not merely land, but immunity and jurisdiction. On
one occasion, adopting a formula that has lately come before us, he said that
nothing was to go out of the land by way of wite[1017]. By this we
understand that he gave to his thegn any wites which might thereafter be
incurred by the inhabitants of the manses which were comprised in the loan,
and further that he gave him the right to hold a court. Domesday Book
requires us to believe that such transactions had not been uncommon[1018].
Will our attempt to explain the land-books create too
Number of immunists.
many holders of sake and soke? We do not think so,
for we do not think that the number of land-books
should be indefinitely multiplied by our imaginations. If we look in
Domesday Book at the counties which lie south of the Thames, we shall
indeed see that the total amount of land of which the churches are tenants in
chief is very large. But the number of these landowning churches is small.
When we have named seven episcopal and a dozen abbatial minsters we
have disposed of by far the greater bulk of the church lands in this district,
and these minsters are as a general rule just those which have transmitted to
Page 280
us in cartularies and chronicles the story of their acquisitions. To churches
that were destroyed by the Danes we may allot some charters; but we
should have no warrant for the supposition that royal diplomata have
perished by the hundred and left no trace behind. In the shires of York,
Lincoln, Nottingham, Derby we might allow sake and soke to every English
prelate who appears as a tenant in chief and yet not raise to twelve[1019] the
number of the ecclesiastical immunists who had lands in this wide region.
As to the lay holders of sake and soke, they were not very many though
they held broad lands; also they belonged for the more part to an exalted
class[1020]. However, here as elsewhere we must admit that every attempted
explanation discloses new problems.
NOTE.
The Ángild Clause.
As we have said above, (p. 274), there are certain charters in which the
clause of immunity makes mention of the ángild (pretium pro pretio,
singulare pretium). We will here collect the obscure texts in which this
difficult term occurs.
First, however, we will call attention to a passage in Domesday’s
account of Worcestershire (D. B. i. 175 b), which throws some light on
the matter. Westminster Abbey holds 200 hides and Pershore Abbey
holds 100 hides. ‘The county says that the church of Pershore is
entitled to church-scot from all the 300 hides [its own 100 and
Westminster’s 200], to wit, from every hide on which a free man
dwells one load of corn on St. Martin’s day, (if he has more hides than
one, they are free), and if that day be infringed [i.e. if payment be not
made thereon], he who has kept back the corn must pay elevenfold, but
first must pay what is due [i.e. he altogether pays twelve loads
—“God’s property and the church’s twelve-fold” (Æthelb. 1.)]; and the
Abbot of Pershore will have a wite (forisfactura) from his own 100
hides, such as he ought to have from his own land; but from the other
200 hides he will have the multifold payment of the corn that is due
(habet summam et persolutionem) and the Abbot of Westminster has
the wite (forisfacturam).’ For solvere et persolvere, see Laws of
that were destroyed by the Danes we may allot some charters; but we
should have no warrant for the supposition that royal diplomata have
perished by the hundred and left no trace behind. In the shires of York,
Lincoln, Nottingham, Derby we might allow sake and soke to every English
prelate who appears as a tenant in chief and yet not raise to twelve[1019] the
number of the ecclesiastical immunists who had lands in this wide region.
As to the lay holders of sake and soke, they were not very many though
they held broad lands; also they belonged for the more part to an exalted
class[1020]. However, here as elsewhere we must admit that every attempted
explanation discloses new problems.
NOTE.
The Ángild Clause.
As we have said above, (p. 274), there are certain charters in which the
clause of immunity makes mention of the ángild (pretium pro pretio,
singulare pretium). We will here collect the obscure texts in which this
difficult term occurs.
First, however, we will call attention to a passage in Domesday’s
account of Worcestershire (D. B. i. 175 b), which throws some light on
the matter. Westminster Abbey holds 200 hides and Pershore Abbey
holds 100 hides. ‘The county says that the church of Pershore is
entitled to church-scot from all the 300 hides [its own 100 and
Westminster’s 200], to wit, from every hide on which a free man
dwells one load of corn on St. Martin’s day, (if he has more hides than
one, they are free), and if that day be infringed [i.e. if payment be not
made thereon], he who has kept back the corn must pay elevenfold, but
first must pay what is due [i.e. he altogether pays twelve loads
—“God’s property and the church’s twelve-fold” (Æthelb. 1.)]; and the
Abbot of Pershore will have a wite (forisfactura) from his own 100
hides, such as he ought to have from his own land; but from the other
200 hides he will have the multifold payment of the corn that is due
(habet summam et persolutionem) and the Abbot of Westminster has
the wite (forisfacturam).’ For solvere et persolvere, see Laws of
Page 281
William (Select Charters) c. 5; for solta et persolta, see Dial. de Scac.
ii. 10.
If then, a Westminster tenant fails to pay church-scot to Pershore, he
must make bót (very ample bót) to Pershore, but his wite will go to his
own lord; nothing is to ‘go out to wite’ from the Westminster land. We
will now turn to the land-books. We take them to be saying in effect
that in such a case as that put by Domesday the grantee of the
immunity is to have his man’s wite, though the restitutory bót will go
to another.
(i) A.D. 767. Uhtred of the Hwiccas. K. 117 (i. 144); B. i. 286:
‘interdicimus ut si aliquis in hac praenominatam terram aliquid foras
furaverit alicui solvere aliquid nisi specialiter pretium pro pretio ad
terminum ad poenam nihil foras.’ We should place a stop after
terminum. Then the last clause means ‘nothing shall go out to wite.’
The mention of the terminus suggests a payment at the boundary of the
immunist’s land.
(ii) [Questionable]. A.D. 799. Cenwulf. K. 176 (i. 213); B. i. 411: ‘de
partibus vero et de causis singulare solvere pretium et nihil aliud de
hac terra.’
(iii) A.D. 799–802. Pilheard. K. 116 (i. 142); B. i. 284: ‘ut ab omnium
fiscalium redituum operum onerumque seu etiam popularium
conciliorum vindictis nisi tantum pretium pro pretio liberae sint in
perpetuum.’
(iv) A.D. 814. Cenwulf of Mercia for the church of Worcester. K. 206 (i.
259); B. i. 489: ‘exceptis his, expeditione et pontis constructione, et
singulare pretium foras, nihilque ad poenam resolvat.’
(v) Cenwulf of Mercia for the church of Worcester. K. 215 (i. 271); B.
i. 507: ‘exceptis his, arcis et pontis constructione et expeditione et
singulare pretium foras adversum aliud; ad poenam vero neque
quadrantem minutam foras resolvat.’
(vi) A.D. 822. Ceolwulf of Mercia for Archbishop Wilfred. K. 216 (i.
272); B. i. 508: ‘liberata permaneat in aefum nisi is quattuor causis
quae nunc nominabo, expeditione contra paganos ostes, et pontes
ii. 10.
If then, a Westminster tenant fails to pay church-scot to Pershore, he
must make bót (very ample bót) to Pershore, but his wite will go to his
own lord; nothing is to ‘go out to wite’ from the Westminster land. We
will now turn to the land-books. We take them to be saying in effect
that in such a case as that put by Domesday the grantee of the
immunity is to have his man’s wite, though the restitutory bót will go
to another.
(i) A.D. 767. Uhtred of the Hwiccas. K. 117 (i. 144); B. i. 286:
‘interdicimus ut si aliquis in hac praenominatam terram aliquid foras
furaverit alicui solvere aliquid nisi specialiter pretium pro pretio ad
terminum ad poenam nihil foras.’ We should place a stop after
terminum. Then the last clause means ‘nothing shall go out to wite.’
The mention of the terminus suggests a payment at the boundary of the
immunist’s land.
(ii) [Questionable]. A.D. 799. Cenwulf. K. 176 (i. 213); B. i. 411: ‘de
partibus vero et de causis singulare solvere pretium et nihil aliud de
hac terra.’
(iii) A.D. 799–802. Pilheard. K. 116 (i. 142); B. i. 284: ‘ut ab omnium
fiscalium redituum operum onerumque seu etiam popularium
conciliorum vindictis nisi tantum pretium pro pretio liberae sint in
perpetuum.’
(iv) A.D. 814. Cenwulf of Mercia for the church of Worcester. K. 206 (i.
259); B. i. 489: ‘exceptis his, expeditione et pontis constructione, et
singulare pretium foras, nihilque ad poenam resolvat.’
(v) Cenwulf of Mercia for the church of Worcester. K. 215 (i. 271); B.
i. 507: ‘exceptis his, arcis et pontis constructione et expeditione et
singulare pretium foras adversum aliud; ad poenam vero neque
quadrantem minutam foras resolvat.’
(vi) A.D. 822. Ceolwulf of Mercia for Archbishop Wilfred. K. 216 (i.
272); B. i. 508: ‘liberata permaneat in aefum nisi is quattuor causis
quae nunc nominabo, expeditione contra paganos ostes, et pontes
Page 282
constructione sui [=seu] arcis munitione vel destructione in eodem
gente, et singulare pretium foras reddat, secundum ritam gentes illius,
et tamen nullam penam foras alicui persolvat.’
(vii) A.D. 831. Wiglaf of Mercia for the archbishop. K. 227 (i. 294); B.
i. 556: ‘nisi his tantum causis, expeditione et arcis munitione pontisque
constructione et singulare pretium contra alium.’
(viii) A.D. 835. Egbert of Wessex for Abingdon. K. 236 (i. 312); B. i.
577: ‘de illa autem tribulatione que witereden nominatur sit libera, nisi
tamen singuli pretium solverit ut talia accipiant. Fures quoque quos
appellant weregeldðeofas si foras rapiautur, pretium eius dimidium illi
aecclesiae, et dimidium regi detur, et si intus rapitur totum reddatur ad
aecclesiam.’
(ix) A.D. 849. Berhtwulf of Mercia for his thegn Egbert. K. 262 (ii. 34);
B. ii. 40: ‘Liberabo ab omnibus saecularibus servitutibus ... nisi in
confinio rationem reddant contra alium.’
(x) A.D. 855. Burhred of Mercia for the church of Worcester. K. 277 (ii.
58); B. ii. 88: ‘nisi tantum quattuor causis, pontis et arcis, et
expeditione contra hostes, et singulare pretium contra alium, et ad
poenam nihil foras resolvat.’
(xi) A.D. 883. Æthelred of Mercia for Berkeley. K. 313 (ii. 110); B. ii.
172: ‘and þæt ic þæt mynster fram æghwelcum gafolum gefreoge þe to
þiode hlafarde belimpeð, littles oððe micles, cuðes ge uncuðes, butan
angilde wið oþrum and fæsten gewerce and fyrd socne and brycg
geweorce ... æghwelces þinges to freon ge wið cyning, ge wið
ealdorman, ge wið gerefan æghwelces þeodomes, lytles and micles,
butan fyrd socne and fæsten geworce and brycg geworce and angylde
wið oðrum and noht ut to wite.’
(xii) A.D. 888. Æthelred of Mercia for a thegn. K. 1068 (v. 133); B. ii.
194: ‘liberam hanc terram describimus ab omnibus causis nisi
singulare pretium contra aliud ponat et modum ecclesiae.’ Is the modus
[or modius] of the church the church-scot?
In a few other cases the immunity mentions penal causes, ‘witeræden,’
and no express exception is made of the ángild. Thus:—
gente, et singulare pretium foras reddat, secundum ritam gentes illius,
et tamen nullam penam foras alicui persolvat.’
(vii) A.D. 831. Wiglaf of Mercia for the archbishop. K. 227 (i. 294); B.
i. 556: ‘nisi his tantum causis, expeditione et arcis munitione pontisque
constructione et singulare pretium contra alium.’
(viii) A.D. 835. Egbert of Wessex for Abingdon. K. 236 (i. 312); B. i.
577: ‘de illa autem tribulatione que witereden nominatur sit libera, nisi
tamen singuli pretium solverit ut talia accipiant. Fures quoque quos
appellant weregeldðeofas si foras rapiautur, pretium eius dimidium illi
aecclesiae, et dimidium regi detur, et si intus rapitur totum reddatur ad
aecclesiam.’
(ix) A.D. 849. Berhtwulf of Mercia for his thegn Egbert. K. 262 (ii. 34);
B. ii. 40: ‘Liberabo ab omnibus saecularibus servitutibus ... nisi in
confinio rationem reddant contra alium.’
(x) A.D. 855. Burhred of Mercia for the church of Worcester. K. 277 (ii.
58); B. ii. 88: ‘nisi tantum quattuor causis, pontis et arcis, et
expeditione contra hostes, et singulare pretium contra alium, et ad
poenam nihil foras resolvat.’
(xi) A.D. 883. Æthelred of Mercia for Berkeley. K. 313 (ii. 110); B. ii.
172: ‘and þæt ic þæt mynster fram æghwelcum gafolum gefreoge þe to
þiode hlafarde belimpeð, littles oððe micles, cuðes ge uncuðes, butan
angilde wið oþrum and fæsten gewerce and fyrd socne and brycg
geweorce ... æghwelces þinges to freon ge wið cyning, ge wið
ealdorman, ge wið gerefan æghwelces þeodomes, lytles and micles,
butan fyrd socne and fæsten geworce and brycg geworce and angylde
wið oðrum and noht ut to wite.’
(xii) A.D. 888. Æthelred of Mercia for a thegn. K. 1068 (v. 133); B. ii.
194: ‘liberam hanc terram describimus ab omnibus causis nisi
singulare pretium contra aliud ponat et modum ecclesiae.’ Is the modus
[or modius] of the church the church-scot?
In a few other cases the immunity mentions penal causes, ‘witeræden,’
and no express exception is made of the ángild. Thus:—
Page 283
(xiii) A.D. 842. Æthelwulf for a thegn. K. 253 (ii. 16); B. ii. 13: ‘ut
regalium tributum et principali dominacione et vi coacta operacione et
poenalium condicionum furis comprehensione ... secura ... permaneat.’
(xiv) [Questionable]. A.D. 844. Æthelwulf for Malmesbury; one of the
documents reciting the famous ‘donation.’ K. 1048 (v. 93); B. ii. 26; H.
& S. iii. 630: ‘ut sit tutus et munitus ab omnibus saecularibus
servitutis, fiscis regalibus, tributis maioribus et minoribus, quod nos
dicimus witereden.’
(xv) A.D. 877. Bp. Tunbert. K. 1063 (v. 121); B. ii. 163: ‘a taxationibus
quod dicimus wite redenne.’
The most detailed and at the same time the most hopelessly obscure
information that we get is such as can be obtained from two Abingdon
charters.
A.D. 821. Cenwulf. K. 214 (i. 269); B. i. 505; H. & S. iii. 556: ‘Si pro
aliquo delicto accusatur homo Dei aecclesiae ille custos solus cum suo
iuramento si audeat illum castiget. Sin autem ut recipiat aliam
iusticiam huius vicissitudinis conditionem praefatum delictum cum
simplo praetio componat.’
A.D. 835. Egbert. K. 236 (i. 312); B. i. 577; H. & S. iii. 613. The same
clause, but with alienam instead of aliam. Also the following:—‘De
illa autem tribulatione que witereden nominatur sit libera nisi tamen
singuli [corr. singulare?] pretium solverit ut talia accipiant [accipiat?].’
This is very dark. Our best guess as to its meaning is this:—If a man of
God, that is, a tenant of the church, is accused of crime, the custos of
the church (this may mean the abbot, but more probably points to his
reeve) may by his single oath purge the accused. But if he dare not do
this, then he (the abbot or reeve) may pay the bót that is claimed, and
by performing this condition he may obtain a transfer (vicissitudo) of
the cause and do what other justice remains to be done, i.e. he may
exact the wite. So in the second charter the abbot may pay the bót, the
singulare pretium, and so obtain a right to exact the wite:—he makes
the payment ut talia [i.e. witereden] accipiat. In guessing that
vicissitudo points to a transfer of a suit, we have in mind the manner in
regalium tributum et principali dominacione et vi coacta operacione et
poenalium condicionum furis comprehensione ... secura ... permaneat.’
(xiv) [Questionable]. A.D. 844. Æthelwulf for Malmesbury; one of the
documents reciting the famous ‘donation.’ K. 1048 (v. 93); B. ii. 26; H.
& S. iii. 630: ‘ut sit tutus et munitus ab omnibus saecularibus
servitutis, fiscis regalibus, tributis maioribus et minoribus, quod nos
dicimus witereden.’
(xv) A.D. 877. Bp. Tunbert. K. 1063 (v. 121); B. ii. 163: ‘a taxationibus
quod dicimus wite redenne.’
The most detailed and at the same time the most hopelessly obscure
information that we get is such as can be obtained from two Abingdon
charters.
A.D. 821. Cenwulf. K. 214 (i. 269); B. i. 505; H. & S. iii. 556: ‘Si pro
aliquo delicto accusatur homo Dei aecclesiae ille custos solus cum suo
iuramento si audeat illum castiget. Sin autem ut recipiat aliam
iusticiam huius vicissitudinis conditionem praefatum delictum cum
simplo praetio componat.’
A.D. 835. Egbert. K. 236 (i. 312); B. i. 577; H. & S. iii. 613. The same
clause, but with alienam instead of aliam. Also the following:—‘De
illa autem tribulatione que witereden nominatur sit libera nisi tamen
singuli [corr. singulare?] pretium solverit ut talia accipiant [accipiat?].’
This is very dark. Our best guess as to its meaning is this:—If a man of
God, that is, a tenant of the church, is accused of crime, the custos of
the church (this may mean the abbot, but more probably points to his
reeve) may by his single oath purge the accused. But if he dare not do
this, then he (the abbot or reeve) may pay the bót that is claimed, and
by performing this condition he may obtain a transfer (vicissitudo) of
the cause and do what other justice remains to be done, i.e. he may
exact the wite. So in the second charter the abbot may pay the bót, the
singulare pretium, and so obtain a right to exact the wite:—he makes
the payment ut talia [i.e. witereden] accipiat. In guessing that
vicissitudo points to a transfer of a suit, we have in mind the manner in
Page 284
which theLeges Henrici, 9 § 4, speak of the ‘transition’ of causes from
court to court. The case that is being dealt with by these charters we
take to be one in which an outsider in a ‘foreign’ court sues one of the
abbot’s tenants. The abbot can swear away the charge, or if he dares
not do this, can obtain cognizance of the cause (in the language of a
later day potest petere curiam suam) and therewith the right to the
wite, but must in this case pay the restitutory bót, or rather, perhaps,
find security that this shall be paid to the plaintiff in case he is
successful. The clause may also imply that a multiple bót can not be
exacted from the immunist’s men, e.g. such a bót as we saw the Abbot
of Pershore exacting from the Westminster men; but this is a minor
question.
court to court. The case that is being dealt with by these charters we
take to be one in which an outsider in a ‘foreign’ court sues one of the
abbot’s tenants. The abbot can swear away the charge, or if he dares
not do this, can obtain cognizance of the cause (in the language of a
later day potest petere curiam suam) and therewith the right to the
wite, but must in this case pay the restitutory bót, or rather, perhaps,
find security that this shall be paid to the plaintiff in case he is
successful. The clause may also imply that a multiple bót can not be
exacted from the immunist’s men, e.g. such a bót as we saw the Abbot
of Pershore exacting from the Westminster men; but this is a minor
question.
Page 285
Page 286
§ 4. Book-land and Loan-land.
We can not say that from the first the gift of book-
The book and the gift.
land establishes between the donee and the royal
donor any such permanent relation as that which in
later times is called tenure. What the king gives he apparently gives for
good and all. In particular, a gift of land to a church is ‘an out and out gift’;
nay more, it is a dedication. Still, even within the sphere of piety and alms,
we sometimes find the notion that in consequence of the gift the donee
should do something for the donor. Cnut frees the lands of the church of
Exeter from all burdens except military service, bridge-repair and
‘assiduous prayers[1021],’ and thus the title by which the churches hold their
lands is already being brought under the rubric Do ut des. Turning to the
books granted to laymen, we see that, at all events from the middle of the
tenth century onwards, they usually state a causa, or as we might say ‘a
consideration,’ for the gift. Generally the gift is ‘an out and out gift.’ Words
are used which expressly tell us that the donee is to enjoy the land during
his life and may on his death give it to whomsoever he chooses. Nothing is
said about his paying rent or about his rendering in the future any service to
the king in return for the land. The ‘consideration’ that is stated in the
instrument is, if we may still use such modern terms, ‘a past consideration.’
The land comes rather as a reward than as a retaining fee. Sometimes
indeed the thegn pays money to the king and is in some sort a buyer of the
land, though the king will take credit for generosity and will talk of giving
rather than of selling[1022]. More often the land comes as a reward to him
for obedience and fidelity or fealty. Already the word fidelitas is in common
use; we have only to render it by fealty and the transaction between the king
and his thegn will be apt to look like an infeudation, especially when the
thegn is described by the foreign term vassallus[1023]. Even the general rule
that the king is rewarding a past, rather than stipulating for a future fealty, is
not unbroken. Thus as early as 801 we find Cenwulf of Mercia and Cuthræd
of Kent giving land to a thegn as a perpetual inheritance ‘but so that he shall
remain a faithful servant and unshaken friend to us and our magnates[1024].’
So again, in 946 King Edmund gives land to a faithful minister ‘in order
We can not say that from the first the gift of book-
The book and the gift.
land establishes between the donee and the royal
donor any such permanent relation as that which in
later times is called tenure. What the king gives he apparently gives for
good and all. In particular, a gift of land to a church is ‘an out and out gift’;
nay more, it is a dedication. Still, even within the sphere of piety and alms,
we sometimes find the notion that in consequence of the gift the donee
should do something for the donor. Cnut frees the lands of the church of
Exeter from all burdens except military service, bridge-repair and
‘assiduous prayers[1021],’ and thus the title by which the churches hold their
lands is already being brought under the rubric Do ut des. Turning to the
books granted to laymen, we see that, at all events from the middle of the
tenth century onwards, they usually state a causa, or as we might say ‘a
consideration,’ for the gift. Generally the gift is ‘an out and out gift.’ Words
are used which expressly tell us that the donee is to enjoy the land during
his life and may on his death give it to whomsoever he chooses. Nothing is
said about his paying rent or about his rendering in the future any service to
the king in return for the land. The ‘consideration’ that is stated in the
instrument is, if we may still use such modern terms, ‘a past consideration.’
The land comes rather as a reward than as a retaining fee. Sometimes
indeed the thegn pays money to the king and is in some sort a buyer of the
land, though the king will take credit for generosity and will talk of giving
rather than of selling[1022]. More often the land comes as a reward to him
for obedience and fidelity or fealty. Already the word fidelitas is in common
use; we have only to render it by fealty and the transaction between the king
and his thegn will be apt to look like an infeudation, especially when the
thegn is described by the foreign term vassallus[1023]. Even the general rule
that the king is rewarding a past, rather than stipulating for a future fealty, is
not unbroken. Thus as early as 801 we find Cenwulf of Mercia and Cuthræd
of Kent giving land to a thegn as a perpetual inheritance ‘but so that he shall
remain a faithful servant and unshaken friend to us and our magnates[1024].’
So again, in 946 King Edmund gives land to a faithful minister ‘in order
Page 287
that while I live he may serve me faithful in mind and obedient in deed and
that after my death he may with the same fealty obey whomsoever of my
friends I may choose[1025].’ The king, it will be seen, reserves the right to
dispose by will of his thegn’s fealty. A continuing relation is established
between the king and his successors in title on the one hand, the holder of
the book-land and his successors in title on the other.
However, as already said, the gift supposes that the
Book-land and service.
personal relationship of lord and thegn already exists
between the donor and the donee before the gift is
made. This relationship was established by a formal ceremony; the thegn
swore an oath of fealty, and it is likely that he bent his knee and bowed his
head before his lord[1026]. The Normans saw their homage in the English
commendation[1027]. The fidelity expected of the thegn is not regarded as a
debt incurred by the receipt of land. And if the king does not usually
stipulate for fidelity, still less does he stipulate for any definite service, in
particular for any definite amount of military service. The land is not to be
free of military service:—this is all that is said. However, to say this is to
say that military service is already a burden on land. Already it is
conceivable—very possibly it is true—that some of the lands of the
churches have been freed even from this burden[1028]. What is more, if we
may believe the Abingdon charters, the ninth century is not far advanced
before the king is occasionally making bargains as to the amount of military
service that the lands of the churches shall render. Abingdon need send to
the host but twelve vassals and twelve shields[1029]. Likewise we see that on
the eve of the Conquest, though other men who neglected the call to arms
might escape with a fine of forty shillings, it was the rule, at least in
Worcestershire, that the free man who had sake and soke and could ‘go with
his land whither he would’ forfeited that land if he was guilty of a similar
default[1030]. With this we must connect those laws of Cnut which say that
the man who flees in battle, as well as the man who is outlawed, forfeits his
book-land to the king, no matter who may be his lord[1031].
Such rules when regarded from one point of view
Military service.
may well be called feudal. Book-land having been
derived from, is specially liable to return to the king.
It will return to him if the holder of it be guilty of shirking his military duty
or of other disgraceful crime. To this we may add that if these rules betray
that after my death he may with the same fealty obey whomsoever of my
friends I may choose[1025].’ The king, it will be seen, reserves the right to
dispose by will of his thegn’s fealty. A continuing relation is established
between the king and his successors in title on the one hand, the holder of
the book-land and his successors in title on the other.
However, as already said, the gift supposes that the
Book-land and service.
personal relationship of lord and thegn already exists
between the donor and the donee before the gift is
made. This relationship was established by a formal ceremony; the thegn
swore an oath of fealty, and it is likely that he bent his knee and bowed his
head before his lord[1026]. The Normans saw their homage in the English
commendation[1027]. The fidelity expected of the thegn is not regarded as a
debt incurred by the receipt of land. And if the king does not usually
stipulate for fidelity, still less does he stipulate for any definite service, in
particular for any definite amount of military service. The land is not to be
free of military service:—this is all that is said. However, to say this is to
say that military service is already a burden on land. Already it is
conceivable—very possibly it is true—that some of the lands of the
churches have been freed even from this burden[1028]. What is more, if we
may believe the Abingdon charters, the ninth century is not far advanced
before the king is occasionally making bargains as to the amount of military
service that the lands of the churches shall render. Abingdon need send to
the host but twelve vassals and twelve shields[1029]. Likewise we see that on
the eve of the Conquest, though other men who neglected the call to arms
might escape with a fine of forty shillings, it was the rule, at least in
Worcestershire, that the free man who had sake and soke and could ‘go with
his land whither he would’ forfeited that land if he was guilty of a similar
default[1030]. With this we must connect those laws of Cnut which say that
the man who flees in battle, as well as the man who is outlawed, forfeits his
book-land to the king, no matter who may be his lord[1031].
Such rules when regarded from one point of view
Military service.
may well be called feudal. Book-land having been
derived from, is specially liable to return to the king.
It will return to him if the holder of it be guilty of shirking his military duty
or of other disgraceful crime. To this we may add that if these rules betray
Page 288
the fact that the holder of this king-given land may none the less have
commended himself and his land to some other lord against whose claims
the king has to legislate, thereby they disclose a feudalism of the worst, of
the centrifugal kind. The ancient controversy as to whether ‘the military
tenures’ were ‘known to the Anglo-Saxons’ is apt to become a battle over
words. The old power of calling out all able-bodied men for defensive
warfare was never abandoned; but it was not abandoned by the Norman and
Angevin kings. The holder of land was not spoken of as holding it by
military service; but it would seem that in the eleventh century the king,
save in some pressing necessity, could only ask for one man’s service from
every five hides, and the holder of book-land forfeited that land if he
disobeyed a lawful summons[1032]. Whether a man who will lose land for
such a cause shall be said to hold it by military service is little better than a
question about the meaning of words. At best it is a question about legal
logic. We are asked to make our choice (and yet may doubt whether our
ancestors had made their choice) between the ideas of misdemeanour and
punishment on the one hand and the idea of reentry for breach of condition
on the other.
The same vagueness enshrouds the infancy of the
Escheat of book-land.
escheat propter defectum tenentis. Already in 825 a
king tells how he gave land to one of his praefecti
who died intestate and without an heir, ‘and so that land by the decree of
my magnates was restored to me who had before possessed it[1033].’ Here
we seem to see the notion that when a gift has spent itself, when there is no
longer any one who can bring himself within the words of donation, the
given land should return to the giver. In another quarter we may see that
when the king makes a gift he does not utterly abandon all interest in the
land that is given. Cenwulf of Mercia in a charter for Christ Church at
Canterbury tells us that King Egbert gave land to a certain thegn of his who
on leaving the country gave it to the minster; but that Offa annulled this gift
and gave away the land to other thegns, saying that it was unlawful for a
thegn to give away without his lord’s witness (testimonio) the land given to
him by his lord[1034]. Cenwulf restored the land to the church; but he took
money for it, and he does not say that Offa had acted illegally. There is
much to show that the ‘restraint on alienation’ is one of the oldest of the
‘incidents of tenure.’ Our materials do not enable us to formulate a general
commended himself and his land to some other lord against whose claims
the king has to legislate, thereby they disclose a feudalism of the worst, of
the centrifugal kind. The ancient controversy as to whether ‘the military
tenures’ were ‘known to the Anglo-Saxons’ is apt to become a battle over
words. The old power of calling out all able-bodied men for defensive
warfare was never abandoned; but it was not abandoned by the Norman and
Angevin kings. The holder of land was not spoken of as holding it by
military service; but it would seem that in the eleventh century the king,
save in some pressing necessity, could only ask for one man’s service from
every five hides, and the holder of book-land forfeited that land if he
disobeyed a lawful summons[1032]. Whether a man who will lose land for
such a cause shall be said to hold it by military service is little better than a
question about the meaning of words. At best it is a question about legal
logic. We are asked to make our choice (and yet may doubt whether our
ancestors had made their choice) between the ideas of misdemeanour and
punishment on the one hand and the idea of reentry for breach of condition
on the other.
The same vagueness enshrouds the infancy of the
Escheat of book-land.
escheat propter defectum tenentis. Already in 825 a
king tells how he gave land to one of his praefecti
who died intestate and without an heir, ‘and so that land by the decree of
my magnates was restored to me who had before possessed it[1033].’ Here
we seem to see the notion that when a gift has spent itself, when there is no
longer any one who can bring himself within the words of donation, the
given land should return to the giver. In another quarter we may see that
when the king makes a gift he does not utterly abandon all interest in the
land that is given. Cenwulf of Mercia in a charter for Christ Church at
Canterbury tells us that King Egbert gave land to a certain thegn of his who
on leaving the country gave it to the minster; but that Offa annulled this gift
and gave away the land to other thegns, saying that it was unlawful for a
thegn to give away without his lord’s witness (testimonio) the land given to
him by his lord[1034]. Cenwulf restored the land to the church; but he took
money for it, and he does not say that Offa had acted illegally. There is
much to show that the ‘restraint on alienation’ is one of the oldest of the
‘incidents of tenure.’ Our materials do not enable us to formulate a general
Page 289
principle, but certain it is that the holders of book-land, whether they be
laymen or ecclesiastics, very generally obtain the consent of the king when
they propose to alienate their land either inter vivos or by testament. We
may not argue from this to any definite condition annexed to the gift, or to
any standing relationship between the donor and the donee like the ‘tenure’
of later times. After all, it is a very natural thought that a reward bestowed
by the king should not be sold or given away. The crosses and stars with
which modern potentates decorate their fideles, we do not expect to see
these in the market[1035]. The land that the king has booked to his thegn is
an ‘honour’ and the giver will expect to be consulted before it passes into
hands that may be unworthy of it. It may be just because the gift of book-
land is made by the king and corroborated by all the powers of church and
state, that the book is conceived as exercising a continuous sway over the
land comprised in it. The book, it has well been said, is the lex possessionis
of that land[1036]. It can make the land descend this way or that way, and the
land will come back to the king if ever the power of the book be spent.
What is more, from the first we seem to see a germ of our famous English
rule that if a gift be made without ‘words of inheritance’ the gift will endure
only during the life of the donee:—will endure, we say, for a gift is no mere
act done once for all but a force that endures for a longer or a shorter
period. Certain it is that most of the charters are careful to say that the gift is
not thus to come to an end but is to go on operating despite the donee’s
death[1037].
And even when, as is generally the case, the book
Alienation of book-land.
made in favour of a lay-man says that the donee is to
have the power of leaving the land to whomsoever
he may please, or to such heirs as he may choose, we still must doubt
whether his testamentary power is utterly unrestrained, whether he will not
have to consult the royal donor when he is making his will. The phenomena
which we have here to consider are very obscure, because we never can be
quite certain why it is that a testator is seeking the king’s aid. We have to
remember that the testament is an exotic, ecclesiastical institution which is
likely to come into collision with the ancient folk-law. From an early time
the church was striving in favour of the utmost measure of testamentary
freedom, for formless wills, for nuncupative wills[1038]. The very largeness
of its claims made impossible any definite compromise between church-
laymen or ecclesiastics, very generally obtain the consent of the king when
they propose to alienate their land either inter vivos or by testament. We
may not argue from this to any definite condition annexed to the gift, or to
any standing relationship between the donor and the donee like the ‘tenure’
of later times. After all, it is a very natural thought that a reward bestowed
by the king should not be sold or given away. The crosses and stars with
which modern potentates decorate their fideles, we do not expect to see
these in the market[1035]. The land that the king has booked to his thegn is
an ‘honour’ and the giver will expect to be consulted before it passes into
hands that may be unworthy of it. It may be just because the gift of book-
land is made by the king and corroborated by all the powers of church and
state, that the book is conceived as exercising a continuous sway over the
land comprised in it. The book, it has well been said, is the lex possessionis
of that land[1036]. It can make the land descend this way or that way, and the
land will come back to the king if ever the power of the book be spent.
What is more, from the first we seem to see a germ of our famous English
rule that if a gift be made without ‘words of inheritance’ the gift will endure
only during the life of the donee:—will endure, we say, for a gift is no mere
act done once for all but a force that endures for a longer or a shorter
period. Certain it is that most of the charters are careful to say that the gift is
not thus to come to an end but is to go on operating despite the donee’s
death[1037].
And even when, as is generally the case, the book
Alienation of book-land.
made in favour of a lay-man says that the donee is to
have the power of leaving the land to whomsoever
he may please, or to such heirs as he may choose, we still must doubt
whether his testamentary power is utterly unrestrained, whether he will not
have to consult the royal donor when he is making his will. The phenomena
which we have here to consider are very obscure, because we never can be
quite certain why it is that a testator is seeking the king’s aid. We have to
remember that the testament is an exotic, ecclesiastical institution which is
likely to come into collision with the ancient folk-law. From an early time
the church was striving in favour of the utmost measure of testamentary
freedom, for formless wills, for nuncupative wills[1038]. The very largeness
of its claims made impossible any definite compromise between church-
Page 290
right and folk-right. So far as we can see, no precise law is evolved as to
when and how and over what a man may exercise a power of testation. The
church will support testaments of the most formless kind; on the other hand,
the heirs of the dead man will endeavour, despite the anathema, to break his
will, and sometimes they will succeed[1039]. Consequently the testator will
endeavour to obtain the crosses of the bishops and the consent of the king.
He has already a book which tells him that he may leave the land to a
chosen heir; but if he be prudent he will not trust to this by itself. Kings
change their minds.
Then the law about heriots complicates the matter.
The heriot and the
The heriot has its origin in the duty of the dying testament.
thegn or of his heirs to return to his lord the arms
which that lord has given or lent to him. We have to
use some such vague phrase as ‘given or lent’; we dare not speak more
precisely[1040]. A time comes when the king provides his thegn, no longer
with arms, but with land; still the heriot is rendered[1041]. In the tenth
century this render is closely connected with the exercise of testamentary
power. The thegn offers a heriot with a prayer that ‘his will may stand.’ He
presents swords and money to the king in order that he may be worthy of
his testament[1042]. When we find such phrases as this, we can not always
be certain that the land of which the testator is going to dispose is land over
which a book purports to give him testamentarypower; he may be hoping
that the king’s aid will be sufficient to enable him to bequeath the unbooked
land that he holds[1043]. In other cases he may be endeavouring to dispose of
lands that have merely been ‘loaned’ to him for his life by the king. But this
will hardly serve to explain all the cases, and we so frequently find the
holder of book-land applying for the king’s consent when he is going to
make an alienation of it inter vivos that we need not marvel at finding a
similar application made when he is about to execute a testament[1044].
This having been said, we shall not be surprised to
The gift and the loan.
find that in ancient times the difference between a
gift of land and a loan of land was not nearly so well
marked as it would be by modern law. The loan may be regarded as a
temporary gift, the gift as a very permanent, if not perpetual, loan. We know
how this matter looks in the law of Bracton’s age. By feoffment one gives
land to a man for his life, or one gives it to him and the heirs of his body, or
when and how and over what a man may exercise a power of testation. The
church will support testaments of the most formless kind; on the other hand,
the heirs of the dead man will endeavour, despite the anathema, to break his
will, and sometimes they will succeed[1039]. Consequently the testator will
endeavour to obtain the crosses of the bishops and the consent of the king.
He has already a book which tells him that he may leave the land to a
chosen heir; but if he be prudent he will not trust to this by itself. Kings
change their minds.
Then the law about heriots complicates the matter.
The heriot and the
The heriot has its origin in the duty of the dying testament.
thegn or of his heirs to return to his lord the arms
which that lord has given or lent to him. We have to
use some such vague phrase as ‘given or lent’; we dare not speak more
precisely[1040]. A time comes when the king provides his thegn, no longer
with arms, but with land; still the heriot is rendered[1041]. In the tenth
century this render is closely connected with the exercise of testamentary
power. The thegn offers a heriot with a prayer that ‘his will may stand.’ He
presents swords and money to the king in order that he may be worthy of
his testament[1042]. When we find such phrases as this, we can not always
be certain that the land of which the testator is going to dispose is land over
which a book purports to give him testamentarypower; he may be hoping
that the king’s aid will be sufficient to enable him to bequeath the unbooked
land that he holds[1043]. In other cases he may be endeavouring to dispose of
lands that have merely been ‘loaned’ to him for his life by the king. But this
will hardly serve to explain all the cases, and we so frequently find the
holder of book-land applying for the king’s consent when he is going to
make an alienation of it inter vivos that we need not marvel at finding a
similar application made when he is about to execute a testament[1044].
This having been said, we shall not be surprised to
The gift and the loan.
find that in ancient times the difference between a
gift of land and a loan of land was not nearly so well
marked as it would be by modern law. The loan may be regarded as a
temporary gift, the gift as a very permanent, if not perpetual, loan. We know
how this matter looks in the law of Bracton’s age. By feoffment one gives
land to a man for his life, or one gives it to him and the heirs of his body, or
Page 291
to him and his heirs: but in any case, the land may come back to the giver.
The difference between the three feoffments is a difference in degree rather
than in kind; one will operate for a longer, another for a shorter time; but,
however absolute the gift may be, the giver never parts with all his interest
in the land[1045]. Or we may put it in another way:—in our English law
usufruct is a temporary dominium and dominium is a usufruct that may be
perpetual. Or, once more, adopting the language of modern statutes, we may
say that the tenant for life is no usufructuary but ‘a limited owner.’ We are
accustomed to bring this doctrine into connexion with rules about
dependent tenure:—the donor, we say, retains an interest in the land because
he is the tenant’s lord. But, on looking at the ancient land-books, we may
find reason to suspect that the confusion of loans with gifts and gifts with
loans (if we may speak of confusion where in truth the things confounded
have never as yet been clearly distinguished) is one of the original germs of
the rule that all land is held of the king. After all, the king—and he is by far
the greatest giver in the country and his gifts are models for all gifts—never
can really part with all the rights that he has in the land that he gives, for he
still will be king of it and therefore in a sense it will always be part of his
land. To maintain a sharp distinction between the rights that he has as king
and the rights that he has as landlord, jurisprudence is not as yet prepared.
—But we must look at the land-loan more closely.
Foreign historians have shown how after the
The precarium.
barbarian invasions one single form of legal thought,
or (if we may borrow a term from them), one single
legal ‘institute’ which had been saved out of the ruins of Roman
jurisprudence, was made to do the hard duty of expressing the most
miscellaneous facts, was made to meet a vast multitude of cases in which,
while one man is the owner of land, another man is occupying and enjoying
it by the owner’s permission. This institute was the precarium. Originally
but a tenancy at will, it was elaborated into different shapes which, when
their elaboration had been completed, had little in common. For some
reason or another one begs (rogare) of a landowner leave to occupy a piece
of land; for some reason or another the prayer is granted, the grantor
making a display of generosity and speaking of his act as a ‘benefit’
(beneficium), an act of good-nature and liberality. An elastic form is thus
established. The petitioner may, or may not, promise to pay a rent to his
The difference between the three feoffments is a difference in degree rather
than in kind; one will operate for a longer, another for a shorter time; but,
however absolute the gift may be, the giver never parts with all his interest
in the land[1045]. Or we may put it in another way:—in our English law
usufruct is a temporary dominium and dominium is a usufruct that may be
perpetual. Or, once more, adopting the language of modern statutes, we may
say that the tenant for life is no usufructuary but ‘a limited owner.’ We are
accustomed to bring this doctrine into connexion with rules about
dependent tenure:—the donor, we say, retains an interest in the land because
he is the tenant’s lord. But, on looking at the ancient land-books, we may
find reason to suspect that the confusion of loans with gifts and gifts with
loans (if we may speak of confusion where in truth the things confounded
have never as yet been clearly distinguished) is one of the original germs of
the rule that all land is held of the king. After all, the king—and he is by far
the greatest giver in the country and his gifts are models for all gifts—never
can really part with all the rights that he has in the land that he gives, for he
still will be king of it and therefore in a sense it will always be part of his
land. To maintain a sharp distinction between the rights that he has as king
and the rights that he has as landlord, jurisprudence is not as yet prepared.
—But we must look at the land-loan more closely.
Foreign historians have shown how after the
The precarium.
barbarian invasions one single form of legal thought,
or (if we may borrow a term from them), one single
legal ‘institute’ which had been saved out of the ruins of Roman
jurisprudence, was made to do the hard duty of expressing the most
miscellaneous facts, was made to meet a vast multitude of cases in which,
while one man is the owner of land, another man is occupying and enjoying
it by the owner’s permission. This institute was the precarium. Originally
but a tenancy at will, it was elaborated into different shapes which, when
their elaboration had been completed, had little in common. For some
reason or another one begs (rogare) of a landowner leave to occupy a piece
of land; for some reason or another the prayer is granted, the grantor
making a display of generosity and speaking of his act as a ‘benefit’
(beneficium), an act of good-nature and liberality. An elastic form is thus
established. The petitioner may, or may not, promise to pay a rent to his
Page 292
benefactor; the benefactor may, or may not, engage that the relationship
shall continue for a fixed term of years, or for the life of the petitioner or for
several lives. Usually this relationship between petitioner and benefactor is
complicated with the bond of patronage: the former has commended
himself to the latter, has come within his power, his protection, his trust
(trustis), has become his fidelis, his homo. At a later time the inferior is a
vassus, the superior is his senior, for the word vassus, which has meant a
menial servant, spreads upwards. Then the precarium, as it were, divides
itself into various channels. One of its streams encompasses the large
province of humble tenancies, wherein the peasants obtain land from the
churches and other owners on more or less arduous conditions, or reserve a
right to occupy so long as they live the lands that they have given to the
saints. Another stream sweeps onward into the domain of grand history and
public law. The noble obtains a spacious territory, perhaps a county, from
the king by way of ‘benefaction’; the precarium becomes the beneficium,
the beneficium becomes the feudum[1046]. The king can not prevent the
beneficia, the feuda, from becoming hereditary.
The analogous English institution was the lǽn or, as
The English land-loan.
we now say, loan. If in translating a German book
we render Lehn by fief, feud, or fee, we should still
remember that a Lehn is a loan. And no doubt the history of our ancient
land-loans was influenced by the history of the precarium. We come upon
the technical terms of continental law when King Æthelbald forbids any one
to beg for a benefit or benefice out of the lands that have been given to the
church of Winchester[1047]. There was need for such prohibitions. Edward
the Elder prayed the bishop of this very church to lend him some land for
his life; the bishop consented, but expressed a fervent hope that there would
be no more of such requests, which in truth were very like commands. It
would seem that some of the English kings occasionally did what had been
done on a large scale in France by Charles Martel or his sons, namely, they
compelled the churches to grant benefices to lay noblemen[1048]. When
bishop Oswald of Worcester declared how he had been lending lands to his
thegns, he used a foreign, technical term: ‘beneficium quod illis praestitum
est[1049].’ But it is clear that the English conception of a land-loan was very
lax; it would blend with the conception of a gift. To describe transactions of
one and the same kind, if such verbs as commodare and lǽnan and lǽtan
shall continue for a fixed term of years, or for the life of the petitioner or for
several lives. Usually this relationship between petitioner and benefactor is
complicated with the bond of patronage: the former has commended
himself to the latter, has come within his power, his protection, his trust
(trustis), has become his fidelis, his homo. At a later time the inferior is a
vassus, the superior is his senior, for the word vassus, which has meant a
menial servant, spreads upwards. Then the precarium, as it were, divides
itself into various channels. One of its streams encompasses the large
province of humble tenancies, wherein the peasants obtain land from the
churches and other owners on more or less arduous conditions, or reserve a
right to occupy so long as they live the lands that they have given to the
saints. Another stream sweeps onward into the domain of grand history and
public law. The noble obtains a spacious territory, perhaps a county, from
the king by way of ‘benefaction’; the precarium becomes the beneficium,
the beneficium becomes the feudum[1046]. The king can not prevent the
beneficia, the feuda, from becoming hereditary.
The analogous English institution was the lǽn or, as
The English land-loan.
we now say, loan. If in translating a German book
we render Lehn by fief, feud, or fee, we should still
remember that a Lehn is a loan. And no doubt the history of our ancient
land-loans was influenced by the history of the precarium. We come upon
the technical terms of continental law when King Æthelbald forbids any one
to beg for a benefit or benefice out of the lands that have been given to the
church of Winchester[1047]. There was need for such prohibitions. Edward
the Elder prayed the bishop of this very church to lend him some land for
his life; the bishop consented, but expressed a fervent hope that there would
be no more of such requests, which in truth were very like commands. It
would seem that some of the English kings occasionally did what had been
done on a large scale in France by Charles Martel or his sons, namely, they
compelled the churches to grant benefices to lay noblemen[1048]. When
bishop Oswald of Worcester declared how he had been lending lands to his
thegns, he used a foreign, technical term: ‘beneficium quod illis praestitum
est[1049].’ But it is clear that the English conception of a land-loan was very
lax; it would blend with the conception of a gift. To describe transactions of
one and the same kind, if such verbs as commodare and lǽnan and lǽtan
Page 293
were used[1050], such words as conferre, concedere, tribuere, largiri and
donare were also used[1051]. A loan is a temporary gift, and the nature of the
transaction remains the same whether the man to whom the loan is made
does, or does not, come under the obligation of paying rent or performing
services.
Unfortunately our materials only permit us to study
Loans of church lands to
one branch of the loan; the aristocratic branch we the great.
may call it. No doubt the lords, especially the
churches, are from an early time letting or ‘loaning’
lands to cultivators. Specimens of such agricultural leases we do not see and
cannot expect to see, for they would hardly be put into writing. But at an
early time we do see the churches loaning lands, and wide lands, to great
men. This is a matter of much importance. One other course in the feudal
edifice is thus constructed. We have seen the churches interposed between
the king and the cultivators of the soil; the churches have become landlords
with free land-holders under them. And now it is discovered that the
churches have a superiority which they can lend to others. We see already a
four-storeyed structure. There are the cultivator, the church’s thegn, the
church, the king. Very great men think it no shame to beg boons from the
church. Already before 750 the bishop of Worcester has granted five manses
to ‘Comes Leppa’ for lives[1052]; before the century is out the abbot of
Medeshamstead has granted ten manses to the ‘princeps’ Cuthbert for
lives[1053]. In 855 the bishop of Worcester gives eleven manses to the
ealdorman of the Mercians and his wife for their lives[1054]; in 904 a
successor of his makes a similar gift[1055]. But we have seen that the king
himself was not above taking a loan from the church. Indeed powerful men
insist on having loans, and the churches, in order to protect themselves
against importunities, obtain from the king this among their other
immunities, namely, that no lay man is to beg boons from them, or that no
lease is to be for longer than the lessee’slife[1056]. In such cases we may also
see the working of a second motive: the church is to be protected against
the prodigality of its own rulers. The leases made by the prelates seem
usually to have been for three lives. This compass is so often reached, so
seldom exceeded[1057] that we may well believe that the English church had
accepted as a rule of sound policy, if not as a rule of law, the novel of
Justinian which set the limit of three lives to leases of church lands[1058].
donare were also used[1051]. A loan is a temporary gift, and the nature of the
transaction remains the same whether the man to whom the loan is made
does, or does not, come under the obligation of paying rent or performing
services.
Unfortunately our materials only permit us to study
Loans of church lands to
one branch of the loan; the aristocratic branch we the great.
may call it. No doubt the lords, especially the
churches, are from an early time letting or ‘loaning’
lands to cultivators. Specimens of such agricultural leases we do not see and
cannot expect to see, for they would hardly be put into writing. But at an
early time we do see the churches loaning lands, and wide lands, to great
men. This is a matter of much importance. One other course in the feudal
edifice is thus constructed. We have seen the churches interposed between
the king and the cultivators of the soil; the churches have become landlords
with free land-holders under them. And now it is discovered that the
churches have a superiority which they can lend to others. We see already a
four-storeyed structure. There are the cultivator, the church’s thegn, the
church, the king. Very great men think it no shame to beg boons from the
church. Already before 750 the bishop of Worcester has granted five manses
to ‘Comes Leppa’ for lives[1052]; before the century is out the abbot of
Medeshamstead has granted ten manses to the ‘princeps’ Cuthbert for
lives[1053]. In 855 the bishop of Worcester gives eleven manses to the
ealdorman of the Mercians and his wife for their lives[1054]; in 904 a
successor of his makes a similar gift[1055]. But we have seen that the king
himself was not above taking a loan from the church. Indeed powerful men
insist on having loans, and the churches, in order to protect themselves
against importunities, obtain from the king this among their other
immunities, namely, that no lay man is to beg boons from them, or that no
lease is to be for longer than the lessee’slife[1056]. In such cases we may also
see the working of a second motive: the church is to be protected against
the prodigality of its own rulers. The leases made by the prelates seem
usually to have been for three lives. This compass is so often reached, so
seldom exceeded[1057] that we may well believe that the English church had
accepted as a rule of sound policy, if not as a rule of law, the novel of
Justinian which set the limit of three lives to leases of church lands[1058].
Page 294
Occasionally the lease is made in consideration of a
The consideration for the
sum of money paid down; occasionally the recipient loan.
of the land comes under an express obligation to pay
rent. An early example shows us the abbot of
Medeshamstead letting ten manses to the ‘princeps’ Cuthbert for lives in
consideration of a gross sum of a thousand shillings and an annual pastus or
‘farm’ of one night[1059]. The bishop of Worcester early in the ninth century
concedes land to a woman for her life on condition that she shall cleanse
and renovate the furniture of the church[1060]. On the other hand, when land
is ‘loaned’ to a king or a great nobleman, this may be in consideration of his
patronage and protection; the church stipulates for his amicitia[1061]. We
may say that he becomes the advocatus of the church, and the patronage
exercised by kings and nobles over the churches is of importance, though
perhaps it was not quite so serious a matter in England as it was elsewhere.
But from our present point of view by far the most
St. Oswald’s loans.
interesting form that the loan takes is the loan to the
thegn or the cniht. Happily it falls out that we have
an excellent opportunity of studying this institution. We recall the fact that
by the gifts of kings and underkings the church of Worcester had become
entitled to vast tracts of land in Worcestershire and the adjoining counties.
Now between the years 962 and 992 Bishop Oswald granted at the very
least some seventy loans comprising in all 180 manses or thereabouts[1062].
In almost all cases the loan was for three lives. In a few cases the recipient
was a kinsman of the bishop, in a few he was an ecclesiastic; far more
generally he is described as ‘minister meus,’ ‘fidelis meus,’ ‘cliens meus,’
‘miles meus,’ ‘my knight,’ ‘my thegn,’ ‘my true man.’ When the ‘cause’ or
consideration for the transaction is expressed it is ‘ob eius fidele
obsequium’ or ‘pro eius humili subiectione atque famulatu’: a recompense
is made for fealty and service. Any thing that could be called a stipulation
for future service is very rare. A definite rent is seldom reserved[1063].
Sometimes the bishop declares that the land is to be free from all earthly
burdens, save service in the host and the repair of bridges and strongholds.
To those excepted imposts he sometimes adds church-scot, or the church’s
rent, without specifying the amount. Sometimes he seems to go further and
to say that the land is to be free from everything save the church’s rent
(ecclesiasticus census)[1064]. In so doing he gives a hint that the recipients
The consideration for the
sum of money paid down; occasionally the recipient loan.
of the land comes under an express obligation to pay
rent. An early example shows us the abbot of
Medeshamstead letting ten manses to the ‘princeps’ Cuthbert for lives in
consideration of a gross sum of a thousand shillings and an annual pastus or
‘farm’ of one night[1059]. The bishop of Worcester early in the ninth century
concedes land to a woman for her life on condition that she shall cleanse
and renovate the furniture of the church[1060]. On the other hand, when land
is ‘loaned’ to a king or a great nobleman, this may be in consideration of his
patronage and protection; the church stipulates for his amicitia[1061]. We
may say that he becomes the advocatus of the church, and the patronage
exercised by kings and nobles over the churches is of importance, though
perhaps it was not quite so serious a matter in England as it was elsewhere.
But from our present point of view by far the most
St. Oswald’s loans.
interesting form that the loan takes is the loan to the
thegn or the cniht. Happily it falls out that we have
an excellent opportunity of studying this institution. We recall the fact that
by the gifts of kings and underkings the church of Worcester had become
entitled to vast tracts of land in Worcestershire and the adjoining counties.
Now between the years 962 and 992 Bishop Oswald granted at the very
least some seventy loans comprising in all 180 manses or thereabouts[1062].
In almost all cases the loan was for three lives. In a few cases the recipient
was a kinsman of the bishop, in a few he was an ecclesiastic; far more
generally he is described as ‘minister meus,’ ‘fidelis meus,’ ‘cliens meus,’
‘miles meus,’ ‘my knight,’ ‘my thegn,’ ‘my true man.’ When the ‘cause’ or
consideration for the transaction is expressed it is ‘ob eius fidele
obsequium’ or ‘pro eius humili subiectione atque famulatu’: a recompense
is made for fealty and service. Any thing that could be called a stipulation
for future service is very rare. A definite rent is seldom reserved[1063].
Sometimes the bishop declares that the land is to be free from all earthly
burdens, save service in the host and the repair of bridges and strongholds.
To those excepted imposts he sometimes adds church-scot, or the church’s
rent, without specifying the amount. Sometimes he seems to go further and
to say that the land is to be free from everything save the church’s rent
(ecclesiasticus census)[1064]. In so doing he gives a hint that the recipients
Page 295
of the lands will have something to pay to, or something to do for the
church. Were it not for this, we might well think that these loans were made
solely in consideration of past services, of obedience already rendered, and
that at most the recipient undertook the vague obligation of being faithful
and obsequious in the future.
But happily for us St. Oswald was a careful man of
St. Oswald’s letter to
business and put on record in the most solemn Edgar.
manner the terms on which he made his land-loans.
The document in which he did this is for our
purposes the most important of all the documents that have come down to
us from the age before the Conquest[1065]. It takes the form of a letter
written to King Edgar. We will give a brief and bald abstract of it[1066]:—‘I
am (says the bishop) deeply grateful to you my lord, for all your liberality
and will remain faithful to you for ever. In particular am I grateful to you
for receiving my complaint and that of God’s holy Church and granting
redress by the counsel of your wise men[1067]. Therefore I have resolved to
put on record the manner in which I have been granting to my faithful men
for the space of three lives the lands committed to my charge, so that by the
leave and witness of you, my lord and king, I may declare this matter to the
bishops my successors, and that they may know what to exact from these
men according to the covenant that they have made with me and according
to their solemn promise. I have written this document in order that none of
them may hereafter endeavour to abjure the service of the church. This then
is the covenant made with the leave of my lord the king and attested,
roborated and confirmed by him and all his wise men. I have granted the
land to be held under me (sub me) on these terms, to wit, that every one of
these men shall fulfil the whole law of riding as riding men should[1068],
and that they shall pay in full all those dues which of right belong to the
church, that is to say ciricsceott, toll, and tace or swinscead, and all other
dues of the church (unless the bishop will excuse them from any thing), and
shall swear that so long as they possess the said land they will be humbly
subject to the commands of the bishop. What is more, they shall hold
themselves ready to supply all the needs of the bishop; they shall lend their
horses; they shall ride themselves, and be ready to build bridges and do all
that is necessary in burning lime for the work of the church[1069]; they shall
erect a hedge for the bishop’s hunt and shall lend their own hunting spears
church. Were it not for this, we might well think that these loans were made
solely in consideration of past services, of obedience already rendered, and
that at most the recipient undertook the vague obligation of being faithful
and obsequious in the future.
But happily for us St. Oswald was a careful man of
St. Oswald’s letter to
business and put on record in the most solemn Edgar.
manner the terms on which he made his land-loans.
The document in which he did this is for our
purposes the most important of all the documents that have come down to
us from the age before the Conquest[1065]. It takes the form of a letter
written to King Edgar. We will give a brief and bald abstract of it[1066]:—‘I
am (says the bishop) deeply grateful to you my lord, for all your liberality
and will remain faithful to you for ever. In particular am I grateful to you
for receiving my complaint and that of God’s holy Church and granting
redress by the counsel of your wise men[1067]. Therefore I have resolved to
put on record the manner in which I have been granting to my faithful men
for the space of three lives the lands committed to my charge, so that by the
leave and witness of you, my lord and king, I may declare this matter to the
bishops my successors, and that they may know what to exact from these
men according to the covenant that they have made with me and according
to their solemn promise. I have written this document in order that none of
them may hereafter endeavour to abjure the service of the church. This then
is the covenant made with the leave of my lord the king and attested,
roborated and confirmed by him and all his wise men. I have granted the
land to be held under me (sub me) on these terms, to wit, that every one of
these men shall fulfil the whole law of riding as riding men should[1068],
and that they shall pay in full all those dues which of right belong to the
church, that is to say ciricsceott, toll, and tace or swinscead, and all other
dues of the church (unless the bishop will excuse them from any thing), and
shall swear that so long as they possess the said land they will be humbly
subject to the commands of the bishop. What is more, they shall hold
themselves ready to supply all the needs of the bishop; they shall lend their
horses; they shall ride themselves, and be ready to build bridges and do all
that is necessary in burning lime for the work of the church[1069]; they shall
erect a hedge for the bishop’s hunt and shall lend their own hunting spears
Page 296
whenever the bishop may need them. And further, to meet many other
wants of the bishop, whether for the fulfilment of the service due to him or
of that due to the king, they shall with all humility and subjection be
obedient to his domination and to his will[1070], in consideration of the
benefice that has been loaned to them, and according to the quantity of the
land that each of them possesses. And when the term for which the lands are
granted has run out, it shall be in the bishop’s power either to retain those
lands for himself or to loan them out to any one for a further term, but so
that the said services due to the church shall be fully rendered. And in case
any shall make wilful default in rendering the aforesaid dues of the church,
he shall make amends according to the bishop’s wite[1071] or else shall lose
the gift and land that he enjoyed. And if any one attempt to defraud the
church of land or service, be he deprived of God’s blessing unless he shall
make full restitution. He who keeps this, let him be blessed; he who violates
this, let him be cursed: Amen. Once more, my lord, I express my gratitude
to you. There are three copies of this document; one at Worcester, one
deposited with the Archbishop of Canterbury and one with the Bishop of
Winchester.’
Now we may well say that here is feudal tenure. In
Feudalism in
the first place, we notice a few verbal points. The Oswaldslaw.
recipient of the lǽn has received a beneficium from
the bishop, and if he will not hold the land de
episcopo, none the less he will hold it sub episcopo. Then he is the bishop’s
fidelis, his fidus homo, his ‘hold and true man,’ his thegn, his knight, his
soldier, his minister, his miles, his eques. Then he takes an oath to the
bishop, and seemingly this oath states in the most energetic terms his utter
subjection to the bishop’s commands. What is more, he swears to be faithful
and obedient because he has received a beneficium from the bishop, and the
amount of his service is measured by the quantity of land that he has
received. Then again, we see that he holds his land by service; if he fails in
his service, at all events if he denies his liability to serve, he is in peril of
losing the land, though perhaps he may escape by paying a pecuniary fine.
As to the services to be rendered, if we compare them with those of which
Glanvill and Bracton speak, they will seem both miscellaneous and
indefinite; perhaps we ought to say that they are all the more feudal on that
account. The tenant is to pay the church-scot, the ecclesiasticus census of
wants of the bishop, whether for the fulfilment of the service due to him or
of that due to the king, they shall with all humility and subjection be
obedient to his domination and to his will[1070], in consideration of the
benefice that has been loaned to them, and according to the quantity of the
land that each of them possesses. And when the term for which the lands are
granted has run out, it shall be in the bishop’s power either to retain those
lands for himself or to loan them out to any one for a further term, but so
that the said services due to the church shall be fully rendered. And in case
any shall make wilful default in rendering the aforesaid dues of the church,
he shall make amends according to the bishop’s wite[1071] or else shall lose
the gift and land that he enjoyed. And if any one attempt to defraud the
church of land or service, be he deprived of God’s blessing unless he shall
make full restitution. He who keeps this, let him be blessed; he who violates
this, let him be cursed: Amen. Once more, my lord, I express my gratitude
to you. There are three copies of this document; one at Worcester, one
deposited with the Archbishop of Canterbury and one with the Bishop of
Winchester.’
Now we may well say that here is feudal tenure. In
Feudalism in
the first place, we notice a few verbal points. The Oswaldslaw.
recipient of the lǽn has received a beneficium from
the bishop, and if he will not hold the land de
episcopo, none the less he will hold it sub episcopo. Then he is the bishop’s
fidelis, his fidus homo, his ‘hold and true man,’ his thegn, his knight, his
soldier, his minister, his miles, his eques. Then he takes an oath to the
bishop, and seemingly this oath states in the most energetic terms his utter
subjection to the bishop’s commands. What is more, he swears to be faithful
and obedient because he has received a beneficium from the bishop, and the
amount of his service is measured by the quantity of land that he has
received. Then again, we see that he holds his land by service; if he fails in
his service, at all events if he denies his liability to serve, he is in peril of
losing the land, though perhaps he may escape by paying a pecuniary fine.
As to the services to be rendered, if we compare them with those of which
Glanvill and Bracton speak, they will seem both miscellaneous and
indefinite; perhaps we ought to say that they are all the more feudal on that
account. The tenant is to pay the church-scot, the ecclesiasticus census of
Page 297
other documents. This, as we learn from Domesday Book, is one load
(summa) of the best corn from every hide of land, and unless it be paid on
St. Martin’s day, it must be paid twelve-fold along with a fine[1072]. He must
pay toll to the bishop when he buys and sells; he must pay tace, apparently
the pannage of a later time, for his pigs. He must go on the bishop’s errands,
provide him with hunting-spears, erect his ‘deer-hedge’ when he goes to the
chase. There remains a margin of unspecified services; for he must do what
he is told to do according to the will of the bishop. But, above all, he is a
horseman, a riding man and must fulfil ‘the law of riding.’ For a moment
we are tempted to say ‘the law of chivalry.’ This indeed would be an
anachronism; but still he is bound to ride at the bishop’s command. Will he
ride only on peaceful errands? We doubt it. He is bound to do all the service
that is due to the king, all the forinsec service[1073] we may say. A certain
quantity of military service is due from the bishop’s lands; his thegns must
do it. As already said, the obligation of serving in warfare is not yet so
precisely connected with the tenure of certain parcels of land as it will be in
the days of Henry II., but already the notion prevails that the land owes
soldiers to the king, and probably the bishop has so arranged matters that
his territory will be fully ‘acquitted’ if his equites, his milites take the field.
Under what banner will they fight? Hardly under the sheriff’s banner.
Oswald is founding Oswaldslaw and within Oswaldslaw the sheriff will
have no power. More probably they will follow the banner of St. Mary of
Worcester. This we know, that in the Confessor’s reign one Eadric was
steersman of the bishop’s ship and commander of the bishop’s troops[1074].
This also we know, that in the suit between the churches of Worcester and
of Evesham that came before the Domesday commissioners, one of the
rights claimed by the bishop against the abbot was that the men of two
villages, Hamton and Bengeworth, were bound to pay geld and to fight
along with the bishop’s men[1075]. And then, suppose that Danes or
Welshmen or Englishmen make a raid on the bishop’s land, is it certain that
he will communicate with the ealdorman or the king before he calls upon
his knights to defend and to avenge him? Still we must not bring into undue
relief the military side of the tenure.
These men may be bound to fight at the bishop’s
Oswald’s riding men.
call, but fighting is not their main business; they are
not professional warriors. They are the predecessors
(summa) of the best corn from every hide of land, and unless it be paid on
St. Martin’s day, it must be paid twelve-fold along with a fine[1072]. He must
pay toll to the bishop when he buys and sells; he must pay tace, apparently
the pannage of a later time, for his pigs. He must go on the bishop’s errands,
provide him with hunting-spears, erect his ‘deer-hedge’ when he goes to the
chase. There remains a margin of unspecified services; for he must do what
he is told to do according to the will of the bishop. But, above all, he is a
horseman, a riding man and must fulfil ‘the law of riding.’ For a moment
we are tempted to say ‘the law of chivalry.’ This indeed would be an
anachronism; but still he is bound to ride at the bishop’s command. Will he
ride only on peaceful errands? We doubt it. He is bound to do all the service
that is due to the king, all the forinsec service[1073] we may say. A certain
quantity of military service is due from the bishop’s lands; his thegns must
do it. As already said, the obligation of serving in warfare is not yet so
precisely connected with the tenure of certain parcels of land as it will be in
the days of Henry II., but already the notion prevails that the land owes
soldiers to the king, and probably the bishop has so arranged matters that
his territory will be fully ‘acquitted’ if his equites, his milites take the field.
Under what banner will they fight? Hardly under the sheriff’s banner.
Oswald is founding Oswaldslaw and within Oswaldslaw the sheriff will
have no power. More probably they will follow the banner of St. Mary of
Worcester. This we know, that in the Confessor’s reign one Eadric was
steersman of the bishop’s ship and commander of the bishop’s troops[1074].
This also we know, that in the suit between the churches of Worcester and
of Evesham that came before the Domesday commissioners, one of the
rights claimed by the bishop against the abbot was that the men of two
villages, Hamton and Bengeworth, were bound to pay geld and to fight
along with the bishop’s men[1075]. And then, suppose that Danes or
Welshmen or Englishmen make a raid on the bishop’s land, is it certain that
he will communicate with the ealdorman or the king before he calls upon
his knights to defend and to avenge him? Still we must not bring into undue
relief the military side of the tenure.
These men may be bound to fight at the bishop’s
Oswald’s riding men.
call, but fighting is not their main business; they are
not professional warriors. They are the predecessors
Page 298
not of the military tenants of the twelfth century, but of the radchenistres,
and radmanni of Domesday Book, the rodknights of Bracton’s text, the
thegns and drengs of the northern counties who puzzle the lawyers of the
Angevin time. Point by point we can compare the tenure of these ministri
and equites of the tenth with that of the thegns and drengs of the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries and at point after point we find similarity, almost
identity. They pay rent; they have horses and their horses are at the service
of their lord; they must ride his errands, carry his stores, assist him in the
chase; they must fight if need be, but the exact nature of this obligation is
indefinite[1076]. Dependent tenure is here and, we may say, feudal tenure,
and even tenure by knight’s service, for though the English cniht of the
tenth century differs much from the knight of the twelfth, still it is a change
in military tactics rather than a change in legal ideas that is required to
convert the one into the other. As events fell out there was a breach of
continuity; the English thegns and drengs and knights either had to make
way for Norman milites, or, as sometimes happened, they were subjected to
Norman milites and constituted a class for which no place could readily be
found in the new jurisprudence of tenures. But had Harold won the day at
Hastings and at the same time learnt a lesson from the imminence of defeat,
some peaceful process would probably have done the same work that was
done by forfeitures and violent displacements. The day for heavy cavalry
and professional militancy was fast approaching when Oswald subjected his
tenants to the lex equitandi
Yet another of those feudal phenomena that come
Heritable loans.
before us in the twelfth century may easily be
engendered by these loans; we mean the precarious
inheritance, the right to ‘relieve’ from the lord the land that a dead man held
of him[1077]. In speaking of Oswald’s loans as ‘leases for three lives’ we
have used a loose phrase which might lead a modern reader astray. Oswald
does not let land to a man for the lives of three persons named in the lease
and therefore existing at the time when the lease is made; rather he lets the
land to a man and declares that it shall descend to two successive heirs of
his. The exact extent of the power that the lessee has of instituting an heir,
in other words of devising the land by testament, instead of allowing it to be
inherited ab intestato, we need not discuss; suffice it that the lessee’s rights
may twice pass from ancestor to heir, or from testator to devisee[1078]. Now
and radmanni of Domesday Book, the rodknights of Bracton’s text, the
thegns and drengs of the northern counties who puzzle the lawyers of the
Angevin time. Point by point we can compare the tenure of these ministri
and equites of the tenth with that of the thegns and drengs of the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries and at point after point we find similarity, almost
identity. They pay rent; they have horses and their horses are at the service
of their lord; they must ride his errands, carry his stores, assist him in the
chase; they must fight if need be, but the exact nature of this obligation is
indefinite[1076]. Dependent tenure is here and, we may say, feudal tenure,
and even tenure by knight’s service, for though the English cniht of the
tenth century differs much from the knight of the twelfth, still it is a change
in military tactics rather than a change in legal ideas that is required to
convert the one into the other. As events fell out there was a breach of
continuity; the English thegns and drengs and knights either had to make
way for Norman milites, or, as sometimes happened, they were subjected to
Norman milites and constituted a class for which no place could readily be
found in the new jurisprudence of tenures. But had Harold won the day at
Hastings and at the same time learnt a lesson from the imminence of defeat,
some peaceful process would probably have done the same work that was
done by forfeitures and violent displacements. The day for heavy cavalry
and professional militancy was fast approaching when Oswald subjected his
tenants to the lex equitandi
Yet another of those feudal phenomena that come
Heritable loans.
before us in the twelfth century may easily be
engendered by these loans; we mean the precarious
inheritance, the right to ‘relieve’ from the lord the land that a dead man held
of him[1077]. In speaking of Oswald’s loans as ‘leases for three lives’ we
have used a loose phrase which might lead a modern reader astray. Oswald
does not let land to a man for the lives of three persons named in the lease
and therefore existing at the time when the lease is made; rather he lets the
land to a man and declares that it shall descend to two successive heirs of
his. The exact extent of the power that the lessee has of instituting an heir,
in other words of devising the land by testament, instead of allowing it to be
inherited ab intestato, we need not discuss; suffice it that the lessee’s rights
may twice pass from ancestor to heir, or from testator to devisee[1078]. Now
Page 299
such a lease may cover the better part of a century. A time will come when
the land ought to return to the church that gave it; but for some eighty years
it will have ‘been in one family’ and twice over it will have been inherited.
Is it very probable that the bishop will be able to oust the third heir? Will he
wish to do so, if three generations of thegns or knights have faithfully
served the church? May we not be fairly certain that this third heir will get
the land on the old terms, if he will ‘recognize’ the church’s right to turn
him out? As a matter of fact we see that Oswald’s successors have great
difficulty in recovering the land that he has let[1079]. In the middle ages he
who allows land to descend twice has often enough allowed it to become
heritable for good and all. Despite solemn charters and awful anathemas he
will have to be content with a relief[1080].
But at least, it will be said, there was no ‘right of
Wardship and marriage.
wardship and marriage.’ We can see the beginning of
it. In 983 Oswald let five manses to his kinsman
Gardulf. Gardulf is to enjoy the land during his life; after his death his
widow is to have it, if she remains a widow or if she marries one of the
bishop’s subjects[1081]. So the bishop is already taking an interest in the
marriages of his tenants; he will have no woman holding his land who is
married to one who is not his man. And then Domesday Book tells us how
in the Confessor’s day one of Oswald’s successors had disposed of an
heiress and her land to one of his knights[1082].
Still, it will be urged, the feudalism here displayed is
Seignorial jurisdiction.
imperfect in one important respect. These tenants of
the church of Worcester hold their land under
contracts cognizable by the national courts; they do not hold by any special
feudal law, they are not subject to any feudal tribunal. Now if when we hear
of ‘feudalism,’ we are to think of that orderly, centralized body of land-law
which in Henry III.’s day has subjected the whole realm to its simple but
mighty formulas, the feudalism of Oswald’s land-loans is imperfect enough.
But then we must remind ourselves that never in this country does feudal
law (the Lehnrecht of Germany) become a system to be contrasted with the
ordinary land law (Landrecht)[1083], and also we must observe that already
in Oswald’s day the thegns of the church of Worcester were in all
probability as completely subject to a private and seignorial justice as ever
were any freeholding Englishman. What court protected their tenure, what
the land ought to return to the church that gave it; but for some eighty years
it will have ‘been in one family’ and twice over it will have been inherited.
Is it very probable that the bishop will be able to oust the third heir? Will he
wish to do so, if three generations of thegns or knights have faithfully
served the church? May we not be fairly certain that this third heir will get
the land on the old terms, if he will ‘recognize’ the church’s right to turn
him out? As a matter of fact we see that Oswald’s successors have great
difficulty in recovering the land that he has let[1079]. In the middle ages he
who allows land to descend twice has often enough allowed it to become
heritable for good and all. Despite solemn charters and awful anathemas he
will have to be content with a relief[1080].
But at least, it will be said, there was no ‘right of
Wardship and marriage.
wardship and marriage.’ We can see the beginning of
it. In 983 Oswald let five manses to his kinsman
Gardulf. Gardulf is to enjoy the land during his life; after his death his
widow is to have it, if she remains a widow or if she marries one of the
bishop’s subjects[1081]. So the bishop is already taking an interest in the
marriages of his tenants; he will have no woman holding his land who is
married to one who is not his man. And then Domesday Book tells us how
in the Confessor’s day one of Oswald’s successors had disposed of an
heiress and her land to one of his knights[1082].
Still, it will be urged, the feudalism here displayed is
Seignorial jurisdiction.
imperfect in one important respect. These tenants of
the church of Worcester hold their land under
contracts cognizable by the national courts; they do not hold by any special
feudal law, they are not subject to any feudal tribunal. Now if when we hear
of ‘feudalism,’ we are to think of that orderly, centralized body of land-law
which in Henry III.’s day has subjected the whole realm to its simple but
mighty formulas, the feudalism of Oswald’s land-loans is imperfect enough.
But then we must remind ourselves that never in this country does feudal
law (the Lehnrecht of Germany) become a system to be contrasted with the
ordinary land law (Landrecht)[1083], and also we must observe that already
in Oswald’s day the thegns of the church of Worcester were in all
probability as completely subject to a private and seignorial justice as ever
were any freeholding Englishman. What court protected their tenure, what
Page 300
court would decide a dispute between them and the bishop? Doubtless—it
will be answered—the hundred court. But in all probability that court, the
court of the great triple hundred of Oswaldslaw was already in the hand of
the bishop who gave it its name[1084]. The suits of these tenants would come
into a court where the bishop would preside by himself or his deputy, and
where the doomsmen would be the tenants and justiciables of the bishop—
not indeed because tenure begets jurisdiction (to such a generalization as
this men have not yet come)—but still, the justice that these tenants will get
will be seignorial justice.
Now how far we should be safe in drawing from
Oswaldslaw and England
Oswald’s loans and Oswaldslaw any general at large.
inferences about the whole of England is a difficult
question. It is clear that the bishop was at great pains
to regulate the temporal affairs of his church. He obtained for his leases the
sanction of every authority human and divine, the consent of the convent,
the ealdorman, the king, the witan; he deposited the covenant with the king,
with the archbishop of Canterbury, with the bishop of Winchester. Also we
must remember that he had lived in a Frankish monastery, and that, at least
in things monastic, he was a radical reformer. Nor should it be concealed
that in Domesday Book the entries concerning the estates of the church of
Worcester stand out in bold relief from the monotonous background. Not
only is the account of the hundred of Oswaldslaw prefaced by a statement
which in forcible words lays stress on its complete subjection to the bishop,
but in numerous cases the tenure of the nobler and freer tenants within that
hundred is described as being more or less precarious:—they do whatever
services the bishop may require; they serve ‘at the will of the bishop’; no
one of them may have any lord but the bishop; they are but tenants for a
time and when that time is expired their land will revert to the church[1085].
However, we should hesitate long before we said
Inferences from
that Oswald’s land-loans were merely foreign Oswald’s loans.
innovations. His predecessors had granted leases for
lives; other churches were granting leases for lives,
and the important document that he sent to the king proves to us that we can
not trust our Anglo-Saxon lease or land-book to contain the whole of the
terms of that tenure which it created. Suppose that this unique document
had perished, how utterly mistaken an opinion should we have formed of
will be answered—the hundred court. But in all probability that court, the
court of the great triple hundred of Oswaldslaw was already in the hand of
the bishop who gave it its name[1084]. The suits of these tenants would come
into a court where the bishop would preside by himself or his deputy, and
where the doomsmen would be the tenants and justiciables of the bishop—
not indeed because tenure begets jurisdiction (to such a generalization as
this men have not yet come)—but still, the justice that these tenants will get
will be seignorial justice.
Now how far we should be safe in drawing from
Oswaldslaw and England
Oswald’s loans and Oswaldslaw any general at large.
inferences about the whole of England is a difficult
question. It is clear that the bishop was at great pains
to regulate the temporal affairs of his church. He obtained for his leases the
sanction of every authority human and divine, the consent of the convent,
the ealdorman, the king, the witan; he deposited the covenant with the king,
with the archbishop of Canterbury, with the bishop of Winchester. Also we
must remember that he had lived in a Frankish monastery, and that, at least
in things monastic, he was a radical reformer. Nor should it be concealed
that in Domesday Book the entries concerning the estates of the church of
Worcester stand out in bold relief from the monotonous background. Not
only is the account of the hundred of Oswaldslaw prefaced by a statement
which in forcible words lays stress on its complete subjection to the bishop,
but in numerous cases the tenure of the nobler and freer tenants within that
hundred is described as being more or less precarious:—they do whatever
services the bishop may require; they serve ‘at the will of the bishop’; no
one of them may have any lord but the bishop; they are but tenants for a
time and when that time is expired their land will revert to the church[1085].
However, we should hesitate long before we said
Inferences from
that Oswald’s land-loans were merely foreign Oswald’s loans.
innovations. His predecessors had granted leases for
lives; other churches were granting leases for lives,
and the important document that he sent to the king proves to us that we can
not trust our Anglo-Saxon lease or land-book to contain the whole of the
terms of that tenure which it created. Suppose that this unique document
had perished, how utterly mistaken an opinion should we have formed of
Page 301
the terms upon which the thegns and knights of the church of Worcester
held their lands! We should have heard hardly a word of money payments,
no word of the oath of subjection, of the lex equitandi, of the indefinite
obligation of obeying whatever commands the bishop might give. It may
well be that the thegns and knights of other churches held on terms very
similar to those that the bishop of Worcester imposed. Even if we think that
Oswald was an innovator, we must remember that the adviser of Edgar, the
friend of Dunstan, the reformer of the monasteries, the man who for thirty
years was Bishop of Worcester and for twenty years Archbishop of York,
was able to make innovations on a grand scale. What such a man does
others will do. The yet safer truth that what Oswald did could be done,
should not be meaningless for us. In the second half of the tenth century
there were men willing to take land on such terms as Oswald has described.
These men were not peasants. The land that Oswald
Economic position of
gave them they were not going to cultivate merely Oswald’s tenants.
by their own labour and the labour of their sons and
their slaves, though we are far from saying that they
scorned to handle the plough. We have in Domesday Book a description of
their holdings, and it is clear that in the Confessor’s day, when some of
Oswald’s leases must yet have been in operation, the lessees had what we
should describe as small manors with villeins and cottagers upon them.
Thus, for example, Eadric the Steersman, who led the bishop’s host, had an
estate of five hides which in 1086 had three villani and four bordarii, to say
nothing of a priest, upon it[1086]. Like enough, what the bishop has been
‘loaning’ to his thegns has been by no means always ‘land in demesne,’ it
has been ‘land in service’: in other words, a superiority, a seignory. Thus, as
we say, another course of the feudal edifice is constructed. Above the
cultivator stands the thegn or the cniht, who himself is a tenant under the
bishop and who owes to the bishop services that are neither very light nor
very definite. We can not but raise the question whether the cultivators, if
we suppose them to be in origin free landowners, can support the weight of
this superstructure without being depressed towards serfage. But we are not
yet in a position to deal thoroughly with this question[1087].
We must now return for a moment to the relation
Loan-land and book-
that exists between the loan and the book. Lǽnland land.
is contrasted with bócland; but historians have had
held their lands! We should have heard hardly a word of money payments,
no word of the oath of subjection, of the lex equitandi, of the indefinite
obligation of obeying whatever commands the bishop might give. It may
well be that the thegns and knights of other churches held on terms very
similar to those that the bishop of Worcester imposed. Even if we think that
Oswald was an innovator, we must remember that the adviser of Edgar, the
friend of Dunstan, the reformer of the monasteries, the man who for thirty
years was Bishop of Worcester and for twenty years Archbishop of York,
was able to make innovations on a grand scale. What such a man does
others will do. The yet safer truth that what Oswald did could be done,
should not be meaningless for us. In the second half of the tenth century
there were men willing to take land on such terms as Oswald has described.
These men were not peasants. The land that Oswald
Economic position of
gave them they were not going to cultivate merely Oswald’s tenants.
by their own labour and the labour of their sons and
their slaves, though we are far from saying that they
scorned to handle the plough. We have in Domesday Book a description of
their holdings, and it is clear that in the Confessor’s day, when some of
Oswald’s leases must yet have been in operation, the lessees had what we
should describe as small manors with villeins and cottagers upon them.
Thus, for example, Eadric the Steersman, who led the bishop’s host, had an
estate of five hides which in 1086 had three villani and four bordarii, to say
nothing of a priest, upon it[1086]. Like enough, what the bishop has been
‘loaning’ to his thegns has been by no means always ‘land in demesne,’ it
has been ‘land in service’: in other words, a superiority, a seignory. Thus, as
we say, another course of the feudal edifice is constructed. Above the
cultivator stands the thegn or the cniht, who himself is a tenant under the
bishop and who owes to the bishop services that are neither very light nor
very definite. We can not but raise the question whether the cultivators, if
we suppose them to be in origin free landowners, can support the weight of
this superstructure without being depressed towards serfage. But we are not
yet in a position to deal thoroughly with this question[1087].
We must now return for a moment to the relation
Loan-land and book-
that exists between the loan and the book. Lǽnland land.
is contrasted with bócland; but historians have had
Page 302
the greatest difficulty in discovering the principle that lies beneath this
distinction[1088]. Certainly we can not say that, while book-land is created
and governed by a charter, there will be no written instrument, no book,
creating and governing the lǽn. We have books which in unambiguous
terms tell us that they bear witness to loans. Nor can we say that the holder
of book-land will always have a perpetual right to the land, ‘an estate in fee
simple,’ an estate to him and his heirs. In many cases a royal charter will
create a smaller estate than this; it will limit the descent of the land to the
heirs male of the donee. Moreover the written leases for three lives of
which we have been speaking are ‘books.’ Thus in 977 Oswald grants three
manses to his thegn Eadric for three lives, and the charter ends with a
statement which tells us in English that Oswald the archbishop is booking
to Eadric his thegn three hides of land which Eadric formerly held as
lǽnland[1089]. A similar deed of 985 contains a similar statement; five hides
which Eadric held as lǽnland are now being booked to him, but booked
only for three lives[1090]. In yet another of Oswald’s charters we are told
that the donee is to hold the land by way of book-land as amply as he before
held it by way of lǽnland[1091]. After this it is needless to say that book-land
may be burdened with rents and services. But indeed it would seem that
Oswald’s thegns and knights held both book-land and lǽnland. It was book-
land because it had been booked to them, and yet very certainly it had only
been loaned to them[1092].
Let us then turn to the laws and read what they say
Book-land in the dooms.
about book-land. Two rules stand out clearly.
Æthelred the Unready declares that every wíte
incurred by a holder of book-land is to be paid to the king[1093]. Cnut
declares that the book-land of the outlaw, whosesoever man he may be, and
of the man who flies in battle is to go to the king[1094]. These laws seem to
put before us the holder of book-land as standing by reason of his land in
some specially close relationship to the king. If we may use the language of
a later day, the holder of book-land is a tenant in chief of the king, and this
even though he may have commended himself to someone else. On the
other hand, if the holder of lǽnland commits a grave crime, his land reverts,
or escheats or is forfeited to the man who made the lǽn[1095]. And yet,
though this be so and though Oswald’s thegns will in some sense or another
be holding book-land, we may be quite certain that should one of them be
distinction[1088]. Certainly we can not say that, while book-land is created
and governed by a charter, there will be no written instrument, no book,
creating and governing the lǽn. We have books which in unambiguous
terms tell us that they bear witness to loans. Nor can we say that the holder
of book-land will always have a perpetual right to the land, ‘an estate in fee
simple,’ an estate to him and his heirs. In many cases a royal charter will
create a smaller estate than this; it will limit the descent of the land to the
heirs male of the donee. Moreover the written leases for three lives of
which we have been speaking are ‘books.’ Thus in 977 Oswald grants three
manses to his thegn Eadric for three lives, and the charter ends with a
statement which tells us in English that Oswald the archbishop is booking
to Eadric his thegn three hides of land which Eadric formerly held as
lǽnland[1089]. A similar deed of 985 contains a similar statement; five hides
which Eadric held as lǽnland are now being booked to him, but booked
only for three lives[1090]. In yet another of Oswald’s charters we are told
that the donee is to hold the land by way of book-land as amply as he before
held it by way of lǽnland[1091]. After this it is needless to say that book-land
may be burdened with rents and services. But indeed it would seem that
Oswald’s thegns and knights held both book-land and lǽnland. It was book-
land because it had been booked to them, and yet very certainly it had only
been loaned to them[1092].
Let us then turn to the laws and read what they say
Book-land in the dooms.
about book-land. Two rules stand out clearly.
Æthelred the Unready declares that every wíte
incurred by a holder of book-land is to be paid to the king[1093]. Cnut
declares that the book-land of the outlaw, whosesoever man he may be, and
of the man who flies in battle is to go to the king[1094]. These laws seem to
put before us the holder of book-land as standing by reason of his land in
some specially close relationship to the king. If we may use the language of
a later day, the holder of book-land is a tenant in chief of the king, and this
even though he may have commended himself to someone else. On the
other hand, if the holder of lǽnland commits a grave crime, his land reverts,
or escheats or is forfeited to the man who made the lǽn[1095]. And yet,
though this be so and though Oswald’s thegns will in some sense or another
be holding book-land, we may be quite certain that should one of them be
Page 303
outlawed the bishop will claim the land. Indeed he is careful about this as
about other matters. Often he inserts in his charter a clause saying that,
whatever the grantee may do, the land shall return unforfeited to the church.
Any solution of these difficulties must be of a
Relation of loan-land to
somewhat speculative kind. We fashion for ourselves book-land.
a history of the book and of the land-loan which runs
as follows:—The written charter first makes its
appearance as a foreign and ecclesiastical novelty. For a very long time it is
used mainly, if not solely, as a means of endowing the churches with lands
and superiorities. It is an instrument of a very solemn character armed with
the anathema and sanctioned by the crosses of those who can bind and
loose. Usually it confers rights which none but kings can bestow, and which
even kings ought hardly to bestow save with the advice of their councillors.
A mass of rights held under such a charter is book-land, or, if we please, the
land over which such rights are exercisable, is book-land for the grantee. In
course of time similar privileges are granted by the kings to their thegns,
though the book does not thereby altogether lose its religious traits. It is
long before private persons begin to use writing for the conveyance or
creation of rights in land. The total number of the books executed by
persons who are neither kings, nor underkings, nor prelates of the church,
was, we take it, never very large; certainly the number of such books that
have come down to us is very small.
Nothing could be more utterly unproved than the
Royal and other books.
opinion that in Anglo-Saxon times written
instruments were commonly used for the transfer of
rights in land. Let us glance for a moment at the documents that purport to
have come to us from the tenth century. Genuine and spurious we have near
six hundred. But we exclude first the grants made by the kings, secondly
Oswald’s leases and a few similar documents executed by other prelates,
thirdly a few testamentary or quasi-testamentary dispositions made by the
great and wealthy. Hardly ten documents remain. Let us observe their
nature. The ealdorman and lady of the Mercians make a grant to a church in
royal fashion[1096]; but in every other case in which we have a document
which we can conceive as either transferring rights in land or as being
formal evidence of such a transfer, the consent of the king or of the king
and witan to the transaction is stated, and with hardly an exception the king
about other matters. Often he inserts in his charter a clause saying that,
whatever the grantee may do, the land shall return unforfeited to the church.
Any solution of these difficulties must be of a
Relation of loan-land to
somewhat speculative kind. We fashion for ourselves book-land.
a history of the book and of the land-loan which runs
as follows:—The written charter first makes its
appearance as a foreign and ecclesiastical novelty. For a very long time it is
used mainly, if not solely, as a means of endowing the churches with lands
and superiorities. It is an instrument of a very solemn character armed with
the anathema and sanctioned by the crosses of those who can bind and
loose. Usually it confers rights which none but kings can bestow, and which
even kings ought hardly to bestow save with the advice of their councillors.
A mass of rights held under such a charter is book-land, or, if we please, the
land over which such rights are exercisable, is book-land for the grantee. In
course of time similar privileges are granted by the kings to their thegns,
though the book does not thereby altogether lose its religious traits. It is
long before private persons begin to use writing for the conveyance or
creation of rights in land. The total number of the books executed by
persons who are neither kings, nor underkings, nor prelates of the church,
was, we take it, never very large; certainly the number of such books that
have come down to us is very small.
Nothing could be more utterly unproved than the
Royal and other books.
opinion that in Anglo-Saxon times written
instruments were commonly used for the transfer of
rights in land. Let us glance for a moment at the documents that purport to
have come to us from the tenth century. Genuine and spurious we have near
six hundred. But we exclude first the grants made by the kings, secondly
Oswald’s leases and a few similar documents executed by other prelates,
thirdly a few testamentary or quasi-testamentary dispositions made by the
great and wealthy. Hardly ten documents remain. Let us observe their
nature. The ealdorman and lady of the Mercians make a grant to a church in
royal fashion[1096]; but in every other case in which we have a document
which we can conceive as either transferring rights in land or as being
formal evidence of such a transfer, the consent of the king or of the king
and witan to the transaction is stated, and with hardly an exception the king
Page 304
executes the document[1097]. Even the holder of book-land who wished to
alienate it, for example, the thegn who wished to pass on his book-land to a
church, did not in general execute a written conveyance. One of three
courses was followed. The donor handed over his own book, the book
granted by the king, and apparently this was enough; or the parties to the
transaction went before the king, delivered up the old and obtained a new
book; or the donor executed some brief instrument—sometimes a mere note
endorsed on the original book—stating how he had transferred his
right[1098]. But in any case, according to the common usage of words, a
usage which has a long history behind it, it is only the man who is holding
under a royal privilege who has ‘book-land.’ It is to this established usage
that the laws refer when they declare that the king and no lower lord is to
have the wíte from the holder of book-land, and that when book-land is
forfeited it is forfeited to the king. For all this, however, if you adhere to the
letter, book-land can only mean land held by book. Now from a remote time
men have been ‘loaning’ land, and prelates when they have made a loan
have sometimes executed a written instrument, a book. A prelate can
pronounce the anathema and the recipient of the lǽn may well wish to be
protected, not merely by writing, but by Christ’s rood. When therefore
Bishop Oswald grants a written lease to one of his thegns who heretofore
has been in enjoyment of the land but has had no charter to show for it, we
may well say that in the future this thegn will have book-land, though at the
same time he has but loan-land. We have no scruple about charging our
ancestors with having a confused terminology. The confusion is due to a
natural development; ‘books’ were formerly used only for one purpose, they
are beginning to be used for many purposes, and consequently ‘book-land’
may mean one thing in one context, another in another. We may say that
every one who holds under a written document holds book-land, or we may
still confine the name ‘book’ to that class of books which was at one time
the only class. The king’s charters, the king’s privileges, have been the only
books; they are still books in a preeminent sense. Just so in later days men
will speak of ‘tenure in capite’ when what they really mean is ‘tenure in
capite of the crown by military service[1099].’
But there is a deeper cause of perplexity. Once more
The gift and the loan.
we must repeat that the gift shades off into the loan,
the loan into the gift. The loan is a gift for a time. It
alienate it, for example, the thegn who wished to pass on his book-land to a
church, did not in general execute a written conveyance. One of three
courses was followed. The donor handed over his own book, the book
granted by the king, and apparently this was enough; or the parties to the
transaction went before the king, delivered up the old and obtained a new
book; or the donor executed some brief instrument—sometimes a mere note
endorsed on the original book—stating how he had transferred his
right[1098]. But in any case, according to the common usage of words, a
usage which has a long history behind it, it is only the man who is holding
under a royal privilege who has ‘book-land.’ It is to this established usage
that the laws refer when they declare that the king and no lower lord is to
have the wíte from the holder of book-land, and that when book-land is
forfeited it is forfeited to the king. For all this, however, if you adhere to the
letter, book-land can only mean land held by book. Now from a remote time
men have been ‘loaning’ land, and prelates when they have made a loan
have sometimes executed a written instrument, a book. A prelate can
pronounce the anathema and the recipient of the lǽn may well wish to be
protected, not merely by writing, but by Christ’s rood. When therefore
Bishop Oswald grants a written lease to one of his thegns who heretofore
has been in enjoyment of the land but has had no charter to show for it, we
may well say that in the future this thegn will have book-land, though at the
same time he has but loan-land. We have no scruple about charging our
ancestors with having a confused terminology. The confusion is due to a
natural development; ‘books’ were formerly used only for one purpose, they
are beginning to be used for many purposes, and consequently ‘book-land’
may mean one thing in one context, another in another. We may say that
every one who holds under a written document holds book-land, or we may
still confine the name ‘book’ to that class of books which was at one time
the only class. The king’s charters, the king’s privileges, have been the only
books; they are still books in a preeminent sense. Just so in later days men
will speak of ‘tenure in capite’ when what they really mean is ‘tenure in
capite of the crown by military service[1099].’
But there is a deeper cause of perplexity. Once more
The gift and the loan.
we must repeat that the gift shades off into the loan,
the loan into the gift. The loan is a gift for a time. It
Page 305
is by words of donation (‘I give,’ ‘I grant’) that Oswald’s beneficia are
praestita to his knights and thegns. Conversely, the king’s most absolute
gift leaves something owing and continuously owing to him; it may be
prayers, it may be fealty and obedience. And having considered by how
rarely good fortune it is that we know the terms of Oswald’s land-loans,
how thoroughly we might have mistaken their nature but for the
preservation of a single document, we shall be very cautious in denying that
between many of the holders of book-land and the king there was in the
latter half of the tenth century a relationship for which we have no other
name than feudal tenure. If Oswald’s charters create such a tenure, what
shall we say of the numerous charters whereby Edred, Edwy, Edgar and
Æthelred grant land to their thegns in consideration of fealty and
obedience? Must not these thegns fulfil the whole lex equitandi; will they
not lose their lands if they fail in this service? True that the rights conferred
upon them are not restrained within the compass of three lives but are
heritable ad infinitum. But does this affect the character of their tenure? Can
we—we can not in more recent times—draw any inference from ‘the
quantum of the estate’ to ‘the quality of the tenure’? On the whole, we are
inclined to believe that the practice of loaning lands affected the practice of
giving lands, there being no sharp and formal distinction between the gift
and the loan, and that when Edward the Confessor died no great injustice
would have been done by a statement that those who held their lands by
royal books held their lands ‘of’ the king. This at least we know, that the
formula of dependent tenure (‘A holds land of B’) was current in the
English speech of the Confessor’s days and that some of the king’s thegns
held their land ‘of’ the king[1100]. We may guess that those old terms ‘book-
land’ and ‘loan-land’ would soon have disappeared even from an
unconquered England, for it was becoming plain that the book bears
witness to a loan. A new word was wanted; that word was feudum.
praestita to his knights and thegns. Conversely, the king’s most absolute
gift leaves something owing and continuously owing to him; it may be
prayers, it may be fealty and obedience. And having considered by how
rarely good fortune it is that we know the terms of Oswald’s land-loans,
how thoroughly we might have mistaken their nature but for the
preservation of a single document, we shall be very cautious in denying that
between many of the holders of book-land and the king there was in the
latter half of the tenth century a relationship for which we have no other
name than feudal tenure. If Oswald’s charters create such a tenure, what
shall we say of the numerous charters whereby Edred, Edwy, Edgar and
Æthelred grant land to their thegns in consideration of fealty and
obedience? Must not these thegns fulfil the whole lex equitandi; will they
not lose their lands if they fail in this service? True that the rights conferred
upon them are not restrained within the compass of three lives but are
heritable ad infinitum. But does this affect the character of their tenure? Can
we—we can not in more recent times—draw any inference from ‘the
quantum of the estate’ to ‘the quality of the tenure’? On the whole, we are
inclined to believe that the practice of loaning lands affected the practice of
giving lands, there being no sharp and formal distinction between the gift
and the loan, and that when Edward the Confessor died no great injustice
would have been done by a statement that those who held their lands by
royal books held their lands ‘of’ the king. This at least we know, that the
formula of dependent tenure (‘A holds land of B’) was current in the
English speech of the Confessor’s days and that some of the king’s thegns
held their land ‘of’ the king[1100]. We may guess that those old terms ‘book-
land’ and ‘loan-land’ would soon have disappeared even from an
unconquered England, for it was becoming plain that the book bears
witness to a loan. A new word was wanted; that word was feudum.
Page 306
Page 307
§ 5. The Growth of Seignorial Power.
We now return to our original theme, the subjection
Subjection of free men.
to seignorial power of free land-holders and their
land, for we now have at our command the legal
machinery, which, when set in motion by economic and social forces, is
capable of effecting that subjection. Let us suppose a village full of free
land-holders. The king makes over to a church all the rights that he has in
that village, reserving only the trinoda necessitas and perhaps some pleas of
the crown. The church now has a superiority over the village, over the
ceorls; it has a right to receive all that, but for the king’s charter, would have
gone to him.
In the first place, it has a right to the feorm, the
The royal grantee and his
pastus or victus that the king has hitherto exacted. land.
We should be wrong in thinking that in the ninth
century (whatever may have been the case in earlier
times) this exaction was a small matter. In 883 Æthelred ealdorman of the
Mercians with the consent of King Alfred freed the lands of Berkeley
minster from such parts of the king’s gafol or feorm as had until then been
unredeemed. In return for this he received twelve hides of land and thirty
mancuses of gold, and then in consideration of another sixty mancuses of
gold he proceeded to grant a lease of these twelve hides for three lives[1101].
The king had been deriving a revenue from this land ‘in clear ale, in beer, in
honey, in cattle, in swine and in sheep.’ In Domesday Book a ‘one night’s
farm’ is no trifle; it is all that the king gets from large stretches of his
demesne[1102]. Having become entitled to this royal right, the church would
proceed to make some new settlement with the villagers. Perhaps it would
stipulate for a one night’s farm for the monks, that is to say, for a
provender-rent capable of supporting the convent for a day. In the middle of
the ninth century a day’s farm of the monks of Canterbury comprised forty
sesters of ale, sixty loaves, a wether, two cheeses and four fowls, besides
other things[1103]. When once a village is charged in favour of a lord with a
provender-rent of this kind, the lord’s grip upon the land may easily be
We now return to our original theme, the subjection
Subjection of free men.
to seignorial power of free land-holders and their
land, for we now have at our command the legal
machinery, which, when set in motion by economic and social forces, is
capable of effecting that subjection. Let us suppose a village full of free
land-holders. The king makes over to a church all the rights that he has in
that village, reserving only the trinoda necessitas and perhaps some pleas of
the crown. The church now has a superiority over the village, over the
ceorls; it has a right to receive all that, but for the king’s charter, would have
gone to him.
In the first place, it has a right to the feorm, the
The royal grantee and his
pastus or victus that the king has hitherto exacted. land.
We should be wrong in thinking that in the ninth
century (whatever may have been the case in earlier
times) this exaction was a small matter. In 883 Æthelred ealdorman of the
Mercians with the consent of King Alfred freed the lands of Berkeley
minster from such parts of the king’s gafol or feorm as had until then been
unredeemed. In return for this he received twelve hides of land and thirty
mancuses of gold, and then in consideration of another sixty mancuses of
gold he proceeded to grant a lease of these twelve hides for three lives[1101].
The king had been deriving a revenue from this land ‘in clear ale, in beer, in
honey, in cattle, in swine and in sheep.’ In Domesday Book a ‘one night’s
farm’ is no trifle; it is all that the king gets from large stretches of his
demesne[1102]. Having become entitled to this royal right, the church would
proceed to make some new settlement with the villagers. Perhaps it would
stipulate for a one night’s farm for the monks, that is to say, for a
provender-rent capable of supporting the convent for a day. In the middle of
the ninth century a day’s farm of the monks of Canterbury comprised forty
sesters of ale, sixty loaves, a wether, two cheeses and four fowls, besides
other things[1103]. When once a village is charged in favour of a lord with a
provender-rent of this kind, the lord’s grip upon the land may easily be
Page 308
tightened. A settlement in terms of bread and beer is not likely to be stable.
Some change in circumstances will make it inconvenient to all parties and
the stronger bargainer will make the best of the new bargain. The church
will be a strong bargainer for it has an inexhaustible treasure-house upon
which to draw. We, however, concerned with legal ideas, have merely to
notice that the law will give free play to social, economic and religious
forces which are likely to work in the lord’s favour.
But a village charged with a ‘provender-rent’ may
Provender rents and the
seem far enough removed from the typical manor of manorial economy.
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. In the one we
see the villagers cultivating each for his own behoof
and supplying the lord at stated seasons with a certain quantity of victuals;
in the other the villagers spend a great portion of their time in tilling the
lord’s demesne land. In the latter case the lord himself appears as an
agriculturist: in the former he is no agriculturist, but merely a receiver of
rent. The gulf may seem wide; but it is not impassable. One part, the last
part, of a process which surmounts it is visible. In the eleventh and twelfth
centuries the lords, though they have much land in demesne, still reckon the
whole or part of what they are to receive from each manor in terms of
‘farms’; the king gets a one night’s farm from this manor, the convent of
Ramsey gets a fortnight’s farm from that manor[1104]. But we can conceive
how the change begins. The monks are not going to travel, as a king may
have travelled, from village to village feasting at the expense of the folk.
They are going to live in their monastery; they want a regular supply of
victuals brought to them. They must have an overseer in the village, one
who will look to it that the bread and beer are sent off punctually and are
good. In the village over which they already have a superiority they acquire
a manse of their very own, a mansus indominicatus as their foreign brethren
would call it. When once they are thus established in the village, piety and
other-worldliness will do much towards increasing their demesne and
strengthening their position[1105].
We have argued above that in the first instance it was
The church and the
not by means of the petty gifts of private persons peasants.
that the churches amassed their wide territories. The
starting point is the alienation of a royal superiority.
Still there can be little doubt that the small folk were just as careful of their
Some change in circumstances will make it inconvenient to all parties and
the stronger bargainer will make the best of the new bargain. The church
will be a strong bargainer for it has an inexhaustible treasure-house upon
which to draw. We, however, concerned with legal ideas, have merely to
notice that the law will give free play to social, economic and religious
forces which are likely to work in the lord’s favour.
But a village charged with a ‘provender-rent’ may
Provender rents and the
seem far enough removed from the typical manor of manorial economy.
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. In the one we
see the villagers cultivating each for his own behoof
and supplying the lord at stated seasons with a certain quantity of victuals;
in the other the villagers spend a great portion of their time in tilling the
lord’s demesne land. In the latter case the lord himself appears as an
agriculturist: in the former he is no agriculturist, but merely a receiver of
rent. The gulf may seem wide; but it is not impassable. One part, the last
part, of a process which surmounts it is visible. In the eleventh and twelfth
centuries the lords, though they have much land in demesne, still reckon the
whole or part of what they are to receive from each manor in terms of
‘farms’; the king gets a one night’s farm from this manor, the convent of
Ramsey gets a fortnight’s farm from that manor[1104]. But we can conceive
how the change begins. The monks are not going to travel, as a king may
have travelled, from village to village feasting at the expense of the folk.
They are going to live in their monastery; they want a regular supply of
victuals brought to them. They must have an overseer in the village, one
who will look to it that the bread and beer are sent off punctually and are
good. In the village over which they already have a superiority they acquire
a manse of their very own, a mansus indominicatus as their foreign brethren
would call it. When once they are thus established in the village, piety and
other-worldliness will do much towards increasing their demesne and
strengthening their position[1105].
We have argued above that in the first instance it was
The church and the
not by means of the petty gifts of private persons peasants.
that the churches amassed their wide territories. The
starting point is the alienation of a royal superiority.
Still there can be little doubt that the small folk were just as careful of their
Page 309
souls as were their rulers. They make gifts to the church. Moreover, the gift
is likely to create a dependent tenure. They want to give, and yet they want
to keep, for their land is their livelihood. They surrender the land to the
church: but then they take it back again as a life-long loan. Thus the church
has no great difficulty about getting demesne. But further, it gets dependent
tenants and a dependent tenure is established. Like enough on the death of
the donor his heirs will be suffered to hold what their ancestor held. Very
possibly the church will be glad to make a compromise, for it may be
doubtful whether these donationes post obitum[1106], or these gifts with
reservation of an usufruct, can be defended against one, who, not having the
fear of God before his eyes, will make a determined attack upon them.
Gradually the church becomes more and more interested in the husbandry
of the village. It receives gifts; it makes loans; it substitutes labour services
to be done on its demesne lands for the old feorm of provender. It is rash to
draw inferences from the fragmentary and obscure laws of Ine; but one of
them certainly suggests that, at least in some district of Wessex, this process
was going on rapidly at the end of the seventh century, so rapidly and so
oppressively that the king had to step in to protect the smaller folk. The man
who has taken a yard of land at a rent is being compelled not only to pay
but also to labour. This, says the king, he need not do unless he is provided
with a house[1107].
Now we are far from saying that the manorial system
Growth of the manorial
of rural economy is thus invented. From the time of system.
the Teutonic conquest of England onwards there may
have been servile villages, Roman villas with slaves
and coloni cultivating the owner’s demesne, which had passed bodily to a
new master. We have no evidence that is capable of disproving or of
proving this. What we think more probable is that in those tracts where true
villages (nucleated villages, as we have before now called them[1108]) were
not formed, the conquerors fitted themselves into an agrarian scheme drawn
for them by the Britons, and that in the small scattered hamlets which
existed in these tracts there was all along a great deal of slavery[1109]. But,
at any rate, the church was a cosmopolitan institution. Many a prelate of the
ninth and tenth centuries, Bishop Oswald for one, must have known well
enough how the foreign monasteries managed their lands, and, whatever
controversies may rage round questions of remoter history, there can be no
is likely to create a dependent tenure. They want to give, and yet they want
to keep, for their land is their livelihood. They surrender the land to the
church: but then they take it back again as a life-long loan. Thus the church
has no great difficulty about getting demesne. But further, it gets dependent
tenants and a dependent tenure is established. Like enough on the death of
the donor his heirs will be suffered to hold what their ancestor held. Very
possibly the church will be glad to make a compromise, for it may be
doubtful whether these donationes post obitum[1106], or these gifts with
reservation of an usufruct, can be defended against one, who, not having the
fear of God before his eyes, will make a determined attack upon them.
Gradually the church becomes more and more interested in the husbandry
of the village. It receives gifts; it makes loans; it substitutes labour services
to be done on its demesne lands for the old feorm of provender. It is rash to
draw inferences from the fragmentary and obscure laws of Ine; but one of
them certainly suggests that, at least in some district of Wessex, this process
was going on rapidly at the end of the seventh century, so rapidly and so
oppressively that the king had to step in to protect the smaller folk. The man
who has taken a yard of land at a rent is being compelled not only to pay
but also to labour. This, says the king, he need not do unless he is provided
with a house[1107].
Now we are far from saying that the manorial system
Growth of the manorial
of rural economy is thus invented. From the time of system.
the Teutonic conquest of England onwards there may
have been servile villages, Roman villas with slaves
and coloni cultivating the owner’s demesne, which had passed bodily to a
new master. We have no evidence that is capable of disproving or of
proving this. What we think more probable is that in those tracts where true
villages (nucleated villages, as we have before now called them[1108]) were
not formed, the conquerors fitted themselves into an agrarian scheme drawn
for them by the Britons, and that in the small scattered hamlets which
existed in these tracts there was all along a great deal of slavery[1109]. But,
at any rate, the church was a cosmopolitan institution. Many a prelate of the
ninth and tenth centuries, Bishop Oswald for one, must have known well
enough how the foreign monasteries managed their lands, and, whatever
controversies may rage round questions of remoter history, there can be no
Page 310
doubt that by this time the rural economy of the church estates in France
was in substance that which we know as manorial. Foreign precedents in
this as in other matters may have done a great work in England[1110]. All
that we are here concerned to show is that there were forces at work which
were capable of transmuting a village full of free landholders into a manor
full of villeins.
Besides the rights transferred to it by the king, the
Church-scot and tithe.
church would have other rights at its command
which it could employ for the subjection—we use
the word in no bad sense—of the peasantry. By the law of God it might
claim first-fruits and tenths. The payment known as ciric-sceat, church-scot,
is a very obscure matter[1111]. Certainly in laws of the tenth century it seems
to be put before us as a general tax or rate, due from all lands, and not
merely from those lands over which a church has the lordship. On the other
hand, both in earlier and in later documents it seems to have a much less
general character. In some of the earlier it looks like a due, we may even
say a rent (ecclesiasticus census) paid to a church out of its own lands,
while in the later documents, for example in Domesday Book, it appears
sporadically and looks like a heavy burden on some lands, a light burden on
others. The evidence suggests that the church had attempted and on the
whole had failed, despite the help of kings and laws, to make this impost
general. That in some districts it was a serious incumbrance we may be
sure. On those estates of the church of Worcester to which we have often
referred, every hide was bound to pay upon St. Martin’s day one horse-load
(summa) of the best corn that grew upon it. He who did not pay upon the
appointed day incurred the outrageous penalty of paying twelve-fold, and in
addition to this a fine was inflicted[1112]. If the bishop often insisted on the
letter of this severe rule, he must have reduced many a free ceorl to beggary.
It is by no means certain that the duty of paying tithe has not a somewhat
similar history. Though in this case the impost became a general burden
incumbent on all lands, it may have been a duty of perfect obligation for the
subjects of the churches, while as yet for the mass of other landowners it
was but a religious duty or even a counsel of perfection. At any rate, this
subtraction of a tenth of the gross produce of the earth is no light thing: it is
quite capable of debasing many men from landownership to dependent
tenancy.
was in substance that which we know as manorial. Foreign precedents in
this as in other matters may have done a great work in England[1110]. All
that we are here concerned to show is that there were forces at work which
were capable of transmuting a village full of free landholders into a manor
full of villeins.
Besides the rights transferred to it by the king, the
Church-scot and tithe.
church would have other rights at its command
which it could employ for the subjection—we use
the word in no bad sense—of the peasantry. By the law of God it might
claim first-fruits and tenths. The payment known as ciric-sceat, church-scot,
is a very obscure matter[1111]. Certainly in laws of the tenth century it seems
to be put before us as a general tax or rate, due from all lands, and not
merely from those lands over which a church has the lordship. On the other
hand, both in earlier and in later documents it seems to have a much less
general character. In some of the earlier it looks like a due, we may even
say a rent (ecclesiasticus census) paid to a church out of its own lands,
while in the later documents, for example in Domesday Book, it appears
sporadically and looks like a heavy burden on some lands, a light burden on
others. The evidence suggests that the church had attempted and on the
whole had failed, despite the help of kings and laws, to make this impost
general. That in some districts it was a serious incumbrance we may be
sure. On those estates of the church of Worcester to which we have often
referred, every hide was bound to pay upon St. Martin’s day one horse-load
(summa) of the best corn that grew upon it. He who did not pay upon the
appointed day incurred the outrageous penalty of paying twelve-fold, and in
addition to this a fine was inflicted[1112]. If the bishop often insisted on the
letter of this severe rule, he must have reduced many a free ceorl to beggary.
It is by no means certain that the duty of paying tithe has not a somewhat
similar history. Though in this case the impost became a general burden
incumbent on all lands, it may have been a duty of perfect obligation for the
subjects of the churches, while as yet for the mass of other landowners it
was but a religious duty or even a counsel of perfection. At any rate, this
subtraction of a tenth of the gross produce of the earth is no light thing: it is
quite capable of debasing many men from landownership to dependent
tenancy.
Page 311
Another potent instrument for the subjection of the
Jurisdictional rights of
free landowners would be the jurisdictional rights the lord.
which passed from the king to the churches and the
thegns. At first this transfer would appear as a small
matter. The president of a court of free men is changed:—that is all. Where
the king’s reeve sat, the bishop or the bishop’s reeve now sits; fines which
went to the royal hoard now go to the minster; but a moot of free men still
administers folk-right to the justiciables of the church. However, in course
of time the change will have important effects. In the first place, it helps to
bind up suit of court with the tenure of land. The suitor goes to the bishop’s
court because he holds land of which the bishop is the lord. If, as will often
be the case, he wishes to escape from the burdensome duty, he will pay an
annual sum in lieu thereof, and here is a new rent. Then again all the affairs
of the territory are now periodically brought under the bishop’s eye; he
knows, or his reeves know, all about every one’s business and they have
countless opportunities of granting favours and therefore of driving
bargains. Moreover it is by no means unlikely that the lord will now have
something to say about the transfer of land, for it is by no means unlikely
that conveyances will be made in court, and that the rod or festuca which
serves as a symbol of possession will be handed by the seller to the reeve
and by the reeve to the purchaser. We need not regard the conveyance in
court as a relic of a time when a village community would have had a word
to say if any of its members proposed to assign his share to an outsider.
There are many reasons for conveying land in court. We get witnesses there,
and no mere mortal witnesses but the testimony of a court which does not
die. Then, again, there may be the claims of expectant heirs to be precluded
and perhaps they can be precluded by a decree of the court. The seller’s
kinsfolk can be ordered to assert their rights within some limited time or
else to hold their peace for ever after, so that the purchaser will hold the
land under the court’s ban[1113]. And thus the rod passes through the hands
of the president. But ‘nothing for nothing’ is a good medieval rule. The lord
will take a small fine for this land-cóp, this sale of land, and soon it may
seem that the purchaser acquires his title to the land rather from the lord
than from the vendor[1114].
Yet another turn is given to the screw, if we may so speak, when the state
and the church begin to hold the lord answerable for taxes which in the last
Jurisdictional rights of
free landowners would be the jurisdictional rights the lord.
which passed from the king to the churches and the
thegns. At first this transfer would appear as a small
matter. The president of a court of free men is changed:—that is all. Where
the king’s reeve sat, the bishop or the bishop’s reeve now sits; fines which
went to the royal hoard now go to the minster; but a moot of free men still
administers folk-right to the justiciables of the church. However, in course
of time the change will have important effects. In the first place, it helps to
bind up suit of court with the tenure of land. The suitor goes to the bishop’s
court because he holds land of which the bishop is the lord. If, as will often
be the case, he wishes to escape from the burdensome duty, he will pay an
annual sum in lieu thereof, and here is a new rent. Then again all the affairs
of the territory are now periodically brought under the bishop’s eye; he
knows, or his reeves know, all about every one’s business and they have
countless opportunities of granting favours and therefore of driving
bargains. Moreover it is by no means unlikely that the lord will now have
something to say about the transfer of land, for it is by no means unlikely
that conveyances will be made in court, and that the rod or festuca which
serves as a symbol of possession will be handed by the seller to the reeve
and by the reeve to the purchaser. We need not regard the conveyance in
court as a relic of a time when a village community would have had a word
to say if any of its members proposed to assign his share to an outsider.
There are many reasons for conveying land in court. We get witnesses there,
and no mere mortal witnesses but the testimony of a court which does not
die. Then, again, there may be the claims of expectant heirs to be precluded
and perhaps they can be precluded by a decree of the court. The seller’s
kinsfolk can be ordered to assert their rights within some limited time or
else to hold their peace for ever after, so that the purchaser will hold the
land under the court’s ban[1113]. And thus the rod passes through the hands
of the president. But ‘nothing for nothing’ is a good medieval rule. The lord
will take a small fine for this land-cóp, this sale of land, and soon it may
seem that the purchaser acquires his title to the land rather from the lord
than from the vendor[1114].
Yet another turn is given to the screw, if we may so speak, when the state
and the church begin to hold the lord answerable for taxes which in the last
Page 312
resort should be paid by the tenant[1115]. This, when
The lord and his man’s
we call to mind the huge weight of the danegeld, will taxes.
appear as a matter of the utmost importance. Before
the end of the tenth century—this is the picture that
we draw for ourselves—large masses of free peasants were in sore straits
and were in many ways subject to their lords. Many of them were really
holding their tenements by a more or less precarious tenure. They had taken
‘loans’ from their lord and become bound to pay rents and work
continuously on his inland. Others of them may have had ancient ancestral
titles which could have been traced back to free settlers and free
conquerors; but for centuries past a lord had wielded rights over their land.
The king’s feorm had become the lord’s gafol, and this, supplemented by
church-scot and by tithes, may have been turned into gafol and week-work.
The time came for a new and heavy tax. This was a crushing burden, and
even had the geld been collected from the small folk it would have had the
effect of converting many of them from landowners into
landborrowers[1116]. But a worse fate befell them. They were so poor that
the state could no longer deal with them; it dealt with their lord; he paid for
their land. It follows that in the eye of the state their land is his land. Less
and less will the national courts and the folk-law recognize their titles; the
lord ‘defends’ this land against all the claims of the state; therefore the state
regards it as his. Hence what seems the primary distinction drawn by
Domesday Book—that between the soke-man and the villanus. The villanus
is not rated to the land-tax. Some men are not rated to the geld because they
have but precarious titles; other men have precarious titles because they are
not rated to the geld. A wide and a legally definable class is formed of men
who hold land and who yet are fast losing the warranty of national law.
When once the country is full of lords with sake and soke, a very small
change, a very small exhibition of indifference on the part of the state, will
deprive the peasants of this warranty and condemn them to hold, not by the
law of the land, but by the custom of their lord’s court.
To this depth of degradation the great mass of the
Depression of the free
English peasants in the southern and western ceorl.
counties—the villani, bordarii, cotarii of Domesday
Book—may perhaps have come before the Norman
Conquest. There may have been no courts which would recognize their
The lord and his man’s
we call to mind the huge weight of the danegeld, will taxes.
appear as a matter of the utmost importance. Before
the end of the tenth century—this is the picture that
we draw for ourselves—large masses of free peasants were in sore straits
and were in many ways subject to their lords. Many of them were really
holding their tenements by a more or less precarious tenure. They had taken
‘loans’ from their lord and become bound to pay rents and work
continuously on his inland. Others of them may have had ancient ancestral
titles which could have been traced back to free settlers and free
conquerors; but for centuries past a lord had wielded rights over their land.
The king’s feorm had become the lord’s gafol, and this, supplemented by
church-scot and by tithes, may have been turned into gafol and week-work.
The time came for a new and heavy tax. This was a crushing burden, and
even had the geld been collected from the small folk it would have had the
effect of converting many of them from landowners into
landborrowers[1116]. But a worse fate befell them. They were so poor that
the state could no longer deal with them; it dealt with their lord; he paid for
their land. It follows that in the eye of the state their land is his land. Less
and less will the national courts and the folk-law recognize their titles; the
lord ‘defends’ this land against all the claims of the state; therefore the state
regards it as his. Hence what seems the primary distinction drawn by
Domesday Book—that between the soke-man and the villanus. The villanus
is not rated to the land-tax. Some men are not rated to the geld because they
have but precarious titles; other men have precarious titles because they are
not rated to the geld. A wide and a legally definable class is formed of men
who hold land and who yet are fast losing the warranty of national law.
When once the country is full of lords with sake and soke, a very small
change, a very small exhibition of indifference on the part of the state, will
deprive the peasants of this warranty and condemn them to hold, not by the
law of the land, but by the custom of their lord’s court.
To this depth of degradation the great mass of the
Depression of the free
English peasants in the southern and western ceorl.
counties—the villani, bordarii, cotarii of Domesday
Book—may perhaps have come before the Norman
Conquest. There may have been no courts which would recognize their
Page 313
titles to their land, except the courts of their lords. We are by no means
certain that even this was so; but they must fall deeper yet before they will
be the ‘serf-villeins’ of the thirteenth century.
However, the conditions which would facilitate such
The slaves.
a farther fall had long been prepared, for slavery had
been losing some of its harshest features. Of this
process we have said something elsewhere[1117]. What the church did for the
slave may have been wisely and was humanely done; but what it did for the
slave was done to the detriment of the poorer classes of free men. By
insisting that the slave has a soul to be saved, that he can be sinned against
and can sin, that his marriage is a sacrament, we obliterate the line between
person and thing. On the other hand, in the submission of one person to the
will of another, a submission which within wide limits is utter and abject,
the church saw no harm. Villeinage and monasticism are not quite
independent phenomena; even a lawyer could see the analogy between the
two[1118]. And a touch of mysticism dignifies slavery:—the bishop of Rome
is the serf of the serfs of God; an earl held land of Westminster Abbey ‘like
a theow[1119].’ One of the surest facts that we know of the England of Cnut’s
time is that the great folk were confounding their free men with their
theowmen and that the king forbad them to do this. We see that one of the
main lines which has separated the rightless slave from the free ceorl is
disappearing, for the lord, as suits his interest best, will treat the same man
now as free and now as bond[1120].
We might here speak of the numerous causes for
Growth of manors from
which in a lawful fashion a free man might be below.
reduced into slavery, and were we to do so, should
have to notice the criminal law with its extremely
heavy tariff of wer and wite and bót. But of this enough for the time has
been said elsewhere[1121], and there are many sides of English history at
which we can not even glance. However, lest we should be charged with a
grave omission, we must explain that the processes which have hitherto
come under our notice are far from being in our eyes the only processes that
tended towards the creation of manors. We have been thinking of the
manors as descending from above (if we may so speak) rather than as
growing up from below. The alienation of royal rights over villages and
villagers has been our starting point, and it is to this quarter that we are
certain that even this was so; but they must fall deeper yet before they will
be the ‘serf-villeins’ of the thirteenth century.
However, the conditions which would facilitate such
The slaves.
a farther fall had long been prepared, for slavery had
been losing some of its harshest features. Of this
process we have said something elsewhere[1117]. What the church did for the
slave may have been wisely and was humanely done; but what it did for the
slave was done to the detriment of the poorer classes of free men. By
insisting that the slave has a soul to be saved, that he can be sinned against
and can sin, that his marriage is a sacrament, we obliterate the line between
person and thing. On the other hand, in the submission of one person to the
will of another, a submission which within wide limits is utter and abject,
the church saw no harm. Villeinage and monasticism are not quite
independent phenomena; even a lawyer could see the analogy between the
two[1118]. And a touch of mysticism dignifies slavery:—the bishop of Rome
is the serf of the serfs of God; an earl held land of Westminster Abbey ‘like
a theow[1119].’ One of the surest facts that we know of the England of Cnut’s
time is that the great folk were confounding their free men with their
theowmen and that the king forbad them to do this. We see that one of the
main lines which has separated the rightless slave from the free ceorl is
disappearing, for the lord, as suits his interest best, will treat the same man
now as free and now as bond[1120].
We might here speak of the numerous causes for
Growth of manors from
which in a lawful fashion a free man might be below.
reduced into slavery, and were we to do so, should
have to notice the criminal law with its extremely
heavy tariff of wer and wite and bót. But of this enough for the time has
been said elsewhere[1121], and there are many sides of English history at
which we can not even glance. However, lest we should be charged with a
grave omission, we must explain that the processes which have hitherto
come under our notice are far from being in our eyes the only processes that
tended towards the creation of manors. We have been thinking of the
manors as descending from above (if we may so speak) rather than as
growing up from below. The alienation of royal rights over villages and
villagers has been our starting point, and it is to this quarter that we are
Page 314
inclined to look for the main source of seignorial power. But, no doubt,
within those villages which had no lords—and plenty of such villages there
were in 1065—forces were at work which made in the direction of
manorialism. They are obscure, for they play among small men whose
doings are not recorded. But we have every reason to suppose that in the
first half of the eleventh century a fortunate ceorl had many opportunities of
amassing land and of thriving at the expense of his thriftless or unlucky
neighbours. Probably the ordinary villager was seldom far removed from
insolvency: that is to say, one raid of freebooters, one murrain, two or three
bad seasons, would rob him of his precious oxen and make him beggar or
borrower. The great class of bordarii who in the east of England are
subjected to the sokemen has probably been recruited in this fashion[1122].
And so we may see in Cambridgeshire that a man will sometimes have half
a hide in one village, a virgate in another, two-thirds of a virgate in a third.
He is ‘thriving to thegn-right.’ Then, again, some prelate or some earl will
perhaps obtain the commendation of all the villagers, and his hold over the
village will be tightened by a grant of sake and soke, though, if we may
draw inferences from Cambridgeshire, this seems to have happened rarely,
for the sokemen of a village have often shown a marvellous disagreement
among themselves in their selection of lords, and seem to have chosen light-
heartedly between the house of Godwin and the house of Leofric as if they
were but voting for the yellows or the blues. We fully admit that these
forces were doing an important work; but they were doing it slowly and it
was not nearly achieved when the Normans came. Nor was it neat work. It
tended to produce not the true and compact manerio-villar arrangement, but
those loose, dissipated manors which we see sprawling awkwardly over the
common fields of the Cambridgeshire townships[1123].
We have been endeavouring to show that the legal,
Theories which connect
social and economic structure revealed to us by the English manor with
Domesday Book can be accounted for, even though the Roman villa.
we believe that in the seventh century there was in
England a large mass of free landowning ceorls and that many villages were
peopled at that time and at later times chiefly by free landowning ceorls and
their slaves. We have now to examine the evidence that is supposed to point
to a contrary conclusion and to connect the English manor of the eleventh
century with the Roman villa of the fifth. Two questions should be
within those villages which had no lords—and plenty of such villages there
were in 1065—forces were at work which made in the direction of
manorialism. They are obscure, for they play among small men whose
doings are not recorded. But we have every reason to suppose that in the
first half of the eleventh century a fortunate ceorl had many opportunities of
amassing land and of thriving at the expense of his thriftless or unlucky
neighbours. Probably the ordinary villager was seldom far removed from
insolvency: that is to say, one raid of freebooters, one murrain, two or three
bad seasons, would rob him of his precious oxen and make him beggar or
borrower. The great class of bordarii who in the east of England are
subjected to the sokemen has probably been recruited in this fashion[1122].
And so we may see in Cambridgeshire that a man will sometimes have half
a hide in one village, a virgate in another, two-thirds of a virgate in a third.
He is ‘thriving to thegn-right.’ Then, again, some prelate or some earl will
perhaps obtain the commendation of all the villagers, and his hold over the
village will be tightened by a grant of sake and soke, though, if we may
draw inferences from Cambridgeshire, this seems to have happened rarely,
for the sokemen of a village have often shown a marvellous disagreement
among themselves in their selection of lords, and seem to have chosen light-
heartedly between the house of Godwin and the house of Leofric as if they
were but voting for the yellows or the blues. We fully admit that these
forces were doing an important work; but they were doing it slowly and it
was not nearly achieved when the Normans came. Nor was it neat work. It
tended to produce not the true and compact manerio-villar arrangement, but
those loose, dissipated manors which we see sprawling awkwardly over the
common fields of the Cambridgeshire townships[1123].
We have been endeavouring to show that the legal,
Theories which connect
social and economic structure revealed to us by the English manor with
Domesday Book can be accounted for, even though the Roman villa.
we believe that in the seventh century there was in
England a large mass of free landowning ceorls and that many villages were
peopled at that time and at later times chiefly by free landowning ceorls and
their slaves. We have now to examine the evidence that is supposed to point
to a contrary conclusion and to connect the English manor of the eleventh
century with the Roman villa of the fifth. Two questions should be
Page 315
distinguished from each other—(1) Have we any proof that during those six
centuries, especially during the first three of them, the type of rural
economy which we know as ‘manorial’ was prevalent in England? (2) Have
we any proof that the tillers of the soil were for the more part slaves or
unfree men? We will move backwards from Domesday Book.
In the first place reliance has been placed on the
The Rectitudines.
document known as Rectitudines Singularum
Personarum[1124]. Of the origin of this we know
nothing; we can not say for certain that it is many years older than the
Norman Conquest. Apparently it is the statement of one who is concerned
in the management of great estates and is desirous of imparting his
knowledge to others. It first sets forth the right of the thegn. He is worthy of
the right given to him by his book. He must do three things in respect of his
land, namely, fyrdfare, burh-bote and bridge-work. From many lands
however ‘a more ample landright arises at the king’s ban’: that is to say, the
thegn is subject to other burdens, such as making a deer-hedge at the king’s
hám, providing warships[1125] and sea-ward and head-ward and fyrd-ward,
and almsfee and church-scot and many other things. Then we hear of the
right of the geneat. It varies from place to place. In some places he must
pay rent (land-gafol) and grass-swine yearly, and ride and carry and lead
loads, work and support his lord[1126], and reap and mow and hew the deer-
hedge and keep it up, build and hedge the burh and make new roads for the
tún, pay church-scot and almsfee, keep head-ward and horse-ward, go
errands far and near wherever he is directed. Next we hear of the cottier’s
services. He works one day a week and three days in harvest-time. He ought
not to pay rent. He ought to have five acres more or less. He pays hearth-
penny on Holy Thursday as every free man should. He ‘defends’ or
‘acquits’ his lord’s inland when there is a summons for sea-ward or for the
king’s deer-hedge or the like, as befits him, and pays church-scot at
Martinmas. Then we have a long statement as to the services of the gebúr.
In some places they are heavy, in others light. On some land he must work
two days a week and three days at harvest by way of week-work. Besides
this there is rent to be paid in money and kind. There is ploughing to be
done and there are boon-works. He has to feed dogs and find bread for the
swine-herd. His beasts must lie[1127] in his lord’s fold from Martinmas to
Easter. On the land where this custom prevails the gebúr receives by way of
centuries, especially during the first three of them, the type of rural
economy which we know as ‘manorial’ was prevalent in England? (2) Have
we any proof that the tillers of the soil were for the more part slaves or
unfree men? We will move backwards from Domesday Book.
In the first place reliance has been placed on the
The Rectitudines.
document known as Rectitudines Singularum
Personarum[1124]. Of the origin of this we know
nothing; we can not say for certain that it is many years older than the
Norman Conquest. Apparently it is the statement of one who is concerned
in the management of great estates and is desirous of imparting his
knowledge to others. It first sets forth the right of the thegn. He is worthy of
the right given to him by his book. He must do three things in respect of his
land, namely, fyrdfare, burh-bote and bridge-work. From many lands
however ‘a more ample landright arises at the king’s ban’: that is to say, the
thegn is subject to other burdens, such as making a deer-hedge at the king’s
hám, providing warships[1125] and sea-ward and head-ward and fyrd-ward,
and almsfee and church-scot and many other things. Then we hear of the
right of the geneat. It varies from place to place. In some places he must
pay rent (land-gafol) and grass-swine yearly, and ride and carry and lead
loads, work and support his lord[1126], and reap and mow and hew the deer-
hedge and keep it up, build and hedge the burh and make new roads for the
tún, pay church-scot and almsfee, keep head-ward and horse-ward, go
errands far and near wherever he is directed. Next we hear of the cottier’s
services. He works one day a week and three days in harvest-time. He ought
not to pay rent. He ought to have five acres more or less. He pays hearth-
penny on Holy Thursday as every free man should. He ‘defends’ or
‘acquits’ his lord’s inland when there is a summons for sea-ward or for the
king’s deer-hedge or the like, as befits him, and pays church-scot at
Martinmas. Then we have a long statement as to the services of the gebúr.
In some places they are heavy, in others light. On some land he must work
two days a week and three days at harvest by way of week-work. Besides
this there is rent to be paid in money and kind. There is ploughing to be
done and there are boon-works. He has to feed dogs and find bread for the
swine-herd. His beasts must lie[1127] in his lord’s fold from Martinmas to
Easter. On the land where this custom prevails the gebúr receives by way of
Page 316
outfit two oxen and one cow and six sheep and seven sown acres upon his
yard-land. After the first year he is to do his services in full and he is to
receive his working tools and the furniture for his house. We then hear of
the special duties and rights of the bee-keeper, the swine-herd, the follower,
the sower, ox-herd, shepherd, beadle, woodward, hayward and so forth.
Now, according to our reading of this document,
Discussion of the
there stand below the thegn, but above the serfs (of Rectitudines.
whom but few words are said[1128]) three classes of
men—there is the geneat, there is the gebúr and
there is the cotsetla. The boor and the cottier are free men; the cottier pays
his hearth-penny, that is his Romescot, his Peter’s-penny, on Holy Thursday
as every free man does; but both boor and cottier do week-work. On the
other hand the geneat does no week-work. He pays a rent, he pays a grass-
swine (that is to say he gives a pig or pigs in return for his pasture rights),
he rides, he carries, he goes errands, he discharges the forinsec service due
from the manor, and he is under a general obligation to do whatever his lord
commands. He bears a name which has originally been an honourable
name; he is his lord’s ‘fellow[1129].’ His services strikingly resemble those
which St. Oswald exacted from his ministri, his equites, his milites[1130].
Almost every word that is said of the geneat is true of those very substantial
persons who took land-loans from the church of Worcester. The geneat
(who becomes a villanus in the Latin version of our document that was
made by a Norman clerk of Henry I.’s reign) is a riding-man, radman,
radcniht, with a horse, a very different being from the villanus of the
thirteenth century[1131]. On the other hand, in the gebúr of this document we
may see the burus, who is also the colibertus of Domesday Book[1132], and
he certainly is in a very dependent position, for his lord provides him with
cattle, with instruments of husbandry, even with the scanty furniture of his
house. We dare not indeed argue from this text that the villanus of
Domesday Book does not owe week-work, for the writer who rendered
geneat by villanus was quite unable to understand many parts of the
document that he was translating[1133]; but when we place the Rectitudines
by the side of the survey we can hardly avoid the belief that the extremely
dependent gebúr of the former is represented, not by the villanus, but by the
burus or colibertus of the latter. However, over and over again the author of
yard-land. After the first year he is to do his services in full and he is to
receive his working tools and the furniture for his house. We then hear of
the special duties and rights of the bee-keeper, the swine-herd, the follower,
the sower, ox-herd, shepherd, beadle, woodward, hayward and so forth.
Now, according to our reading of this document,
Discussion of the
there stand below the thegn, but above the serfs (of Rectitudines.
whom but few words are said[1128]) three classes of
men—there is the geneat, there is the gebúr and
there is the cotsetla. The boor and the cottier are free men; the cottier pays
his hearth-penny, that is his Romescot, his Peter’s-penny, on Holy Thursday
as every free man does; but both boor and cottier do week-work. On the
other hand the geneat does no week-work. He pays a rent, he pays a grass-
swine (that is to say he gives a pig or pigs in return for his pasture rights),
he rides, he carries, he goes errands, he discharges the forinsec service due
from the manor, and he is under a general obligation to do whatever his lord
commands. He bears a name which has originally been an honourable
name; he is his lord’s ‘fellow[1129].’ His services strikingly resemble those
which St. Oswald exacted from his ministri, his equites, his milites[1130].
Almost every word that is said of the geneat is true of those very substantial
persons who took land-loans from the church of Worcester. The geneat
(who becomes a villanus in the Latin version of our document that was
made by a Norman clerk of Henry I.’s reign) is a riding-man, radman,
radcniht, with a horse, a very different being from the villanus of the
thirteenth century[1131]. On the other hand, in the gebúr of this document we
may see the burus, who is also the colibertus of Domesday Book[1132], and
he certainly is in a very dependent position, for his lord provides him with
cattle, with instruments of husbandry, even with the scanty furniture of his
house. We dare not indeed argue from this text that the villanus of
Domesday Book does not owe week-work, for the writer who rendered
geneat by villanus was quite unable to understand many parts of the
document that he was translating[1133]; but when we place the Rectitudines
by the side of the survey we can hardly avoid the belief that the extremely
dependent gebúr of the former is represented, not by the villanus, but by the
burus or colibertus of the latter. However, over and over again the author of
Page 317
the Rectitudines has protested that customs vary. He will lay down no
general rule; he does but know what goes on in certain places[1134].
In 956 King Eadwig gave to Bath Abbey thirty
The Tidenham case.
manses at Tidenham in Gloucestershire[1135]. A
cartulary compiled in the twelfth century contains a
copy of his gift, and remote from this it contains a statement of the services
due from the men of Tidenham. It is possible, but unlikely, that this
statement represents the state of affairs that existed at the moment when the
minster received the gift; to all appearance it belongs to a later date[1136]. It
begins by stating that at Tidenham there are 30 hides, 9 of inland and 21
‘gesettes landes,’ that is 9 hides of demesne and 21 hides of land set to
tenants. Then after an account of the fisheries, which were of importance, it
tells us of the services due from the geneat and from the gebúr. The geneat
shall work as well on the land as off the land, whichever he is bid, and ride
and carry and lead loads and drive droves ‘and do many other things.’ The
gebúr must do week-work, of which some particulars are stated, and he also
must pay rent in money and in kind. Here again a well marked line is drawn
between the geneat and the gebúr. Here again the geneat, like the cniht or
minister of Oswaldslaw, is under a very general obligation of obedience to
his lord; but he is a riding man and there is nothing whatever to show that
he is habitually employed in agricultural labour upon his lord’s demesne. As
to the gebúr, he has to work hard enough day by day, and week by week,
though of his legal status we are told no word.
In a Winchester cartulary, ‘a cartulary of the lowest
The Stoke case.
possible character,’ there stands what purports to be
a copy of the charter whereby in the year 900
Edward the Elder gave to the church of Winchester 10 manentes of land ‘æt
Stoce be Hysseburnan’ together with all the men who were thereon at the
time of Alfred’s death and all the men who were ‘æt Hisseburna’ at the
same period. Edward, we are told, acquired the land ‘æt Stoce’ in exchange
for land ‘æt Ceolseldene’ and ‘æt Sweoresholte [Sparsholt].’ At the end of
the would-be charter stand the names of its witnesses. Then follows in
English (but hardly the English of the year 900) a statement of the services
which the ceorls shall do ‘to Hysseburnan.’ Then follow the boundaries.
Then the eschatocol of the charter and the list of witnesses is repeated[1137].
On the face of the copy are three suspicious traits: (1) the modernized
general rule; he does but know what goes on in certain places[1134].
In 956 King Eadwig gave to Bath Abbey thirty
The Tidenham case.
manses at Tidenham in Gloucestershire[1135]. A
cartulary compiled in the twelfth century contains a
copy of his gift, and remote from this it contains a statement of the services
due from the men of Tidenham. It is possible, but unlikely, that this
statement represents the state of affairs that existed at the moment when the
minster received the gift; to all appearance it belongs to a later date[1136]. It
begins by stating that at Tidenham there are 30 hides, 9 of inland and 21
‘gesettes landes,’ that is 9 hides of demesne and 21 hides of land set to
tenants. Then after an account of the fisheries, which were of importance, it
tells us of the services due from the geneat and from the gebúr. The geneat
shall work as well on the land as off the land, whichever he is bid, and ride
and carry and lead loads and drive droves ‘and do many other things.’ The
gebúr must do week-work, of which some particulars are stated, and he also
must pay rent in money and in kind. Here again a well marked line is drawn
between the geneat and the gebúr. Here again the geneat, like the cniht or
minister of Oswaldslaw, is under a very general obligation of obedience to
his lord; but he is a riding man and there is nothing whatever to show that
he is habitually employed in agricultural labour upon his lord’s demesne. As
to the gebúr, he has to work hard enough day by day, and week by week,
though of his legal status we are told no word.
In a Winchester cartulary, ‘a cartulary of the lowest
The Stoke case.
possible character,’ there stands what purports to be
a copy of the charter whereby in the year 900
Edward the Elder gave to the church of Winchester 10 manentes of land ‘æt
Stoce be Hysseburnan’ together with all the men who were thereon at the
time of Alfred’s death and all the men who were ‘æt Hisseburna’ at the
same period. Edward, we are told, acquired the land ‘æt Stoce’ in exchange
for land ‘æt Ceolseldene’ and ‘æt Sweoresholte [Sparsholt].’ At the end of
the would-be charter stand the names of its witnesses. Then follows in
English (but hardly the English of the year 900) a statement of the services
which the ceorls shall do ‘to Hysseburnan.’ Then follow the boundaries.
Then the eschatocol of the charter and the list of witnesses is repeated[1137].
On the face of the copy are three suspicious traits: (1) the modernized
Page 318
language, (2) the repeated eschatocol, (3) the description of the services, for
the like is found in no other charter. This is not all. Two other documents in
the same cartulary bear on the same transaction. By the first Edward gave to
the church of Winchester 50 manentes ‘æt Hysseburnan’ which he had
obtained by an exchange for land ‘æt Merchamme[1138].’ By the second he
gave to the church of Winchester 50 manentes ‘ad Hursbourne’ and other 10
‘ad Stoke[1139].’ The more carefully these three documents are examined,
the more difficult will the critic find it to acquit the Winchester monks of
falsifying their ‘books’ and improving Edward’s gift. Therefore this famous
statement about the ceorls’ services is not the least suspicious part of a
highly suspicious document. It is to this effect:—‘From each hiwisc (family
or hide), at the autumnal equinox, forty pence and six church mittan of ale
and three sesters of loaf-wheat. In their own time they shall plough three
acres and sow them with their own seed, and in their own time bring it [the
produce of the sown land] to barn. They shall pay three pounds of gafol
barley and mow half an acre of gafol-mead in their own time and bring it to
the rick; four fothers of split gafol-wood for a shingle-rick in their own time
and sixteen yards of gafol-fencing in their own time. And at Easter two
ewes with two lambs, but two young sheep may be counted for an old one;
and they shall wash and shear sheep in their own time. And every week they
shall do what work they are bid, except three weeks, one at Midwinter, one
at Easter and the third at the Gang Days.’ Here no doubt, as in the account
of Tidenham, as in the Rectitudines, we see what may fairly be called the
manorial economy. The lord has a village; he has demesne land (inland)
which is cultivated for him by the labour of his tenants; these tenants pay
gafol in money or in kind; some of them (the geneat of Tidenham, the
geneat of the Rectitudines) assist him when called upon to do so; others
work steadily from day to day; in many particulars the extent of the work
due from them is ascertained; whether they are free men, whether they are
bound to the soil, whether the national courts will protect them in their
tenure, whether they are slaves, we are not told.
That such an arrangement was common in the
Inferences from these
eleventh century we know; a solitary instance of it cases.
comes to us professedly from the first year of the
tenth, and certainly from a cartulary that is full of
lies. To draw general inferences from a few such instances would be rash.
the like is found in no other charter. This is not all. Two other documents in
the same cartulary bear on the same transaction. By the first Edward gave to
the church of Winchester 50 manentes ‘æt Hysseburnan’ which he had
obtained by an exchange for land ‘æt Merchamme[1138].’ By the second he
gave to the church of Winchester 50 manentes ‘ad Hursbourne’ and other 10
‘ad Stoke[1139].’ The more carefully these three documents are examined,
the more difficult will the critic find it to acquit the Winchester monks of
falsifying their ‘books’ and improving Edward’s gift. Therefore this famous
statement about the ceorls’ services is not the least suspicious part of a
highly suspicious document. It is to this effect:—‘From each hiwisc (family
or hide), at the autumnal equinox, forty pence and six church mittan of ale
and three sesters of loaf-wheat. In their own time they shall plough three
acres and sow them with their own seed, and in their own time bring it [the
produce of the sown land] to barn. They shall pay three pounds of gafol
barley and mow half an acre of gafol-mead in their own time and bring it to
the rick; four fothers of split gafol-wood for a shingle-rick in their own time
and sixteen yards of gafol-fencing in their own time. And at Easter two
ewes with two lambs, but two young sheep may be counted for an old one;
and they shall wash and shear sheep in their own time. And every week they
shall do what work they are bid, except three weeks, one at Midwinter, one
at Easter and the third at the Gang Days.’ Here no doubt, as in the account
of Tidenham, as in the Rectitudines, we see what may fairly be called the
manorial economy. The lord has a village; he has demesne land (inland)
which is cultivated for him by the labour of his tenants; these tenants pay
gafol in money or in kind; some of them (the geneat of Tidenham, the
geneat of the Rectitudines) assist him when called upon to do so; others
work steadily from day to day; in many particulars the extent of the work
due from them is ascertained; whether they are free men, whether they are
bound to the soil, whether the national courts will protect them in their
tenure, whether they are slaves, we are not told.
That such an arrangement was common in the
Inferences from these
eleventh century we know; a solitary instance of it cases.
comes to us professedly from the first year of the
tenth, and certainly from a cartulary that is full of
lies. To draw general inferences from a few such instances would be rash.
Page 319
What should we believe of ‘the English village of the eleventh century’ if
the one village of which we had any knowledge was Orwell in
Cambridgeshire[1140]? What should we believe of ‘the English village of the
thirteenth century’ if our only example was a village on the ancient
demesne? The traces of a manorial economy that have been discovered in
yet remoter times are few, slight and dubious. A passage in the laws of
Ine[1141] seems to prove that there were men who had let out small
quantities of land, ‘a yard or more,’ to cultivators at rents and who were
wrongfully endeavouring to get from their lessees work as well as gafol.
The same law may prove the highly probable proposition that some men
had taken ‘loans’ of manses and were paying for them, not only by gafol,
but by work done on the lord’s land. That already in Ine’s day there were
many free men who were needy and had lords above them, that already the
state was beginning to consecrate the relation between lord and man as a
security for the peace and a protection against crime is undoubted[1142]. But
this does not bring us very near to the Roman villa. Nor shall we see a villa
wherever the dooms or the land-books make mention of a hám or a tún, for
the meanest ceorl may have a tún and will probably have a home of his
own[1143]
It is said that the England of Bede’s day was full of
The villa and the vicus.
villae and that Bede calls the same place now villa
and now vicus[1144]. But before we enter on any
argument about the use of such words, we ought first to remember that
neither Bede nor the scribes of the land-books were trained philologists.
London is a villa[1145], but it is also a civitas, urbs, oppidum, vicus, a wíc, a
tún, a burh, and a port. When we see such words as these used
promiscuously we must lay but little stress upon the occurrence of a
particular term in a particular case. Suppose for a moment that in England
there were many villages full of free landholders: what should they be
called in Latin? They should, it is replied, be called vici and they should not
be called villae, for a villa is an estate. But it is part of the case of those who
have used this argument that at the time of the barbarian invasions the
Roman world was full of villae, so full that every or almost every vicus was
situated on and formed part of a villa[1146]. We are therefore exacting a good
deal from Bede, from a man who learnt his Latin in school, if we require
him to be ever mindful of this nice distinction. We are saying to him: ‘True
the one village of which we had any knowledge was Orwell in
Cambridgeshire[1140]? What should we believe of ‘the English village of the
thirteenth century’ if our only example was a village on the ancient
demesne? The traces of a manorial economy that have been discovered in
yet remoter times are few, slight and dubious. A passage in the laws of
Ine[1141] seems to prove that there were men who had let out small
quantities of land, ‘a yard or more,’ to cultivators at rents and who were
wrongfully endeavouring to get from their lessees work as well as gafol.
The same law may prove the highly probable proposition that some men
had taken ‘loans’ of manses and were paying for them, not only by gafol,
but by work done on the lord’s land. That already in Ine’s day there were
many free men who were needy and had lords above them, that already the
state was beginning to consecrate the relation between lord and man as a
security for the peace and a protection against crime is undoubted[1142]. But
this does not bring us very near to the Roman villa. Nor shall we see a villa
wherever the dooms or the land-books make mention of a hám or a tún, for
the meanest ceorl may have a tún and will probably have a home of his
own[1143]
It is said that the England of Bede’s day was full of
The villa and the vicus.
villae and that Bede calls the same place now villa
and now vicus[1144]. But before we enter on any
argument about the use of such words, we ought first to remember that
neither Bede nor the scribes of the land-books were trained philologists.
London is a villa[1145], but it is also a civitas, urbs, oppidum, vicus, a wíc, a
tún, a burh, and a port. When we see such words as these used
promiscuously we must lay but little stress upon the occurrence of a
particular term in a particular case. Suppose for a moment that in England
there were many villages full of free landholders: what should they be
called in Latin? They should, it is replied, be called vici and they should not
be called villae, for a villa is an estate. But it is part of the case of those who
have used this argument that at the time of the barbarian invasions the
Roman world was full of villae, so full that every or almost every vicus was
situated on and formed part of a villa[1146]. We are therefore exacting a good
deal from Bede, from a man who learnt his Latin in school, if we require
him to be ever mindful of this nice distinction. We are saying to him: ‘True
Page 320
it is that a knot of neighbouring houses with the appurtenant lands is
habitually called a villa; but then this word introduces the notion of
ownership; the villa is an unit in a system of property law, and, if your
village is not also an estate, a praedium, then you should call it vicus and
not villa.’ To this we must add that, while the word villa did not until after
the Norman Conquest force its way into English speech, the word vicus
became an English word at a very early period[1147]. It became our word
wick and it became part of a very large number of place-names[1148]. The
Domesday surveyors found herdwicks and berewicks in many parts of the
country[1149]. Moreover we can see that in the Latin documents villa is used
in the loosest manner. London is a villa; but a single house, a single ‘haw,’
in the city of Canterbury or the city of Rochester is a villa[1150].
If we carefully attend to the wording of the land-
Notices of manors in the
books, we shall find the manorial economy far more charters.
visible in the later than in the earlier of them. The
Confessor gives to Westminster ‘ða cotlife Perscore
and Dorhurste’ with all their lands and all their berewicks[1151]. He gives
the cotlif Eversley and all things of right belonging thereto, with church and
mill, with wood and field, with meadow and heath, with water and with
moor[1152]. From 998 we have a gift of a ‘heafod-botl,’ a capital mansion,
we may say, and its appurtenances[1153]. In earlier times we may sometimes
find that the subject matter of the royal gift is spoken of as forming a single
unit; it is a villa, or it is a vicus. But rarely is the thing that is given called a
villa except when the thing that is given is just a single hide[1154]. If a
charter freely disposes of several villae, meaning thereby villages, we shall
probably find some other reasons for assigning that charter, whatever date it
may bear, to the eleventh, the twelfth or a yet later century[1155]. Sometimes
in old books the king will say that he is giving a vicus, a vicus of five or
eight or ten tributarii[1156]. Much more frequently he will not speak thus; he
will not speak as though the subject matter of his gift had a physical unity
and individuality. ‘I give,’ he will say, ‘so many manentes, tributarii, or
casati in the place known as X,’ or ‘I give a certain part of my land, to wit,
that of so many manentes, tributarii, or casati at the spot which men call Y.’
Such language does not suggest that the manses thus given are subservient
to one dominant and dominical manse or manor; it is very unlike the
language of the twelfth century[1157]. Such words as fundus and praedium
habitually called a villa; but then this word introduces the notion of
ownership; the villa is an unit in a system of property law, and, if your
village is not also an estate, a praedium, then you should call it vicus and
not villa.’ To this we must add that, while the word villa did not until after
the Norman Conquest force its way into English speech, the word vicus
became an English word at a very early period[1147]. It became our word
wick and it became part of a very large number of place-names[1148]. The
Domesday surveyors found herdwicks and berewicks in many parts of the
country[1149]. Moreover we can see that in the Latin documents villa is used
in the loosest manner. London is a villa; but a single house, a single ‘haw,’
in the city of Canterbury or the city of Rochester is a villa[1150].
If we carefully attend to the wording of the land-
Notices of manors in the
books, we shall find the manorial economy far more charters.
visible in the later than in the earlier of them. The
Confessor gives to Westminster ‘ða cotlife Perscore
and Dorhurste’ with all their lands and all their berewicks[1151]. He gives
the cotlif Eversley and all things of right belonging thereto, with church and
mill, with wood and field, with meadow and heath, with water and with
moor[1152]. From 998 we have a gift of a ‘heafod-botl,’ a capital mansion,
we may say, and its appurtenances[1153]. In earlier times we may sometimes
find that the subject matter of the royal gift is spoken of as forming a single
unit; it is a villa, or it is a vicus. But rarely is the thing that is given called a
villa except when the thing that is given is just a single hide[1154]. If a
charter freely disposes of several villae, meaning thereby villages, we shall
probably find some other reasons for assigning that charter, whatever date it
may bear, to the eleventh, the twelfth or a yet later century[1155]. Sometimes
in old books the king will say that he is giving a vicus, a vicus of five or
eight or ten tributarii[1156]. Much more frequently he will not speak thus; he
will not speak as though the subject matter of his gift had a physical unity
and individuality. ‘I give,’ he will say, ‘so many manentes, tributarii, or
casati in the place known as X,’ or ‘I give a certain part of my land, to wit,
that of so many manentes, tributarii, or casati at the spot which men call Y.’
Such language does not suggest that the manses thus given are subservient
to one dominant and dominical manse or manor; it is very unlike the
language of the twelfth century[1157]. Such words as fundus and praedium
Page 321
are conspicuously absent, and ager usually means but a small piece of land,
an acre. Foreign precedents would have suggested that when an estate was
to be conveyed it should be conveyed cum servis et ancillis, or cum
mancipiis et accolabus; such clauses are rare in our English land-
books[1158].
But, it will be said, at all events the king is giving
The mansa and the
persons, men, as well as land; he is giving manentes, manens.
casati, tributarii. What is more these are foreign
words and they describe the ‘semi-servile’ occupants
of the soil. Now it is true that sometimes he gives manentes, casati,
tributarii, though more often he gives either so many manses (mansas), or
‘the land of so many manentes, casati, tributarii,’ while in Kent he gives
plough-lands or sullungs. But we think it plain that in England these Latin
words were used simply to describe the extent, or rather the rateable extent,
of land, without much reference to the number or the quality of its
occupants. The terra unius manentis, even the unus casatus when that is the
subject of a conveyance, is like Bede’s terra unius familiae, the unit known
to Englishmen as the hiwisc, or hide[1159]. Hence it is that reference is so
often made to repute and estimation. ‘I give,’ says Egbert, ‘a certain portion
of land to the amount, as I estimate, of five casati,’ or (it may be) ‘of twenty
manentes[1160].’ Nothing can be easier than to count whether there be four,
five, or six ‘semi-servile’ households on a given piece of land. Far easier
would it be to do this than to do what is habitually done, namely, to set forth
the boundaries of the land with laborious precision. But there is already an
element of estimation, of appreciation, in these units. Already they are units
in a system of taxation. Hence also it is that so very frequently what the
king gives is just exactly five, or some multiple of five, of these units[1161].
Rating is a rough process; five and ten are pleasant numbers.
But against the argument which would see in every
The hide.
conveyance of ‘five manentes’ or of ‘the land of five
casati’ a conveyance of five semi-servile households
with their land we have another objection to urge. Here we will state it
briefly; a fuller statement would take us far away from our present theme. If
the land-books of the churches are to lead up to Domesday Book, the unit
conveyed as terra unius manentis (casati, tributarii) is a hide with some
120 acres of arable land, the land appropriate to a plough-team of eight
an acre. Foreign precedents would have suggested that when an estate was
to be conveyed it should be conveyed cum servis et ancillis, or cum
mancipiis et accolabus; such clauses are rare in our English land-
books[1158].
But, it will be said, at all events the king is giving
The mansa and the
persons, men, as well as land; he is giving manentes, manens.
casati, tributarii. What is more these are foreign
words and they describe the ‘semi-servile’ occupants
of the soil. Now it is true that sometimes he gives manentes, casati,
tributarii, though more often he gives either so many manses (mansas), or
‘the land of so many manentes, casati, tributarii,’ while in Kent he gives
plough-lands or sullungs. But we think it plain that in England these Latin
words were used simply to describe the extent, or rather the rateable extent,
of land, without much reference to the number or the quality of its
occupants. The terra unius manentis, even the unus casatus when that is the
subject of a conveyance, is like Bede’s terra unius familiae, the unit known
to Englishmen as the hiwisc, or hide[1159]. Hence it is that reference is so
often made to repute and estimation. ‘I give,’ says Egbert, ‘a certain portion
of land to the amount, as I estimate, of five casati,’ or (it may be) ‘of twenty
manentes[1160].’ Nothing can be easier than to count whether there be four,
five, or six ‘semi-servile’ households on a given piece of land. Far easier
would it be to do this than to do what is habitually done, namely, to set forth
the boundaries of the land with laborious precision. But there is already an
element of estimation, of appreciation, in these units. Already they are units
in a system of taxation. Hence also it is that so very frequently what the
king gives is just exactly five, or some multiple of five, of these units[1161].
Rating is a rough process; five and ten are pleasant numbers.
But against the argument which would see in every
The hide.
conveyance of ‘five manentes’ or of ‘the land of five
casati’ a conveyance of five semi-servile households
with their land we have another objection to urge. Here we will state it
briefly; a fuller statement would take us far away from our present theme. If
the land-books of the churches are to lead up to Domesday Book, the unit
conveyed as terra unius manentis (casati, tributarii) is a hide with some
120 acres of arable land, the land appropriate to a plough-team of eight
Page 322
oxen. Had the semi-servile manens as a general rule 120 arable acres, a
plough-team of eight oxen? We do not believe it, and those who have most
strongly insisted on the servility or ‘semi-servility’ of the tillers of the soil,
do not believe it. They would give the gebúr but a quarter of a hide and but
two beasts of the plough. That being so, it should be common ground that
the terra unius manentis (casati, tributarii) can not be construed as ‘the
land occupied by one semi-servile tenant.’ An explanation of the fact that
land is conveyed by reference to units so large as the hide of 120 acres and
that these units are spoken of as though each household would normally
have one of them must be sought elsewhere; we can not here pause to find
it. But in any case these foreign terms should give us little trouble. When he
hears such words as manens, casatus, tributarius, the man who has lived in
Gaul may hear some undertone of servility or ‘semi-servility.’ We do not
discuss this matter; it may be so. But look at the words themselves, what do
they primarily mean? A manens is one who dwells upon land, a casatus is
one to whom a casa has been allotted, a tributarius pays tributum; the free
English landowner pays a tributum to the king[1162]. We must make the best
we can of a foreign, an inappropriate tongue, and the best that we make is
often very bad, especially when we have a taste for fine writing. And so
England is full of villas which are Roman and satraps who, no doubt, are
Persian.
plough-team of eight oxen? We do not believe it, and those who have most
strongly insisted on the servility or ‘semi-servility’ of the tillers of the soil,
do not believe it. They would give the gebúr but a quarter of a hide and but
two beasts of the plough. That being so, it should be common ground that
the terra unius manentis (casati, tributarii) can not be construed as ‘the
land occupied by one semi-servile tenant.’ An explanation of the fact that
land is conveyed by reference to units so large as the hide of 120 acres and
that these units are spoken of as though each household would normally
have one of them must be sought elsewhere; we can not here pause to find
it. But in any case these foreign terms should give us little trouble. When he
hears such words as manens, casatus, tributarius, the man who has lived in
Gaul may hear some undertone of servility or ‘semi-servility.’ We do not
discuss this matter; it may be so. But look at the words themselves, what do
they primarily mean? A manens is one who dwells upon land, a casatus is
one to whom a casa has been allotted, a tributarius pays tributum; the free
English landowner pays a tributum to the king[1162]. We must make the best
we can of a foreign, an inappropriate tongue, and the best that we make is
often very bad, especially when we have a taste for fine writing. And so
England is full of villas which are Roman and satraps who, no doubt, are
Persian.
Page 323
And whence, we must ask, comes that system of intermixed
The strip-holding and the
‘strip-holding’ that we find in our English fields? Who laid villa.
out those fields? The obvious answer is that they were laid
out by men who would sacrifice economy and efficiency at
the shrine of equality. Each manse is to have the same number of strips; the strips of
one manse must be neither better nor worse than those of its neighbour and therefore
must be scattered abroad over the whole territory of the village. That this system was
not invented by men who owned large continuous tracts is plain. No such owner
would for one moment dream of cutting up his land in this ridiculous fashion, and of
reserving for his own manse, not a ring-fenced demesne, but strips lying here and
there, ‘hide-meal and acre-meal’ among the strips of his serfs. That is not the theory.
No one supposes that a Roman landowner whose hands were free allowed the soil of
his villa to be parcelled out in accordance with this wasteful, cumbrous, barbarous
plan. So his hands must not be free; the soil of which he becomes the owner must
already be plotted out in strips, and these strips must be so tightly bound up into
manses, that he scruples to overturn an existing arrangement, and contents himself
with appropriating a few of the manses for his own use and compelling the occupants
of the others to labour for him and pay him rents. In this there is nothing impossible;
but we have only deferred, not solved the problem. Who laid out our English fields
and tied the strips into manses? That this work was done by the Britons before they
were brought under the Roman yoke does not seem very probable. Celtic rural
economy, whenever it has had a chance of unfettered development, has made for
results far other than those that are recorded by the larger half of the map of England.
If throughout England the Romans found so tough a system of intermixed manses
that, despite all its absurdities, they could not but spare it, then the Britons who dwelt
in the land that was to be English were many centuries in advance of the Britons who
dwelt in the land that was to be Welsh. To eke out this hypothesis another must be
introduced. The Teutonic invaders of Britain must be brought from some
manorialized province. So, after all, the model of the English field may have been
‘made in Germany.’ Somehow or another it was made in South Germany by semi-
servile people, whose semi-servility was such a half-and-half affair that they could
not be prevented from sacrificing every interest of their lords at the shrine of
equality[1163].
We are far from saying that wherever there is strip-holding,
The lords and the strips.
there liberty and equality have once reigned[1164]. It is very
possible that where a barbarian chieftain obtained a ring-
fenced allotment of conquered soil, he sometimes divided it into scattered strips
which he parcelled out among his unfree dependants. But if he did this, he did it
because his only idea of agriculture was derived from a village formed by men who
were free and equal. The maintenance of a system of intermixed strip-holding may be
The strip-holding and the
‘strip-holding’ that we find in our English fields? Who laid villa.
out those fields? The obvious answer is that they were laid
out by men who would sacrifice economy and efficiency at
the shrine of equality. Each manse is to have the same number of strips; the strips of
one manse must be neither better nor worse than those of its neighbour and therefore
must be scattered abroad over the whole territory of the village. That this system was
not invented by men who owned large continuous tracts is plain. No such owner
would for one moment dream of cutting up his land in this ridiculous fashion, and of
reserving for his own manse, not a ring-fenced demesne, but strips lying here and
there, ‘hide-meal and acre-meal’ among the strips of his serfs. That is not the theory.
No one supposes that a Roman landowner whose hands were free allowed the soil of
his villa to be parcelled out in accordance with this wasteful, cumbrous, barbarous
plan. So his hands must not be free; the soil of which he becomes the owner must
already be plotted out in strips, and these strips must be so tightly bound up into
manses, that he scruples to overturn an existing arrangement, and contents himself
with appropriating a few of the manses for his own use and compelling the occupants
of the others to labour for him and pay him rents. In this there is nothing impossible;
but we have only deferred, not solved the problem. Who laid out our English fields
and tied the strips into manses? That this work was done by the Britons before they
were brought under the Roman yoke does not seem very probable. Celtic rural
economy, whenever it has had a chance of unfettered development, has made for
results far other than those that are recorded by the larger half of the map of England.
If throughout England the Romans found so tough a system of intermixed manses
that, despite all its absurdities, they could not but spare it, then the Britons who dwelt
in the land that was to be English were many centuries in advance of the Britons who
dwelt in the land that was to be Welsh. To eke out this hypothesis another must be
introduced. The Teutonic invaders of Britain must be brought from some
manorialized province. So, after all, the model of the English field may have been
‘made in Germany.’ Somehow or another it was made in South Germany by semi-
servile people, whose semi-servility was such a half-and-half affair that they could
not be prevented from sacrificing every interest of their lords at the shrine of
equality[1163].
We are far from saying that wherever there is strip-holding,
The lords and the strips.
there liberty and equality have once reigned[1164]. It is very
possible that where a barbarian chieftain obtained a ring-
fenced allotment of conquered soil, he sometimes divided it into scattered strips
which he parcelled out among his unfree dependants. But if he did this, he did it
because his only idea of agriculture was derived from a village formed by men who
were free and equal. The maintenance of a system of intermixed strip-holding may be
Page 324
due to seignorial power, and a great deal of the rigidity of the agrarian arrangements
that we see in the England of the thirteenth century may be due to the same cause.
Seignorial power was not, at least in origin, absolute ownership. It had to make the
best it could of an existing system. For the lord’s purposes that system was at its best
when it was rigid and no tenement was partible. But assuredly this plan was not
originally invented by great proprietors who were seeking to get the most they could
out of their land, their slaves and their capital.
That we have not been denying the existence of slavery will
The ceorl and the slave.
be plain. Indeed we may strongly suspect that the men who
parcelled out our fields were for the more part slave-owners,
though slave-owners in a very small way. To say nothing of Welshmen, there was
quite enough inter-tribal warfare to supply the ceorl with a captive. But it was not for
the sake of slaves or serfs or ‘semi-servile’ folk that the system of intermixed strips
was introduced.
Lastly, the theory which would derive the English manor
The condition of the
from the Roman villa must face the grave problem Danelaw.
presented to it by the account which Domesday Book, when
speaking of the Confessor’s day, gives of the eastern and
northern counties, of a large quarter of all England, and of just that part of England
which was populous. We see swarms of men who are free men but who are subject,
they and their land, to various modes and degrees of seignorial power. The modes are
many, the degrees are gentle. Personal, tenurial, justiciary threads are woven into a
web that bewilders us. Here we see the work of commendation, there the work of the
land-loan, and there again what comes of grants of sake and soke. We see the
formation of manors taking place under our eyes, and as yet the process is by no
means perfect. In village after village there is nothing that our economic historians
would consent to call a manor. Now, no doubt, the difference between the east and the
west is, at least in part, due to Danish invasions and Danish settlements. But how
shall we picture to ourselves the action of the Danes? Is it to be supposed that they
found the Anglo-Roman manor-villa a prevalent and prosperous institution, that they
destroyed it and put something else in its place, put in its place the village of free
peasants who could ‘go with their land’ to what lord they pleased? If so, then we have
to face the question why these heathen Danes acted in a manner so different from that
in which their predecessors, the heathen Angles and Saxons, had acted. Surely one
part of the explanation is that the inswarming barbarians checked the manorializing
process that was steadily at work in Wessex and Mercia. We do not say that this is the
whole explanation. We have seen how free were many of the Cambridgeshire villages
and have little reason to believe that they had been settled by Danes[1165]. The west
country is the country to which we shall naturally look for the most abundant traces
of the Wealh theow. There it is that we find numerous servi, and there that we find
that we see in the England of the thirteenth century may be due to the same cause.
Seignorial power was not, at least in origin, absolute ownership. It had to make the
best it could of an existing system. For the lord’s purposes that system was at its best
when it was rigid and no tenement was partible. But assuredly this plan was not
originally invented by great proprietors who were seeking to get the most they could
out of their land, their slaves and their capital.
That we have not been denying the existence of slavery will
The ceorl and the slave.
be plain. Indeed we may strongly suspect that the men who
parcelled out our fields were for the more part slave-owners,
though slave-owners in a very small way. To say nothing of Welshmen, there was
quite enough inter-tribal warfare to supply the ceorl with a captive. But it was not for
the sake of slaves or serfs or ‘semi-servile’ folk that the system of intermixed strips
was introduced.
Lastly, the theory which would derive the English manor
The condition of the
from the Roman villa must face the grave problem Danelaw.
presented to it by the account which Domesday Book, when
speaking of the Confessor’s day, gives of the eastern and
northern counties, of a large quarter of all England, and of just that part of England
which was populous. We see swarms of men who are free men but who are subject,
they and their land, to various modes and degrees of seignorial power. The modes are
many, the degrees are gentle. Personal, tenurial, justiciary threads are woven into a
web that bewilders us. Here we see the work of commendation, there the work of the
land-loan, and there again what comes of grants of sake and soke. We see the
formation of manors taking place under our eyes, and as yet the process is by no
means perfect. In village after village there is nothing that our economic historians
would consent to call a manor. Now, no doubt, the difference between the east and the
west is, at least in part, due to Danish invasions and Danish settlements. But how
shall we picture to ourselves the action of the Danes? Is it to be supposed that they
found the Anglo-Roman manor-villa a prevalent and prosperous institution, that they
destroyed it and put something else in its place, put in its place the village of free
peasants who could ‘go with their land’ to what lord they pleased? If so, then we have
to face the question why these heathen Danes acted in a manner so different from that
in which their predecessors, the heathen Angles and Saxons, had acted. Surely one
part of the explanation is that the inswarming barbarians checked the manorializing
process that was steadily at work in Wessex and Mercia. We do not say that this is the
whole explanation. We have seen how free were many of the Cambridgeshire villages
and have little reason to believe that they had been settled by Danes[1165]. The west
country is the country to which we shall naturally look for the most abundant traces
of the Wealh theow. There it is that we find numerous servi, and there that we find
Page 325
rather trevs than villages. But also we have hardly a single land-book of early date
which deals with any part of the territory that became the Danelaw. Many a book the
Danes may have burnt when they sacked the monasteries. They sacked the
monasteries, burnt the books and freed the land. But still we may doubt whether the
practice of booking lands to the churches had gone far in East Anglia and the adjacent
shires when they were once more overwhelmed by barbarism. No doubt in course of
time the churches of the east became rich: Ely and St Edmunds, Peterborough and
Ramsey, Croyland and Thorney. But, even when supplemented by legend and forgery,
their titles to wide territories can seldom be compared for antiquity to the titles that
might have been pleaded by the churches of Kent and Wessex and the Severn Valley.
Richly endowed churches mean a subjected peasantry. And thus we may say of the
Danes that if in a certain sense they freed the districts which they conquered, they in
the same sense enslaved the rest of England. Year by year Wessex and Mercia had to
strain every nerve in order to repel the pagans, to fit out fleets, build burgs and keep
armies always in the field. The peasant must in the end bear the cost of this
exhausting struggle. Meanwhile in the north and the east the process that makes
manors has been interrupted; it must be begun once more. It was accomplished by
men some of whom had Scandinavian blood in their veins, but who were not
heathens, not barbarians: it was accomplished by Normans steeped in Frankish
feudalism.
which deals with any part of the territory that became the Danelaw. Many a book the
Danes may have burnt when they sacked the monasteries. They sacked the
monasteries, burnt the books and freed the land. But still we may doubt whether the
practice of booking lands to the churches had gone far in East Anglia and the adjacent
shires when they were once more overwhelmed by barbarism. No doubt in course of
time the churches of the east became rich: Ely and St Edmunds, Peterborough and
Ramsey, Croyland and Thorney. But, even when supplemented by legend and forgery,
their titles to wide territories can seldom be compared for antiquity to the titles that
might have been pleaded by the churches of Kent and Wessex and the Severn Valley.
Richly endowed churches mean a subjected peasantry. And thus we may say of the
Danes that if in a certain sense they freed the districts which they conquered, they in
the same sense enslaved the rest of England. Year by year Wessex and Mercia had to
strain every nerve in order to repel the pagans, to fit out fleets, build burgs and keep
armies always in the field. The peasant must in the end bear the cost of this
exhausting struggle. Meanwhile in the north and the east the process that makes
manors has been interrupted; it must be begun once more. It was accomplished by
men some of whom had Scandinavian blood in their veins, but who were not
heathens, not barbarians: it was accomplished by Normans steeped in Frankish
feudalism.
Page 326
Page 327
§ 6. The Village Community.
We have argued for an England in which there were many
The village community.
free villages. It remains for us to say a word of the doctrines
which would fill England with free landowning village
communities. Here we enter a misty region where arguments suggested by what are
thought to be ‘survivals’ and inferences drawn from other climes or other ages take
the place of documents. We are among guesses and little has as yet been proved.
A popular theory teaches us that land belonged to
The popular theory.
communities before it belonged to individuals. This theory
has the great merit of being vague and elastic; but, as it
seems to think itself precise, and probably owes some of its popularity to its pretence
of precision, we feel it our duty to point out to it its real merit, its vague elasticity.
It apparently attributes the ownership of land to
Co-ownership and
communities. It contrasts communities with individuals. In ownership by corporations.
so doing it seems to hint, and yet to be afraid of saying, that
land was owned by corporations before it was owned by
men. The hesitation we can understand. No one who has paid any attention to the
history of law is likely to maintain with a grave face that the ownership of land was
attributed to fictitious persons before it was attributed to men. But if we abandon
ownership by corporations and place in its stead co-ownership, then we seem to be
making an unfortunate use of words if we say that land belonged to communities
before it belonged to individuals. Co-ownership is ownership by individuals. When at
the present day an English landowner dies and his land descends to his ten daughters,
it is owned by individuals, by ten individuals. If each of these ten ladies died intestate
leaving ten daughters, the land would still be owned by individuals, by a hundred
individuals.
The distinction that modern law draws between the
‘Communities’ as owners.
landowning corporation and the group of co-owners is as
sharp as any distinction can be. It will be daily brought
home to any one who takes an active share in the management of the affairs of a
corporation, for example, a small college which has a master, six fellows and eight
scholars. A conveyance of land to the college and a conveyance of land to these
fifteen men would have utterly different effects. A corporation may be deep in debt
while none of its members owes a farthing. Now we may suspect, and not without
warrant, that in a remote past these two very different notions, namely that of land
owned by a corporation and that of land owned by a group of co-owners were
We have argued for an England in which there were many
The village community.
free villages. It remains for us to say a word of the doctrines
which would fill England with free landowning village
communities. Here we enter a misty region where arguments suggested by what are
thought to be ‘survivals’ and inferences drawn from other climes or other ages take
the place of documents. We are among guesses and little has as yet been proved.
A popular theory teaches us that land belonged to
The popular theory.
communities before it belonged to individuals. This theory
has the great merit of being vague and elastic; but, as it
seems to think itself precise, and probably owes some of its popularity to its pretence
of precision, we feel it our duty to point out to it its real merit, its vague elasticity.
It apparently attributes the ownership of land to
Co-ownership and
communities. It contrasts communities with individuals. In ownership by corporations.
so doing it seems to hint, and yet to be afraid of saying, that
land was owned by corporations before it was owned by
men. The hesitation we can understand. No one who has paid any attention to the
history of law is likely to maintain with a grave face that the ownership of land was
attributed to fictitious persons before it was attributed to men. But if we abandon
ownership by corporations and place in its stead co-ownership, then we seem to be
making an unfortunate use of words if we say that land belonged to communities
before it belonged to individuals. Co-ownership is ownership by individuals. When at
the present day an English landowner dies and his land descends to his ten daughters,
it is owned by individuals, by ten individuals. If each of these ten ladies died intestate
leaving ten daughters, the land would still be owned by individuals, by a hundred
individuals.
The distinction that modern law draws between the
‘Communities’ as owners.
landowning corporation and the group of co-owners is as
sharp as any distinction can be. It will be daily brought
home to any one who takes an active share in the management of the affairs of a
corporation, for example, a small college which has a master, six fellows and eight
scholars. A conveyance of land to the college and a conveyance of land to these
fifteen men would have utterly different effects. A corporation may be deep in debt
while none of its members owes a farthing. Now we may suspect, and not without
warrant, that in a remote past these two very different notions, namely that of land
owned by a corporation and that of land owned by a group of co-owners were
Page 328
intimately blent in some much vaguer notion that was neither exactly the one nor
exactly the other. We may suspect that could we examine the conduct of certain men
who lived long ago we should be sorely puzzled to say whether they were behaving
as the co-owners of a tract of land or as the members of a corporation which was its
owner. But to fashion for ourselves any clear and stable notion of a tertium quid that
is neither corporate ownership nor co-ownership, but partly the one and partly the
other, seems impossible[1166]. Therefore if, in accordance with the popular theory, we
attribute the ownership of lands to ‘communities,’ we ought to add that we do not
attribute it to corporations and that we are fully aware that co-ownership can not be
sharply contrasted with ownership by individuals.
Also since we are apt to fall into the trick of talking about
Possession and ownership.
possession when we mean ownership or proprietary right,
we need not perhaps ask pardon for the remark that land
owned by a group of three joint tenants may be possessed in many different ways.
The three may be jointly possessing the whole; each may be severally possessing a
physically divided third; the whole may be possessed by one of them or by some
fourth person; the possession may be rightful or wrongful. But there is a graver
question that must be raised. When we say that land belonged to communities before
it belonged to individuals, are we really speaking of ownership or of something else.
At the present day no two legal ideas seem more distinct
Ownership and
from each other than that of governmental power and that of governmental power.
proprietary right. The ‘sovereign’ of Great Britain (be the
sovereignty where it may) is not the owner of Great Britain,
and if we still say that all land is ‘held of’ the king, we know that the abolition of this
antique dogma, this caput mortuum, might be easily accomplished without any
perceptible revolution in the practical rules of English law. A landowner in the United
States does not ‘hold of’ the State or the people or the government of the State. The
‘eminent domain’ of the State is neither ownership nor any mode of ownership.
Further, we conceive that the sovereign person or sovereign body can, without
claiming any ownership in the soil, place many restrictions on the use that an owner
may make of his land. A law may prohibit owners from building on certain lands:
those lands are still their lands. Again, the supposed law may be not a negative but a
positive rule; it may require that the owners of certain lands shall build upon them, or
shall till them, or shall keep them as pasture[1167]: still neither state nor sovereign will
be owner of those lands or have any proprietary interest in them. Our law may subject
certain lands to a land-tax to be paid to the state in money, or to a tithe to be paid to
the church in kind, but the state will not and the church will not be part-owner of
those lands. Our state may habitually expropriate owners, may take their lands from
them because they are felons or because their lands are wanted for the construction of
railways. We may conceive it expropriating owners who have done no wrong and yet
exactly the other. We may suspect that could we examine the conduct of certain men
who lived long ago we should be sorely puzzled to say whether they were behaving
as the co-owners of a tract of land or as the members of a corporation which was its
owner. But to fashion for ourselves any clear and stable notion of a tertium quid that
is neither corporate ownership nor co-ownership, but partly the one and partly the
other, seems impossible[1166]. Therefore if, in accordance with the popular theory, we
attribute the ownership of lands to ‘communities,’ we ought to add that we do not
attribute it to corporations and that we are fully aware that co-ownership can not be
sharply contrasted with ownership by individuals.
Also since we are apt to fall into the trick of talking about
Possession and ownership.
possession when we mean ownership or proprietary right,
we need not perhaps ask pardon for the remark that land
owned by a group of three joint tenants may be possessed in many different ways.
The three may be jointly possessing the whole; each may be severally possessing a
physically divided third; the whole may be possessed by one of them or by some
fourth person; the possession may be rightful or wrongful. But there is a graver
question that must be raised. When we say that land belonged to communities before
it belonged to individuals, are we really speaking of ownership or of something else.
At the present day no two legal ideas seem more distinct
Ownership and
from each other than that of governmental power and that of governmental power.
proprietary right. The ‘sovereign’ of Great Britain (be the
sovereignty where it may) is not the owner of Great Britain,
and if we still say that all land is ‘held of’ the king, we know that the abolition of this
antique dogma, this caput mortuum, might be easily accomplished without any
perceptible revolution in the practical rules of English law. A landowner in the United
States does not ‘hold of’ the State or the people or the government of the State. The
‘eminent domain’ of the State is neither ownership nor any mode of ownership.
Further, we conceive that the sovereign person or sovereign body can, without
claiming any ownership in the soil, place many restrictions on the use that an owner
may make of his land. A law may prohibit owners from building on certain lands:
those lands are still their lands. Again, the supposed law may be not a negative but a
positive rule; it may require that the owners of certain lands shall build upon them, or
shall till them, or shall keep them as pasture[1167]: still neither state nor sovereign will
be owner of those lands or have any proprietary interest in them. Our law may subject
certain lands to a land-tax to be paid to the state in money, or to a tithe to be paid to
the church in kind, but the state will not and the church will not be part-owner of
those lands. Our state may habitually expropriate owners, may take their lands from
them because they are felons or because their lands are wanted for the construction of
railways. We may conceive it expropriating owners who have done no wrong and yet
Page 329
are to have no compensation; but until the expropriation takes place the state does not
own the land. As with land, so with chattels. The owner of a cart may find that it is
impressed for the purpose of military transport[1168] and yet the cart is his and not the
state’s.
Similar powers may be exercised by persons or bodies that
Ownership and the powers
are not sovereign, for example, by the governor of a of subordinate governors.
province, by a county council or a municipal corporation.
Suppose that the owners of land situate within a certain
borough are prohibited by a by-law from placing on their soil any buildings the plans
of which have not been approved by the town council. Carry this supposition further:
—suppose that the town council is a ‘folk-moot’ which every inhabitant of the
borough may attend. Still, according to our thinking, there would here be no
communal ownership and no division of ownership between individuals and a
corporation. If we thought it well to say that in such a case the community would
have some kind of ‘eminent domain’ over the land of individuals, we should have to
add that this kind of eminent domain was not a proprietary right, but merely
governmental power, a power of making general rules and issuing particular
commands. Nor would the case be altered if the expressed object of such rules and
commands was the interest, it may even be the pecuniary interest, of the men of the
town. The erection of buildings may be controlled in order that the town may be
wholesome and sightly, or we may conceive that landowners in the suburbs are
compelled to keep their land as market-gardens or as dairy-forms in order that
vegetables or milk may be cheap:—for all this the town council or community of
townsfolk would have no property in the land.
But though this be so, we can not doubt that could we trace
Evolution of sovereignty
back these ideas to their origin, we should come to a time and ownership.
when they were hardly distinct from each other. The
language of our medieval law tells us that this is so. The one
word dominium has to cover both proprietary rights and many kinds of political
power; it stands for ownership, lordship, sovereignty, suzerainty. The power that
Edward I. wields over all England, the power that he claims over all Scotland, all
Gascony, the right that he has in his palace of Westminster, the right that he has in his
war-horse, all these are but modes of dominium. Then we imagine a barbarous horde
invading a country, putting its inhabitants to the sword and defending it against all
comers. Doubtless in some sort the land is its land. But in what sort? In the sort in
which Queen Victoria or the British nation has lands in every quarter of the globe, the
sort in which all France belongs to the French Republic, or the sort in which
Blackacre is the land of John Styles? Have the barbarians themselves answered this
question? Have they asked it[1169].
own the land. As with land, so with chattels. The owner of a cart may find that it is
impressed for the purpose of military transport[1168] and yet the cart is his and not the
state’s.
Similar powers may be exercised by persons or bodies that
Ownership and the powers
are not sovereign, for example, by the governor of a of subordinate governors.
province, by a county council or a municipal corporation.
Suppose that the owners of land situate within a certain
borough are prohibited by a by-law from placing on their soil any buildings the plans
of which have not been approved by the town council. Carry this supposition further:
—suppose that the town council is a ‘folk-moot’ which every inhabitant of the
borough may attend. Still, according to our thinking, there would here be no
communal ownership and no division of ownership between individuals and a
corporation. If we thought it well to say that in such a case the community would
have some kind of ‘eminent domain’ over the land of individuals, we should have to
add that this kind of eminent domain was not a proprietary right, but merely
governmental power, a power of making general rules and issuing particular
commands. Nor would the case be altered if the expressed object of such rules and
commands was the interest, it may even be the pecuniary interest, of the men of the
town. The erection of buildings may be controlled in order that the town may be
wholesome and sightly, or we may conceive that landowners in the suburbs are
compelled to keep their land as market-gardens or as dairy-forms in order that
vegetables or milk may be cheap:—for all this the town council or community of
townsfolk would have no property in the land.
But though this be so, we can not doubt that could we trace
Evolution of sovereignty
back these ideas to their origin, we should come to a time and ownership.
when they were hardly distinct from each other. The
language of our medieval law tells us that this is so. The one
word dominium has to cover both proprietary rights and many kinds of political
power; it stands for ownership, lordship, sovereignty, suzerainty. The power that
Edward I. wields over all England, the power that he claims over all Scotland, all
Gascony, the right that he has in his palace of Westminster, the right that he has in his
war-horse, all these are but modes of dominium. Then we imagine a barbarous horde
invading a country, putting its inhabitants to the sword and defending it against all
comers. Doubtless in some sort the land is its land. But in what sort? In the sort in
which Queen Victoria or the British nation has lands in every quarter of the globe, the
sort in which all France belongs to the French Republic, or the sort in which
Blackacre is the land of John Styles? Have the barbarians themselves answered this
question? Have they asked it[1169].
Page 330
Now if we are going to confuse sovereignty with ownership,
Communal ownership as a
imperium with dominium, political power with proprietary stage.
right, why then let our socialists and collectivists cease their
striving and sing Te Deum. Already their ideal must be
attained. Every inch of the soil of France, to name one instance, ‘belongs’ to the
French Republic. But, if we would not be guilty of this confusion, then we must be
very careful before we assent to the proposition that in the normal course of history
(if indeed in such a context history can be said to have a normal course) the
ownership of land by communities appears before the ownership of land by
individuals. Even if we put aside all such criticisms as would be legal quibbles in the
eyes of impatient theorists, and refuse to say whether the ‘community’ is a mass of
men, an ideal person or tertium quid, we still are likely to find that the
anthropologists will be against us. We are now told by one of the acutest of explorers
that, if we leave out of account as no true case of ownership the sort of inchoate
sovereignty which an independent tribe of hunters may exercise over a piece of the
world’s surface, ‘ownership of land by individuals’ is to be found at a much lower
grade in the scale of civilization than that at which ‘communal ownership’ makes its
first appearance[1170]. Communal ownership, it is said, is not seen until that stage is
reached at which the power of the chieftain is already a considerable force and the
work of centralization is progressing. With these inductions we do not meddle; but if
the anthropologist will concede to the historian that he need not start from
communalism as from a necessary and primitive datum, a large room will be open for
our guesses when we speculate about the doings of a race of barbarians who have
come into contact with Roman ideas. Even had our anthropologists at their command
materials that would justify them in prescribing a normal programme for the human
race and in decreeing that every independent portion of mankind must, if it is to move
at all, move through one fated series of stages which may be designated as Stage A,
Stage B, Stage C and so forth, we still should have to face the fact that the rapidly
progressive groups have been just those which have not been independent, which
have not worked out their own salvation, but have appropriated alien ideas and have
thus been enabled, for anything that we can tell, to leap from Stage A to Stage X
without passing through any intermediate stages. Our Anglo-Saxon ancestors did not
arrive at the alphabet, or at the Nicene Creed, by traversing a long series of ‘stages’;
they leapt to the one and to the other.
But in truth we are learning that the attempt to construct a
A normal sequence of
normal programme for all portions of mankind is idle and stages.
unscientific. For one thing, the number of such portions that
we can with any plausibility treat as independent is very
small. For another, such is the complexity of human affairs and such their
interdependence, that we can not hope for scientific laws which will formulate a
sequence of stages in any one province of man’s activity. We can not, for instance,
Communal ownership as a
imperium with dominium, political power with proprietary stage.
right, why then let our socialists and collectivists cease their
striving and sing Te Deum. Already their ideal must be
attained. Every inch of the soil of France, to name one instance, ‘belongs’ to the
French Republic. But, if we would not be guilty of this confusion, then we must be
very careful before we assent to the proposition that in the normal course of history
(if indeed in such a context history can be said to have a normal course) the
ownership of land by communities appears before the ownership of land by
individuals. Even if we put aside all such criticisms as would be legal quibbles in the
eyes of impatient theorists, and refuse to say whether the ‘community’ is a mass of
men, an ideal person or tertium quid, we still are likely to find that the
anthropologists will be against us. We are now told by one of the acutest of explorers
that, if we leave out of account as no true case of ownership the sort of inchoate
sovereignty which an independent tribe of hunters may exercise over a piece of the
world’s surface, ‘ownership of land by individuals’ is to be found at a much lower
grade in the scale of civilization than that at which ‘communal ownership’ makes its
first appearance[1170]. Communal ownership, it is said, is not seen until that stage is
reached at which the power of the chieftain is already a considerable force and the
work of centralization is progressing. With these inductions we do not meddle; but if
the anthropologist will concede to the historian that he need not start from
communalism as from a necessary and primitive datum, a large room will be open for
our guesses when we speculate about the doings of a race of barbarians who have
come into contact with Roman ideas. Even had our anthropologists at their command
materials that would justify them in prescribing a normal programme for the human
race and in decreeing that every independent portion of mankind must, if it is to move
at all, move through one fated series of stages which may be designated as Stage A,
Stage B, Stage C and so forth, we still should have to face the fact that the rapidly
progressive groups have been just those which have not been independent, which
have not worked out their own salvation, but have appropriated alien ideas and have
thus been enabled, for anything that we can tell, to leap from Stage A to Stage X
without passing through any intermediate stages. Our Anglo-Saxon ancestors did not
arrive at the alphabet, or at the Nicene Creed, by traversing a long series of ‘stages’;
they leapt to the one and to the other.
But in truth we are learning that the attempt to construct a
A normal sequence of
normal programme for all portions of mankind is idle and stages.
unscientific. For one thing, the number of such portions that
we can with any plausibility treat as independent is very
small. For another, such is the complexity of human affairs and such their
interdependence, that we can not hope for scientific laws which will formulate a
sequence of stages in any one province of man’s activity. We can not, for instance,
Page 331
find a law which deals only with political and neglects proprietary arrangements, or a
law which deals only with property and neglects religion. So soon as we penetrate
below the surface, each of the cases whence we would induce our law begins to look
extremely unique, and we shall hesitate long before we fill up the blanks that occur in
the history of one nation by institutions and processes that have been observed in
some other quarter. If we are in haste to drive the men of every race past all the
known ‘stages,’ if we force our reluctant forefathers through agnatic gentes and
house-communities and the rest of it, our normal programme for the human race is
like to become a grotesque assortment of odds and ends.
It is an interesting question whether in the history of our
Was land owned by village
own people we ought to suppose any definite ‘stage’ communities?
intermediate between the introduction of steady agriculture
and the ownership of land by individuals. To say the least,
we have no proof that among the Germans the land was continuously tilled before it
was owned by individuals or by those small groups that constituted the households.
This seems to be so whether we have regard to the country in which the Germans had
once lived as nomads or to those Celtic and Roman lands which they subdued. To
Gaul and to Britain they seem to have brought with them the idea that the cultivable
land should be allotted in severalty. In some cases they fitted themselves into the
agrarian framework that they found; in other cases they formed villages closely
resembling those that they had left behind them in their older home. But to all
appearance, even in that older home, so soon as the village was formed and had
ploughed lands around it, the strips into which those fields were divided were owned
in severalty by the householders of the village. Great pains had been taken to make
the division equitable; each householder was to have strips equal in number and in
value, and to secure equivalence each was to have a strip in every part of the arable
territory. But our evidence, though it may point to some co-operation in agriculture,
does not point to a communistic division of the fruits[1171]. Nor does it point to a time
when a village council or a majority of villagers conceived that it had power to re-
allot the arable strips at regular or irregular intervals[1172]. On the contrary, the
individual’s hold upon his strips developed very rapidly into an inheritable and
partible ownership. No doubt this ownership grew more intense as time went on. It is
a common remark that during yet recent ages the ownership of land that is known to
our law has been growing more intense. This is true and patent enough; the
landowner has gained powers of alienation that his predecessors did not enjoy.
Possibly the only ownership of land that was known to the Lex Salica was inalienable
and could be inherited only by sons of the dead owner. Then again, in old days a
trespass that did no harm would have been no trespass. ‘Nominal damages’ are no
primitive institution, and for a long time a man may have had no action if strange
cattle browsed over land on which no crop of corn was ripening[1173]. But this
growing intensity of ownership may be seen also in the case of movable goods.
law which deals only with property and neglects religion. So soon as we penetrate
below the surface, each of the cases whence we would induce our law begins to look
extremely unique, and we shall hesitate long before we fill up the blanks that occur in
the history of one nation by institutions and processes that have been observed in
some other quarter. If we are in haste to drive the men of every race past all the
known ‘stages,’ if we force our reluctant forefathers through agnatic gentes and
house-communities and the rest of it, our normal programme for the human race is
like to become a grotesque assortment of odds and ends.
It is an interesting question whether in the history of our
Was land owned by village
own people we ought to suppose any definite ‘stage’ communities?
intermediate between the introduction of steady agriculture
and the ownership of land by individuals. To say the least,
we have no proof that among the Germans the land was continuously tilled before it
was owned by individuals or by those small groups that constituted the households.
This seems to be so whether we have regard to the country in which the Germans had
once lived as nomads or to those Celtic and Roman lands which they subdued. To
Gaul and to Britain they seem to have brought with them the idea that the cultivable
land should be allotted in severalty. In some cases they fitted themselves into the
agrarian framework that they found; in other cases they formed villages closely
resembling those that they had left behind them in their older home. But to all
appearance, even in that older home, so soon as the village was formed and had
ploughed lands around it, the strips into which those fields were divided were owned
in severalty by the householders of the village. Great pains had been taken to make
the division equitable; each householder was to have strips equal in number and in
value, and to secure equivalence each was to have a strip in every part of the arable
territory. But our evidence, though it may point to some co-operation in agriculture,
does not point to a communistic division of the fruits[1171]. Nor does it point to a time
when a village council or a majority of villagers conceived that it had power to re-
allot the arable strips at regular or irregular intervals[1172]. On the contrary, the
individual’s hold upon his strips developed very rapidly into an inheritable and
partible ownership. No doubt this ownership grew more intense as time went on. It is
a common remark that during yet recent ages the ownership of land that is known to
our law has been growing more intense. This is true and patent enough; the
landowner has gained powers of alienation that his predecessors did not enjoy.
Possibly the only ownership of land that was known to the Lex Salica was inalienable
and could be inherited only by sons of the dead owner. Then again, in old days a
trespass that did no harm would have been no trespass. ‘Nominal damages’ are no
primitive institution, and for a long time a man may have had no action if strange
cattle browsed over land on which no crop of corn was ripening[1173]. But this
growing intensity of ownership may be seen also in the case of movable goods.
Page 332
Indeed there is a sense in which English law may be said to have known a full
ownership of land long ages before it knew a full ownership of chattels[1174]. What,
however, we are concerned to observe is that the German village community does not
seem to have resisted this development of ownership or set up for itself any
antagonistic proprietary claim. It sought no more as regards the arable fields than a
certain power of regulating their culture, and in old times the Flurzwang, the
customary rotation of crop and fallow, must have appeared less as the outcome of
human ordinance than as an unalterable arrangement established by the nature of
things in general and of acre strips in particular[1175].
Thus, so far back as we can see, the German village had a
Meadows, pasture and
solid core of individualism. There were, however, lands wood.
which in a certain sense belonged to it and which were not
allotted for good and all among its various members. For
one thing, the meadows were often subjected to a more communal scheme. In the
later middle ages we may see them annually redistributed by rotation or by lot among
the owners of the arable. The meadows, which must be sharply distinguished from
the pasture, were few, and, as we may see from Domesday and other records, they
were exceedingly valuable. Probably their great but varying value stood in the way of
any permanent partition that would have seemed equitable. Still they were allotted
annually and the right to an allotment ‘ran with’ the house and the arable strips. But
again, there were woods and pastures. If we must at once find an owner for this
Almende, we may be inclined to place the ownership in a village community, though
not without remembering that if this community may develop into a land-owning
corporation, it may develop into a group of co-owners. But in all likelihood the
question as to the whereabouts of ownership might go unanswered and unasked for a
long time. Rights of user exercisable over these woods and pastures were attached to
the ownership of the houses and the arable strips, and such ‘rights of common’ may
take that acutely individualistic form which they seem to have taken in the England of
the thirteenth century. The freeholder of ‘ancient arable,’ whose tenement represents
one of the original shares, has a right to turn out beasts on the waste, on the whole
waste and every inch of it, and of this right nor lord, nor community can deprive
him[1176]. Perhaps we may attribute to our law about this matter an unusual and, in a
certain sense, an abnormal individualism. In the much governed England of the
Angevin time, the strong central power encouraged every freeholder to look to it for
relief against all kinds of pressure seignorial or communal. Elsewhere a village moot
may assume and retain some control over these pasture rights. But still the untilled
land, the waste, the Almende, exists mainly, if not solely, for the benefit of a small
group of tenements that are owned and possessed in severalty. As to the ownership of
the land that is subject to the rights of pasture, it is a nude, a very nude dominium, and
for a long while no one gives it a thought.
ownership of land long ages before it knew a full ownership of chattels[1174]. What,
however, we are concerned to observe is that the German village community does not
seem to have resisted this development of ownership or set up for itself any
antagonistic proprietary claim. It sought no more as regards the arable fields than a
certain power of regulating their culture, and in old times the Flurzwang, the
customary rotation of crop and fallow, must have appeared less as the outcome of
human ordinance than as an unalterable arrangement established by the nature of
things in general and of acre strips in particular[1175].
Thus, so far back as we can see, the German village had a
Meadows, pasture and
solid core of individualism. There were, however, lands wood.
which in a certain sense belonged to it and which were not
allotted for good and all among its various members. For
one thing, the meadows were often subjected to a more communal scheme. In the
later middle ages we may see them annually redistributed by rotation or by lot among
the owners of the arable. The meadows, which must be sharply distinguished from
the pasture, were few, and, as we may see from Domesday and other records, they
were exceedingly valuable. Probably their great but varying value stood in the way of
any permanent partition that would have seemed equitable. Still they were allotted
annually and the right to an allotment ‘ran with’ the house and the arable strips. But
again, there were woods and pastures. If we must at once find an owner for this
Almende, we may be inclined to place the ownership in a village community, though
not without remembering that if this community may develop into a land-owning
corporation, it may develop into a group of co-owners. But in all likelihood the
question as to the whereabouts of ownership might go unanswered and unasked for a
long time. Rights of user exercisable over these woods and pastures were attached to
the ownership of the houses and the arable strips, and such ‘rights of common’ may
take that acutely individualistic form which they seem to have taken in the England of
the thirteenth century. The freeholder of ‘ancient arable,’ whose tenement represents
one of the original shares, has a right to turn out beasts on the waste, on the whole
waste and every inch of it, and of this right nor lord, nor community can deprive
him[1176]. Perhaps we may attribute to our law about this matter an unusual and, in a
certain sense, an abnormal individualism. In the much governed England of the
Angevin time, the strong central power encouraged every freeholder to look to it for
relief against all kinds of pressure seignorial or communal. Elsewhere a village moot
may assume and retain some control over these pasture rights. But still the untilled
land, the waste, the Almende, exists mainly, if not solely, for the benefit of a small
group of tenements that are owned and possessed in severalty. As to the ownership of
the land that is subject to the rights of pasture, it is a nude, a very nude dominium, and
for a long while no one gives it a thought.
Page 333
In a favourable environment the German village community
The bond between
may and will become a landowning corporation. But many neighbours.
dangers lie before it: internal as well as external dangers.
We must not think of it as a closely knit body of men. The
agrarian is almost the only tie that keeps it together. Originally the men who settle
down in a village are likely to be kinsmen. Some phrases in the continental folk-laws,
and some perhaps of our English place-names, point in this direction. But (explain
this how we will) the German system of kinship, which binds men together by the
sacred tie of blood-feud, traces blood both through father and through mother, and
therefore will not suffer a ‘blood-feud-kin’ to have either a local habitation or a
name[1177]. Very soon, especially if daughters or the sons of daughters are allowed
(and very ancient Frankish laws allow them) to inherit the dead man’s land, a man
who lives in one village will often be closer of kin to men who live in other villages
than to his neighbours. The village community was not a gens. The bond of blood
was sacred, but it did not tie the Germans into mutually exclusive clans. Nor did it
hold them in large ‘house-communities,’ for the partible inheritance seems as a
general rule to have been soon partitioned[1178]. Nor again may we ascribe to the
German house-father much power over his full-grown sons[1179].
Moreover, the village community was not a body that could
Feebleness of the village
declare the law of the tribe or nation. It had no court, no community.
jurisdiction. If moots were held in it, these would be
comparable rather to meetings of shareholders than to
sessions of a tribunal. In short, the village landowners formed a group of men whose
economic affairs were inextricably intermixed, but this was almost the only principle
that made them an unit, unless and until the state began to use the township as its
organ for the maintenance of the peace and the collection of taxes. That is the reason
why we read little of the township in our Anglo-Saxon dooms[1180]. Only as the
state’s pressure increases, does the vill become one of the public institutions of the
kingdom. We may even exaggerate the amount of agricultural co-operation that was
to be found within it. Beyond the age in which the typical peasant is a virgater
contributing two oxen to a team of eight, our English evidence seems to point to a
time when the normal ‘townsman’ held a hide and had slaves and oxen enough for its
cultivation. Nor in all probability was the village community a large body. We may
doubt whether in the oldest days it usually comprised more than some ten
shareholders[1181].
Whatever might come in course of time, we must not
Absence of organization.
suppose that the village had much that could be called a
constitution. In particular, we must be careful not to carry
too far back the notion that votes will be counted and that the voice of a majority will
be treated as the voice of all. When that marvellous title De migrantibus raises a
The bond between
may and will become a landowning corporation. But many neighbours.
dangers lie before it: internal as well as external dangers.
We must not think of it as a closely knit body of men. The
agrarian is almost the only tie that keeps it together. Originally the men who settle
down in a village are likely to be kinsmen. Some phrases in the continental folk-laws,
and some perhaps of our English place-names, point in this direction. But (explain
this how we will) the German system of kinship, which binds men together by the
sacred tie of blood-feud, traces blood both through father and through mother, and
therefore will not suffer a ‘blood-feud-kin’ to have either a local habitation or a
name[1177]. Very soon, especially if daughters or the sons of daughters are allowed
(and very ancient Frankish laws allow them) to inherit the dead man’s land, a man
who lives in one village will often be closer of kin to men who live in other villages
than to his neighbours. The village community was not a gens. The bond of blood
was sacred, but it did not tie the Germans into mutually exclusive clans. Nor did it
hold them in large ‘house-communities,’ for the partible inheritance seems as a
general rule to have been soon partitioned[1178]. Nor again may we ascribe to the
German house-father much power over his full-grown sons[1179].
Moreover, the village community was not a body that could
Feebleness of the village
declare the law of the tribe or nation. It had no court, no community.
jurisdiction. If moots were held in it, these would be
comparable rather to meetings of shareholders than to
sessions of a tribunal. In short, the village landowners formed a group of men whose
economic affairs were inextricably intermixed, but this was almost the only principle
that made them an unit, unless and until the state began to use the township as its
organ for the maintenance of the peace and the collection of taxes. That is the reason
why we read little of the township in our Anglo-Saxon dooms[1180]. Only as the
state’s pressure increases, does the vill become one of the public institutions of the
kingdom. We may even exaggerate the amount of agricultural co-operation that was
to be found within it. Beyond the age in which the typical peasant is a virgater
contributing two oxen to a team of eight, our English evidence seems to point to a
time when the normal ‘townsman’ held a hide and had slaves and oxen enough for its
cultivation. Nor in all probability was the village community a large body. We may
doubt whether in the oldest days it usually comprised more than some ten
shareholders[1181].
Whatever might come in course of time, we must not
Absence of organization.
suppose that the village had much that could be called a
constitution. In particular, we must be careful not to carry
too far back the notion that votes will be counted and that the voice of a majority will
be treated as the voice of all. When that marvellous title De migrantibus raises a
Page 334
corner of the curtain and gives us our only glance into a village of newly settled
Salian Franks, the one indisputable trait that we see among much that is disputable is
that the new-comer must leave the village if one villager objects to his presence. His
presence, we may suppose, might be objectionable because it might add to the
number of those who enjoyed wood, waste and water in common; but any one
villager can insist on his departure. Out of this state of things ‘communal ownership’
may grow; but all the communalism that we see at present is very like
individualism[1182]. Above all, we must not picture these village lands as ‘impressed
with a trust’ in favour of unborn generations or as devoted to ‘public purposes.’ If in
course of time small folk, cottiers, ‘under-settles’ and the like, are found in the
village, they will have to struggle for rights in the waste, and the rights, if any, that
they get will be meagre when compared with those of the owners of ‘whole lands’
and ‘half lands.’ An oligarchy of peasant proprietors may rule the waste and the
village.
Thus even in favourable circumstances there were many
The German village on
difficulties to be overcome if the communalism, such as it conquered soil.
was, of the village community was to be maintained and
developed. But where the village was founded upon
conquered soil the circumstances were not favourable. If the Germans invaded Gaul
or Britain, the very fields themselves seemed to rebel against communalism and to
demand a ring-fenced severalty. Throughout large tracts in Gaul the barbarians were
content to adapt themselves to the shell that was provided for them. A certain aliquot
share of every estate might be taken from its former owner and be allotted to a
Burgundian or a Goth according to a uniform plan[1183]. Throughout other large tracts
villages of the Germanic type were founded; a large part of northern Gaul was
studded with such villages, and it may be well for us to remember that some of our
Norman subjugators came to us from a land of villages, if others came from a land of
isolated homesteads[1184]. There can be little doubt that in Britain numerous villages
were formed which reproduced in all essentials the villages which Saxons and Angles
had left behind them on the mainland, and as little doubt that very often, in the west
and south-west of Britain, German kings and eorls took to themselves integral estates,
the boundaries and agrarian arrangement whereof had been drawn by Romans, or
rather by Celts[1185].
Then the invasions and the long wars called for a rapid
Development of kingly
development of kingship. Very quickly the Frankish power.
kingship became despotism. In England also the kings
became powerful and the hereditary nobles disappeared.
There was taxation. The country was plotted out according to some rude scheme to
provide the king with meat and cheese and ale[1186]. Then came bishops and priests
with the suggestion that he should devote his revenues to the service of God and with
Salian Franks, the one indisputable trait that we see among much that is disputable is
that the new-comer must leave the village if one villager objects to his presence. His
presence, we may suppose, might be objectionable because it might add to the
number of those who enjoyed wood, waste and water in common; but any one
villager can insist on his departure. Out of this state of things ‘communal ownership’
may grow; but all the communalism that we see at present is very like
individualism[1182]. Above all, we must not picture these village lands as ‘impressed
with a trust’ in favour of unborn generations or as devoted to ‘public purposes.’ If in
course of time small folk, cottiers, ‘under-settles’ and the like, are found in the
village, they will have to struggle for rights in the waste, and the rights, if any, that
they get will be meagre when compared with those of the owners of ‘whole lands’
and ‘half lands.’ An oligarchy of peasant proprietors may rule the waste and the
village.
Thus even in favourable circumstances there were many
The German village on
difficulties to be overcome if the communalism, such as it conquered soil.
was, of the village community was to be maintained and
developed. But where the village was founded upon
conquered soil the circumstances were not favourable. If the Germans invaded Gaul
or Britain, the very fields themselves seemed to rebel against communalism and to
demand a ring-fenced severalty. Throughout large tracts in Gaul the barbarians were
content to adapt themselves to the shell that was provided for them. A certain aliquot
share of every estate might be taken from its former owner and be allotted to a
Burgundian or a Goth according to a uniform plan[1183]. Throughout other large tracts
villages of the Germanic type were founded; a large part of northern Gaul was
studded with such villages, and it may be well for us to remember that some of our
Norman subjugators came to us from a land of villages, if others came from a land of
isolated homesteads[1184]. There can be little doubt that in Britain numerous villages
were formed which reproduced in all essentials the villages which Saxons and Angles
had left behind them on the mainland, and as little doubt that very often, in the west
and south-west of Britain, German kings and eorls took to themselves integral estates,
the boundaries and agrarian arrangement whereof had been drawn by Romans, or
rather by Celts[1185].
Then the invasions and the long wars called for a rapid
Development of kingly
development of kingship. Very quickly the Frankish power.
kingship became despotism. In England also the kings
became powerful and the hereditary nobles disappeared.
There was taxation. The country was plotted out according to some rude scheme to
provide the king with meat and cheese and ale[1186]. Then came bishops and priests
with the suggestion that he should devote his revenues to the service of God and with
Page 335
forms of conveyance which made him speak as if the whole land were his to give
away. Here, so we have argued, was the beginning of a process which placed many a
village under a lord. The words of this lord’s ‘book’ told him that he was owner, or at
least lord, of this village ‘with its woods and its pastures.’ The men of the village
might or might not maintain all their accustomed rights, but at any rate no expansion
of those rights beyond the ancient usage was possible. The potentialities of the waste
(if we may so speak) had been handed over to a lord; the future was his.
We must not, however, repeat what has been lengthily said
Free villages in England.
above touching the growth of the manorial system, though
we are painfully aware that we have neglected many phases
of the complicated process. Here let us remember that this process was not complete
in the year 1066, and let us look once more at the free villages in the east; for
example, at Orwell[1187]. Who owned the land that served as a pasture for the pecunia
villae? Shall we place the ownership in the thirteen holders of the arable strips into
which the four hides were divided, or in a corporation whereof they were the
members, or in their various lords, those eight exalted persons to whom they were
commended, or shall we say that here is res nullius? The supposition that the lords
are owners of the waste we may briefly dismiss. The landholders are free to
‘withdraw themselves’ and seek other lords. That the land is res nullius we may also
positively deny, if thereby be meant that it lies open to occupation. Let a man of the
next village turn out his beasts there and he will find out fast enough that he has done
a wrong. But who will sue him? Will all the villagers join as co-plaintiffs or will the
village corporation appear by its attorney? Far more in accordance with all that we
see in later days is it to suppose that any one of the men of Orwell who has a right to
turn out beasts can resent the invasion[1188]. This brings to our notice the core of
individualism that lies in the centre of the village. The houses and the arable strips are
owned in severalty, and annexed to these houses and arable strips are pasture rights
which are the rights of individuals and which, it may be believed, seem to exhaust the
utility of the waste. What remains to dispute about? A nude, a very nude dominium,
which is often imperceptible.
Not always imperceptible. From time to time these Orwell
The village meeting.
people in town meeting assembled may have taken some
grave resolution as to the treatment of the waste. They may
now and then have decided to add to the amount of arable and diminish the amount of
pasture. But occasional measures of this sort, for which a theoretical, if not a real,
unanimity is secured, will not generate a regulative organ, still less a proprietary
corporation. In decade after decade a township-moot at Orwell would have little to
do. The moot of the Wetherley hundred is the court that deems dooms for the men of
Orwell. If the lands of Orwell had been steadily regarded as the lands of a corporation
they would have passed in one lump to some one Norman lord. But such corporate
away. Here, so we have argued, was the beginning of a process which placed many a
village under a lord. The words of this lord’s ‘book’ told him that he was owner, or at
least lord, of this village ‘with its woods and its pastures.’ The men of the village
might or might not maintain all their accustomed rights, but at any rate no expansion
of those rights beyond the ancient usage was possible. The potentialities of the waste
(if we may so speak) had been handed over to a lord; the future was his.
We must not, however, repeat what has been lengthily said
Free villages in England.
above touching the growth of the manorial system, though
we are painfully aware that we have neglected many phases
of the complicated process. Here let us remember that this process was not complete
in the year 1066, and let us look once more at the free villages in the east; for
example, at Orwell[1187]. Who owned the land that served as a pasture for the pecunia
villae? Shall we place the ownership in the thirteen holders of the arable strips into
which the four hides were divided, or in a corporation whereof they were the
members, or in their various lords, those eight exalted persons to whom they were
commended, or shall we say that here is res nullius? The supposition that the lords
are owners of the waste we may briefly dismiss. The landholders are free to
‘withdraw themselves’ and seek other lords. That the land is res nullius we may also
positively deny, if thereby be meant that it lies open to occupation. Let a man of the
next village turn out his beasts there and he will find out fast enough that he has done
a wrong. But who will sue him? Will all the villagers join as co-plaintiffs or will the
village corporation appear by its attorney? Far more in accordance with all that we
see in later days is it to suppose that any one of the men of Orwell who has a right to
turn out beasts can resent the invasion[1188]. This brings to our notice the core of
individualism that lies in the centre of the village. The houses and the arable strips are
owned in severalty, and annexed to these houses and arable strips are pasture rights
which are the rights of individuals and which, it may be believed, seem to exhaust the
utility of the waste. What remains to dispute about? A nude, a very nude dominium,
which is often imperceptible.
Not always imperceptible. From time to time these Orwell
The village meeting.
people in town meeting assembled may have taken some
grave resolution as to the treatment of the waste. They may
now and then have decided to add to the amount of arable and diminish the amount of
pasture. But occasional measures of this sort, for which a theoretical, if not a real,
unanimity is secured, will not generate a regulative organ, still less a proprietary
corporation. In decade after decade a township-moot at Orwell would have little to
do. The moot of the Wetherley hundred is the court that deems dooms for the men of
Orwell. If the lands of Orwell had been steadily regarded as the lands of a corporation
they would have passed in one lump to some one Norman lord. But such corporate
Page 336
feeling as there was was weak. The men of Orwell had been seeking lords, each man
for himself, in the most opposite quarters. Many of the virgates that are physically in
one village have, as we have seen[1189], been made ‘to lie in’ other villages; for the
free man can carry his land where he pleases. When this is so, he is already beginning
to feel that the tie which keeps him in a village community is a restraint that has,
perhaps unfortunately, been imposed upon him and his property by ancient history.
The fate of these lordless communities and of their waste
What might have become of
was still trembling in the balance when King Harold fell. To the free village.
guess what would have happened had he held his own is not
easy. It is possible that what was done by foreigners would
have been done, though less rapidly, by lords of English race, and that by
consolidating soke and commendation into a firm landlordship and then making
among themselves treaties of partition, they would have acquired the ownership of
the pasture land subject to the rights of common. It is perhaps more probable that in
some cases the old indeterminate state of things might have been maintained until the
idea of a fictitious personality had spread from the chapter-house to the borough and
from the borough to the village. Then the ownership of the soil might have been
attributed to a corporation of which the freeholders in the village were the members.
One famous case which came to light in the seventeenth century may warn us that
throughout the middle ages there were here and there groups of freeholders, and even
of customary tenants, who were managing agrarian affairs in a manner which
feudalism could not explain and our English law would not warrant, for they were
behaving as though they were members of a landowning corporation[1190]. Often in
the east of England the manors must have been so intermixed that village meetings,
not however of a democratic kind, may have dealt with business which lay outside
the competence of any seignorial court. We know little and, it is to be feared, must be
content to know little of such meetings. They were not sessions of a tribunal; they
kept no rolls; the law knew them not. But we dare not say that if all seignorial
pressure had been removed, the village lands would have been preserved as
communal lands for modern villagers. Where there was no seignorial pressure, no
joint and several liability for dues, the tie was lax between the owners of the strips in
the village fields; and if there was a corporate element in their union, there was also a
strong element of co-ownership. Had they been left to themselves, we can not say
with any confidence that they would not sooner or later have partitioned the waste.
Was it not their land, and might they not do what they liked with their own.
One other question may be touched. It was the fashion in
Mark communities.
England some years ago that those who spoke of village
communities should say something of ‘the Germanic mark.’
What they said seemed often to imply that the German village community was a mark
community. This was a mistake. It seems indeed that there were parts of Germany in
for himself, in the most opposite quarters. Many of the virgates that are physically in
one village have, as we have seen[1189], been made ‘to lie in’ other villages; for the
free man can carry his land where he pleases. When this is so, he is already beginning
to feel that the tie which keeps him in a village community is a restraint that has,
perhaps unfortunately, been imposed upon him and his property by ancient history.
The fate of these lordless communities and of their waste
What might have become of
was still trembling in the balance when King Harold fell. To the free village.
guess what would have happened had he held his own is not
easy. It is possible that what was done by foreigners would
have been done, though less rapidly, by lords of English race, and that by
consolidating soke and commendation into a firm landlordship and then making
among themselves treaties of partition, they would have acquired the ownership of
the pasture land subject to the rights of common. It is perhaps more probable that in
some cases the old indeterminate state of things might have been maintained until the
idea of a fictitious personality had spread from the chapter-house to the borough and
from the borough to the village. Then the ownership of the soil might have been
attributed to a corporation of which the freeholders in the village were the members.
One famous case which came to light in the seventeenth century may warn us that
throughout the middle ages there were here and there groups of freeholders, and even
of customary tenants, who were managing agrarian affairs in a manner which
feudalism could not explain and our English law would not warrant, for they were
behaving as though they were members of a landowning corporation[1190]. Often in
the east of England the manors must have been so intermixed that village meetings,
not however of a democratic kind, may have dealt with business which lay outside
the competence of any seignorial court. We know little and, it is to be feared, must be
content to know little of such meetings. They were not sessions of a tribunal; they
kept no rolls; the law knew them not. But we dare not say that if all seignorial
pressure had been removed, the village lands would have been preserved as
communal lands for modern villagers. Where there was no seignorial pressure, no
joint and several liability for dues, the tie was lax between the owners of the strips in
the village fields; and if there was a corporate element in their union, there was also a
strong element of co-ownership. Had they been left to themselves, we can not say
with any confidence that they would not sooner or later have partitioned the waste.
Was it not their land, and might they not do what they liked with their own.
One other question may be touched. It was the fashion in
Mark communities.
England some years ago that those who spoke of village
communities should say something of ‘the Germanic mark.’
What they said seemed often to imply that the German village community was a mark
community. This was a mistake. It seems indeed that there were parts of Germany in
Page 337
which the word ‘mark’ was loosely used[1191]; but the true Markgenossenschaft was
utterly different from the Dorfgenossenschaft, and the lands with which it dealt were
just those lands that belonged to no village[1192]. In the country which saw the
Germans becoming an agricultural race, the lands belonging to the villages were but
oases in a wild territory. In later days some large piece of this territory is found to be
under the control of a ‘mark-community,’ whose members are dwelling here and there
in many different villages and exercise rights over the land (for the more part it is
forest land[1193]) that belongs to no village but constitutes the mark. Traces of what
might have become ‘the mark system’ may perhaps be found in England; but not
where they have been usually sought.
We read of a tract in Suffolk which is common pasture for
Intercommoning between
the whole hundred of Coleness[1194]. Instances in which a vills.
piece of land is common pasture for many vills were by no
means uncommon in the thirteenth century. They grow rarer
as time goes on. Our law provided but a precarious and uncomfortable niche for them
under the rubric common pur cause de vicinage[1195]. These are the traces of what in
different surroundings might have become, and perhaps were near to becoming, mark
communities. In the thirteenth century the state seems to have been already enforcing
the theory that every inch of land ought to lie within the territory of some vill[1196].
This was a police measure. The responsibility of one set of villagers was not to cease
until the boundary was reached where the responsibility of another set began. But
even in recent times there have been larger moors in the north of England which
‘belonged’ (we will use a vague word) to two or more townships in common. At any
rate, we must not take back this theory that the vills exhaust the land into the days of
the Germanic settlement[1197]. In some districts the vills must have been separated
from each other by wide woods, and in all likelihood large portions of these woods
were not proper to any one village, but were regarded as belonging, in some sense or
another, to a group of villages. However, land of this kind was just the land which
was most exposed to an assertion of royal ownership, and we imagine that a mark
community had from the first little chance of organizing itself in England[1198]. But
we have already made too many guesses.
We must not be in a hurry to get to the beginning of the long
Last words.
history of law. Very slowly we are making our way towards
it. The history of law must be a history of ideas. It must
represent, not merely what men have done and said, but what men have thought in
bygone ages. The task of reconstructing ancient ideas is hazardous, and can only be
accomplished little by little. If we are in a hurry to get to the beginning we shall miss
the path. Against many kinds of anachronism we now guard ourselves. We are careful
of costume, of armour and architecture, of words and forms of speech. But it is far
easier to be careful of these things than to prevent the intrusion of untimely ideas. In
utterly different from the Dorfgenossenschaft, and the lands with which it dealt were
just those lands that belonged to no village[1192]. In the country which saw the
Germans becoming an agricultural race, the lands belonging to the villages were but
oases in a wild territory. In later days some large piece of this territory is found to be
under the control of a ‘mark-community,’ whose members are dwelling here and there
in many different villages and exercise rights over the land (for the more part it is
forest land[1193]) that belongs to no village but constitutes the mark. Traces of what
might have become ‘the mark system’ may perhaps be found in England; but not
where they have been usually sought.
We read of a tract in Suffolk which is common pasture for
Intercommoning between
the whole hundred of Coleness[1194]. Instances in which a vills.
piece of land is common pasture for many vills were by no
means uncommon in the thirteenth century. They grow rarer
as time goes on. Our law provided but a precarious and uncomfortable niche for them
under the rubric common pur cause de vicinage[1195]. These are the traces of what in
different surroundings might have become, and perhaps were near to becoming, mark
communities. In the thirteenth century the state seems to have been already enforcing
the theory that every inch of land ought to lie within the territory of some vill[1196].
This was a police measure. The responsibility of one set of villagers was not to cease
until the boundary was reached where the responsibility of another set began. But
even in recent times there have been larger moors in the north of England which
‘belonged’ (we will use a vague word) to two or more townships in common. At any
rate, we must not take back this theory that the vills exhaust the land into the days of
the Germanic settlement[1197]. In some districts the vills must have been separated
from each other by wide woods, and in all likelihood large portions of these woods
were not proper to any one village, but were regarded as belonging, in some sense or
another, to a group of villages. However, land of this kind was just the land which
was most exposed to an assertion of royal ownership, and we imagine that a mark
community had from the first little chance of organizing itself in England[1198]. But
we have already made too many guesses.
We must not be in a hurry to get to the beginning of the long
Last words.
history of law. Very slowly we are making our way towards
it. The history of law must be a history of ideas. It must
represent, not merely what men have done and said, but what men have thought in
bygone ages. The task of reconstructing ancient ideas is hazardous, and can only be
accomplished little by little. If we are in a hurry to get to the beginning we shall miss
the path. Against many kinds of anachronism we now guard ourselves. We are careful
of costume, of armour and architecture, of words and forms of speech. But it is far
easier to be careful of these things than to prevent the intrusion of untimely ideas. In
Page 338
particular there lies a besetting danger for us in the barbarian’s use of a language
which is too good for his thought. Mistakes then are easy, and when committed they
will be fatal and fundamental mistakes. If, for example, we introduce the persona
ficta too soon, we shall be doing worse than if we armed Hengest and Horsa with
machine guns or pictured the Venerable Bede correcting proofs for the press; we shall
have built upon a crumbling foundation. The most efficient method of protecting
ourselves against such errors is that of reading our history backwards as well as
forwards, of making sure of our middle ages before we talk about the ‘archaic,’ of
accustoming our eyes to the twilight before we go out into the night.
which is too good for his thought. Mistakes then are easy, and when committed they
will be fatal and fundamental mistakes. If, for example, we introduce the persona
ficta too soon, we shall be doing worse than if we armed Hengest and Horsa with
machine guns or pictured the Venerable Bede correcting proofs for the press; we shall
have built upon a crumbling foundation. The most efficient method of protecting
ourselves against such errors is that of reading our history backwards as well as
forwards, of making sure of our middle ages before we talk about the ‘archaic,’ of
accustoming our eyes to the twilight before we go out into the night.
Page 339
Page 340
ESSAY III.
THE HIDE.
What was the hide? However unwilling we may be to face
What was the hide?
this dreary old question, we can not escape it. At first sight
it may seem avoidable by those who are interested in the
general drift of national life, but have no desire to solve petty problems or face
unnecessary difficulties. The history of weights and measures, some may say, is
probably very curious and no doubt is worth study; but we, who shall be amply
satisfied if we understand the grand movements and the broad traits, must leave this
little province, as we must leave much else, to antiquarian specialists. Unfortunately,
however, that question about the hide is ‘pre-judicial’ to all the great questions of
early English history.
If our choice lay between 30 and 40 acres, or again between
Importance of the question.
a long and a short hundred, then indeed we might refuse to
take part in the conflict. But between the advocates of big
hides of 120 acres or thereabouts and the advocates of little hides of 30 acres or
thereabouts there should be no peace. In the construction of early English history we
shall adopt one style of architecture if we are supplied with small hides, while if our
materials consist of big hides an entirely different ‘plan and elevation’ must be
chosen. Let us take one example. We find the kings giving away manses or hides by
fives and tens. What are they really doing? Are they or are they not giving away
whole villages? Obviously this question is pre-judicial to many another. Our whole
conception of the Anglo-Saxon kingship will be profoundly affected by our
attribution or our denial to the king of an alienable superiority over villages that are
full of free landowners. This question, therefore, we should have upon our hands even
if we thought that we could rear the fabric of political and constitutional history
without first laying an economic foundation. But the day for such castles in the air is
passing. Howbeit, we must not talk in this pompous way of castles or foundations.
We are not going to lay foundations, nor even to choose a site. We hope to test a few
materials and perhaps to show how a site may some day be acquired.
From the Norman Conquest so far back as we can go, a
Hide and manse in Bede.
certain possessory unit or a certain typical tenement is being
thrust upon our notice by the laws, the charters, the
historians[1199]. We may begin with Bede. When he is going to speak of the area or
the capacity of a tract of land, be it large or be it small, he refers to a certain unit or
type, namely, the land of one family (terra unius familiae). The abbess Hild acquires
THE HIDE.
What was the hide? However unwilling we may be to face
What was the hide?
this dreary old question, we can not escape it. At first sight
it may seem avoidable by those who are interested in the
general drift of national life, but have no desire to solve petty problems or face
unnecessary difficulties. The history of weights and measures, some may say, is
probably very curious and no doubt is worth study; but we, who shall be amply
satisfied if we understand the grand movements and the broad traits, must leave this
little province, as we must leave much else, to antiquarian specialists. Unfortunately,
however, that question about the hide is ‘pre-judicial’ to all the great questions of
early English history.
If our choice lay between 30 and 40 acres, or again between
Importance of the question.
a long and a short hundred, then indeed we might refuse to
take part in the conflict. But between the advocates of big
hides of 120 acres or thereabouts and the advocates of little hides of 30 acres or
thereabouts there should be no peace. In the construction of early English history we
shall adopt one style of architecture if we are supplied with small hides, while if our
materials consist of big hides an entirely different ‘plan and elevation’ must be
chosen. Let us take one example. We find the kings giving away manses or hides by
fives and tens. What are they really doing? Are they or are they not giving away
whole villages? Obviously this question is pre-judicial to many another. Our whole
conception of the Anglo-Saxon kingship will be profoundly affected by our
attribution or our denial to the king of an alienable superiority over villages that are
full of free landowners. This question, therefore, we should have upon our hands even
if we thought that we could rear the fabric of political and constitutional history
without first laying an economic foundation. But the day for such castles in the air is
passing. Howbeit, we must not talk in this pompous way of castles or foundations.
We are not going to lay foundations, nor even to choose a site. We hope to test a few
materials and perhaps to show how a site may some day be acquired.
From the Norman Conquest so far back as we can go, a
Hide and manse in Bede.
certain possessory unit or a certain typical tenement is being
thrust upon our notice by the laws, the charters, the
historians[1199]. We may begin with Bede. When he is going to speak of the area or
the capacity of a tract of land, be it large or be it small, he refers to a certain unit or
type, namely, the land of one family (terra unius familiae). The abbess Hild acquires
Page 341
the land of one family and erects a religious house upon it[1200]; king Oswy gives
away twelve tracts of land, each of which consists of ‘the possessiones of ten
families’[1201]; the kingdom of the South Saxons contains the land of 7,000
families[1202]. We see that already Bede is thinking rather of the size or capacity of a
tract of soil than of the number of households that happen to be dwelling there. ‘The
measure (mensura) of the Isle of Wight is, according to the English mode of
reckoning, 1200 families[1203].’ ‘The isle of Thanet is no small island: that is to say,
according to the customary English computation, it is of 600 families[1204].’ Some
apology is due from a scholar who writes in Latin and who writes thus; so Bede tells
us that he is using the English mode of reckoning; he is literally translating some
English term.
When his own book is rendered into English that term will
Hide and manse in the land-
reappear. Usually it reappears in the form híd, but books.
occasionally we have hiwisc or hiwscipe. There seems no
room for doubt that hiwisc and the more abstract hiwscipe
mean a household, and very little room for doubt that híd springs from a root that is
common to it and them and has the same primary meaning[1205]. Elsewhere we may
find an equivalence between the hide and the hiwisc:—‘If a Welsh man thrives so that
he has a hiwisc of land and can render the king’s gafol, then his wergild is 120
shillings; but if he attains only to a half-hide then his wergild is 80 shillings[1206].’ In
the charters also we may now and then find that the land to be conveyed is a
hiwisc[1207], or is the land of one familia[1208]. However, the common English term is
hide, while the scribes of the land-books, who as yet are above inventing a Latin
hida, ring the changes on half-a-dozen phrases[1209]. We begin with terra unius
manentis, terra unius casati, terra unius tributarii, which keep clearly before our
eyes the fact or the theory that the normal householder, the normal taxpayer, will
possess one of these units. At a little later time the more convenient mansa
(sometimes mansio[1210] or mansiuncula) becomes popular, and we may see also that
men are beginning to speak of manents, casates, tributaries ‘of land,’ much as they
would speak of acres or perches of land[1211]. So far as we can see, all these terms are
being used as though they were absolutely equivalent. If a clerk has to describe
several different tenements, he will write of manentes in one clause and casati in the
next, merely because a repetition of the same term would be inelegant[1212]. In
Kentish charters we read more of the aratrum and the sullung than of the manse and
the hide; but apparently we have here other names for what is a similar and in some
sort an equivalent unit[1213]; and it is by no means unknown that Kentish tenements
will be called manses and hides[1214].
Now if we ask whether the type to which reference is thus
The large hide and the
made is a tenement comprising about six-score acres of manorial arrangement.
arable land, we are asking a question of the gravest
away twelve tracts of land, each of which consists of ‘the possessiones of ten
families’[1201]; the kingdom of the South Saxons contains the land of 7,000
families[1202]. We see that already Bede is thinking rather of the size or capacity of a
tract of soil than of the number of households that happen to be dwelling there. ‘The
measure (mensura) of the Isle of Wight is, according to the English mode of
reckoning, 1200 families[1203].’ ‘The isle of Thanet is no small island: that is to say,
according to the customary English computation, it is of 600 families[1204].’ Some
apology is due from a scholar who writes in Latin and who writes thus; so Bede tells
us that he is using the English mode of reckoning; he is literally translating some
English term.
When his own book is rendered into English that term will
Hide and manse in the land-
reappear. Usually it reappears in the form híd, but books.
occasionally we have hiwisc or hiwscipe. There seems no
room for doubt that hiwisc and the more abstract hiwscipe
mean a household, and very little room for doubt that híd springs from a root that is
common to it and them and has the same primary meaning[1205]. Elsewhere we may
find an equivalence between the hide and the hiwisc:—‘If a Welsh man thrives so that
he has a hiwisc of land and can render the king’s gafol, then his wergild is 120
shillings; but if he attains only to a half-hide then his wergild is 80 shillings[1206].’ In
the charters also we may now and then find that the land to be conveyed is a
hiwisc[1207], or is the land of one familia[1208]. However, the common English term is
hide, while the scribes of the land-books, who as yet are above inventing a Latin
hida, ring the changes on half-a-dozen phrases[1209]. We begin with terra unius
manentis, terra unius casati, terra unius tributarii, which keep clearly before our
eyes the fact or the theory that the normal householder, the normal taxpayer, will
possess one of these units. At a little later time the more convenient mansa
(sometimes mansio[1210] or mansiuncula) becomes popular, and we may see also that
men are beginning to speak of manents, casates, tributaries ‘of land,’ much as they
would speak of acres or perches of land[1211]. So far as we can see, all these terms are
being used as though they were absolutely equivalent. If a clerk has to describe
several different tenements, he will write of manentes in one clause and casati in the
next, merely because a repetition of the same term would be inelegant[1212]. In
Kentish charters we read more of the aratrum and the sullung than of the manse and
the hide; but apparently we have here other names for what is a similar and in some
sort an equivalent unit[1213]; and it is by no means unknown that Kentish tenements
will be called manses and hides[1214].
Now if we ask whether the type to which reference is thus
The large hide and the
made is a tenement comprising about six-score acres of manorial arrangement.
arable land, we are asking a question of the gravest
Page 342
importance. For let us look at some of the consequences which will flow from an
affirmative answer. Let it be granted that, long before the Norman Conquest, the hide
has become an unit in an unwieldy system of taxation, which has been governed by
false assumptions and vitiated by caprice, until the fiscal hide in a given case may
widely diverge from its original or indeed from any fixed type. None the less, this
system has for its base the theory that the typical man of Anglo-Saxon law, the typical
householder or taxpayer, has a hide, has land enough for a team of oxen, has 120
arable acres. The language of the charters supposes that this is so. No doubt the
supposition is, as every supposition of this kind must be, untrue; but still it must have
a core of truth, and in the remotest age this core will be at its largest. Men will not fall
into a habit of speaking of 120 arable acres or thereabouts as the tenement of one
family or of one householder, unless as a matter of fact the tenement of one family or
of one householder has in a preponderant number of cases some such content as this.
Suppose, for example, that the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of the sixth century had been
composed chiefly of lords, whose estates ranged from 600 acres to some much larger
quantity, and of ‘semi-servile’ cultivators, the average size of whose tenements was
30 acres, such a usage of words as that which we are considering could never have
struck root. Either the small tenement of the cultivator or the big tenement of his lord
must have been taken as the typical ‘manse,’ the typical ‘land of one householder.’
Let us at once press home this argument, though at present it involves a hypothesis,
for in the dull disquisitions that follow we may be cheered by the thought that great
questions are at stake. If in the oldest time the typical ‘land of one householder’ had
120 arable acres, the manorial system was not prevalent, not dominant, in England. It
will be admitted on all hands that this would be much too large a tenement for a serf
or a semi-servile colonus. On the other hand, it is much too small a tenement for any
one who is going to play the part of a manorial lord, unless we use the term manorial
in so wide a sense that it becomes useless. For how many tenants will this manorial
lord, who is to be taken as the typical householder, have upon his 120 acres? If his
arrangements are at all like those revealed to us by Domesday Book, he will keep at
least one-third of his land in demesne, and there will remain but 80 acres for the
coloni. Shall we give him three coloni, or four or five? We can hardly give him a
larger number. Furthermore, it is quite clear that this ‘manorial lord’ will not own a
village. The villages as we see them in the earliest charters and thence onward into
Domesday Book contain five, ten, fifteen hides. Our manorial lord must be content to
take his hide in little scraps scattered about among the scraps of some ten or twenty
other ‘manorial lords’ whose hides are similarly dispersed in the open field of a
village. All this seems to follow inevitably if once we are satisfied that the hide of the
old days had 120 arable acres or thereabouts; for the hide is the land of one typical
householder[1215].
Now for a long time past there has been among historians
Our course.
and antiquaries a good deal of agreement in favour of this
affirmative answer. Let it be granted that, long before the Norman Conquest, the hide
has become an unit in an unwieldy system of taxation, which has been governed by
false assumptions and vitiated by caprice, until the fiscal hide in a given case may
widely diverge from its original or indeed from any fixed type. None the less, this
system has for its base the theory that the typical man of Anglo-Saxon law, the typical
householder or taxpayer, has a hide, has land enough for a team of oxen, has 120
arable acres. The language of the charters supposes that this is so. No doubt the
supposition is, as every supposition of this kind must be, untrue; but still it must have
a core of truth, and in the remotest age this core will be at its largest. Men will not fall
into a habit of speaking of 120 arable acres or thereabouts as the tenement of one
family or of one householder, unless as a matter of fact the tenement of one family or
of one householder has in a preponderant number of cases some such content as this.
Suppose, for example, that the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of the sixth century had been
composed chiefly of lords, whose estates ranged from 600 acres to some much larger
quantity, and of ‘semi-servile’ cultivators, the average size of whose tenements was
30 acres, such a usage of words as that which we are considering could never have
struck root. Either the small tenement of the cultivator or the big tenement of his lord
must have been taken as the typical ‘manse,’ the typical ‘land of one householder.’
Let us at once press home this argument, though at present it involves a hypothesis,
for in the dull disquisitions that follow we may be cheered by the thought that great
questions are at stake. If in the oldest time the typical ‘land of one householder’ had
120 arable acres, the manorial system was not prevalent, not dominant, in England. It
will be admitted on all hands that this would be much too large a tenement for a serf
or a semi-servile colonus. On the other hand, it is much too small a tenement for any
one who is going to play the part of a manorial lord, unless we use the term manorial
in so wide a sense that it becomes useless. For how many tenants will this manorial
lord, who is to be taken as the typical householder, have upon his 120 acres? If his
arrangements are at all like those revealed to us by Domesday Book, he will keep at
least one-third of his land in demesne, and there will remain but 80 acres for the
coloni. Shall we give him three coloni, or four or five? We can hardly give him a
larger number. Furthermore, it is quite clear that this ‘manorial lord’ will not own a
village. The villages as we see them in the earliest charters and thence onward into
Domesday Book contain five, ten, fifteen hides. Our manorial lord must be content to
take his hide in little scraps scattered about among the scraps of some ten or twenty
other ‘manorial lords’ whose hides are similarly dispersed in the open field of a
village. All this seems to follow inevitably if once we are satisfied that the hide of the
old days had 120 arable acres or thereabouts; for the hide is the land of one typical
householder[1215].
Now for a long time past there has been among historians
Our course.
and antiquaries a good deal of agreement in favour of this
Page 343
large hide, but against it appeal may be made to honoured names, such as those of
Kemble and Eyton[1216]. Also it must be confessed that in favour of much smaller
hides, or at least of much smaller hides for the earliest days, some weighty arguments
may be advanced. In order that they may be understood, and perchance refuted, we
must pursue a long and devious course and must raise by the way many questions,
touching which we have no right to an opinion: questions about agriculture, questions
about land measurement, perhaps even physiological questions. Also it is our
misfortune that, as we stumble through the night, we must needs stumble against
some of our fellow adventurers.
Kemble and Eyton[1216]. Also it must be confessed that in favour of much smaller
hides, or at least of much smaller hides for the earliest days, some weighty arguments
may be advanced. In order that they may be understood, and perchance refuted, we
must pursue a long and devious course and must raise by the way many questions,
touching which we have no right to an opinion: questions about agriculture, questions
about land measurement, perhaps even physiological questions. Also it is our
misfortune that, as we stumble through the night, we must needs stumble against
some of our fellow adventurers.
Page 344
Page 345
§ 1. Measures and Fields.
At the present moment there is no need for arguments which
Permanence and change in
insist upon the immutable character of ancient agrarian agrarian history.
arrangements. If we take up a map of a common field drawn
in the eighteenth century, the lines that we see upon it are in
the main very old. The scheme seems fashioned for the purpose of resisting change
and compelling the men of one age to till the land as their fathers tilled it. Nothing
but an unanimous agreement among those who are not likely to agree can break up
that prison-house of cells in which agriculture has been cramped and confined.
Rather, it may be, the student who is perusing the ‘estate map’ and who is fascinated
by the possession of a new tool for picking historical locks, should warn himself that,
though there has been permanence, there has also been change, and that in a far-off
time changes of a certain sort came quickly. True that in the current of agricultural
progress there is a rapid acceleration as it flows towards our own day. We may easily
go back to an age when the introduction of a new process or new implement was rare.
On the other hand, if we fix our attention on the map of any one village and
contemplate its strips and balks and virgates, the hazard involved in an assumption of
their antiquity will increase swiftly when we have left behind us the advent of Duke
William and are urging our inferential career towards Hengest or, it may be, towards
Cæsar.
Let us look, for example, at the changes that take place in
Rapidity of change in old
some Essex villages during the twenty years that precede times.
the Domesday Inquest. The following table shows them:
Lord’s Men’s
Villani Bordarii Servi
teams teams
Teidana[1217], T.R.E. 5 3 4 2 4
T.R.W. 1 17 0 3 3
Waldena[1218], T.R.E. 66 17 16 8 5
T.R.W. 46 40 20 10 22
Hame[1219], T.R.E. 32 16 3 5 8
T.R.W. 48 79 3 4 12
Benefelda[1220], T.R.E. 10 2 7 3 7
T.R.W. 9 11 4 3 4
At the present moment there is no need for arguments which
Permanence and change in
insist upon the immutable character of ancient agrarian agrarian history.
arrangements. If we take up a map of a common field drawn
in the eighteenth century, the lines that we see upon it are in
the main very old. The scheme seems fashioned for the purpose of resisting change
and compelling the men of one age to till the land as their fathers tilled it. Nothing
but an unanimous agreement among those who are not likely to agree can break up
that prison-house of cells in which agriculture has been cramped and confined.
Rather, it may be, the student who is perusing the ‘estate map’ and who is fascinated
by the possession of a new tool for picking historical locks, should warn himself that,
though there has been permanence, there has also been change, and that in a far-off
time changes of a certain sort came quickly. True that in the current of agricultural
progress there is a rapid acceleration as it flows towards our own day. We may easily
go back to an age when the introduction of a new process or new implement was rare.
On the other hand, if we fix our attention on the map of any one village and
contemplate its strips and balks and virgates, the hazard involved in an assumption of
their antiquity will increase swiftly when we have left behind us the advent of Duke
William and are urging our inferential career towards Hengest or, it may be, towards
Cæsar.
Let us look, for example, at the changes that take place in
Rapidity of change in old
some Essex villages during the twenty years that precede times.
the Domesday Inquest. The following table shows them:
Lord’s Men’s
Villani Bordarii Servi
teams teams
Teidana[1217], T.R.E. 5 3 4 2 4
T.R.W. 1 17 0 3 3
Waldena[1218], T.R.E. 66 17 16 8 5
T.R.W. 46 40 20 10 22
Hame[1219], T.R.E. 32 16 3 5 8
T.R.W. 48 79 3 4 12
Benefelda[1220], T.R.E. 10 2 7 3 7
T.R.W. 9 11 4 3 4
Page 346
Wimbeis[1221], T.R.E. 26 18 6 3 21
T.R.W. 26 55 0 3 15
These are but specimens of the obscure little revolutions that are being accomplished
in the Essex villages. In general there has been a marked increase in the number of
bordarii, at the expense of the villeins on the one part and the serfs on the other[1222],
and this, whatever else it may represent, must tell us of a redistribution of tenements,
perhaps of a process that substitutes the half-virgate for the virgate as the average
holding of an Essex peasant. The jar of conquest has made such revolutions
easy[1223].
But, it will be said, though the ‘bundles’ of strips be cut in
Devastation of villages.
half, the main features of the field remain constant. Let us,
however, look at Yorkshire, where for fifteen years an
immense tract of land has been lying ‘waste.’ Have we any reason to believe that
when agriculture slowly steals back into this desert there will be a mere restoration of
the defaced map? Surely not. If for a few years an ‘open field’ lies waste, there will
be no mere restoration. For one thing, many of the old outlines will have utterly
vanished. Even if the acres were already divided by the so-called ‘balks’ (and we can
not be sure that they always were[1224]), the balk was but a narrow strip of
unploughed sward and would hardly be perceptible when the whole field was once
more a sheet of grass and weeds. For another thing, new settlers would probably
begin by ploughing only a small portion of the old field. It is likely enough that their
measuring rod would not be even approximately equal to the rod employed in a
previous century, and they would have ample opportunity for the introduction of
novelties, for the substitution of three fields for two and for all that such a change
implies. Now William’s deliberate devastation of the north is but one final and
grandiose exploit of an ancient kind of warfare. After his day agrarian history
becomes more stable because invasions cease and the character of civil warfare
changes. The strife between York and Lancaster, between King and Parliament,
passes like a thunderstorm over the fields; it damages the crops; but that is all, and
Bosworth ‘Field’ and Naseby ‘Field’ will next year be tilled in the same old way. A
raid of the Danes, a feud between Angle and Saxon, was a different affair. The
peasants fought. Men, women and children were sold as slaves. Also there was
deliberate devastation. ‘They make a wilderness and call it peace.’ What else should
they call it, when a foodless wilderness is the most scientific of all frontiers? Readers
of the English Chronicle will doubt whether there is any village in England that has
not been once, or more than once, a deserted village. And if we must reckon with war,
there is famine also to be reckoned with. When in a few brief words the English
Chronicler tells us that in 1043 there was mickle hunger in the land so that the sestar
of corn sold for sixty pence and even more[1225], he is, like enough, telling us of a
T.R.W. 26 55 0 3 15
These are but specimens of the obscure little revolutions that are being accomplished
in the Essex villages. In general there has been a marked increase in the number of
bordarii, at the expense of the villeins on the one part and the serfs on the other[1222],
and this, whatever else it may represent, must tell us of a redistribution of tenements,
perhaps of a process that substitutes the half-virgate for the virgate as the average
holding of an Essex peasant. The jar of conquest has made such revolutions
easy[1223].
But, it will be said, though the ‘bundles’ of strips be cut in
Devastation of villages.
half, the main features of the field remain constant. Let us,
however, look at Yorkshire, where for fifteen years an
immense tract of land has been lying ‘waste.’ Have we any reason to believe that
when agriculture slowly steals back into this desert there will be a mere restoration of
the defaced map? Surely not. If for a few years an ‘open field’ lies waste, there will
be no mere restoration. For one thing, many of the old outlines will have utterly
vanished. Even if the acres were already divided by the so-called ‘balks’ (and we can
not be sure that they always were[1224]), the balk was but a narrow strip of
unploughed sward and would hardly be perceptible when the whole field was once
more a sheet of grass and weeds. For another thing, new settlers would probably
begin by ploughing only a small portion of the old field. It is likely enough that their
measuring rod would not be even approximately equal to the rod employed in a
previous century, and they would have ample opportunity for the introduction of
novelties, for the substitution of three fields for two and for all that such a change
implies. Now William’s deliberate devastation of the north is but one final and
grandiose exploit of an ancient kind of warfare. After his day agrarian history
becomes more stable because invasions cease and the character of civil warfare
changes. The strife between York and Lancaster, between King and Parliament,
passes like a thunderstorm over the fields; it damages the crops; but that is all, and
Bosworth ‘Field’ and Naseby ‘Field’ will next year be tilled in the same old way. A
raid of the Danes, a feud between Angle and Saxon, was a different affair. The
peasants fought. Men, women and children were sold as slaves. Also there was
deliberate devastation. ‘They make a wilderness and call it peace.’ What else should
they call it, when a foodless wilderness is the most scientific of all frontiers? Readers
of the English Chronicle will doubt whether there is any village in England that has
not been once, or more than once, a deserted village. And if we must reckon with war,
there is famine also to be reckoned with. When in a few brief words the English
Chronicler tells us that in 1043 there was mickle hunger in the land so that the sestar
of corn sold for sixty pence and even more[1225], he is, like enough, telling us of a
Page 347
disaster which depopulated many a village and forced many a villager to bow his
head for meat in those evil days[1226]. Agrarian history becomes more catastrophic as
we trace it backwards.
And, putting on one side the ravages of war and famine, we
Village colonies.
must call to mind the numerous hints that our map gives us
of village colonization[1227]. Men did not make two
contiguous villages at one time and call them both Hamton. Names are given to
places in order that they may be distinguished from neighbouring places. So when we
see two different villages, called Hamton and Other Hamton, lying next each other,
we may be fairly certain that they are not of equal antiquity, and it is not unlikely that
the one is the offshoot and daughter of the other[1228]. There are about one hundred
and fifty Newtons and Newtowns in England. Every instance of colonization, every
new settlement in the woods, gave scope for the introduction of novelties, such scope
as was not to be found in after days when men stood thicker on the soil and all the
best land was already tilled[1229].
Therefore we must not trust a method of husbandry or a
Antiquity of the three-field
scheme of land-measures much further than we can see it. system.
Nothing, for example, could be rasher than the assumption
that the ‘three-course system’ of tillage was common in the
England of the seventh century[1230]. We have a little evidence that it was practised in
the eleventh[1231], perhaps some evidence, that it was not unknown in the ninth[1232].
But ‘the two-course system’ can be traced as far[1233], and seems to have been as
common, if not commoner, in the thirteenth century[1234]. If on a modern map we see
a village with ‘trinity fields,’ we must not at once decide that those who laid them out
sowed two in every year, for it is well within the bounds of possibility that two were
left idle[1235]. An agriculture of this kind was not unknown in the Yorkshire of the
fourteenth century[1236], and indeed we read that in the eighteenth ‘one crop and two
fallows’ was the traditional course in the open field of a Suffolk village[1237].
We have time enough on our hands. Between Domesday
Differences between the
Book and the withdrawal of the legions lies as long an different shires.
interval as that which separates the Conqueror from Mr
Arthur Young. Also we have space enough on our hands.
Any theory that would paint all England as plotted out for proprietary and agricultural
purposes in accordance with a single pattern would be of all theories the least
probable. We need not contrast Kent with Westmoreland, or Cornwall with Norfolk,
for our maps seem to tell us that Somerset differed from Wiltshire and Dorset. The
settlement of a heathen folk loosely banded together under a war-lord was one thing;
the conquest of a new province by a Christian king who was advised by foreign
bishops and had already been taught that he had land to ‘book,’ would be another
thing. If, as seems possible, we read in Ine’s laws of a ‘plantation’ of some parts of
head for meat in those evil days[1226]. Agrarian history becomes more catastrophic as
we trace it backwards.
And, putting on one side the ravages of war and famine, we
Village colonies.
must call to mind the numerous hints that our map gives us
of village colonization[1227]. Men did not make two
contiguous villages at one time and call them both Hamton. Names are given to
places in order that they may be distinguished from neighbouring places. So when we
see two different villages, called Hamton and Other Hamton, lying next each other,
we may be fairly certain that they are not of equal antiquity, and it is not unlikely that
the one is the offshoot and daughter of the other[1228]. There are about one hundred
and fifty Newtons and Newtowns in England. Every instance of colonization, every
new settlement in the woods, gave scope for the introduction of novelties, such scope
as was not to be found in after days when men stood thicker on the soil and all the
best land was already tilled[1229].
Therefore we must not trust a method of husbandry or a
Antiquity of the three-field
scheme of land-measures much further than we can see it. system.
Nothing, for example, could be rasher than the assumption
that the ‘three-course system’ of tillage was common in the
England of the seventh century[1230]. We have a little evidence that it was practised in
the eleventh[1231], perhaps some evidence, that it was not unknown in the ninth[1232].
But ‘the two-course system’ can be traced as far[1233], and seems to have been as
common, if not commoner, in the thirteenth century[1234]. If on a modern map we see
a village with ‘trinity fields,’ we must not at once decide that those who laid them out
sowed two in every year, for it is well within the bounds of possibility that two were
left idle[1235]. An agriculture of this kind was not unknown in the Yorkshire of the
fourteenth century[1236], and indeed we read that in the eighteenth ‘one crop and two
fallows’ was the traditional course in the open field of a Suffolk village[1237].
We have time enough on our hands. Between Domesday
Differences between the
Book and the withdrawal of the legions lies as long an different shires.
interval as that which separates the Conqueror from Mr
Arthur Young. Also we have space enough on our hands.
Any theory that would paint all England as plotted out for proprietary and agricultural
purposes in accordance with a single pattern would be of all theories the least
probable. We need not contrast Kent with Westmoreland, or Cornwall with Norfolk,
for our maps seem to tell us that Somerset differed from Wiltshire and Dorset. The
settlement of a heathen folk loosely banded together under a war-lord was one thing;
the conquest of a new province by a Christian king who was advised by foreign
bishops and had already been taught that he had land to ‘book,’ would be another
thing. If, as seems possible, we read in Ine’s laws of a ‘plantation’ of some parts of
Page 348
Somerset effected by means of large allotments made to the king’s gesiths, who
undertake to put tillers on the soil[1238], we must not at once infer that this is an old
procedure, for it may be very new, and may have for its outcome an agrarian
arrangement strikingly unlike that which existed in the heart of the older Wessex.
Moreover there are upon the face of our map many cases
New and old villages.
which seem to tell us that in the oldest days the smallest
district that bore a name was often large, and therefore that
the territory which subserved a single group of homesteads was often spacious. One
example we will take from Norfolk. We find a block of land that now-a-days consists
of eleven parishes, namely, Wiggenhall St. Mary the Virgin, Wiggenhall St. German,
Wiggenhall St. Peter, Wiggenhall St. Mary Magdalen, Tilney cum Islington, Tilney
All Saints, Tilney St. Lawrence, Terrington St. Clement, Terrington St. John, Walpole
St. Peter, Walpole St. Andrew[1239]. In such a case we can hardly suppose that all these
villages belong to the same age, even if we are not entitled to infer that the later
villages were not founded until the day for parish churches had arrived. This being so,
it is highly probable that some villages were formed at all stages of the feudalizing
process, and therefore that a historical account of ‘the’ English township, or even of
‘the’ English nucleated village, would of necessity be untrue. And, while this East
Anglian specimen is still before us, we may notice another interesting trait. In the
Marshland Fen there is a considerable tract of ground which consists of ‘detached
portions’ of these and other villages. Each has been given a block there, a fairly
rectangular block. At one point the partition is minute. A space of less than 36 acres
has been cut up so that no less than six villages shall have a piece, a rectangular piece
of it[1240]. It seems very possible that this fen has at some time been common ground
for all these villages, and, as already said, it is in this quarter that we may perhaps
find traces of something that resembled the ‘marks’ of Germany[1241]. The science of
village morphology is still very young, and we must not be led away into any
discussion of its elements; but there is the more reason why we should take to heart
those warnings that it already gives us, because what we can read of hides is to be
found for the more part in documents proceeding from a central power, which, for
governmental and fiscal purposes, endeavours to preserve fictitious continuity and
uniformity in the midst of change and variety. However, we must draw nearer to our
task.
As regards land measurement, we may be fairly certain that
History of measures.
in the days before the Norman Conquest there was little
real, though much nominal uniformity. The only measures
for the size of things with which nature has equipped the natural man are his limbs.
For the things that he handles he uses his thumb, span, cubit, ell; for the ground upon
which he walks, his foot and his pace. For large spaces and long distances he must
have recourse to ‘time-labour-units,’ to the day’s journey and the morning’s
undertake to put tillers on the soil[1238], we must not at once infer that this is an old
procedure, for it may be very new, and may have for its outcome an agrarian
arrangement strikingly unlike that which existed in the heart of the older Wessex.
Moreover there are upon the face of our map many cases
New and old villages.
which seem to tell us that in the oldest days the smallest
district that bore a name was often large, and therefore that
the territory which subserved a single group of homesteads was often spacious. One
example we will take from Norfolk. We find a block of land that now-a-days consists
of eleven parishes, namely, Wiggenhall St. Mary the Virgin, Wiggenhall St. German,
Wiggenhall St. Peter, Wiggenhall St. Mary Magdalen, Tilney cum Islington, Tilney
All Saints, Tilney St. Lawrence, Terrington St. Clement, Terrington St. John, Walpole
St. Peter, Walpole St. Andrew[1239]. In such a case we can hardly suppose that all these
villages belong to the same age, even if we are not entitled to infer that the later
villages were not founded until the day for parish churches had arrived. This being so,
it is highly probable that some villages were formed at all stages of the feudalizing
process, and therefore that a historical account of ‘the’ English township, or even of
‘the’ English nucleated village, would of necessity be untrue. And, while this East
Anglian specimen is still before us, we may notice another interesting trait. In the
Marshland Fen there is a considerable tract of ground which consists of ‘detached
portions’ of these and other villages. Each has been given a block there, a fairly
rectangular block. At one point the partition is minute. A space of less than 36 acres
has been cut up so that no less than six villages shall have a piece, a rectangular piece
of it[1240]. It seems very possible that this fen has at some time been common ground
for all these villages, and, as already said, it is in this quarter that we may perhaps
find traces of something that resembled the ‘marks’ of Germany[1241]. The science of
village morphology is still very young, and we must not be led away into any
discussion of its elements; but there is the more reason why we should take to heart
those warnings that it already gives us, because what we can read of hides is to be
found for the more part in documents proceeding from a central power, which, for
governmental and fiscal purposes, endeavours to preserve fictitious continuity and
uniformity in the midst of change and variety. However, we must draw nearer to our
task.
As regards land measurement, we may be fairly certain that
History of measures.
in the days before the Norman Conquest there was little
real, though much nominal uniformity. The only measures
for the size of things with which nature has equipped the natural man are his limbs.
For the things that he handles he uses his thumb, span, cubit, ell; for the ground upon
which he walks, his foot and his pace. For large spaces and long distances he must
have recourse to ‘time-labour-units,’ to the day’s journey and the morning’s
Page 349
ploughing. Then gradually, under the fostering care of government, steady equations
are established between these units:—twelve thumbs, for instance, are to make a foot.
Thus the measures for land are brought into connexion with the more delicate
measures used for cloth and similar stuff. Then an attempt to obtain some standard
less variable than the limb may forge a link between thumbs and grains of corn.
Another device is the measuring rod. One rod will represent the arm of an average
man; a longer rod may serve to mediate between the foot which is short and the acre
or day’s ploughing which is large. In laying out a field in such wise that it shall
consist of equal pieces, each of which can be ploughed in a forenoon, we naturally
use a rod. We say, for example, that to plough a strip that is 4 rods wide and 40 long
is a fair day’s work. For some while there is no reason why the rods employed in two
neighbouring villages should be strictly or even approximately equal[1242]. Taxation is
the great force that makes for standard land measures. Then a king declares how
many thumbs there ought to be in the cloth-ell or cloth-yard. At a later time he
actually makes cloth-ells or cloth-yards and distributes them, keeping an ultimate
standard in his own palace. Thenceforward all other units tend to become mere
fractions or multiples of this royal stick. The foot is a third, the thumb or inch a
thirty-sixth part thereof. Five and a half cloth-measuring yards make a royal land-
measuring rod. Plot out a space which is four rods by forty, you will have an acre.
The whole story, if ever it be told at length, will be intricate;
Slow growth of uniformity.
but we believe that a general persuasion that land-
measurements ought to be fixed by law and by reference to
some one carefully preserved standard is much more modern than most people think.
Real accuracy and the establishment of a measure that is to be common to the whole
realm first emerge in connexion with the measurement of cloth and such like. There is
a delightful passage in the old Scotch laws which tells us that the ell ought to contain
37 inches meted by the thumbs of three men, ‘þat is to say, a mekill man and a man of
messurabill statur and of a lytill man[1243].’ We have somewhere read that in
Germany, if a perch of fifteen feet was to be manufactured, the first fifteen people
who chanced to come out of church contributed each a foot towards the construction
of the standard. At an early time, however, men were trying to find some class of
small things which were of a fairly invariable length and hit upon barley-corns. This
seems to have happened in England before the Norman Conquest[1244]. Instead of
taking the ‘thoume’ of ‘a man of messurabill statur’ for your inch, you are to take
three barley-corns, ‘iii bear cornys gud and chosyn but tayllis (i.e. without the
tails)’[1245]. But the twelfth century was drawing to an end before any decisive step
was taken to secure uniformity even in the measurement of cloth. In Richard I.’s day
guardians of weights and measures are to be appointed in every county, city and
borough; they are to keep iron ulnae[1246]. At this time or a little later these ulnae, ells
or cloth-yards were being delivered out by a royal officer to all who might require
them, and that officer had the custody of the ultimate standards[1247]. We may doubt
are established between these units:—twelve thumbs, for instance, are to make a foot.
Thus the measures for land are brought into connexion with the more delicate
measures used for cloth and similar stuff. Then an attempt to obtain some standard
less variable than the limb may forge a link between thumbs and grains of corn.
Another device is the measuring rod. One rod will represent the arm of an average
man; a longer rod may serve to mediate between the foot which is short and the acre
or day’s ploughing which is large. In laying out a field in such wise that it shall
consist of equal pieces, each of which can be ploughed in a forenoon, we naturally
use a rod. We say, for example, that to plough a strip that is 4 rods wide and 40 long
is a fair day’s work. For some while there is no reason why the rods employed in two
neighbouring villages should be strictly or even approximately equal[1242]. Taxation is
the great force that makes for standard land measures. Then a king declares how
many thumbs there ought to be in the cloth-ell or cloth-yard. At a later time he
actually makes cloth-ells or cloth-yards and distributes them, keeping an ultimate
standard in his own palace. Thenceforward all other units tend to become mere
fractions or multiples of this royal stick. The foot is a third, the thumb or inch a
thirty-sixth part thereof. Five and a half cloth-measuring yards make a royal land-
measuring rod. Plot out a space which is four rods by forty, you will have an acre.
The whole story, if ever it be told at length, will be intricate;
Slow growth of uniformity.
but we believe that a general persuasion that land-
measurements ought to be fixed by law and by reference to
some one carefully preserved standard is much more modern than most people think.
Real accuracy and the establishment of a measure that is to be common to the whole
realm first emerge in connexion with the measurement of cloth and such like. There is
a delightful passage in the old Scotch laws which tells us that the ell ought to contain
37 inches meted by the thumbs of three men, ‘þat is to say, a mekill man and a man of
messurabill statur and of a lytill man[1243].’ We have somewhere read that in
Germany, if a perch of fifteen feet was to be manufactured, the first fifteen people
who chanced to come out of church contributed each a foot towards the construction
of the standard. At an early time, however, men were trying to find some class of
small things which were of a fairly invariable length and hit upon barley-corns. This
seems to have happened in England before the Norman Conquest[1244]. Instead of
taking the ‘thoume’ of ‘a man of messurabill statur’ for your inch, you are to take
three barley-corns, ‘iii bear cornys gud and chosyn but tayllis (i.e. without the
tails)’[1245]. But the twelfth century was drawing to an end before any decisive step
was taken to secure uniformity even in the measurement of cloth. In Richard I.’s day
guardians of weights and measures are to be appointed in every county, city and
borough; they are to keep iron ulnae[1246]. At this time or a little later these ulnae, ells
or cloth-yards were being delivered out by a royal officer to all who might require
them, and that officer had the custody of the ultimate standards[1247]. We may doubt
Page 350
whether the laws which require in general terms that there shall be one measure
throughout the realm had measures of land in view[1248]. A common standard is not
nearly as necessary in this case as it is in the case of cloth. Even in our own day men
do not buy land by the acre or the perch in the same sense as that in which they buy
cloth or cotton by the yard. Very rarely will anyone name a price for a rood and leave
it to the other bargainer to decide which out of many roods shall be included in the
sale. Nevertheless, the distribution of iron ulnae was important. An equation was
established between the cloth measure and the land measure: five-and-a-half ulnae or
cloth-yards make one royal perch. After this we soon find that land is occasionally
measured by the iron ulna of the king[1249].
The scheme of computation that we know as ‘superficial
Superficial measure.
measure’ was long in making itself part of the mental
furniture of the ordinary man. Such terms as ‘square rod’
and ‘square mile’ were not current, nor such equations as that which tells us how 144
square inches make a square foot. Whatever may have been the attainments of some
cloistered mathematicians, the man of business did not suppose that he could talk of
size without talking of shape, and indeed a set of terms which speak of shapeless size
is not very useful until men have enough of geometry and trigonometry to measure
spaces that are not rectangular parallelograms. The enlightened people of the
thirteenth century can say that if an acre is x perches long it is y perches wide[1250].
They can compare the size of spaces if all the lines be straight and all the angles right;
and for them an acre is no longer of necessity ten times as long as it is broad. But
they will not tell us (and they do not think) that an acre contains z ‘square perches.’
This is of some importance to students of Domesday Book. Very often the size of a
tract of land is indicated by the length of two lines:—The wood or the pasture is x
leagues (furlongs, perches, feet) in length and y in breadth. Now, to say the least, we
are hasty if we treat this as a statement which gives us size without shape. It is not all
one to say that a wood is a league long and a league wide and to say that it is two
leagues long and half a league wide. The jurors are not speaking of superficial
content, they are speaking of length and breadth, and they are either giving us the
extreme diameters of the irregularly shaped woods and pastures, or (and this seems
more probable) they are making rough estimates of mean diameters. If we go back to
an earlier time, the less we think of ‘superficial measure’ the better[1251].
Let us recall the main features of our modern system, giving
The modern system.
them the names that they bore in medieval Latin.
Linear Measure.
12 inches (pollices)=1 foot (pes); 3 feet=1 yard (ulna); 5·5 yards=1 rod, pole, perch
(virga, pertica, perca); 40 perches=1 furlong (quarentina); 8 furlongs=1 mile
(mille); 12 furlongs=1 leuua, leuca, leuga (league)[1252].
throughout the realm had measures of land in view[1248]. A common standard is not
nearly as necessary in this case as it is in the case of cloth. Even in our own day men
do not buy land by the acre or the perch in the same sense as that in which they buy
cloth or cotton by the yard. Very rarely will anyone name a price for a rood and leave
it to the other bargainer to decide which out of many roods shall be included in the
sale. Nevertheless, the distribution of iron ulnae was important. An equation was
established between the cloth measure and the land measure: five-and-a-half ulnae or
cloth-yards make one royal perch. After this we soon find that land is occasionally
measured by the iron ulna of the king[1249].
The scheme of computation that we know as ‘superficial
Superficial measure.
measure’ was long in making itself part of the mental
furniture of the ordinary man. Such terms as ‘square rod’
and ‘square mile’ were not current, nor such equations as that which tells us how 144
square inches make a square foot. Whatever may have been the attainments of some
cloistered mathematicians, the man of business did not suppose that he could talk of
size without talking of shape, and indeed a set of terms which speak of shapeless size
is not very useful until men have enough of geometry and trigonometry to measure
spaces that are not rectangular parallelograms. The enlightened people of the
thirteenth century can say that if an acre is x perches long it is y perches wide[1250].
They can compare the size of spaces if all the lines be straight and all the angles right;
and for them an acre is no longer of necessity ten times as long as it is broad. But
they will not tell us (and they do not think) that an acre contains z ‘square perches.’
This is of some importance to students of Domesday Book. Very often the size of a
tract of land is indicated by the length of two lines:—The wood or the pasture is x
leagues (furlongs, perches, feet) in length and y in breadth. Now, to say the least, we
are hasty if we treat this as a statement which gives us size without shape. It is not all
one to say that a wood is a league long and a league wide and to say that it is two
leagues long and half a league wide. The jurors are not speaking of superficial
content, they are speaking of length and breadth, and they are either giving us the
extreme diameters of the irregularly shaped woods and pastures, or (and this seems
more probable) they are making rough estimates of mean diameters. If we go back to
an earlier time, the less we think of ‘superficial measure’ the better[1251].
Let us recall the main features of our modern system, giving
The modern system.
them the names that they bore in medieval Latin.
Linear Measure.
12 inches (pollices)=1 foot (pes); 3 feet=1 yard (ulna); 5·5 yards=1 rod, pole, perch
(virga, pertica, perca); 40 perches=1 furlong (quarentina); 8 furlongs=1 mile
(mille); 12 furlongs=1 leuua, leuca, leuga (league)[1252].
Page 351
Superficial Measure.
144 square inches=1 square foot; 9 square feet=1 square yard; 30·25 square
yards=1 square perch; 40 square perches=1 rood; 4 roods=1 acre[1253].
In the thirteenth century these outlines are already drawn; but, as we have seen, if we
are to breathe the spirit of the time, we ought to say (while admitting that acres may
be variously shaped) that the normal acre is 4 perches in width and 40 perches (=1
furlong) in length. The only other space that we need consider is the quarter of an
acre, our rood. That ought to be 1 perch in width and 1 furlong (=40 perches) in
length. The breadth of the acre is still known to all Englishmen, for it is the distance
between the wickets.
This system has been generated by the corelation of cloth-
The ancient elements of
measures and land-measures. If we are going back to remote land measure.
times, we must expel the cloth-measures as intruders. What
then is left is very simple; it is this:—the human foot, a
day’s ploughing and a measuring stick which mediates between feet and acres. That
stick has had many names. Our arithmetic books preserve three, ‘rod, pole or perch’;
it has also been known as a gād or goad and a lug: but probably its oldest name is
yard (gyrd). It is of some importance that we should perceive that our modern yard of
three feet is not one of the very ancient land-measures. It is a ‘cloth-yard’ not a land-
yard. In medieval documents the Latin name for it is ulna[1254], and probably the
oldest English name for it is eln, elle, ell. There seems to have been a shifting of
names. The measuring rod that was used for land had so many names, such as perch,
rod, pole, goad, lug, that it could afford, if we may so speak, to dispense with the
additional name of yard, which therefore might stand for the much shorter rod that
was used by the clothiers. However, even in our own century men have been
speaking of ‘yards of land’ in a manner which implies that at one time a yard, when
mentioned in this context, was the same thing as the perch. When they have spoken
of a ‘yard of land’ they have meant sometimes a quarter of an acre (our rood) and
sometimes a much larger space. In 1820 a ‘yard of land’ means, we are told, a quarter
of an acre in Wiltshire, while in Buckinghamshire it stands for a tract which varies
from 28 to 40 acres[1255]. This last application of the term we shall consider by and
by. A yard of land or rood of land (rood and rod are all one) is a quarter of an acre,
because an acre is four rods or ‘yards’ or perches in width, and, when an acre is to be
divided, it is always, and for a very good reason, divided by lines parallel to its long
sides. So though the rood or yard of land may in course of time take other shapes and
even become a shapeless size, it ought to be a rod or ‘yard’ in width and forty rods or
one furlong in length.
So we start with the human foot, the day’s ploughing and a
The German acre.
rod. How much borrowing there has been in this matter by
144 square inches=1 square foot; 9 square feet=1 square yard; 30·25 square
yards=1 square perch; 40 square perches=1 rood; 4 roods=1 acre[1253].
In the thirteenth century these outlines are already drawn; but, as we have seen, if we
are to breathe the spirit of the time, we ought to say (while admitting that acres may
be variously shaped) that the normal acre is 4 perches in width and 40 perches (=1
furlong) in length. The only other space that we need consider is the quarter of an
acre, our rood. That ought to be 1 perch in width and 1 furlong (=40 perches) in
length. The breadth of the acre is still known to all Englishmen, for it is the distance
between the wickets.
This system has been generated by the corelation of cloth-
The ancient elements of
measures and land-measures. If we are going back to remote land measure.
times, we must expel the cloth-measures as intruders. What
then is left is very simple; it is this:—the human foot, a
day’s ploughing and a measuring stick which mediates between feet and acres. That
stick has had many names. Our arithmetic books preserve three, ‘rod, pole or perch’;
it has also been known as a gād or goad and a lug: but probably its oldest name is
yard (gyrd). It is of some importance that we should perceive that our modern yard of
three feet is not one of the very ancient land-measures. It is a ‘cloth-yard’ not a land-
yard. In medieval documents the Latin name for it is ulna[1254], and probably the
oldest English name for it is eln, elle, ell. There seems to have been a shifting of
names. The measuring rod that was used for land had so many names, such as perch,
rod, pole, goad, lug, that it could afford, if we may so speak, to dispense with the
additional name of yard, which therefore might stand for the much shorter rod that
was used by the clothiers. However, even in our own century men have been
speaking of ‘yards of land’ in a manner which implies that at one time a yard, when
mentioned in this context, was the same thing as the perch. When they have spoken
of a ‘yard of land’ they have meant sometimes a quarter of an acre (our rood) and
sometimes a much larger space. In 1820 a ‘yard of land’ means, we are told, a quarter
of an acre in Wiltshire, while in Buckinghamshire it stands for a tract which varies
from 28 to 40 acres[1255]. This last application of the term we shall consider by and
by. A yard of land or rood of land (rood and rod are all one) is a quarter of an acre,
because an acre is four rods or ‘yards’ or perches in width, and, when an acre is to be
divided, it is always, and for a very good reason, divided by lines parallel to its long
sides. So though the rood or yard of land may in course of time take other shapes and
even become a shapeless size, it ought to be a rod or ‘yard’ in width and forty rods or
one furlong in length.
So we start with the human foot, the day’s ploughing and a
The German acre.
rod. How much borrowing there has been in this matter by
Page 352
race from race is an obscure question. For example, the mediation of a rod between
the foot and the day’s work is common to the Roman and the Germanic systems.
Here the similarity ends, and the vast differences which begin seem to have
exceedingly deep roots. We can not be content with saying that the Roman puts two
oxen in the plough and therefore draws short furrows, whereas the German puts eight
oxen and draws long furrows. There seems to be a radical disagreement between
them as to what a plough should be and what a plough should do[1256]. To these
matters we can make but the slightest reference, nor dare we touch the problems of
Celtic history. Somehow or another the Germans come to the rule that generally an
acre or day’s work should be four rods wide and, if possible, about forty rods
long[1257].
It is very probable that in England this rule prevailed at a
English acres.
remote time. Throughout the middle ages and on to our own
day there have been many ‘acres’ in England which swerved
markedly from what had become the statutory type, and in some cases a pattern
divergent from the statutory pattern became ‘customary’ in a district. But apparently
these customary acres commonly agree with the royal standard in involving the
equation: 1 acre = 4 perches x 40 perches[1258]. In Domesday Book and thence
onwards the common Latin for furlong is quarentina, and this tells us of furrows that
are forty perches long. It is when we ask for the number of feet in a perch that we
begin to get various answers, and very various they are. The statutory number, the
ugly 16·5, looks like a compromise[1259] between 15 and 18, both of which numbers
seem to have been common in England and elsewhere. This is the royal equation in
the thirteenth century; it has been found near the middle of the twelfth[1260]; more at
present we cannot say. Short perches and small acres have
Small acres.
been very common in the south of England. In 1820 some
information about the customary acre was collected[1261]:—In Bedfordshire it was
‘sometimes 2 roods.’ In Dorsetshire ‘generally 134 [instead of 160] perches.’ In
Hampshire, ‘from 107 to 120 perches, but sometimes 180,’ In Herefordshire, ‘two-
thirds of a statute acre,’ but ‘of wood, an acre and three-fifths or 256 perches.’ In
Worcestershire, ‘sometimes 132 or 141 perches.’ In Sussex, ‘107, 110, 120, 130 or
212 perches’; ‘short acre, 100 or 120 perches’; ‘forest acre, 180 perches,’ Then as to
rods, the ‘lug or goad’ of Dorsetshire had 15 ft. 1 in.; in Hertfordshire, 20 feet; in
Wiltshire, 15 or 161⁄2 or 18. The wide prevalence of rods of 15 feet can not be
doubted, and it seems possible that rods with as few as 12 feet have been in use[1262].
An acre raised from a 12 foot rod would, if feet were invariable, be little more than
half our modern statute acre. Nowhere do we see any sure trace of a rod so short as
the Roman pertica of ten pedes, though the scribes of the land-books will give the
name pertica to the English gyrd[1263].
the foot and the day’s work is common to the Roman and the Germanic systems.
Here the similarity ends, and the vast differences which begin seem to have
exceedingly deep roots. We can not be content with saying that the Roman puts two
oxen in the plough and therefore draws short furrows, whereas the German puts eight
oxen and draws long furrows. There seems to be a radical disagreement between
them as to what a plough should be and what a plough should do[1256]. To these
matters we can make but the slightest reference, nor dare we touch the problems of
Celtic history. Somehow or another the Germans come to the rule that generally an
acre or day’s work should be four rods wide and, if possible, about forty rods
long[1257].
It is very probable that in England this rule prevailed at a
English acres.
remote time. Throughout the middle ages and on to our own
day there have been many ‘acres’ in England which swerved
markedly from what had become the statutory type, and in some cases a pattern
divergent from the statutory pattern became ‘customary’ in a district. But apparently
these customary acres commonly agree with the royal standard in involving the
equation: 1 acre = 4 perches x 40 perches[1258]. In Domesday Book and thence
onwards the common Latin for furlong is quarentina, and this tells us of furrows that
are forty perches long. It is when we ask for the number of feet in a perch that we
begin to get various answers, and very various they are. The statutory number, the
ugly 16·5, looks like a compromise[1259] between 15 and 18, both of which numbers
seem to have been common in England and elsewhere. This is the royal equation in
the thirteenth century; it has been found near the middle of the twelfth[1260]; more at
present we cannot say. Short perches and small acres have
Small acres.
been very common in the south of England. In 1820 some
information about the customary acre was collected[1261]:—In Bedfordshire it was
‘sometimes 2 roods.’ In Dorsetshire ‘generally 134 [instead of 160] perches.’ In
Hampshire, ‘from 107 to 120 perches, but sometimes 180,’ In Herefordshire, ‘two-
thirds of a statute acre,’ but ‘of wood, an acre and three-fifths or 256 perches.’ In
Worcestershire, ‘sometimes 132 or 141 perches.’ In Sussex, ‘107, 110, 120, 130 or
212 perches’; ‘short acre, 100 or 120 perches’; ‘forest acre, 180 perches,’ Then as to
rods, the ‘lug or goad’ of Dorsetshire had 15 ft. 1 in.; in Hertfordshire, 20 feet; in
Wiltshire, 15 or 161⁄2 or 18. The wide prevalence of rods of 15 feet can not be
doubted, and it seems possible that rods with as few as 12 feet have been in use[1262].
An acre raised from a 12 foot rod would, if feet were invariable, be little more than
half our modern statute acre. Nowhere do we see any sure trace of a rod so short as
the Roman pertica of ten pedes, though the scribes of the land-books will give the
name pertica to the English gyrd[1263].
Page 353
In northern districts the ‘customary’ acre grows larger. In
Large acres.
Lincolnshire it is said to be ‘5 roods, particularly for
copyhold land’; but small acres were known there also[1264].
In Staffordshire, ‘nearly 21⁄4 acres.’ In Cheshire, ‘formerly and still in some places
10,240 square yards’ (pointing to a rod of 24 feet). In Westmoreland, ‘6760 square
yards’ (pointing to a rod of 191⁄2 feet), also the so-called ‘Irish acre’ of 7840 square
yards (pointing to a rod of 21 feet). There is much evidence that rods of 20 and 21
feet were often used in Yorkshire and Derbyshire. Rods of 18, 191⁄2, 21, 221⁄2 and 24
feet were known in Lancashire. A writer of the thirteenth century speaks as if rods of
16, 18, 20, 22 and 24 feet were in common use, and mentions none shorter[1265]. As
just said, the Irish plantation acre was founded on a rod of 21 feet. The Scotch acre
also is larger than the English; it would contain about 6150·4 instead of 4840 of our
square yards; it is formed from a rod of 6 Scotch ells. On the other hand, the acres
which have prevailed in Wales seem to be small; one type had 4320 of our square
yards, another 3240
There has been variety enough. Even if the limits of
Anglo-Saxon rods and
variation are given by rods of 12 and 24 feet, this will acres.
enable one acre to be four times as large as another.
Whether before the twelfth century there was anything that
we ought to call a standard rod, a royal rod for all England, must be very doubtful. In
royal and other land-books references are made to furlongs, to acre-breadths, to yards
or rods or perches, and to feet as to known measures of length[1266], but whether a
kingly gift is always measured by a kingly rod we do not know. The Carolingian
emperors endeavoured to impose a rod upon their dominions; it seems to have been
considerably shorter than our statute perch[1267]. In this province we need not expect
many Norman novelties. We see from Domesday Book that the Frenchmen
introduced the ancient Gallic arpentum[1268] as a measure for vineyards[1269]; but
most of the vines were of their own planting, and the mere fact that they used this
measure only for the vineyards seems to tell us that they were content with English
rods and English acres[1270]. In Normandy the perches seem to have ranged upwards
from 16 to 25 feet[1271]; so that 16·5 would not have hit the average. On the whole,
our perch seems to speak of a king whose interests and estates lay in southern
England and who struck a mean between 15 and 18. Whoever he was, we owe him no
thanks for the ‘undecimal’ element that taints our system[1272].
But we must be cautious in drawing inferences from loose
Customary acres and forest
reports about ‘customary’ measures. Village maps and acres.
village fields have yet to be seriously studied. We may in
the meanwhile doubt whether in some districts to which the
largest acres are ascribed, such acres are normal or are drawn in the oldest villages.
We may suspect them of being ‘forest acres.’ If once a good many of these abnormal
Large acres.
Lincolnshire it is said to be ‘5 roods, particularly for
copyhold land’; but small acres were known there also[1264].
In Staffordshire, ‘nearly 21⁄4 acres.’ In Cheshire, ‘formerly and still in some places
10,240 square yards’ (pointing to a rod of 24 feet). In Westmoreland, ‘6760 square
yards’ (pointing to a rod of 191⁄2 feet), also the so-called ‘Irish acre’ of 7840 square
yards (pointing to a rod of 21 feet). There is much evidence that rods of 20 and 21
feet were often used in Yorkshire and Derbyshire. Rods of 18, 191⁄2, 21, 221⁄2 and 24
feet were known in Lancashire. A writer of the thirteenth century speaks as if rods of
16, 18, 20, 22 and 24 feet were in common use, and mentions none shorter[1265]. As
just said, the Irish plantation acre was founded on a rod of 21 feet. The Scotch acre
also is larger than the English; it would contain about 6150·4 instead of 4840 of our
square yards; it is formed from a rod of 6 Scotch ells. On the other hand, the acres
which have prevailed in Wales seem to be small; one type had 4320 of our square
yards, another 3240
There has been variety enough. Even if the limits of
Anglo-Saxon rods and
variation are given by rods of 12 and 24 feet, this will acres.
enable one acre to be four times as large as another.
Whether before the twelfth century there was anything that
we ought to call a standard rod, a royal rod for all England, must be very doubtful. In
royal and other land-books references are made to furlongs, to acre-breadths, to yards
or rods or perches, and to feet as to known measures of length[1266], but whether a
kingly gift is always measured by a kingly rod we do not know. The Carolingian
emperors endeavoured to impose a rod upon their dominions; it seems to have been
considerably shorter than our statute perch[1267]. In this province we need not expect
many Norman novelties. We see from Domesday Book that the Frenchmen
introduced the ancient Gallic arpentum[1268] as a measure for vineyards[1269]; but
most of the vines were of their own planting, and the mere fact that they used this
measure only for the vineyards seems to tell us that they were content with English
rods and English acres[1270]. In Normandy the perches seem to have ranged upwards
from 16 to 25 feet[1271]; so that 16·5 would not have hit the average. On the whole,
our perch seems to speak of a king whose interests and estates lay in southern
England and who struck a mean between 15 and 18. Whoever he was, we owe him no
thanks for the ‘undecimal’ element that taints our system[1272].
But we must be cautious in drawing inferences from loose
Customary acres and forest
reports about ‘customary’ measures. Village maps and acres.
village fields have yet to be seriously studied. We may in
the meanwhile doubt whether in some districts to which the
largest acres are ascribed, such acres are normal or are drawn in the oldest villages.
We may suspect them of being ‘forest acres.’ If once a good many of these abnormal
Page 354
units are distributed in a district, they will by their very peculiarity attract more than
their fair share of attention and will be spoken of as characteristic of that district. In
Germany, as well as in England, we find forest acres which are much larger than
common acres and are meted by a rod which is longer than the common rod[1273].
Possibly men have found a long rod convenient when they have large spaces to
measure, but we fancy that the true explanation would illustrate the influence
exercised by taxation on systems of measurement. Some scheme of allotment or
colonization is being framed; an equal tribute is to be reserved from the allotted acres.
If, however, there is uncleared woodland to be distributed, rude equity, instead of
changing the tribute on the acre, changes the acre’s size and uses a long rod for land
that can not at once be tilled[1274]. Also fields that were plotted out by Normans were
likely to have large acres, and as the perches of Normandy seem to have been longer
than most of the perches that were used in France, we may perhaps infer that the
Scandinavian rods were long and find in them an explanation of the big acres of
northern England. But at present such inferences would be precarious.
Whether in its origin the land-measuring rod is a mere
The acre and the day’s
representative of a certain number of feet or is some work.
instrument useful for other purposes seems to be dubious.
One of the names that it has borne in English is goad; but
most of our rods would be extravagantly long goads[1275]. Possibly the width of four
oxen yoked abreast has exercised some influence upon its length[1276]. When a rod
had once found acceptance, it must speedily have begun to convert that ‘time-labour-
unit,’ the acre, into a measured space. Already in the land-books we read of acres of
meadow[1277]; this is no longer a contradiction in terms. Still there can be no doubt
that our acre, like the jurnale, Tagwerk, Morgen of the Continent, has at its root the
tract that can be ploughed in a day, or in a forenoon:—in the afternoon the oxen must
go to the pasture[1278]. Now, when compared with their foreign cousins, our statute
perch is a long rod and our statute acre is a decidedly large ‘day-work-unit[1279].’ It
seems to tell of plentiful land, sparse population and poor husbandry. This is of some
importance. There is a good deal of evidence pointing to the conclusion that, whereas
in the oldest days men really ploughed an acre in a forenoon, the current of
agricultural progress made for a while towards the diminution of the space that was
covered by a day’s labour. In Ælfric’s dialogue the ploughman complains that each
day he must till ‘a full acre or more[1280].’ His successor, the poetic Piers, had only a
half-acre to plough[1281]. In monastic cartularies which come from southern counties,
where we have no reason to suspect exceptionally large acres, the villein seems often
to plough less than an acre[1282]. Then that enlightened agriculturist, Walter of
Henley, enters upon a long argument to prove to his readers that you really can
plough seven-eighths of an acre in a forenoon, and even a whole acre if you are but
engaged in that light kind of ploughing which does for a second fallowing[1283]. Five
centuries later another enlightened agriculturist, Arthur Young, discovered that ‘from
their fair share of attention and will be spoken of as characteristic of that district. In
Germany, as well as in England, we find forest acres which are much larger than
common acres and are meted by a rod which is longer than the common rod[1273].
Possibly men have found a long rod convenient when they have large spaces to
measure, but we fancy that the true explanation would illustrate the influence
exercised by taxation on systems of measurement. Some scheme of allotment or
colonization is being framed; an equal tribute is to be reserved from the allotted acres.
If, however, there is uncleared woodland to be distributed, rude equity, instead of
changing the tribute on the acre, changes the acre’s size and uses a long rod for land
that can not at once be tilled[1274]. Also fields that were plotted out by Normans were
likely to have large acres, and as the perches of Normandy seem to have been longer
than most of the perches that were used in France, we may perhaps infer that the
Scandinavian rods were long and find in them an explanation of the big acres of
northern England. But at present such inferences would be precarious.
Whether in its origin the land-measuring rod is a mere
The acre and the day’s
representative of a certain number of feet or is some work.
instrument useful for other purposes seems to be dubious.
One of the names that it has borne in English is goad; but
most of our rods would be extravagantly long goads[1275]. Possibly the width of four
oxen yoked abreast has exercised some influence upon its length[1276]. When a rod
had once found acceptance, it must speedily have begun to convert that ‘time-labour-
unit,’ the acre, into a measured space. Already in the land-books we read of acres of
meadow[1277]; this is no longer a contradiction in terms. Still there can be no doubt
that our acre, like the jurnale, Tagwerk, Morgen of the Continent, has at its root the
tract that can be ploughed in a day, or in a forenoon:—in the afternoon the oxen must
go to the pasture[1278]. Now, when compared with their foreign cousins, our statute
perch is a long rod and our statute acre is a decidedly large ‘day-work-unit[1279].’ It
seems to tell of plentiful land, sparse population and poor husbandry. This is of some
importance. There is a good deal of evidence pointing to the conclusion that, whereas
in the oldest days men really ploughed an acre in a forenoon, the current of
agricultural progress made for a while towards the diminution of the space that was
covered by a day’s labour. In Ælfric’s dialogue the ploughman complains that each
day he must till ‘a full acre or more[1280].’ His successor, the poetic Piers, had only a
half-acre to plough[1281]. In monastic cartularies which come from southern counties,
where we have no reason to suspect exceptionally large acres, the villein seems often
to plough less than an acre[1282]. Then that enlightened agriculturist, Walter of
Henley, enters upon a long argument to prove to his readers that you really can
plough seven-eighths of an acre in a forenoon, and even a whole acre if you are but
engaged in that light kind of ploughing which does for a second fallowing[1283]. Five
centuries later another enlightened agriculturist, Arthur Young, discovered that ‘from
Page 355
North Leach, through Gloucestershire, Monmouthshire, and Glamorganshire, light
and middling turnip-land etc.’ was being ploughed at the rate of half an acre to one
acre a day by teams of ‘eight oxen; never less than six; or four and two horses.’ This,
he says, was being done ‘merely in compliance with the obstinacy of the low people,’
for ‘the labourers will not touch a plough without the usual number of beasts in
it[1284]’. Mr Young could not tell us of ‘these vile remnants of barbarity without a
great degree of disgust[1285]’. But we are grateful. We see that an acre of light land
was the maximum that these ‘low people’ with their eight oxen would plough in a
day, and we take it that at one time the voice of reforming science had urged men to
diminish the area ploughed in a given time, to plough deeper and to draw their
furrows closer. The old tradition was probably well content with a furrow for every
foot. Walter of Henley proposed to put six additional furrows into the acre[1286].
Hereafter we shall see that some of the statistics given by Domesday Book fall in
with the suggestion that we are here making. Also we may see on our maps that the
strip which a man has in one place is very often not an acre but a half-acre. Now, in
days when men really ploughed an acre at a stretch, such an arrangement would have
involved a waste of time, since, when the morning’s work was half done, the plough
would be removed from one ‘shot’ to another[1287].
At length we reach the fields, and at once we learn that
The real acres in the fields.
there is something unreal in all our talk of acre and half-acre
strips. In passing we may observe that some of our English
meadows which show by their ‘beds’ that they were not always meadows, seem to
show also that the boundaries of the strips were not drawn by straight rods, but were
drawn by the plough. The beds are not straight, but slightly sinuous, and such, it is
said, is the natural course of the old plough; it swerves to the left, and this tendency is
then corrected by those who guide it[1288]. But, apart from this, land refuses to be cut
into parallelograms each of which is 40 rods long and 4 wide. In other words, the
‘real acres’ in an open field diverge widely from the ideal acre that was in the minds
of those who made them.
Let us recall a few features of the common field, though
The ‘shots.’
they will be familiar to all who have read Mr Seebohm’s
book[1289]. A natural limit to the length of the furrow is set
by the endurance of oxen. From this it follows that even if the surface that lies open is
perfectly level and practically limitless, it will none the less be broken up into what
our Latin documents call culturae[1290]. The cultura is a set of contiguous and parallel
acre-strips; it tends to be a rude parallelogram; two of its sides will be each a furlong
(‘furrowlong’) in length, while the length of the other sides will vary from case to
case. We commonly find that every great field (campus) is divided into divers
culturae, each of which has its own name. The commonest English equivalent for the
word cultura seems to have been furlong, and this use of furlong was very natural;
and middling turnip-land etc.’ was being ploughed at the rate of half an acre to one
acre a day by teams of ‘eight oxen; never less than six; or four and two horses.’ This,
he says, was being done ‘merely in compliance with the obstinacy of the low people,’
for ‘the labourers will not touch a plough without the usual number of beasts in
it[1284]’. Mr Young could not tell us of ‘these vile remnants of barbarity without a
great degree of disgust[1285]’. But we are grateful. We see that an acre of light land
was the maximum that these ‘low people’ with their eight oxen would plough in a
day, and we take it that at one time the voice of reforming science had urged men to
diminish the area ploughed in a given time, to plough deeper and to draw their
furrows closer. The old tradition was probably well content with a furrow for every
foot. Walter of Henley proposed to put six additional furrows into the acre[1286].
Hereafter we shall see that some of the statistics given by Domesday Book fall in
with the suggestion that we are here making. Also we may see on our maps that the
strip which a man has in one place is very often not an acre but a half-acre. Now, in
days when men really ploughed an acre at a stretch, such an arrangement would have
involved a waste of time, since, when the morning’s work was half done, the plough
would be removed from one ‘shot’ to another[1287].
At length we reach the fields, and at once we learn that
The real acres in the fields.
there is something unreal in all our talk of acre and half-acre
strips. In passing we may observe that some of our English
meadows which show by their ‘beds’ that they were not always meadows, seem to
show also that the boundaries of the strips were not drawn by straight rods, but were
drawn by the plough. The beds are not straight, but slightly sinuous, and such, it is
said, is the natural course of the old plough; it swerves to the left, and this tendency is
then corrected by those who guide it[1288]. But, apart from this, land refuses to be cut
into parallelograms each of which is 40 rods long and 4 wide. In other words, the
‘real acres’ in an open field diverge widely from the ideal acre that was in the minds
of those who made them.
Let us recall a few features of the common field, though
The ‘shots.’
they will be familiar to all who have read Mr Seebohm’s
book[1289]. A natural limit to the length of the furrow is set
by the endurance of oxen. From this it follows that even if the surface that lies open is
perfectly level and practically limitless, it will none the less be broken up into what
our Latin documents call culturae[1290]. The cultura is a set of contiguous and parallel
acre-strips; it tends to be a rude parallelogram; two of its sides will be each a furlong
(‘furrowlong’) in length, while the length of the other sides will vary from case to
case. We commonly find that every great field (campus) is divided into divers
culturae, each of which has its own name. The commonest English equivalent for the
word cultura seems to have been furlong, and this use of furlong was very natural;
Page 356
but, as we require that term for another purpose, we will call the cultura a shot. So
large were the fields, that the annual value of an acre in one shot would sometimes be
eight times greater than that of an acre in another shot[1291]. To such differences our
ancestors were keenly alive. Hence the dispersion of the strips which constitute a
single tenement.
But to make ‘shots’ which should be rectangular and just 40
Delimitation of shots.
feet long was often impossible. Even if the surface of the
field were flat, its boundaries were the irregular curves
drawn by streams and mounds. In order to economize space, shots running at right
angles to other shots were introduced, and of necessity some furlongs were longer
than others. If, however, as was often the case, men were laying out their fields
among the folds of the hills, their acres would be yet more irregular both in size and
in shape. They would be compelled to make very small shots, and the various furrows
if ‘produced’ (in the geometer’s sense of that word) would cut each other at all
imaginable angles. On the maps we may still see them struggling with these
difficulties, drawing as many rectilinear shots as may be and then compelled to parcel
out as best they can the irregularly shaped patches that remain. And then we see that
even these patches have been allotted either as acres or as half-acres.
Therefore, when we are dealing with medieval documents,
The real and the ideal acre.
we have always to remember that besides ideal acres there
were real acres which were mapped out on the surface of
the earth, and that a plot will be, and rightly may be, called an acre though its size is
not that of any ideal acre. To tell a man that one of these acre-strips was not an acre
because it was too small would at one time have been like telling him that his foot
was no foot because it fell short of twelve inches. This point is made very plain by
some of the beautiful estate maps edited by Mr Mowat[1292]. We have a map of ‘the
village of Whitehill in the parishe of Tackley in the countye Oxon., the moitye or one
halfe whereof belongeth to the presidente and schollers of Corpus christi colledge in
the universitye of Oxon., the other moitye unto Edwarde Standerd yeoman the
particulars whereof soe far as knowne doe plainelye appeare in the platte and those
which are unknowne, as wastes comons and lotte meadowes are equallye divided
betweene them, drawne in November anno domini 1605, regni regis Iacobi iijo.’ We
see four great fields divided first into shots and then into strips. Each strip on the map
bears an inscription assigning it either to the college or to Mr Standerd, and with
great regularity the strips are assigned to the college and to Standerd alternately. Then
on each strip is set its ‘estimated’ content, and on each strip of the college land is also
set its true content. Thus looking at one particular shot in the South Field we read:
large were the fields, that the annual value of an acre in one shot would sometimes be
eight times greater than that of an acre in another shot[1291]. To such differences our
ancestors were keenly alive. Hence the dispersion of the strips which constitute a
single tenement.
But to make ‘shots’ which should be rectangular and just 40
Delimitation of shots.
feet long was often impossible. Even if the surface of the
field were flat, its boundaries were the irregular curves
drawn by streams and mounds. In order to economize space, shots running at right
angles to other shots were introduced, and of necessity some furlongs were longer
than others. If, however, as was often the case, men were laying out their fields
among the folds of the hills, their acres would be yet more irregular both in size and
in shape. They would be compelled to make very small shots, and the various furrows
if ‘produced’ (in the geometer’s sense of that word) would cut each other at all
imaginable angles. On the maps we may still see them struggling with these
difficulties, drawing as many rectilinear shots as may be and then compelled to parcel
out as best they can the irregularly shaped patches that remain. And then we see that
even these patches have been allotted either as acres or as half-acres.
Therefore, when we are dealing with medieval documents,
The real and the ideal acre.
we have always to remember that besides ideal acres there
were real acres which were mapped out on the surface of
the earth, and that a plot will be, and rightly may be, called an acre though its size is
not that of any ideal acre. To tell a man that one of these acre-strips was not an acre
because it was too small would at one time have been like telling him that his foot
was no foot because it fell short of twelve inches. This point is made very plain by
some of the beautiful estate maps edited by Mr Mowat[1292]. We have a map of ‘the
village of Whitehill in the parishe of Tackley in the countye Oxon., the moitye or one
halfe whereof belongeth to the presidente and schollers of Corpus christi colledge in
the universitye of Oxon., the other moitye unto Edwarde Standerd yeoman the
particulars whereof soe far as knowne doe plainelye appeare in the platte and those
which are unknowne, as wastes comons and lotte meadowes are equallye divided
betweene them, drawne in November anno domini 1605, regni regis Iacobi iijo.’ We
see four great fields divided first into shots and then into strips. Each strip on the map
bears an inscription assigning it either to the college or to Mr Standerd, and with
great regularity the strips are assigned to the college and to Standerd alternately. Then
on each strip is set its ‘estimated’ content, and on each strip of the college land is also
set its true content. Thus looking at one particular shot in the South Field we read:
Page 357
ij. ac. coll. 1. 1. 36
Edw. Stand. ij. ac.
ij. ac. coll. 1. 2. 2
Edw. Stand. ij. ac.
ij. ac. coll. 1. 2. 2
Edw. Stand. ij. ac.
ij. ac. coll. 1. 0. 39.
This means that, going along this shot, we first come to a two-acre-strip of college
land containing by admeasurement 1 A. 1 R. 36 P.; next to a two-acre strip of
Standerd’s land, which the surveyor, who was making the map for the college, was
not at pains to measure; then to a two-acre strip of college land containing 1 A. 2 R. 2
P.:—and so forth. Then in the margin of the map has been set ‘A note of the contentes
of the landes in Whitehille belonginge to the colledge.’ It tells us how ‘theire
groundes in the West Fielde by estimation 80 acres doe conteine by statute measure
48 A. 2 R. 24 P.’ The other fields we may deal with in a table
A. A. B. P.
East Field estimation 75 measure 51 1 25
Middle Field 58 39 3 36
South Field 103 59 2 13
It will be seen at once that the discrepancy between the two sets of figures is not to be
fully explained by the supposition that at Whitehill men had measured land by
measures differing from our statutory standards[1293]. The size of a ‘two-acres’ (and
the land in this instance had been divided chiefly into ‘two-acres’) varied not only
from field to field and shot to shot, but within one and the same shot. Each two-acre
strip has an equal breadth, but the curving boundaries of the fields make some strips
longer than others[1294].
We turn to the admirable maps of Heyford in Oxfordshire
Varying size of the acres.
designed in 1606. Here the land is divided among many
occupiers and cut up into a vast number of strips, to each of
which is assigned its ‘estimated’ and its measured content. Thus we read:—
dim. ac. Jo. Sheres 1. 18
dim. ac. Ric. Elkins 1. 18
dim. ac. Jo. Merry 1. 18.
In this part of this shot a ‘half-acre’ contains 1 R. 18 P. Some of the shots in this
village have fairly straight and rectangular boundaries, so that we may, for example,
find that many successive ‘half-acres’ contain 1 R. 18 P. But then if we pass to the next
shot we shall find 1 R. 28 P. in the ‘half-acre,’ while in a third shot we shall find but 1
Edw. Stand. ij. ac.
ij. ac. coll. 1. 2. 2
Edw. Stand. ij. ac.
ij. ac. coll. 1. 2. 2
Edw. Stand. ij. ac.
ij. ac. coll. 1. 0. 39.
This means that, going along this shot, we first come to a two-acre-strip of college
land containing by admeasurement 1 A. 1 R. 36 P.; next to a two-acre strip of
Standerd’s land, which the surveyor, who was making the map for the college, was
not at pains to measure; then to a two-acre strip of college land containing 1 A. 2 R. 2
P.:—and so forth. Then in the margin of the map has been set ‘A note of the contentes
of the landes in Whitehille belonginge to the colledge.’ It tells us how ‘theire
groundes in the West Fielde by estimation 80 acres doe conteine by statute measure
48 A. 2 R. 24 P.’ The other fields we may deal with in a table
A. A. B. P.
East Field estimation 75 measure 51 1 25
Middle Field 58 39 3 36
South Field 103 59 2 13
It will be seen at once that the discrepancy between the two sets of figures is not to be
fully explained by the supposition that at Whitehill men had measured land by
measures differing from our statutory standards[1293]. The size of a ‘two-acres’ (and
the land in this instance had been divided chiefly into ‘two-acres’) varied not only
from field to field and shot to shot, but within one and the same shot. Each two-acre
strip has an equal breadth, but the curving boundaries of the fields make some strips
longer than others[1294].
We turn to the admirable maps of Heyford in Oxfordshire
Varying size of the acres.
designed in 1606. Here the land is divided among many
occupiers and cut up into a vast number of strips, to each of
which is assigned its ‘estimated’ and its measured content. Thus we read:—
dim. ac. Jo. Sheres 1. 18
dim. ac. Ric. Elkins 1. 18
dim. ac. Jo. Merry 1. 18.
In this part of this shot a ‘half-acre’ contains 1 R. 18 P. Some of the shots in this
village have fairly straight and rectangular boundaries, so that we may, for example,
find that many successive ‘half-acres’ contain 1 R. 18 P. But then if we pass to the next
shot we shall find 1 R. 28 P. in the ‘half-acre,’ while in a third shot we shall find but 1
Page 358
R. 8 P. Yet every strip of land is a ‘half-acre’ or an ‘acre’ or a ‘acre and a half’ or a
‘two acres’ or a ‘three acres.’ We see further that when ‘acres’ occur among ‘half-
acres’ the strips vary in breadth but not in length.
On a map of Roxton made in 1768 we have the same thing written out in English
words. Thus:—
Eliz. Gardner a half 0. 1. 32
Carpenter a half 0. 1. 32
Harris an acre 0. 3. 24
Carpenter a half 0. 1. 32
Jam. Gardner an acre 0. 3. 24
Makepace a half 0. 1. 34
The result of all this is that anyone who lives in a village knows how many ‘acres’ its
fields contain. He has not to measure anything; he has only to count strips, for he is
not likely to confuse ‘acres’ with ‘half-acres’ and that is the only mistake that he
could make.
If a shot had a curved boundary, little or no pains seem to
Irregular length of acres.
have been taken to equalize the strips that lay within it by
making additional width serve as a compensation for
deficient length. The width of the so-called acre remained approximately constant
while its length varied. Thus, to take an example from the map of Heyford, we see a
shot which is bounded on the one side by a straight line and on the other by a curving
road. At one end of it the acre contains 2 R. 8 P.; this increases to 2 R. 30 P.; then
slowly decreases until it has fallen as low as 1 R. 36 P., and then again rises to 2 R. 2 P.
When they were dividing the field, men attempted to map out shots in which
approximately equal areas could be constructed; but, when a shot was once delimited,
then all the acres in it were made equally broad, while their length could not but vary,
except in the rare case in which the shot was a true rectangle[1295].
It is probable that the whole system was made yet more
The selions or beds.
visible by the practice of ploughing the land into ‘beds’ or
ridges, which has but recently fallen out of use. In our Latin
documents these ridges appear as selions (seliones). In English they were called
‘lands,’ for the French sillon struck no root in our language. Anyone who has walked
through English grass fields will know what they looked like, for they triumph over
time and change[1296]. Now it would seem that a fairly common usage made four
selions in each acre[1297]; in other words, each acre-strip was divided longitudinally
into four waves, so that the distance from crest to crest or trough to trough was a
perch in length. Where this usage obtained, you could tell how many acres a shot or
‘two acres’ or a ‘three acres.’ We see further that when ‘acres’ occur among ‘half-
acres’ the strips vary in breadth but not in length.
On a map of Roxton made in 1768 we have the same thing written out in English
words. Thus:—
Eliz. Gardner a half 0. 1. 32
Carpenter a half 0. 1. 32
Harris an acre 0. 3. 24
Carpenter a half 0. 1. 32
Jam. Gardner an acre 0. 3. 24
Makepace a half 0. 1. 34
The result of all this is that anyone who lives in a village knows how many ‘acres’ its
fields contain. He has not to measure anything; he has only to count strips, for he is
not likely to confuse ‘acres’ with ‘half-acres’ and that is the only mistake that he
could make.
If a shot had a curved boundary, little or no pains seem to
Irregular length of acres.
have been taken to equalize the strips that lay within it by
making additional width serve as a compensation for
deficient length. The width of the so-called acre remained approximately constant
while its length varied. Thus, to take an example from the map of Heyford, we see a
shot which is bounded on the one side by a straight line and on the other by a curving
road. At one end of it the acre contains 2 R. 8 P.; this increases to 2 R. 30 P.; then
slowly decreases until it has fallen as low as 1 R. 36 P., and then again rises to 2 R. 2 P.
When they were dividing the field, men attempted to map out shots in which
approximately equal areas could be constructed; but, when a shot was once delimited,
then all the acres in it were made equally broad, while their length could not but vary,
except in the rare case in which the shot was a true rectangle[1295].
It is probable that the whole system was made yet more
The selions or beds.
visible by the practice of ploughing the land into ‘beds’ or
ridges, which has but recently fallen out of use. In our Latin
documents these ridges appear as selions (seliones). In English they were called
‘lands,’ for the French sillon struck no root in our language. Anyone who has walked
through English grass fields will know what they looked like, for they triumph over
time and change[1296]. Now it would seem that a fairly common usage made four
selions in each acre[1297]; in other words, each acre-strip was divided longitudinally
into four waves, so that the distance from crest to crest or trough to trough was a
perch in length. Where this usage obtained, you could tell how many acres a shot or
Page 359
field contained by merely observing the undulations of the surface. Even if, as was
often the case, the number of selions in the acre was not four, still the number that
went to an acre of a given shot would be known, and a man might argue that a strip
was an acre because in crossing it he traversed three or six terrestrial waves[1298].
If we look at old maps, we soon see that when an acre was
Acres divided lengthwise.
divided, it was always divided by a line that was parallel,
not to its short ends, but to its long sides. No one would
think of dividing it in any other fashion. Suppose that you bisected it by bisecting its
long sides, you would force each owner of a half-acre to turn his plough as often as if
he had a whole acre. Besides, you would have uneconomical furrows; the oxen would
be stopped before they had traversed what was regarded as the natural distance for
beasts to go. Divide your acre into two long strips, then your folk and beasts can
plough in the good old way. Hence it follows that when men think of dividing an acre
they speak only of its breadth. Hence it follows that the quarter of an acre is a ‘rood’
or ‘yard[1299]’ or virga or virgata of land. Its width is a rod or land-yard, and its length
—but there is no need to speak of its length[1300].
How then does it happen that these terms ‘virgate’ and ‘yard
The virgate.
of land,’ though given to a quarter of an acre, are yet more
commonly given to a much larger quantity containing 30
acres or thereabouts? The explanation is simple. The typical tenement is a hide. If you
give a man a quarter of a hide (an equitable quarter, equal in value as well as extent to
every remaining quarter) you do this by giving him a quarter of every acre in the
hide. You give him a rood, a yard, a virga[1301], a virgata in every acre, and therefore
a rood, a yard, a virga, a virgata of a typical tenement[1302].
No doubt it is clumsy to have only one term for two
The double meaning of a
quantities, one of which is perhaps a hundred-and-twenty yard.
times as great as the other; but the context will tell us which
is meant, and the difference between the two is so large that
blunders will be impossible. In course of time there will be a differentiation and
specification of terms. To our ears, for example, rōd (rood) will mean one thing, rŏd
another, yard a third; but even in the nineteenth century royal commissioners will
report that a ‘yard of land’ may mean a quarter of an acre or ‘from 28 to 40
acres[1303].’ When men have not apprehended ‘superficial measure’ (the measurement
of shapeless size), when their only units are the human foot, a rod, an average day’s
work and the tenement of a typical householder, their language will be poor, because
their thought is poor.
We have now arrived at a not insignificant truth. The virgate
The yard-land a fraction of a
or yard-land of 30 acres or thereabouts is not a primary unit hide.
like the hide, the rod, the acre. It is derivative; it is
often the case, the number of selions in the acre was not four, still the number that
went to an acre of a given shot would be known, and a man might argue that a strip
was an acre because in crossing it he traversed three or six terrestrial waves[1298].
If we look at old maps, we soon see that when an acre was
Acres divided lengthwise.
divided, it was always divided by a line that was parallel,
not to its short ends, but to its long sides. No one would
think of dividing it in any other fashion. Suppose that you bisected it by bisecting its
long sides, you would force each owner of a half-acre to turn his plough as often as if
he had a whole acre. Besides, you would have uneconomical furrows; the oxen would
be stopped before they had traversed what was regarded as the natural distance for
beasts to go. Divide your acre into two long strips, then your folk and beasts can
plough in the good old way. Hence it follows that when men think of dividing an acre
they speak only of its breadth. Hence it follows that the quarter of an acre is a ‘rood’
or ‘yard[1299]’ or virga or virgata of land. Its width is a rod or land-yard, and its length
—but there is no need to speak of its length[1300].
How then does it happen that these terms ‘virgate’ and ‘yard
The virgate.
of land,’ though given to a quarter of an acre, are yet more
commonly given to a much larger quantity containing 30
acres or thereabouts? The explanation is simple. The typical tenement is a hide. If you
give a man a quarter of a hide (an equitable quarter, equal in value as well as extent to
every remaining quarter) you do this by giving him a quarter of every acre in the
hide. You give him a rood, a yard, a virga[1301], a virgata in every acre, and therefore
a rood, a yard, a virga, a virgata of a typical tenement[1302].
No doubt it is clumsy to have only one term for two
The double meaning of a
quantities, one of which is perhaps a hundred-and-twenty yard.
times as great as the other; but the context will tell us which
is meant, and the difference between the two is so large that
blunders will be impossible. In course of time there will be a differentiation and
specification of terms. To our ears, for example, rōd (rood) will mean one thing, rŏd
another, yard a third; but even in the nineteenth century royal commissioners will
report that a ‘yard of land’ may mean a quarter of an acre or ‘from 28 to 40
acres[1303].’ When men have not apprehended ‘superficial measure’ (the measurement
of shapeless size), when their only units are the human foot, a rod, an average day’s
work and the tenement of a typical householder, their language will be poor, because
their thought is poor.
We have now arrived at a not insignificant truth. The virgate
The yard-land a fraction of a
or yard-land of 30 acres or thereabouts is not a primary unit hide.
like the hide, the rod, the acre. It is derivative; it is
Page 360
compound. In its origin it is a rod’s breadth in every acre of a hide. In course of time
in this case, as in other cases, size will triumph over shape. The acre need not be ten
times as long as it is broad; the virgate need not be composed, perhaps is rarely
composed, of scattered quarter-acres; quartering acres is an uneconomical process; it
leads to waste of time. But still the term will carry on its face the traces of an ancient
history and a protest against some modern theories. The virgate in its inception can
not be a typical tenement; it is a fraction of a typical tenement.
What we have here been saying seems to be borne out by
The yard-land in laws and
the Anglo-Saxon laws and charters. They barely recognize charters.
the existence of such entities as yard-lands or virgates. The
charters, it must be confessed, deal with large tracts and
seldom have need to notice less than a hide. When, however, they descend below the
hide, they at once come down to the acre, and this although the quantity that they
have to specify is 90, or 60 or 30 acres[1304]. On the other hand, any reference to such
an unit as the virgate or yard-land is exceedingly rare. To judge by the charters, this is
a unit which was but beginning to force itself upon men’s notice in the last century
before the Conquest[1305]. From a remote time there may have been many tenements
that were like the virgates or yard-lands of later days; but the old strain of language
that is preserved in the charters ignores them, has no name for them, and, when they
receive a name, it signifies that they are fractions of a householder’s tenement.
As an unit larger than the acre men have known nothing but
The hide not at first a
the hide, the manse, the land of one family, the land of one measure.
householder. This is what we find in England: also it is
found in Germany and Scandinavia[1306]. The state bases its
structure, its taxation, its military system, upon the theory that such units exist and
can be fairly treated as equal or equivalent. This theory must have facts behind it,
though in course of time the state may thrust it upon lands that it will not fit, for
example, upon a land of ring-fenced property where there is no approximate equality
between the various tenements. In its origin a hide will not be a measure of land. A
measure is an idea; a hide is a tenement. The ‘foot’ does not begin by being twelve
inches; it begins by being a part of the human body. The ‘acre’ does not begin by
being 4840 square yards; it begins by being a strip in the fields that is ploughed in a
forenoon. But unless there were much equality between human feet, the foot would
not become a measure; nor would the acre become a measure unless the method of
ploughing land were fairly uniform. A great deal of similarity between the ‘real’ hides
or ‘householder’s lands’ we must needs suppose if the hide becomes a measure; not
only must those in any one village be much alike, there must be similarity between
the villages.
After a certain sort the hide does become a measure. Bede
The hide as a measure.
does not believe that if the families in the Isle of Wight were
in this case, as in other cases, size will triumph over shape. The acre need not be ten
times as long as it is broad; the virgate need not be composed, perhaps is rarely
composed, of scattered quarter-acres; quartering acres is an uneconomical process; it
leads to waste of time. But still the term will carry on its face the traces of an ancient
history and a protest against some modern theories. The virgate in its inception can
not be a typical tenement; it is a fraction of a typical tenement.
What we have here been saying seems to be borne out by
The yard-land in laws and
the Anglo-Saxon laws and charters. They barely recognize charters.
the existence of such entities as yard-lands or virgates. The
charters, it must be confessed, deal with large tracts and
seldom have need to notice less than a hide. When, however, they descend below the
hide, they at once come down to the acre, and this although the quantity that they
have to specify is 90, or 60 or 30 acres[1304]. On the other hand, any reference to such
an unit as the virgate or yard-land is exceedingly rare. To judge by the charters, this is
a unit which was but beginning to force itself upon men’s notice in the last century
before the Conquest[1305]. From a remote time there may have been many tenements
that were like the virgates or yard-lands of later days; but the old strain of language
that is preserved in the charters ignores them, has no name for them, and, when they
receive a name, it signifies that they are fractions of a householder’s tenement.
As an unit larger than the acre men have known nothing but
The hide not at first a
the hide, the manse, the land of one family, the land of one measure.
householder. This is what we find in England: also it is
found in Germany and Scandinavia[1306]. The state bases its
structure, its taxation, its military system, upon the theory that such units exist and
can be fairly treated as equal or equivalent. This theory must have facts behind it,
though in course of time the state may thrust it upon lands that it will not fit, for
example, upon a land of ring-fenced property where there is no approximate equality
between the various tenements. In its origin a hide will not be a measure of land. A
measure is an idea; a hide is a tenement. The ‘foot’ does not begin by being twelve
inches; it begins by being a part of the human body. The ‘acre’ does not begin by
being 4840 square yards; it begins by being a strip in the fields that is ploughed in a
forenoon. But unless there were much equality between human feet, the foot would
not become a measure; nor would the acre become a measure unless the method of
ploughing land were fairly uniform. A great deal of similarity between the ‘real’ hides
or ‘householder’s lands’ we must needs suppose if the hide becomes a measure; not
only must those in any one village be much alike, there must be similarity between
the villages.
After a certain sort the hide does become a measure. Bede
The hide as a measure.
does not believe that if the families in the Isle of Wight were
Page 361
counted, the sum would be just 1200. The Anglo-Saxon kings are giving away half-
hides or half-manses as well as manses or hides. They can speak of three hides and
thirty acres[1307] or of two hides less sixty acres[1308]. Men are beginning to work
sums in hides and acres as they work sums in pounds and pence. Indubitably such
sums are worked in Domesday Book. In the thirteenth century the hide can even be
treated as a pure superficial measure. An instance is given by an ‘extent’ of the village
of Sawston in Cambridgeshire. The content of about two hundred small parcels of
land is given in terms of acres and roods. Then an addition sum is worked and a total
is stated in hides, virgates and acres, the equation that is employed being 1 H. = 4 V. =
120 A. It is a remarkable case, because the area, not only of arable land, but of
meadows, pasture, crofts, gardens and messuages is added up into hides. The hide is
here a pure measure, a mere multiple of acres[1309]. The men who made this ‘extent’
could have spoken of a hide of cloth. But this seems a rare and it is a late instance. At
an earlier time the hide is conceived as consisting only of arable acres with
appurtenances.
A word to explain this conception. In very old times when
The hide as a measure of
men thought of land as the subject-matter of grants and arable.
taxes they spoke only of arable land[1310]. If we are to
understand their sayings and doings, we must think
ourselves into an economic arrangement very different from that in which we are now
immersed. We must well-nigh abolish buying and selling. Every village, perhaps
every hide, must be very nearly self-sufficient. Now when once population has grown
so thick that nomadic practices are forsaken, the strain of supporting mankind falls
almost wholly on the ploughed land. That strain is severe. Many acres feed few
people. Thus the arable becomes prominent. But further, arable implies pasture. This
is not a legal theory; it is a physical fact. A householder can not have arable land
unless he has pasture rights. Arable land is land that is ploughed; ploughing implies
oxen; oxen, pasture. Our householder can not use a steam-plough; what is more, he
can not buy hay. If he keeps beasts, they must eat. If he does not keep beasts, he has
no arable land. Lastly, as a general rule men do not possess pasture land in severalty;
they turn out their beasts on ‘the common of the vill.’ Therefore, in very old schemes
of taxation and the like, pasture land is neglected: not because it is unimportant, but
because it is indispensably necessary. It may be taken for granted. If a man has 120
acres of arable land, he must have adequate pasture rights; there must be in
Domesday’s language pastura sufficens carucis. And in the common case there will
be not much more than sufficient pasture. If there were, it would soon be broken up to
provide more corn. Every village must be self-supporting, and therefore an
equilibrium of arable and pasture will be established in every village. Thus if, for
fiscal and governmental purposes, there is to be a typical tenement, it may be a
tenement of x arable acres, and nothing need be said of any other kind of ground.
hides or half-manses as well as manses or hides. They can speak of three hides and
thirty acres[1307] or of two hides less sixty acres[1308]. Men are beginning to work
sums in hides and acres as they work sums in pounds and pence. Indubitably such
sums are worked in Domesday Book. In the thirteenth century the hide can even be
treated as a pure superficial measure. An instance is given by an ‘extent’ of the village
of Sawston in Cambridgeshire. The content of about two hundred small parcels of
land is given in terms of acres and roods. Then an addition sum is worked and a total
is stated in hides, virgates and acres, the equation that is employed being 1 H. = 4 V. =
120 A. It is a remarkable case, because the area, not only of arable land, but of
meadows, pasture, crofts, gardens and messuages is added up into hides. The hide is
here a pure measure, a mere multiple of acres[1309]. The men who made this ‘extent’
could have spoken of a hide of cloth. But this seems a rare and it is a late instance. At
an earlier time the hide is conceived as consisting only of arable acres with
appurtenances.
A word to explain this conception. In very old times when
The hide as a measure of
men thought of land as the subject-matter of grants and arable.
taxes they spoke only of arable land[1310]. If we are to
understand their sayings and doings, we must think
ourselves into an economic arrangement very different from that in which we are now
immersed. We must well-nigh abolish buying and selling. Every village, perhaps
every hide, must be very nearly self-sufficient. Now when once population has grown
so thick that nomadic practices are forsaken, the strain of supporting mankind falls
almost wholly on the ploughed land. That strain is severe. Many acres feed few
people. Thus the arable becomes prominent. But further, arable implies pasture. This
is not a legal theory; it is a physical fact. A householder can not have arable land
unless he has pasture rights. Arable land is land that is ploughed; ploughing implies
oxen; oxen, pasture. Our householder can not use a steam-plough; what is more, he
can not buy hay. If he keeps beasts, they must eat. If he does not keep beasts, he has
no arable land. Lastly, as a general rule men do not possess pasture land in severalty;
they turn out their beasts on ‘the common of the vill.’ Therefore, in very old schemes
of taxation and the like, pasture land is neglected: not because it is unimportant, but
because it is indispensably necessary. It may be taken for granted. If a man has 120
acres of arable land, he must have adequate pasture rights; there must be in
Domesday’s language pastura sufficens carucis. And in the common case there will
be not much more than sufficient pasture. If there were, it would soon be broken up to
provide more corn. Every village must be self-supporting, and therefore an
equilibrium of arable and pasture will be established in every village. Thus if, for
fiscal and governmental purposes, there is to be a typical tenement, it may be a
tenement of x arable acres, and nothing need be said of any other kind of ground.
Page 362
We are going to argue that the Anglo-Saxons give 120 acres,
The hide of 120 acres.
arable acres, to the hide. Our main argument will be that the
equation 1 H. = 120 A. is implied in the fiscal system
revealed by Domesday Book. But, by way of making this equation probable, we may
notice that, if we had no evidence later than the Conquest, all that we should find on
the face of the Anglo-Saxon land-books would be favourable to this equation. In the
first place, on the only occasion on which we hear of the content of a hide, it is put at
120 acres[1311]. In the second place, when a number of acres is mentioned, it is
commonly one of those numbers, such as 150, 90, 80, 60, 30, which will often occur
if hides of 120 acres are being partitioned[1312]. The force of this last remark may
seem to be diminished if we remember how excellent a dividend is 120. It is neatly
divisible by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 12. But then we must reflect that this very quality
recommended it to organizers, more especially as there were 240 pence in the pound.
Supposing for a moment that we bring home this equation
Real and fiscal hides.
to the Anglo-Saxon financiers, there would still remain the
question how far it truthfully represented agrarian facts. To
that question no precise answer can be given: the truth lies somewhere between two
extremes. We must not for one instant believe that England was so neat a chess-board
as a rude fiscal theory paints, where every pawn stands on its square, every ‘family’
in the centre of 120 acre-strips of 4 by 40 perches. The barbarian, for all his
materialism, is an idealist. He is, like the child, a master in the art of make-believe.
He sees things not as they are, but as they might conveniently be. Every householder
has a hide; every hide has 120 acres of arable; every hide is worth one pound a year;
every householder has a team; every team is of eight oxen; every team is worth one
pound. If all this be not so, then it ought to be so and must be deemed to be so. Then
by a Procrustean process he packs the complex and irregular facts into his scheme.
What is worse, he will not count. He will assume that a large district has a round
1200 hides, and will then ordain that those hides must be found. We see this on a
small scale if we study manorial ‘extents’ or village maps. The virgates are not equal;
the acres are far from equal; but they are deemed to be equal[1313]. Nevertheless, we
must stop short of the other extreme or we shall be over-estimating the power of such
government and the originality of such statesmanship as existed. Theories like those
of which we are speaking are born of facts and in their turn generate new facts. Our
forefathers really lived in a simpler and a more chess-board-like England than that
which we know. There must have been much equality among the hides and among the
villages. When we see that a ‘hundred’ in Cambridgeshire has exactly 100 hides
which are distributed between six vills of 10 hides apiece and eight vills of 5 hides
apiece, this simple symmetry is in part the unreal outcome of a capricious method of
taxation, but in part it is a real economic fact. There was an English conquest of
England, and, to all seeming, the conquest of eastern England was singularly
thorough. In all probability a great many villages were formed approximately at one
The hide of 120 acres.
arable acres, to the hide. Our main argument will be that the
equation 1 H. = 120 A. is implied in the fiscal system
revealed by Domesday Book. But, by way of making this equation probable, we may
notice that, if we had no evidence later than the Conquest, all that we should find on
the face of the Anglo-Saxon land-books would be favourable to this equation. In the
first place, on the only occasion on which we hear of the content of a hide, it is put at
120 acres[1311]. In the second place, when a number of acres is mentioned, it is
commonly one of those numbers, such as 150, 90, 80, 60, 30, which will often occur
if hides of 120 acres are being partitioned[1312]. The force of this last remark may
seem to be diminished if we remember how excellent a dividend is 120. It is neatly
divisible by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 12. But then we must reflect that this very quality
recommended it to organizers, more especially as there were 240 pence in the pound.
Supposing for a moment that we bring home this equation
Real and fiscal hides.
to the Anglo-Saxon financiers, there would still remain the
question how far it truthfully represented agrarian facts. To
that question no precise answer can be given: the truth lies somewhere between two
extremes. We must not for one instant believe that England was so neat a chess-board
as a rude fiscal theory paints, where every pawn stands on its square, every ‘family’
in the centre of 120 acre-strips of 4 by 40 perches. The barbarian, for all his
materialism, is an idealist. He is, like the child, a master in the art of make-believe.
He sees things not as they are, but as they might conveniently be. Every householder
has a hide; every hide has 120 acres of arable; every hide is worth one pound a year;
every householder has a team; every team is of eight oxen; every team is worth one
pound. If all this be not so, then it ought to be so and must be deemed to be so. Then
by a Procrustean process he packs the complex and irregular facts into his scheme.
What is worse, he will not count. He will assume that a large district has a round
1200 hides, and will then ordain that those hides must be found. We see this on a
small scale if we study manorial ‘extents’ or village maps. The virgates are not equal;
the acres are far from equal; but they are deemed to be equal[1313]. Nevertheless, we
must stop short of the other extreme or we shall be over-estimating the power of such
government and the originality of such statesmanship as existed. Theories like those
of which we are speaking are born of facts and in their turn generate new facts. Our
forefathers really lived in a simpler and a more chess-board-like England than that
which we know. There must have been much equality among the hides and among the
villages. When we see that a ‘hundred’ in Cambridgeshire has exactly 100 hides
which are distributed between six vills of 10 hides apiece and eight vills of 5 hides
apiece, this simple symmetry is in part the unreal outcome of a capricious method of
taxation, but in part it is a real economic fact. There was an English conquest of
England, and, to all seeming, the conquest of eastern England was singularly
thorough. In all probability a great many villages were formed approximately at one
Page 363
time and on one plan. Conveniently simple figures could be drawn, for the slate was
clean[1314].
However, at an early time the hide becomes an unit in a
Causes of divergence of
system of assessment. The language of the land-books tells fiscal from real hides.
us that this is so[1315]. Already in Ine’s day we hear of the
amount of victual that ten hides must find for the king’s
support[1316]. About the end of the tenth century the duty of maintaining burgs is
bound up with the possession of hides[1317]. Before the end of that century heavy
sums are being raised as a tribute for the Danes. For this purpose, as we shall try to
show hereafter, ‘hides’ are cast upon shires and hundreds by those who, instead of
counting, make pleasantly convenient assumptions about the capacity of provinces
and districts, and in all probability the assumptions made in the oldest times were the
furthest from the truth. Now and again the assessments of shires and hundreds were
corrected in a manner which, so far as we are concerned, only made matters worse. It
becomes apparent that hides are not of one value or nearly of one value. This
becomes painfully apparent when Cornwall and other far western lands are brought
under contribution. So large sums of hides are struck off the poorer counties. The
fiscal ‘hide’ becomes a lame compromise between an unit of area and an unit of
value. Then privilege confounds confusion; the estates of favoured churches and
nobles are ‘beneficially hidated.’ But this is not all. Probably the real hides, the real
old settlers’ tenements, which you could count if you looked at a village and its fields,
are rapidly going to pieces, and the fragments thereof are entering into new
combinations. In the lordless villages economic forces of an easily imaginable kind
will make for this end. Not only may we suppose some increase of population,
especially where Danes swarm in, and some progress in the art of agriculture, but also
the bond of blood becomes weaker and the familia that lives in one house grows
smaller. So the hides go to pieces. The birth of trade and the establishment of markets
help this process. It is no longer necessary that every tenement should be self-
sufficient; men can buy what they do not grow. The formation of manors may have
tended in some sort to arrest this movement. A system of equal (theoretically equal)
tenements was convenient to lords who were collecting ‘provender rents’ and
extending their powers; but under seignorial pressure virgates, rather than hides, were
likely to become the prominent units. We may well believe that if to make two ears of
corn grow where one grew is to benefit mankind, the lords were public benefactors,
and that the husbandry of the manors was more efficient than was that of the lordless
townships. The clergy were in touch with their fellows on the Continent; also the
church’s reeve was a professional agriculturist and might even write a tract on the
management of manors[1318]. There was more cooperation, more communalism, less
waste. A family could live and thrive upon a virgate[1319].
clean[1314].
However, at an early time the hide becomes an unit in a
Causes of divergence of
system of assessment. The language of the land-books tells fiscal from real hides.
us that this is so[1315]. Already in Ine’s day we hear of the
amount of victual that ten hides must find for the king’s
support[1316]. About the end of the tenth century the duty of maintaining burgs is
bound up with the possession of hides[1317]. Before the end of that century heavy
sums are being raised as a tribute for the Danes. For this purpose, as we shall try to
show hereafter, ‘hides’ are cast upon shires and hundreds by those who, instead of
counting, make pleasantly convenient assumptions about the capacity of provinces
and districts, and in all probability the assumptions made in the oldest times were the
furthest from the truth. Now and again the assessments of shires and hundreds were
corrected in a manner which, so far as we are concerned, only made matters worse. It
becomes apparent that hides are not of one value or nearly of one value. This
becomes painfully apparent when Cornwall and other far western lands are brought
under contribution. So large sums of hides are struck off the poorer counties. The
fiscal ‘hide’ becomes a lame compromise between an unit of area and an unit of
value. Then privilege confounds confusion; the estates of favoured churches and
nobles are ‘beneficially hidated.’ But this is not all. Probably the real hides, the real
old settlers’ tenements, which you could count if you looked at a village and its fields,
are rapidly going to pieces, and the fragments thereof are entering into new
combinations. In the lordless villages economic forces of an easily imaginable kind
will make for this end. Not only may we suppose some increase of population,
especially where Danes swarm in, and some progress in the art of agriculture, but also
the bond of blood becomes weaker and the familia that lives in one house grows
smaller. So the hides go to pieces. The birth of trade and the establishment of markets
help this process. It is no longer necessary that every tenement should be self-
sufficient; men can buy what they do not grow. The formation of manors may have
tended in some sort to arrest this movement. A system of equal (theoretically equal)
tenements was convenient to lords who were collecting ‘provender rents’ and
extending their powers; but under seignorial pressure virgates, rather than hides, were
likely to become the prominent units. We may well believe that if to make two ears of
corn grow where one grew is to benefit mankind, the lords were public benefactors,
and that the husbandry of the manors was more efficient than was that of the lordless
townships. The clergy were in touch with their fellows on the Continent; also the
church’s reeve was a professional agriculturist and might even write a tract on the
management of manors[1318]. There was more cooperation, more communalism, less
waste. A family could live and thrive upon a virgate[1319].
Page 364
But, what concerns us at the present moment is the, for us
Effects of the divergence of
disastrous, effect of this divergence of the fiscal from the fiscal from real hides.
real hide. Even if finance had not complicated the problem,
we should, as we have already seen, have found many
difficulties if we tried to construe medieval statements of acreage. Already we should
have had three different ‘acres’ to think of. We will imagine that a village has 590
‘acre strips’ in its field. In one sense, therefore, it has 590 acres. But the ideal to
which these strips tend and were meant to conform is that of acres measured by a rod
of 15 feet. Measured by that rod there would, we will suppose, be 550 acres. Then,
however, we may use the royal rod and say that there are 454 acres or thereabouts.
But the field was divided into five tenements that were known as hides, and the
general theory is that a hide (householder’s land) contains, or must be supposed to
contain, 120 acres. Therefore there are here 600 acres. And now a partitionary method
of taxation stamps this as a vill of four hides. Consequently the ‘hide’ of this village
may have as many as 150 or as few as 90 ‘acres.’ It ought not to be so. It would not
be so if men were always distinguishing between ‘acre strips’ and measured acres,
between ‘real’ hides (which, to tell truth, are no longer real, since they are falling to
pieces) and ‘fiscal’ or ‘geld’ hides. But it will be so. Here and there we may see an
effort to keep up distinctions between the ‘carucate for gelding’ and the ‘carucate for
ploughing,’ between the real acre and the acre ‘for defence (acra warae)[1320]’; but
men tire of these long phrases and argue backwards and forwards between the
rateable and the real. Hence some of the worst puzzles of Domesday Book[1321].
Such being the causes of perplexity, it is perhaps surprising
Acreage of the hide in later
that in the thirteenth century when we begin to obtain a days.
large stock of manorial extents, ‘the hide’ should still
exhibit some uniformity. But, unless we have been misled
by a partial induction, a tendency to reckon 120 rather than any other number of acres
to the hide is plainly perceptible. The following are the equations that prevailed on
the manors of Ramsey Abbey, which were scattered in the eastern midlands[1322].
Huntingdonshire
Upwood with Raveley 1 H. = 4 V. = 80 A.
Wistow 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Broughton 1 H. = 6½ V. = 208 A.
Warboys 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Holywell 1 H. = 5 V. = 90 A.
Slepe (St Ives) 1 H. = 5 V. = 80 A.
Houghton with Wyton 1 H. = 6 V. = 108 A.
Hemingford 1 H. = 6 V. = 96 A.
Dillington 1 H. = 6 V. = 201 A.
Effects of the divergence of
disastrous, effect of this divergence of the fiscal from the fiscal from real hides.
real hide. Even if finance had not complicated the problem,
we should, as we have already seen, have found many
difficulties if we tried to construe medieval statements of acreage. Already we should
have had three different ‘acres’ to think of. We will imagine that a village has 590
‘acre strips’ in its field. In one sense, therefore, it has 590 acres. But the ideal to
which these strips tend and were meant to conform is that of acres measured by a rod
of 15 feet. Measured by that rod there would, we will suppose, be 550 acres. Then,
however, we may use the royal rod and say that there are 454 acres or thereabouts.
But the field was divided into five tenements that were known as hides, and the
general theory is that a hide (householder’s land) contains, or must be supposed to
contain, 120 acres. Therefore there are here 600 acres. And now a partitionary method
of taxation stamps this as a vill of four hides. Consequently the ‘hide’ of this village
may have as many as 150 or as few as 90 ‘acres.’ It ought not to be so. It would not
be so if men were always distinguishing between ‘acre strips’ and measured acres,
between ‘real’ hides (which, to tell truth, are no longer real, since they are falling to
pieces) and ‘fiscal’ or ‘geld’ hides. But it will be so. Here and there we may see an
effort to keep up distinctions between the ‘carucate for gelding’ and the ‘carucate for
ploughing,’ between the real acre and the acre ‘for defence (acra warae)[1320]’; but
men tire of these long phrases and argue backwards and forwards between the
rateable and the real. Hence some of the worst puzzles of Domesday Book[1321].
Such being the causes of perplexity, it is perhaps surprising
Acreage of the hide in later
that in the thirteenth century when we begin to obtain a days.
large stock of manorial extents, ‘the hide’ should still
exhibit some uniformity. But, unless we have been misled
by a partial induction, a tendency to reckon 120 rather than any other number of acres
to the hide is plainly perceptible. The following are the equations that prevailed on
the manors of Ramsey Abbey, which were scattered in the eastern midlands[1322].
Huntingdonshire
Upwood with Raveley 1 H. = 4 V. = 80 A.
Wistow 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Broughton 1 H. = 6½ V. = 208 A.
Warboys 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Holywell 1 H. = 5 V. = 90 A.
Slepe (St Ives) 1 H. = 5 V. = 80 A.
Houghton with Wyton 1 H. = 6 V. = 108 A.
Hemingford 1 H. = 6 V. = 96 A.
Dillington 1 H. = 6 V. = 201 A.
Page 365
Weston 1 H. = 4 V. = 112 A.
Brington 1 H. = 4 V. = 136 A.
Bythorn 1 H. = 4 V. = 176 A.
Gidding 1 H. = 4 V. = 112 A.
Elton 1 H. = 6 V. = 144 A.
Stukeley 1 H. = 4 V. = 96 A.
Ripton with Remington 1 H. = 4 V. = 62 A.
Northamptonshire
Barnwell 1 H. = 7 V. = 252 A.
Hemington 1 H. = 7 V. = 252 A.
Bedfordshire
Cranfield 1 H. = 4 V. = 192 A.
Barton 1 H. = 4 V. = 96 A.
Shitlingdon 1 H. = 4 V. = 48 A.
Hertfordshire
Therfield 1 H. = 4 V. = 256 A.
Suffolk
Lawshall 1 H. = 3 V. = 156 A.
Norfolk
Brancaster 1 H. =4 V. = 160 A.
Ringstead 1 H. =4 V. = 120 A.
Cambridgeshire
Elsworth 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Knapwell 1 H. = 4 V. = 160 A.
Graveley Freehold 1 H. = 7 V. = unknown
Villeinage 1 H. = 6¾ V. = 135 A.
Over 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Girton 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Burwell 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Here in thirty-one instances what we take to be the normal equation appears but seven
times, but no other equation occurs more than twice. Moreover, so far as we have
observed, the variations in the acreage that will be ascribed to a hide are not
provincial, they are villar variations: that is to say, though we may see that the
average hide of one county would have more acres than those that are contained in
the average hide of another, we can not affirm that the hide of a certain county or
hundred contains a acres, while that of another has b acres, and, on the other hand, we
Brington 1 H. = 4 V. = 136 A.
Bythorn 1 H. = 4 V. = 176 A.
Gidding 1 H. = 4 V. = 112 A.
Elton 1 H. = 6 V. = 144 A.
Stukeley 1 H. = 4 V. = 96 A.
Ripton with Remington 1 H. = 4 V. = 62 A.
Northamptonshire
Barnwell 1 H. = 7 V. = 252 A.
Hemington 1 H. = 7 V. = 252 A.
Bedfordshire
Cranfield 1 H. = 4 V. = 192 A.
Barton 1 H. = 4 V. = 96 A.
Shitlingdon 1 H. = 4 V. = 48 A.
Hertfordshire
Therfield 1 H. = 4 V. = 256 A.
Suffolk
Lawshall 1 H. = 3 V. = 156 A.
Norfolk
Brancaster 1 H. =4 V. = 160 A.
Ringstead 1 H. =4 V. = 120 A.
Cambridgeshire
Elsworth 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Knapwell 1 H. = 4 V. = 160 A.
Graveley Freehold 1 H. = 7 V. = unknown
Villeinage 1 H. = 6¾ V. = 135 A.
Over 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Girton 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Burwell 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A.
Here in thirty-one instances what we take to be the normal equation appears but seven
times, but no other equation occurs more than twice. Moreover, so far as we have
observed, the variations in the acreage that will be ascribed to a hide are not
provincial, they are villar variations: that is to say, though we may see that the
average hide of one county would have more acres than those that are contained in
the average hide of another, we can not affirm that the hide of a certain county or
hundred contains a acres, while that of another has b acres, and, on the other hand, we
Page 366
often see a startling difference between two contiguous villages. Lastly, where the
computation of 120 acres to a hide is forsaken, we see little agreement in favour of
any other equation. In particular, though now and again the hide of a village will
perchance have 240 acres, we can find no trace of any ‘double hide’ in which
ingenuity might see a link between the Roman and English systems of measurement
and taxation[1323]. The only other general proposition which our evidence suggests is
that a land which habitually displays unusually large virgates will often be a land in
which a given area of arable soil has borne an unusually light weight of taxation, and
this, as we shall hereafter see, will often, though not always, be a land where a given
area of arable soil has been deemed to bear an unusually small value. But this
connexion between many-acred hides and light taxation is not very strongly marked
in our cartularies[1324].
In the land-books which deal with Kent the aratrum or
The carucate and bovate.
sulung[1325] is commoner than the hide or manse, and
Domesday Book shows us that in Kent the solin (sulung) is
the fiscal unit that plays the part that is elsewhere played by the hide. That same part
is played in Suffolk, Norfolk, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, and the counties of Derby,
Nottingham and Leicester by the carucata, which has for its eighth part the bovata.
These terms seem to be French: that is to say, they apparently formed no part of the
official Latin that had been current in England[1326]. We may infer, however, that they
translated some English, or rather perhaps some Scandinavian terms, for only in
Danish counties do we find them used to describe the geldable units. It is exceedingly
doubtful whether we ought to treat this method of reckoning as older than the Danish
invasions. Bede, himself a Northumbrian, uses the ‘family-land’ as his unit, no matter
what be the part of England of which he is speaking, and his translator uses the híd or
hiwisc in the same indiscriminate fashion. Unfortunately the ‘carucated’ shires are
those which yield us hardly any land-books, and we do not know what the English
jurors said when the Norman clerks wrote carucata and bovata: perhaps plough-gate
and ox-gate, or plough-gang and ox-gang, or, again, a plough of land, for these were
the vernacular words of a later age. On the whole, the little evidence that we have
seems to point to the greater antiquity in England of a reckoning which takes the
‘house-land’ rather than the ‘plough-land’ as its unit[1327].
As to the bovate or ox-gang, it seems to be an unit only in
The ox-gang.
the same sense as that in which the virgate or yard-land is
an unit; the one is the eighth, the other is the fourth of an
unit. That, in days when eight oxen are yoked to a plough, the eighth of a plough-
gang should be called an ox-gang will not surprise us, though, as a matter of fact, an
ox never ‘goes’ or ploughs in solitude[1328]. In our Latin documents a third part of a
knight’s fee will be, not tertia pars feodi unius militis, but far more commonly,
feodum tertiae partis unius militis. We do not infer from this that fractions of knights,
computation of 120 acres to a hide is forsaken, we see little agreement in favour of
any other equation. In particular, though now and again the hide of a village will
perchance have 240 acres, we can find no trace of any ‘double hide’ in which
ingenuity might see a link between the Roman and English systems of measurement
and taxation[1323]. The only other general proposition which our evidence suggests is
that a land which habitually displays unusually large virgates will often be a land in
which a given area of arable soil has borne an unusually light weight of taxation, and
this, as we shall hereafter see, will often, though not always, be a land where a given
area of arable soil has been deemed to bear an unusually small value. But this
connexion between many-acred hides and light taxation is not very strongly marked
in our cartularies[1324].
In the land-books which deal with Kent the aratrum or
The carucate and bovate.
sulung[1325] is commoner than the hide or manse, and
Domesday Book shows us that in Kent the solin (sulung) is
the fiscal unit that plays the part that is elsewhere played by the hide. That same part
is played in Suffolk, Norfolk, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, and the counties of Derby,
Nottingham and Leicester by the carucata, which has for its eighth part the bovata.
These terms seem to be French: that is to say, they apparently formed no part of the
official Latin that had been current in England[1326]. We may infer, however, that they
translated some English, or rather perhaps some Scandinavian terms, for only in
Danish counties do we find them used to describe the geldable units. It is exceedingly
doubtful whether we ought to treat this method of reckoning as older than the Danish
invasions. Bede, himself a Northumbrian, uses the ‘family-land’ as his unit, no matter
what be the part of England of which he is speaking, and his translator uses the híd or
hiwisc in the same indiscriminate fashion. Unfortunately the ‘carucated’ shires are
those which yield us hardly any land-books, and we do not know what the English
jurors said when the Norman clerks wrote carucata and bovata: perhaps plough-gate
and ox-gate, or plough-gang and ox-gang, or, again, a plough of land, for these were
the vernacular words of a later age. On the whole, the little evidence that we have
seems to point to the greater antiquity in England of a reckoning which takes the
‘house-land’ rather than the ‘plough-land’ as its unit[1327].
As to the bovate or ox-gang, it seems to be an unit only in
The ox-gang.
the same sense as that in which the virgate or yard-land is
an unit; the one is the eighth, the other is the fourth of an
unit. That, in days when eight oxen are yoked to a plough, the eighth of a plough-
gang should be called an ox-gang will not surprise us, though, as a matter of fact, an
ox never ‘goes’ or ploughs in solitude[1328]. In our Latin documents a third part of a
knight’s fee will be, not tertia pars feodi unius militis, but far more commonly,
feodum tertiae partis unius militis. We do not infer from this that fractions of knights,
Page 367
or fractions of knight’s fees are older than integral knights and integral fees. The
bovate seems to have been much less widely known than the carucate, for apparently
it had no place in the computation that was generally used in East Anglia, where men
reckoned by carucates, half-carucates and acres and where the virgate was not
absolutely unknown[1329].
In the financial system, as we have said, the carucate plays
The fiscal carucate.
for some counties the part that is played for others by the
hide. Fiscally they seem to be equivalent: that is to say,
when every hide of Wessex is to pay two shillings, every carucate of Lincolnshire
will pay that sum. We think also and shall try to show that the Exchequer reckons 120
acres to the carucate, or, in other words, that if a tenement taxed as a carucate were
divided into six equal shares, each share would at the Exchequer be called 20 acres.
The same forces, however, which have made the fiscal hide diverge widely from the
‘real’ hide have played upon the plough-gangs of the Danelaw. In the Boldon Book
we read of many bovates with 15 acres apiece, though the figures 20, 131⁄2, 121⁄2, 12
and 8 are also represented, and, when we come to the extents of the thirteenth
century, we seem to see in the north but a feeble tendency to any uniformity among
the equations that connect carucates with acres. The numbers of the acres in a bovate
given by a series of Yorkshire inquests is 7, 7, 8, 15, 12, 6, 12, 15, 15, 6, 5, 9, 10, 10,
12, 24, 4, 16, 12, 18, 8, 6, 10, 24, 32[1330]. With a bovate of 4 acres, our carucate
would have no more than 32. But then, in the north we may find very long rods and
very large acres[1331], and, where Danes have settled, we have the best reason to
expect those complications which would arise from the superimposition of a new set
of measures upon a territory that had been arranged to suit another set[1332].
Having been led into speaking of plough-gangs, we may
Acreage tilled by a plough.
end these discursive remarks by a gentle protest against the
use that is sometimes made of the statements that are found
in the book called Fleta. It is a second-rate legal treatise of Edward I.’s day. It seems
to have fallen dead from its author’s pen and it hardly deserved a better fate. For the
more part it is a poor abstract of Bracton’s work. When it ceases to pillage Bracton, it
pillages other authors, and what it says of ploughing appears to be derived at second
hand from Walter of Henley[1333]. Now Walter of Henley’s successful and popular
treatise on Husbandry is a good and important book; but we must be careful before
we treat it as an exponent of the traditional mode of agriculture, for evidently Walter
was an enlightened reformer. We might even call him the Arthur Young of his time.
Now, it is sometimes said that according to Fleta ‘the carucate’ would have 160 acres
in ‘a two course manor’ and 180 in ‘a three course manor.’ A reference to Walter of
Henley will show him endeavouring to convince the men of his time that such
amounts as these really can be ploughed, if they work hard. ‘Some men will tell you
bovate seems to have been much less widely known than the carucate, for apparently
it had no place in the computation that was generally used in East Anglia, where men
reckoned by carucates, half-carucates and acres and where the virgate was not
absolutely unknown[1329].
In the financial system, as we have said, the carucate plays
The fiscal carucate.
for some counties the part that is played for others by the
hide. Fiscally they seem to be equivalent: that is to say,
when every hide of Wessex is to pay two shillings, every carucate of Lincolnshire
will pay that sum. We think also and shall try to show that the Exchequer reckons 120
acres to the carucate, or, in other words, that if a tenement taxed as a carucate were
divided into six equal shares, each share would at the Exchequer be called 20 acres.
The same forces, however, which have made the fiscal hide diverge widely from the
‘real’ hide have played upon the plough-gangs of the Danelaw. In the Boldon Book
we read of many bovates with 15 acres apiece, though the figures 20, 131⁄2, 121⁄2, 12
and 8 are also represented, and, when we come to the extents of the thirteenth
century, we seem to see in the north but a feeble tendency to any uniformity among
the equations that connect carucates with acres. The numbers of the acres in a bovate
given by a series of Yorkshire inquests is 7, 7, 8, 15, 12, 6, 12, 15, 15, 6, 5, 9, 10, 10,
12, 24, 4, 16, 12, 18, 8, 6, 10, 24, 32[1330]. With a bovate of 4 acres, our carucate
would have no more than 32. But then, in the north we may find very long rods and
very large acres[1331], and, where Danes have settled, we have the best reason to
expect those complications which would arise from the superimposition of a new set
of measures upon a territory that had been arranged to suit another set[1332].
Having been led into speaking of plough-gangs, we may
Acreage tilled by a plough.
end these discursive remarks by a gentle protest against the
use that is sometimes made of the statements that are found
in the book called Fleta. It is a second-rate legal treatise of Edward I.’s day. It seems
to have fallen dead from its author’s pen and it hardly deserved a better fate. For the
more part it is a poor abstract of Bracton’s work. When it ceases to pillage Bracton, it
pillages other authors, and what it says of ploughing appears to be derived at second
hand from Walter of Henley[1333]. Now Walter of Henley’s successful and popular
treatise on Husbandry is a good and important book; but we must be careful before
we treat it as an exponent of the traditional mode of agriculture, for evidently Walter
was an enlightened reformer. We might even call him the Arthur Young of his time.
Now, it is sometimes said that according to Fleta ‘the carucate’ would have 160 acres
in ‘a two course manor’ and 180 in ‘a three course manor.’ A reference to Walter of
Henley will show him endeavouring to convince the men of his time that such
amounts as these really can be ploughed, if they work hard. ‘Some men will tell you
Page 368
that a plough can not till eight score or nine score acres by the year, but I will show
you that it can.’ His calculation is worth repeating. It is as follows:
The year has 52 weeks. Deduct 8 for holy-days and other
hindrances.
There remain 44 weeks or 264 days, Sundays excluded.
Two course. Plough 40 acres for winter seed,
40 for spring seed and 80 for fallow (total 160)
at 7⁄8ths of an acre per day = 1826⁄7 days
Also plough by way of second fallowing 80
acres at an acre per day = 80 days
Total 2626⁄7 days[1334].
It is a strenuous and sanguine, if not an impossible, Walter of Henley’s scheme.
programme. When harvest time and the holy weeks are
omitted, the plough is to ‘go’ every week-day throughout the year, despite frost and
tempest. Obviously it is a programme that can only enter the head of an enthusiastic
lord who has supernumerary oxen, and will know how to fill the place of a
ploughman who is ill. We have little warrant for believing that what Walter hopes to
do is being commonly done in his day, less for importing his projects into an earlier
age. In order that he may keep his beasts up to their arduous toil, he proposes to feed
them with oats during half the year[1335]. If we inferred that the Saxon invaders of
England treated their oxen thus, we might be guilty of an anachronism differing only
in degree from that which would furnish them with steam-ploughs. But, to come to
much later days, the Domesday of St. Paul’s enables us to say with some certainty
that the ordinary team of eight beasts accomplished no such feats as those of which
Walter speaks. For example, at Thorpe in Essex the canons have about 180 acres of
arable land in demesne. These, it is estimated, can be tilled by one team of ten heads
together with the ploughing service that is due from the tenants, and these tenants
have to plough at least 80 acres, to wit, 40 in winter and 40 in Lent[1336]. We must
observe that to till even 120 acres according to Walter’s two-course plan would mean
that a plough must ‘go’ 180 acres in every year, and that, even if it does its acre every
day, more than half the week-days in the year must be devoted to ploughing. We may,
however, seriously doubt whether a scheme which would plough the land thrice
between every two crops had been generally prevalent[1337]. Nay, we may even doubt
whether the practice of fallowing had been universal[1338]. Not unfrequently in our
cartularies the villein is required to plough between Michaelmas and Christmas and
again between Christmas and Lady Day, while nothing is said of his ploughing in the
summer[1339]. We are only beginning to learn a little about medieval agriculture.
However, we have now said all that we had to say by way of preface to what we fear
will be a dreary and inconclusive discussion of some of those abundant figures that
you that it can.’ His calculation is worth repeating. It is as follows:
The year has 52 weeks. Deduct 8 for holy-days and other
hindrances.
There remain 44 weeks or 264 days, Sundays excluded.
Two course. Plough 40 acres for winter seed,
40 for spring seed and 80 for fallow (total 160)
at 7⁄8ths of an acre per day = 1826⁄7 days
Also plough by way of second fallowing 80
acres at an acre per day = 80 days
Total 2626⁄7 days[1334].
It is a strenuous and sanguine, if not an impossible, Walter of Henley’s scheme.
programme. When harvest time and the holy weeks are
omitted, the plough is to ‘go’ every week-day throughout the year, despite frost and
tempest. Obviously it is a programme that can only enter the head of an enthusiastic
lord who has supernumerary oxen, and will know how to fill the place of a
ploughman who is ill. We have little warrant for believing that what Walter hopes to
do is being commonly done in his day, less for importing his projects into an earlier
age. In order that he may keep his beasts up to their arduous toil, he proposes to feed
them with oats during half the year[1335]. If we inferred that the Saxon invaders of
England treated their oxen thus, we might be guilty of an anachronism differing only
in degree from that which would furnish them with steam-ploughs. But, to come to
much later days, the Domesday of St. Paul’s enables us to say with some certainty
that the ordinary team of eight beasts accomplished no such feats as those of which
Walter speaks. For example, at Thorpe in Essex the canons have about 180 acres of
arable land in demesne. These, it is estimated, can be tilled by one team of ten heads
together with the ploughing service that is due from the tenants, and these tenants
have to plough at least 80 acres, to wit, 40 in winter and 40 in Lent[1336]. We must
observe that to till even 120 acres according to Walter’s two-course plan would mean
that a plough must ‘go’ 180 acres in every year, and that, even if it does its acre every
day, more than half the week-days in the year must be devoted to ploughing. We may,
however, seriously doubt whether a scheme which would plough the land thrice
between every two crops had been generally prevalent[1337]. Nay, we may even doubt
whether the practice of fallowing had been universal[1338]. Not unfrequently in our
cartularies the villein is required to plough between Michaelmas and Christmas and
again between Christmas and Lady Day, while nothing is said of his ploughing in the
summer[1339]. We are only beginning to learn a little about medieval agriculture.
However, we have now said all that we had to say by way of preface to what we fear
will be a dreary and inconclusive discussion of some of those abundant figures that
Page 369
Domesday Book supplies. A few we have endeavoured to collect in the tables which
will meet the reader’s eye when he turns this page, and which will be explained on
later pages.
will meet the reader’s eye when he turns this page, and which will be explained on
later pages.
Page 370
Page 371
§ 2. Domesday Statistics.
As a general rule the account given by Domesday Book of
Domesday’s three
any manor contains three different statements about it which statements.
seem to have some bearing upon the subject of our present
inquiry. (A) It will tell us that the manor is rated to the geld
at a certain number of units, which units will in Kent be solins or sulungs and yokes
(iuga), in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire,
Norfolk and Suffolk carucates and bovates (but bovates are, to say the least, rare in
East Anglia), and in the rest of England hides and virgates; but acres also will from
time to time appear in the statement. (B) It will tell us that the manor contains land for
a certain number of teams, or for a certain number of oxen. (C) It will tell us that
there are on the manor a certain number of teams, some whereof belong to the lord
and some to the men.
TABLE I. STATISTICS
Recorded Hides,
Modern Danegeld
Population Carucates,
Acreage circ. ann 1150
(Ellis) Sulungs
I II III IV
£ s. d.
Kent 975,820 12,205 105 16 10 1,224
Sussex 932,733 10,410 217 0 6 3,474
Surrey 461,230 4,383 179 16 0 1,830
Hampshire 1,037,764 10,373 184 15 4 2,588
Berkshire 461,742 6,324 205 11 4 2,473
Wiltshire 880,248 10,150 389 13 0 4,050
Dorset 632,272 7,807 248 5 0 2,277
[7,512 E] [2,321 E]
Somerset 1,042,488 13,764 277 10 4 2,936
[13,307 E] [2,951 E]
Devon 1,667,097 17,434 103 19 8 1,119
Cornwall 868,208 5,438 22 15 0 155
Middlesex 180,480(?) 2,302 85 12 0 868
Hertford 406,932 4,927 110 1 4 1,050
As a general rule the account given by Domesday Book of
Domesday’s three
any manor contains three different statements about it which statements.
seem to have some bearing upon the subject of our present
inquiry. (A) It will tell us that the manor is rated to the geld
at a certain number of units, which units will in Kent be solins or sulungs and yokes
(iuga), in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire,
Norfolk and Suffolk carucates and bovates (but bovates are, to say the least, rare in
East Anglia), and in the rest of England hides and virgates; but acres also will from
time to time appear in the statement. (B) It will tell us that the manor contains land for
a certain number of teams, or for a certain number of oxen. (C) It will tell us that
there are on the manor a certain number of teams, some whereof belong to the lord
and some to the men.
TABLE I. STATISTICS
Recorded Hides,
Modern Danegeld
Population Carucates,
Acreage circ. ann 1150
(Ellis) Sulungs
I II III IV
£ s. d.
Kent 975,820 12,205 105 16 10 1,224
Sussex 932,733 10,410 217 0 6 3,474
Surrey 461,230 4,383 179 16 0 1,830
Hampshire 1,037,764 10,373 184 15 4 2,588
Berkshire 461,742 6,324 205 11 4 2,473
Wiltshire 880,248 10,150 389 13 0 4,050
Dorset 632,272 7,807 248 5 0 2,277
[7,512 E] [2,321 E]
Somerset 1,042,488 13,764 277 10 4 2,936
[13,307 E] [2,951 E]
Devon 1,667,097 17,434 103 19 8 1,119
Cornwall 868,208 5,438 22 15 0 155
Middlesex 180,480(?) 2,302 85 12 0 868
Hertford 406,932 4,927 110 1 4 1,050
Page 372
Buckingham 475,094 5,420 204 14 7 2,074
Oxford 485,322 6,775 249 16 5 2,412
Gloucester 796,731 8,366 194 1 6 2,388
Worcester 480,342 4,625 101 6 0 1,189
Hereford 537,363 5,368 93 15 6 1,324
Cambridge 549,565 5,204 114 15 0 1,233
Huntingdon 233,928 2,914 71 5 0 747
Bedford 298,494 3,875 110 12 0 1,193
Northampton 639,541 8,441 119 10 9 1,356
Leicester 528,986 6,772 100 0 0 2,500(?)
Warwick 578,595 6,574 128 12 6 1,338
Stafford 749,713 3,178 45 1 0 505
[499 E]
Shropshire 859,516 5,080 117 18 6 1,245
Chester [655,036] 2,349 0 0 0 512
Derby 657,550 3,041 679
112 1 11
Nottingham 539,752 5,686 567
Rutland [97,273] 862 11 12 0 37
York [3,888,351] 8,055 165 9 5 10,095
Lincoln 1,694,907 25,305 266 0 0 4,188
Essex 985,545 16,060 236 8 0 2,650
Norfolk 1,315,092 27,087 330 2 2 [2,422]
Suffolk 947,742 20,491 235 0 8
Continued
Hides
Gelding
Teamlands Teams Valet (Pearson)
T. R.
W.
V VI VII VIII
£ s. d.
3,102 5,140 9 10 Kent
2,241 3,091 3,255 7 4 Sussex
706 1,172 1,142 1,524 4 9 Surrey
1,572 2,847 2,614 Hampshire
Oxford 485,322 6,775 249 16 5 2,412
Gloucester 796,731 8,366 194 1 6 2,388
Worcester 480,342 4,625 101 6 0 1,189
Hereford 537,363 5,368 93 15 6 1,324
Cambridge 549,565 5,204 114 15 0 1,233
Huntingdon 233,928 2,914 71 5 0 747
Bedford 298,494 3,875 110 12 0 1,193
Northampton 639,541 8,441 119 10 9 1,356
Leicester 528,986 6,772 100 0 0 2,500(?)
Warwick 578,595 6,574 128 12 6 1,338
Stafford 749,713 3,178 45 1 0 505
[499 E]
Shropshire 859,516 5,080 117 18 6 1,245
Chester [655,036] 2,349 0 0 0 512
Derby 657,550 3,041 679
112 1 11
Nottingham 539,752 5,686 567
Rutland [97,273] 862 11 12 0 37
York [3,888,351] 8,055 165 9 5 10,095
Lincoln 1,694,907 25,305 266 0 0 4,188
Essex 985,545 16,060 236 8 0 2,650
Norfolk 1,315,092 27,087 330 2 2 [2,422]
Suffolk 947,742 20,491 235 0 8
Continued
Hides
Gelding
Teamlands Teams Valet (Pearson)
T. R.
W.
V VI VII VIII
£ s. d.
3,102 5,140 9 10 Kent
2,241 3,091 3,255 7 4 Sussex
706 1,172 1,142 1,524 4 9 Surrey
1,572 2,847 2,614 Hampshire
Page 373
1,338 2,087 1,796 2,383 16 1 Berkshire
3,457 2,997 Wiltshire
2,303 1,762 2,656 9 8 Dorset
[2,332 E] [3,359 12 9E]
4,858 3,804 Somerset
[4,812 E] [4,161 4 7E]
7,972 5,542 3,220 14 3 Devon
399 2,377 1,187 662 1 4 Cornwall
664 545 754 7 8 Middlesex
1,716 1,406 1,541 13 11 Hertford
2,244 1,952 1,813 7 9 Buckingham
2,639 2,467 3,242 2 11 Oxford
3,768 2,827 6 8 Gloucester
1,889 991 0 6 Worcester
2,479 Hereford
1,676 1,443 Cambridge
1,120 967 864 15 4 Huntingdon
1,557 1,367 1,096 12 2 Bedford
2,931 2,422 1,843 0 7 Northampton
1,817 736 3 0 Leicester
2,276 2,003 1,359 13 8 Warwick
1,398 951 [516 16 3E] Stafford
1,755 Shropshire
Chester
762 862 461 4 0 Derby
1,255 1,991 Nottingham
Rutland
York
5,043 4,712 Lincoln
3,920 4,784 10 8 Essex
4,853 4,154 11 7 Norfolk
Suffolk
TABLE II. AVERAGES.
Acreage Acreage Acreage Population
div. by div. by div. by div. by
3,457 2,997 Wiltshire
2,303 1,762 2,656 9 8 Dorset
[2,332 E] [3,359 12 9E]
4,858 3,804 Somerset
[4,812 E] [4,161 4 7E]
7,972 5,542 3,220 14 3 Devon
399 2,377 1,187 662 1 4 Cornwall
664 545 754 7 8 Middlesex
1,716 1,406 1,541 13 11 Hertford
2,244 1,952 1,813 7 9 Buckingham
2,639 2,467 3,242 2 11 Oxford
3,768 2,827 6 8 Gloucester
1,889 991 0 6 Worcester
2,479 Hereford
1,676 1,443 Cambridge
1,120 967 864 15 4 Huntingdon
1,557 1,367 1,096 12 2 Bedford
2,931 2,422 1,843 0 7 Northampton
1,817 736 3 0 Leicester
2,276 2,003 1,359 13 8 Warwick
1,398 951 [516 16 3E] Stafford
1,755 Shropshire
Chester
762 862 461 4 0 Derby
1,255 1,991 Nottingham
Rutland
York
5,043 4,712 Lincoln
3,920 4,784 10 8 Essex
4,853 4,154 11 7 Norfolk
Suffolk
TABLE II. AVERAGES.
Acreage Acreage Acreage Population
div. by div. by div. by div. by
Page 374
population teamlands teams teamlands
IX X XI XII
Kent 79 314
Sussex 89 301
Surrey 105 393 403 3·7
Hampshire 100 364 397 3·6
Berkshire 73 221 257 3·0
Wiltshire 86 254 293 2·9
Dorset 80 274 358 3·3
Somerset 75 214 274 2·8
Devon 95 209 300 2·1
Cornwall 159 365 731 2·2
Middlesex 78 271 331 3·4
Hertford 82 237 289 2·8
Buckingham 87 211 243 2·4
Oxford 71 183 196 2·5
Gloucester 95 211
Worcester 103 254
Hereford 100 216
Cambridge 105 327 380 3·1
Huntingdon 80 208 241 2·6
Bedford 77 191 218 2·4
Northampton 75 218 264 2·8
Leicester 78 291
Warwick 88 254 288 2·8
Stafford 235 536 788 2·2
Shropshire 169 489
Chester [278]
Derby 216 862 762 3·9
Nottingham 94 430 271 4·4
Rutland [112]
York [482]
Lincoln 66 336 359 5·0
Essex 61 251
Norfolk 48 270
Suffolk 46
IX X XI XII
Kent 79 314
Sussex 89 301
Surrey 105 393 403 3·7
Hampshire 100 364 397 3·6
Berkshire 73 221 257 3·0
Wiltshire 86 254 293 2·9
Dorset 80 274 358 3·3
Somerset 75 214 274 2·8
Devon 95 209 300 2·1
Cornwall 159 365 731 2·2
Middlesex 78 271 331 3·4
Hertford 82 237 289 2·8
Buckingham 87 211 243 2·4
Oxford 71 183 196 2·5
Gloucester 95 211
Worcester 103 254
Hereford 100 216
Cambridge 105 327 380 3·1
Huntingdon 80 208 241 2·6
Bedford 77 191 218 2·4
Northampton 75 218 264 2·8
Leicester 78 291
Warwick 88 254 288 2·8
Stafford 235 536 788 2·2
Shropshire 169 489
Chester [278]
Derby 216 862 762 3·9
Nottingham 94 430 271 4·4
Rutland [112]
York [482]
Lincoln 66 336 359 5·0
Essex 61 251
Norfolk 48 270
Suffolk 46
Page 375
Total
Experimental
valet div.
Population Teamlands valet of
by
div. by div. by teamland [or
teamland
teams teams of land tilled
[or by
by team]
teams]
XIII XIV XV XVI
£ s. d. £ s. d.
3·9 [1 13 1] 1 14 11 Kent
3·3 [1 1 0] 0 18 3 Sussex
3·8 1·02 1 6 0 1 0 8 Surrey
3·9 1·08 1 2 6 Hampshire
3·5 1·16 1 2 4 1 2 10 Berkshire
3·3 1·15 1 4 4 Wiltshire
4·4 1·30 1 3 0 1 6 8 Dorset
3·6 1·27 0 15 9 Somerset
3·1 1·43 0 8 0 0 5 3 Devon
4·5 2·00 0 5 6 0 3 8 Cornwall
4·2 1·21 1 2 8 1 1 1 Middlesex
3·5 1·22 0 17 11 0 13 11 Hertford
2·7 1·14 0 16 1 0 13 6 Buckingham
2·7 1·06 1 4 6 1 0 8 Oxford
2·2 [0 15 0] [0 16 1] Gloucester
2·4 [0 10 5] [0 10 7] Worcester
2·1 [0 9 11] Hereford
3·6 1·16 1 2 9 Cambridge
3·0 1·15 0 15 5 0 12 2 Huntingdon
2·8 1·13 0 14 1 0 15 4 Bedford
3·4 1·21 0 9 9 Northampton
3·7 0 9 8 Leicester
3·2 1·13 0 11 11 0 10 10 Warwick
3·3 1·47 0 7 4 0 8 8 Stafford
2·8 [0 7 2] Shropshire
Chester
3·5 0·88 0 12 1 0 11 7 Derby
2·8 0·63 0 3 6 Nottingham
Experimental
valet div.
Population Teamlands valet of
by
div. by div. by teamland [or
teamland
teams teams of land tilled
[or by
by team]
teams]
XIII XIV XV XVI
£ s. d. £ s. d.
3·9 [1 13 1] 1 14 11 Kent
3·3 [1 1 0] 0 18 3 Sussex
3·8 1·02 1 6 0 1 0 8 Surrey
3·9 1·08 1 2 6 Hampshire
3·5 1·16 1 2 4 1 2 10 Berkshire
3·3 1·15 1 4 4 Wiltshire
4·4 1·30 1 3 0 1 6 8 Dorset
3·6 1·27 0 15 9 Somerset
3·1 1·43 0 8 0 0 5 3 Devon
4·5 2·00 0 5 6 0 3 8 Cornwall
4·2 1·21 1 2 8 1 1 1 Middlesex
3·5 1·22 0 17 11 0 13 11 Hertford
2·7 1·14 0 16 1 0 13 6 Buckingham
2·7 1·06 1 4 6 1 0 8 Oxford
2·2 [0 15 0] [0 16 1] Gloucester
2·4 [0 10 5] [0 10 7] Worcester
2·1 [0 9 11] Hereford
3·6 1·16 1 2 9 Cambridge
3·0 1·15 0 15 5 0 12 2 Huntingdon
2·8 1·13 0 14 1 0 15 4 Bedford
3·4 1·21 0 9 9 Northampton
3·7 0 9 8 Leicester
3·2 1·13 0 11 11 0 10 10 Warwick
3·3 1·47 0 7 4 0 8 8 Stafford
2·8 [0 7 2] Shropshire
Chester
3·5 0·88 0 12 1 0 11 7 Derby
2·8 0·63 0 3 6 Nottingham
Page 376
Rutland
York
5·3 1·07 0 17 6 Lincoln
4·0 [1 4 4] Essex
5·5 [0 17 1] Norfolk
Suffolk
We may begin our investigation with a formula common in Northern formulas.
Derbyshire.
In M [place name] habuit K [man’s name] a car[ucatas] terrae ad geldum. Terra b
car[ucarum or carucis]. Ibi nunc in dominio d car[ucae] et ... villani et ... bordarii
habent e car[ucas].
The Lincolnshire formula is perhaps yet plainer. Instead of saying ‘Terra b
car[ucarum],’ it says, ‘Terra ad b car[ucas].’ Still more instructive is a formula used
in Yorkshire.
In M habuit K a car[ucatas] terrae ad geldum ubi possunt esse b car[ucae]. Nunc
habet ibi K d car[ucas] et ... villanos et ... bordarios cum e car[ucis].
As a variant on the phrase ‘ubi possunt esse b car[ucae],’ we have, ‘quas potest arare
1 car[uca],’ or ‘has possunt arare b car[ucae][1340].’
The teams on the demesne (d) and the teams of the tenants (e) are enumerated
separately. The total number of the teams (d + e) we will call c.
Now occasionally we may find an entry concerning which the following equation will
hold good: a = b = c: in other words, the same number will stand for the carucates at
which the manor is taxed, the ‘teamlands’ that there are in it (or to put it another way
the number of teams that ‘can be there,’ or the number of teams that ‘can plough
it’[1341]) and also for the teams that are actually to be found there. Thus:—
Terra Roberti de Todeni.... In Ulestanestorp habuit Leuricus 4 car[ucatas] terrae ad
geldum. Terra totidem car[ucis]. Ibi habet Robertus in dominio 1 car[ucam] et 6
villanos et 3 bordarios et 8 sochemannos habentes 3 car[ucas][1342].
Here a = b = c. But entries so neat as this are not very common. In the first place, the
number (c) of teams often exceeds or falls short of the number (b) of ‘teamlands,’ or,
which is the same thing, the number of teams that there ‘can be.’ An excess of
‘teamlands’ over teams is common. In some parts of Yorkshire and elsewhere instead
of reading that there are so many teams, we read ‘modo vasta est’:—there are no oxen
there at all. But the reverse of this case is not very uncommon. Thus we may be told
that there are 3 carucates for geld, that ‘there can be there 2 teams’ and that there are
York
5·3 1·07 0 17 6 Lincoln
4·0 [1 4 4] Essex
5·5 [0 17 1] Norfolk
Suffolk
We may begin our investigation with a formula common in Northern formulas.
Derbyshire.
In M [place name] habuit K [man’s name] a car[ucatas] terrae ad geldum. Terra b
car[ucarum or carucis]. Ibi nunc in dominio d car[ucae] et ... villani et ... bordarii
habent e car[ucas].
The Lincolnshire formula is perhaps yet plainer. Instead of saying ‘Terra b
car[ucarum],’ it says, ‘Terra ad b car[ucas].’ Still more instructive is a formula used
in Yorkshire.
In M habuit K a car[ucatas] terrae ad geldum ubi possunt esse b car[ucae]. Nunc
habet ibi K d car[ucas] et ... villanos et ... bordarios cum e car[ucis].
As a variant on the phrase ‘ubi possunt esse b car[ucae],’ we have, ‘quas potest arare
1 car[uca],’ or ‘has possunt arare b car[ucae][1340].’
The teams on the demesne (d) and the teams of the tenants (e) are enumerated
separately. The total number of the teams (d + e) we will call c.
Now occasionally we may find an entry concerning which the following equation will
hold good: a = b = c: in other words, the same number will stand for the carucates at
which the manor is taxed, the ‘teamlands’ that there are in it (or to put it another way
the number of teams that ‘can be there,’ or the number of teams that ‘can plough
it’[1341]) and also for the teams that are actually to be found there. Thus:—
Terra Roberti de Todeni.... In Ulestanestorp habuit Leuricus 4 car[ucatas] terrae ad
geldum. Terra totidem car[ucis]. Ibi habet Robertus in dominio 1 car[ucam] et 6
villanos et 3 bordarios et 8 sochemannos habentes 3 car[ucas][1342].
Here a = b = c. But entries so neat as this are not very common. In the first place, the
number (c) of teams often exceeds or falls short of the number (b) of ‘teamlands,’ or,
which is the same thing, the number of teams that there ‘can be.’ An excess of
‘teamlands’ over teams is common. In some parts of Yorkshire and elsewhere instead
of reading that there are so many teams, we read ‘modo vasta est’:—there are no oxen
there at all. But the reverse of this case is not very uncommon. Thus we may be told
that there are 3 carucates for geld, that ‘there can be there 2 teams’ and that there are
Page 377
4 teams[1343]; we may find a manor that contains land for but 3 teams equipped with
as many as 7[1344]. As to the relation between a and b, this is not fixed. On one and
the same page we may find that a is equal to, greater and less than b. Thus in
Lincolnshire[1345]:
as many as 7[1344]. As to the relation between a and b, this is not fixed. On one and
the same page we may find that a is equal to, greater and less than b. Thus in
Lincolnshire[1345]:
Page 378
In Colebi habuit Siuuard 7 car. terrae ad geldum. Terra ad totidem car.
In Cherchebi habuit Comes Morcar 5 car. terrae ad geldum. Terra ad 4 car.
In Bodebi habuit Comes Morcar 8 car. terrae ad geldum. Terra ad 9 car.
Leaving now for a while the carucated part of England
Southern formulas.
and postponing our visit to Kent, we find similar
formulas. They tell us (A) that the manor contains a
certain number of units of assessment, (B) that there is land for a certain number of
teams, (C) that there are so many teams upon it. But we have a new set of units of
assessment; instead of carucates and bovates, we have hides and virgates. The
Huntingdonshire formula is particularly clear. It runs thus:
In M habet K a hidas ad geldum. Terra b car[ucarum or carucis]. Ibi nunc in
dominio d car[ucae] et ... villani et ... bordarii habentes e car[ucas].
The number of hides that is put before us is the number of hides ‘for geld.’ So in
Cheshire and Shropshire the number of hides that is put before us is the number of
‘hidae geld[antes].’ From this we easily pass to the formula that prevails in
Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset and Devon:
K tenet M. T[empore] R[egis] E[dwardi] geldabat pro a hidis. Terra est b
car[ucarum]. In dominio sunt d car[ucae] et ... villani et ... bordarii cum e
car[ucis].
A formula common in Sussex, Surrey and several other counties instead of telling
us that this manor has a hides for geld, or has a gelding hides, or gelds for a hides,
tells us—what seems exactly the same thing—that it ‘defends itself’ for a hides.
Then we pass to counties such as Middlesex, Hertford, Buckingham and Oxford
where the entry does not commonly use any words which explicitly refer to geld:
—we are told that K holds M for so many hides (pro a hidis). Lastly, we may pass
to counties, such as Warwickshire and Staffordshire where, at first sight, the
entries may seem to us ambiguous. They run thus—‘K holds M. There are there a
hides. There is land for b teams.’ Here for a moment it may seem to us that we
have two different statements about the actual extent or capacity of the manor:—
there are a hides there, but land for b teams. But comparing the formulas in use
here with those in use in other counties, we can hardly doubt that they all come to
one and the same thing:—a statement about b, the capacity of the manor, is
preceded by a statement about its taxation, which statement may take the short
form, ‘There are a hides there,’ instead of one of the longer forms, ‘It gelds, or
defends itself, for a hides,’ or ‘He holds a gelding hides, or a hides for geld.’
In Cherchebi habuit Comes Morcar 5 car. terrae ad geldum. Terra ad 4 car.
In Bodebi habuit Comes Morcar 8 car. terrae ad geldum. Terra ad 9 car.
Leaving now for a while the carucated part of England
Southern formulas.
and postponing our visit to Kent, we find similar
formulas. They tell us (A) that the manor contains a
certain number of units of assessment, (B) that there is land for a certain number of
teams, (C) that there are so many teams upon it. But we have a new set of units of
assessment; instead of carucates and bovates, we have hides and virgates. The
Huntingdonshire formula is particularly clear. It runs thus:
In M habet K a hidas ad geldum. Terra b car[ucarum or carucis]. Ibi nunc in
dominio d car[ucae] et ... villani et ... bordarii habentes e car[ucas].
The number of hides that is put before us is the number of hides ‘for geld.’ So in
Cheshire and Shropshire the number of hides that is put before us is the number of
‘hidae geld[antes].’ From this we easily pass to the formula that prevails in
Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset and Devon:
K tenet M. T[empore] R[egis] E[dwardi] geldabat pro a hidis. Terra est b
car[ucarum]. In dominio sunt d car[ucae] et ... villani et ... bordarii cum e
car[ucis].
A formula common in Sussex, Surrey and several other counties instead of telling
us that this manor has a hides for geld, or has a gelding hides, or gelds for a hides,
tells us—what seems exactly the same thing—that it ‘defends itself’ for a hides.
Then we pass to counties such as Middlesex, Hertford, Buckingham and Oxford
where the entry does not commonly use any words which explicitly refer to geld:
—we are told that K holds M for so many hides (pro a hidis). Lastly, we may pass
to counties, such as Warwickshire and Staffordshire where, at first sight, the
entries may seem to us ambiguous. They run thus—‘K holds M. There are there a
hides. There is land for b teams.’ Here for a moment it may seem to us that we
have two different statements about the actual extent or capacity of the manor:—
there are a hides there, but land for b teams. But comparing the formulas in use
here with those in use in other counties, we can hardly doubt that they all come to
one and the same thing:—a statement about b, the capacity of the manor, is
preceded by a statement about its taxation, which statement may take the short
form, ‘There are a hides there,’ instead of one of the longer forms, ‘It gelds, or
defends itself, for a hides,’ or ‘He holds a gelding hides, or a hides for geld.’
Page 379
In Kent again, we have the three statements, though here
Kentish formulas.
the units of assessment are sulungs and yokes:—the land
‘defends itself’ for a sulungs; there is land there for b
teams; there are d teams in demesne and the men have e teams.
In the hidated south, as in the carucated north, the relation
Relation between the three
between the three amounts is not invariable. We may find statements.
that a = b = c. It is common to find that c is less than b,
but occasionally it is greater; on one and the same page
we may find that c is equal to, is greater, is less than b. Then a is often equal to b,
often it is less than b, but sometimes it is greater. We have therefore three
statements about the manor, between which there is no necessary connexion of any
very simple kind.
It may look pedantic, but will be convenient if, by means of the letters A, B and C,
we try to keep distinctly before our minds ‘the A statement’ about the units of
assessment, ‘the B statement’ about the ‘teamlands,’ or teams for which ‘there is
land,’ and ‘the C statement’ about the existing teams. We shall find hereafter that
there are certain counties in which we do not get all three statements, at least in
any of their accustomed forms. In Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and
Herefordshire we rarely get the B statement. As to Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk, we
seem at first sight to obtain A and not B, or B and not A, while Leicestershire will
require separate treatment.
Now if we are ever to understand these matters, it is
Introduction of statistics.
necessary that we should look at the whole of England.
Far be it from us to say that microscopic labour spent
upon one county or one hundred is wasted; often it is of the highest value; but such
work is apt to engender theories which break down the moment they are carried
outside the district in which they had their origin. Well would it be if the broad
features of Domesday Book could be set out before us in a series of statistical
tables. The task would be gigantic and could hardly be performed except by a
body of men who had plenteous leisure and who would work together
harmoniously. However, rather to suggest what might and some day must be done,
than to parade what has been done rapidly and badly, some figures have been set
forth above in two tables[1346]. That they are extremely inaccurate can not be
doubtful, for he who compiled them had other things to do and lacks many of the
qualities which should be required of a good counter of hides. For unmethodical
habits and faulty arithmetic no excuse is possible; but it will be remembered that,
as matters now stand, two men not unskilled in Domesday might add up the
number of hides in a county and arrive at very different results, because they
Kentish formulas.
the units of assessment are sulungs and yokes:—the land
‘defends itself’ for a sulungs; there is land there for b
teams; there are d teams in demesne and the men have e teams.
In the hidated south, as in the carucated north, the relation
Relation between the three
between the three amounts is not invariable. We may find statements.
that a = b = c. It is common to find that c is less than b,
but occasionally it is greater; on one and the same page
we may find that c is equal to, is greater, is less than b. Then a is often equal to b,
often it is less than b, but sometimes it is greater. We have therefore three
statements about the manor, between which there is no necessary connexion of any
very simple kind.
It may look pedantic, but will be convenient if, by means of the letters A, B and C,
we try to keep distinctly before our minds ‘the A statement’ about the units of
assessment, ‘the B statement’ about the ‘teamlands,’ or teams for which ‘there is
land,’ and ‘the C statement’ about the existing teams. We shall find hereafter that
there are certain counties in which we do not get all three statements, at least in
any of their accustomed forms. In Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and
Herefordshire we rarely get the B statement. As to Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk, we
seem at first sight to obtain A and not B, or B and not A, while Leicestershire will
require separate treatment.
Now if we are ever to understand these matters, it is
Introduction of statistics.
necessary that we should look at the whole of England.
Far be it from us to say that microscopic labour spent
upon one county or one hundred is wasted; often it is of the highest value; but such
work is apt to engender theories which break down the moment they are carried
outside the district in which they had their origin. Well would it be if the broad
features of Domesday Book could be set out before us in a series of statistical
tables. The task would be gigantic and could hardly be performed except by a
body of men who had plenteous leisure and who would work together
harmoniously. However, rather to suggest what might and some day must be done,
than to parade what has been done rapidly and badly, some figures have been set
forth above in two tables[1346]. That they are extremely inaccurate can not be
doubtful, for he who compiled them had other things to do and lacks many of the
qualities which should be required of a good counter of hides. For unmethodical
habits and faulty arithmetic no excuse is possible; but it will be remembered that,
as matters now stand, two men not unskilled in Domesday might add up the
number of hides in a county and arrive at very different results, because they
Page 380
would hold different opinions as to the meaning of certain formulas which are not
uncommon. What is here set before the reader is intended to be no more than a
distant approach towards the truth. It will serve its end if it states the sort of
figures that would be obtained by careful and leisurely computers, and therefore
the sort of problems that have to be solved[1347].
We must now explain our statistics. In Column I. we give
Explanation of statistics.
the acreage of the modern counties[1348]. A warning
bracket will remind the reader that in the cases of
Yorkshire, Cheshire and Rutland the modern does not Sidenote: Acreage.
coincide even approximately with the ancient boundary.
To Middlesex we give a figure larger than that given by our statisticians, for they
know a county of London which has been formed at the expense of its
neighbours[1349]. Many minor variations should be remembered by those who
would use Domesday Book for delicate purposes; for example, they must call to
mind the merger in circumambient shires of what were once detached pieces of
other counties. But of such niceties we can here take no account[1350].
In Column II. we state the ‘recorded population’ as
Population.
computed by Ellis. In the cases of Dorset and Somerset
we also state, and we sign with the letter E, the result of
Eyton’s labours. We must not forget that these figures give us rather the number of
tenants or occupiers than the number of human beings. Our readers must multiply
them by four, five or six, according to knowledge or taste, before the population of
England will be attained.
In Column III., for a reason that will become evident
Danegeld.
hereafter, we place the amount of danegeld charged
against the counties—charged against them, not actually
paid by them[1351]—in the middle of the twelfth century. The sources of these
figures are the Pipe Rolls of 31 Henry I. and 2 and 8 Henry II. In these accounts
the amount charged against a county is approximately constant. Some of the
variations are probably due to a contemptuous treatment of small sums[1352]; but
there are cases in which a sheriff seems to have been allowed to deduct £10 or so,
without any recorded explanation[1353]. We choose the highest figures when there
is any discord between our three rolls. The danegeld was being levied at the rate of
two shillings on the hide, and therefore, if we would find the number of geldant
hides, we have to multiply by ten the number of pounds that are set against the
county.
Column IV. contains our estimate of A: in other words, of the number of hides,
carucates or sulungs. As we are arguing for a large hide, we have thought right in
uncommon. What is here set before the reader is intended to be no more than a
distant approach towards the truth. It will serve its end if it states the sort of
figures that would be obtained by careful and leisurely computers, and therefore
the sort of problems that have to be solved[1347].
We must now explain our statistics. In Column I. we give
Explanation of statistics.
the acreage of the modern counties[1348]. A warning
bracket will remind the reader that in the cases of
Yorkshire, Cheshire and Rutland the modern does not Sidenote: Acreage.
coincide even approximately with the ancient boundary.
To Middlesex we give a figure larger than that given by our statisticians, for they
know a county of London which has been formed at the expense of its
neighbours[1349]. Many minor variations should be remembered by those who
would use Domesday Book for delicate purposes; for example, they must call to
mind the merger in circumambient shires of what were once detached pieces of
other counties. But of such niceties we can here take no account[1350].
In Column II. we state the ‘recorded population’ as
Population.
computed by Ellis. In the cases of Dorset and Somerset
we also state, and we sign with the letter E, the result of
Eyton’s labours. We must not forget that these figures give us rather the number of
tenants or occupiers than the number of human beings. Our readers must multiply
them by four, five or six, according to knowledge or taste, before the population of
England will be attained.
In Column III., for a reason that will become evident
Danegeld.
hereafter, we place the amount of danegeld charged
against the counties—charged against them, not actually
paid by them[1351]—in the middle of the twelfth century. The sources of these
figures are the Pipe Rolls of 31 Henry I. and 2 and 8 Henry II. In these accounts
the amount charged against a county is approximately constant. Some of the
variations are probably due to a contemptuous treatment of small sums[1352]; but
there are cases in which a sheriff seems to have been allowed to deduct £10 or so,
without any recorded explanation[1353]. We choose the highest figures when there
is any discord between our three rolls. The danegeld was being levied at the rate of
two shillings on the hide, and therefore, if we would find the number of geldant
hides, we have to multiply by ten the number of pounds that are set against the
county.
Column IV. contains our estimate of A: in other words, of the number of hides,
carucates or sulungs. As we are arguing for a large hide, we have thought right in
Page 381
doubtful cases to lean in favour of inclusion rather than of
Hides, carucates, sulungs.
exclusion. We count all hides, except those ascribed to the
shire’s boroughs[1354], even though we are told that they
have ‘never’ gelded. Also, when a hide is mentioned, we count it, even though we
have a strong suspicion that the same hide is mentioned again on some other page.
Especially in Sussex, where the rapes have recently been rearranged, this may
make our figures too high[1355]. Then, again, we have frankly begged important
questions by assuming that in Domesday Book the following equations are correct.
1 Hide = 4 Virgates = 120 Acres
1 Carucate = 8 Bovates = 120 Acres
1 Sulung = 4 Yokes = 120 Acres.
In the counties with which we have dealt, except Norfolk and Essex (Suffolk we
have left alone), acres are so rarely mentioned that the error, if any, introduced by
our hypothesis as to their relation to hides and carucates will be almost
infinitesimal, and, even if we are wrong in supposing that the virgate is the quarter
of a hide and that the bovate is the eighth of a carucate, the vitiation of our results
that will be due to this blunder will but rarely be considerable[1356].
Almost everywhere we may find some hides (carucates,
Reduced hidage.
sulungs) that do not geld and many cases in which a tract
now gelds for a smaller number of hides (carucates,
sulungs) than that for which it formerly paid. In four counties, however, Sussex,
Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire, we see that since William’s advent there has,
rightfully or wrongfully, been a large and generally distributed reduction in the tale
of the gelding hides. In our Column V. we give a rough statement of the reduced
number[1357]. In Cornwall we read of an assessment that prevailed in the
Confessor’s day and of a heavier assessment. The figures which speak of this
heavier assessment we place in our Column V[1358].
We now pass from A to B. In Column VI. we set the
The teamlands.
number of teamlands, thus answering the question Quot
carucarum [carucis] ibi est terra. We have assumed, but
this rarely has an appreciable effect on our calculations, that the land of one ox is
the eighth, the land of two oxen the fourth part of the land of one team. There are
certain counties where we receive no statement about the teamlands, while in
certain others the statement, though it seems to be expected, is often omitted[1359].
For this reason some blanks will be found in this column. In most of the other
counties instances occur with more or less frequency in which nothing is said of
the teamlands. In these cases we have thought it fair to assume that there were
Hides, carucates, sulungs.
exclusion. We count all hides, except those ascribed to the
shire’s boroughs[1354], even though we are told that they
have ‘never’ gelded. Also, when a hide is mentioned, we count it, even though we
have a strong suspicion that the same hide is mentioned again on some other page.
Especially in Sussex, where the rapes have recently been rearranged, this may
make our figures too high[1355]. Then, again, we have frankly begged important
questions by assuming that in Domesday Book the following equations are correct.
1 Hide = 4 Virgates = 120 Acres
1 Carucate = 8 Bovates = 120 Acres
1 Sulung = 4 Yokes = 120 Acres.
In the counties with which we have dealt, except Norfolk and Essex (Suffolk we
have left alone), acres are so rarely mentioned that the error, if any, introduced by
our hypothesis as to their relation to hides and carucates will be almost
infinitesimal, and, even if we are wrong in supposing that the virgate is the quarter
of a hide and that the bovate is the eighth of a carucate, the vitiation of our results
that will be due to this blunder will but rarely be considerable[1356].
Almost everywhere we may find some hides (carucates,
Reduced hidage.
sulungs) that do not geld and many cases in which a tract
now gelds for a smaller number of hides (carucates,
sulungs) than that for which it formerly paid. In four counties, however, Sussex,
Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire, we see that since William’s advent there has,
rightfully or wrongfully, been a large and generally distributed reduction in the tale
of the gelding hides. In our Column V. we give a rough statement of the reduced
number[1357]. In Cornwall we read of an assessment that prevailed in the
Confessor’s day and of a heavier assessment. The figures which speak of this
heavier assessment we place in our Column V[1358].
We now pass from A to B. In Column VI. we set the
The teamlands.
number of teamlands, thus answering the question Quot
carucarum [carucis] ibi est terra. We have assumed, but
this rarely has an appreciable effect on our calculations, that the land of one ox is
the eighth, the land of two oxen the fourth part of the land of one team. There are
certain counties where we receive no statement about the teamlands, while in
certain others the statement, though it seems to be expected, is often omitted[1359].
For this reason some blanks will be found in this column. In most of the other
counties instances occur with more or less frequency in which nothing is said of
the teamlands. In these cases we have thought it fair to assume that there were
Page 382
teamlands equal in number to the teams (B = C). The effect of this assumption will
be to bring the number of teamlands (B) somewhat closer to the number of teams
(C) than it would otherwise have been, but no very great harm will have thus been
done to our rude statistics[1360].
Column VII. gives the number of teams. Here we assume
The teams.
(we shall endeavour to prove hereafter) that the caruca of
Domesday Book always means the same, namely, eight
oxen[1361].
Lastly in Column VIII. we place the results attained by
The values.
Pearson[1362] and Eyton in their endeavours to add
together the various sums which the various estates in a
shire are said to be worth (valet) or to render (reddit) in the Conqueror’s day, and
to thus obtain a total valet for the shire. We need hardly say that these values are
‘annual values.’
The relations between our divers sets of figures are more
The table of ratios.
important than the figures themselves, therefore we have
worked the division sums the results of which are printed
in the second Table, the first seven columns whereof are filled by quotients[1363].
The last column calls for more remark. The valets obtained for the various
counties by Pearson and Eyton are somewhat precarious. They involve theories as
to the relation between the values of gold and silver, as to the relation between the
value of a pound reckoned by tale and a pound reckoned by weight, as to
‘blanched’ money and the cost of ‘a night’s farm.’ Also a good deal is included that
can hardly be called the value of land, since it comprehends, not only the value of
mills and the like, but also in some cases the revenue derived from courts. In order
therefore that we might compare the values given to land in the various counties,
we have taken at hazard a number of small estates in order that we might by
addition and division obtain the value of a typical teamland with typical
appurtenances. In general we have chosen ten estates each of which has one
teamland, ten estates each of which has two teamlands and ten estates each of
which has five teamlands, and then we have divided the sum of their values by
eighty, the number of teamlands that they comprise. On the whole, the figures that
we thus obtain and place in Column XVI. are not widely removed from those in
Column XV., which represent the quotients arising from a division of Pearson’s
‘county values’ by the number of teamlands that are contained in the counties[1364].
In order that not too much credence and yet just credence
An apology.
enough may be given to the figures that we have hastily
put together, we will set beside those that we have stated
be to bring the number of teamlands (B) somewhat closer to the number of teams
(C) than it would otherwise have been, but no very great harm will have thus been
done to our rude statistics[1360].
Column VII. gives the number of teams. Here we assume
The teams.
(we shall endeavour to prove hereafter) that the caruca of
Domesday Book always means the same, namely, eight
oxen[1361].
Lastly in Column VIII. we place the results attained by
The values.
Pearson[1362] and Eyton in their endeavours to add
together the various sums which the various estates in a
shire are said to be worth (valet) or to render (reddit) in the Conqueror’s day, and
to thus obtain a total valet for the shire. We need hardly say that these values are
‘annual values.’
The relations between our divers sets of figures are more
The table of ratios.
important than the figures themselves, therefore we have
worked the division sums the results of which are printed
in the second Table, the first seven columns whereof are filled by quotients[1363].
The last column calls for more remark. The valets obtained for the various
counties by Pearson and Eyton are somewhat precarious. They involve theories as
to the relation between the values of gold and silver, as to the relation between the
value of a pound reckoned by tale and a pound reckoned by weight, as to
‘blanched’ money and the cost of ‘a night’s farm.’ Also a good deal is included that
can hardly be called the value of land, since it comprehends, not only the value of
mills and the like, but also in some cases the revenue derived from courts. In order
therefore that we might compare the values given to land in the various counties,
we have taken at hazard a number of small estates in order that we might by
addition and division obtain the value of a typical teamland with typical
appurtenances. In general we have chosen ten estates each of which has one
teamland, ten estates each of which has two teamlands and ten estates each of
which has five teamlands, and then we have divided the sum of their values by
eighty, the number of teamlands that they comprise. On the whole, the figures that
we thus obtain and place in Column XVI. are not widely removed from those in
Column XV., which represent the quotients arising from a division of Pearson’s
‘county values’ by the number of teamlands that are contained in the counties[1364].
In order that not too much credence and yet just credence
An apology.
enough may be given to the figures that we have hastily
put together, we will set beside those that we have stated
Page 383
for Gloucestershire the results of a minute analysis accomplished by Mr Charles
Taylor[1365]. We have set down: Population, 8366 (from Ellis); Hides, 2388;
Teams, 3768; Total Valet, £2827 6s. 8d. (from Pearson). Mr Taylor gives:
Population, 8239[1366]; Hides, 2611 (or 2596); Teams, 3909; Total Valet, £3130 7s.
10d. Now these variations are wide and may in some sort be discreditable to those
who differ from Mr Taylor[1367]. But they are not very substantial if we come to
averages and ratios and a comparison of counties. For the purposes for which we
shall use our figures, it is no great matter whether in this county there are 2·1 or
2·2 ‘recorded men’ to the plough-team[1368]. The broad features of Gloucestershire
are that its hides fall far short of its teams, that its recorded population is sparse,
that the average value of the land tilled by a team falls well below twenty shillings,
that this shire differs markedly and in certain assignable respects from Wiltshire,
where the hides exceed the teams, from Lincoln, where, despite the fen, the
population is thick, from Kent, where the average value of land tilled by a team
rises above thirty shillings[1369].
Our figures tell of wide variations; but we may be
Constancy of ratios.
allowed to call attention to the stability of certain ratios, a
stability which is gratifying to the diffident arithmetician.
In twenty-one counties we can divide ‘the recorded population’ by the number of
teamlands. The quotient never falls as low as 2 and only twice exceeds 4[1370]. For
the same twenty-one counties we can divide the number of teamlands by the
number of teams. Only twice will the quotient fall below 1 and only once will it
touch 2. We must not, however, be led away into a general discussion of these
figures. That task would require a wary and learned economist. We must keep our
minds bent on what may be called the A B C of our subject[1371].
Now we may start with what seems to be the most
The team.
objective of our three statements, that which gives us C,
the number of teams. We know that in A there is an
element of estimation, of assessment; we may fear that this is true of B also; but an
ox or a team ought to be a fact and not a theory. At the outset, however, a
troublesome question arises. We have assumed that whenever our record speaks of
a caruca it means eight oxen. On the other hand, there are who maintain that
whereas the carucae of the demesne consisted of eight, those ascribed to the
villeins comprised but four oxen[1372], and others have thought that the strength of
Domesday’s caruca varied from place to place with the varying practice of divers
agriculturists.
But, in the first place, it is abundantly clear that the clerk
Variability of the caruca.
who compiled the account of Cambridgeshire from the
Taylor[1365]. We have set down: Population, 8366 (from Ellis); Hides, 2388;
Teams, 3768; Total Valet, £2827 6s. 8d. (from Pearson). Mr Taylor gives:
Population, 8239[1366]; Hides, 2611 (or 2596); Teams, 3909; Total Valet, £3130 7s.
10d. Now these variations are wide and may in some sort be discreditable to those
who differ from Mr Taylor[1367]. But they are not very substantial if we come to
averages and ratios and a comparison of counties. For the purposes for which we
shall use our figures, it is no great matter whether in this county there are 2·1 or
2·2 ‘recorded men’ to the plough-team[1368]. The broad features of Gloucestershire
are that its hides fall far short of its teams, that its recorded population is sparse,
that the average value of the land tilled by a team falls well below twenty shillings,
that this shire differs markedly and in certain assignable respects from Wiltshire,
where the hides exceed the teams, from Lincoln, where, despite the fen, the
population is thick, from Kent, where the average value of land tilled by a team
rises above thirty shillings[1369].
Our figures tell of wide variations; but we may be
Constancy of ratios.
allowed to call attention to the stability of certain ratios, a
stability which is gratifying to the diffident arithmetician.
In twenty-one counties we can divide ‘the recorded population’ by the number of
teamlands. The quotient never falls as low as 2 and only twice exceeds 4[1370]. For
the same twenty-one counties we can divide the number of teamlands by the
number of teams. Only twice will the quotient fall below 1 and only once will it
touch 2. We must not, however, be led away into a general discussion of these
figures. That task would require a wary and learned economist. We must keep our
minds bent on what may be called the A B C of our subject[1371].
Now we may start with what seems to be the most
The team.
objective of our three statements, that which gives us C,
the number of teams. We know that in A there is an
element of estimation, of assessment; we may fear that this is true of B also; but an
ox or a team ought to be a fact and not a theory. At the outset, however, a
troublesome question arises. We have assumed that whenever our record speaks of
a caruca it means eight oxen. On the other hand, there are who maintain that
whereas the carucae of the demesne consisted of eight, those ascribed to the
villeins comprised but four oxen[1372], and others have thought that the strength of
Domesday’s caruca varied from place to place with the varying practice of divers
agriculturists.
But, in the first place, it is abundantly clear that the clerk
Variability of the caruca.
who compiled the account of Cambridgeshire from the
Page 384
original verdicts held himself at liberty to substitute ‘half a team’ for ‘four oxen’
and ‘four oxen’ for ‘half a team[1373].’ In the second place, the theory of a variable
caruca would in our eyes reduce to an absurdity the practice of stating the capacity
of land in terms of the teams and the oxen that can plough it. We are carefully told
about each estate that ‘there is land for b teams, or for b´ oxen, or for b teams and
b´ oxen.’ Now if a ‘team’ has always the same meaning, we have here a valuable
truth. If, on the other hand, a ‘team’ may mean eight or may mean four oxen, we
are being told next to nothing. The apparently precise ‘there is land for 4 teams’
becomes the useless ‘there is land for 32 or 16 or for some number between 32 and
16 oxen.’ What could the statesmen, who were hoping to correct the assessment of
the danegeld, make of so vague a statement? They propose to work sums in teams
and teamlands. They spend immense pains in ascertaining that here there is ‘land
for half a team’ or ‘land for half an ox.’ We are accusing them of laborious folly
unless we suppose that they can at a moment’s notice convert teams into oxen.
If it be allowed that in the statement (B) about the number
The caruca a constant.
of teamlands the term caruca has always the same
meaning, we cannot stop there, but must believe that in
the statement (C) about the number of teams this same meaning is retained. Often
enough when there is equality between teamlands and teams (C = B), the entry
takes the following form:—There is land for b teams and ‘they’ are there[1374].
What are there? The teams for which ‘there is land’: those teams which are serving
as a measure for the capacity of land. Let us try the two modes of interpretation on
the first lines that strike our eye. Here we have two successive entries, each of
which tells us that ‘there is land for 6 teams[1375].’ If the caruca is a constant, we
have learnt that in one particular there is equality between these estates. If the
caruca is a variable, we have learnt nothing of the kind. Let us see what we can
gain by reading further. In the one case there were 3 teams on the demesne and the
villeins had 61⁄2; in the other there were 2 teams on the demesne, the villeins had 2
and the sokemen 2. We want to know whether the second of these estates is under-
teamed or over-teamed. There is land for 6 teams and there are 6 teams on it; but 2
of these teams belong to villeins and 2 to sokemen. If we give the villeins but 4
oxen to the team, how many shall we give the sokemen? Shall we say 6? If so,
there are 36 oxen here. Is that too many or too few or just enough for the arable
land that there is? That is an unanswerable question, for the king’s commissioners
have been content with the statement that the number of oxen appropriate to this
estate lies somewhere between 23 and 49
Surely when we are told that 8 sokemen have ‘2 teams
The villeins’ teams.
and 6 oxen’ or that 9 sokemen and 5 bordiers have ‘3
teams and 7 oxen[1376],’ we are being told that the teams
and ‘four oxen’ for ‘half a team[1373].’ In the second place, the theory of a variable
caruca would in our eyes reduce to an absurdity the practice of stating the capacity
of land in terms of the teams and the oxen that can plough it. We are carefully told
about each estate that ‘there is land for b teams, or for b´ oxen, or for b teams and
b´ oxen.’ Now if a ‘team’ has always the same meaning, we have here a valuable
truth. If, on the other hand, a ‘team’ may mean eight or may mean four oxen, we
are being told next to nothing. The apparently precise ‘there is land for 4 teams’
becomes the useless ‘there is land for 32 or 16 or for some number between 32 and
16 oxen.’ What could the statesmen, who were hoping to correct the assessment of
the danegeld, make of so vague a statement? They propose to work sums in teams
and teamlands. They spend immense pains in ascertaining that here there is ‘land
for half a team’ or ‘land for half an ox.’ We are accusing them of laborious folly
unless we suppose that they can at a moment’s notice convert teams into oxen.
If it be allowed that in the statement (B) about the number
The caruca a constant.
of teamlands the term caruca has always the same
meaning, we cannot stop there, but must believe that in
the statement (C) about the number of teams this same meaning is retained. Often
enough when there is equality between teamlands and teams (C = B), the entry
takes the following form:—There is land for b teams and ‘they’ are there[1374].
What are there? The teams for which ‘there is land’: those teams which are serving
as a measure for the capacity of land. Let us try the two modes of interpretation on
the first lines that strike our eye. Here we have two successive entries, each of
which tells us that ‘there is land for 6 teams[1375].’ If the caruca is a constant, we
have learnt that in one particular there is equality between these estates. If the
caruca is a variable, we have learnt nothing of the kind. Let us see what we can
gain by reading further. In the one case there were 3 teams on the demesne and the
villeins had 61⁄2; in the other there were 2 teams on the demesne, the villeins had 2
and the sokemen 2. We want to know whether the second of these estates is under-
teamed or over-teamed. There is land for 6 teams and there are 6 teams on it; but 2
of these teams belong to villeins and 2 to sokemen. If we give the villeins but 4
oxen to the team, how many shall we give the sokemen? Shall we say 6? If so,
there are 36 oxen here. Is that too many or too few or just enough for the arable
land that there is? That is an unanswerable question, for the king’s commissioners
have been content with the statement that the number of oxen appropriate to this
estate lies somewhere between 23 and 49
Surely when we are told that 8 sokemen have ‘2 teams
The villeins’ teams.
and 6 oxen’ or that 9 sokemen and 5 bordiers have ‘3
teams and 7 oxen[1376],’ we are being told that the teams
Page 385
in question have no less than eight oxen apiece. Surely when we are told that there
are 23 villeins and 5 bordiers with 2 teams and 5 oxen[1377], we are being told that
the teams of these villeins are not teams of four. And what are we to say of cases
in which a certain number of teams is ascribed to a number of persons who belong
to various classes, as for example when 6 villeins and 7 bordiers and 2 sokemen
are said to have 3 teams and 5 oxen[1378], or where 3 villeins, 2 bordiers, a priest
and a huntsman are said to have one team and 6 oxen[1379], or where 19 radknights
‘with their men’ are said to have 48 teams[1380]? Even if we suppose that the
officers of the exchequer have tables which tell them how many oxen a caruca
implies when it is attributed to a Northamptonshire sokeman or a Gloucestershire
radknight, we are still setting before them insoluble problems. The radknights of
Berkeley ‘with their men’ have 48 teams:—this may cover less than 200 or more
than 300 oxen. And yet the record that is guilty of this laxity will tell us how in
Bedfordshire Terra est dimidio bovi, et ibi est semibos[1381].
The main argument that has been urged in favour of a
The villeins’ oxen.
variable caruca is that which, basing itself on later
documents, protests that a villein ought not to have more
than two oxen[1382]. Now true it seems to be that if by the number of the teams
belonging to the villani and bordarii of Domesday Book we divide the number of
villani plus half the number of bordarii (and this would be a fair procedure), we
shall obtain as our quotient a figure that will be much nearer to 2 than to 4. But it
must be common ground to all who read our record that some villeins are much
better supplied with oxen than are their neighbours, and that some villeins have
whole teams, whatever a ‘team’ may mean. There is so much difference in this
respect between manor and manor that we are not justified in talking of any
particular number of oxen as the normal outfit of the villanus, and outside of
Domesday Book we have far too little evidence to sanction the dogma that the
average number must stand close to 2[1383]. Even the villein virgater on the
monastic manors of the thirteenth century is often expected to have four oxen, and
his having eight is a possibility that must be contemplated[1384].
That light as well as heavy ploughs were in use we have
Light and heavy ploughs.
not denied. At a little later time we see teams of six beasts
and teams of ten engaged in ploughing. But the compilers
of Domesday Book are not concerned with the methods of husbandry; they are
registering the number of oxen. If a man has one ox which is employed as a beast
of the plough, they say of him: Arat cum uno bove[1385]. If he and another man
have such an ox between them, they say: Ibi est semibos. If he has four oxen, they
set this down as dimidia caruca. Instead of telling us that there are thirty-eight
are 23 villeins and 5 bordiers with 2 teams and 5 oxen[1377], we are being told that
the teams of these villeins are not teams of four. And what are we to say of cases
in which a certain number of teams is ascribed to a number of persons who belong
to various classes, as for example when 6 villeins and 7 bordiers and 2 sokemen
are said to have 3 teams and 5 oxen[1378], or where 3 villeins, 2 bordiers, a priest
and a huntsman are said to have one team and 6 oxen[1379], or where 19 radknights
‘with their men’ are said to have 48 teams[1380]? Even if we suppose that the
officers of the exchequer have tables which tell them how many oxen a caruca
implies when it is attributed to a Northamptonshire sokeman or a Gloucestershire
radknight, we are still setting before them insoluble problems. The radknights of
Berkeley ‘with their men’ have 48 teams:—this may cover less than 200 or more
than 300 oxen. And yet the record that is guilty of this laxity will tell us how in
Bedfordshire Terra est dimidio bovi, et ibi est semibos[1381].
The main argument that has been urged in favour of a
The villeins’ oxen.
variable caruca is that which, basing itself on later
documents, protests that a villein ought not to have more
than two oxen[1382]. Now true it seems to be that if by the number of the teams
belonging to the villani and bordarii of Domesday Book we divide the number of
villani plus half the number of bordarii (and this would be a fair procedure), we
shall obtain as our quotient a figure that will be much nearer to 2 than to 4. But it
must be common ground to all who read our record that some villeins are much
better supplied with oxen than are their neighbours, and that some villeins have
whole teams, whatever a ‘team’ may mean. There is so much difference in this
respect between manor and manor that we are not justified in talking of any
particular number of oxen as the normal outfit of the villanus, and outside of
Domesday Book we have far too little evidence to sanction the dogma that the
average number must stand close to 2[1383]. Even the villein virgater on the
monastic manors of the thirteenth century is often expected to have four oxen, and
his having eight is a possibility that must be contemplated[1384].
That light as well as heavy ploughs were in use we have
Light and heavy ploughs.
not denied. At a little later time we see teams of six beasts
and teams of ten engaged in ploughing. But the compilers
of Domesday Book are not concerned with the methods of husbandry; they are
registering the number of oxen. If a man has one ox which is employed as a beast
of the plough, they say of him: Arat cum uno bove[1385]. If he and another man
have such an ox between them, they say: Ibi est semibos. If he has four oxen, they
set this down as dimidia caruca. Instead of telling us that there are thirty-eight
Page 386
oxen, they speak of five teams less two oxen[1386]. Twelve pence make a shilling;
and, at all events at the Exchequer, eight oxen make a team.
Very lately an argument has been advanced in favour of a
The team of Domesday and
caruca, the strength of which varies from place to place. other documents.
In many instances the Black Book of Peterborough in its
description of the abbatial estates will give to the
demesne of a particular manor exactly the same number of teams that are ascribed
to it by Domesday Book, and, while in some cases the later of these documents
will tell us that there are eight oxen to the team, in others it will speak of teams of
six[1387]. That there is force in this argument we must admit; but many changes
will take place in forty years, and we can not think that the correspondence
between the two documents is sufficiently close to warrant the inference that the
caruca of Domesday can have fewer beasts than eight. An exactly parallel
argument would serve to prove that the hide of Domesday contains a variable
number of fiscal ‘acres.’ Were it possible (but we shall see that it is not) for us to
regard the teamland of Domesday as a fixed area, then we might afford to allow
the strength of the team to vary; but if the teamland is no fixed area and the team
has no fixed strength, then King William’s inquest ends in a collection of unknown
quantities.
We turn from the team (C) to the teamland (B), and must
The teamland.
face some perplexing questions. Reluctantly we have
come to the opinion that this term ‘the land of (or for) one
team’ does not in the first instance denote a fixed areal quantity of arable land. We
have adopted this opinion reluctantly because we are differing from some of the
best expositors of our record, and because it compels us to say that many of the
statistical data with which that record provides us are not so useful as we hoped
that they would be.
In the first place, we must notice that if this term stands
Fractional parts of the
for a fixed quantity, a very rude use is being made of it. teamland.
We see indeed that fractional parts of a teamland can be
conceived. We often meet the land of (or for) half a team;
we may come upon the land of or for two oxen, one ox, half an ox. But, except in
a few counties, any mention of fractions smaller than the half of a team is rare, and
even halves seldom occur. Now certainly the teamland was a large unit for such
treatment as this. If, for instance, we suppose that it contained 120 acres, then we
must infer that in some shires the jurors who had to describe a mass of 420 acres
would have called it land for 3 or else land for 4 teams, and that in most shires an
odd 80 acres would have been neglected or would have done duty as half a
and, at all events at the Exchequer, eight oxen make a team.
Very lately an argument has been advanced in favour of a
The team of Domesday and
caruca, the strength of which varies from place to place. other documents.
In many instances the Black Book of Peterborough in its
description of the abbatial estates will give to the
demesne of a particular manor exactly the same number of teams that are ascribed
to it by Domesday Book, and, while in some cases the later of these documents
will tell us that there are eight oxen to the team, in others it will speak of teams of
six[1387]. That there is force in this argument we must admit; but many changes
will take place in forty years, and we can not think that the correspondence
between the two documents is sufficiently close to warrant the inference that the
caruca of Domesday can have fewer beasts than eight. An exactly parallel
argument would serve to prove that the hide of Domesday contains a variable
number of fiscal ‘acres.’ Were it possible (but we shall see that it is not) for us to
regard the teamland of Domesday as a fixed area, then we might afford to allow
the strength of the team to vary; but if the teamland is no fixed area and the team
has no fixed strength, then King William’s inquest ends in a collection of unknown
quantities.
We turn from the team (C) to the teamland (B), and must
The teamland.
face some perplexing questions. Reluctantly we have
come to the opinion that this term ‘the land of (or for) one
team’ does not in the first instance denote a fixed areal quantity of arable land. We
have adopted this opinion reluctantly because we are differing from some of the
best expositors of our record, and because it compels us to say that many of the
statistical data with which that record provides us are not so useful as we hoped
that they would be.
In the first place, we must notice that if this term stands
Fractional parts of the
for a fixed quantity, a very rude use is being made of it. teamland.
We see indeed that fractional parts of a teamland can be
conceived. We often meet the land of (or for) half a team;
we may come upon the land of or for two oxen, one ox, half an ox. But, except in
a few counties, any mention of fractions smaller than the half of a team is rare, and
even halves seldom occur. Now certainly the teamland was a large unit for such
treatment as this. If, for instance, we suppose that it contained 120 acres, then we
must infer that in some shires the jurors who had to describe a mass of 420 acres
would have called it land for 3 or else land for 4 teams, and that in most shires an
odd 80 acres would have been neglected or would have done duty as half a
Page 387
teamland. The hides or the carucates (A) have often been split into small fractions
where the jurors distribute integral teamlands. One example of this common
phenomenon shall be given. In Grantchester lie six estates[1388]:
the first rated at 3 v. has land for 1 team,
the first rated at 3 v. has land for 1 team,
the second rated at 2 h. 3 v. has land for 6 teams,
the third rated at 2 h. 3 v. has land for 4 teams,
the fourth rated at 11⁄2 v. has land for 1 team,
the fifth rated at 1 v. has land for 4 oxen,
the sixth rated at 1⁄2 v. has land for 3 oxen.
The teamland does not break up easily. As a general rule, we only hear of
fractional parts of it when the jurors are compelled to deal with a tenement so
small that it can not be said to possess even one teamland[1389].
In passing we observe that this phrase, ‘There is land for
Land for oxen and wood
x teams’ finds exact parallels in two other phrases that are for swine.
not very uncommon, namely, ‘There is pasture for y
sheep’ and ‘There is wood for z pigs’: also that the values
given to y and z are often large and round. It may be that the jurors have in their
minds equations which connect the area of a wood or pasture with its power of
feeding swine or sheep, but an extremely lax use must be made of these equations
when the number of sheep is fixed at a neat hundred or the number of pigs at a
neat thousand, nor dare we say that the quality of the grass and trees has no
influence upon the computation.
Secondly, we observe that the teamland when it does
Teamland no areal unit.
break into fractional parts does not break into virgates,
bovates, acres, roods, or any other units which we can
regard as units in a scheme of areal measurement[1390]. The eighth of a teamland is
the land of (or for) an ox. If we wish to speak of the sixteenth of a teamland, we
must introduce the half-ox. Now had the jurors been told to state the quantity of
the arable land comprised in a tenement, they had at their command plenty of
words which would have served this purpose. No sooner will they have told us
that there is land for two teams, than they will add that there are five acres of
meadow and a wood which is three furlongs in length by two in breadth. We infer
that they have not been asked to state the area of the arable. They have been asked
to say something about it, but not to state its area.
What had they been asked to say? Here we naturally turn
The commissioners and the
to that well-known introduction to the Inquisitio Eliensis
where the jurors distribute integral teamlands. One example of this common
phenomenon shall be given. In Grantchester lie six estates[1388]:
the first rated at 3 v. has land for 1 team,
the first rated at 3 v. has land for 1 team,
the second rated at 2 h. 3 v. has land for 6 teams,
the third rated at 2 h. 3 v. has land for 4 teams,
the fourth rated at 11⁄2 v. has land for 1 team,
the fifth rated at 1 v. has land for 4 oxen,
the sixth rated at 1⁄2 v. has land for 3 oxen.
The teamland does not break up easily. As a general rule, we only hear of
fractional parts of it when the jurors are compelled to deal with a tenement so
small that it can not be said to possess even one teamland[1389].
In passing we observe that this phrase, ‘There is land for
Land for oxen and wood
x teams’ finds exact parallels in two other phrases that are for swine.
not very uncommon, namely, ‘There is pasture for y
sheep’ and ‘There is wood for z pigs’: also that the values
given to y and z are often large and round. It may be that the jurors have in their
minds equations which connect the area of a wood or pasture with its power of
feeding swine or sheep, but an extremely lax use must be made of these equations
when the number of sheep is fixed at a neat hundred or the number of pigs at a
neat thousand, nor dare we say that the quality of the grass and trees has no
influence upon the computation.
Secondly, we observe that the teamland when it does
Teamland no areal unit.
break into fractional parts does not break into virgates,
bovates, acres, roods, or any other units which we can
regard as units in a scheme of areal measurement[1390]. The eighth of a teamland is
the land of (or for) an ox. If we wish to speak of the sixteenth of a teamland, we
must introduce the half-ox. Now had the jurors been told to state the quantity of
the arable land comprised in a tenement, they had at their command plenty of
words which would have served this purpose. No sooner will they have told us
that there is land for two teams, than they will add that there are five acres of
meadow and a wood which is three furlongs in length by two in breadth. We infer
that they have not been asked to state the area of the arable. They have been asked
to say something about it, but not to state its area.
What had they been asked to say? Here we naturally turn
The commissioners and the
to that well-known introduction to the Inquisitio Eliensis
Page 388
which professes to describe the procedure of the teamlands.
commissioners and which at many points corresponds
with the contents of Domesday Book[1391]. We read that the barons made inquiry
about the number of the hides (A) and the number of the teams (C); we do not read
any word about the teamlands (B). Quot hidae they must ask; Quot carucae[1392]
in dominio et quot hominum they must ask; Quot carucis ibi est terra—there is no
such question. On the other hand, the jurors are told to give all the particulars
thrice over (hoc totum tripliciter), once with reference to King Edward’s day, once
with reference to the date when the Conqueror bestowed the manor, and once with
reference to the present time.
Now, if these be the interrogatories that the justiciars
The teamlands of Great
administered to the jurors, then the answering verdicts as Domesday.
they are recorded in Great Domesday err both by defect
and by excess. On the one hand, save when they are
dealing with the geld or the value of a tenement, they rarely give any figures from
King Edward’s day, and still seldomer do they speak about the date of the
Conqueror’s feoffments. Our record does not systematically report that whereas
there are now four teams on this manor, there were five in the Confessor’s reign
and three when its new lord received it. On the other hand, we obtain the
apparently unasked for information that ‘there is land for five teams.’
We turn to Little Domesday and all is altered. Here the
The teams of Little
words of the writ seem to be punctually obeyed. The Domesday.
particulars are stated three times over, the words tunc,
post and modo pointing to the three periods. Thus we
learn how many teams there were when Edward was living and when the
Conqueror gave the land away. On the other hand, we are not told how many
teams ‘could till’ that land, though if the existing teams are fewer than those that
were ploughing in time past, it will sometimes be remarked that the old state of
things could be ‘restored[1393].’
Next we visit Leicestershire. We may open our book at a
The Leicestershire
page which will make us think that the account of this formulas.
shire will be very similar to those reports that are typical
of Great Domesday. We read that Ralph holds four
carucates; that there is land for four teams; that there are two teams on the
demesne while the villeins have two[1394]. But then, alternating with entries which
run in this accustomed form, we find others which, instead of telling us that there
is land for so many teams, will tell us that there were so many upon it in the time
of King Edward[1395]. Perhaps, were this part of the survey explored by one having
commissioners and which at many points corresponds
with the contents of Domesday Book[1391]. We read that the barons made inquiry
about the number of the hides (A) and the number of the teams (C); we do not read
any word about the teamlands (B). Quot hidae they must ask; Quot carucae[1392]
in dominio et quot hominum they must ask; Quot carucis ibi est terra—there is no
such question. On the other hand, the jurors are told to give all the particulars
thrice over (hoc totum tripliciter), once with reference to King Edward’s day, once
with reference to the date when the Conqueror bestowed the manor, and once with
reference to the present time.
Now, if these be the interrogatories that the justiciars
The teamlands of Great
administered to the jurors, then the answering verdicts as Domesday.
they are recorded in Great Domesday err both by defect
and by excess. On the one hand, save when they are
dealing with the geld or the value of a tenement, they rarely give any figures from
King Edward’s day, and still seldomer do they speak about the date of the
Conqueror’s feoffments. Our record does not systematically report that whereas
there are now four teams on this manor, there were five in the Confessor’s reign
and three when its new lord received it. On the other hand, we obtain the
apparently unasked for information that ‘there is land for five teams.’
We turn to Little Domesday and all is altered. Here the
The teams of Little
words of the writ seem to be punctually obeyed. The Domesday.
particulars are stated three times over, the words tunc,
post and modo pointing to the three periods. Thus we
learn how many teams there were when Edward was living and when the
Conqueror gave the land away. On the other hand, we are not told how many
teams ‘could till’ that land, though if the existing teams are fewer than those that
were ploughing in time past, it will sometimes be remarked that the old state of
things could be ‘restored[1393].’
Next we visit Leicestershire. We may open our book at a
The Leicestershire
page which will make us think that the account of this formulas.
shire will be very similar to those reports that are typical
of Great Domesday. We read that Ralph holds four
carucates; that there is land for four teams; that there are two teams on the
demesne while the villeins have two[1394]. But then, alternating with entries which
run in this accustomed form, we find others which, instead of telling us that there
is land for so many teams, will tell us that there were so many upon it in the time
of King Edward[1395]. Perhaps, were this part of the survey explored by one having
Page 389
the requisite knowledge, he would teach us that the jurors of some wapentakes use
the one formula while the other is peculiar to other wapentakes; but, as the record
stands, the variation seems due to the compiling clerk. Be that as it may, we can
hardly read through these Leicestershire entries without being driven to believe
that substantially the same piece of information is being conveyed to us now in
one and now in the other of two shapes that in our eyes are dissimilar. To say,
‘There were four teams here in King Edward’s day’ is much the same as to say,
‘There is land here for four teams.’ Conversely, to say, ‘There is land here for four
teams’ is much the same as to say,‘There were four teams here in King Edward’s
day.’ For an exact equivalence we must not contend; but if the commissioners get
the one piece of information they do not want the other. On no single occasion,
unless we are mistaken, are both put on record[1396].
When we have thought over these things, we shall
Origin of the inquiry about
perhaps fashion for ourselves some such guess as that the teamlands.
which follows. The original scheme of the Inquest was
unnecessarily cumbrous. The design of collecting the
statistics of the past broke down. Let us imagine a similar attempt made in our
own day. Local juries are summoned to swear communal verdicts about the
number of horses and oxen that the farmers were keeping twenty years ago.
Roughly, very roughly true would such verdicts be, although no foreign invasion,
no influx of alien men and words and manners divides us from the fortieth year of
Queen Victoria. In Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk some sort of answer about these
matters was extracted from the jurors; but frequently they report that the
arrangements which exist now have always existed, and by this they mean that
they cannot remember any change. Now, when we fail to find in Great Domesday
any similar figures, we may ascribe this to one of two causes. Either the
commissioners did not collect statistics, or the compilers did not think them
worthy of preservation. In some cases the one supposition may be true, in other
cases the other. We may be fairly certain that in many or all counties the horses
and the pigs and the ‘otiose animals’ that were extant in 1086 were enumerated in
the verdicts[1397]. Also we know that Domesday Book is no mere transcript, but is
an abstract or digest, and we have cause for believing that those who made it held
themselves free to vary the phrases used by the jurors, provided that no material
change was thus introduced[1398]. Howbeit, to come to the question that is
immediately before us, our evidence seems to tell us that the commissioners and
their master discovered that the original programme of the inquest was
unnecessarily cumbrous. Once and again in more recent days has a similar
discovery been made by royal commissioners. So some interrogatories were
dropped.
the one formula while the other is peculiar to other wapentakes; but, as the record
stands, the variation seems due to the compiling clerk. Be that as it may, we can
hardly read through these Leicestershire entries without being driven to believe
that substantially the same piece of information is being conveyed to us now in
one and now in the other of two shapes that in our eyes are dissimilar. To say,
‘There were four teams here in King Edward’s day’ is much the same as to say,
‘There is land here for four teams.’ Conversely, to say, ‘There is land here for four
teams’ is much the same as to say,‘There were four teams here in King Edward’s
day.’ For an exact equivalence we must not contend; but if the commissioners get
the one piece of information they do not want the other. On no single occasion,
unless we are mistaken, are both put on record[1396].
When we have thought over these things, we shall
Origin of the inquiry about
perhaps fashion for ourselves some such guess as that the teamlands.
which follows. The original scheme of the Inquest was
unnecessarily cumbrous. The design of collecting the
statistics of the past broke down. Let us imagine a similar attempt made in our
own day. Local juries are summoned to swear communal verdicts about the
number of horses and oxen that the farmers were keeping twenty years ago.
Roughly, very roughly true would such verdicts be, although no foreign invasion,
no influx of alien men and words and manners divides us from the fortieth year of
Queen Victoria. In Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk some sort of answer about these
matters was extracted from the jurors; but frequently they report that the
arrangements which exist now have always existed, and by this they mean that
they cannot remember any change. Now, when we fail to find in Great Domesday
any similar figures, we may ascribe this to one of two causes. Either the
commissioners did not collect statistics, or the compilers did not think them
worthy of preservation. In some cases the one supposition may be true, in other
cases the other. We may be fairly certain that in many or all counties the horses
and the pigs and the ‘otiose animals’ that were extant in 1086 were enumerated in
the verdicts[1397]. Also we know that Domesday Book is no mere transcript, but is
an abstract or digest, and we have cause for believing that those who made it held
themselves free to vary the phrases used by the jurors, provided that no material
change was thus introduced[1398]. Howbeit, to come to the question that is
immediately before us, our evidence seems to tell us that the commissioners and
their master discovered that the original programme of the inquest was
unnecessarily cumbrous. Once and again in more recent days has a similar
discovery been made by royal commissioners. So some interrogatories were
dropped.
Page 390
Then we suspect that the inquiry about the number of
Modification of the
oxen that were ploughing in Edward’s day became a more inquiry.
practicable, if looser, inquiry about the number of oxen
capable of tilling the land. The transition would not be
difficult. What King William really wants to know is the agricultural capacity of
the tenement. He learns that there are now upon it so many beasts of the plough.
But this number may be accidentally large or accidentally small. With an eye to
future taxation, he wishes for figures expressive of the normal condition of things.
But, according to the dominant idea of his reign, the normal condition of things is
their Edwardian condition, that in which they stood before the usurper deforced
the rightful heir. And so these two formulas which we see alternating in the
account of Leicestershire really do mean much the same thing: ‘There is land for x
teams’: ‘There were x teams in the time of King Edward.’
But if we suppose the justices abandoning the question
Inquiry as to potential
‘How many teams twenty years ago?’ in favour of ‘How teams.
many teams can there be?’ we see that, though they are
easing their task and enabling themselves to obtain
answers in the place of silence, they are also substituting for a matter of pure fact
what may easily become a matter of opinion. They have left the actual behind and
are inquiring about potentialities. They will now get answers more speedily; but
who eight centuries afterwards will be able to analyze the mental processes of
which these answers are the upshot? It is possible that a jury sets to work with an
equation which connects oxen with area, for example, one which tells that a team
can plough 120 acres. It is but too possible that this equation varies from place to
place and that the commissioners do not try to prevent variations. They are not
asking about area; they are asking about the number of teams requisite for the
tillage of the tenement. With this and its value as data, William’s ministers hope to
correct the antiquated assessments. Some of the commissioners may allow the
jurors to take the custom of the district as a guide, while others would like to force
one equation on the whole country. Our admiration for Domesday Book will be
increased, not diminished, if we remember that it is the work not of machines but
of men. Some of the justices seem to have thought that the inquiry about potential
teams (B) was not of the first importance, not nearly so important as the inquiries
about actual teams (C) and gelding units (A). In various counties we see many
entries in which Terra est is followed by a blank space. In Gloucester, Worcester
and Hereford we find no systematic mention of teamlands, but only occasional
reports which show that at certain places there might be more teams than there are.
At the end of the account of the Bishop of Worcester’s triple hundred of
Oswaldslaw (an account so favourable to St. Mary that it might have been dictated
by her representative) we find the remark that in none of these manors could there
Modification of the
oxen that were ploughing in Edward’s day became a more inquiry.
practicable, if looser, inquiry about the number of oxen
capable of tilling the land. The transition would not be
difficult. What King William really wants to know is the agricultural capacity of
the tenement. He learns that there are now upon it so many beasts of the plough.
But this number may be accidentally large or accidentally small. With an eye to
future taxation, he wishes for figures expressive of the normal condition of things.
But, according to the dominant idea of his reign, the normal condition of things is
their Edwardian condition, that in which they stood before the usurper deforced
the rightful heir. And so these two formulas which we see alternating in the
account of Leicestershire really do mean much the same thing: ‘There is land for x
teams’: ‘There were x teams in the time of King Edward.’
But if we suppose the justices abandoning the question
Inquiry as to potential
‘How many teams twenty years ago?’ in favour of ‘How teams.
many teams can there be?’ we see that, though they are
easing their task and enabling themselves to obtain
answers in the place of silence, they are also substituting for a matter of pure fact
what may easily become a matter of opinion. They have left the actual behind and
are inquiring about potentialities. They will now get answers more speedily; but
who eight centuries afterwards will be able to analyze the mental processes of
which these answers are the upshot? It is possible that a jury sets to work with an
equation which connects oxen with area, for example, one which tells that a team
can plough 120 acres. It is but too possible that this equation varies from place to
place and that the commissioners do not try to prevent variations. They are not
asking about area; they are asking about the number of teams requisite for the
tillage of the tenement. With this and its value as data, William’s ministers hope to
correct the antiquated assessments. Some of the commissioners may allow the
jurors to take the custom of the district as a guide, while others would like to force
one equation on the whole country. Our admiration for Domesday Book will be
increased, not diminished, if we remember that it is the work not of machines but
of men. Some of the justices seem to have thought that the inquiry about potential
teams (B) was not of the first importance, not nearly so important as the inquiries
about actual teams (C) and gelding units (A). In various counties we see many
entries in which Terra est is followed by a blank space. In Gloucester, Worcester
and Hereford we find no systematic mention of teamlands, but only occasional
reports which show that at certain places there might be more teams than there are.
At the end of the account of the Bishop of Worcester’s triple hundred of
Oswaldslaw (an account so favourable to St. Mary that it might have been dictated
by her representative) we find the remark that in none of these manors could there
Page 391
be any more teams than now are there[1399]. The bishop, who fully understands the
object of the inquest, does not mean to have his assessment raised, and the justices
are compelled to take the word of jurors every one of whom is the vassal of St.
Mary.
We know so little as to the commissioners’ intentions, in
Normal relation between
particular so little as to any design on their part to force teams and teamlands.
upon the whole country some one equation connecting
oxen with area, that the task which is set before us if we
would explain the relation between the number of the teams (C) and the number of
the teamlands (B) that we find in a given county is sometimes an intricate and
perhaps insoluble problem. If England be taken as a whole, the two numbers will
stand very close to each other. In some counties, for example in Lincolnshire, if at
the foot of each page we add up the particulars, we shall long remain in doubt
whether B or C will be the greater when our final sum is made. In county after
county we shall find a large number of entries in which B = C, and, though there
will always be some cases in which, the tenement being waste, C descends to zero,
and others in which C is less than B, still the deficiency will be partially redressed
by instances in which B falls short of C. On the whole, the relation between the
two is that which we might expect. Often there is equality; often the variation is
small; but an excess on the part of B is commoner than an excess on the part of C,
and when the waste teamlands have been brought into the account, then in most
counties B will usually exceed C by 10 per cent, or little more. There are, however,
some marked and perplexing exceptions to this rule[1400].
As we pass through the southern counties from east to
Deficiency of teams in the
west, the ratio borne by the teamlands to the teams south-west.
steadily increases, until ascending by leaps it reaches
1.43:1 (or thereabouts) in Devon and 2:1 in Cornwall.
Now to all seeming we are not in a country which has recently been devastated; it
is not like Yorkshire; we find no large number of ‘waste’ or unpopulated or
unvalued estates. Here and there we may see a tenement which has as many teams
as it has teamlands; but in the great majority of cases the preponderance of
teamlands is steadily maintained. What does this mean? One conceivable
explanation we may decidedly reject. It does not mean a relatively scientific
agriculture which makes the most of the ox. Nor does it mean a fertile soil[1401].
Our figures seem to show that men are sparse and poor; also they are servile. We
suspect their tillage to be of that backward kind which ploughs enormous tracts for
a poor return. Arva per annos mutant et superest ager. Of the whole of the land
that is sometimes ploughed, they sow less than two-thirds or a half in any one
year: perhaps they sow one-third only, so that of the space which the royal
object of the inquest, does not mean to have his assessment raised, and the justices
are compelled to take the word of jurors every one of whom is the vassal of St.
Mary.
We know so little as to the commissioners’ intentions, in
Normal relation between
particular so little as to any design on their part to force teams and teamlands.
upon the whole country some one equation connecting
oxen with area, that the task which is set before us if we
would explain the relation between the number of the teams (C) and the number of
the teamlands (B) that we find in a given county is sometimes an intricate and
perhaps insoluble problem. If England be taken as a whole, the two numbers will
stand very close to each other. In some counties, for example in Lincolnshire, if at
the foot of each page we add up the particulars, we shall long remain in doubt
whether B or C will be the greater when our final sum is made. In county after
county we shall find a large number of entries in which B = C, and, though there
will always be some cases in which, the tenement being waste, C descends to zero,
and others in which C is less than B, still the deficiency will be partially redressed
by instances in which B falls short of C. On the whole, the relation between the
two is that which we might expect. Often there is equality; often the variation is
small; but an excess on the part of B is commoner than an excess on the part of C,
and when the waste teamlands have been brought into the account, then in most
counties B will usually exceed C by 10 per cent, or little more. There are, however,
some marked and perplexing exceptions to this rule[1400].
As we pass through the southern counties from east to
Deficiency of teams in the
west, the ratio borne by the teamlands to the teams south-west.
steadily increases, until ascending by leaps it reaches
1.43:1 (or thereabouts) in Devon and 2:1 in Cornwall.
Now to all seeming we are not in a country which has recently been devastated; it
is not like Yorkshire; we find no large number of ‘waste’ or unpopulated or
unvalued estates. Here and there we may see a tenement which has as many teams
as it has teamlands; but in the great majority of cases the preponderance of
teamlands is steadily maintained. What does this mean? One conceivable
explanation we may decidedly reject. It does not mean a relatively scientific
agriculture which makes the most of the ox. Nor does it mean a fertile soil[1401].
Our figures seem to show that men are sparse and poor; also they are servile. We
suspect their tillage to be of that backward kind which ploughs enormous tracts for
a poor return. Arva per annos mutant et superest ager. Of the whole of the land
that is sometimes ploughed, they sow less than two-thirds or a half in any one
year: perhaps they sow one-third only, so that of the space which the royal
Page 392
commissioners reckon as three teamlands two-thirds are always idle. We must
remember that in modern times the husbandry that prevailed in Cornwall was
radically different from that which governed the English open fields. It was what
the agrarian historians of Germany call a Feldgrasswirtschaft[1402]. That perhaps is
the best explanation which we can give of this general and normal excess of
teamlands over teams. But to this we may add that systems of mensuration and
assessment which fitted the greater part of England very well, may have fitted
Devon, Cornwall and some other western counties very badly[1403]. Those systems
are the outcome of villages and spacious common fields where, without
measurement, you count the ‘acres’ and the plough-lands or house-lands, and they
refuse to register with any accuracy the arrangements of the Celtic hamlets, or
rather trevs of the west.
It is by no means impossible that when the commissioners
Actual and potential
came to a county which was very sparsely peopled (and in teamlands.
Cornwall each ‘recorded man’ might have had near 160
acres of some sort or another all to himself) their question
about the number of teamlands or about the number of teams ‘that could plough
there’ became a question about remote possibilities, rather than about existing or
probable arrangements, and that the answer to it became mere guesswork. On one
occasion in Cornwall they are content with the statement that there is land for
‘fifteen or thirty teams[1404].’ In the description of a wasted tract of Staffordshire
we see six cases close together in which two different guesses as to the number of
the potential teamlands are recorded[1405]:—‘There is land for two teams’, but ‘or
three’ is interlined. Five times ‘or two’ is written above ‘one,’ Now this is of
importance, for perhaps we may see in it the key to the treatment that wasted
Yorkshire receives. How much arable land is there in this village? Well, if by
‘arable land’ you mean land that is ploughed, there is none. If you do not mean
this, if you are speaking of a ‘waste’ vill where no land has been ploughed these
fifteen years, then you must be content with a speculative answer[1406]. If the
ruined cottages were rebuilt and inhabited, if oxen and men were imported, then
employment might be found for four or five teams. Called to speculate about these
matters, the Yorkshire jurors very naturally catch hold of any solid fact which may
serve as a base for computations. This fact they seem to find in the geld
assessment. This estate is rated to the geld at two carucates; the assessment seems
tolerably fair; so they say that two teams would plough the land. Or again, this
estate is rated to the geld at four carucates; but its assessment is certainly too high,
so let it be set down for two teamlands[1407]. Even in other parts of the country the
jurors may sometimes avail themselves of this device. In particular there are tracts
in which they are fond of reporting that the number of teamlands is just equal to
(B=A) or just twice as great (B=2A) as the number of gelding carucates. We very
remember that in modern times the husbandry that prevailed in Cornwall was
radically different from that which governed the English open fields. It was what
the agrarian historians of Germany call a Feldgrasswirtschaft[1402]. That perhaps is
the best explanation which we can give of this general and normal excess of
teamlands over teams. But to this we may add that systems of mensuration and
assessment which fitted the greater part of England very well, may have fitted
Devon, Cornwall and some other western counties very badly[1403]. Those systems
are the outcome of villages and spacious common fields where, without
measurement, you count the ‘acres’ and the plough-lands or house-lands, and they
refuse to register with any accuracy the arrangements of the Celtic hamlets, or
rather trevs of the west.
It is by no means impossible that when the commissioners
Actual and potential
came to a county which was very sparsely peopled (and in teamlands.
Cornwall each ‘recorded man’ might have had near 160
acres of some sort or another all to himself) their question
about the number of teamlands or about the number of teams ‘that could plough
there’ became a question about remote possibilities, rather than about existing or
probable arrangements, and that the answer to it became mere guesswork. On one
occasion in Cornwall they are content with the statement that there is land for
‘fifteen or thirty teams[1404].’ In the description of a wasted tract of Staffordshire
we see six cases close together in which two different guesses as to the number of
the potential teamlands are recorded[1405]:—‘There is land for two teams’, but ‘or
three’ is interlined. Five times ‘or two’ is written above ‘one,’ Now this is of
importance, for perhaps we may see in it the key to the treatment that wasted
Yorkshire receives. How much arable land is there in this village? Well, if by
‘arable land’ you mean land that is ploughed, there is none. If you do not mean
this, if you are speaking of a ‘waste’ vill where no land has been ploughed these
fifteen years, then you must be content with a speculative answer[1406]. If the
ruined cottages were rebuilt and inhabited, if oxen and men were imported, then
employment might be found for four or five teams. Called to speculate about these
matters, the Yorkshire jurors very naturally catch hold of any solid fact which may
serve as a base for computations. This fact they seem to find in the geld
assessment. This estate is rated to the geld at two carucates; the assessment seems
tolerably fair; so they say that two teams would plough the land. Or again, this
estate is rated to the geld at four carucates; but its assessment is certainly too high,
so let it be set down for two teamlands[1407]. Even in other parts of the country the
jurors may sometimes avail themselves of this device. In particular there are tracts
in which they are fond of reporting that the number of teamlands is just equal to
(B=A) or just twice as great (B=2A) as the number of gelding carucates. We very
Page 393
much fear, though the ground for this fear can not be explained at this stage of our
inquiry, that the figure which the jurors state when questioned about potential
teams is sometimes dictated by a traditional estimate which has been playing a
part in the geld assessment, and that the number of teamlands is but remotely
connected with the agrarian arrangements of 1086. All our other guesses therefore
must be regarded as being subject to this horrible suspicion, of which we shall
have more to say hereafter[1408].
This makes it difficult for us to construe the second great
The land of excessive
aberration from the general rule that the number of the teams.
teamlands in a county will slightly exceed the number of
teams. In Derby and Nottingham apparent
‘understocking’ becomes the exception and ‘overstocking’ the rule. In Derby there
is a good deal of ‘waste’ where we have to reckon teamlands but no teams, and yet
on many pages the number of teams is the greater (C>B). In Nottingham there
seem to be on the average near 200 teams where there are but 125 teamlands. In
many columns of the Lincolnshire survey, and therefore perhaps in some districts
of that large and variegated county, the teams have a majority, though, if we have
not blundered, they are beaten by the teamlands when the whole shire has been
surveyed. It is very possible that a similar phenomenon would have been recorded
in Essex and East Anglia if the inquiry in those counties had taken the form that
was usual elsewhere, for the teams seem to be thick on the land. Now to interpret
the steady excess of teams that we see in Derby and Nottingham is not easy. We
can hardly suppose that the jurors are confessing that they habitually employ a
superfluity of oxen. Perhaps, however, we may infer that in this district a given
area of land will be ploughed by an unusually large number of teams, whereas in
Devon and Cornwall a given area will be ploughed, though intermittently, by an
unusually small number. In every way the contrast between Devon and Cornwall
on the one hand, Lincoln, Nottingham and Derby on the other, is strongly marked.
Of the quality of soils something should, no doubt, be said which we are too
ignorant to say. An acre would yield more corn in Nottingham and Derby, to say
nothing of Lincoln, than in Devon and Cornwall, though the valets that we find in
the three Danish shires are by no means so high as those that are displayed by
some of the southern counties. But if we ask how many households our average
teamland is supporting, then among all the counties that we have examined
Lincoln, Nottingham and Derby stand at the very top, while Devon and Cornwall
stand with the depopulated Stafford at the very bottom of the list[1409]. Then,
again, we see the contrasts between village and trev, between Dane and Celt,
between sokeman and slave. Possibly Northampton, Derby and parts of Lincoln
really are ‘over-teamed’: that is to say, were the land of these counties to come to
the hands of lords who held large and compact estates, the number of plough-
inquiry, that the figure which the jurors state when questioned about potential
teams is sometimes dictated by a traditional estimate which has been playing a
part in the geld assessment, and that the number of teamlands is but remotely
connected with the agrarian arrangements of 1086. All our other guesses therefore
must be regarded as being subject to this horrible suspicion, of which we shall
have more to say hereafter[1408].
This makes it difficult for us to construe the second great
The land of excessive
aberration from the general rule that the number of the teams.
teamlands in a county will slightly exceed the number of
teams. In Derby and Nottingham apparent
‘understocking’ becomes the exception and ‘overstocking’ the rule. In Derby there
is a good deal of ‘waste’ where we have to reckon teamlands but no teams, and yet
on many pages the number of teams is the greater (C>B). In Nottingham there
seem to be on the average near 200 teams where there are but 125 teamlands. In
many columns of the Lincolnshire survey, and therefore perhaps in some districts
of that large and variegated county, the teams have a majority, though, if we have
not blundered, they are beaten by the teamlands when the whole shire has been
surveyed. It is very possible that a similar phenomenon would have been recorded
in Essex and East Anglia if the inquiry in those counties had taken the form that
was usual elsewhere, for the teams seem to be thick on the land. Now to interpret
the steady excess of teams that we see in Derby and Nottingham is not easy. We
can hardly suppose that the jurors are confessing that they habitually employ a
superfluity of oxen. Perhaps, however, we may infer that in this district a given
area of land will be ploughed by an unusually large number of teams, whereas in
Devon and Cornwall a given area will be ploughed, though intermittently, by an
unusually small number. In every way the contrast between Devon and Cornwall
on the one hand, Lincoln, Nottingham and Derby on the other, is strongly marked.
Of the quality of soils something should, no doubt, be said which we are too
ignorant to say. An acre would yield more corn in Nottingham and Derby, to say
nothing of Lincoln, than in Devon and Cornwall, though the valets that we find in
the three Danish shires are by no means so high as those that are displayed by
some of the southern counties. But if we ask how many households our average
teamland is supporting, then among all the counties that we have examined
Lincoln, Nottingham and Derby stand at the very top, while Devon and Cornwall
stand with the depopulated Stafford at the very bottom of the list[1409]. Then,
again, we see the contrasts between village and trev, between Dane and Celt,
between sokeman and slave. Possibly Northampton, Derby and parts of Lincoln
really are ‘over-teamed’: that is to say, were the land of these counties to come to
the hands of lords who held large and compact estates, the number of plough-
Page 394
teams would be reduced. Where there is freedom there will be some waste. The
tenements split into fractions, and the owner of a small piece must keep oxen
enough to draw a plough or trust to the friendliness and reciprocal needs of his
neighbours. Manorialism has this advantage: it can make the most of the ox.
Another possible guess is that the real carucates and bovates of this district (by
which we mean the units which locally bear these names and which are the units
in the proprietary or tenurial scheme) have few acres, fewer than would be allowed
by some equation which the royal commissioners for these counties carry in their
minds. Being assured (for example) that the bovates in a certain village or hundred
have few acres, they may be allowing the jurors to count as three team-lands (‘of
imperial measure’) a space of arable that has been locally treated as four. So, after
all, the rule that normally each teamland should have its team and that each team
should till its teamland may be holding good in these counties, though the
proprietary and agrarian units have differed from those that the commissioners
treat as orthodox.
One last guess is lawful after what we have seen in
Attempts to explain the
Leicestershire. These Nottinghamshire folk may be telling excess of teams.
how many teams there were in King Edward’s time and
recording a large increase in the number of oxen and
therefore perhaps in the cultivated area. In this case, however, we should expect to
find the valet greater than the valuit, while really we find that a fall in value is
normal throughout the shire.
We must here say one parenthetical word about the
Digression to East Anglia.
account of East Anglia. In one respect it differs from the
account of any other district[1410]. We are told of the
various landholders that they hold so many carucates or so many acres. Analogy
would lead us to suppose that this is a statement touching the amount of geld with
which they are charged. Though there is no statement parallel to the Terra est b
carucis which we find in most parts of England, still there are some other counties
remote from East Anglia—Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford—where no such
statement is given to us. In other words, a natural first guess would be that in
Norfolk and Suffolk we are informed about A and not about B. But then, it is
apparent that some information about A is being given to us by a quite different
formula such as we shall not meet outside East Anglia. We are told about a vill that
when the hundred pays 20s. for the geld this vill pays so many pence—seven
pence halfpenny, it may be, or eight pence three farthings. This is the formula
which prescribes how much geld the landholders of the vill must pay and it says
nothing of carucates or of acres. Now this might make us think that the carucates
and acres which are attributed to the landholders are ‘real’ and not ‘rateable’ areas,
tenements split into fractions, and the owner of a small piece must keep oxen
enough to draw a plough or trust to the friendliness and reciprocal needs of his
neighbours. Manorialism has this advantage: it can make the most of the ox.
Another possible guess is that the real carucates and bovates of this district (by
which we mean the units which locally bear these names and which are the units
in the proprietary or tenurial scheme) have few acres, fewer than would be allowed
by some equation which the royal commissioners for these counties carry in their
minds. Being assured (for example) that the bovates in a certain village or hundred
have few acres, they may be allowing the jurors to count as three team-lands (‘of
imperial measure’) a space of arable that has been locally treated as four. So, after
all, the rule that normally each teamland should have its team and that each team
should till its teamland may be holding good in these counties, though the
proprietary and agrarian units have differed from those that the commissioners
treat as orthodox.
One last guess is lawful after what we have seen in
Attempts to explain the
Leicestershire. These Nottinghamshire folk may be telling excess of teams.
how many teams there were in King Edward’s time and
recording a large increase in the number of oxen and
therefore perhaps in the cultivated area. In this case, however, we should expect to
find the valet greater than the valuit, while really we find that a fall in value is
normal throughout the shire.
We must here say one parenthetical word about the
Digression to East Anglia.
account of East Anglia. In one respect it differs from the
account of any other district[1410]. We are told of the
various landholders that they hold so many carucates or so many acres. Analogy
would lead us to suppose that this is a statement touching the amount of geld with
which they are charged. Though there is no statement parallel to the Terra est b
carucis which we find in most parts of England, still there are some other counties
remote from East Anglia—Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford—where no such
statement is given to us. In other words, a natural first guess would be that in
Norfolk and Suffolk we are informed about A and not about B. But then, it is
apparent that some information about A is being given to us by a quite different
formula such as we shall not meet outside East Anglia. We are told about a vill that
when the hundred pays 20s. for the geld this vill pays so many pence—seven
pence halfpenny, it may be, or eight pence three farthings. This is the formula
which prescribes how much geld the landholders of the vill must pay and it says
nothing of carucates or of acres. Now this might make us think that the carucates
and acres which are attributed to the landholders are ‘real’ and not ‘rateable’ areas,
Page 395
and are to be put on a level with the teamlands (B) rather than with the hides or
gelding carucates (A) of other counties. Nevertheless, on second thoughts we may
return to our first opinion. If these carucates are equivalent to the teamlands of
other counties, Norfolk and Suffolk not only differ but differ very widely from the
rest of England[1411]. In Norfolk we make about 2,422 carucates and about 4,853
teams, and, however wide of the mark these figures may be[1412], the fact that
there are upon an average about two teams to every carucate is apparent on page
after page of the record; often the ratio is yet higher. We have seen a phenomenon
of the same kind, though less pronounced, in Nottingham; but then, if in Norfolk
we proceed to divide the ‘recorded population’ by the number of carucates, we
shall get 11 as our quotient. This is so very much higher than anything that we
have seen elsewhere that we are daunted by it; for, even though we recall the
possibility that a good many tenants in this free county are counted twice because
they hold under two lords, still this reflection will hardly enable us to make the
requisite allowance. To this it may be added that if we divide the acreage of
Norfolk by its carucates and treat the carucates as teamlands, the quotient will
place Norfolk among the counties in which the smallest part of the total area was
under the plough. Further, it will be observed that the statement about the
geldability of the vills does not enable us to bring home any particular sum to any
given man. Be it granted that the sum due from a vill is fixed by the proposition
that it contributes thirteen pence to every pound levied from the hundred, we have
still to decide how much Ralph and how much Roger, two landholders of the vill,
must contribute; and our decision will, we take it, be dictated by the statement that
Ralph has one carucate and Roger 60 acres. We fear therefore that here again we
can not penetrate through the rateable to the real[1413].
About the ‘land for one team’ we can hardly get beyond
The teamland no areal
vague guesswork, and may seriously doubt whether the measure.
inquiry as to the number of possible ploughs was
interpreted in the same manner in all parts of the country.
Here it may have been regarded as a reference to the good old time of King
Edward, here to the local custom; there an attempt may have been made to enforce
some royal ‘standard measure,’ and there again men were driven to speculate as to
what might happen if a wilderness were once more inhabited. But unless we are
mistaken, the first step towards a solution of the many problems that beset us is
taken when we perceive that the jurors have not been asked to state the areal
extent of the tilled or the tillable land.
Far other, as is well known, was the doctrine of one
Eyton’s theory.
whom all students of Domesday revere. For Mr Eyton the
teamland was precisely 120 of our statute acres[1414]. The
gelding carucates (A) of other counties. Nevertheless, on second thoughts we may
return to our first opinion. If these carucates are equivalent to the teamlands of
other counties, Norfolk and Suffolk not only differ but differ very widely from the
rest of England[1411]. In Norfolk we make about 2,422 carucates and about 4,853
teams, and, however wide of the mark these figures may be[1412], the fact that
there are upon an average about two teams to every carucate is apparent on page
after page of the record; often the ratio is yet higher. We have seen a phenomenon
of the same kind, though less pronounced, in Nottingham; but then, if in Norfolk
we proceed to divide the ‘recorded population’ by the number of carucates, we
shall get 11 as our quotient. This is so very much higher than anything that we
have seen elsewhere that we are daunted by it; for, even though we recall the
possibility that a good many tenants in this free county are counted twice because
they hold under two lords, still this reflection will hardly enable us to make the
requisite allowance. To this it may be added that if we divide the acreage of
Norfolk by its carucates and treat the carucates as teamlands, the quotient will
place Norfolk among the counties in which the smallest part of the total area was
under the plough. Further, it will be observed that the statement about the
geldability of the vills does not enable us to bring home any particular sum to any
given man. Be it granted that the sum due from a vill is fixed by the proposition
that it contributes thirteen pence to every pound levied from the hundred, we have
still to decide how much Ralph and how much Roger, two landholders of the vill,
must contribute; and our decision will, we take it, be dictated by the statement that
Ralph has one carucate and Roger 60 acres. We fear therefore that here again we
can not penetrate through the rateable to the real[1413].
About the ‘land for one team’ we can hardly get beyond
The teamland no areal
vague guesswork, and may seriously doubt whether the measure.
inquiry as to the number of possible ploughs was
interpreted in the same manner in all parts of the country.
Here it may have been regarded as a reference to the good old time of King
Edward, here to the local custom; there an attempt may have been made to enforce
some royal ‘standard measure,’ and there again men were driven to speculate as to
what might happen if a wilderness were once more inhabited. But unless we are
mistaken, the first step towards a solution of the many problems that beset us is
taken when we perceive that the jurors have not been asked to state the areal
extent of the tilled or the tillable land.
Far other, as is well known, was the doctrine of one
Eyton’s theory.
whom all students of Domesday revere. For Mr Eyton the
teamland was precisely 120 of our statute acres[1414]. The
Page 396
proof offered of this lies in a comparison of the figures given by Domesday with
the superficial content of modern parishes. What seems to us to have been proved
is that, if we start with the proposed equation, we shall rarely be brought into
violent collision with ascertained facts, and that, when such a collision seems
imminent, it can almost always be prevented by the intervention of some plausible
hypothesis about shifted boundaries or neglected wastes. More than this has not
been done. Always at the end of his toil the candid investigator admits that when
he has added up all the figures that Domesday gives for arable, meadow, wood and
pasture, the land of the county is by no means exhausted. Then the residue must be
set down as ‘unsurveyed’ or ‘unregistered’ and guesses made as to its
whereabouts[1415]. Then further, this method involves theories about lineal and
superficial measurements which are, in our eyes, precarious.
One word about this point must be said, though we can
Domesday’s lineal
not devote much room to it. The content of various measure.
spaces, such as woods and pastures, is often indicated by
a reference to linear standards, leagues, furlongs, perches,
feet, and there seems to be little doubt that the main equations which govern the
system are these:
1 league = 12 furlongs or quarentines or acre-lengths
= 480 perches.
Now we read numerous statements which take the following form:—‘It is x
leagues (furlongs, perches) long and y wide,’ or, to take a concrete example, ‘The
wood is 1 league long and 4 furlongs wide.’ The question arises whether we are
justified in making this mean that here is a wood whose superficial content is
equal to that of a rectangular parallelogram 480 statute perches long by 160 statute
perches wide. We are rash in imposing our perch of 16·5 feet on the whole
England of the eleventh century, even though we are to measure arable land. We
are rasher in using that perch for the measurement of woodland. But perhaps we
are rasher still in supposing that the Domesday jurors have true superficial
measurement in their minds[1416]. We strongly suspect that they are thinking of
shape as well as of size, and may be giving us the extreme diameters of the wood
or some diameters that they guess to be near the mean. If a clergyman told us that
his parish was 3 miles long by 2 wide, we should not accuse him of falsehood or
blunder if we subsequently discovered that in shape it was approximately a right-
angled triangle and contained only some 3 superficial miles. And now let us
observe how rude these statements are. The Norfolk jurors are in the habit of
recording the length and the breadth of the vills. Occasionally they profess to do
this with extreme accuracy[1417]. However, we reckon that in about 100 out of 550
the superficial content of modern parishes. What seems to us to have been proved
is that, if we start with the proposed equation, we shall rarely be brought into
violent collision with ascertained facts, and that, when such a collision seems
imminent, it can almost always be prevented by the intervention of some plausible
hypothesis about shifted boundaries or neglected wastes. More than this has not
been done. Always at the end of his toil the candid investigator admits that when
he has added up all the figures that Domesday gives for arable, meadow, wood and
pasture, the land of the county is by no means exhausted. Then the residue must be
set down as ‘unsurveyed’ or ‘unregistered’ and guesses made as to its
whereabouts[1415]. Then further, this method involves theories about lineal and
superficial measurements which are, in our eyes, precarious.
One word about this point must be said, though we can
Domesday’s lineal
not devote much room to it. The content of various measure.
spaces, such as woods and pastures, is often indicated by
a reference to linear standards, leagues, furlongs, perches,
feet, and there seems to be little doubt that the main equations which govern the
system are these:
1 league = 12 furlongs or quarentines or acre-lengths
= 480 perches.
Now we read numerous statements which take the following form:—‘It is x
leagues (furlongs, perches) long and y wide,’ or, to take a concrete example, ‘The
wood is 1 league long and 4 furlongs wide.’ The question arises whether we are
justified in making this mean that here is a wood whose superficial content is
equal to that of a rectangular parallelogram 480 statute perches long by 160 statute
perches wide. We are rash in imposing our perch of 16·5 feet on the whole
England of the eleventh century, even though we are to measure arable land. We
are rasher in using that perch for the measurement of woodland. But perhaps we
are rasher still in supposing that the Domesday jurors have true superficial
measurement in their minds[1416]. We strongly suspect that they are thinking of
shape as well as of size, and may be giving us the extreme diameters of the wood
or some diameters that they guess to be near the mean. If a clergyman told us that
his parish was 3 miles long by 2 wide, we should not accuse him of falsehood or
blunder if we subsequently discovered that in shape it was approximately a right-
angled triangle and contained only some 3 superficial miles. And now let us
observe how rude these statements are. The Norfolk jurors are in the habit of
recording the length and the breadth of the vills. Occasionally they profess to do
this with extreme accuracy[1417]. However, we reckon that in about 100 out of 550
Page 397
cases they say that the vill is one league long by a half-league wide. This
delightfully symmetrical county therefore should have quite a hundred parishes,
each of which contains close upon 720 acres. Among the 800 parishes of modern
Norfolk there are not 70 whose size lies between 600 and 800 acres. We are not
saying that time spent over these lineal measurements is wasted, but an argument
which gets to the size of the teamland by postulating in the first place that our
statute perch was commonly used for all purposes throughout England, and in the
second that these lineal can be converted into superficial measurements by simple
arithmetic, is not very cogent and is apt to become circular, for the teamland
contains its 120 acres because that is the space left for it by parochial boundaries
when we have measured off the woods and pastures, and our measurement of the
woods and pastures is correct because it will leave 120 acres for every teamland.
One more word about these lineal measurements. In
Measured teamlands.
Norfolk and Suffolk the total area of the vills is indicated
by them, and so it is in Yorkshire also. Now, unless we
err, it sometimes happens that if we arithmetically deduce the total area from its
recorded length and breadth, and then subtract from that area the content of any
measured woods and pastures that there may be, we shall be left with too little
space to give each East Anglian carucate or each Yorkshire teamland 120 acres and
with far too little to allow a similar area to each East Anglian team. Try one
experiment. At Shereford in Norfolk we have to force at least one carucate on
which there are two teams into a space that is 3 furlongs in length by 3 in
breadth[1418]. That means, if our method be sound, that each team has at the utmost
45 acres to till. Try we Yorkshire. There also we shall find entries which to all
appearance will not suffer us to give 120 acres to the teamland.
In Andrebi ... 9 carucates for geld; there may be 6 teams.... The whole half a
league long and half [a league] wide[1419].
In Hotone and Bileham ... a manor of 10 carucates for geld; there may be 10
teams.... The whole 10 quarantines long and 8 wide[1420].
In Warlavesbi 6 carucates for geld; there may be 4 teams.... The whole half a
league long and half [a league] wide[1421].
It would seem then that in these cases the utmost limit for the teamland is 60, 80,
90 acres. Then again, there are a few precious instances in which lineal measures
are used in order to indicate the size of a piece of land the whole of which is
arable. This occurs so rarely that we may fairly expect something exceptional. The
result is bewildering. At Thetford we hear of land that is half a league long and
half a league wide: ‘the whole of this land is arable and 4 teams can plough
delightfully symmetrical county therefore should have quite a hundred parishes,
each of which contains close upon 720 acres. Among the 800 parishes of modern
Norfolk there are not 70 whose size lies between 600 and 800 acres. We are not
saying that time spent over these lineal measurements is wasted, but an argument
which gets to the size of the teamland by postulating in the first place that our
statute perch was commonly used for all purposes throughout England, and in the
second that these lineal can be converted into superficial measurements by simple
arithmetic, is not very cogent and is apt to become circular, for the teamland
contains its 120 acres because that is the space left for it by parochial boundaries
when we have measured off the woods and pastures, and our measurement of the
woods and pastures is correct because it will leave 120 acres for every teamland.
One more word about these lineal measurements. In
Measured teamlands.
Norfolk and Suffolk the total area of the vills is indicated
by them, and so it is in Yorkshire also. Now, unless we
err, it sometimes happens that if we arithmetically deduce the total area from its
recorded length and breadth, and then subtract from that area the content of any
measured woods and pastures that there may be, we shall be left with too little
space to give each East Anglian carucate or each Yorkshire teamland 120 acres and
with far too little to allow a similar area to each East Anglian team. Try one
experiment. At Shereford in Norfolk we have to force at least one carucate on
which there are two teams into a space that is 3 furlongs in length by 3 in
breadth[1418]. That means, if our method be sound, that each team has at the utmost
45 acres to till. Try we Yorkshire. There also we shall find entries which to all
appearance will not suffer us to give 120 acres to the teamland.
In Andrebi ... 9 carucates for geld; there may be 6 teams.... The whole half a
league long and half [a league] wide[1419].
In Hotone and Bileham ... a manor of 10 carucates for geld; there may be 10
teams.... The whole 10 quarantines long and 8 wide[1420].
In Warlavesbi 6 carucates for geld; there may be 4 teams.... The whole half a
league long and half [a league] wide[1421].
It would seem then that in these cases the utmost limit for the teamland is 60, 80,
90 acres. Then again, there are a few precious instances in which lineal measures
are used in order to indicate the size of a piece of land the whole of which is
arable. This occurs so rarely that we may fairly expect something exceptional. The
result is bewildering. At Thetford we hear of land that is half a league long and
half a league wide: ‘the whole of this land is arable and 4 teams can plough
Page 398
it[1422].’ Here then, but 90 acres are assigned to the teamland. We journey to
Yorkshire and first we will take an entry which suits the Eytonian doctrine well
enough. ‘There are 13 carucates of land less one bovate for geld; 8 teams can
plough them.... Arable land 10 quarentines long and equally broad[1423].’ In this
case we have 1000 acres to divide among 8 teamlands, and this would make each
teamland 125 acres:—we could hardly expect a pleasanter quotient. But on the
same page we have an entry which tells of a manor with 60 carucates and 6
bovates for geld and 35 teamlands where the ‘arable land’ is described as being ‘2
leagues long and 2 [leagues] wide[1424].’ This gives nearly 165 acres to the
teamland. There are two Lincolnshire entries which, when treated in a similar way,
give 160[1425] and 225[1426] acres to the teamland. Then there is a Staffordshire
entry which gives no less than 360 acres to each teamland, though it gives only
160 to each existing team[1427]. The suspicion can not but cross our minds that as
regards the amount of land that had 8 oxen for its culture there may have been as
wide a difference between the various shires in the days of the Confessor as there
was in the days of Arthur Young; only, whereas in the eighteenth century a little
space ploughed by many oxen was a relic of barbarism, it was in the eleventh an
index of prosperity, freedom, a thick population and a comparatively intense
agriculture. But theories about the facts of husbandry will not dispel the whole of
the fog which shrouds the Domesday teamland.
That, if all England be taken as a whole, the average
Amount of ploughed land
teamland of Domesday Book would contain about 120 in England.
acres seems possible, and since we ourselves are
committed to the belief that the old traditional hide had
arable acres to this number, it may be advisable that we should examine some
districts of ancient England through the medium of the hypothesis that
Domesday’s teamland has a long-hundred of our statute acres. In Column 1. of the
following table we place the result obtained if we multiply a county’s teamlands
(or in the case of Sussex and Gloucester the teams) by 120; and in the following
columns we give the figures which show the state of the county in 1895. In order
to make a rough comparison the easier, we give round figures and omit three
noughts, so that, for example, 371 stands for 371,000 acres[1428].
Mountain
and Total
Heath Acreage
Land Woods of
Permanent used for and Modern
Arable Arable pastures grazing Plantation County
in 1086 (1895) (1895) (1895) (1895) (1895)
Yorkshire and first we will take an entry which suits the Eytonian doctrine well
enough. ‘There are 13 carucates of land less one bovate for geld; 8 teams can
plough them.... Arable land 10 quarentines long and equally broad[1423].’ In this
case we have 1000 acres to divide among 8 teamlands, and this would make each
teamland 125 acres:—we could hardly expect a pleasanter quotient. But on the
same page we have an entry which tells of a manor with 60 carucates and 6
bovates for geld and 35 teamlands where the ‘arable land’ is described as being ‘2
leagues long and 2 [leagues] wide[1424].’ This gives nearly 165 acres to the
teamland. There are two Lincolnshire entries which, when treated in a similar way,
give 160[1425] and 225[1426] acres to the teamland. Then there is a Staffordshire
entry which gives no less than 360 acres to each teamland, though it gives only
160 to each existing team[1427]. The suspicion can not but cross our minds that as
regards the amount of land that had 8 oxen for its culture there may have been as
wide a difference between the various shires in the days of the Confessor as there
was in the days of Arthur Young; only, whereas in the eighteenth century a little
space ploughed by many oxen was a relic of barbarism, it was in the eleventh an
index of prosperity, freedom, a thick population and a comparatively intense
agriculture. But theories about the facts of husbandry will not dispel the whole of
the fog which shrouds the Domesday teamland.
That, if all England be taken as a whole, the average
Amount of ploughed land
teamland of Domesday Book would contain about 120 in England.
acres seems possible, and since we ourselves are
committed to the belief that the old traditional hide had
arable acres to this number, it may be advisable that we should examine some
districts of ancient England through the medium of the hypothesis that
Domesday’s teamland has a long-hundred of our statute acres. In Column 1. of the
following table we place the result obtained if we multiply a county’s teamlands
(or in the case of Sussex and Gloucester the teams) by 120; and in the following
columns we give the figures which show the state of the county in 1895. In order
to make a rough comparison the easier, we give round figures and omit three
noughts, so that, for example, 371 stands for 371,000 acres[1428].
Mountain
and Total
Heath Acreage
Land Woods of
Permanent used for and Modern
Arable Arable pastures grazing Plantation County
in 1086 (1895) (1895) (1895) (1895) (1895)
Page 399
1000 1000 1000 1000 1000 1000
Acres Acres Acres Acres Acres Acres
Sussex 371 298 381 9 124 933
Surrey 141 133 152 12 54 461
Berkshire 251 204 163 1 36 462
Dorset 280 188 300 18 38 632
Somerset 577 207 653 48 46 1042
Devon 957 581 633 138 86 1667
Buckingham 269 165 236 2 32 476
Oxford 317 228 188 1 27 485
Gloucester 589 269 387 7 58 797
Bedford 187 155 100 1 13 298
Northampton 352 215 344 0 28 640
Lincoln 605 1017 501 2 43 1695
These figures are startling enough. We are required to Decrease of arable.
believe that in many counties, even in Sussex where the
forest still filled a large space, there were more acres ploughed T. R. W. than are
ploughed T. R. V., while in some cases the number has been reduced by one half
during the intervening centuries. Were the old acres in Oxfordshire as large as our
own, a good deal more than three-fifths of that county was ploughed. Much might
be said of the extreme futility of ancient agriculture. Then we should have to
remember the ‘inclosures’ of the sixteenth century; also the movement which in
our own day threatens to carry us back to ‘the pastoral state[1429].’ We should have
to scrutinize those abundant marks of the plough which occur in our meadows and
on our hillsides, even where we least expect them, and to distinguish those which
were being made in the days of the Norman conqueror from those which tell of a
much later age when ‘the Corsican tyrant’ threatened our shores.
And then there is the great food problem. At this point we
The food problem.
might desire the aid of a jury of scientific experts. We are,
indeed, but ill prepared to deliver a charge or to define a
clear issue, but the main question may be roughly stated thus:—South of Yorkshire
and Cheshire we have some 275,000 ‘recorded men,’ some 75,000 recorded teams
and (if we allow 120 statute acres to every team) some 9,000,000 statute acres of
arable land[1430]. Is this supply of arable adequate or excessive for the population?
Unfortunately, however, the question involves more than one unknown quantity.
Acres Acres Acres Acres Acres Acres
Sussex 371 298 381 9 124 933
Surrey 141 133 152 12 54 461
Berkshire 251 204 163 1 36 462
Dorset 280 188 300 18 38 632
Somerset 577 207 653 48 46 1042
Devon 957 581 633 138 86 1667
Buckingham 269 165 236 2 32 476
Oxford 317 228 188 1 27 485
Gloucester 589 269 387 7 58 797
Bedford 187 155 100 1 13 298
Northampton 352 215 344 0 28 640
Lincoln 605 1017 501 2 43 1695
These figures are startling enough. We are required to Decrease of arable.
believe that in many counties, even in Sussex where the
forest still filled a large space, there were more acres ploughed T. R. W. than are
ploughed T. R. V., while in some cases the number has been reduced by one half
during the intervening centuries. Were the old acres in Oxfordshire as large as our
own, a good deal more than three-fifths of that county was ploughed. Much might
be said of the extreme futility of ancient agriculture. Then we should have to
remember the ‘inclosures’ of the sixteenth century; also the movement which in
our own day threatens to carry us back to ‘the pastoral state[1429].’ We should have
to scrutinize those abundant marks of the plough which occur in our meadows and
on our hillsides, even where we least expect them, and to distinguish those which
were being made in the days of the Norman conqueror from those which tell of a
much later age when ‘the Corsican tyrant’ threatened our shores.
And then there is the great food problem. At this point we
The food problem.
might desire the aid of a jury of scientific experts. We are,
indeed, but ill prepared to deliver a charge or to define a
clear issue, but the main question may be roughly stated thus:—South of Yorkshire
and Cheshire we have some 275,000 ‘recorded men,’ some 75,000 recorded teams
and (if we allow 120 statute acres to every team) some 9,000,000 statute acres of
arable land[1430]. Is this supply of arable adequate or excessive for the population?
Unfortunately, however, the question involves more than one unknown quantity.
Page 400
In the first place, by what figure are we to multiply the
What was the population?
number of ‘recorded men’ before we shall obtain the total
population? Here we have to remember that nothing is
said by our record about some of the largest towns and that the figures which we
obtain from Norwich[1431] suggest that the inhabitants of London, Winchester and
the like should not be neglected, even by those who are aiming at the rudest
computation. Then what we read of Bury St Edmunds[1432] suggests that around
every great abbey were clustered many artificers, servants and bedesmen who as a
general rule were not enumerated by the jurors. We must also remember the
monks, nuns and canons and the large households of barons and prelates[1433].
Again, it is by no means unlikely that, despite a high rate of mortality among
children, the household of the ordinary villein was upon an average larger than is
the household of the modern cottager or artizan, for the blood-bond was stronger
than it is now-a-days. Married brothers with their wives and children may not
unfrequently have dwelt in one house and may be described in our record as a
single villanus because they hold an undivided inheritance. On the other hand, we
have seen reason to think that in the eastern villages many men may be counted
more than once[1434]. Shall we, for the sake of argument, multiply the recorded
men by 5? This would give us a population of 1,375,000 souls[1435].
What portion of the arable land shall we suppose to be
What was the field-
sown in any one year? Some grave doubts may occur to system?
us before we put this portion higher than one half[1436].
Common opinion would perhaps strike a balance between
two-field and three-field husbandry. So we will suppose that out of 9 million acres
5 million are sown.
Then comes the insoluble question about the acre’s yield.
What was the acre’s yield?
Even could we state an average, this would not be very
serviceable, for every district had to feed itself in every
year, and the statistics of the later middle ages suggest that the difference between
good and bad years was very large, while the valuations of the manors in
Domesday Book seem to tell us that the difference between fertile and sterile,
forward and backward counties was much wider in the eleventh century than it is
in our own day. The scientific agriculturist of the thirteenth century proposed to
sow an acre with two bushels of wheat and regarded ten bushels as the proper
return[1437]. Walter of Henley proved by figures that a three-fold return would not
be remunerative, unless prices were exceptionally good, but he evidently thought
of this exiguous yield as a possibility[1438], and yet, as we have seen, he represents
the ‘high farming’ of his time and in his two-course husbandry would plough the
land thrice over between every two crops. In the first half of the next century we
What was the population?
number of ‘recorded men’ before we shall obtain the total
population? Here we have to remember that nothing is
said by our record about some of the largest towns and that the figures which we
obtain from Norwich[1431] suggest that the inhabitants of London, Winchester and
the like should not be neglected, even by those who are aiming at the rudest
computation. Then what we read of Bury St Edmunds[1432] suggests that around
every great abbey were clustered many artificers, servants and bedesmen who as a
general rule were not enumerated by the jurors. We must also remember the
monks, nuns and canons and the large households of barons and prelates[1433].
Again, it is by no means unlikely that, despite a high rate of mortality among
children, the household of the ordinary villein was upon an average larger than is
the household of the modern cottager or artizan, for the blood-bond was stronger
than it is now-a-days. Married brothers with their wives and children may not
unfrequently have dwelt in one house and may be described in our record as a
single villanus because they hold an undivided inheritance. On the other hand, we
have seen reason to think that in the eastern villages many men may be counted
more than once[1434]. Shall we, for the sake of argument, multiply the recorded
men by 5? This would give us a population of 1,375,000 souls[1435].
What portion of the arable land shall we suppose to be
What was the field-
sown in any one year? Some grave doubts may occur to system?
us before we put this portion higher than one half[1436].
Common opinion would perhaps strike a balance between
two-field and three-field husbandry. So we will suppose that out of 9 million acres
5 million are sown.
Then comes the insoluble question about the acre’s yield.
What was the acre’s yield?
Even could we state an average, this would not be very
serviceable, for every district had to feed itself in every
year, and the statistics of the later middle ages suggest that the difference between
good and bad years was very large, while the valuations of the manors in
Domesday Book seem to tell us that the difference between fertile and sterile,
forward and backward counties was much wider in the eleventh century than it is
in our own day. The scientific agriculturist of the thirteenth century proposed to
sow an acre with two bushels of wheat and regarded ten bushels as the proper
return[1437]. Walter of Henley proved by figures that a three-fold return would not
be remunerative, unless prices were exceptionally good, but he evidently thought
of this exiguous yield as a possibility[1438], and yet, as we have seen, he represents
the ‘high farming’ of his time and in his two-course husbandry would plough the
land thrice over between every two crops. In the first half of the next century we
Page 401
can not put the average as high as 8 bushels[1439]. To eyes that look for 29 or 30, a
yield of from 6 to 10 may seem pitiful; and the ‘miserable husbandry’ that Arthur
Young saw in the west of England was producing from 15 to 20[1440]. However,
there are countries in which a crop of wheat which gave 10 of our bushels to one
of our acres would not be very small[1441]. For our present purpose, the figure that
we should wish to obtain would be, not that which expressed the yield of an
average year, but that which was the outcome of a bad year, for we have to keep
folk alive and they can not wait for the good times. Let us then take our hypothesis
from Walter of Henley. We suppose a yield of 6 bushels, 2 of which must be
retained for seed. This would give us 20 million bushels as food, or, we will say,
15 bushels for every person.
Now, had we to deal with modern wheat and modern
Of beer.
mills, we might argue that the bushel of wheat would
weigh 60 pounds, that the weight of flour would be 72 per
cent. of the weight of grain[1442], and that every human mouth could thus be
provided with a little more than 28 ounces of flour every day, or, to put it another
way, with bread amounting to nine-sixteenths of a four pound loaf[1443]. Some
large, but indefinable, deduction should be made from this amount on the score of
poor grain and wasteful processes. As the sum stands, we are at present proposing
to give to each person a great deal more wheat-flour than would be obtained if the
total amount consumed now-a-days in the United Kingdom were divided by the
number of its inhabitants[1444]. But it need hardly be said that the problem is far
more complex than are our figures. In the first place, we have to withdraw from
the men of 1086 a large quantity, perhaps more than a half, of the wheat-flour that
we have given them in order to supply its place with other cereals[1445], in
particular with barley and oats, much of which, together with some of the
wheat[1446], will be consumed in the form of beer. And who shall fathom that
ocean? Multum biberunt de cerevisia Anglicana, as the pope said. Their choice lay
for the more part between beer and water. In the twelfth century the corn-rents
paid to the bishop of Durham often comprised malt, wheat and oats in equal
quantities[1447]. In the next century the economy of the canons of St. Paul’s was so
arranged that for every 30 quarters of wheat that went to make bread, 7 quarters of
wheat, 7 of barley and 32 of oats went to make beer[1448]. The weekly allowance
of every canon included 30 gallons[1449]. In one year their brewery seems to have
produced 67,814 gallons from 175 quarters of wheat, a like quantity of barley and
708 quarters of oats[1450]. With such figures before us, it becomes a serious
question whether we can devote less than a third of the sown land to the provision
of drink. The monk, who would have growled if he got less than a gallon a day,
would, we may suppose, consume in the course of a year 20 bushels of barley or
an equivalent amount of other grain: in other words, the produce, when seed-corn
yield of from 6 to 10 may seem pitiful; and the ‘miserable husbandry’ that Arthur
Young saw in the west of England was producing from 15 to 20[1440]. However,
there are countries in which a crop of wheat which gave 10 of our bushels to one
of our acres would not be very small[1441]. For our present purpose, the figure that
we should wish to obtain would be, not that which expressed the yield of an
average year, but that which was the outcome of a bad year, for we have to keep
folk alive and they can not wait for the good times. Let us then take our hypothesis
from Walter of Henley. We suppose a yield of 6 bushels, 2 of which must be
retained for seed. This would give us 20 million bushels as food, or, we will say,
15 bushels for every person.
Now, had we to deal with modern wheat and modern
Of beer.
mills, we might argue that the bushel of wheat would
weigh 60 pounds, that the weight of flour would be 72 per
cent. of the weight of grain[1442], and that every human mouth could thus be
provided with a little more than 28 ounces of flour every day, or, to put it another
way, with bread amounting to nine-sixteenths of a four pound loaf[1443]. Some
large, but indefinable, deduction should be made from this amount on the score of
poor grain and wasteful processes. As the sum stands, we are at present proposing
to give to each person a great deal more wheat-flour than would be obtained if the
total amount consumed now-a-days in the United Kingdom were divided by the
number of its inhabitants[1444]. But it need hardly be said that the problem is far
more complex than are our figures. In the first place, we have to withdraw from
the men of 1086 a large quantity, perhaps more than a half, of the wheat-flour that
we have given them in order to supply its place with other cereals[1445], in
particular with barley and oats, much of which, together with some of the
wheat[1446], will be consumed in the form of beer. And who shall fathom that
ocean? Multum biberunt de cerevisia Anglicana, as the pope said. Their choice lay
for the more part between beer and water. In the twelfth century the corn-rents
paid to the bishop of Durham often comprised malt, wheat and oats in equal
quantities[1447]. In the next century the economy of the canons of St. Paul’s was so
arranged that for every 30 quarters of wheat that went to make bread, 7 quarters of
wheat, 7 of barley and 32 of oats went to make beer[1448]. The weekly allowance
of every canon included 30 gallons[1449]. In one year their brewery seems to have
produced 67,814 gallons from 175 quarters of wheat, a like quantity of barley and
708 quarters of oats[1450]. With such figures before us, it becomes a serious
question whether we can devote less than a third of the sown land to the provision
of drink. The monk, who would have growled if he got less than a gallon a day,
would, we may suppose, consume in the course of a year 20 bushels of barley or
an equivalent amount of other grain: in other words, the produce, when seed-corn
Page 402
is deducted, of from two to three acres of land; and perhaps to every mouth in
England we must give half a gallon daily[1451].
But if we can not make teetotallers of our ancestors (and
The Englishman’s diet.
in very truth we can not) neither may we convert them to
vegetarianism. What we can read of the provender-rents
paid in the days before the Conquest suggests that those who were well-to-do,
including the monks, consumed a great deal of mutton, pork, poultry, fish, eels,
cheese and honey[1452]. This would relieve the arable of part of the pressure that it
would otherwise have borne, for, though we already hear of two manors which
between them supply 6000 dog-loaves for the king’s hounds[1453], and also read of
pigs that are fattened with corn[1454], it is not very probable that any beasts, save
those that laboured, got much from the arable, except the straw, and the stubble
which we may suspect of having been abundantly mixed with grass and weeds. It
is likely, however, that the oxen which were engaged in ploughing were fed at
times with oats. Walter of Henley would keep his plough-beasts at the manger for
five-and-twenty weeks in the year and would during that time give 70 bushels of
oats to every eight of them[1455]. At this rate our 75,000 teams would require
5,250,000 bushels of oats, and on this score we might have to deduct some 4
million bushels of wheat[1456] from our 20 millions and reduce by one-fifth each
person’s allowance of grain. But then, it is by no means certain that we ought to
transplant Walter’s practices into the eleventh century; we have seen that he
expected much of his oxen[1457].
At first sight it may seem incredible that the average
Is the arable super-
human being annually required the produce of nearly abundant?
seven acres. But observe how rapidly the area will
disappear. We deduct a half for the idle shift; a third of the
remainder we set apart as beer-land. We have not much more than two acres
remaining, and may yet have to feed oxen and horses. But suppose that we
concede to every human mouth the wheat of two full acres; we can not say for
certain that we are giving it a quarter of grain, even though we suppose each acre
to yield more than was to be had always and everywhere in the fourteenth
century[1458].
Our doubt about the food of the oxen makes it difficult
Amount of pasturage.
for us to state even the outlines of another important
problem. Are we leaving pasture enough for the beasts?
Their number was by no means small. South of the southern frontier of Cheshire
and Yorkshire we must accommodate in the first place some 600,000 beasts of the
plough, and in the second place and for their maintenance a sufficiency of bulls,
England we must give half a gallon daily[1451].
But if we can not make teetotallers of our ancestors (and
The Englishman’s diet.
in very truth we can not) neither may we convert them to
vegetarianism. What we can read of the provender-rents
paid in the days before the Conquest suggests that those who were well-to-do,
including the monks, consumed a great deal of mutton, pork, poultry, fish, eels,
cheese and honey[1452]. This would relieve the arable of part of the pressure that it
would otherwise have borne, for, though we already hear of two manors which
between them supply 6000 dog-loaves for the king’s hounds[1453], and also read of
pigs that are fattened with corn[1454], it is not very probable that any beasts, save
those that laboured, got much from the arable, except the straw, and the stubble
which we may suspect of having been abundantly mixed with grass and weeds. It
is likely, however, that the oxen which were engaged in ploughing were fed at
times with oats. Walter of Henley would keep his plough-beasts at the manger for
five-and-twenty weeks in the year and would during that time give 70 bushels of
oats to every eight of them[1455]. At this rate our 75,000 teams would require
5,250,000 bushels of oats, and on this score we might have to deduct some 4
million bushels of wheat[1456] from our 20 millions and reduce by one-fifth each
person’s allowance of grain. But then, it is by no means certain that we ought to
transplant Walter’s practices into the eleventh century; we have seen that he
expected much of his oxen[1457].
At first sight it may seem incredible that the average
Is the arable super-
human being annually required the produce of nearly abundant?
seven acres. But observe how rapidly the area will
disappear. We deduct a half for the idle shift; a third of the
remainder we set apart as beer-land. We have not much more than two acres
remaining, and may yet have to feed oxen and horses. But suppose that we
concede to every human mouth the wheat of two full acres; we can not say for
certain that we are giving it a quarter of grain, even though we suppose each acre
to yield more than was to be had always and everywhere in the fourteenth
century[1458].
Our doubt about the food of the oxen makes it difficult
Amount of pasturage.
for us to state even the outlines of another important
problem. Are we leaving pasture enough for the beasts?
Their number was by no means small. South of the southern frontier of Cheshire
and Yorkshire we must accommodate in the first place some 600,000 beasts of the
plough, and in the second place and for their maintenance a sufficiency of bulls,
Page 403
cows and calves. Now-a-days England keeps 4,723,000 head of cattle, but we have
been excluding from view near a quarter of England. Then there are other animals
to be provided for. Their number we can not guess, for apparently the statistics that
we obtain from the south-western and eastern counties give us only the stock that
is on the demesne of the manors[1459]. We have seen that the peasants in East
Anglia had sheep enough to make their ‘fold-soke’ an important social
institution[1460]. Also we have much evidence of large herds of pigs belonging to
the villeins, though these we may send to the woods. But, attending only to the
dominical stock, we will begin by looking at the manor which stands first in the
Cambridgeshire Inquest. The lord has 5 teams, 8 head of not-ploughing cattle, 4
rounceys, 10 pigs and 480 sheep. Then, in the accompanying table we will give
some figures from various counties which show the amount of stock that is kept
where there are 200 teams or thereabouts.
Teams Beasts
(Demesne not of
and the
Tenants’ Plough Horses Goats Pigs Sheep
Essex 207 267 34 107 777 1657
Suffolk 200 196 30 295 676 1705
Norfolk 202 132 44 200 672 5673
Dorset 202 159 47 281 479 6160
Somerset 202 82 16 49 198 1506
Devon 205 282 16 135 173 1553
Cornwall 200 62 35 52 26 1445
Total 1418 1180 222 1119 3001 19699
Even if we look only at the flocks which belong to the holders of manors, we may
have to feed a million sheep south of the Humber, and, though all England now
maintains more than 15 millions, it does this by devoting a large portion of its
arable to the growth of turnips and the like. No doubt, the medieval sheep were
wretched little animals; also large numbers of them were slaughtered and salted at
the approach of winter; but from the arable they got only the stubble, and every
extension of the ploughed area deteriorated the quality besides diminishing the
quantity of the pasture that was left for their hungry mouths. As already said, our
forefathers did not live on bread and beer; bacon must have been plentiful among
them[1461]. Also many fleeces were needed for their clothing. As to meadow land
(pratum), that is, land that was mown, it was sparse and precious[1462]; the supply
of it was often insufficient even for the lord’s demesne oxen. At least in
been excluding from view near a quarter of England. Then there are other animals
to be provided for. Their number we can not guess, for apparently the statistics that
we obtain from the south-western and eastern counties give us only the stock that
is on the demesne of the manors[1459]. We have seen that the peasants in East
Anglia had sheep enough to make their ‘fold-soke’ an important social
institution[1460]. Also we have much evidence of large herds of pigs belonging to
the villeins, though these we may send to the woods. But, attending only to the
dominical stock, we will begin by looking at the manor which stands first in the
Cambridgeshire Inquest. The lord has 5 teams, 8 head of not-ploughing cattle, 4
rounceys, 10 pigs and 480 sheep. Then, in the accompanying table we will give
some figures from various counties which show the amount of stock that is kept
where there are 200 teams or thereabouts.
Teams Beasts
(Demesne not of
and the
Tenants’ Plough Horses Goats Pigs Sheep
Essex 207 267 34 107 777 1657
Suffolk 200 196 30 295 676 1705
Norfolk 202 132 44 200 672 5673
Dorset 202 159 47 281 479 6160
Somerset 202 82 16 49 198 1506
Devon 205 282 16 135 173 1553
Cornwall 200 62 35 52 26 1445
Total 1418 1180 222 1119 3001 19699
Even if we look only at the flocks which belong to the holders of manors, we may
have to feed a million sheep south of the Humber, and, though all England now
maintains more than 15 millions, it does this by devoting a large portion of its
arable to the growth of turnips and the like. No doubt, the medieval sheep were
wretched little animals; also large numbers of them were slaughtered and salted at
the approach of winter; but from the arable they got only the stubble, and every
extension of the ploughed area deteriorated the quality besides diminishing the
quantity of the pasture that was left for their hungry mouths. As already said, our
forefathers did not live on bread and beer; bacon must have been plentiful among
them[1461]. Also many fleeces were needed for their clothing. As to meadow land
(pratum), that is, land that was mown, it was sparse and precious[1462]; the supply
of it was often insufficient even for the lord’s demesne oxen. At least in
Page 404
Cambridgeshire, we find traces of a theory which taught that every ox should have
an acre of meadow; but commonly this was an unrealized ideal[1463]. In Dorset
now-a-days there will be near 95,000 acres growing grass for hay, whereas there
were not 7,000 acres of meadow in 1086[1464]. Therefore we are throwing a heavy
strain on the pasture[1465].
Lastly, we must not neglect, as some modern calculators
Area of the villages.
do, the sites of the villages, the straggling group of houses
with their court-yards, gardens and crofts, for this deducts
a sensible piece from the conceivably tillable area. An exceedingly minute account
of Sawston in Cambridgeshire which comes from the year 1279 shows us a
territory thus divided: Messuages, Gardens, Crofts, etc., 85 acres: Arable, 1243
acres: Meadow, 82 acres: Several Pasture, 30 acres. The neighbouring village of
Whittlesford shows us: Messuages, Gardens, Crofts, etc., 35 acres: Arable, 1363
acres: Meadow, 44 acres: Several Pasture, 35 acres. In both cases we must add
some unspecified quantity of Common Pasture[1466]. The core of the village was
not large when compared with its fields; but it can not be ignored.
Recurring for a moment to our food problem, we may
Produce and value.
observe that the values that are set on the manors in
Domesday Book seem to point to a very feeble yield of
corn. Without looking for extreme cases, we shall often find that the value of a
teamland is no more than 10 shillings. Now let us make the hypothesis most
favourable to fertility and suppose that this ‘value’ represents a pure, net rent[1467].
We will make another convenient but extravagant assumption; we will say that 24
bushels of wheat will make 365 four-pound loaves. If then a lord is to get one such
loaf every day from each teamland that is valued at 10 shillings, the price of wheat
will be a good deal less than 5 pence the bushel; if two daily loaves are to be had,
the price of the bushel must be reduced below 21⁄2 pence, for the cost of grinding
and baking is not negligible. Whether this last price could be assumed as normal
must be very doubtful, for the little that Domesday tells us about the price of grain
is told in obscure and disputable terms[1468]. However, the evidence that comes to
us from the twelfth[1469] and thirteenth centuries[1470] suggests a rough equivalence
between an ox and two quarters of wheat, and in the eleventh the traditional price
of the ox was 30 pence. But at any rate, the lord who has a small village with five
teamlands, and who lets it to a firmarius, will receive a rent which, when it is
stated in loaves, is by no means splendid. He will not be much of a hláford, or
have many ‘loaf-eaters’ if his whole revenue is £2. 10s. or, in other words, if he is
lord of but one small village in the midlands.
an acre of meadow; but commonly this was an unrealized ideal[1463]. In Dorset
now-a-days there will be near 95,000 acres growing grass for hay, whereas there
were not 7,000 acres of meadow in 1086[1464]. Therefore we are throwing a heavy
strain on the pasture[1465].
Lastly, we must not neglect, as some modern calculators
Area of the villages.
do, the sites of the villages, the straggling group of houses
with their court-yards, gardens and crofts, for this deducts
a sensible piece from the conceivably tillable area. An exceedingly minute account
of Sawston in Cambridgeshire which comes from the year 1279 shows us a
territory thus divided: Messuages, Gardens, Crofts, etc., 85 acres: Arable, 1243
acres: Meadow, 82 acres: Several Pasture, 30 acres. The neighbouring village of
Whittlesford shows us: Messuages, Gardens, Crofts, etc., 35 acres: Arable, 1363
acres: Meadow, 44 acres: Several Pasture, 35 acres. In both cases we must add
some unspecified quantity of Common Pasture[1466]. The core of the village was
not large when compared with its fields; but it can not be ignored.
Recurring for a moment to our food problem, we may
Produce and value.
observe that the values that are set on the manors in
Domesday Book seem to point to a very feeble yield of
corn. Without looking for extreme cases, we shall often find that the value of a
teamland is no more than 10 shillings. Now let us make the hypothesis most
favourable to fertility and suppose that this ‘value’ represents a pure, net rent[1467].
We will make another convenient but extravagant assumption; we will say that 24
bushels of wheat will make 365 four-pound loaves. If then a lord is to get one such
loaf every day from each teamland that is valued at 10 shillings, the price of wheat
will be a good deal less than 5 pence the bushel; if two daily loaves are to be had,
the price of the bushel must be reduced below 21⁄2 pence, for the cost of grinding
and baking is not negligible. Whether this last price could be assumed as normal
must be very doubtful, for the little that Domesday tells us about the price of grain
is told in obscure and disputable terms[1468]. However, the evidence that comes to
us from the twelfth[1469] and thirteenth centuries[1470] suggests a rough equivalence
between an ox and two quarters of wheat, and in the eleventh the traditional price
of the ox was 30 pence. But at any rate, the lord who has a small village with five
teamlands, and who lets it to a firmarius, will receive a rent which, when it is
stated in loaves, is by no means splendid. He will not be much of a hláford, or
have many ‘loaf-eaters’ if his whole revenue is £2. 10s. or, in other words, if he is
lord of but one small village in the midlands.
Page 405
Here we must leave this question to those who are expert
Varying size of acres.
in the history of agriculture; but if some relief is required,
it may be plausibly obtained by a reduction in the size of
the ancient acre. A small piece off the village perches will mean a great piece off
the 2,600 teamlands of Oxfordshire, and we seem to have the best warrant for a
recourse to this device where it is most needed. The pressure upon our space
appears to be at its utmost in Oxfordshire, and just for that county we have first-
rate evidence of some very small acres[1471]. On the other hand, in Lincolnshire
and generally in the north, where we read of abnormally large acres, we seem to
have room enough for them. And here may be a partial explanation of the apparent
fact that the teamland of Oxfordshire does not support three, while that of
Lincolnshire supports five recorded men.
In these last paragraphs we have been speaking of
The teamland in
averages struck for large spaces; but if we come to some Cambridgeshire.
particular districts we shall have the greatest difficulty in
allowing 120 acres to every teamland. This is the case in
southern Cambridgeshire. In that county Domesday’s list of vills is so nearly the
same as the modern list of parishes that we run no great risk in comparing the
ancient teamlands with the modern acreage vill by vill, if we also compare them
hundred by hundred. The general result will be to make us unwilling to bestow on
every teamland a long-hundred of acres. One example shall be given. The
Whittlesford Hundred[1472] contains five vills and we can not easily concede to it
more land than is now within its boundary. In the following table we give for each
vill its modern acreage, then the number of its teamlands, then the result of
multiplying that number by 120.
Whittlesford Hundred.
Sawston 1884 10 1200
Whittlesford 1969 11 1320
Duxford 3232 21[1473] 2520
Hinxton 1557 16[1474] 1920
Ickleton 2695 241⁄2 2940
The Hundred 11337 821⁄2 9900
In two cases out of five we have already come upon sheer physical impossibility.
But let us suppose some rearrangement of parish boundaries and look at the whole
hundred. We are giving it 9900 acres of arable and leaving 1437 for other
purposes. Then we are told of ‘meadow for’ 37 teams and this at the rate usual in
Cambridgeshire[1475], means 296 acres, so that we have only 1141 left. On this we
Varying size of acres.
in the history of agriculture; but if some relief is required,
it may be plausibly obtained by a reduction in the size of
the ancient acre. A small piece off the village perches will mean a great piece off
the 2,600 teamlands of Oxfordshire, and we seem to have the best warrant for a
recourse to this device where it is most needed. The pressure upon our space
appears to be at its utmost in Oxfordshire, and just for that county we have first-
rate evidence of some very small acres[1471]. On the other hand, in Lincolnshire
and generally in the north, where we read of abnormally large acres, we seem to
have room enough for them. And here may be a partial explanation of the apparent
fact that the teamland of Oxfordshire does not support three, while that of
Lincolnshire supports five recorded men.
In these last paragraphs we have been speaking of
The teamland in
averages struck for large spaces; but if we come to some Cambridgeshire.
particular districts we shall have the greatest difficulty in
allowing 120 acres to every teamland. This is the case in
southern Cambridgeshire. In that county Domesday’s list of vills is so nearly the
same as the modern list of parishes that we run no great risk in comparing the
ancient teamlands with the modern acreage vill by vill, if we also compare them
hundred by hundred. The general result will be to make us unwilling to bestow on
every teamland a long-hundred of acres. One example shall be given. The
Whittlesford Hundred[1472] contains five vills and we can not easily concede to it
more land than is now within its boundary. In the following table we give for each
vill its modern acreage, then the number of its teamlands, then the result of
multiplying that number by 120.
Whittlesford Hundred.
Sawston 1884 10 1200
Whittlesford 1969 11 1320
Duxford 3232 21[1473] 2520
Hinxton 1557 16[1474] 1920
Ickleton 2695 241⁄2 2940
The Hundred 11337 821⁄2 9900
In two cases out of five we have already come upon sheer physical impossibility.
But let us suppose some rearrangement of parish boundaries and look at the whole
hundred. We are giving it 9900 acres of arable and leaving 1437 for other
purposes. Then we are told of ‘meadow for’ 37 teams and this at the rate usual in
Cambridgeshire[1475], means 296 acres, so that we have only 1141 left. On this we
Page 406
must place the sites of five villages, houses, farmyards, fourteen water-mills,
cottages, gardens. Probably we want 250 acres at least to meet this demand. Not
900 acres remain for pasture. The dominical flocks and herds were not large, but
the lords were receiving divers ploughshares in return for the pasture rights
accorded to the tenants and in some of the vills there was not nearly enough
meadow for the oxen of the villeins. It is difficult to believe that 87 per cent. of a
Cambridgeshire hundred was under the plough, and that less than 8 per cent. was
pasture. However, we know too little to say that even this was impossible. In the
twelfth century we read of manors in which there is no pasture, except upon the
arable field that is taking its turn of idleness[1476]. We must remember that this idle
field was not fallowed until the summer[1477]; also we may suspect that much that
was not corn grew on the medieval corn-land.
Saddened by our encounter with the teamlands (B)—and
The hides of Domesday.
our last word about them is not yet said—we turn to the
hides, carucates and sulungs (A). With a fair allowance
for errors we feel safe in believing that the total number mentioned by Domesday
Book falls short of 70,000—and yet time was when we spoke of 60,000 knight’s
fees of 5 hides apiece[1478]. Let us then recall once more those tales of taxation that
are told by the chronicler[1479]. If Cnut raised a geld of £72,000, then, even if we
allow him something from those remote northern lands which William’s
commissioners did not enter, the rate of the impost can hardly have been less than
a pound on the hide. We are not told that he raised this sum in the course of a
single year; but, even if we suppose it spread over four years, it is a monstrous
exaction, and we can hardly fancy that in earlier days the pirates had waited long
for the £24,000 or £30,000 that were the price of their forbearance. And yet, as
already said, our choice seems to lie between believing these stories and charging
the annalist with reckless mendacity. Hereafter we shall argue that some ancient
statements about hidage, even some made by Bede himself, deserve no credit; but
it is one thing for a Northumbrian scholar of the eighth century to make very bad
guesses about the area of Sussex, and another for a chronicler of the eleventh to
keep on telling us that a king levies £21,099 or £11,048 or the like, if these sums
are wildly in excess of those that were demanded. As to the value of money, the
economists must be heard; but it is probable that the sea-rovers insisted on good
weight[1480], and when in the twelfth century we can begin to trace the movement
of prices, in particular the price of oxen, they are not falling but rising. However,
we have already said our say about the enormity of the danegeld.
We are now to investigate the ‘law’ of A and its relation to
Relation between hide and
B. We shall soon be convinced that we are not dealing teamland.
with two perfectly independent variables. There will often
cottages, gardens. Probably we want 250 acres at least to meet this demand. Not
900 acres remain for pasture. The dominical flocks and herds were not large, but
the lords were receiving divers ploughshares in return for the pasture rights
accorded to the tenants and in some of the vills there was not nearly enough
meadow for the oxen of the villeins. It is difficult to believe that 87 per cent. of a
Cambridgeshire hundred was under the plough, and that less than 8 per cent. was
pasture. However, we know too little to say that even this was impossible. In the
twelfth century we read of manors in which there is no pasture, except upon the
arable field that is taking its turn of idleness[1476]. We must remember that this idle
field was not fallowed until the summer[1477]; also we may suspect that much that
was not corn grew on the medieval corn-land.
Saddened by our encounter with the teamlands (B)—and
The hides of Domesday.
our last word about them is not yet said—we turn to the
hides, carucates and sulungs (A). With a fair allowance
for errors we feel safe in believing that the total number mentioned by Domesday
Book falls short of 70,000—and yet time was when we spoke of 60,000 knight’s
fees of 5 hides apiece[1478]. Let us then recall once more those tales of taxation that
are told by the chronicler[1479]. If Cnut raised a geld of £72,000, then, even if we
allow him something from those remote northern lands which William’s
commissioners did not enter, the rate of the impost can hardly have been less than
a pound on the hide. We are not told that he raised this sum in the course of a
single year; but, even if we suppose it spread over four years, it is a monstrous
exaction, and we can hardly fancy that in earlier days the pirates had waited long
for the £24,000 or £30,000 that were the price of their forbearance. And yet, as
already said, our choice seems to lie between believing these stories and charging
the annalist with reckless mendacity. Hereafter we shall argue that some ancient
statements about hidage, even some made by Bede himself, deserve no credit; but
it is one thing for a Northumbrian scholar of the eighth century to make very bad
guesses about the area of Sussex, and another for a chronicler of the eleventh to
keep on telling us that a king levies £21,099 or £11,048 or the like, if these sums
are wildly in excess of those that were demanded. As to the value of money, the
economists must be heard; but it is probable that the sea-rovers insisted on good
weight[1480], and when in the twelfth century we can begin to trace the movement
of prices, in particular the price of oxen, they are not falling but rising. However,
we have already said our say about the enormity of the danegeld.
We are now to investigate the ‘law’ of A and its relation to
Relation between hide and
B. We shall soon be convinced that we are not dealing teamland.
with two perfectly independent variables. There will often
Page 407
be wide variations between the two; A may descend to zero, while B is high, and in
some counties we shall see a steady tendency which makes A decidedly higher or
decidedly lower than B. And yet, if we look at England as a whole, we can not
help feeling that in some sense or another A ought to be equal to B, and that, when
this equation holds good, things are in a condition that we may call normal.
Perhaps, as we shall see hereafter, the current notion has been that the teamland
should be taxed as a hide if it lies in a district where a teamland will usually be
worth about a pound a year. But for the time we will leave value out of account,
and, to save words, we will appropriate three terms and use them technically.
When A = B, there is ‘equal rating’; when A > B, there is ‘over-rating’; when A < B
there is ‘under-rating.’ We shall find, then, that in many counties there are
numerous cases of equal rating. Thus in Buckinghamshire we count
cases of under-rating 136
cases of equal rating 102
cases of over-rating 115
In Lincolnshire we may find an unbroken series of fourteen entries each of which
gives us an instance of equal rating[1481]. In both Lincolnshire and Yorkshire such
cases are common, but, while in Lincolnshire over-rating is rare, in Yorkshire
under-rating is very rare. Fewer are the over-rated than the under-rated counties;
but there are some for which the figures can not be given, and, as immense
Yorkshire is set before us as much over-rated, the balance must be nearly
redressed. But further, we may see that the relation between A and B is apt to
change somewhat suddenly at the border of a county. The best illustration is given
by the twin shires of Leicester and Northampton, the one over-rated, the other
grossly under-rated. Another good illustration is given by the south-western
counties. Wiltshire is heavily over-rated; Dorset, as a whole, very equally rated;
Somerset decidedly under-rated, while when we come to Devon and Cornwall we
enter a land so much underrated that, had we only the account of these two
counties, the assumption that is implied in our terms ‘under-rated’ and ‘over-rated’
would never have entered our heads.
Now for one cause of the aberration of A from B we have
Unhidated estates.
not far to seek; it is a cause which will make A less than B
and which may reduce A to zero. It is privilege. Certain
estates have been altogether exempt from geld. In particular many royal estates
have been exempt. ‘Nescitur quot hidae sint ibi quia non reddidit
geldum’—‘Nunquam geldavit nec scitur quot hidae sint ibi’—‘Rex Edwardus
tenuit; tunc 20 hidae sed nunquam geldaverunt’:—such and such like are the
formulas that describe this immunity. The number of actually geldant hides is here
some counties we shall see a steady tendency which makes A decidedly higher or
decidedly lower than B. And yet, if we look at England as a whole, we can not
help feeling that in some sense or another A ought to be equal to B, and that, when
this equation holds good, things are in a condition that we may call normal.
Perhaps, as we shall see hereafter, the current notion has been that the teamland
should be taxed as a hide if it lies in a district where a teamland will usually be
worth about a pound a year. But for the time we will leave value out of account,
and, to save words, we will appropriate three terms and use them technically.
When A = B, there is ‘equal rating’; when A > B, there is ‘over-rating’; when A < B
there is ‘under-rating.’ We shall find, then, that in many counties there are
numerous cases of equal rating. Thus in Buckinghamshire we count
cases of under-rating 136
cases of equal rating 102
cases of over-rating 115
In Lincolnshire we may find an unbroken series of fourteen entries each of which
gives us an instance of equal rating[1481]. In both Lincolnshire and Yorkshire such
cases are common, but, while in Lincolnshire over-rating is rare, in Yorkshire
under-rating is very rare. Fewer are the over-rated than the under-rated counties;
but there are some for which the figures can not be given, and, as immense
Yorkshire is set before us as much over-rated, the balance must be nearly
redressed. But further, we may see that the relation between A and B is apt to
change somewhat suddenly at the border of a county. The best illustration is given
by the twin shires of Leicester and Northampton, the one over-rated, the other
grossly under-rated. Another good illustration is given by the south-western
counties. Wiltshire is heavily over-rated; Dorset, as a whole, very equally rated;
Somerset decidedly under-rated, while when we come to Devon and Cornwall we
enter a land so much underrated that, had we only the account of these two
counties, the assumption that is implied in our terms ‘under-rated’ and ‘over-rated’
would never have entered our heads.
Now for one cause of the aberration of A from B we have
Unhidated estates.
not far to seek; it is a cause which will make A less than B
and which may reduce A to zero. It is privilege. Certain
estates have been altogether exempt from geld. In particular many royal estates
have been exempt. ‘Nescitur quot hidae sint ibi quia non reddidit
geldum’—‘Nunquam geldavit nec scitur quot hidae sint ibi’—‘Rex Edwardus
tenuit; tunc 20 hidae sed nunquam geldaverunt’:—such and such like are the
formulas that describe this immunity. The number of actually geldant hides is here
Page 408
reduced to zero, and sometimes the very term ‘hides,’ so usually does it imply
taxation, is deemed inappropriate. But these royal estates do not stand alone. Often
enough some estate of a church has been utterly freed from taxation. The bishop of
Salisbury, for example, has a great estate at Sherborne which has gelded for 43
hides; but ‘in this same Sherborne he has 16 carucates of land; this land was never
divided into hides nor did it pay geld[1482].’
But then again, we have the phenomenon which has aptly
Beneficial hidation.
been called ‘beneficial hidation.’ Without being entirely
freed from the tax, a manor has been rated at a smaller
number of hides than it really contains. ‘There are 5 hides’ says a Gloucestershire
entry, ‘3 of them geld, but by grant of the Kings Edward and William 2 of them do
not geld[1483].’ ‘There are 8 hides there’ says another entry ‘and the ninth hide
belongs to the church of St. Edward; King Æthelred gave it quit [of geld][1484].’
‘There are 20 hides; of these 4 were quit of geld in the time of King Cnut[1485].’
‘The Bishop [of Winchester] holds Fernham [Fareham] in demesne; it always
belonged to the bishopric; in King Edward’s day it defended itself for 20 hides,
and it does so still; there are by tale 30 hides, but King Edward gave them thus
[i.e. granted that they should be 20 hides] by reason of the vikings, for it
[Fareham] is by the sea[1486].’ ‘Harold held it of King Edward; before Harold had
it, it defended itself for 27 hides, afterwards for 16 hides because Harold so
pleased. The men of the hundred never heard or saw any writ from the king which
put it at that figure[1487].’ We have chosen these examples because they give us
more information than we can often obtain; they take us back to the days of Cnut
and of Æthelred; they tell us of the depredations of the vikings; they show us a
magnate fixing the rateable value of his estate ad libitum suum. But our record is
replete with other instances in which we are told that by special royal favour an
estate has been lightly taxed[1488]. What is more, there are many other instances in
which we can hardly doubt that this same cause has been at work, though we are
not expressly told of it. When in a district which as a whole is over-rated, or but
moderately under-rated, we come upon a few manors which are extravagantly
under-rated, then we may fairly draw the inference that there has been ‘beneficial
hidation.’
Certainly this will account for much, and we have reason
Effect of privilege.
to believe that this disturbing force had been in operation
for a long time past and on a grand scale. There is an
undated writ of Æthelred[1489], which ordains that an immense estate of the church
of Winchester having Chilcombe for its centre and containing 100 hides shall
defend itself for one hide. In Domesday Book Chilcombe does defend itself for
one hide though it has land for 88 teams[1490]. But further, Æthelred is decreeing
taxation, is deemed inappropriate. But these royal estates do not stand alone. Often
enough some estate of a church has been utterly freed from taxation. The bishop of
Salisbury, for example, has a great estate at Sherborne which has gelded for 43
hides; but ‘in this same Sherborne he has 16 carucates of land; this land was never
divided into hides nor did it pay geld[1482].’
But then again, we have the phenomenon which has aptly
Beneficial hidation.
been called ‘beneficial hidation.’ Without being entirely
freed from the tax, a manor has been rated at a smaller
number of hides than it really contains. ‘There are 5 hides’ says a Gloucestershire
entry, ‘3 of them geld, but by grant of the Kings Edward and William 2 of them do
not geld[1483].’ ‘There are 8 hides there’ says another entry ‘and the ninth hide
belongs to the church of St. Edward; King Æthelred gave it quit [of geld][1484].’
‘There are 20 hides; of these 4 were quit of geld in the time of King Cnut[1485].’
‘The Bishop [of Winchester] holds Fernham [Fareham] in demesne; it always
belonged to the bishopric; in King Edward’s day it defended itself for 20 hides,
and it does so still; there are by tale 30 hides, but King Edward gave them thus
[i.e. granted that they should be 20 hides] by reason of the vikings, for it
[Fareham] is by the sea[1486].’ ‘Harold held it of King Edward; before Harold had
it, it defended itself for 27 hides, afterwards for 16 hides because Harold so
pleased. The men of the hundred never heard or saw any writ from the king which
put it at that figure[1487].’ We have chosen these examples because they give us
more information than we can often obtain; they take us back to the days of Cnut
and of Æthelred; they tell us of the depredations of the vikings; they show us a
magnate fixing the rateable value of his estate ad libitum suum. But our record is
replete with other instances in which we are told that by special royal favour an
estate has been lightly taxed[1488]. What is more, there are many other instances in
which we can hardly doubt that this same cause has been at work, though we are
not expressly told of it. When in a district which as a whole is over-rated, or but
moderately under-rated, we come upon a few manors which are extravagantly
under-rated, then we may fairly draw the inference that there has been ‘beneficial
hidation.’
Certainly this will account for much, and we have reason
Effect of privilege.
to believe that this disturbing force had been in operation
for a long time past and on a grand scale. There is an
undated writ of Æthelred[1489], which ordains that an immense estate of the church
of Winchester having Chilcombe for its centre and containing 100 hides shall
defend itself for one hide. In Domesday Book Chilcombe does defend itself for
one hide though it has land for 88 teams[1490]. But further, Æthelred is decreeing
Page 409
nothing new; his ancestors, his ‘elders,’ have ‘set and freed’ all this land as one
hide ‘be the same more or less.’ Behind this writ stand older charters which are not
of good repute. Still we can see nothing improbable in the supposition that
Æthelred issued the writ ascribed to him and that what he said in it was
substantially true. Before his day there may have been no impost that was known
as a ‘geld’; but there may have been, as we have endeavoured to show, other
imposts to which land contributed at the rate of so much per hide. We suspect that
‘beneficial hidation’ had a long history before Domesday Book was made.
But it will not account for all the facts that are before us;
Divergence of hide from
indeed it will serve for few of them. Privilege can account teamland.
for exceptional cases; it will not account for steady and
consistent under-rating; still less will it account for steady
and consistent over-rating. We must look elsewhere, and for a moment we may
find some relief in the reflection that by the operation of natural and obvious
causes an old rate-book will become antiquated. There will be more ‘teamlands’
than there are gelding hides because new land has been brought under cultivation;
on the other hand, land will sometimes go out of cultivation and then there will be
more gelding hides than there are teamlands. Now that there is truth here we do
not doubt. As we have already said[1491], the stability of agrarian affairs in these
early times may easily be overestimated. But we can not in this direction find the
explanation of changes that take place suddenly at the boundaries of counties.
A master hand has lately turned our thoughts to the right
Partition of the geld.
quarter. There can we think be no doubt that, as Mr
Round has argued, the geld was imposed according to a
method which we have called the method of subpartitioned provincial quotas[1492].
A sum cast upon a hundred has been divided among that hundred’s vills; a sum
cast upon a vill has been divided among the lands that the vill contains. It is in
substance the method which still governs our land-tax, and in this very year our
attention has been pointedly called to its inequitable results. But, whereas in later
centuries men distributed pounds, shillings and pence among the counties, our
remoter ancestors distributed hides or carucates or acres. The effect was the same;
and it is not unlikely that they could pass with rapidity from acres to pence,
because the pound had 240 pence in it and the fiscal hide had 120 acres. So the
complaint urged this year that Lancashire is under-taxed and Hertfordshire over-
taxed[1493] would have been in their mouths the complaint that too many hides had
been cast on the one county and too few on the other.
We will not repeat Mr Round’s convincing arguments.
Distribution of hides.
Just to recall their character, we will notice the beautiful
hide ‘be the same more or less.’ Behind this writ stand older charters which are not
of good repute. Still we can see nothing improbable in the supposition that
Æthelred issued the writ ascribed to him and that what he said in it was
substantially true. Before his day there may have been no impost that was known
as a ‘geld’; but there may have been, as we have endeavoured to show, other
imposts to which land contributed at the rate of so much per hide. We suspect that
‘beneficial hidation’ had a long history before Domesday Book was made.
But it will not account for all the facts that are before us;
Divergence of hide from
indeed it will serve for few of them. Privilege can account teamland.
for exceptional cases; it will not account for steady and
consistent under-rating; still less will it account for steady
and consistent over-rating. We must look elsewhere, and for a moment we may
find some relief in the reflection that by the operation of natural and obvious
causes an old rate-book will become antiquated. There will be more ‘teamlands’
than there are gelding hides because new land has been brought under cultivation;
on the other hand, land will sometimes go out of cultivation and then there will be
more gelding hides than there are teamlands. Now that there is truth here we do
not doubt. As we have already said[1491], the stability of agrarian affairs in these
early times may easily be overestimated. But we can not in this direction find the
explanation of changes that take place suddenly at the boundaries of counties.
A master hand has lately turned our thoughts to the right
Partition of the geld.
quarter. There can we think be no doubt that, as Mr
Round has argued, the geld was imposed according to a
method which we have called the method of subpartitioned provincial quotas[1492].
A sum cast upon a hundred has been divided among that hundred’s vills; a sum
cast upon a vill has been divided among the lands that the vill contains. It is in
substance the method which still governs our land-tax, and in this very year our
attention has been pointedly called to its inequitable results. But, whereas in later
centuries men distributed pounds, shillings and pence among the counties, our
remoter ancestors distributed hides or carucates or acres. The effect was the same;
and it is not unlikely that they could pass with rapidity from acres to pence,
because the pound had 240 pence in it and the fiscal hide had 120 acres. So the
complaint urged this year that Lancashire is under-taxed and Hertfordshire over-
taxed[1493] would have been in their mouths the complaint that too many hides had
been cast on the one county and too few on the other.
We will not repeat Mr Round’s convincing arguments.
Distribution of hides.
Just to recall their character, we will notice the beautiful
Page 410
hundred of Armingford in Cambridgeshire[1494]. In Edward’s day it had 100 hides
divided among fourteen vills, six of which had 10 hides apiece, while eight had 5
hides apiece. Before 1085 the number of hides in the hundred had been reduced
from 100 to 80; the number of hides in each of the ‘ten-hide vills’ had been
reduced to 8; and each ‘five-hide vill’ had got rid of one of its hides. Obviously
such results as these are not obtained by a method which begins by investigating
the content of each landholder’s tenement. The hides in the vill are imposed from
above, not built up from below[1495].
We have no wish to traverse ground which must by this
The Worcestershire hidage.
time be familiar to all students of Domesday. But, having
in our eye certain ancient statements about the hidage of
England, we will endeavour to carry the argument one step further. In
Worcestershire we have strong evidence of a neat arrangement of a whole county.
In the first place, we are told that ‘in this county there are twelve hundreds,
whereof seven, so the shire says, are so free that the sheriff has nothing in them,
and therefore, so he says, he is a great loser by his farm[1496].’ Then we are told
that the church of Worcester has a hundred called Oswaldslaw in which lie 300
hides. Then we remember that notorious charter (Altitonantis) which tells how this
triple hundred of Oswaldslaw was made up of three old hundreds, called
Cuthbertslaw, Wulfhereslaw and Wimborntree[1497]. Then, turning to the
particulars, we find that exactly 300 hides are ascribed to the various estates which
St. Mary of Worcester holds in this triple hundred. Those particulars are the
following:—
Norwiche 25
Chemesege 24 The Worcester estate.
Overberie 6
Wiche 15
Segesbarue 4
Fledebirie 40
Scepwestun 2 25
Breodun 35 200 100
Herferthun 3
Rippel 25
Grimanleh 3
Blochelei 38
Halhegan 7
Tredinctun 23
Cropetorn 50
We have here preserved the order in which Domesday Book names the estates, but
have added some brackets which may serve to emphasize the artificiality of the
system. Then, looking back once more at our Altitonantis, we see Edgar adding
lands to the 50 hides at Cropthorn, so that ‘a perfect hundred’ may be compiled,
and the lands that he adds seem to be just those which in our table are bracketed
with the Cropthorn estate.
divided among fourteen vills, six of which had 10 hides apiece, while eight had 5
hides apiece. Before 1085 the number of hides in the hundred had been reduced
from 100 to 80; the number of hides in each of the ‘ten-hide vills’ had been
reduced to 8; and each ‘five-hide vill’ had got rid of one of its hides. Obviously
such results as these are not obtained by a method which begins by investigating
the content of each landholder’s tenement. The hides in the vill are imposed from
above, not built up from below[1495].
We have no wish to traverse ground which must by this
The Worcestershire hidage.
time be familiar to all students of Domesday. But, having
in our eye certain ancient statements about the hidage of
England, we will endeavour to carry the argument one step further. In
Worcestershire we have strong evidence of a neat arrangement of a whole county.
In the first place, we are told that ‘in this county there are twelve hundreds,
whereof seven, so the shire says, are so free that the sheriff has nothing in them,
and therefore, so he says, he is a great loser by his farm[1496].’ Then we are told
that the church of Worcester has a hundred called Oswaldslaw in which lie 300
hides. Then we remember that notorious charter (Altitonantis) which tells how this
triple hundred of Oswaldslaw was made up of three old hundreds, called
Cuthbertslaw, Wulfhereslaw and Wimborntree[1497]. Then, turning to the
particulars, we find that exactly 300 hides are ascribed to the various estates which
St. Mary of Worcester holds in this triple hundred. Those particulars are the
following:—
Norwiche 25
Chemesege 24 The Worcester estate.
Overberie 6
Wiche 15
Segesbarue 4
Fledebirie 40
Scepwestun 2 25
Breodun 35 200 100
Herferthun 3
Rippel 25
Grimanleh 3
Blochelei 38
Halhegan 7
Tredinctun 23
Cropetorn 50
We have here preserved the order in which Domesday Book names the estates, but
have added some brackets which may serve to emphasize the artificiality of the
system. Then, looking back once more at our Altitonantis, we see Edgar adding
lands to the 50 hides at Cropthorn, so that ‘a perfect hundred’ may be compiled,
and the lands that he adds seem to be just those which in our table are bracketed
with the Cropthorn estate.
Page 411
Thus we have disposed of three out of those twelve
The Westminster estate.
‘hundreds’ of which Worcestershire is composed and also
of 300 hides of land. Next we perceive that the church of
Westminster is said to hold 200 hides. Reckoning up the particulars, we find, not
indeed 200, but 199.
H.
H. V.
V.
Persore 2 Pidelet 5
Wiche 6 Newentune 10
Pendesham 2 Garstune 1.3
Berlingeham 3.1 Pidelet 4
Bricstelmestune 10 Peritune 6
Depeforde 10 Garstune 7
Aichintune 16 Piplintune 4.2
Beford 10 Piplintune 6.2
Longedune 30 Cumbrintune 9
Poiwic 3 Cumbrintune 10
Snodesbyrie 11 Broctune 3
Husentre 6 Stoche 15
Wich 1 Cumbrintune 2
Dormestun 5 199.0
Then the church of Pershore has just 100 hides; they are The Pershore estate.
distributed thus:—
Persore 26
Beolege 21
Sture 20
Bradeweia 30
Lege 3
100
It is easy to divide these manors into two groups, each of which has 50 hides. The
county also tells us that the church of Pershore ought to have the church-scot from
‘the whole 300 hides,’ that is, as well from the 200 allotted to Westminster as from
the 100 which Pershore holds[1498].
The Westminster estate.
‘hundreds’ of which Worcestershire is composed and also
of 300 hides of land. Next we perceive that the church of
Westminster is said to hold 200 hides. Reckoning up the particulars, we find, not
indeed 200, but 199.
H.
H. V.
V.
Persore 2 Pidelet 5
Wiche 6 Newentune 10
Pendesham 2 Garstune 1.3
Berlingeham 3.1 Pidelet 4
Bricstelmestune 10 Peritune 6
Depeforde 10 Garstune 7
Aichintune 16 Piplintune 4.2
Beford 10 Piplintune 6.2
Longedune 30 Cumbrintune 9
Poiwic 3 Cumbrintune 10
Snodesbyrie 11 Broctune 3
Husentre 6 Stoche 15
Wich 1 Cumbrintune 2
Dormestun 5 199.0
Then the church of Pershore has just 100 hides; they are The Pershore estate.
distributed thus:—
Persore 26
Beolege 21
Sture 20
Bradeweia 30
Lege 3
100
It is easy to divide these manors into two groups, each of which has 50 hides. The
county also tells us that the church of Pershore ought to have the church-scot from
‘the whole 300 hides,’ that is, as well from the 200 allotted to Westminster as from
the 100 which Pershore holds[1498].
Page 412
Then Evesham Abbey has, we are told, 65 hides in the
The Evesham estate.
hundred of Fissesberge. ‘In that hundred,’ it is added, ‘lie
20 hides of Dodingtree and 15 hides in Worcester make
up the hundred.’ The 65 hides which Evesham holds are allotted thus:—
Evesham 3.0
Lenchewic 1.0
Nortune 7.0
Offenham 1.0 25
Liteltune 6.0
Bratfortune 6.0
Aldintone 1.0
Wiqwene 3.0
Bratfortune 6.0
Badesei 6.2
25
Liteltune 7.0
Huniburne 2.2
Ambreslege 15.0
65.0
We have dealt heretofore with 665 hides. Let us now The residue of
reckon up all the hides in Worcestershire that we have not Worcestershire.
yet counted. The task is not perfectly straightforward, for
we have to meet a few difficult questions. In order that our account may be
checked by others, we will set forth its details. We will go through the survey
noting all the hides which we have not already reckoned.
Worcester city 15.0 More 1.0 Glese 1.0
Bremesgrave 30.0 Betune 3.2 Merlie 0.1
[1499]Suchelei 5.0 More 0.1 Wich 1.0
Grastone 3.2 Edboldelege 2.2 Escelie 4.0
Cochesei 2.2 Eslei 6.0 Nordfeld 6.0
Willingewic 2.3 Eslei 1.0 Franchelie 1.0
Celdvic 3.0 Ridmerlege 1.2 Welingewiche 0.3
Chideminstre 20.0 Celdeslai 1.0 Escelie 1.0
Terdeberie 9.0 Estham 3.0 Werwelie 0.2
Clent 9.0 Ælmeleia 11.0 Cercehalle 2.0
Wich 0.2 Wich 10.0 Bellem 3.0
Clive 10.2 Sudtune 1.0 Hageleia 5.2
The Evesham estate.
hundred of Fissesberge. ‘In that hundred,’ it is added, ‘lie
20 hides of Dodingtree and 15 hides in Worcester make
up the hundred.’ The 65 hides which Evesham holds are allotted thus:—
Evesham 3.0
Lenchewic 1.0
Nortune 7.0
Offenham 1.0 25
Liteltune 6.0
Bratfortune 6.0
Aldintone 1.0
Wiqwene 3.0
Bratfortune 6.0
Badesei 6.2
25
Liteltune 7.0
Huniburne 2.2
Ambreslege 15.0
65.0
We have dealt heretofore with 665 hides. Let us now The residue of
reckon up all the hides in Worcestershire that we have not Worcestershire.
yet counted. The task is not perfectly straightforward, for
we have to meet a few difficult questions. In order that our account may be
checked by others, we will set forth its details. We will go through the survey
noting all the hides which we have not already reckoned.
Worcester city 15.0 More 1.0 Glese 1.0
Bremesgrave 30.0 Betune 3.2 Merlie 0.1
[1499]Suchelei 5.0 More 0.1 Wich 1.0
Grastone 3.2 Edboldelege 2.2 Escelie 4.0
Cochesei 2.2 Eslei 6.0 Nordfeld 6.0
Willingewic 2.3 Eslei 1.0 Franchelie 1.0
Celdvic 3.0 Ridmerlege 1.2 Welingewiche 0.3
Chideminstre 20.0 Celdeslai 1.0 Escelie 1.0
Terdeberie 9.0 Estham 3.0 Werwelie 0.2
Clent 9.0 Ælmeleia 11.0 Cercehalle 2.0
Wich 0.2 Wich 10.0 Bellem 3.0
Clive 10.2 Sudtune 1.0 Hageleia 5.2
Page 413
Fepsetanatum 6.0 Mamele 0.2 Dudelei 1.0
Crohlea 5.0 Broc 0.2 Suineforde 3.0
Hambyrie 14.0 Colingvic 1.0 Pevemore 3.0
Stoche 10.0 Mortune 4.0 Cradeleie 1.0
Huerteberie 20.0 Stotune 3.0 Belintones 5.0
Ulwardelei 5.0 Stanford 2.2 Witone 2.0
Alvievecherche 13.0 Scelves 1.0 Celvestune 1.0
Ardolvestone 15.0 Chintune 5.0 Cochehi 2.2
Boclintun 8.0 Beretune 2.0 Osmerlie 1.0
Cuer 2.0 Tamedeberie 3.0 Costone 3.0
Inteberga 15.2 Wich 0.2 Beneslei 1.0
Wich 1.0 Clistune 3.0 Udecote 1.2
Salewarpe 1.0 Chure 3.0 Russococ 5.0
Tametdeberie 0.2 Stanford 1.2 Stanes 6.0
Wich 0.2 Caldeslei 1.0 Lundredele 2.0
Matma 5.0 Cuer 1.0 Hatete 1.0
[1500]Mortune 5.0 Hamme 1.0 Hamtune 4.0
Achelenz 4.2 Sapie 3.0 Hortune 2.0
Buintun 1.0 Carletune 1.1 Cochesie 2.0
Circelenz 4.0 Edevent 1.0 Brotune 2.0
Actune 6.0 Wicelbold 11.0 Urso’s hide 1.0
Lenche 4.0 Elmerige 8.0 Uptune 3.0
Wich 1.0 Croelai 5.0 Witune 0.2
Ludeleia 2.0 Dodeham 1.0 Hantune 4.0
Hala 10.0 Redmerleie 1.2 Tichenapletreu 3.0
Salewarpe 5.0 Hanlege 1.2 Cedeslai 25.0
Wermeslai 2.0 Hanlege 3.0 Hilhamatone 0.1
Linde 2.0 Alretune 1.2 Fecheham 10.0
Halac 1.0 Hadesoro 2.0 Holewei 3.0
Dunclent 3.0 Holim 1.0 [1501]Mertelai 13.0
Alvintune 2.0 Stilledune 0.2 539.0
We have here therefore 539 hides to be added to the 665 of which we rendered an
account above. We thus bring out a grand total of 1204 hides. Perhaps the true
total should be exactly 1200; but at any rate it stands close to that beautiful figure.
And now we remember how we were told that there were ‘twelve hundreds’ in
Worcestershire from seven of which the sheriff got nothing. Of these twelve the
church of Worcester had three in its ‘hundred’ of Oswaldslaw, the church of
Crohlea 5.0 Broc 0.2 Suineforde 3.0
Hambyrie 14.0 Colingvic 1.0 Pevemore 3.0
Stoche 10.0 Mortune 4.0 Cradeleie 1.0
Huerteberie 20.0 Stotune 3.0 Belintones 5.0
Ulwardelei 5.0 Stanford 2.2 Witone 2.0
Alvievecherche 13.0 Scelves 1.0 Celvestune 1.0
Ardolvestone 15.0 Chintune 5.0 Cochehi 2.2
Boclintun 8.0 Beretune 2.0 Osmerlie 1.0
Cuer 2.0 Tamedeberie 3.0 Costone 3.0
Inteberga 15.2 Wich 0.2 Beneslei 1.0
Wich 1.0 Clistune 3.0 Udecote 1.2
Salewarpe 1.0 Chure 3.0 Russococ 5.0
Tametdeberie 0.2 Stanford 1.2 Stanes 6.0
Wich 0.2 Caldeslei 1.0 Lundredele 2.0
Matma 5.0 Cuer 1.0 Hatete 1.0
[1500]Mortune 5.0 Hamme 1.0 Hamtune 4.0
Achelenz 4.2 Sapie 3.0 Hortune 2.0
Buintun 1.0 Carletune 1.1 Cochesie 2.0
Circelenz 4.0 Edevent 1.0 Brotune 2.0
Actune 6.0 Wicelbold 11.0 Urso’s hide 1.0
Lenche 4.0 Elmerige 8.0 Uptune 3.0
Wich 1.0 Croelai 5.0 Witune 0.2
Ludeleia 2.0 Dodeham 1.0 Hantune 4.0
Hala 10.0 Redmerleie 1.2 Tichenapletreu 3.0
Salewarpe 5.0 Hanlege 1.2 Cedeslai 25.0
Wermeslai 2.0 Hanlege 3.0 Hilhamatone 0.1
Linde 2.0 Alretune 1.2 Fecheham 10.0
Halac 1.0 Hadesoro 2.0 Holewei 3.0
Dunclent 3.0 Holim 1.0 [1501]Mertelai 13.0
Alvintune 2.0 Stilledune 0.2 539.0
We have here therefore 539 hides to be added to the 665 of which we rendered an
account above. We thus bring out a grand total of 1204 hides. Perhaps the true
total should be exactly 1200; but at any rate it stands close to that beautiful figure.
And now we remember how we were told that there were ‘twelve hundreds’ in
Worcestershire from seven of which the sheriff got nothing. Of these twelve the
church of Worcester had three in its ‘hundred’ of Oswaldslaw, the church of
Page 414
Westminster two, the church of Pershore one, and the church of Evesham one. But
the Evesham or Fissesberge hundred was not perfect; it required ‘making up’ by
means of 15 hides in the city of Worcester and 20 in the hundred of Dodingtree.
Thus five hundreds remain to be accounted for, and in its rubrics Domesday Book
names just five, namely, Came, Clent, Cresselaw, Dodingtree and Esch. We can
not allot to each of these its constituent hides, for we never can rely on Domesday
Book giving all the ‘hundredal rubrics’ that it ought to give, and the
Worcestershire hundreds were subjected to rearrangement before the day of maps
had dawned[1502]. An intimate knowledge of the county might achieve the
reconstruction of the old hundreds. But, as it is, we seem to see enough. We seem
to see pretty plainly that Worcestershire has been divided into twelve districts
known as hundreds each of which has contained 100 hides. It is an anomaly to be
specially noted that one of the jurisdictional hundreds, one which has been granted
to the church of Evesham, has only 65 hides and can only be made up into a
‘hundred’ for financial purposes by adding to it 20 hides lying in another
jurisdictional hundred and the 15 hides at which the city of Worcester is rated.
The moment has now come when we may tender in
The County Hidage.
evidence an ancient document which professes to state the
hidage of certain districts. There are three such
documents which should not be confused. We propose to call them respectively (1)
The Tribal Hidage, (2) The Burghal Hidage, and (3) The County Hidage; and this
is their order of date. For the two oldest we are not yet ready. The youngest
professes to give us a statement about the hidage of thirteen counties. We have it
both in Latin and in Old English. It has come down to us in divers manuscripts,
which do not agree very perfectly. We will here give its upshot, placing in a last
column the figures at which we have arrived when counting the hides in
Domesday.
The County Hidage.
Cotton, Cotton, MS. Jes.
Claudius, Vespasian, Coll. Ox.;
B. vii. A. xviii. f. Gale, Morris,
f.204 b; 112 b; Scriptores Old Domesday
Kemble, Kemble, xv. p. 748 English Book
Saxons Saxons Croyland Miscellany, (boroughs
i. 493 i. 494 MS. p. 145 omitted)
Wiltshire 4800 4800 4800 4800 4050
Bedfordshire 1200 1000 1200 1200 1193
Cambridgeshire 2500 2500 2005 2500 1233
the Evesham or Fissesberge hundred was not perfect; it required ‘making up’ by
means of 15 hides in the city of Worcester and 20 in the hundred of Dodingtree.
Thus five hundreds remain to be accounted for, and in its rubrics Domesday Book
names just five, namely, Came, Clent, Cresselaw, Dodingtree and Esch. We can
not allot to each of these its constituent hides, for we never can rely on Domesday
Book giving all the ‘hundredal rubrics’ that it ought to give, and the
Worcestershire hundreds were subjected to rearrangement before the day of maps
had dawned[1502]. An intimate knowledge of the county might achieve the
reconstruction of the old hundreds. But, as it is, we seem to see enough. We seem
to see pretty plainly that Worcestershire has been divided into twelve districts
known as hundreds each of which has contained 100 hides. It is an anomaly to be
specially noted that one of the jurisdictional hundreds, one which has been granted
to the church of Evesham, has only 65 hides and can only be made up into a
‘hundred’ for financial purposes by adding to it 20 hides lying in another
jurisdictional hundred and the 15 hides at which the city of Worcester is rated.
The moment has now come when we may tender in
The County Hidage.
evidence an ancient document which professes to state the
hidage of certain districts. There are three such
documents which should not be confused. We propose to call them respectively (1)
The Tribal Hidage, (2) The Burghal Hidage, and (3) The County Hidage; and this
is their order of date. For the two oldest we are not yet ready. The youngest
professes to give us a statement about the hidage of thirteen counties. We have it
both in Latin and in Old English. It has come down to us in divers manuscripts,
which do not agree very perfectly. We will here give its upshot, placing in a last
column the figures at which we have arrived when counting the hides in
Domesday.
The County Hidage.
Cotton, Cotton, MS. Jes.
Claudius, Vespasian, Coll. Ox.;
B. vii. A. xviii. f. Gale, Morris,
f.204 b; 112 b; Scriptores Old Domesday
Kemble, Kemble, xv. p. 748 English Book
Saxons Saxons Croyland Miscellany, (boroughs
i. 493 i. 494 MS. p. 145 omitted)
Wiltshire 4800 4800 4800 4800 4050
Bedfordshire 1200 1000 1200 1200 1193
Cambridgeshire 2500 2500 2005 2500 1233
Page 415
Huntingdonshire 850[1503] 850[1503] 8001⁄2 850 747
Northamptonshire 3200 4200 3200 3200 1356
Gloucestershire 2400 2000 2400 3400 2388
Worcestershire 1200 1500 1200 1200 1189
Herefordshire 1500 1500 1005 1200 1324
Warwickshire 1200 1200 1200 1200 1338
Oxfordshire 2400 2400 2400 2400 2412
Shropshire 2300 2400 2400 2400 1245
Cheshire 1300 1200 1200 1200 512
Staffordshire 500 500 —— 500 505
Dr Liebermann has said that the text whence these figures Date of the document.
are derived was probably compiled in English and in the
eleventh century[1504]. If we put faith in it, we shall be inclined to set its date at
some distance before that of Domesday Book. But our first question should be
whether it merits credence; whether it was written by some one who knew what he
was about or whether it is wild guesswork. Now when we see that the scrupulous
Eyton brought out the hides of Staffordshire at 499, or rather at 499 H 213⁄30 V, and
that this document makes them 500, we shall begin to take it very seriously,
without relying on our own 505, the result of hasty addition. We have also seen
enough to say that 1200 for Worcestershire is very near the mark. As regards other
counties, we set so little reliance upon our own computation, that we are not very
willing to institute a comparison; but we have given Bedfordshire 1193 hides[1505]
and this document gives it 1200; we have given Oxfordshire 2412 and this
document gives it 2400; we have given Gloucestershire 2388[1506] and two
versions of this document give it 2400. Having seen so much agreement, we must
note some cases of violent discord. For Wiltshire 4800 seems decidedly too high,
though we have brought the number of its hides above 4000. The figure given to
Cambridgeshire is almost twice that which Domesday would justify, and the
figures given to Cheshire, Shropshire and Northamptonshire are absurdly large
when compared with the numbers recorded in 1086. These cases are enough to
show that, though no doubt some or all of the transcribers of The County Hidage
must be charged with blunders, the divergence of the copies from Domesday can
not be safely laid to this account. About certain counties there is just that
agreement which we might expect, when we remember how precarious our own
figures are. About certain other counties there is utter disagreement. We infer
therefore that the original document did not truly state the hidage as it stood in
1086; but may it not have represented an older state of things.
Northamptonshire 3200 4200 3200 3200 1356
Gloucestershire 2400 2000 2400 3400 2388
Worcestershire 1200 1500 1200 1200 1189
Herefordshire 1500 1500 1005 1200 1324
Warwickshire 1200 1200 1200 1200 1338
Oxfordshire 2400 2400 2400 2400 2412
Shropshire 2300 2400 2400 2400 1245
Cheshire 1300 1200 1200 1200 512
Staffordshire 500 500 —— 500 505
Dr Liebermann has said that the text whence these figures Date of the document.
are derived was probably compiled in English and in the
eleventh century[1504]. If we put faith in it, we shall be inclined to set its date at
some distance before that of Domesday Book. But our first question should be
whether it merits credence; whether it was written by some one who knew what he
was about or whether it is wild guesswork. Now when we see that the scrupulous
Eyton brought out the hides of Staffordshire at 499, or rather at 499 H 213⁄30 V, and
that this document makes them 500, we shall begin to take it very seriously,
without relying on our own 505, the result of hasty addition. We have also seen
enough to say that 1200 for Worcestershire is very near the mark. As regards other
counties, we set so little reliance upon our own computation, that we are not very
willing to institute a comparison; but we have given Bedfordshire 1193 hides[1505]
and this document gives it 1200; we have given Oxfordshire 2412 and this
document gives it 2400; we have given Gloucestershire 2388[1506] and two
versions of this document give it 2400. Having seen so much agreement, we must
note some cases of violent discord. For Wiltshire 4800 seems decidedly too high,
though we have brought the number of its hides above 4000. The figure given to
Cambridgeshire is almost twice that which Domesday would justify, and the
figures given to Cheshire, Shropshire and Northamptonshire are absurdly large
when compared with the numbers recorded in 1086. These cases are enough to
show that, though no doubt some or all of the transcribers of The County Hidage
must be charged with blunders, the divergence of the copies from Domesday can
not be safely laid to this account. About certain counties there is just that
agreement which we might expect, when we remember how precarious our own
figures are. About certain other counties there is utter disagreement. We infer
therefore that the original document did not truly state the hidage as it stood in
1086; but may it not have represented an older state of things.
Page 416
Let us take one case of flagrant aberration. Three copies
The Northampton Geld
tell us that Northamptonshire has 3200 hides; one that it Roll.
has 4200. The balance of authority inclines therefore to
3200. Domesday will not give us half that number. But let
us turn to the Northamptonshire Geld Roll[1507], the date of which Mr Round
places between the Conquest and 1075[1508]. It gives the county 26631⁄2 hides. So
here we have a case in which between 1075 and 1086 a county was relieved of
about half of its hides[1509]. Also at 2664 we are within a moderate distance of
3200. But the Geld Roll does more than this. It represents Northamptonshire as
composed of 28 districts; 22 of these are called ‘hundreds’; two are ‘two-
hundreds’; four are ‘other-half hundreds,’ or, as we might say, ‘hundred-and-a-
halfs.’ We work a sum:—
(22+4+6) × 100 = 3200.
The result will increase our respect for The County Hidage. Now, when the Geld
Roll was made, some of the ‘hundreds’ of Northamptonshire contained their 100
hides apiece, but others were charged with a smaller number, which generally was
round, such as 80, 60, 40 hides; and this arrangement is set before us as that which
existed ‘in the days of Edward the king.’ If therefore we put faith in The County
Hidage and its 3200 hides, we must hold that it speaks to us from the earlier part
of the Confessor’s reign or from some yet older time.
Is it too good, too neat to be true? Before we pass a
Value of The County
condemnatory judgment we must recall the case of Hidage.
Worcestershire, its twelve ‘hundreds’ and 1200 hides.
Also we must recall the case of the Armingford hundred
in Cambridgeshire, where we have seen how in William’s reign an abatement of
20 per cent, was equitably apportioned among the fourteen villages, and the 100
hides were reduced to 80[1510]. Moreover, if in Domesday Book we pass from
Northamptonshire to the neighbouring county of Leicester, we see a startling
contrast. The former is decidedly ‘under-rated’; the latter is ‘over-rated.’
Leicestershire has about 2500 carucates, while Northamptonshire has hardly more
than half that number of hides. The explanation is that Northamptonshire has
obtained, while Leicestershire is going to obtain a reduction. The Pipe Rolls of the
twelfth century show us that either under Rufus or under Henry I. this sadly over-
taxed county was set down for exactly 1000 carucates.
As to the other cases in which there is a strident discord
Reductions of hidage.
between Domesday and The County Hidage, the case of
Chester, where the contrast is between some 500 hides
and a round 1200 will not perhaps detain us long, for we may imagine, if we
The Northampton Geld
tell us that Northamptonshire has 3200 hides; one that it Roll.
has 4200. The balance of authority inclines therefore to
3200. Domesday will not give us half that number. But let
us turn to the Northamptonshire Geld Roll[1507], the date of which Mr Round
places between the Conquest and 1075[1508]. It gives the county 26631⁄2 hides. So
here we have a case in which between 1075 and 1086 a county was relieved of
about half of its hides[1509]. Also at 2664 we are within a moderate distance of
3200. But the Geld Roll does more than this. It represents Northamptonshire as
composed of 28 districts; 22 of these are called ‘hundreds’; two are ‘two-
hundreds’; four are ‘other-half hundreds,’ or, as we might say, ‘hundred-and-a-
halfs.’ We work a sum:—
(22+4+6) × 100 = 3200.
The result will increase our respect for The County Hidage. Now, when the Geld
Roll was made, some of the ‘hundreds’ of Northamptonshire contained their 100
hides apiece, but others were charged with a smaller number, which generally was
round, such as 80, 60, 40 hides; and this arrangement is set before us as that which
existed ‘in the days of Edward the king.’ If therefore we put faith in The County
Hidage and its 3200 hides, we must hold that it speaks to us from the earlier part
of the Confessor’s reign or from some yet older time.
Is it too good, too neat to be true? Before we pass a
Value of The County
condemnatory judgment we must recall the case of Hidage.
Worcestershire, its twelve ‘hundreds’ and 1200 hides.
Also we must recall the case of the Armingford hundred
in Cambridgeshire, where we have seen how in William’s reign an abatement of
20 per cent, was equitably apportioned among the fourteen villages, and the 100
hides were reduced to 80[1510]. Moreover, if in Domesday Book we pass from
Northamptonshire to the neighbouring county of Leicester, we see a startling
contrast. The former is decidedly ‘under-rated’; the latter is ‘over-rated.’
Leicestershire has about 2500 carucates, while Northamptonshire has hardly more
than half that number of hides. The explanation is that Northamptonshire has
obtained, while Leicestershire is going to obtain a reduction. The Pipe Rolls of the
twelfth century show us that either under Rufus or under Henry I. this sadly over-
taxed county was set down for exactly 1000 carucates.
As to the other cases in which there is a strident discord
Reductions of hidage.
between Domesday and The County Hidage, the case of
Chester, where the contrast is between some 500 hides
and a round 1200 will not perhaps detain us long, for we may imagine, if we
Page 417
please, that the Chestershire of Cnut’s day was much larger than the territory
described under that name in 1086[1511]. The 2500 hides attributed to
Cambridgeshire and the 2400 attributed to Shropshire may shock us, for, if they
are correctly stated, they point to reductions of 50 per cent. or thereabouts. But we
have seen some and are going to see some other large abatements.
On the whole, we believe that this County Hidage, though
The county quotas.
it has come to us in transcripts some or all of which are
careless, is an old and trustworthy document, that it is
right in attributing to the counties neat sums of hides, such as 1200 and 2400, and
that it is right in representing the current of change that was flowing in the
eleventh century as setting towards a rapid reduction in the number of hides. Only
in one case, that of Warwickshire, have we any cause to believe that it gives fewer
hides to a county than are given by Domesday; here the defect is not very large,
and, besides the possibility of mistranscription, we must also remember the
possibility of changed boundaries[1512].
There is one other feature of this document that we ought
The hundred and the
to notice. Let us compare the number of hides which it hundred hides.
gives to a county with the number of ‘hundreds’ which
that county contains according to Domesday Book. The
latter number we will place in brackets[1513].
Bedfordshire 1200 hides [12 hundreds]: Northamptonshire 3200 [28 hundreds
which, however, have been reckoned to be 32[1514]]: Worcestershire 1200 [12]:
Warwickshire 1200 [12]: Cheshire 1200 [12]: Staffordshire 500 [5]: Wiltshire
4800 [40]: Cambridgeshire 2500 [17]: Huntingdonshire 850 [4]: Gloucestershire
2400 [39[1515]]: Herefordshire 1500 [19]: Oxfordshire 2400 [uncertain, but at
least 19]: Shropshire 2400 [13].
In six out of thirteen cases we seem to see a connexion of the simplest kind
between the hides and the hundreds. Now in the eyes of some this trait may be
discreditable to The County Hidage, for they will infer that its author was
possessed by a theory and deduced the hides from the hundreds. But, after all that
we have seen[1516] of symmetrical districts and reductions of hidage, we ought not
to take fright at this point. Other people besides the writer of this list may have
been possessed by a theory which connected hides with hundreds, and they may
have been people who were able to give effect to their theories by decreeing how
many hides a district must be deemed to contain. Is it not even possible that we
have here, albeit in faded characters, one of their decrees? But the history of the
hundreds can not be discussed in a parenthesis. Some further corroboration this
County Hidage will receive when hereafter we set it beside The Burghal Hidage,
described under that name in 1086[1511]. The 2500 hides attributed to
Cambridgeshire and the 2400 attributed to Shropshire may shock us, for, if they
are correctly stated, they point to reductions of 50 per cent. or thereabouts. But we
have seen some and are going to see some other large abatements.
On the whole, we believe that this County Hidage, though
The county quotas.
it has come to us in transcripts some or all of which are
careless, is an old and trustworthy document, that it is
right in attributing to the counties neat sums of hides, such as 1200 and 2400, and
that it is right in representing the current of change that was flowing in the
eleventh century as setting towards a rapid reduction in the number of hides. Only
in one case, that of Warwickshire, have we any cause to believe that it gives fewer
hides to a county than are given by Domesday; here the defect is not very large,
and, besides the possibility of mistranscription, we must also remember the
possibility of changed boundaries[1512].
There is one other feature of this document that we ought
The hundred and the
to notice. Let us compare the number of hides which it hundred hides.
gives to a county with the number of ‘hundreds’ which
that county contains according to Domesday Book. The
latter number we will place in brackets[1513].
Bedfordshire 1200 hides [12 hundreds]: Northamptonshire 3200 [28 hundreds
which, however, have been reckoned to be 32[1514]]: Worcestershire 1200 [12]:
Warwickshire 1200 [12]: Cheshire 1200 [12]: Staffordshire 500 [5]: Wiltshire
4800 [40]: Cambridgeshire 2500 [17]: Huntingdonshire 850 [4]: Gloucestershire
2400 [39[1515]]: Herefordshire 1500 [19]: Oxfordshire 2400 [uncertain, but at
least 19]: Shropshire 2400 [13].
In six out of thirteen cases we seem to see a connexion of the simplest kind
between the hides and the hundreds. Now in the eyes of some this trait may be
discreditable to The County Hidage, for they will infer that its author was
possessed by a theory and deduced the hides from the hundreds. But, after all that
we have seen[1516] of symmetrical districts and reductions of hidage, we ought not
to take fright at this point. Other people besides the writer of this list may have
been possessed by a theory which connected hides with hundreds, and they may
have been people who were able to give effect to their theories by decreeing how
many hides a district must be deemed to contain. Is it not even possible that we
have here, albeit in faded characters, one of their decrees? But the history of the
hundreds can not be discussed in a parenthesis. Some further corroboration this
County Hidage will receive when hereafter we set it beside The Burghal Hidage,
Page 418
and we may then be able to carry Worcester’s 1200 and Oxford’s 2400 hides far
back into the tenth century.
Meanwhile, making use of our terms ‘equally rated’ (A =
Comparison of Domesday
B), ‘over-rated’ (A > B), and ‘under-rated’ (A < B), let us hidage with Pipe Rolls.
briefly survey the counties as they stand in Domesday.
Some help towards an estimation of their hidage is given
to us by those few Pipe Rolls of the twelfth century which contain accounts of a
danegeld. But we must not at once condemn as false the results of our own
arithmetic merely because they do not square with the figures on these rolls. One
instance will be enough to prove this. The Henries have to be content with £166 or
thereabouts from Yorkshire, or, in other words, to treat it as having 1660 ‘carucates
for geld.’ We give it a little more than 10,000 and shall not admit that we have
given it 8000 too many. This poor, wasted giant has been relieved and has been set
below little Surrey. So again, though Leicestershire will account to Henry I. and
his grandson for but £100, it most certainly had more than 1000 and more than
2000 carucates when William’s commissioners visited it. On the other hand, there
seem to be cases in a small group of counties in which his sons were able to
recover a certain amount of geld which had been, rightfully or wrongfully,
withheld or forborne during his own reign. But, taking the counties in mass, we
hope that our figures are sufficiently consonant with those upon the Pipe Rolls.
Absolutely consonant they ought not to be, for we have endeavoured to include the
hides that are privileged from gelding, and in some shires (Hereford, for example)
their number is by no means small. Also some leakage in an old tax may always be
suspected, and the Pipe Rolls themselves show some unexplained variations in the
amount for which a sheriff accounts, and some arithmetical errors[1517].
But now we will make our tour and write brief notes as we go.
Kent is scandalously under-rated. Of this there can be no
Under-rated and over-rated
doubt, though, since in many cases blanks are left where counties.
the number of the teamlands should stand, the figures can
not be fully given. There has in a few instances been a
reduction in the number of geldable sulungs since the Conquest, but this does not
very greatly affect the result. The under-rating seems to be generally distributed
throughout the county. It had not been redressed in Henry I.’s day. Indeed on the
Pipe Rolls Kent appears as paying but £105, while Sussex pays twice as much.
Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire appear to have all been over-rated. In the
Conqueror’s day, however, they shuffled off large numbers of their geldant hides
and were paying for considerably fewer hides than they had teamlands. Some part
of this reduction was perhaps unauthorized. At any rate the sums that appear on
back into the tenth century.
Meanwhile, making use of our terms ‘equally rated’ (A =
Comparison of Domesday
B), ‘over-rated’ (A > B), and ‘under-rated’ (A < B), let us hidage with Pipe Rolls.
briefly survey the counties as they stand in Domesday.
Some help towards an estimation of their hidage is given
to us by those few Pipe Rolls of the twelfth century which contain accounts of a
danegeld. But we must not at once condemn as false the results of our own
arithmetic merely because they do not square with the figures on these rolls. One
instance will be enough to prove this. The Henries have to be content with £166 or
thereabouts from Yorkshire, or, in other words, to treat it as having 1660 ‘carucates
for geld.’ We give it a little more than 10,000 and shall not admit that we have
given it 8000 too many. This poor, wasted giant has been relieved and has been set
below little Surrey. So again, though Leicestershire will account to Henry I. and
his grandson for but £100, it most certainly had more than 1000 and more than
2000 carucates when William’s commissioners visited it. On the other hand, there
seem to be cases in a small group of counties in which his sons were able to
recover a certain amount of geld which had been, rightfully or wrongfully,
withheld or forborne during his own reign. But, taking the counties in mass, we
hope that our figures are sufficiently consonant with those upon the Pipe Rolls.
Absolutely consonant they ought not to be, for we have endeavoured to include the
hides that are privileged from gelding, and in some shires (Hereford, for example)
their number is by no means small. Also some leakage in an old tax may always be
suspected, and the Pipe Rolls themselves show some unexplained variations in the
amount for which a sheriff accounts, and some arithmetical errors[1517].
But now we will make our tour and write brief notes as we go.
Kent is scandalously under-rated. Of this there can be no
Under-rated and over-rated
doubt, though, since in many cases blanks are left where counties.
the number of the teamlands should stand, the figures can
not be fully given. There has in a few instances been a
reduction in the number of geldable sulungs since the Conquest, but this does not
very greatly affect the result. The under-rating seems to be generally distributed
throughout the county. It had not been redressed in Henry I.’s day. Indeed on the
Pipe Rolls Kent appears as paying but £105, while Sussex pays twice as much.
Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire appear to have all been over-rated. In the
Conqueror’s day, however, they shuffled off large numbers of their geldant hides
and were paying for considerably fewer hides than they had teamlands. Some part
of this reduction was perhaps unauthorized. At any rate the sums that appear on
Page 419
the Pipe Rolls seem to show that in Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire more hides
were gelding under Henry I. than had been recently gelding when the survey was
made; but the recovery was not sufficient to restore the state of things that existed
under the Confessor. Wiltshire, so far as we can see, has always been a sorely
over-rated county. It obtains no reduction under William. In the Pipe Rolls it
stands at the very head of the counties. Dorset, taken as a whole, is exceedingly
fairly rated. Eyton seems to have made 2321 hides and 2332 teamlands; but if the
royal demesne (much of which is unhidated) be left out on both sides of the
account, there will be slight over-rating. Somerset is very much under-rated, even
if no notice be taken of the royal demesne. Devon is grossly under-rated. Cornwall
is enormously under-rated. To all appearance considerably more than 1000
teamlands have stood as 400 hides, and even this light assessment seems to be the
work of the Conqueror, for in the Confessor’s day the whole county seems to have
paid for hardly more than 150 hides[1518]. Middlesex is decidedly over-rated; but
Hertford, Buckingham, Oxford, Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Cambridge,
Huntingdon, Bedford are under-rated. The ratio borne by hides to teamlands varies
from county to county. We believe that it becomes small in Gloucester and
Worcester and falls much below 1:2 in Hereford[1519]. This ratio is very small
again in Warwick, Stafford, Shropshire and Cheshire. The two sister counties of
Northampton and Leicester have, as already said, been very differently treated.
Northampton is escaping easily, while Leicester, if we are not much mistaken, is
over-rated[1520]. Then however the Pipe Rolls show that before the end of Henry
I.’s reign Leicester has succeeded in largely reducing its geldability. We have seen
reason to believe that a similar reduction had been made in Northamptonshire
shortly before the compilation of Domesday Book. Derby is under-rated;
Nottingham is much under-rated. Lincoln, though under-rated, is an instance of a
county in which we long doubt whether the under-rating of some will not be
compensated by the over-rating of other estates. So far as we can tell, Yorkshire
had been heavily over-rated; but then, the teamland of Yorkshire is very often a
merely potential teamland, and we can not be certain that the jurors will give to the
waste vills as many teamlands as they had before the devastation. In the end a very
small sum of geld is exacted.
We have seen enough in the case of Northampton to make
Hidage and value.
us hesitate before we decide that the arrangement of hides
set forth by Domesday Book is in all cases very ancient.
That book shows us two different assessments of Cornwall; it shows us Sussex,
Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire relieving themselves or obtaining relief in the
Conqueror’s time; it shows us some Cambridgeshire hundreds disburdened of their
hides. But of the great reduction in Northamptonshire we should have learnt
nothing from its pages. Therefore in other cases we must be cautious, even in the
were gelding under Henry I. than had been recently gelding when the survey was
made; but the recovery was not sufficient to restore the state of things that existed
under the Confessor. Wiltshire, so far as we can see, has always been a sorely
over-rated county. It obtains no reduction under William. In the Pipe Rolls it
stands at the very head of the counties. Dorset, taken as a whole, is exceedingly
fairly rated. Eyton seems to have made 2321 hides and 2332 teamlands; but if the
royal demesne (much of which is unhidated) be left out on both sides of the
account, there will be slight over-rating. Somerset is very much under-rated, even
if no notice be taken of the royal demesne. Devon is grossly under-rated. Cornwall
is enormously under-rated. To all appearance considerably more than 1000
teamlands have stood as 400 hides, and even this light assessment seems to be the
work of the Conqueror, for in the Confessor’s day the whole county seems to have
paid for hardly more than 150 hides[1518]. Middlesex is decidedly over-rated; but
Hertford, Buckingham, Oxford, Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Cambridge,
Huntingdon, Bedford are under-rated. The ratio borne by hides to teamlands varies
from county to county. We believe that it becomes small in Gloucester and
Worcester and falls much below 1:2 in Hereford[1519]. This ratio is very small
again in Warwick, Stafford, Shropshire and Cheshire. The two sister counties of
Northampton and Leicester have, as already said, been very differently treated.
Northampton is escaping easily, while Leicester, if we are not much mistaken, is
over-rated[1520]. Then however the Pipe Rolls show that before the end of Henry
I.’s reign Leicester has succeeded in largely reducing its geldability. We have seen
reason to believe that a similar reduction had been made in Northamptonshire
shortly before the compilation of Domesday Book. Derby is under-rated;
Nottingham is much under-rated. Lincoln, though under-rated, is an instance of a
county in which we long doubt whether the under-rating of some will not be
compensated by the over-rating of other estates. So far as we can tell, Yorkshire
had been heavily over-rated; but then, the teamland of Yorkshire is very often a
merely potential teamland, and we can not be certain that the jurors will give to the
waste vills as many teamlands as they had before the devastation. In the end a very
small sum of geld is exacted.
We have seen enough in the case of Northampton to make
Hidage and value.
us hesitate before we decide that the arrangement of hides
set forth by Domesday Book is in all cases very ancient.
That book shows us two different assessments of Cornwall; it shows us Sussex,
Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire relieving themselves or obtaining relief in the
Conqueror’s time; it shows us some Cambridgeshire hundreds disburdened of their
hides. But of the great reduction in Northamptonshire we should have learnt
nothing from its pages. Therefore in other cases we must be cautious, even in the
Page 420
scandalous case of Kent, for we can not tell that there has not been a large
reduction of its sulungs in quite recent years. However, behind all the caprice and
presumable jobbery, we can not help fancying that we see a certain equitable
principle. We have talked of under-rating and over-rating as if we held that every
teamland in the kingdom should pay a like amount. But such equality would
certainly not be equity. The average teamland of Kent is worth full thirty shillings
a year; the average teamland of Cornwall is barely worth five; to put an equal tax
on the two would be an extreme of injustice. Now we have formed no very high
estimate of the justice or the statesmanship of the English witan, and what we are
going to say is wrung from us by figures which have dissipated some
preconceived ideas; but they hardly allow us to doubt that the number of hides cast
upon a county had been affected not only by the amount, but also by the value of
its teamlands. If, starting at the east of Sussex, we journey through the southern
counties, we see that over-rating prevails in Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire, Berkshire,
Wiltshire, and Dorset. We see also that the valet of the average teamland stands
rather above than below one pound. We pursue our journey. The ratio that A bears
to B begins to decline rapidly and at the same time the valets descend by leaps and
bounds. When we have reached Devon we are in a land which could not with any
show of justice be taxed at the same rate per acre as that which Wiltshire might
bear without complaint. Every test that we can apply shows the extreme poverty of
the country that once was ‘West Wales.’ That poverty continues through the
middle ages. We look, for example, at the contributions to the tax of 1341 and
compare them with the acreage of the contributing counties. Equal sums are paid
by 1020 acres in Wiltshire, 1310 in Dorset, 1740 in Somerset, 3215 in Devon,
3550 in Cornwall[1521]. We look at the subsidy of 1294[1522], and, in order that
Devon and Cornwall may not be put at a disadvantage by moor and sea-shore, we
take as our dividend the number of acres in a county that are now-a-days under
cultivation[1523], and for our divisor the number of pence that the county pays. The
quotients are, for Wiltshire 2·7, for Dorset 2·8, for Somerset 2·5, for Devon 6·4,
for Cornwall 5·2. Retaining the same dividend, we try as a divisor the ‘polls’ for
which a county will answer in 1377[1524]. Cornwall here makes a better show; but
Devonshire still displays its misery. The quotients are, for Wiltshire 16, for Dorset
14, for Somerset 15, for Devon 27, for Cornwall 17. These figures we have
introduced because they support the inferences that we should draw from the
valets and valuits of Domesday Book, a study of which has convinced us that the
distribution of fiscal hides has not been altogether independent of the varying
value of land.
But in order that we may not trust to vague impressions,
Connexion between hidage
let us set down in one column the number of hides and value.
(carucates or sulungs) that we have given to twenty
reduction of its sulungs in quite recent years. However, behind all the caprice and
presumable jobbery, we can not help fancying that we see a certain equitable
principle. We have talked of under-rating and over-rating as if we held that every
teamland in the kingdom should pay a like amount. But such equality would
certainly not be equity. The average teamland of Kent is worth full thirty shillings
a year; the average teamland of Cornwall is barely worth five; to put an equal tax
on the two would be an extreme of injustice. Now we have formed no very high
estimate of the justice or the statesmanship of the English witan, and what we are
going to say is wrung from us by figures which have dissipated some
preconceived ideas; but they hardly allow us to doubt that the number of hides cast
upon a county had been affected not only by the amount, but also by the value of
its teamlands. If, starting at the east of Sussex, we journey through the southern
counties, we see that over-rating prevails in Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire, Berkshire,
Wiltshire, and Dorset. We see also that the valet of the average teamland stands
rather above than below one pound. We pursue our journey. The ratio that A bears
to B begins to decline rapidly and at the same time the valets descend by leaps and
bounds. When we have reached Devon we are in a land which could not with any
show of justice be taxed at the same rate per acre as that which Wiltshire might
bear without complaint. Every test that we can apply shows the extreme poverty of
the country that once was ‘West Wales.’ That poverty continues through the
middle ages. We look, for example, at the contributions to the tax of 1341 and
compare them with the acreage of the contributing counties. Equal sums are paid
by 1020 acres in Wiltshire, 1310 in Dorset, 1740 in Somerset, 3215 in Devon,
3550 in Cornwall[1521]. We look at the subsidy of 1294[1522], and, in order that
Devon and Cornwall may not be put at a disadvantage by moor and sea-shore, we
take as our dividend the number of acres in a county that are now-a-days under
cultivation[1523], and for our divisor the number of pence that the county pays. The
quotients are, for Wiltshire 2·7, for Dorset 2·8, for Somerset 2·5, for Devon 6·4,
for Cornwall 5·2. Retaining the same dividend, we try as a divisor the ‘polls’ for
which a county will answer in 1377[1524]. Cornwall here makes a better show; but
Devonshire still displays its misery. The quotients are, for Wiltshire 16, for Dorset
14, for Somerset 15, for Devon 27, for Cornwall 17. These figures we have
introduced because they support the inferences that we should draw from the
valets and valuits of Domesday Book, a study of which has convinced us that the
distribution of fiscal hides has not been altogether independent of the varying
value of land.
But in order that we may not trust to vague impressions,
Connexion between hidage
let us set down in one column the number of hides and value.
(carucates or sulungs) that we have given to twenty
Page 421
counties and in another column the annual value of those counties in the time of
King Edward as calculated by Mr Pearson[1525].
Hides, Value Hides,
Value in
Carucates, in Carucates,
Pounds
Sulungs Pounds Sulungs
Kent 1224 3954 Oxford 2412 2789
Sussex 3474 3467 Gloucester 2388 2855
Surrey 1830 1417 Worcester 1189 1060
Berkshire 2473 2378 Huntingdon 747 900
Dorset 2277 2564 Bedford 1193 1475
Devon 1119 2912 Northampton 1356 1407
Cornwall 399 729 Leicester 2500 491
Middlesex 868 911 Warwick 1338 954
Hertford 1050 1894 Derby 679 631
Buckingham 2074 1785 Essex 2650 4079
33240 38652
No one can look along these lines of figures without One pound one hide.
fancying that some force, conscious or unconscious, has
made for ‘One pound, one hide.’ But we will use another test, which is in some
respects fairer, if in others it is rude. The total of the valets or valuits of a county
sometimes includes and sometimes excludes the profit that the king derives from
boroughs and from county courts; also the rents of his demesne manors are
sometimes stated in disputable terms. Therefore from every county we will take
eighty simple entries, some from the lands of the churches, some from the fiefs of
the barons, and in a large county we will select our cases from many different
pages. In each case we set down the number of gelding hides (carucates, sulungs)
and the valuit given for the T. R. E.[1526]. Our method will not be delicate enough
to detect slight differences; it will only suffice to display any general tendency that
is at work throughout England and to stamp as exceptional any shires which
widely depart from the common rule, if common rule there be. Using this method
we find the values of the hide (carucate, sulung) to have been as follows, our
figures standing for pounds and decimal fractions of a pound. We begin with the
lowest and end with the highest valuit.
Leicester 0·26, York 0·34, Surrey 0·68, Northampton 0·75, Wiltshire 0·77,
Sussex 0·81, Chester 0·82, Warwick 0·84, Somerset 0·85, Buckingham 0·86,
Oxford 0·87, Dorset 0·88, Berkshire 0·89, Hereford 0·91, Gloucester 0·99,
Lincoln 0·99, Derby 1·00, Huntingdon 1·02, Shropshire 1·02, Bedford 1·09,
King Edward as calculated by Mr Pearson[1525].
Hides, Value Hides,
Value in
Carucates, in Carucates,
Pounds
Sulungs Pounds Sulungs
Kent 1224 3954 Oxford 2412 2789
Sussex 3474 3467 Gloucester 2388 2855
Surrey 1830 1417 Worcester 1189 1060
Berkshire 2473 2378 Huntingdon 747 900
Dorset 2277 2564 Bedford 1193 1475
Devon 1119 2912 Northampton 1356 1407
Cornwall 399 729 Leicester 2500 491
Middlesex 868 911 Warwick 1338 954
Hertford 1050 1894 Derby 679 631
Buckingham 2074 1785 Essex 2650 4079
33240 38652
No one can look along these lines of figures without One pound one hide.
fancying that some force, conscious or unconscious, has
made for ‘One pound, one hide.’ But we will use another test, which is in some
respects fairer, if in others it is rude. The total of the valets or valuits of a county
sometimes includes and sometimes excludes the profit that the king derives from
boroughs and from county courts; also the rents of his demesne manors are
sometimes stated in disputable terms. Therefore from every county we will take
eighty simple entries, some from the lands of the churches, some from the fiefs of
the barons, and in a large county we will select our cases from many different
pages. In each case we set down the number of gelding hides (carucates, sulungs)
and the valuit given for the T. R. E.[1526]. Our method will not be delicate enough
to detect slight differences; it will only suffice to display any general tendency that
is at work throughout England and to stamp as exceptional any shires which
widely depart from the common rule, if common rule there be. Using this method
we find the values of the hide (carucate, sulung) to have been as follows, our
figures standing for pounds and decimal fractions of a pound. We begin with the
lowest and end with the highest valuit.
Leicester 0·26, York 0·34, Surrey 0·68, Northampton 0·75, Wiltshire 0·77,
Sussex 0·81, Chester 0·82, Warwick 0·84, Somerset 0·85, Buckingham 0·86,
Oxford 0·87, Dorset 0·88, Berkshire 0·89, Hereford 0·91, Gloucester 0·99,
Lincoln 0·99, Derby 1·00, Huntingdon 1·02, Shropshire 1·02, Bedford 1·09,
Page 422
Hampshire 1·10, Worcester 1·10, Middlesex 1·15, Essex 1·41, Devon 1·52,
Hertford 1·69, Cambridge 1·73, Nottingham 1·76, Kent 3·25, Cornwall 3·92.
Now ‘One pound, one hide’ seems to be the central point
Equivalence of pound and
of this series, the point of rest through which the hide.
pendulum swings. Our experiment has been much too
partial to tell us whether a shire is slightly over-taxed or
slightly undertaxed; but, unless we have shamefully blundered, it tells us that in
some twenty out of thirty counties the aberration from the equivalence of pound
and hide will not exceed twenty five per cent.: in other words, the value of the
normal hide will not be less than 15 nor more than 25 shillings. Also we have
brought our counties into an admirable disorder. We have snapped all bonds of
race and of neighbourhood. For example, we see the under-taxed Hampshire in the
midst of over-taxed counties; we have divorced Nottingham from Derby and
Leicester from Northampton. The one general remark that we can make about the
geographical distribution of taxation is that, if East Anglia is under-taxed (and this
is likely), then Kent, Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridge and Hertford would form
a continuous block of territory that is escaping easily.
The markedly exceptional cases are the most interesting.
Cases of under-taxation.
First let us look at the worst instances of immunity. In
Kent we seem to see ‘beneficial hidation’ on a gigantic
scale; but on the whole, though the evidence is not Kent.
conclusive, we do not think that this is due to any modern
privilege. We can not doubt that for a long time past the Kentish churches have
been magnificently endowed, and yet the number of manses and sulungs that their
land-books bestow upon them is not very large, and the number attributed to any
one place is usually small, perceptibly smaller than the number of hides that will
be comprised in a West Saxon charter. If a royal land-book condescends to
mention acres (iugera, segetes)[1527] it will almost certainly be a Kentish charter,
and we may guess that its acres are already fiscal acres of wide extent. To say
more would be perilous. The title-deeds of Christ Church can not be readily
harmonized with Domesday Book[1528]; perhaps we ought to add that this is much
to their credit; but the documents which come to us from St. Augustin’s and
Rochester suggest that the arrangement of sulungs which exists in the eleventh
century is ancient, or, at any rate, that the monks knew of no older computation
which dealt out these units with a far more lavish hand[1529]. In Kent the churches
were powerful and therefore may have been able to preserve a scheme of
assessment which unduly favoured a rich and prosperous shire; but we can not be
certain that the hide and the Kentish sulung have really had the same starting-
Hertford 1·69, Cambridge 1·73, Nottingham 1·76, Kent 3·25, Cornwall 3·92.
Now ‘One pound, one hide’ seems to be the central point
Equivalence of pound and
of this series, the point of rest through which the hide.
pendulum swings. Our experiment has been much too
partial to tell us whether a shire is slightly over-taxed or
slightly undertaxed; but, unless we have shamefully blundered, it tells us that in
some twenty out of thirty counties the aberration from the equivalence of pound
and hide will not exceed twenty five per cent.: in other words, the value of the
normal hide will not be less than 15 nor more than 25 shillings. Also we have
brought our counties into an admirable disorder. We have snapped all bonds of
race and of neighbourhood. For example, we see the under-taxed Hampshire in the
midst of over-taxed counties; we have divorced Nottingham from Derby and
Leicester from Northampton. The one general remark that we can make about the
geographical distribution of taxation is that, if East Anglia is under-taxed (and this
is likely), then Kent, Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridge and Hertford would form
a continuous block of territory that is escaping easily.
The markedly exceptional cases are the most interesting.
Cases of under-taxation.
First let us look at the worst instances of immunity. In
Kent we seem to see ‘beneficial hidation’ on a gigantic
scale; but on the whole, though the evidence is not Kent.
conclusive, we do not think that this is due to any modern
privilege. We can not doubt that for a long time past the Kentish churches have
been magnificently endowed, and yet the number of manses and sulungs that their
land-books bestow upon them is not very large, and the number attributed to any
one place is usually small, perceptibly smaller than the number of hides that will
be comprised in a West Saxon charter. If a royal land-book condescends to
mention acres (iugera, segetes)[1527] it will almost certainly be a Kentish charter,
and we may guess that its acres are already fiscal acres of wide extent. To say
more would be perilous. The title-deeds of Christ Church can not be readily
harmonized with Domesday Book[1528]; perhaps we ought to add that this is much
to their credit; but the documents which come to us from St. Augustin’s and
Rochester suggest that the arrangement of sulungs which exists in the eleventh
century is ancient, or, at any rate, that the monks knew of no older computation
which dealt out these units with a far more lavish hand[1529]. In Kent the churches
were powerful and therefore may have been able to preserve a scheme of
assessment which unduly favoured a rich and prosperous shire; but we can not be
certain that the hide and the Kentish sulung have really had the same starting-
Page 423
point, nor even perhaps that Kent was settled village-wise by its Germanic
invaders[1530].
Devon and Cornwall ought to be ‘under-rated’ (A < B) for
West Wales.
they are very poor. What we find is that they are so much
under-rated that the hide is worth a good deal more than a
pound. Here again we are inclined to think that this under-rating is old, perhaps as
old as the subjection of West Wales. Such land-books as we obtain from this
distressful country point in that direction, for they give but few hides and
condescend to speak of virgates[1531]. Among them is a charter professing to come
from Æthelstan which bestows ‘one manse’ upon the church of St. Buryan; but
clearly this one manse is a wide tract. Also this would-be charter speaks to us of
land that is measured by the arpent, and, whether or no it was forged by French
clerks after the Norman Conquest, it may tell us that this old Celtic measure has
been continuously used in the Celtic west[1532]. Be that as it may, when we are
speculating about the under-taxation of Devon and Cornwall, we may remember
that where the agrarian outlines were drawn by Welsh folk, the hide, though it
might be imposed from above as a piece of fiscal machinery, would be an intruder
among the Celtic trevs and out of harmony with its environment. The light
taxation of Cambridgeshire is perhaps more wonderful, for our figures represent
the hidage of the Confessor’s time, and we have seen[1533] how some of the
hundreds in this prosperous shire (our champion wheat-grower) obtained a large
abatement from the Conqueror[1534]. If, in accordance with The County Hidage,
we doubled the number of Cambridgeshire’s hides, though it would be over-taxed,
it would not be so heavily taxed as are some other counties.
Extreme over-taxation is far more interesting to us at the
Cases of over-taxation.
present moment than extreme under-taxation. The latter
may be the result of privilege, and in the middle ages
privileges will be accorded for value received in this world or promised in another.
But what are we to say of Leicester? On the face of our record it seems to have
been in Edward’s day the very poorest of all the counties and yet to have borne a
crushing number of carucates. Under William it was beginning to prosper but still
was miserably poor[1535]. We have bethought ourselves of various devices for
explaining this difficult case—of saying, for instance, that the Leicestershire
‘carucate of land’ is not a carucate for geld[1536]. But this case does not stand quite
alone. The Yorkshire carucates, and they are expressly called ‘carucates for geld,’
had been worth little. It is likely that the figure that we have given for Yorkshire is
not very near the true average for that wide territory; but we examined an
unusually large number of entries and avoided any which showed signs of
devastation in the present or the past. Also we see that in Northamptonshire, if we
invaders[1530].
Devon and Cornwall ought to be ‘under-rated’ (A < B) for
West Wales.
they are very poor. What we find is that they are so much
under-rated that the hide is worth a good deal more than a
pound. Here again we are inclined to think that this under-rating is old, perhaps as
old as the subjection of West Wales. Such land-books as we obtain from this
distressful country point in that direction, for they give but few hides and
condescend to speak of virgates[1531]. Among them is a charter professing to come
from Æthelstan which bestows ‘one manse’ upon the church of St. Buryan; but
clearly this one manse is a wide tract. Also this would-be charter speaks to us of
land that is measured by the arpent, and, whether or no it was forged by French
clerks after the Norman Conquest, it may tell us that this old Celtic measure has
been continuously used in the Celtic west[1532]. Be that as it may, when we are
speculating about the under-taxation of Devon and Cornwall, we may remember
that where the agrarian outlines were drawn by Welsh folk, the hide, though it
might be imposed from above as a piece of fiscal machinery, would be an intruder
among the Celtic trevs and out of harmony with its environment. The light
taxation of Cambridgeshire is perhaps more wonderful, for our figures represent
the hidage of the Confessor’s time, and we have seen[1533] how some of the
hundreds in this prosperous shire (our champion wheat-grower) obtained a large
abatement from the Conqueror[1534]. If, in accordance with The County Hidage,
we doubled the number of Cambridgeshire’s hides, though it would be over-taxed,
it would not be so heavily taxed as are some other counties.
Extreme over-taxation is far more interesting to us at the
Cases of over-taxation.
present moment than extreme under-taxation. The latter
may be the result of privilege, and in the middle ages
privileges will be accorded for value received in this world or promised in another.
But what are we to say of Leicester? On the face of our record it seems to have
been in Edward’s day the very poorest of all the counties and yet to have borne a
crushing number of carucates. Under William it was beginning to prosper but still
was miserably poor[1535]. We have bethought ourselves of various devices for
explaining this difficult case—of saying, for instance, that the Leicestershire
‘carucate of land’ is not a carucate for geld[1536]. But this case does not stand quite
alone. The Yorkshire carucates, and they are expressly called ‘carucates for geld,’
had been worth little. It is likely that the figure that we have given for Yorkshire is
not very near the true average for that wide territory; but we examined an
unusually large number of entries and avoided any which showed signs of
devastation in the present or the past. Also we see that in Northamptonshire, if we
Page 424
take the Edwardian valuit and the number of hides existing in 1086, we have an
over-taxed county; and yet we have reason to believe that since 1075 it had been
relieved of about half its hides. Had this not been done, it would have stood along
with Yorkshire, and, if it once had those 3200 of which The County Hidage
speaks, it would have stood along with its sister, the wretched Leicestershire. We
might find relief in the supposition that the Leicestershire of Edward’s time had
been scourged by war or pestilence; but unfortunately the jurors often tell us how
many teams were then upon the manors, and in so doing give a marvellously small
value to the land that one team tilled. Such reports as the following are
common[1537].
Teams Teams Valuit Valet
Carucates T. R. E. T. R. W. sol. sol.
Werditone 4 5 3 1 20
Castone 9 10 7 40 140
Wortone 6 6 5 40 100
Tuicros 6 6 7 3 40
Gopeshille 3 3 3 1 30
Scepa 2 3 3 2 30
What can these figures mean? They can not mean that a tract of land was being
habitually tilled by three teams and yet was producing in the form of profit or rent
no more than the worth of one or two shillings a year. An organized attempt to
deceive King William into an abatement seems out of the question, for he is being
told of a rapid increase of prosperity. Our best, though an unwarranted, guess is
that the Leicestershire valuit speaks not of the Confessor’s day, but of some time
of disorder that followed the Conquest, for in truth it seems to give us but ‘prairie
values.’ However, if we take, not the valuit, but the valet, we still have carucates
that are worth much less than a pound, and it seems clear that the carucate had
been worth much less than a pound in the as yet unravaged Yorkshire. On the
whole, these cases, together with what we can learn of Lancashire, will dispose us
to receive with more favour than we might otherwise have shown certain
statements about the hidage of England that have yet to be adduced. In Yorkshire,
Lancashire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire we may perhaps see the
unreformed relics of an age when the distribution of fiscal units among the various
provinces of England was the sport of wild guesswork[1538].
We have spoken of a tendency on the part of the hide to
Equity and hidage.
be worth a pound. Now we have no wish to represent this
equitable element as all powerful or very powerful; the
over-taxed county; and yet we have reason to believe that since 1075 it had been
relieved of about half its hides. Had this not been done, it would have stood along
with Yorkshire, and, if it once had those 3200 of which The County Hidage
speaks, it would have stood along with its sister, the wretched Leicestershire. We
might find relief in the supposition that the Leicestershire of Edward’s time had
been scourged by war or pestilence; but unfortunately the jurors often tell us how
many teams were then upon the manors, and in so doing give a marvellously small
value to the land that one team tilled. Such reports as the following are
common[1537].
Teams Teams Valuit Valet
Carucates T. R. E. T. R. W. sol. sol.
Werditone 4 5 3 1 20
Castone 9 10 7 40 140
Wortone 6 6 5 40 100
Tuicros 6 6 7 3 40
Gopeshille 3 3 3 1 30
Scepa 2 3 3 2 30
What can these figures mean? They can not mean that a tract of land was being
habitually tilled by three teams and yet was producing in the form of profit or rent
no more than the worth of one or two shillings a year. An organized attempt to
deceive King William into an abatement seems out of the question, for he is being
told of a rapid increase of prosperity. Our best, though an unwarranted, guess is
that the Leicestershire valuit speaks not of the Confessor’s day, but of some time
of disorder that followed the Conquest, for in truth it seems to give us but ‘prairie
values.’ However, if we take, not the valuit, but the valet, we still have carucates
that are worth much less than a pound, and it seems clear that the carucate had
been worth much less than a pound in the as yet unravaged Yorkshire. On the
whole, these cases, together with what we can learn of Lancashire, will dispose us
to receive with more favour than we might otherwise have shown certain
statements about the hidage of England that have yet to be adduced. In Yorkshire,
Lancashire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire we may perhaps see the
unreformed relics of an age when the distribution of fiscal units among the various
provinces of England was the sport of wild guesswork[1538].
We have spoken of a tendency on the part of the hide to
Equity and hidage.
be worth a pound. Now we have no wish to represent this
equitable element as all powerful or very powerful; the
Page 425
case of Kent is sufficient to show that it may be overruled by favouritism or
privilege. There has been a ‘beneficial hidation’ of shires as there has been a
‘beneficial hidation’ of manors. Still that the kings and witan have considered the
value as well as the number of teamlands seems fairly plain. Probably they have
considered it in a rough, ‘typical’ fashion. Any one who peruses Domesday Book
paying attention to the valets will be struck in the first place by their roundness. If
a teamland is not worth 20, it is worth 10 or 30, 5 or 40 shillings. The jurors seem
to keep in their minds as types the ‘one-pound-teamland,’ the ‘half-pound-
teamland’ and so forth. But then, whereas in one county ‘twenty shillings’ will
stand for ‘fair average’ and in another for ‘rather poor,’ in a third it will indicate
unusual excellence. Similarly we imagine that when fiscal hides have been
distributed or redistributed, there has been talk of typical qualities of land, of first-
rate and fourth-rate land. Any tradition of Roman taxation which had perdured in
Britain or crossed the sea from Frankland would have taught men that this was the
right method of procedure. But it is by no means certain that we can carry back
this equitable principle very far[1539]. Long ago the prevailing idea may have been
that teamland, house-land, pound-land and fiscal hide were, or ought normally to
be, all one; and then the discovery that there are wide tracts in which the worth of
an average teamland is much less or somewhat greater than a pound may have
come in as a disturbing and differentiating force and awakened debates in the
council of the nation. We may, if we like such excursions, fancy the conservatives
arguing for the good old rule ‘One teamland, one hide,’ while a party of financial
reformers has raised the cry ‘One pound, one hide.’ Then ‘pressure was brought to
bear in influential quarters,’ and in favour of their own districts the witan in the
moots jobbed and jerrymandered and rolled the friendly log, for all the world as if
they had been mere modern politicians.
But, to be serious, it is in some conjecture such as this
Distribution of hides and of
that we may perchance find aid when we are teamlands.
endeavouring to loosen one of Domesday’s worst knots.
We have hinted before now[1540] that there are districts in
which the teamland (B) seems to be as artificial and as remote from real agrarian
life as is the hide or the gelding carucate (A). To any one who thinks that when we
touch Domesday’s teamland we have always freed ourselves from the geld system
and penetrated through the rateable to the real, the following piece of the survey of
Rutland may be commended. ‘In Martinesleie Wapentake there is a hundred in
which there are 12 carucates for geld and there can be 48 teams.’ Now there is
nothing curious in the fact that 48 ‘real’ teamlands are rated at 12 carucates. But
let us look closer. Beside one smaller estate there are in this wapentake three
manors. Their arrangement is this[1541]:—
privilege. There has been a ‘beneficial hidation’ of shires as there has been a
‘beneficial hidation’ of manors. Still that the kings and witan have considered the
value as well as the number of teamlands seems fairly plain. Probably they have
considered it in a rough, ‘typical’ fashion. Any one who peruses Domesday Book
paying attention to the valets will be struck in the first place by their roundness. If
a teamland is not worth 20, it is worth 10 or 30, 5 or 40 shillings. The jurors seem
to keep in their minds as types the ‘one-pound-teamland,’ the ‘half-pound-
teamland’ and so forth. But then, whereas in one county ‘twenty shillings’ will
stand for ‘fair average’ and in another for ‘rather poor,’ in a third it will indicate
unusual excellence. Similarly we imagine that when fiscal hides have been
distributed or redistributed, there has been talk of typical qualities of land, of first-
rate and fourth-rate land. Any tradition of Roman taxation which had perdured in
Britain or crossed the sea from Frankland would have taught men that this was the
right method of procedure. But it is by no means certain that we can carry back
this equitable principle very far[1539]. Long ago the prevailing idea may have been
that teamland, house-land, pound-land and fiscal hide were, or ought normally to
be, all one; and then the discovery that there are wide tracts in which the worth of
an average teamland is much less or somewhat greater than a pound may have
come in as a disturbing and differentiating force and awakened debates in the
council of the nation. We may, if we like such excursions, fancy the conservatives
arguing for the good old rule ‘One teamland, one hide,’ while a party of financial
reformers has raised the cry ‘One pound, one hide.’ Then ‘pressure was brought to
bear in influential quarters,’ and in favour of their own districts the witan in the
moots jobbed and jerrymandered and rolled the friendly log, for all the world as if
they had been mere modern politicians.
But, to be serious, it is in some conjecture such as this
Distribution of hides and of
that we may perchance find aid when we are teamlands.
endeavouring to loosen one of Domesday’s worst knots.
We have hinted before now[1540] that there are districts in
which the teamland (B) seems to be as artificial and as remote from real agrarian
life as is the hide or the gelding carucate (A). To any one who thinks that when we
touch Domesday’s teamland we have always freed ourselves from the geld system
and penetrated through the rateable to the real, the following piece of the survey of
Rutland may be commended. ‘In Martinesleie Wapentake there is a hundred in
which there are 12 carucates for geld and there can be 48 teams.’ Now there is
nothing curious in the fact that 48 ‘real’ teamlands are rated at 12 carucates. But
let us look closer. Beside one smaller estate there are in this wapentake three
manors. Their arrangement is this[1541]:—
Page 426
Villeins
Carucates Desmesne Men’s
and
for geld teams teams
Teamlands bordiers
Ocheham 4 16 157 2 37
Hameldune 4 16 153 5 40
Redlinctune 4 16 196[1542] 4 30
Subtenancy 24 4 5
12 48 530 127
Now surely the three sixteens are just as artificial as the three fours, and in what
possible sense can we affirm that there is land for only 48 teams when we see that
530 tenants are actually ploughing it with 127 teams? Behind this there must be
some theory or some tradition that we have not yet fathomed[1543].
We strongly suspect that in the work of distributing and
Area and value as elements
reducing the geld, ‘the land for one team’ has been of geldability.
playing a part for some time past. In order to decide, for
example, whether a claim for abatement was just, the
statesman had to consider two elements, the number of the teamlands and their
value. He would be content with round figures, indeed no others would content
him or be amenable to his rude manipulation. So it is decided that some province
or district has, or must be deemed to have, y teamlands. Also it is decided at this or
at some other time, or perhaps from time to time, that the land in this district
(regard being had to its state of cultivation) is or must be deemed to be first-class,
or, as the case may be, third-class land. Then a combination of these propositions
induces the conclusion that the district has x hides or carucates for geld. Then
inside the district, when the process of subpartitionment begins, a similar method
is pursued. There are x hides or carucates for geld to be distributed. They ought to
be distributed with reference to the number and value of real teamlands. The work
is rudely done in the subpartitionary fashion. A certain sub-district has x/a hides
thrown upon it; a sub-sub-district has x/ab; but this apportionment is obtained by
combining a proposition about value with a partitionment of the y teamlands. The
sub-sub-district has x/ab hides, because y/cd teamlands fall to its share and
because its land is assigned to a certain class. Then, perhaps for the purpose of
future rearrangements, the number of teamlands (y/cd) is remembered as well the
number of hides or gelding carucates (x/ab). The result is that every manor in a
certain district has four hides and sixteen teamlands. It is very pretty; it was never
(except for technical purposes) very true, and every year makes it less true[1544].
Carucates Desmesne Men’s
and
for geld teams teams
Teamlands bordiers
Ocheham 4 16 157 2 37
Hameldune 4 16 153 5 40
Redlinctune 4 16 196[1542] 4 30
Subtenancy 24 4 5
12 48 530 127
Now surely the three sixteens are just as artificial as the three fours, and in what
possible sense can we affirm that there is land for only 48 teams when we see that
530 tenants are actually ploughing it with 127 teams? Behind this there must be
some theory or some tradition that we have not yet fathomed[1543].
We strongly suspect that in the work of distributing and
Area and value as elements
reducing the geld, ‘the land for one team’ has been of geldability.
playing a part for some time past. In order to decide, for
example, whether a claim for abatement was just, the
statesman had to consider two elements, the number of the teamlands and their
value. He would be content with round figures, indeed no others would content
him or be amenable to his rude manipulation. So it is decided that some province
or district has, or must be deemed to have, y teamlands. Also it is decided at this or
at some other time, or perhaps from time to time, that the land in this district
(regard being had to its state of cultivation) is or must be deemed to be first-class,
or, as the case may be, third-class land. Then a combination of these propositions
induces the conclusion that the district has x hides or carucates for geld. Then
inside the district, when the process of subpartitionment begins, a similar method
is pursued. There are x hides or carucates for geld to be distributed. They ought to
be distributed with reference to the number and value of real teamlands. The work
is rudely done in the subpartitionary fashion. A certain sub-district has x/a hides
thrown upon it; a sub-sub-district has x/ab; but this apportionment is obtained by
combining a proposition about value with a partitionment of the y teamlands. The
sub-sub-district has x/ab hides, because y/cd teamlands fall to its share and
because its land is assigned to a certain class. Then, perhaps for the purpose of
future rearrangements, the number of teamlands (y/cd) is remembered as well the
number of hides or gelding carucates (x/ab). The result is that every manor in a
certain district has four hides and sixteen teamlands. It is very pretty; it was never
(except for technical purposes) very true, and every year makes it less true[1544].
Page 427
That exactly this was done, we do not say and do not
The equitable teamland.
think; but something like it may have been done. As
already remarked, we gravely doubt whether that question
which the commissioners put about potential teams was understood in the same
way in different counties, but we are sadly afraid that some of the answers that
they obtained were references, not to existing agrarian facts, but to a fiscal history
which already lay in the past and is now hopelessly obscure. A mystery of iniquity
is bad, but the mysteries of archaic equity are worse. In many Anglo-Saxon
arrangements we find a curious mixture of clumsiness and elaboration.
We can not quit this part of our subject without adding
Artificial valets.
that there are cases in which the valuits and valets look as
artificial and systematic as the hides and the teamlands.
On a single page we find a description of five handsome Yorkshire manors[1545].
We wish to know their value in the past and the present, and what we learn is this:
Brostewic valuit £56, valet £10; Chilnesse valuit £56, valet £10; Witfornes valuit
£56, valet £6; Mapletone valuit £56, valet £6; Hornesse valuit £56, valet £6; and
yet between these manors there are large variations in the number of the carucates
and the number of the teamlands. Then we look about and see that it has been
common for the first-class manor of Yorkshire, if it is the centre of an extensive
soke, to be worth precisely £56[1546]. We can not but fear that the value of these
manors is a legal fiction, though a fiction that is founded upon fact. Their
supposed worth seems fixed at a figure that will fit into some scheme, the clue to
which we have not yet recovered. Everywhere we are baffled by the make-believe
of ancient finance.
The obscure forces which conspired to determine the
The new assessments of
quotas of the various counties might be illustrated by an Henry II.
episode in the reign of Henry II. The old danegeld is still
being occasionally levied, and in the main the old
assessment prevails. But alongside of this we see a newer tax. From time to time
the king takes a gift (donum, assisa, gersuma) from the counties. A certain round
number of marks is demanded from every shire. For this purpose a new tariff is
employed, and yet it is not wholly independent of the old, for we can hardly look
at it without seeing that it is so constructed as to redress in a rude fashion the
antiquated scheme of the danegeld. In the first column of the following table we
give, omitting fractions, the pounds that the counties contribute when a danegeld is
levied, in the second and third the half-marks (6s. 8d.) that they pay by way of gift
on two different occasions early in the reign of Henry of Anjou[1547].
The equitable teamland.
think; but something like it may have been done. As
already remarked, we gravely doubt whether that question
which the commissioners put about potential teams was understood in the same
way in different counties, but we are sadly afraid that some of the answers that
they obtained were references, not to existing agrarian facts, but to a fiscal history
which already lay in the past and is now hopelessly obscure. A mystery of iniquity
is bad, but the mysteries of archaic equity are worse. In many Anglo-Saxon
arrangements we find a curious mixture of clumsiness and elaboration.
We can not quit this part of our subject without adding
Artificial valets.
that there are cases in which the valuits and valets look as
artificial and systematic as the hides and the teamlands.
On a single page we find a description of five handsome Yorkshire manors[1545].
We wish to know their value in the past and the present, and what we learn is this:
Brostewic valuit £56, valet £10; Chilnesse valuit £56, valet £10; Witfornes valuit
£56, valet £6; Mapletone valuit £56, valet £6; Hornesse valuit £56, valet £6; and
yet between these manors there are large variations in the number of the carucates
and the number of the teamlands. Then we look about and see that it has been
common for the first-class manor of Yorkshire, if it is the centre of an extensive
soke, to be worth precisely £56[1546]. We can not but fear that the value of these
manors is a legal fiction, though a fiction that is founded upon fact. Their
supposed worth seems fixed at a figure that will fit into some scheme, the clue to
which we have not yet recovered. Everywhere we are baffled by the make-believe
of ancient finance.
The obscure forces which conspired to determine the
The new assessments of
quotas of the various counties might be illustrated by an Henry II.
episode in the reign of Henry II. The old danegeld is still
being occasionally levied, and in the main the old
assessment prevails. But alongside of this we see a newer tax. From time to time
the king takes a gift (donum, assisa, gersuma) from the counties. A certain round
number of marks is demanded from every shire. For this purpose a new tariff is
employed, and yet it is not wholly independent of the old, for we can hardly look
at it without seeing that it is so constructed as to redress in a rude fashion the
antiquated scheme of the danegeld. In the first column of the following table we
give, omitting fractions, the pounds that the counties contribute when a danegeld is
levied, in the second and third the half-marks (6s. 8d.) that they pay by way of gift
on two different occasions early in the reign of Henry of Anjou[1547].
Page 428
Danegeld Donum
Donum of of
2 Hen. II. 4 Hen.
II.
half-
£ half-marks
marks
Kent 106 320 240
Sussex 217 202 160
Surrey 180 160 160
Hampshire 185 200
Berkshire 206 148 120
Wiltshire 390 200 160
Dorset 248
Somerset 278 200 300
Devon 104 368 300
Cornwall 23
Middlesex 86 175 80
Hertford 110 120
Buckingham 205
200 240
Bedford 111
Oxford 250 140 200
Gloucester 194 218 260
Worcester 101 100 120
Hereford 94 80 140
Cambridge 115 160
Huntingdon 71 100
Northampton 120 240 280
Leicester 100 100 160
Warwick 129 100 240
Stafford 45 80 100
Shropshire 118 80 140
Derby
112 160 280
Nottingham
York 165 1000[1548] 1000
Lincoln 266 540 600
Donum of of
2 Hen. II. 4 Hen.
II.
half-
£ half-marks
marks
Kent 106 320 240
Sussex 217 202 160
Surrey 180 160 160
Hampshire 185 200
Berkshire 206 148 120
Wiltshire 390 200 160
Dorset 248
Somerset 278 200 300
Devon 104 368 300
Cornwall 23
Middlesex 86 175 80
Hertford 110 120
Buckingham 205
200 240
Bedford 111
Oxford 250 140 200
Gloucester 194 218 260
Worcester 101 100 120
Hereford 94 80 140
Cambridge 115 160
Huntingdon 71 100
Northampton 120 240 280
Leicester 100 100 160
Warwick 129 100 240
Stafford 45 80 100
Shropshire 118 80 140
Derby
112 160 280
Nottingham
York 165 1000[1548] 1000
Lincoln 266 540 600
Page 429
Essex 236 400 400
Norfolk 330 400
400
Suffolk 235 240
The variable tariff of dona hits most heavily just those counties which have been
too favourably treated; Kent and Devon must make large ‘gifts’ because they pay
little geld. Yorkshire, which once more is becoming prosperous, heads the new list,
though it pays less geld than Surrey; and, on the other hand, Wiltshire, which
makes the largest of all contributions to the ancient tax, is leniently treated. When
men have acquired a vested right in an iniquitous assessment, the fertile politician
neither reforms nor abolishes the old, but invents a new impost.
And now, after all these inconclusive meanderings, we
Acreage of the fiscal hide.
will state our cheerful belief that the hide of Domesday
(A) is always[1549] composed of 120 acres and that the
carucate for geld of Domesday (A) is always composed of 120 acres. We are
speaking only of a fiscal system. Let us forget for a time that the terms that we are
using can be employed to describe masses of land. Let us treat them as red and
white counters. In the game played at the Exchequer the red counter called a hide
is the equivalent of 120 white counters called acres.
If Domesday Book is to serve its primary purpose, if it is
Equation between hide and
to tell the king’s officers how much geld is due, it is acres.
absolutely necessary that by some ready process they
should be able to work sums in hides and acres and in
carucates and acres. They must understand such statements as the following:—‘it
defends itself for 2 hides and 5 acres[1550]’: ‘it gelded for 3 hides, 1 virgate and 11⁄2
acres[1551]’: ‘he has 5 bovates, 13 acres and 1 virgate for geld[1552].’ Now it is
conceivable that the treasury contains a book of tables which will teach the clerks
that a hide has a acres in Surrey and b acres in Devon; but this seems highly
improbable. As we have already said[1553], the variations between the numbers of
‘real’ acres that go to make ‘real’ hides are not provincial, they are villar
variations. That the financiers at Winchester should consider villar variations is out
of the question. Therefore if we can prove that in one district they employed a
given equation, there is a strong presumption that they used it in other districts.
And unfortunately our proof has to be of this kind, for in many counties acres are
rarely mentioned and we get no sums that are worked in acres and hides. But
further, if we see one equation holding good in a considerable number of cases, we
shall still believe that this is the one true equation, though other cases occur in
which it breaks down. We have to remember the possibility of mistranscription,
the possibility of bad arithmetic, the possibility of a haughty treatment of small
Norfolk 330 400
400
Suffolk 235 240
The variable tariff of dona hits most heavily just those counties which have been
too favourably treated; Kent and Devon must make large ‘gifts’ because they pay
little geld. Yorkshire, which once more is becoming prosperous, heads the new list,
though it pays less geld than Surrey; and, on the other hand, Wiltshire, which
makes the largest of all contributions to the ancient tax, is leniently treated. When
men have acquired a vested right in an iniquitous assessment, the fertile politician
neither reforms nor abolishes the old, but invents a new impost.
And now, after all these inconclusive meanderings, we
Acreage of the fiscal hide.
will state our cheerful belief that the hide of Domesday
(A) is always[1549] composed of 120 acres and that the
carucate for geld of Domesday (A) is always composed of 120 acres. We are
speaking only of a fiscal system. Let us forget for a time that the terms that we are
using can be employed to describe masses of land. Let us treat them as red and
white counters. In the game played at the Exchequer the red counter called a hide
is the equivalent of 120 white counters called acres.
If Domesday Book is to serve its primary purpose, if it is
Equation between hide and
to tell the king’s officers how much geld is due, it is acres.
absolutely necessary that by some ready process they
should be able to work sums in hides and acres and in
carucates and acres. They must understand such statements as the following:—‘it
defends itself for 2 hides and 5 acres[1550]’: ‘it gelded for 3 hides, 1 virgate and 11⁄2
acres[1551]’: ‘he has 5 bovates, 13 acres and 1 virgate for geld[1552].’ Now it is
conceivable that the treasury contains a book of tables which will teach the clerks
that a hide has a acres in Surrey and b acres in Devon; but this seems highly
improbable. As we have already said[1553], the variations between the numbers of
‘real’ acres that go to make ‘real’ hides are not provincial, they are villar
variations. That the financiers at Winchester should consider villar variations is out
of the question. Therefore if we can prove that in one district they employed a
given equation, there is a strong presumption that they used it in other districts.
And unfortunately our proof has to be of this kind, for in many counties acres are
rarely mentioned and we get no sums that are worked in acres and hides. But
further, if we see one equation holding good in a considerable number of cases, we
shall still believe that this is the one true equation, though other cases occur in
which it breaks down. We have to remember the possibility of mistranscription,
the possibility of bad arithmetic, the possibility of a haughty treatment of small
Page 430
numbers: the actual existence of all these dangers can be amply proved. Therefore
if once we have inductively obtained an equation which serves in many instances,
we shall hold by it, unless the instances in which it fails point either to some one
other equation or to the conclusion that the equation varies from parish to parish.
Now the Cambridgeshire Inquest professes to give us the
Evidence from
total hidage of a vill and then proceeds to allot the hides Cambridgeshire.
among the various tenants in chief. Sometimes when it
does this it speaks of virgates and acres and thus gives us
an opportunity of seeing how many acres are reckoned to the hide or to the virgate.
The equation 1 H. = 4 V. is implied in many entries. But further, there are at least
ten cases which assume one or both of the following equations: namely, 1 H. = 120
A. and 1 V. = 30 A. On the other hand, there are some cases in which the sum that is
put before us is not rightly worked if these equations be correct; but in some of
these cases the Inquisitio and Domesday Book contradict each other and in some a
small quantity is neglected. The very few remaining cases point to no one rival
equation, and are not too numerous to be ascribed to carelessness[1554].
A similar test can be applied to a part of Cambridgeshire
Evidence from the Isle of
that is not included in the Cambridgeshire Inquest but is Ely.
included in the Inquisitio Eliensis. We speak of the Isle of
Ely. There are entries which, having told us how many
hides a manor contained, proceed to allot these among their various occupants,
and, as in some of these cases a calculation by acres is mixed up with a calculation
by hides, they hold out a hope that we may be able to discover how many acres
were reckoned to the hide. We will begin with Ely itself. ‘Ely defends itself for 10
hides.... In demesne there are 5 hides ... and there are 40 villeins with 15 acres
apiece ... and 18 cottiers and 20 serfs[1555].’ Now if from the total of 10 hides we
subtract the 5 that are in demesne, this leaves 5 others, and if we divide these 5
among the 40 villeins this gives to each villein 1/8th of a hide; but we are told that
each villein has 15 acres; therefore it follows that 120 acres make a hide. We
reckon that in eight other cases[1556] the same method of computation is followed,
though in one of these a hide divided among 17 villeins is said to give them 7
acres apiece and this shows us how a single acre may be neglected in order to
avoid a very ugly fraction[1557]. Against these cases must be set seven which give
less pleasing results[1558]. In at least one of these no possible theory will justify the
arithmetic of our record as it stands[1559], and there is no accord between the
remaining five.
At first sight the survey of Middlesex seems to offer
Evidence from Middlesex.
materials similar to those that come to us from
if once we have inductively obtained an equation which serves in many instances,
we shall hold by it, unless the instances in which it fails point either to some one
other equation or to the conclusion that the equation varies from parish to parish.
Now the Cambridgeshire Inquest professes to give us the
Evidence from
total hidage of a vill and then proceeds to allot the hides Cambridgeshire.
among the various tenants in chief. Sometimes when it
does this it speaks of virgates and acres and thus gives us
an opportunity of seeing how many acres are reckoned to the hide or to the virgate.
The equation 1 H. = 4 V. is implied in many entries. But further, there are at least
ten cases which assume one or both of the following equations: namely, 1 H. = 120
A. and 1 V. = 30 A. On the other hand, there are some cases in which the sum that is
put before us is not rightly worked if these equations be correct; but in some of
these cases the Inquisitio and Domesday Book contradict each other and in some a
small quantity is neglected. The very few remaining cases point to no one rival
equation, and are not too numerous to be ascribed to carelessness[1554].
A similar test can be applied to a part of Cambridgeshire
Evidence from the Isle of
that is not included in the Cambridgeshire Inquest but is Ely.
included in the Inquisitio Eliensis. We speak of the Isle of
Ely. There are entries which, having told us how many
hides a manor contained, proceed to allot these among their various occupants,
and, as in some of these cases a calculation by acres is mixed up with a calculation
by hides, they hold out a hope that we may be able to discover how many acres
were reckoned to the hide. We will begin with Ely itself. ‘Ely defends itself for 10
hides.... In demesne there are 5 hides ... and there are 40 villeins with 15 acres
apiece ... and 18 cottiers and 20 serfs[1555].’ Now if from the total of 10 hides we
subtract the 5 that are in demesne, this leaves 5 others, and if we divide these 5
among the 40 villeins this gives to each villein 1/8th of a hide; but we are told that
each villein has 15 acres; therefore it follows that 120 acres make a hide. We
reckon that in eight other cases[1556] the same method of computation is followed,
though in one of these a hide divided among 17 villeins is said to give them 7
acres apiece and this shows us how a single acre may be neglected in order to
avoid a very ugly fraction[1557]. Against these cases must be set seven which give
less pleasing results[1558]. In at least one of these no possible theory will justify the
arithmetic of our record as it stands[1559], and there is no accord between the
remaining five.
At first sight the survey of Middlesex seems to offer
Evidence from Middlesex.
materials similar to those that come to us from
Page 431
Cambridgeshire. Very curious and instructive they are. A Middlesex entry will
usually give us the number of hides (A), the number of teamlands (B), the number
of teams (C), and also certain particulars which state the quantity of land that there
is in demesne and the quantities held by divers classes of tenants. The sum of these
particulars we may call P. Now we begin by hoping that P will be equal to A, and,
since the particulars often contain acres as well as hides and virgates, we hope also
to discover the equation that is involved in the sum. As an example we will take a
case in which all goes well. At Cowley a manor defends itself for two hides; in
demesne are one and a half hides; two villeins have a half hide. Here A = 2 H. and
P = 11⁄2 H. + 1⁄2 H.; so all is as it should be. But we soon come upon cases in which,
though we make no assumption about the relation of the acre to the hide, our P
refuses to be equal to our A. Then perhaps we begin to hope that P will be equal to
B: in other words, that the sum of the quantities ascribed to lord and tenants will
be equal to the number of teamlands. But this is more fallacious than the former
hope. We will put a few specimens in a table[1560].
Hides Teamlands Sum of particulars
Harrow (Abp. Canterbury) 100 70 461⁄2 H. + 13 V. + 13 A.
Stepney (Bp. London) 32 25 181⁄2 H. + 481⁄2 V.
Fulham (Bp. London) 40 40 411⁄2 H. + 30 V.
Westminster (Abbot) 131⁄2 11 10 H. + 141⁄2 V. + 5 A.
Sunbury (Abb. 1
7 6 4 H. + 10 ⁄2 V.
Westminster)
Shepperton (Abb.
8 7 31⁄2 H. + 17 V. + 24 A.
Westminster)
1
Feltham (C. Mortain) 12 10 6 H. + 16 ⁄2 V.
Chelsea (Edw. of Salisbury) 2 5 1 H. + 4 V. + 5 A.
We seem to have here three independent statements, and, Meaning of the Middlesex
though throughout the county P shows a tendency to keep entries.
near to A, still we must not make calculations which
suppose that the ‘hide’ of A is the ‘hide’ of P. Take Chelsea for example. We must
not say: 2 H. = 1 H. + 4 V. + 5 A., and therefore four virgates and five acres make a
hide. No, it seems possible that in these Middlesex ‘particulars’ we do at last touch
real agrarian arrangements. At Fulham the bishop has 13 hides in demesne; 5
villeins have 1 hide apiece; 13 villeins have 1 virgate apiece; 34 have a half-
virgate apiece; 22 cottiers have in all a half-hide; Frenchmen and London
burgesses have 23 hides; so there are 411⁄2 hides and 30 virgates. That we take to
be the real arrangement of the manor, though we are far from saying that all its
usually give us the number of hides (A), the number of teamlands (B), the number
of teams (C), and also certain particulars which state the quantity of land that there
is in demesne and the quantities held by divers classes of tenants. The sum of these
particulars we may call P. Now we begin by hoping that P will be equal to A, and,
since the particulars often contain acres as well as hides and virgates, we hope also
to discover the equation that is involved in the sum. As an example we will take a
case in which all goes well. At Cowley a manor defends itself for two hides; in
demesne are one and a half hides; two villeins have a half hide. Here A = 2 H. and
P = 11⁄2 H. + 1⁄2 H.; so all is as it should be. But we soon come upon cases in which,
though we make no assumption about the relation of the acre to the hide, our P
refuses to be equal to our A. Then perhaps we begin to hope that P will be equal to
B: in other words, that the sum of the quantities ascribed to lord and tenants will
be equal to the number of teamlands. But this is more fallacious than the former
hope. We will put a few specimens in a table[1560].
Hides Teamlands Sum of particulars
Harrow (Abp. Canterbury) 100 70 461⁄2 H. + 13 V. + 13 A.
Stepney (Bp. London) 32 25 181⁄2 H. + 481⁄2 V.
Fulham (Bp. London) 40 40 411⁄2 H. + 30 V.
Westminster (Abbot) 131⁄2 11 10 H. + 141⁄2 V. + 5 A.
Sunbury (Abb. 1
7 6 4 H. + 10 ⁄2 V.
Westminster)
Shepperton (Abb.
8 7 31⁄2 H. + 17 V. + 24 A.
Westminster)
1
Feltham (C. Mortain) 12 10 6 H. + 16 ⁄2 V.
Chelsea (Edw. of Salisbury) 2 5 1 H. + 4 V. + 5 A.
We seem to have here three independent statements, and, Meaning of the Middlesex
though throughout the county P shows a tendency to keep entries.
near to A, still we must not make calculations which
suppose that the ‘hide’ of A is the ‘hide’ of P. Take Chelsea for example. We must
not say: 2 H. = 1 H. + 4 V. + 5 A., and therefore four virgates and five acres make a
hide. No, it seems possible that in these Middlesex ‘particulars’ we do at last touch
real agrarian arrangements. At Fulham the bishop has 13 hides in demesne; 5
villeins have 1 hide apiece; 13 villeins have 1 virgate apiece; 34 have a half-
virgate apiece; 22 cottiers have in all a half-hide; Frenchmen and London
burgesses have 23 hides; so there are 411⁄2 hides and 30 virgates. That we take to
be the real arrangement of the manor, though we are far from saying that all its
Page 432
hides are equal. But it gelds for only 40 hides. A virgate can not be a negative
quantity. Therefore we need say no more of these Middlesex entries, only in
passing let us observe that the discrepancy between P and B is often considerable,
and this seems to show that the teamland of these Middlesex jurors is not in very
close touch with the agrarian and proprietary allotments.
To yet one other quarter we have hopefully turned only to
Evidence in the Geld
be disappointed, namely, to the so-called Geld Inquests, Inquests.
copies of which are placed at the beginning of the Exeter
Domesday. They tell us of a geld that obviously is being
levied at the rate of six shillings on the hide, and sometimes they seem to tell us
expressly or implicitly the amount that an acre pays. For a moment we may think
that we are obtaining valuable results. Thus at Domerham we find that 14 hides
minus 4 acres pay £4. 3s. 8d. We conclude that each acre is taxed at one penny and
that 72 A. = 1 H.[1561]. Then at Celeberge 20 H. minus 4 A. is taxed at £5. 19s. 6d.
We conclude that each acre is taxed at three-half-pence and that 48 A. = 1 H.[1562].
But we soon come to sums which are absurd and discover that as regards small
quantities these documents are for our present purpose quite useless. For the
Wiltshire hundreds we have three different documents. They do not agree in their
arithmetic. Probably they represent the efforts of three different computers.
Indubitably one or more of them made blunders. To give one example:—one of
our documents begins its account of Mere by saying that it contains 85 hides, 1⁄2 a
hide and 1⁄2 a virgate; the other two documents say 86 hides, 1⁄2 a hide and 1
virgate[1563]. This is by no means the only instance of such discrepant results. But
mere clerical or arithmetical errors are not the only obstacle to our use of these
accounts. It soon becomes quite evident that small amounts are dealt with in an
irregular fashion. Thrice over we are assured that 15 H. 1⁄2 V. paid the king £4. 11s.
0d.[1564]; but they should have paid £4. 10s. 9d., if four virgates make a hide.
Thrice over we are assured that 641⁄2 H. paid £19. 6s. 10d.[1565]. All suppositions as
to acres and virgates apart, 641⁄2 H. should have paid £19. 7s. 0d In Somersetshire
the calculations do not speak of acres, but they introduce us to the fertinus or
farthing, which is certainly meant to be the quarter of a virgate. Numerous entries
show us that 4 fertini = 1 virgate, and yet when a mass of land expressed in terms
of hides, virgates and farthings is said to pay a certain sum for geld, we find that
the odd farthings are reckoned as paying, sometimes 3d., sometimes 4d.,
sometimes 42⁄3d., sometimes 5d., sometimes 6d. per farthing[1566]. So again, when
additions are made, odd acres are ignored. We are told that in a certain hundred the
barons have 20 hides in demesne, and then that this amount is made up by the
following particulars, 8 H. + 1 V. + 3 H. + 3 V + 41⁄2 H. - 4 A. + 31⁄2 H. It is obvious
that these particulars when added together do not make 20 hides, though they may
well make 20 hides and 4 acres[1567]. A study of these Geld Inquests has brought
quantity. Therefore we need say no more of these Middlesex entries, only in
passing let us observe that the discrepancy between P and B is often considerable,
and this seems to show that the teamland of these Middlesex jurors is not in very
close touch with the agrarian and proprietary allotments.
To yet one other quarter we have hopefully turned only to
Evidence in the Geld
be disappointed, namely, to the so-called Geld Inquests, Inquests.
copies of which are placed at the beginning of the Exeter
Domesday. They tell us of a geld that obviously is being
levied at the rate of six shillings on the hide, and sometimes they seem to tell us
expressly or implicitly the amount that an acre pays. For a moment we may think
that we are obtaining valuable results. Thus at Domerham we find that 14 hides
minus 4 acres pay £4. 3s. 8d. We conclude that each acre is taxed at one penny and
that 72 A. = 1 H.[1561]. Then at Celeberge 20 H. minus 4 A. is taxed at £5. 19s. 6d.
We conclude that each acre is taxed at three-half-pence and that 48 A. = 1 H.[1562].
But we soon come to sums which are absurd and discover that as regards small
quantities these documents are for our present purpose quite useless. For the
Wiltshire hundreds we have three different documents. They do not agree in their
arithmetic. Probably they represent the efforts of three different computers.
Indubitably one or more of them made blunders. To give one example:—one of
our documents begins its account of Mere by saying that it contains 85 hides, 1⁄2 a
hide and 1⁄2 a virgate; the other two documents say 86 hides, 1⁄2 a hide and 1
virgate[1563]. This is by no means the only instance of such discrepant results. But
mere clerical or arithmetical errors are not the only obstacle to our use of these
accounts. It soon becomes quite evident that small amounts are dealt with in an
irregular fashion. Thrice over we are assured that 15 H. 1⁄2 V. paid the king £4. 11s.
0d.[1564]; but they should have paid £4. 10s. 9d., if four virgates make a hide.
Thrice over we are assured that 641⁄2 H. paid £19. 6s. 10d.[1565]. All suppositions as
to acres and virgates apart, 641⁄2 H. should have paid £19. 7s. 0d In Somersetshire
the calculations do not speak of acres, but they introduce us to the fertinus or
farthing, which is certainly meant to be the quarter of a virgate. Numerous entries
show us that 4 fertini = 1 virgate, and yet when a mass of land expressed in terms
of hides, virgates and farthings is said to pay a certain sum for geld, we find that
the odd farthings are reckoned as paying, sometimes 3d., sometimes 4d.,
sometimes 42⁄3d., sometimes 5d., sometimes 6d. per farthing[1566]. So again, when
additions are made, odd acres are ignored. We are told that in a certain hundred the
barons have 20 hides in demesne, and then that this amount is made up by the
following particulars, 8 H. + 1 V. + 3 H. + 3 V + 41⁄2 H. - 4 A. + 31⁄2 H. It is obvious
that these particulars when added together do not make 20 hides, though they may
well make 20 hides and 4 acres[1567]. A study of these Geld Inquests has brought
Page 433
us reluctantly to the conclusion that, though they amply prove that 4 V. = 1 H., they
afford no proof as to the number of acres that are reckoned to the virgate[1568].
One word to explain that the apparent rudeness with
Treatment of small
which small figures are treated is not due to any quantities.
persuasion that they may be safely disregarded, but is
rather the natural outcome of a partitionary method of
taxation. Little quantities are lost in the process. It is known that a certain hundred
should have, for example, 80 hides and a certain vill 5 hides: but when you come
to add up the particulars you can not bring out these round figures, perhaps
because many years ago a small error was made by some one when an estate of
23⁄4 hides was being divided into 7 shares. If a mistake be made, it can never be
corrected; the landowner who has once or twice paid for 47 acres will refuse to
pay for 48 and will tell you that the deficient acre does not lie on his land.
The ignes fatui which dance over the survey of Middlesex
Result of the evidence.
and the Geld Inquests of the south-western counties have
for a while led us from our straight path. We have seen
that in Cambridgeshire the equation 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A. is employed on at least
twenty occasions. Now as to the rest of England it must at once be confessed that
we have no such convincing evidence. In many counties acres of arable land are
but rarely mentioned; parcels of land which geld for less than a hide are generally
expressed in terms of hides and virgates; we read, for example, not of so many
acres, but of the ninth part of a hide or of two third parts of a virgate. Thus we are
compelled for the more part to fall back upon the presumption that the treasury has
but one mode of reckoning for the whole of England.
But we would not rest our case altogether upon
Evidence from Essex.
probability. In Essex we find one fairly clear case in
which our equation is used[1569]. Sometimes, again, we
read that a tract of land is, or gelds for, or defends itself for x hides and z acres, or
for x hides, y virgates and z acres. Now in any entry which takes the first of these
forms we have some evidence that z acres are less than one hide, and from any
entry which takes the second of these forms we may infer that z acres are less than
one virgate. Of course from such a statement as that ‘A holds 90 or 115 or 240
acres’ we draw no inference. It is common enough in our own day to speak of
things costing thirty shillings or eighteen pence. But we never speak of things
costing one pound and thirty shillings, or one shilling and eighteen pence, and we
should require much proof before we thought so meanly of our ancestors as to
suppose that they habitually spoke in this clumsy fashion.
afford no proof as to the number of acres that are reckoned to the virgate[1568].
One word to explain that the apparent rudeness with
Treatment of small
which small figures are treated is not due to any quantities.
persuasion that they may be safely disregarded, but is
rather the natural outcome of a partitionary method of
taxation. Little quantities are lost in the process. It is known that a certain hundred
should have, for example, 80 hides and a certain vill 5 hides: but when you come
to add up the particulars you can not bring out these round figures, perhaps
because many years ago a small error was made by some one when an estate of
23⁄4 hides was being divided into 7 shares. If a mistake be made, it can never be
corrected; the landowner who has once or twice paid for 47 acres will refuse to
pay for 48 and will tell you that the deficient acre does not lie on his land.
The ignes fatui which dance over the survey of Middlesex
Result of the evidence.
and the Geld Inquests of the south-western counties have
for a while led us from our straight path. We have seen
that in Cambridgeshire the equation 1 H. = 4 V. = 120 A. is employed on at least
twenty occasions. Now as to the rest of England it must at once be confessed that
we have no such convincing evidence. In many counties acres of arable land are
but rarely mentioned; parcels of land which geld for less than a hide are generally
expressed in terms of hides and virgates; we read, for example, not of so many
acres, but of the ninth part of a hide or of two third parts of a virgate. Thus we are
compelled for the more part to fall back upon the presumption that the treasury has
but one mode of reckoning for the whole of England.
But we would not rest our case altogether upon
Evidence from Essex.
probability. In Essex we find one fairly clear case in
which our equation is used[1569]. Sometimes, again, we
read that a tract of land is, or gelds for, or defends itself for x hides and z acres, or
for x hides, y virgates and z acres. Now in any entry which takes the first of these
forms we have some evidence that z acres are less than one hide, and from any
entry which takes the second of these forms we may infer that z acres are less than
one virgate. Of course from such a statement as that ‘A holds 90 or 115 or 240
acres’ we draw no inference. It is common enough in our own day to speak of
things costing thirty shillings or eighteen pence. But we never speak of things
costing one pound and thirty shillings, or one shilling and eighteen pence, and we
should require much proof before we thought so meanly of our ancestors as to
suppose that they habitually spoke in this clumsy fashion.
Page 434
Let us use this test. Happily in Essex we very frequently have a tract of land
described as being x hides and z acres.
Now we read of
described as being x hides and z acres.
Now we read of
Page 435
a half hide and 30 acres[1570],
a hide and a half and 31 acres[1571],
a half hide and 35 acres[1572],
a half hide and 37 acres[1573],
a hide and a half and 40 acres[1574],
a hide and a half and 45 acres[1575],
a half hide and 45 acres[1576],
two hides and a half and 45 acres[1577],
a half hide and 48 acres[1578],
x hides and 80 acres[1579],
nine hides and 82 acres[1580].
We have here cited twenty instances in which, as we think, the hide exceeds
60 acres (we might have cited many others) and twelve in which it exceeds
80 acres. We might further adduce instances in which our record speaks of a
virgate and 10 acres, a virgate and 15 acres, and even of a virgate and 20
acres[1581], and when we read of two hides less 30 acres and two hides less
40 acres[1582] we infer that a hide probably has not only more but
considerably more than the 30, 40 or 48 acres that are allowed to it by
Kemble and Eyton. Our argument is based on the belief that men do not
habitually adopt extremely cumbrous forms of speech. From a single
instance we should draw no inference, and therefore when we just once read
of ‘three hides and a half and 80 acres’ we do not infer that 80 acres are less
than half a hide[1583].
But more can be made of these returns from Essex.
Evidence from Essex
We will take a large number of tracts of land continued.
described in the formula ‘x hides and z acres’; we
will observe the various numbers for which z stands,
and if we find some particular number frequently repeating itself we shall
be entitled to argue that this number of acres is some very simple fraction of
a hide. We will take at hazard 100 consecutive entries which contain this
formula—‘x hides + z acres,’ where x is either an integral number or 1⁄2. The
result is that in 37 cases z is 30, in 12 it is 15, in 8 it is 40; then 35 and 20
occur 5 times; 80, 50, 45, 37, 18, 10 occur thrice, and 38 and 151⁄2 twice;
eleven other numbers occur once apiece. There can we think be but one
explanation of this. The hide contains that number of acres of which 30 is
the quarter, 40 the third, 15 the eighth[1584].
a hide and a half and 31 acres[1571],
a half hide and 35 acres[1572],
a half hide and 37 acres[1573],
a hide and a half and 40 acres[1574],
a hide and a half and 45 acres[1575],
a half hide and 45 acres[1576],
two hides and a half and 45 acres[1577],
a half hide and 48 acres[1578],
x hides and 80 acres[1579],
nine hides and 82 acres[1580].
We have here cited twenty instances in which, as we think, the hide exceeds
60 acres (we might have cited many others) and twelve in which it exceeds
80 acres. We might further adduce instances in which our record speaks of a
virgate and 10 acres, a virgate and 15 acres, and even of a virgate and 20
acres[1581], and when we read of two hides less 30 acres and two hides less
40 acres[1582] we infer that a hide probably has not only more but
considerably more than the 30, 40 or 48 acres that are allowed to it by
Kemble and Eyton. Our argument is based on the belief that men do not
habitually adopt extremely cumbrous forms of speech. From a single
instance we should draw no inference, and therefore when we just once read
of ‘three hides and a half and 80 acres’ we do not infer that 80 acres are less
than half a hide[1583].
But more can be made of these returns from Essex.
Evidence from Essex
We will take a large number of tracts of land continued.
described in the formula ‘x hides and z acres’; we
will observe the various numbers for which z stands,
and if we find some particular number frequently repeating itself we shall
be entitled to argue that this number of acres is some very simple fraction of
a hide. We will take at hazard 100 consecutive entries which contain this
formula—‘x hides + z acres,’ where x is either an integral number or 1⁄2. The
result is that in 37 cases z is 30, in 12 it is 15, in 8 it is 40; then 35 and 20
occur 5 times; 80, 50, 45, 37, 18, 10 occur thrice, and 38 and 151⁄2 twice;
eleven other numbers occur once apiece. There can we think be but one
explanation of this. The hide contains that number of acres of which 30 is
the quarter, 40 the third, 15 the eighth[1584].
Page 436
But Essex, it must be confessed, lies next to
Further evidence.
Cambridgeshire, and for the rest of England we have
less evidence. Still there are entries which make
against any theory which would give to the hide but 30, 40 or 48 acres. In
Hertfordshire we read of ‘a hide and a half and 26 acres[1585].’ In the same
county we read of ‘a half virgate and 10 acres,’ and this seems to tell of a
hide of at least 88 acres[1586]. In Gloucestershire we read of a manor of one
hide and are told that ‘in this hide, when it is ploughed, there are but (non
sunt nisi) 64 acres of land,’ whence we may draw the inference that such an
acreage was unusually small[1587]. We pass from Mercia into Wessex. In
Somersetshire we read of ‘three virgates and a half and 5 acres[1588],’ in
Dorset of ‘three virgates and a half and 7 acres[1589],’ in Somerset of ‘one
and a half virgates and 8 acres[1590].’
To prove that the fiscal carucate was composed of
Acreage of the fiscal
120 (fiscal) acres is by no means easy. If, however, carucate.
we have sojourned for a while in Essex and then
cross the border, we can hardly doubt that in East
Anglia the carucate bears to the acres the relation that is borne by those
hides among which we have been living. Norfolk and Suffolk are carucated
counties, but while in the other carucated counties it is usual to express the
smaller quantities of land in terms of the bovate (8 bovates making one
carucate) and to say nothing of acres, in East Anglia, on the other hand, it is
uncommon to mention the bovate—in Suffolk we may even find the
virgate[1591]—and men reckon by carucates, half-carucates and acres. We
allow the description of Suffolk to fall open where it pleases and observe a
hundred consecutive cases in which a plot of land (as distinguished from
meadow) is spoken of as containing a certain number of acres. In 22 cases
out of the hundred that number is 60, in 8 it, is 30, in 7 it is 20, in 5 it is 40,
in 5 it is 15; no other number occurs more than 4 times, and yet the numbers
that appear range from 100 to 2. We have tried the same experiment on two
hundred cases in Norfolk; in 28 cases the number of acres was 30, in 16
cases it was 60, in 13 it was 40, in 13 it was 16, in 12 it was 20, in 10 it was
80, in 9 it was 15, though the numbers ranged from 1 to 405. Surely the
explanation of this must be that 60 acres are half a carucate, that 30 acres
are a quarter, that 40 acres are a third, 20 a sixth, 15 an eighth. We have
made many similar experiments and always with a similar result; wherever
Further evidence.
Cambridgeshire, and for the rest of England we have
less evidence. Still there are entries which make
against any theory which would give to the hide but 30, 40 or 48 acres. In
Hertfordshire we read of ‘a hide and a half and 26 acres[1585].’ In the same
county we read of ‘a half virgate and 10 acres,’ and this seems to tell of a
hide of at least 88 acres[1586]. In Gloucestershire we read of a manor of one
hide and are told that ‘in this hide, when it is ploughed, there are but (non
sunt nisi) 64 acres of land,’ whence we may draw the inference that such an
acreage was unusually small[1587]. We pass from Mercia into Wessex. In
Somersetshire we read of ‘three virgates and a half and 5 acres[1588],’ in
Dorset of ‘three virgates and a half and 7 acres[1589],’ in Somerset of ‘one
and a half virgates and 8 acres[1590].’
To prove that the fiscal carucate was composed of
Acreage of the fiscal
120 (fiscal) acres is by no means easy. If, however, carucate.
we have sojourned for a while in Essex and then
cross the border, we can hardly doubt that in East
Anglia the carucate bears to the acres the relation that is borne by those
hides among which we have been living. Norfolk and Suffolk are carucated
counties, but while in the other carucated counties it is usual to express the
smaller quantities of land in terms of the bovate (8 bovates making one
carucate) and to say nothing of acres, in East Anglia, on the other hand, it is
uncommon to mention the bovate—in Suffolk we may even find the
virgate[1591]—and men reckon by carucates, half-carucates and acres. We
allow the description of Suffolk to fall open where it pleases and observe a
hundred consecutive cases in which a plot of land (as distinguished from
meadow) is spoken of as containing a certain number of acres. In 22 cases
out of the hundred that number is 60, in 8 it, is 30, in 7 it is 20, in 5 it is 40,
in 5 it is 15; no other number occurs more than 4 times, and yet the numbers
that appear range from 100 to 2. We have tried the same experiment on two
hundred cases in Norfolk; in 28 cases the number of acres was 30, in 16
cases it was 60, in 13 it was 40, in 13 it was 16, in 12 it was 20, in 10 it was
80, in 9 it was 15, though the numbers ranged from 1 to 405. Surely the
explanation of this must be that 60 acres are half a carucate, that 30 acres
are a quarter, that 40 acres are a third, 20 a sixth, 15 an eighth. We have
made many similar experiments and always with a similar result; wherever
Page 437
we open the book we find plots of 60 acres and of 30 acres in rich
abundance. We use another test. When land is described by the formula ‘x
carucatae et z acrae,’ what values are assigned to z? We find 40 very
commonly, 42, 45, 50, 60 (but this is rare, for it is easier to say ‘x1⁄2
carucates’ than ‘x carucates and 60 acres’) 68, 69, 80 (at least four times),
81, and 100[1592]. On the one hand, then, we have a good deal of evidence
that the carucate contains more than 80 acres, some evidence that it contains
more than 100 acres, and some that it does not contain many more, for no
case have we seen in which z exceeds 100. Perhaps in Norfolk the figure 16
occurs rather more frequently than our theory would expect, but 16 is two-
fifteenths of 120, and the figures 32 and 64 occur but rarely. Also it must be
confessed that in Derbyshire we hear of ‘eleven bovates and a half and eight
acres,’ also of ‘twelve bovates and a half and eight acres[1593].’ These
entries, to use an argument which we have formerly used in our own favour,
seem to imply that half a bovate is more than eight acres and would
therefore give us a carucate of at least 144. We can only answer that, though
men do not habitually use clumsy modes of reckoning, they do this
occasionally[1594].
Of the Kentish sulung very little can be discovered
Acreage of the fiscal
from Domesday. Apparently it was divided into 4 sulung.
yokes (iuga)[1595] and the yoke was probably divided
into 4 virgates. We have indeed one statement
connecting acres with sulungs which some have thought of great
importance. ‘In the common land of St. Martin [i.e. the land which belongs
to the communitas of the canons of St. Martin] are 400 acres and a half
which make two sulungs and a half[1596].’ Thence, a small quantity being
neglected, the inference has been drawn that the Kentish sulung was
composed of 160 acres, while some would read ‘400 acres and a half’ to
mean 450 acres and would so get 180 acres for the sulung[1597]. But the
entry deals with one particular case and it connects real acres with rateable
units:—the canons have 4001⁄2 or more probably 450 acres, which are rated
at 21⁄2 sulungs. If we passed to another estate, we might find a different
relation between the fiscal and the real units. Kent was egregiously
undertaxed and as a general rule its fiscal sulung will have many real acres.
Turning to the cases in which the geldability of land is expressed in terms of
sulungs and acres, or yokes and acres, we can gather no more than that the
abundance. We use another test. When land is described by the formula ‘x
carucatae et z acrae,’ what values are assigned to z? We find 40 very
commonly, 42, 45, 50, 60 (but this is rare, for it is easier to say ‘x1⁄2
carucates’ than ‘x carucates and 60 acres’) 68, 69, 80 (at least four times),
81, and 100[1592]. On the one hand, then, we have a good deal of evidence
that the carucate contains more than 80 acres, some evidence that it contains
more than 100 acres, and some that it does not contain many more, for no
case have we seen in which z exceeds 100. Perhaps in Norfolk the figure 16
occurs rather more frequently than our theory would expect, but 16 is two-
fifteenths of 120, and the figures 32 and 64 occur but rarely. Also it must be
confessed that in Derbyshire we hear of ‘eleven bovates and a half and eight
acres,’ also of ‘twelve bovates and a half and eight acres[1593].’ These
entries, to use an argument which we have formerly used in our own favour,
seem to imply that half a bovate is more than eight acres and would
therefore give us a carucate of at least 144. We can only answer that, though
men do not habitually use clumsy modes of reckoning, they do this
occasionally[1594].
Of the Kentish sulung very little can be discovered
Acreage of the fiscal
from Domesday. Apparently it was divided into 4 sulung.
yokes (iuga)[1595] and the yoke was probably divided
into 4 virgates. We have indeed one statement
connecting acres with sulungs which some have thought of great
importance. ‘In the common land of St. Martin [i.e. the land which belongs
to the communitas of the canons of St. Martin] are 400 acres and a half
which make two sulungs and a half[1596].’ Thence, a small quantity being
neglected, the inference has been drawn that the Kentish sulung was
composed of 160 acres, while some would read ‘400 acres and a half’ to
mean 450 acres and would so get 180 acres for the sulung[1597]. But the
entry deals with one particular case and it connects real acres with rateable
units:—the canons have 4001⁄2 or more probably 450 acres, which are rated
at 21⁄2 sulungs. If we passed to another estate, we might find a different
relation between the fiscal and the real units. Kent was egregiously
undertaxed and as a general rule its fiscal sulung will have many real acres.
Turning to the cases in which the geldability of land is expressed in terms of
sulungs and acres, or yokes and acres, we can gather no more than that the
Page 438
sulung is greater than 60 acres, so much greater that ‘3 sulungs less 60
acres[1598]’ is a natural phrase, and that the half-sulung is greater than
40[1599] and than 42 acres[1600]. We may suspect that the Exchequer was
reckoning 120 (fiscal) acres to the sulung but can not say that this is proved.
And now we must glance at certain theories opposed
Kemble’s theory.
to that which has been here stated. Kemble contends
that the hide contained 30 or 33 Saxon which were
equal to 40 Norman acres, and that the hide of Domesday Book contains 40
Norman acres[1601]. Now in so far as this doctrine deals with the time before
the Conquest, we will postpone our judgment upon it. So far as it deals with
the Domesday hide, it is supported by two arguments. One of these is to the
effect that England has not room for all the hides that are attributed to it if
the hide had many more than 30 or 40 acres; this argument also we will for
a while defer. The other[1602] is based on a single passage in the Exeter
Domesday relating to the manor of Poleham. That entry seems to involve an
equation which can only be solved if 1 virgate = 10 acres. William of
Mohun has a manor which in the time of King Edward paid geld for 10
hides; he has in demesne 4 H., 1 V., 6 A. and the villeins have 51⁄2 H., 4 A.[1603]
Now three or four such entries would certainly set the matter at rest; but a
single entry can not. By way of answer it will be enough to say that the very
next entry seems to imply an equation of precisely the same form, but one
that is plainly absurd. This same William has a manor called Ham; it paid
geld for 5 hides; there were 3 H., 8 A. in demesne and the villains had 2 H.
less 12 A. Shall we draw the conclusion that 5 H. = 5 H. - 4 A.? The truth we
suspect to be that here, as in Middlesex, geldable units and actual areal units
have already begun to perplex each other. Both Poleham and Ham are what
we call ‘over-rated’ manors. It is known that Poleham contains 10 hides and
Ham 5 hides, but, when we come to look for the acres that will make up the
due tale of hides, we can not find them; for let King William’s officers have
never so clear a terminology of their own, the country folk will not for ever
be distinguishing between ‘acres ad geldum’ and ‘acres ad arandum’ But be
the explanation what it may, we repeat that the one equation that Kemble
could find to support his argument is found in the closest company with an
equation which when similarly treated produces a nonsensical result. This is
all the direct evidence that he has produced from Domesday Book in favour
of the hide of 40 acres. Robertson, while holding that the hide of Mercia
acres[1598]’ is a natural phrase, and that the half-sulung is greater than
40[1599] and than 42 acres[1600]. We may suspect that the Exchequer was
reckoning 120 (fiscal) acres to the sulung but can not say that this is proved.
And now we must glance at certain theories opposed
Kemble’s theory.
to that which has been here stated. Kemble contends
that the hide contained 30 or 33 Saxon which were
equal to 40 Norman acres, and that the hide of Domesday Book contains 40
Norman acres[1601]. Now in so far as this doctrine deals with the time before
the Conquest, we will postpone our judgment upon it. So far as it deals with
the Domesday hide, it is supported by two arguments. One of these is to the
effect that England has not room for all the hides that are attributed to it if
the hide had many more than 30 or 40 acres; this argument also we will for
a while defer. The other[1602] is based on a single passage in the Exeter
Domesday relating to the manor of Poleham. That entry seems to involve an
equation which can only be solved if 1 virgate = 10 acres. William of
Mohun has a manor which in the time of King Edward paid geld for 10
hides; he has in demesne 4 H., 1 V., 6 A. and the villeins have 51⁄2 H., 4 A.[1603]
Now three or four such entries would certainly set the matter at rest; but a
single entry can not. By way of answer it will be enough to say that the very
next entry seems to imply an equation of precisely the same form, but one
that is plainly absurd. This same William has a manor called Ham; it paid
geld for 5 hides; there were 3 H., 8 A. in demesne and the villains had 2 H.
less 12 A. Shall we draw the conclusion that 5 H. = 5 H. - 4 A.? The truth we
suspect to be that here, as in Middlesex, geldable units and actual areal units
have already begun to perplex each other. Both Poleham and Ham are what
we call ‘over-rated’ manors. It is known that Poleham contains 10 hides and
Ham 5 hides, but, when we come to look for the acres that will make up the
due tale of hides, we can not find them; for let King William’s officers have
never so clear a terminology of their own, the country folk will not for ever
be distinguishing between ‘acres ad geldum’ and ‘acres ad arandum’ But be
the explanation what it may, we repeat that the one equation that Kemble
could find to support his argument is found in the closest company with an
equation which when similarly treated produces a nonsensical result. This is
all the direct evidence that he has produced from Domesday Book in favour
of the hide of 40 acres. Robertson, while holding that the hide of Mercia
Page 439
contained 120 acres, adopted Kemble’s opinion that the hide of Wessex
contained 40 without producing any witness from Domesday save only the
passage about Poleham[1604]. Eyton reckons 48 ‘gheld acres’ to the ‘gheld
hide,’ but he leaves us utterly at a loss to tell how he came by this
computation[1605].
Another theory we must examine. It is ingenious
The ploughland and the
and, were it true, would throw much light on a dark plough.
corner. It starts from the facts disclosed by the
survey of the East Riding of Yorkshire[1606]. In that
district, it is said, the number of carucates for geld that there are in any
manor (this number we will call a) is usually either equal to, or just twice
the number (which we call b) of the ‘lands for one plough,’ or, as we say,
teamlands. Further, it can be shown from maps and other modern evidences
that the manors in which a = b were manors with two common fields, in
other words, were ‘two-course manors,’ while those in which a = 2b were
manors with three common fields, in other words were ‘three-course
manors.’ The suggested explanation is that while the teamland or ‘land for
one plough’ means the amount of land that one plough will till in the course
of a year, the ‘carucate for geld’ is the amount of land which one plough
tills in one field in the course of a year. Manor X, let us suppose, is a two-
course manor; the whole amount of land which a plough will till there in a
year will lie in one field; therefore in this case a = b. Manor Y is a three-
course manor; in a given year a plough will there till a certain quantity of
land, but half its work will have been done in one field, half in another;
therefore in this case a = 2b
Now we must own to doubting the possibility of
The Yorkshire carucates.
deciding with any certainty from comparatively
modern evidence which (if any) of the Yorkshire
vills were under a system of three-course culture in the eleventh century. In
the year 1086 many of them were lying and for long years had lain waste
either in whole or in part. Thus the first group of examples that is put before
us as the foundation for a theory consists of 15 manors the sum of whose
carucates for geld is 911⁄4 while the sum of the teamlands is 913⁄4. What was
the state of these manors in 1086? Three of them were absolutely waste.
The recorded population on the others consisted of four priests, one
sokemean, eighty-four villeins and twenty-six bordiers; the number of
contained 40 without producing any witness from Domesday save only the
passage about Poleham[1604]. Eyton reckons 48 ‘gheld acres’ to the ‘gheld
hide,’ but he leaves us utterly at a loss to tell how he came by this
computation[1605].
Another theory we must examine. It is ingenious
The ploughland and the
and, were it true, would throw much light on a dark plough.
corner. It starts from the facts disclosed by the
survey of the East Riding of Yorkshire[1606]. In that
district, it is said, the number of carucates for geld that there are in any
manor (this number we will call a) is usually either equal to, or just twice
the number (which we call b) of the ‘lands for one plough,’ or, as we say,
teamlands. Further, it can be shown from maps and other modern evidences
that the manors in which a = b were manors with two common fields, in
other words, were ‘two-course manors,’ while those in which a = 2b were
manors with three common fields, in other words were ‘three-course
manors.’ The suggested explanation is that while the teamland or ‘land for
one plough’ means the amount of land that one plough will till in the course
of a year, the ‘carucate for geld’ is the amount of land which one plough
tills in one field in the course of a year. Manor X, let us suppose, is a two-
course manor; the whole amount of land which a plough will till there in a
year will lie in one field; therefore in this case a = b. Manor Y is a three-
course manor; in a given year a plough will there till a certain quantity of
land, but half its work will have been done in one field, half in another;
therefore in this case a = 2b
Now we must own to doubting the possibility of
The Yorkshire carucates.
deciding with any certainty from comparatively
modern evidence which (if any) of the Yorkshire
vills were under a system of three-course culture in the eleventh century. In
the year 1086 many of them were lying and for long years had lain waste
either in whole or in part. Thus the first group of examples that is put before
us as the foundation for a theory consists of 15 manors the sum of whose
carucates for geld is 911⁄4 while the sum of the teamlands is 913⁄4. What was
the state of these manors in 1086? Three of them were absolutely waste.
The recorded population on the others consisted of four priests, one
sokemean, eighty-four villeins and twenty-six bordiers; the number of
Page 440
existing teams was 351⁄2; the total valet of the whole fifteen estates was £7.
1s., though they had been worth £72 in King Edward’s day[1607]. It is
obvious enough that very little land is really being ploughed, and surely it is
a most perilous inference that, when culture comes back to these deserted
villages, the old state of things will be reproduced, so that we shall be able
to decide which of them had three and which had two fields in the days
before the devastation. Further, we can not think that, even for the East
Riding of Yorkshire, the figures show as much regularity as has been
attributed to them. In the first place, there are admittedly many cases in
which neither of the two equations of which we have spoken (a = b or a =
2b) is precisely true. We can only say that they are approximately true. Then
there are other cases—too many, as we think, to be treated as exceptional—
in which a bears to b some very simple ratio which is neither 1:1 nor yet
2:1; it is 3:2, or 4:3, or 5:3
But at any rate, to extend the theory to the whole of
Relation between
Yorkshire, to say nothing of all England, is out of the teamlands and fiscal
question. No doubt as a whole Yorkshire was (in the carucates.
terms that we have used) an ‘over-rated’ county: that
is to say, as a general rule, a, if not equal to, was greater than b. But it can
not be said that when a was not equal to b it normally was, or even tended
to be equal to 2b. We take by chance a page describing the possessions of
Count Alan[1608]; it contains 20 entries; in one of these a = b, in one a = 2b,
in one b is greater than a; in ten cases the proportion which a bears to b is
3:2, in two it is 4:3, in two it is 5:3, in one 6:5, in one 7:5, in one it is 17:12.
In the counties of Lincoln, Nottingham and Derby an application of this
doctrine would be ludicrous, for very commonly b is greater than a. What is
more, the method of taxation that it presupposes is so unjust that we are
loath to attribute it to any one. To tax a man in proportion to the area of the
land that he treats as arable, that is a plausibly equitable method; to tax him
in proportion to the area that he has ploughed in a given year, that also is a
plausibly equitable method; but the present proposal could only be
explained as a deliberate effort to tax the three-field system out of
existence[1609]. To take the figures that have been suggested to us by the
author of this theory, we suppose that X is using a team of oxen in ‘a two-
course manor’; he has 160 acres of arable land and ploughs 80 of them in
every year. Then in another village Y is using a team of oxen according to
1s., though they had been worth £72 in King Edward’s day[1607]. It is
obvious enough that very little land is really being ploughed, and surely it is
a most perilous inference that, when culture comes back to these deserted
villages, the old state of things will be reproduced, so that we shall be able
to decide which of them had three and which had two fields in the days
before the devastation. Further, we can not think that, even for the East
Riding of Yorkshire, the figures show as much regularity as has been
attributed to them. In the first place, there are admittedly many cases in
which neither of the two equations of which we have spoken (a = b or a =
2b) is precisely true. We can only say that they are approximately true. Then
there are other cases—too many, as we think, to be treated as exceptional—
in which a bears to b some very simple ratio which is neither 1:1 nor yet
2:1; it is 3:2, or 4:3, or 5:3
But at any rate, to extend the theory to the whole of
Relation between
Yorkshire, to say nothing of all England, is out of the teamlands and fiscal
question. No doubt as a whole Yorkshire was (in the carucates.
terms that we have used) an ‘over-rated’ county: that
is to say, as a general rule, a, if not equal to, was greater than b. But it can
not be said that when a was not equal to b it normally was, or even tended
to be equal to 2b. We take by chance a page describing the possessions of
Count Alan[1608]; it contains 20 entries; in one of these a = b, in one a = 2b,
in one b is greater than a; in ten cases the proportion which a bears to b is
3:2, in two it is 4:3, in two it is 5:3, in one 6:5, in one 7:5, in one it is 17:12.
In the counties of Lincoln, Nottingham and Derby an application of this
doctrine would be ludicrous, for very commonly b is greater than a. What is
more, the method of taxation that it presupposes is so unjust that we are
loath to attribute it to any one. To tax a man in proportion to the area of the
land that he treats as arable, that is a plausibly equitable method; to tax him
in proportion to the area that he has ploughed in a given year, that also is a
plausibly equitable method; but the present proposal could only be
explained as a deliberate effort to tax the three-field system out of
existence[1609]. To take the figures that have been suggested to us by the
author of this theory, we suppose that X is using a team of oxen in ‘a two-
course manor’; he has 160 acres of arable land and ploughs 80 of them in
every year. Then in another village Y is using a team of oxen according to
Page 441
the three-course system; he has, we are told, 180 acres of arable and
ploughs 120 acres in every year. This unfortunate Y is to pay double the
amount of geld that is paid by X. We could understand a demand that Y
should pay nine shillings when X pays eight, for Y has in all 180 acres of
arable and X has 160. We could understand a demand that Y should pay
three shillings when X pays two, for Y sows 120 acres a year and X sows 80.
But nothing short of a settled desire to extirpate the three-field system will
prompt us to exact two shillings from Y for every one that is paid by X.
Lastly, we must repeat in passing our protest[1610] against the introduction
into this context of those figures which express the aspirations of that
enthusiast of the plough, Walter of Henley. That the ‘land for one team’ of
Domesday Book points normally or commonly to an area of arable land
containing 160 or 180 acres we can not believe. If we give it on an average
120 acres we may perhaps find room for the recorded team lands, though
probably we shall often have to make our acres small; but county after
county will refuse to make room for teamlands with 160 or 180 acres[1611].
No doubt the regularity of the Yorkshire figures is remarkable. There are
other districts in northern England where we may see some one relation
between A and B steadily prevailing. We will call to mind, by way of
example, the symmetrical arrangement that we have seen in one of the
Rutland wapentakes, where A = 4B. This we can not explain, nor will it be
explained until Domesday Book has been rearranged by hundreds and vills;
we have, however, hazarded a guess as to the quarter in which the
explanation may be found[1612]. As to the Yorkshire figures, we think that of
all the figures in the record they are the least likely to be telling us the
simple truth about the amount of cultivated land.
We may now briefly recapitulate the evidence which
The fiscal hide of 120
leads us to the old-fashioned belief that King acres.
William’s Exchequer reckons 120 acres to the hide.
There are at the least twenty sums set before us
which involve the equation: 1H. = 120A. or 1V. = 30A. We doubt whether
there are two sums which involve any one other equation. That there are
sums which involve or seem to involve other equations we fully admit; but
when a fair allowance has been made for mistranscription, miscalculation,
the loss of acres due to partitionary arrangements[1613], and, above all, to a
transition from the rateable to the real, from the hidage on the roll to the
ploughs 120 acres in every year. This unfortunate Y is to pay double the
amount of geld that is paid by X. We could understand a demand that Y
should pay nine shillings when X pays eight, for Y has in all 180 acres of
arable and X has 160. We could understand a demand that Y should pay
three shillings when X pays two, for Y sows 120 acres a year and X sows 80.
But nothing short of a settled desire to extirpate the three-field system will
prompt us to exact two shillings from Y for every one that is paid by X.
Lastly, we must repeat in passing our protest[1610] against the introduction
into this context of those figures which express the aspirations of that
enthusiast of the plough, Walter of Henley. That the ‘land for one team’ of
Domesday Book points normally or commonly to an area of arable land
containing 160 or 180 acres we can not believe. If we give it on an average
120 acres we may perhaps find room for the recorded team lands, though
probably we shall often have to make our acres small; but county after
county will refuse to make room for teamlands with 160 or 180 acres[1611].
No doubt the regularity of the Yorkshire figures is remarkable. There are
other districts in northern England where we may see some one relation
between A and B steadily prevailing. We will call to mind, by way of
example, the symmetrical arrangement that we have seen in one of the
Rutland wapentakes, where A = 4B. This we can not explain, nor will it be
explained until Domesday Book has been rearranged by hundreds and vills;
we have, however, hazarded a guess as to the quarter in which the
explanation may be found[1612]. As to the Yorkshire figures, we think that of
all the figures in the record they are the least likely to be telling us the
simple truth about the amount of cultivated land.
We may now briefly recapitulate the evidence which
The fiscal hide of 120
leads us to the old-fashioned belief that King acres.
William’s Exchequer reckons 120 acres to the hide.
There are at the least twenty sums set before us
which involve the equation: 1H. = 120A. or 1V. = 30A. We doubt whether
there are two sums which involve any one other equation. That there are
sums which involve or seem to involve other equations we fully admit; but
when a fair allowance has been made for mistranscription, miscalculation,
the loss of acres due to partitionary arrangements[1613], and, above all, to a
transition from the rateable to the real, from the hidage on the roll to the
Page 442
strips in the fields, we can not think that these cases are sufficiently
numerous to shake our faith. We have further seen that in Essex and East
Anglia the acres of the fiscal system lie in batches of just those sizes which
would be produced if an unit of 120 acres was being broken into halfs,
thirds, quarters and fifths. Lastly, ‘the rustics’ of the twelfth century ‘tell us
that the hide according to its original constitution consists of a hundred
acres[1614]’ and probably these rustics reckon by the long hundred.
If now we are satisfied about this matter, we seem to
Antiquity of the large
be entitled to some inferences about remoter history. hide.
The fiscal practice of reckoning 120 acres to the hide
can hardly be new. Owing to many causes, among
which we recall the partitionary system of taxation, the influence of an
equity which would consider value as well as area, and the disturbing forces
of privilege and favouritism, the fiscal hide of the Confessor’s day has
strayed far away from the fields and is no measure of land[1615]. At its worst
it is jobbery; at its best a lame compromise between an unit of area and an
unit of value. And yet, for all this, it is composed of acres, of 120 acres. The
theory that is involved in this mode of calculation is so little in harmony
with the existing facts that we can not but believe that it is ancient. It seems
to point to a time long gone by when the typical tenement which was to
serve as an unit of taxation generally had six score arable acres, little more
or less.
numerous to shake our faith. We have further seen that in Essex and East
Anglia the acres of the fiscal system lie in batches of just those sizes which
would be produced if an unit of 120 acres was being broken into halfs,
thirds, quarters and fifths. Lastly, ‘the rustics’ of the twelfth century ‘tell us
that the hide according to its original constitution consists of a hundred
acres[1614]’ and probably these rustics reckon by the long hundred.
If now we are satisfied about this matter, we seem to
Antiquity of the large
be entitled to some inferences about remoter history. hide.
The fiscal practice of reckoning 120 acres to the hide
can hardly be new. Owing to many causes, among
which we recall the partitionary system of taxation, the influence of an
equity which would consider value as well as area, and the disturbing forces
of privilege and favouritism, the fiscal hide of the Confessor’s day has
strayed far away from the fields and is no measure of land[1615]. At its worst
it is jobbery; at its best a lame compromise between an unit of area and an
unit of value. And yet, for all this, it is composed of acres, of 120 acres. The
theory that is involved in this mode of calculation is so little in harmony
with the existing facts that we can not but believe that it is ancient. It seems
to point to a time long gone by when the typical tenement which was to
serve as an unit of taxation generally had six score arable acres, little more
or less.
Page 443
Page 444
§ 3. Beyond Domesday.
We have now seen a good deal of evidence which
The hide beyond
tends to prove that the hide has had for its model a Domesday.
tenement comprising 120 acres of arable land or
thereabouts. Some slight evidence of this we have
seen on the face of the Anglo-Saxon land-books[1616]. A little more evidence
pointing in the same direction we have seen in the manorial extents of a
later day[1617]. And now we have argued that the fiscal hide of the
Conqueror’s day is composed of 120 (fiscal) acres. From all this we are
inclined to infer that the hide has, if we may so speak, started by being a
tenement which, if it attained its ideal, would comprise a long-hundred of
arable acre-strips, and thence to infer that in the very old days of conquest
and settlement the free family or the free house-father commonly and
normally possessed a tenement of this large size.
We have now to confess that this theory is open to attack, and must
endeavour to defend it, or rather to explain why we think that, when all
objections have been weighed, the balance of probability still inclines in its
favour.
That all along from Bede’s day downwards
Arguments in favour of
Englishmen have had in their minds a typical the small hide.
tenement and have been making this idea the
framework of their scheme of government can not be
doubted. Nor can we doubt that this idea has had some foundation in fact. It
could not occur to any one except in a country where a large and
preponderant number of tenements really, if roughly, conformed to a single
type. Therefore the contest must be, and indeed has been, between the
champions of different typical tenements, and in the main there are but two
theories in the field. The one would give the Anglo-Saxon hide its long-
hundred of acres, the other would concede to it but some thirty or forty, and
would in effect equate it with the virgate rather than with the hide of later
days[1618]. Perhaps we may briefly state the arguments which have been
urged in favour of this small hide by saying that small hides are requisite (1)
We have now seen a good deal of evidence which
The hide beyond
tends to prove that the hide has had for its model a Domesday.
tenement comprising 120 acres of arable land or
thereabouts. Some slight evidence of this we have
seen on the face of the Anglo-Saxon land-books[1616]. A little more evidence
pointing in the same direction we have seen in the manorial extents of a
later day[1617]. And now we have argued that the fiscal hide of the
Conqueror’s day is composed of 120 (fiscal) acres. From all this we are
inclined to infer that the hide has, if we may so speak, started by being a
tenement which, if it attained its ideal, would comprise a long-hundred of
arable acre-strips, and thence to infer that in the very old days of conquest
and settlement the free family or the free house-father commonly and
normally possessed a tenement of this large size.
We have now to confess that this theory is open to attack, and must
endeavour to defend it, or rather to explain why we think that, when all
objections have been weighed, the balance of probability still inclines in its
favour.
That all along from Bede’s day downwards
Arguments in favour of
Englishmen have had in their minds a typical the small hide.
tenement and have been making this idea the
framework of their scheme of government can not be
doubted. Nor can we doubt that this idea has had some foundation in fact. It
could not occur to any one except in a country where a large and
preponderant number of tenements really, if roughly, conformed to a single
type. Therefore the contest must be, and indeed has been, between the
champions of different typical tenements, and in the main there are but two
theories in the field. The one would give the Anglo-Saxon hide its long-
hundred of acres, the other would concede to it but some thirty or forty, and
would in effect equate it with the virgate rather than with the hide of later
days[1618]. Perhaps we may briefly state the arguments which have been
urged in favour of this small hide by saying that small hides are requisite (1)
Page 445
if we are to find room enough within the appropriate areal boundaries for
the hides that are distributed by Domesday Book and the Anglo-Saxon
charters, (2) if we are to explain the large quantities of hides or family-lands
which are assigned to divers districts by Bede and by that ancient document
which we call The Tribal Hidage, (3) if we are to bring our own typical
tenement into line with the typical tenement of Germany, (4) if we are not
to overdo our family or house-father with arable acres and bushels of corn.
A ‘name-shifting’ must be postulated. Somehow or
Continuity in the hide of
another, what was the hide becomes the virgate, the land-books.
while the name ‘hide’ is transferred to a much larger
unit. Now in such a name-shifting there is nothing
that is very improbable, if we approach the matter a priori. Thought has
been poor and language has been poor. The term ‘yard of land’ may, as we
have seen[1619], stand for a quarter-acre or for a much larger space. But this
particular name-shifting seems to us improbable in a high degree. For when
did it happen? Surely it did not happen after the Norman Conquest. We
have from Edward the Confessor quite enough documents to warrant our
saying with certainty that the hides and manses of his charters are the hides
of Domesday Book. Suppose for a moment that all these parchments were
forged after the Conquest, this would only strengthen our case, for stupid
indeed must the forger have been who did not remember that if he was to
make a title-deed for the abbey’s lands he must multiply the hides by four
or thereabouts. This argument will carry us far. We trace the stream of land-
books back from Edward to Cnut, to Æthelred, to Edgar, to Offa, nay, to the
very days of Bede; nowhere can we see any such breach of continuity as
that which would appear had the hypothetical name-shifting taken place.
The forgers know nothing of it. Boldly they make the first Christian kings
bestow upon the church just about the number of manses that the church has
in the eleventh century if the manse be Domesday’s hide.
Both points might be illustrated by the Chertsey
Examples from charters
charters. In Domesday Book St. Peter of Chertsey is of Chertsey.
credited with many hides in divers parts of
Surrey[1620]. A charter is forthcoming whereby
Edward the Confessor confirms the abbey’s possession of these
estates[1621], and in the main the number of ‘manses’ that this charter locates
in any village is the number of ‘hides’ that the abbey will have there in the
the hides that are distributed by Domesday Book and the Anglo-Saxon
charters, (2) if we are to explain the large quantities of hides or family-lands
which are assigned to divers districts by Bede and by that ancient document
which we call The Tribal Hidage, (3) if we are to bring our own typical
tenement into line with the typical tenement of Germany, (4) if we are not
to overdo our family or house-father with arable acres and bushels of corn.
A ‘name-shifting’ must be postulated. Somehow or
Continuity in the hide of
another, what was the hide becomes the virgate, the land-books.
while the name ‘hide’ is transferred to a much larger
unit. Now in such a name-shifting there is nothing
that is very improbable, if we approach the matter a priori. Thought has
been poor and language has been poor. The term ‘yard of land’ may, as we
have seen[1619], stand for a quarter-acre or for a much larger space. But this
particular name-shifting seems to us improbable in a high degree. For when
did it happen? Surely it did not happen after the Norman Conquest. We
have from Edward the Confessor quite enough documents to warrant our
saying with certainty that the hides and manses of his charters are the hides
of Domesday Book. Suppose for a moment that all these parchments were
forged after the Conquest, this would only strengthen our case, for stupid
indeed must the forger have been who did not remember that if he was to
make a title-deed for the abbey’s lands he must multiply the hides by four
or thereabouts. This argument will carry us far. We trace the stream of land-
books back from Edward to Cnut, to Æthelred, to Edgar, to Offa, nay, to the
very days of Bede; nowhere can we see any such breach of continuity as
that which would appear had the hypothetical name-shifting taken place.
The forgers know nothing of it. Boldly they make the first Christian kings
bestow upon the church just about the number of manses that the church has
in the eleventh century if the manse be Domesday’s hide.
Both points might be illustrated by the Chertsey
Examples from charters
charters. In Domesday Book St. Peter of Chertsey is of Chertsey.
credited with many hides in divers parts of
Surrey[1620]. A charter is forthcoming whereby
Edward the Confessor confirms the abbey’s possession of these
estates[1621], and in the main the number of ‘manses’ that this charter locates
in any village is the number of ‘hides’ that the abbey will have there in the
Page 446
year 1086. The two lists are not and ought not to be identical, for there have
been rearrangements; but obviously the manse of the one is the hide of the
other. Then the monks have books which profess to come from the seventh
century[1622] and to show how Frithwald the kingling of Surrey endowed
their monastery. These books may be forgeries; but the scale on which they
are forged is the scale of the Confessor’s charter and of Domesday Book. It
has been thought that they are as old as Edgar’s day[1623]; but at any rate
their makers did not suppose that in order to tell a profitable story they must
portray Frithwald bestowing four manses for every hide that the abbey
possessed.
Or look we at the estates of St. Aldhelm. The monks
Examples from charters
of Malmesbury have a book from the Confessor[1624] of Malmesbury.
which agrees very accurately, perhaps too accurately,
with the Domesday record[1625]. The latter ascribes
to their house (among other lands) 10 hides at Dauntsey, 5 at Somerford, 5
at Norton, 30 at Kemble 35 at Purton. The Confessor has confirmed to them
(among other lands) 10 ‘hides’ at Dauntsey given by Æthelwulf, 5 at
Somerford and 5 at Norton given by Æthelstan, 30 at Kemble and 35 at
Purton given by Ceadwealla. Then behind this book are older books. Here is
one dated in 931 by which Æthelstan gives quinque mansas at Somerford
and quinque mansas at Norton[1626]. Here is another dated in 850 by which
Æthelwulf gives decem mansiones at Dauntsey[1627]. Here is a third by
which in 796 Egfrith restores that terram xxxv manentium at Purton[1628].
Here from 682, from the days of Aldhelm himself, is a deed of Ceadwealla
bestowing xxxii cassatos at Kemble[1629]. It is pretty; it is much too pretty;
but it is good proof that the Malmesbury monks know nothing of any
change in the conveyancer’s unit[1630].
If we examine any reputable set of land-books, those
Permanence of the
of Worcester, for example, or those of Abingdon and hidation.
try to trace the history of those very hides the
existence of which is chronicled by Domesday
Book, we shall often fail. This was to be expected. Any one who has ‘read
with a conveyancer’ will know that many difficulties are apt to arise when
an attempt is made to identify the piece of land described in one with that
described in another and much older document. In the days before the
Conquest many causes were perplexing our task. We have spoken of them
been rearrangements; but obviously the manse of the one is the hide of the
other. Then the monks have books which profess to come from the seventh
century[1622] and to show how Frithwald the kingling of Surrey endowed
their monastery. These books may be forgeries; but the scale on which they
are forged is the scale of the Confessor’s charter and of Domesday Book. It
has been thought that they are as old as Edgar’s day[1623]; but at any rate
their makers did not suppose that in order to tell a profitable story they must
portray Frithwald bestowing four manses for every hide that the abbey
possessed.
Or look we at the estates of St. Aldhelm. The monks
Examples from charters
of Malmesbury have a book from the Confessor[1624] of Malmesbury.
which agrees very accurately, perhaps too accurately,
with the Domesday record[1625]. The latter ascribes
to their house (among other lands) 10 hides at Dauntsey, 5 at Somerford, 5
at Norton, 30 at Kemble 35 at Purton. The Confessor has confirmed to them
(among other lands) 10 ‘hides’ at Dauntsey given by Æthelwulf, 5 at
Somerford and 5 at Norton given by Æthelstan, 30 at Kemble and 35 at
Purton given by Ceadwealla. Then behind this book are older books. Here is
one dated in 931 by which Æthelstan gives quinque mansas at Somerford
and quinque mansas at Norton[1626]. Here is another dated in 850 by which
Æthelwulf gives decem mansiones at Dauntsey[1627]. Here is a third by
which in 796 Egfrith restores that terram xxxv manentium at Purton[1628].
Here from 682, from the days of Aldhelm himself, is a deed of Ceadwealla
bestowing xxxii cassatos at Kemble[1629]. It is pretty; it is much too pretty;
but it is good proof that the Malmesbury monks know nothing of any
change in the conveyancer’s unit[1630].
If we examine any reputable set of land-books, those
Permanence of the
of Worcester, for example, or those of Abingdon and hidation.
try to trace the history of those very hides the
existence of which is chronicled by Domesday
Book, we shall often fail. This was to be expected. Any one who has ‘read
with a conveyancer’ will know that many difficulties are apt to arise when
an attempt is made to identify the piece of land described in one with that
described in another and much older document. In the days before the
Conquest many causes were perplexing our task. We have spoken of them
Page 447
before, but will recall them to memory. New assessments were sometimes
made, and thenceforth an estate which had formerly contained five hides
might be spoken of as having only four. New villages were formed, and the
hides which had been attributed to one place would thenceforth be
attributed to another. Great landlords enjoyed a large power of rearranging
their lands, not only for the purposes of their own economy, but also for the
purposes of public finance. In some cases they had collected their estates
into a few gigantic maneria each of which would pay a single round sum to
the king[1631]. Lastly, the kings gave and the kings took away. The
disendowment of churches and simple spoliation were not unknown;
exchanges were frequent; no series of land-books is complete. But when
some allowance has been made for the effects of these causes, we shall see
plainly that, if the charters are to account for the facts displayed by
Domesday Book, then the manses of the charters, even of the earliest
charters, can not have been of much less extent than the hides of the
Norman record. We know of no case in which a church, whatever its wealth
of genuine and spurious parchments, could make a title to many more
manses than the hides that it had in 1086[1632].
Another test of continuity may be applied. In the
Gifts of villages.
Conqueror’s day a village in the south of England
will very commonly be rated at five or some low
multiple of five hides, ten, fifteen or twenty[1633]. Now we have argued
above that the land-book of an Anglo-Saxon king generally, though not
always, disposes of an integral village or several integral villages, and if we
look at the land-books we shall commonly see that the manses or hides
which they describe as being at a single place are in number five or some
low multiple of five. We open the second volume of the Codex
Diplomaticus and analyze the first hundred instances of royal gifts which do
not bear a condemnatory asterisk and which are not gifts of small plots in or
about the towns of Canterbury and Rochester. In date these land-books
range from A.D. 840 to A.D. 956. In sixty out of a hundred cases the number
of manses is 5 or a multiple of 5. In eighteen it is 5; in sixteen 10; in six 15;
in thirteen 20; in three 25; in one 30; in one 80; in two 100. There are a few
small gifts; one of a yokelet; six of 1 manse; four of 2 manses; five of 3.
The great bulk of the gifts range from 5 to 25 manses. Only four out of 100
exceed 25; of these four, one is of 30, another of 80, while two are of 100.
made, and thenceforth an estate which had formerly contained five hides
might be spoken of as having only four. New villages were formed, and the
hides which had been attributed to one place would thenceforth be
attributed to another. Great landlords enjoyed a large power of rearranging
their lands, not only for the purposes of their own economy, but also for the
purposes of public finance. In some cases they had collected their estates
into a few gigantic maneria each of which would pay a single round sum to
the king[1631]. Lastly, the kings gave and the kings took away. The
disendowment of churches and simple spoliation were not unknown;
exchanges were frequent; no series of land-books is complete. But when
some allowance has been made for the effects of these causes, we shall see
plainly that, if the charters are to account for the facts displayed by
Domesday Book, then the manses of the charters, even of the earliest
charters, can not have been of much less extent than the hides of the
Norman record. We know of no case in which a church, whatever its wealth
of genuine and spurious parchments, could make a title to many more
manses than the hides that it had in 1086[1632].
Another test of continuity may be applied. In the
Gifts of villages.
Conqueror’s day a village in the south of England
will very commonly be rated at five or some low
multiple of five hides, ten, fifteen or twenty[1633]. Now we have argued
above that the land-book of an Anglo-Saxon king generally, though not
always, disposes of an integral village or several integral villages, and if we
look at the land-books we shall commonly see that the manses or hides
which they describe as being at a single place are in number five or some
low multiple of five. We open the second volume of the Codex
Diplomaticus and analyze the first hundred instances of royal gifts which do
not bear a condemnatory asterisk and which are not gifts of small plots in or
about the towns of Canterbury and Rochester. In date these land-books
range from A.D. 840 to A.D. 956. In sixty out of a hundred cases the number
of manses is 5 or a multiple of 5. In eighteen it is 5; in sixteen 10; in six 15;
in thirteen 20; in three 25; in one 30; in one 80; in two 100. There are a few
small gifts; one of a yokelet; six of 1 manse; four of 2 manses; five of 3.
The great bulk of the gifts range from 5 to 25 manses. Only four out of 100
exceed 25; of these four, one is of 30, another of 80, while two are of 100.
Page 448
At this rate of progress and if the manse had no more than some 30 acres,
we shall have extreme difficulty in accounting for the large territories which
on the eve of the Conquest were held by the churches of Wessex, and by
those very churches which have left us cartularies that are only too ample.
This is not all. If these manses were but yard-lands, then, unless we suppose
that the average village was a tiny cluster, it is plain enough that the kings
did not usually give away integral villages, and yet a church’s lordship of
integral villages and even of divers contiguous villages is one of the surest
and most impressive traits that the Conqueror’s record reveals.
Parenthetically we may admit that the king is not
Gifts of manses in
always giving away a whole village. Nasse has villages.
contended that when a land-book professes to
dispose of a certain number (x) of manses at the
place called X, and then sets forth the boundaries of X, we must not infer
that the whole of the land that lies within those boundaries is comprised in
the grant[1634]. The proof of this consists of a few instances in which, to all
appearance, two different tracts of land are conveyed by two different books
and yet the boundaries stated in those two books are the same. We will
allege one instance additional to those that have been mentioned by others.
In 969 Bishop Oswald of Worcester gave to his man Æthelweard seven
manses, whereof five lay in the place called Tedington. The book which
effected this conveyance states the bounds of Tedington[1635]. In 977 the
same bishop gave to his man Eadric three manses at Tedington by a book
which describes the boundaries of that place in just the same manner as that
in which they were set forth by the earlier charter[1636]. Some care,
however, should be taken before we assume that the two deeds which deal
with land at X dispose of different tracts; for book-land had a way of
returning to the king who gave it; also the gift of one king was sometimes
confirmed by another; and even if the one book purports to convey x and
the other y manses, we must call to mind the possibility that there has been
a reassessment or a clerical error. Still it seems to be fairly well proved that
there are cases in which the x manses which the donor gives are but some of
the manses that lie within the meres drawn by his deed of gift. This
certainly deserves remark. At first sight nothing could look more foolish
than that we should painfully define the limits of the village territory and
yet leave undefined the limits of that part of the village territory which we
we shall have extreme difficulty in accounting for the large territories which
on the eve of the Conquest were held by the churches of Wessex, and by
those very churches which have left us cartularies that are only too ample.
This is not all. If these manses were but yard-lands, then, unless we suppose
that the average village was a tiny cluster, it is plain enough that the kings
did not usually give away integral villages, and yet a church’s lordship of
integral villages and even of divers contiguous villages is one of the surest
and most impressive traits that the Conqueror’s record reveals.
Parenthetically we may admit that the king is not
Gifts of manses in
always giving away a whole village. Nasse has villages.
contended that when a land-book professes to
dispose of a certain number (x) of manses at the
place called X, and then sets forth the boundaries of X, we must not infer
that the whole of the land that lies within those boundaries is comprised in
the grant[1634]. The proof of this consists of a few instances in which, to all
appearance, two different tracts of land are conveyed by two different books
and yet the boundaries stated in those two books are the same. We will
allege one instance additional to those that have been mentioned by others.
In 969 Bishop Oswald of Worcester gave to his man Æthelweard seven
manses, whereof five lay in the place called Tedington. The book which
effected this conveyance states the bounds of Tedington[1635]. In 977 the
same bishop gave to his man Eadric three manses at Tedington by a book
which describes the boundaries of that place in just the same manner as that
in which they were set forth by the earlier charter[1636]. Some care,
however, should be taken before we assume that the two deeds which deal
with land at X dispose of different tracts; for book-land had a way of
returning to the king who gave it; also the gift of one king was sometimes
confirmed by another; and even if the one book purports to convey x and
the other y manses, we must call to mind the possibility that there has been
a reassessment or a clerical error. Still it seems to be fairly well proved that
there are cases in which the x manses which the donor gives are but some of
the manses that lie within the meres drawn by his deed of gift. This
certainly deserves remark. At first sight nothing could look more foolish
than that we should painfully define the limits of the village territory and
yet leave undefined the limits of that part of the village territory which we
Page 449
are giving away. But this practice is explicable if we remember the nature of
a manse in a village. It consists of many scattered strips of arable land and
of rights over uncultivated waste. To define the limits of the whole territory
is important, for the donee should know how far his cattle can wander
without trespass. To specify each acre-strip would, on the other hand, be a
tedious task and would serve no profitable end. However, there can be little
doubt that very generally what a charter bestows is the whole of the land of
which the boundaries are described, and therefore the whole territory of a
village or of several neighbouring villages.
But at the moment the charters which will be the
The largest gifts.
most instructive will be those which attribute to a
single place some large number of hides. In these the
champions of a small hide have found their stronghold. They see perhaps
100 hides ascribed to the place called X; they look for that place in modern
maps and gazetteers and then tell us that in order to pack our 100 hides
within the parochial boundary we must reduce the size of the hide to 30
acres at the most.
The dangers that beset this process may be well
The Winchester estate at
illustrated by the documents relating to one of the at Chilcombe.
most interesting estates in all England, the great
Chilcombe estate of the church of Winchester, which
stretched for many a mile from the gates of the royal city of the West Saxon
kings. Let us follow the story as the monks told it in a series of charters,
few of which have escaped Kemble’s asterisk. In the first days of English
Christianity, Cynegils, king of the West Saxons, gave the Chilcombe valley
to St. Birinus. King after king confirmed the gift, but it was never put into
writing until the days of Æthelwulf. He declared by charter that this land
should defend itself for one hide. This was part of that great tithing
operation which puzzles the modern historian[1637]. In 908 Edward the
Elder confirmed this act by a charter in which he declared that the land at
Chilcombe (including that at Nursling and Chilbolton) contained 100
manses, but that the whole was to be reckoned as a single manse. He also
remarked that the land included many villae[1638]. The next book comes
from Æthelstan; the whole valley (vallis illuster Ciltecumb appellata) with
all its appendages was to owe the service of a single manse[1639]. Two
charters were obtained from Edgar. However much land there might be at
a manse in a village. It consists of many scattered strips of arable land and
of rights over uncultivated waste. To define the limits of the whole territory
is important, for the donee should know how far his cattle can wander
without trespass. To specify each acre-strip would, on the other hand, be a
tedious task and would serve no profitable end. However, there can be little
doubt that very generally what a charter bestows is the whole of the land of
which the boundaries are described, and therefore the whole territory of a
village or of several neighbouring villages.
But at the moment the charters which will be the
The largest gifts.
most instructive will be those which attribute to a
single place some large number of hides. In these the
champions of a small hide have found their stronghold. They see perhaps
100 hides ascribed to the place called X; they look for that place in modern
maps and gazetteers and then tell us that in order to pack our 100 hides
within the parochial boundary we must reduce the size of the hide to 30
acres at the most.
The dangers that beset this process may be well
The Winchester estate at
illustrated by the documents relating to one of the at Chilcombe.
most interesting estates in all England, the great
Chilcombe estate of the church of Winchester, which
stretched for many a mile from the gates of the royal city of the West Saxon
kings. Let us follow the story as the monks told it in a series of charters,
few of which have escaped Kemble’s asterisk. In the first days of English
Christianity, Cynegils, king of the West Saxons, gave the Chilcombe valley
to St. Birinus. King after king confirmed the gift, but it was never put into
writing until the days of Æthelwulf. He declared by charter that this land
should defend itself for one hide. This was part of that great tithing
operation which puzzles the modern historian[1637]. In 908 Edward the
Elder confirmed this act by a charter in which he declared that the land at
Chilcombe (including that at Nursling and Chilbolton) contained 100
manses, but that the whole was to be reckoned as a single manse. He also
remarked that the land included many villae[1638]. The next book comes
from Æthelstan; the whole valley (vallis illuster Ciltecumb appellata) with
all its appendages was to owe the service of a single manse[1639]. Two
charters were obtained from Edgar. However much land there might be at
Page 450
Chilcombe, it was to defend itself for one hide[1640]. A writ of similar
import, which Kemble has accepted, was issued by Æthelred the
Unready[1641]. It said that there were a hundred hides at Chilcombe and
proceeded to allot them thus:—
Æstun 4 Easton
Afintun and Ufintun 5 Avington and Ovington
Ticceburn 25 Titchbourne
Cymestun 5 Kilmiston
Stokev 5 Bishopstoke
Brambridge and
Brombrygce and Oterburn 5
Otterbourne
Twyfyrde 20 Twyford
Ceolbandingtun 20 Chilbolton
Hnutscilling 5 Nursling
This territory extends along the left-hand bank of the Itchen from Kilmiston
to Titchbourne, thence past Ovington, Avington, Easton, Chilcombe, and
Winchester itself, Twyford, Brambridge, Otterbourne to Bishopstoke. If we
journeyed by straight lines from village to village we should find that our
course was a long twenty miles. Then, to complete the 100 hides, Nursling
which is near Southampton and Chilbolton which is near Andover are
thrown in. But all these lands lie ‘into Ciltecumbe.’
It is to be feared that these charters tell lies invented
The many hides at
by those who wished to evade their share of national Chilcombe.
burdens. And they seem to have failed in their
object, for in the Confessor’s day, though a very
large estate at ‘Chilcombe’ with nine churches upon it was rated at but one
hide, several of the other villages that we have mentioned were separately
assessed[1642]. But to lie themselves into an immunity from taxes, this the
monks might hope to do; to lie themselves into the possession of square
leagues of land, this would have been an impossible feat, and the solid fact
remains that their church was the lord of a spacious and continuous block of
territory in the very heart of the old West Saxon realm, just outside the gates
of the royal burg, along the Itchen river, the land that would be seized and
import, which Kemble has accepted, was issued by Æthelred the
Unready[1641]. It said that there were a hundred hides at Chilcombe and
proceeded to allot them thus:—
Æstun 4 Easton
Afintun and Ufintun 5 Avington and Ovington
Ticceburn 25 Titchbourne
Cymestun 5 Kilmiston
Stokev 5 Bishopstoke
Brambridge and
Brombrygce and Oterburn 5
Otterbourne
Twyfyrde 20 Twyford
Ceolbandingtun 20 Chilbolton
Hnutscilling 5 Nursling
This territory extends along the left-hand bank of the Itchen from Kilmiston
to Titchbourne, thence past Ovington, Avington, Easton, Chilcombe, and
Winchester itself, Twyford, Brambridge, Otterbourne to Bishopstoke. If we
journeyed by straight lines from village to village we should find that our
course was a long twenty miles. Then, to complete the 100 hides, Nursling
which is near Southampton and Chilbolton which is near Andover are
thrown in. But all these lands lie ‘into Ciltecumbe.’
It is to be feared that these charters tell lies invented
The many hides at
by those who wished to evade their share of national Chilcombe.
burdens. And they seem to have failed in their
object, for in the Confessor’s day, though a very
large estate at ‘Chilcombe’ with nine churches upon it was rated at but one
hide, several of the other villages that we have mentioned were separately
assessed[1642]. But to lie themselves into an immunity from taxes, this the
monks might hope to do; to lie themselves into the possession of square
leagues of land, this would have been an impossible feat, and the solid fact
remains that their church was the lord of a spacious and continuous block of
territory in the very heart of the old West Saxon realm, just outside the gates
of the royal burg, along the Itchen river, the land that would be seized and
Page 451
settled at the earliest moment. The best explanation that they could give of
this fact was that the first Christian kings had bestowed mile after mile of
land upon the minster. What better theory have we[1643]?
The truth seems to be that some of the very earliest
The Winchester estates
gifts of land that were made to the churches might, if at Downton and Taunton.
we have regard to the size of the existing kingdoms,
be fairly called the cession of provinces, the cession
of large governmental and jurisdictional districts. The bishops want a
revenue, and in the earliest days a large district must be ceded if even a
modest revenue is to be produced, for all that the king has to give away is
the chieftain’s right to live at the expense of the folk and to receive the
proceeds of justice. Therefore not only whole villages but whole hundreds
were given. Chilcombe was by no means the only vast estate that the bishop
of the West Saxons acquired in very early days. Domesday Book shows us
how at Downton in Wiltshire the church of Winchester has had a round 100
hides[1644]. For these 100 hides we have a series of charters which professes
to begin in the days when the men of Wessex were accepting the new faith.
They bear the names of Cenwealla[1645], Egbert[1646], Edward[1647],
Æthelstan[1648], Edred[1649], Edgar[1650], and Æthelred[1651]. Kemble has
accepted the last four of them. They tell a consistent story. There were 100
manses at Downton, or, to speak more accurately, 55 at Downton itself and
45 at Ebbesborne (the modern Bishopston) on the other side of the
Avon[1652]. We might speak of other extensive tracts, of Farnham where
there have been 60 hides[1653], of Alresford where there have been 51[1654],
of Mitcheldever where there have been 106[1655], of Taunton where there
have been 54 and more[1656]. Whenever the West Saxons conquer new lands
they cede a wide province to their bishop. But perhaps we have already said
more than enough of these cessions, though in our eyes they are very
important; they are among the first manifestations of incipient feudalism
and feudalism brings manorialism in its train. We have recurred to them
here because the Winchester charters which describe them testify strongly
to the continuity of the hide and also indicate the weak point in the
arguments that are urged by the advocates of little hides[1657].
Kemble has argued that it is impossible for us to
Kemble and the Taunton
allow the hide of Domesday Book or the hide or estate.
manse of the charters as many as 120 acres. Take a
this fact was that the first Christian kings had bestowed mile after mile of
land upon the minster. What better theory have we[1643]?
The truth seems to be that some of the very earliest
The Winchester estates
gifts of land that were made to the churches might, if at Downton and Taunton.
we have regard to the size of the existing kingdoms,
be fairly called the cession of provinces, the cession
of large governmental and jurisdictional districts. The bishops want a
revenue, and in the earliest days a large district must be ceded if even a
modest revenue is to be produced, for all that the king has to give away is
the chieftain’s right to live at the expense of the folk and to receive the
proceeds of justice. Therefore not only whole villages but whole hundreds
were given. Chilcombe was by no means the only vast estate that the bishop
of the West Saxons acquired in very early days. Domesday Book shows us
how at Downton in Wiltshire the church of Winchester has had a round 100
hides[1644]. For these 100 hides we have a series of charters which professes
to begin in the days when the men of Wessex were accepting the new faith.
They bear the names of Cenwealla[1645], Egbert[1646], Edward[1647],
Æthelstan[1648], Edred[1649], Edgar[1650], and Æthelred[1651]. Kemble has
accepted the last four of them. They tell a consistent story. There were 100
manses at Downton, or, to speak more accurately, 55 at Downton itself and
45 at Ebbesborne (the modern Bishopston) on the other side of the
Avon[1652]. We might speak of other extensive tracts, of Farnham where
there have been 60 hides[1653], of Alresford where there have been 51[1654],
of Mitcheldever where there have been 106[1655], of Taunton where there
have been 54 and more[1656]. Whenever the West Saxons conquer new lands
they cede a wide province to their bishop. But perhaps we have already said
more than enough of these cessions, though in our eyes they are very
important; they are among the first manifestations of incipient feudalism
and feudalism brings manorialism in its train. We have recurred to them
here because the Winchester charters which describe them testify strongly
to the continuity of the hide and also indicate the weak point in the
arguments that are urged by the advocates of little hides[1657].
Kemble has argued that it is impossible for us to
Kemble and the Taunton
allow the hide of Domesday Book or the hide or estate.
manse of the charters as many as 120 acres. Take a
Page 452
village, discover how many hides are ascribed to it, discover how many
acres it has at the present day, you will often find that the whole territory of
the village will not suffice to supply the requisite number of hides if the
hide is to have 120 or even 60 acres. Kemble illustrates this method by
taking nine vills in Somerset and Devon. One of them is Taunton. Modern
Taunton, he says, has 2730 acres, the Tantone of 1086 had 65 hides[1658];
multiply 65 even by so low a figure as 40 and you will nearly exhaust all
Taunton’s soil[1658]. This argument involves the assumption that the limits
of modern Taunton include the whole land that is ascribed to ‘Tantone’ in
the Conqueror’s geld-book. Strangely different was the result to which
Eyton came after a minute examination of the whole survey of
Somersetshire. The ‘Tantone’ of Domesday covers some thirteen or
fourteen villages and is now represented not by 2730 but by 24,000
acres[1659]. The editor of the Anglo-Saxon charters should have guessed that
many hides ‘lay in’ Taunton which as a matter of physical geography were
far off from the walls of the bishop’s burg[1660]. There are counties in which
the list of the places that are mentioned in Domesday is so nearly identical
with the list of our modern parishes, that no very great risk would be run if
we circumspectly pursued Kemble’s method; but just in those counties to
which he applied it the risk is immeasurably great, for it is the land where
many villages are often collected into one great manerium and all their
hides are spoken of as lying in one place. Not until we have compared the
whole survey of the county with the whole of its modern map, are we
entitled to make even a guess as to the amount of land that a place-name
covers. Often enough in those shires where there are large and ancient
ecclesiastical estates, those shires in which the feudal and manorial
development began earliest and has gone furthest, hides ‘are’ in law where
they are not in fact. They ‘lie into’ the hall at which they geld or the moot-
stow to which they render soke, and this may be far distant from their
natural bed[1661].
As we go backwards this danger is complicated by
Difficulty of identifying
another, namely, by the growth of new villages. The parcels.
village of Hamton has been a large village with 20
hides. Some of its arable land has lain two or three
miles from the clustered steads. A partition of its fields is made and a new
cluster of steads is formed; for housebuilding is not a lengthy or costly
acres it has at the present day, you will often find that the whole territory of
the village will not suffice to supply the requisite number of hides if the
hide is to have 120 or even 60 acres. Kemble illustrates this method by
taking nine vills in Somerset and Devon. One of them is Taunton. Modern
Taunton, he says, has 2730 acres, the Tantone of 1086 had 65 hides[1658];
multiply 65 even by so low a figure as 40 and you will nearly exhaust all
Taunton’s soil[1658]. This argument involves the assumption that the limits
of modern Taunton include the whole land that is ascribed to ‘Tantone’ in
the Conqueror’s geld-book. Strangely different was the result to which
Eyton came after a minute examination of the whole survey of
Somersetshire. The ‘Tantone’ of Domesday covers some thirteen or
fourteen villages and is now represented not by 2730 but by 24,000
acres[1659]. The editor of the Anglo-Saxon charters should have guessed that
many hides ‘lay in’ Taunton which as a matter of physical geography were
far off from the walls of the bishop’s burg[1660]. There are counties in which
the list of the places that are mentioned in Domesday is so nearly identical
with the list of our modern parishes, that no very great risk would be run if
we circumspectly pursued Kemble’s method; but just in those counties to
which he applied it the risk is immeasurably great, for it is the land where
many villages are often collected into one great manerium and all their
hides are spoken of as lying in one place. Not until we have compared the
whole survey of the county with the whole of its modern map, are we
entitled to make even a guess as to the amount of land that a place-name
covers. Often enough in those shires where there are large and ancient
ecclesiastical estates, those shires in which the feudal and manorial
development began earliest and has gone furthest, hides ‘are’ in law where
they are not in fact. They ‘lie into’ the hall at which they geld or the moot-
stow to which they render soke, and this may be far distant from their
natural bed[1661].
As we go backwards this danger is complicated by
Difficulty of identifying
another, namely, by the growth of new villages. The parcels.
village of Hamton has been a large village with 20
hides. Some of its arable land has lain two or three
miles from the clustered steads. A partition of its fields is made and a new
cluster of steads is formed; for housebuilding is not a lengthy or costly
Page 453
process. And so Little Hamton or ‘Other’ Hamton with 5 hides splits off
from the old Hamton which has 15. We must not now try to force 20 hides
into the territory of either village[1662]. And as this danger increases, the
other hardly diminishes, for we come to the time when a king will
sometimes give a large jurisdictional district and call it all by one name. If
the once heathen Osric of the Hwiccas gave to a church ‘100 manentes
adjoining the city that is called the Hot Baths,’ he in all probability gave
away the ‘hundred’ of Bath; he gave Bath itself and a territory which in the
eleventh century was the site of a dozen villages[1663]. We have the best
reason for believing that when a king of the eighth century says that he is
giving 20 manses in the place called Cridie he is giving his rights over a
tract which comprises ten or twelve of our modern parishes and more than
the whole of the modern hundred of Crediton[1664].
We have given above some figures which will enable
The numerous hides in
our readers to compare the hides and the teamlands ancient documents.
of a county with its modern acreage. Also we have
confessed to thinking that we can hardly concede to
every teamland that Domesday mentions 120 statute acres of arable
land[1665]. On the other hand, we do not think that there would in general be
much difficulty in finding 120 arable acres for every fiscal hide, though
perhaps in the south the average size of the acre would be small[1666].
However, we have admitted, or rather contended, that before the middle of
the eleventh century the hides of the fiscal system had strayed far away
from the original type, and the sight of an over-hided vill would not
disconcert us. But unfortunately we can not be content with such results as
we have as yet attained. We have already seen that the hides attributed to a
district show a tendency to increase their number as we trace them
backwards[1667], and there are certain old documents which deal out hides
so lavishly that we must seriously face the question whether,
notwithstanding the continuity of the land-books, we must not suppose that
some large change has taken place in the character of the typical tenement.
We have said above that we have inherited three
The Burghal Hidage.
ancient documents which distribute hides among
districts. We call them in order of date (1) The Tribal
Hidage, (2) The Burghal Hidage, (3) The County Hidage. Of the youngest
we have spoken. We must now attend to that which holds the middle place.
from the old Hamton which has 15. We must not now try to force 20 hides
into the territory of either village[1662]. And as this danger increases, the
other hardly diminishes, for we come to the time when a king will
sometimes give a large jurisdictional district and call it all by one name. If
the once heathen Osric of the Hwiccas gave to a church ‘100 manentes
adjoining the city that is called the Hot Baths,’ he in all probability gave
away the ‘hundred’ of Bath; he gave Bath itself and a territory which in the
eleventh century was the site of a dozen villages[1663]. We have the best
reason for believing that when a king of the eighth century says that he is
giving 20 manses in the place called Cridie he is giving his rights over a
tract which comprises ten or twelve of our modern parishes and more than
the whole of the modern hundred of Crediton[1664].
We have given above some figures which will enable
The numerous hides in
our readers to compare the hides and the teamlands ancient documents.
of a county with its modern acreage. Also we have
confessed to thinking that we can hardly concede to
every teamland that Domesday mentions 120 statute acres of arable
land[1665]. On the other hand, we do not think that there would in general be
much difficulty in finding 120 arable acres for every fiscal hide, though
perhaps in the south the average size of the acre would be small[1666].
However, we have admitted, or rather contended, that before the middle of
the eleventh century the hides of the fiscal system had strayed far away
from the original type, and the sight of an over-hided vill would not
disconcert us. But unfortunately we can not be content with such results as
we have as yet attained. We have already seen that the hides attributed to a
district show a tendency to increase their number as we trace them
backwards[1667], and there are certain old documents which deal out hides
so lavishly that we must seriously face the question whether,
notwithstanding the continuity of the land-books, we must not suppose that
some large change has taken place in the character of the typical tenement.
We have said above that we have inherited three
The Burghal Hidage.
ancient documents which distribute hides among
districts. We call them in order of date (1) The Tribal
Hidage, (2) The Burghal Hidage, (3) The County Hidage. Of the youngest
we have spoken. We must now attend to that which holds the middle place.
Page 454
It states that large round numbers of hides belong to certain places, which
seem to be strongholds. The sense in which a large number of hides might
belong to a burh will be clear to those who have read the foregoing
pages[1668]. This document has only come down to us in a corrupt form, but
it has come from a remote time and seems to represent a scheme of West-
Saxon defence which was antiquated long years before the coming of the
Normans. We will give its effect, preserving the most important variants
and adding within brackets some guesses of our own.
The Burghal Hidage[1669]
Hides.
to Heorepeburan, Heorewburan[1670] 324
to Hastingecestre [Hastings] 15 or 500
to Lathe, Lawe [Lewes][1671] 1300
to Burhham [Burpham near Arundel] 726
to Cisseceastre [Chichester] 1500
to Portecheastre [Porchester] 650
to Hamtona and to Wincestre [Southampton and Winchester] 2400
to Piltone, Pistone[1672], Wiltone [Wilton] 1400
to Tysanbyring [Tisbury][1673] 700
to Soraflesbyring, Soraflesburieg, Sceaftesbyrig [Shaftesbury] 700
to Thoriham, Tweonham, Twenham [Twyneham][1674] 470
to Weareham [Wareham] 1600
to Brydian [Bridport or more probably Bredy][1675] 1760
to Excencestre [Exeter] 734
to Halganwille, Hallgan Wylla [Halwell][1676] 300
to Hlidan, Hlida [Lidford] 140
to Wiltone Wisbearstaple, Piltone wið Bearstaple [Pilton[1677]
360
with Barnstaple]
to Weted, Weced [Watchet][1678] 513
to Orenbrege, Oxenebrege, Axanbrige [Axbridge] 400
to Lenge, Lengen [Lyng][1679] 100
to Langiord, Langport [Langport] 600
seem to be strongholds. The sense in which a large number of hides might
belong to a burh will be clear to those who have read the foregoing
pages[1668]. This document has only come down to us in a corrupt form, but
it has come from a remote time and seems to represent a scheme of West-
Saxon defence which was antiquated long years before the coming of the
Normans. We will give its effect, preserving the most important variants
and adding within brackets some guesses of our own.
The Burghal Hidage[1669]
Hides.
to Heorepeburan, Heorewburan[1670] 324
to Hastingecestre [Hastings] 15 or 500
to Lathe, Lawe [Lewes][1671] 1300
to Burhham [Burpham near Arundel] 726
to Cisseceastre [Chichester] 1500
to Portecheastre [Porchester] 650
to Hamtona and to Wincestre [Southampton and Winchester] 2400
to Piltone, Pistone[1672], Wiltone [Wilton] 1400
to Tysanbyring [Tisbury][1673] 700
to Soraflesbyring, Soraflesburieg, Sceaftesbyrig [Shaftesbury] 700
to Thoriham, Tweonham, Twenham [Twyneham][1674] 470
to Weareham [Wareham] 1600
to Brydian [Bridport or more probably Bredy][1675] 1760
to Excencestre [Exeter] 734
to Halganwille, Hallgan Wylla [Halwell][1676] 300
to Hlidan, Hlida [Lidford] 140
to Wiltone Wisbearstaple, Piltone wið Bearstaple [Pilton[1677]
360
with Barnstaple]
to Weted, Weced [Watchet][1678] 513
to Orenbrege, Oxenebrege, Axanbrige [Axbridge] 400
to Lenge, Lengen [Lyng][1679] 100
to Langiord, Langport [Langport] 600
Page 455
to Bathan, Badecan, Baderan [Bath] 3200(?)
to Malmesberinge [Malmesbury] 1500
1003 or
to Croccegelate, Croccagelada [Cricklade]
1300
to Oxeforde and to Wallingeforde [Oxford and Wallingford] 2400
to Buckingham and to Sceaftelege, Sceafteslege, Steaftesege 600 or
[Buckingham and ?][1680] 1500
to Eschingum and to Suthringa geweorc [Southwark and
1800
Eashing][1681]
These figures having been stated, we are told that they make a total of
27,070 hides[1682]. And then we read ‘et triginta[1683] to Astsexum [al.
Westsexum], and to Wygraceastrum mcc, hydas. to Wæringewice [al.
Parlingewice] feower and xxiiii. hund hyda.’
Apparently we start at some burg in the extreme east
Meaning of The Burghal
of Sussex, go through Hastings, Lewes, Burpham, Hidage.
Chichester, Porchester, and then pass through
Hampshire, through the south of Wiltshire, through
Dorset to Devon, keeping always well to the south. Then in Devon we turn
to the north and retrace our steps by moving to the east along a more
northerly route than that which we followed in the first instance. In short,
we make a round of Wessex and end at Southwark. This done, we cast up
the number of hides and find them to be somewhat more than 27,000. Then
in what may be a postscript the remark is made that to Essex and Worcester
belong 1200 hides (probably 1200 apiece) and to Warwick 2404. The writer
seems to know Wessex pretty thoroughly; of the rest of England he (if he
added the postscript) has little to tell us. We might perhaps imagine him
drawing up this statement under Edward the Elder[1684]. He hears reports of
what has been done to make Essex defensible and of two famous burgs built
in Mercia; but the military system of Wessex he knows[1685]. Of a military
system it is that he is telling us. He does not take the counties of Wessex
one by one; he visits the burgs, and his tour through them takes him twice
through Wiltshire: westwards along a southerly and eastwards along a
northerly line. It is an artificial system that he discloses to us. The 324 hides
allotted to ‘Heorepeburan’ (a place that eludes us) may seem insufficiently
to Malmesberinge [Malmesbury] 1500
1003 or
to Croccegelate, Croccagelada [Cricklade]
1300
to Oxeforde and to Wallingeforde [Oxford and Wallingford] 2400
to Buckingham and to Sceaftelege, Sceafteslege, Steaftesege 600 or
[Buckingham and ?][1680] 1500
to Eschingum and to Suthringa geweorc [Southwark and
1800
Eashing][1681]
These figures having been stated, we are told that they make a total of
27,070 hides[1682]. And then we read ‘et triginta[1683] to Astsexum [al.
Westsexum], and to Wygraceastrum mcc, hydas. to Wæringewice [al.
Parlingewice] feower and xxiiii. hund hyda.’
Apparently we start at some burg in the extreme east
Meaning of The Burghal
of Sussex, go through Hastings, Lewes, Burpham, Hidage.
Chichester, Porchester, and then pass through
Hampshire, through the south of Wiltshire, through
Dorset to Devon, keeping always well to the south. Then in Devon we turn
to the north and retrace our steps by moving to the east along a more
northerly route than that which we followed in the first instance. In short,
we make a round of Wessex and end at Southwark. This done, we cast up
the number of hides and find them to be somewhat more than 27,000. Then
in what may be a postscript the remark is made that to Essex and Worcester
belong 1200 hides (probably 1200 apiece) and to Warwick 2404. The writer
seems to know Wessex pretty thoroughly; of the rest of England he (if he
added the postscript) has little to tell us. We might perhaps imagine him
drawing up this statement under Edward the Elder[1684]. He hears reports of
what has been done to make Essex defensible and of two famous burgs built
in Mercia; but the military system of Wessex he knows[1685]. Of a military
system it is that he is telling us. He does not take the counties of Wessex
one by one; he visits the burgs, and his tour through them takes him twice
through Wiltshire: westwards along a southerly and eastwards along a
northerly line. It is an artificial system that he discloses to us. The 324 hides
allotted to ‘Heorepeburan’ (a place that eludes us) may seem insufficiently
Page 456
round until we add it to the 726 given to ‘Burhham.’ The Wiltshire burgs
seem to be grouped thus:—
1400
700
Wilton 700 2800
Tisbury 1500
Shaftesbury 1300 2800 5600
Malmesbury
Cricklade
To compare these figures with those given in The Burghal Hidage and
Domesday Book and in The County Hidage is not a later documents.
straightforward task, for the military districts of 900
may not have been coincident with the counties of 1086, and, for example,
Bath may have been supported partly by Gloucestershire and partly by
Somerset[1686]. The best comparison that we can make is the following:—
Burghal County Domesday
Hidage Hidage Book
Sussex[1687] 4350 3474
1800 (or
Surrey[1688] 1830
3600)
Hampshire[1689] 3520 2588
Berkshire[1690] 2400 2473
Wiltshire[1691] 5600 4800 4050
Dorset[1692] 3360 2321
Somerset[1693] 4813 2951
Devon[1694] 1534 1119
Oxford 2400 2400 2412
Buckingham 1500 2074
Essex(?) 1200 2650
Worcester 1200 1200 1189
seem to be grouped thus:—
1400
700
Wilton 700 2800
Tisbury 1500
Shaftesbury 1300 2800 5600
Malmesbury
Cricklade
To compare these figures with those given in The Burghal Hidage and
Domesday Book and in The County Hidage is not a later documents.
straightforward task, for the military districts of 900
may not have been coincident with the counties of 1086, and, for example,
Bath may have been supported partly by Gloucestershire and partly by
Somerset[1686]. The best comparison that we can make is the following:—
Burghal County Domesday
Hidage Hidage Book
Sussex[1687] 4350 3474
1800 (or
Surrey[1688] 1830
3600)
Hampshire[1689] 3520 2588
Berkshire[1690] 2400 2473
Wiltshire[1691] 5600 4800 4050
Dorset[1692] 3360 2321
Somerset[1693] 4813 2951
Devon[1694] 1534 1119
Oxford 2400 2400 2412
Buckingham 1500 2074
Essex(?) 1200 2650
Worcester 1200 1200 1189
Page 457
Warwick 2404 1200 1338
There is discord here, but also there is concord. According to our reckoning,
the Oxfordshire and Berkshire of Domesday Book have just about 2400
hides apiece; then The County Hidage gives Oxfordshire 2400; and The
Burghal Hidage gives 2400 to Oxford and 2400 to Wallingford. Both
documents give 1200 to Worcester, and this is very close to the number that
Domesday Book assigns. Next we see that, with hardly an exception[1695],
all the aberrations of our Burghal Hidage from Domesday Book lie in one
direction. They all point to great reductions of hidage, which seem to have
been distributed with a fairly even hand. Further, in the case of Wiltshire we
see a progressive abatement. The hidage is lowered from 5600 to 4800 and
then to a little over 4000, and the first reduction seems to have relieved the
shire of just one-seventh of its hides.
Now it seems to us that, on the one hand, we must
Criticism of The Burghal
reckon with this document as with one which, Hidage.
however much it may have been distorted by
copyists, is or once was a truthful, and possibly an
official record, and that, on the other hand, we can reckon with it and yet
retain that notion of the hide which we have been elaborating. In a general
way it both gives support to and receives support from the evidence that has
already come before us. We have seen reductions of hidage or carucatage
made in Yorkshire and Leicestershire after the Domesday survey; we have
seen reductions in Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire, Berkshire, Cambridge,
Northamptonshire. Here we come upon earlier reductions. They are large;
but still they are not of such a kind as to make us think that any great
change has taken place in men’s idea of a normal and typical hide. For one
thing, we might be rash if we denied that during that miserable tenth
century both the population and the wealth of Wessex were declining, for,
despite its Æthelstan and Edgar, a miserable time it was. A real extinction of
many a ‘real hide’ there may have been. But our main explanation will be
that, by a process which is gradual and yet catastrophic, the ancient
exaggerated estimates of population and wealth are being brought into
correspondence with the humbler facts.
We must now turn to a more famous and yet older
The Tribal Hidage.
document, namely that which we call The Tribal
There is discord here, but also there is concord. According to our reckoning,
the Oxfordshire and Berkshire of Domesday Book have just about 2400
hides apiece; then The County Hidage gives Oxfordshire 2400; and The
Burghal Hidage gives 2400 to Oxford and 2400 to Wallingford. Both
documents give 1200 to Worcester, and this is very close to the number that
Domesday Book assigns. Next we see that, with hardly an exception[1695],
all the aberrations of our Burghal Hidage from Domesday Book lie in one
direction. They all point to great reductions of hidage, which seem to have
been distributed with a fairly even hand. Further, in the case of Wiltshire we
see a progressive abatement. The hidage is lowered from 5600 to 4800 and
then to a little over 4000, and the first reduction seems to have relieved the
shire of just one-seventh of its hides.
Now it seems to us that, on the one hand, we must
Criticism of The Burghal
reckon with this document as with one which, Hidage.
however much it may have been distorted by
copyists, is or once was a truthful, and possibly an
official record, and that, on the other hand, we can reckon with it and yet
retain that notion of the hide which we have been elaborating. In a general
way it both gives support to and receives support from the evidence that has
already come before us. We have seen reductions of hidage or carucatage
made in Yorkshire and Leicestershire after the Domesday survey; we have
seen reductions in Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire, Berkshire, Cambridge,
Northamptonshire. Here we come upon earlier reductions. They are large;
but still they are not of such a kind as to make us think that any great
change has taken place in men’s idea of a normal and typical hide. For one
thing, we might be rash if we denied that during that miserable tenth
century both the population and the wealth of Wessex were declining, for,
despite its Æthelstan and Edgar, a miserable time it was. A real extinction of
many a ‘real hide’ there may have been. But our main explanation will be
that, by a process which is gradual and yet catastrophic, the ancient
exaggerated estimates of population and wealth are being brought into
correspondence with the humbler facts.
We must now turn to a more famous and yet older
The Tribal Hidage.
document, namely that which we call The Tribal
Page 458
Hidage[1696]. It assigns large round quantities of hides to various districts, or
rather to various peoples, whose very names would otherwise have been
unknown to us. We are not about to add to the commentaries that have been
written upon it; but its general scheme seems to be fairly plain. It begins by
allotting to Myrcna land 30,000 hides. On this follow eighteen more or less
obscure names to each of which a sum of hides is assigned; 36,100 hides
are distributed between them. Then a grand total of 66,100 is stated. Ten
other more or less obscure names follow, and 19,000 hides are thus
disposed of. Then we have more intelligible entries:—‘East Engle 30,000.
East Sexena 7,000. Cantwarena 15,000. South Sexena 7,000. West Sexena
100,000.’ Then we are told that the complete sum is 242,700, a statement
which is not true as the figures stand, for they amount to 244,100. The
broad features, therefore, of this system seem to be these:—It ascribes to
Wessex 100,000 hides, to Sussex 7,000, to Kent 15,000, to Essex 7,000, to
East Anglia 30,000, to Mercia 30,000, to the rest of England 55,100.
Apparently we must look for this rest of England outside Wessex, Sussex,
Kent, Essex and East Anglia and outside the Mercians’ land, though this last
term is probably used in an old and therefore narrow sense. The least
obscure of the obscure names that are put before us, those of the dwellers in
the Peak, the dwellers in Elmet and the men of Lindsey, seem to point to the
same conclusion[1697].
Now our first remark about this document will
Criticism of The Tribal
perhaps be either that it is wild nonsense, or that its Hidage.
‘hide’ has for its type something very different from
the model that has served for those hides of which
we have hitherto been reading. Domesday will not allow the whole of
England 70,000 hides (carucates, sulungs) and now we are asked to
accommodate more than 240,000. Kent is to have 15,000 hides instead of
1200 sulungs. Even the gulf between The Burghal Hidage and this Tribal
Hidage is enormous. The one would attribute less than 4500 hides to the
Sussex burgs, the other would burden the South Saxons with 7000. In the
older document Wessex has 100,000 hides, while in the younger the burgs
of Surrey, Hampshire, Berkshire, Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset and Devon
have as their contributories less than a quarter of that number. The suspicion
can not but cross our mind that the ‘hides’ of The Tribal Hidage are yard-
rather to various peoples, whose very names would otherwise have been
unknown to us. We are not about to add to the commentaries that have been
written upon it; but its general scheme seems to be fairly plain. It begins by
allotting to Myrcna land 30,000 hides. On this follow eighteen more or less
obscure names to each of which a sum of hides is assigned; 36,100 hides
are distributed between them. Then a grand total of 66,100 is stated. Ten
other more or less obscure names follow, and 19,000 hides are thus
disposed of. Then we have more intelligible entries:—‘East Engle 30,000.
East Sexena 7,000. Cantwarena 15,000. South Sexena 7,000. West Sexena
100,000.’ Then we are told that the complete sum is 242,700, a statement
which is not true as the figures stand, for they amount to 244,100. The
broad features, therefore, of this system seem to be these:—It ascribes to
Wessex 100,000 hides, to Sussex 7,000, to Kent 15,000, to Essex 7,000, to
East Anglia 30,000, to Mercia 30,000, to the rest of England 55,100.
Apparently we must look for this rest of England outside Wessex, Sussex,
Kent, Essex and East Anglia and outside the Mercians’ land, though this last
term is probably used in an old and therefore narrow sense. The least
obscure of the obscure names that are put before us, those of the dwellers in
the Peak, the dwellers in Elmet and the men of Lindsey, seem to point to the
same conclusion[1697].
Now our first remark about this document will
Criticism of The Tribal
perhaps be either that it is wild nonsense, or that its Hidage.
‘hide’ has for its type something very different from
the model that has served for those hides of which
we have hitherto been reading. Domesday will not allow the whole of
England 70,000 hides (carucates, sulungs) and now we are asked to
accommodate more than 240,000. Kent is to have 15,000 hides instead of
1200 sulungs. Even the gulf between The Burghal Hidage and this Tribal
Hidage is enormous. The one would attribute less than 4500 hides to the
Sussex burgs, the other would burden the South Saxons with 7000. In the
older document Wessex has 100,000 hides, while in the younger the burgs
of Surrey, Hampshire, Berkshire, Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset and Devon
have as their contributories less than a quarter of that number. The suspicion
can not but cross our mind that the ‘hides’ of The Tribal Hidage are yard-
Page 459
lands, or, in other words have for their moulding idea rather a tenement of
30 than a tenement of 120 arable acres[1698].
Before we decide this important question we must
Bede’s hidage.
give audience to Bede, whose testimony seems to
point in the same direction. As already said, he uses
one and the same unit, namely, the land of a family, whenever he speaks of
a tract of soil, whether that tract be the territory of a large tribe or an estate
that is granted to a monastery. He gives 7000 of these units to the South
Saxons, 5000 to the South Mercians, 7000 to the North Mercians, 960 to
Anglesey, 300 and more to Man, 600 to Thanet, 1200 to Wight, 600 to the
Isle of Ely, 87 to the promontory of Selsey, 5 to Iona. Then he tells how
Alchfrid bestowed on Wilfrid the land of 10 families at Stanford and a
monastery of 30 families at Ripon, and in various other cases we hear of a
prelate acquiring the land of 20, 12, 10, 8 families or of one family[1699].
Now we must notice that in their estimates of one
Criticism of Bede’s
large province there is a certain agreement between hidage.
the Ecclesiastical History and The Tribal Hidage.
Both give the South Saxons 7000 hides or
families[1700]. What are we then to say? If we suppose that Bede is speaking
to us of tenements which tend to conform to the hide of 120 arable acres his
statements must fly far beyond their mark. For example, the Isle of Wight is
to have 1200 hides, and yet, according to Domesday Book, the whole of
Hampshire including that island will not have 3000 hides, nor 3000
‘teamlands,’ nor 3000 teams. Bede’s Wight contains as many hides as the
Worcestershire or the Herefordshire of Domesday. He allots 600 of his units
to the Isle of Ely, which in 1086 had about 80 hides and 126 teamlands. He
allots another 600 of his units to the Isle of Thanet, which in 1086 had about
66 sulungs and 93 teamlands[1701].
We have now reached the critical point in our essay.
Bede and the large hide.
Before us lie two paths and it is hardly too much to
say that our whole conception of early English
history depends on the choice that we make. Either as we pursue our
retrogressive course through the centuries there comes a time when the hide
of 120 acres gives place to some other and much smaller typical tenement,
30 than a tenement of 120 arable acres[1698].
Before we decide this important question we must
Bede’s hidage.
give audience to Bede, whose testimony seems to
point in the same direction. As already said, he uses
one and the same unit, namely, the land of a family, whenever he speaks of
a tract of soil, whether that tract be the territory of a large tribe or an estate
that is granted to a monastery. He gives 7000 of these units to the South
Saxons, 5000 to the South Mercians, 7000 to the North Mercians, 960 to
Anglesey, 300 and more to Man, 600 to Thanet, 1200 to Wight, 600 to the
Isle of Ely, 87 to the promontory of Selsey, 5 to Iona. Then he tells how
Alchfrid bestowed on Wilfrid the land of 10 families at Stanford and a
monastery of 30 families at Ripon, and in various other cases we hear of a
prelate acquiring the land of 20, 12, 10, 8 families or of one family[1699].
Now we must notice that in their estimates of one
Criticism of Bede’s
large province there is a certain agreement between hidage.
the Ecclesiastical History and The Tribal Hidage.
Both give the South Saxons 7000 hides or
families[1700]. What are we then to say? If we suppose that Bede is speaking
to us of tenements which tend to conform to the hide of 120 arable acres his
statements must fly far beyond their mark. For example, the Isle of Wight is
to have 1200 hides, and yet, according to Domesday Book, the whole of
Hampshire including that island will not have 3000 hides, nor 3000
‘teamlands,’ nor 3000 teams. Bede’s Wight contains as many hides as the
Worcestershire or the Herefordshire of Domesday. He allots 600 of his units
to the Isle of Ely, which in 1086 had about 80 hides and 126 teamlands. He
allots another 600 of his units to the Isle of Thanet, which in 1086 had about
66 sulungs and 93 teamlands[1701].
We have now reached the critical point in our essay.
Bede and the large hide.
Before us lie two paths and it is hardly too much to
say that our whole conception of early English
history depends on the choice that we make. Either as we pursue our
retrogressive course through the centuries there comes a time when the hide
of 120 acres gives place to some other and much smaller typical tenement,
Page 460
or the men of Bede’s day grossly exaggerated the number of the hides that
there were in England and the various parts thereof.
We make our choice. We refuse to abandon the large
Continuity of the hide in
hide. In the first place, we call to mind the continuity the land-books.
of the charters. They have begun to flow in Bede’s
day; they never cease to flow until they debouch in
Domesday Book. They know but one tenemental unit. To describe it they
use Bede’s phrase, and his translator’s phrases. It is the hiwisc, the terra
unius familiae, the terra unius manentis, the manse, the hide[1702]. Between
this and the acre they know nothing except the yard of land. Of it they
speak but seldom, and it can only be explained as being a yard in every acre
of a hide. No moment can we fix when an old mode of reckoning by
reference to small tenements is superseded by references to a fourfold larger
model.
In the second place, we have been prepared for
Gradual reduction of
exaggeration. We have seen the hides steadily hidage.
increasing in number as we passed from Domesday
Book to The County Hidage and thence to The
Burghal Hidage, and what may we not expect in the remote age that we
have now reached? Even in the days of The Burghal Hidage there was a
kingdom of England. There was a king of the English who was trying to
coordinate his various dominions in one common scheme of national
defence. But now we have penetrated to an age when there is no English
nation. The gens Anglorum whose ecclesiastical history is being written is
but a loose congeries of kindred folks. Rude indeed will be the guesses
made at such a time about the strength of tribes and the wealth of countries.
The South Mercians are a folk of 5000 families, ‘so they say’:—that is all
that Bede can tell us about them. It is not likely that they have
underestimated their numbers. When there is a kingdom of England, when
there is a crushing tax called ‘danegeld,’ then the day will have come when
a county will, if it can, ‘conceal’ its hides. At an earlier time the various
folks will brag of their strength and there will be none to mitigate their
boasts. Moreover we can not put our finger on the spot where the breach of
continuity occurs. In 1086 Sussex has about 3100 teamlands; it has about
3500 hides. The Burghal Hidage would burden it with nearly 4500, and now
there were in England and the various parts thereof.
We make our choice. We refuse to abandon the large
Continuity of the hide in
hide. In the first place, we call to mind the continuity the land-books.
of the charters. They have begun to flow in Bede’s
day; they never cease to flow until they debouch in
Domesday Book. They know but one tenemental unit. To describe it they
use Bede’s phrase, and his translator’s phrases. It is the hiwisc, the terra
unius familiae, the terra unius manentis, the manse, the hide[1702]. Between
this and the acre they know nothing except the yard of land. Of it they
speak but seldom, and it can only be explained as being a yard in every acre
of a hide. No moment can we fix when an old mode of reckoning by
reference to small tenements is superseded by references to a fourfold larger
model.
In the second place, we have been prepared for
Gradual reduction of
exaggeration. We have seen the hides steadily hidage.
increasing in number as we passed from Domesday
Book to The County Hidage and thence to The
Burghal Hidage, and what may we not expect in the remote age that we
have now reached? Even in the days of The Burghal Hidage there was a
kingdom of England. There was a king of the English who was trying to
coordinate his various dominions in one common scheme of national
defence. But now we have penetrated to an age when there is no English
nation. The gens Anglorum whose ecclesiastical history is being written is
but a loose congeries of kindred folks. Rude indeed will be the guesses
made at such a time about the strength of tribes and the wealth of countries.
The South Mercians are a folk of 5000 families, ‘so they say’:—that is all
that Bede can tell us about them. It is not likely that they have
underestimated their numbers. When there is a kingdom of England, when
there is a crushing tax called ‘danegeld,’ then the day will have come when
a county will, if it can, ‘conceal’ its hides. At an earlier time the various
folks will brag of their strength and there will be none to mitigate their
boasts. Moreover we can not put our finger on the spot where the breach of
continuity occurs. In 1086 Sussex has about 3100 teamlands; it has about
3500 hides. The Burghal Hidage would burden it with nearly 4500, and now
Page 461
we are required to give it 7000. There is no place where we can see its hides
suddenly multiplied or divided by four.
Dare we set any limit to the power of exaggeration?
Over-estimates of
In much later days when England had long been hidage.
strongly governed and accurate fiscal rolls were
being carefully stored in the treasury, men believed
in 60,000 knight’s fees; royal ministers believed in 32,000; and yet we now
see good reason for doubting whether there were more than 5000[1703]. In
the reign of Edward III. the collective wisdom of the nation supposed, and
acted upon the supposition, that there were more than 40,000 parishes in
England, and then made the humiliating discovery that there were less than
9000[1704]. We hear that the same error was current in the days of Wolsey.
Men still believed in those 40,000 parishes[1705]. Such numbers as these
stood written in ancient manuscripts, some of which seem to have taken our
Tribal Hidage as a base for calculations[1706]. These traditional numbers will
not be lightly abandoned, though their falsehood might be proved by a few
days’ labour spent among the official archives. Counting hides is repulsive
work. If then these things happen in an age which is much closer to our own
than to Bede’s, ought we not to be surprised at the moderation of those
current estimates of tribal strength that he reports.
Thirdly, when Bede speaks not of a large province,
Size of Bede’s hide.
but of an estate acquired by a prelate, then his story
seems to require that ‘the land of one family’ should
be that big tenemental unit, the manse or hide of the land-books. Let us take
by way of example the largest act of liberality that he records. King Oswy,
going to battle, promises that if he be victorious he will devote to God his
daughter with twelve estates for the endowment of monasteries. He is
victorious; he fulfils his vow. He gives twelve estates, six in Deira, six in
Bernicia; each consists of ‘the possessions of ten families.’ His daughter
enters Hild’s monastery at Hartlepool. Two years afterwards she acquires an
estate of ten families at Streanaeshalch and founds a monastery there.
According to our reading of the story, Oswy bestows twelve ‘ten-hide vills’;
he gives, that is, his rights, his superiority, over twelve villages of about the
average size, some of which are in Deira, some in Bernicia. It is a
handsome gift made on a grand occasion and in return for a magnificent
victory; but it is on the scale of those gifts whereof we read in the West
suddenly multiplied or divided by four.
Dare we set any limit to the power of exaggeration?
Over-estimates of
In much later days when England had long been hidage.
strongly governed and accurate fiscal rolls were
being carefully stored in the treasury, men believed
in 60,000 knight’s fees; royal ministers believed in 32,000; and yet we now
see good reason for doubting whether there were more than 5000[1703]. In
the reign of Edward III. the collective wisdom of the nation supposed, and
acted upon the supposition, that there were more than 40,000 parishes in
England, and then made the humiliating discovery that there were less than
9000[1704]. We hear that the same error was current in the days of Wolsey.
Men still believed in those 40,000 parishes[1705]. Such numbers as these
stood written in ancient manuscripts, some of which seem to have taken our
Tribal Hidage as a base for calculations[1706]. These traditional numbers will
not be lightly abandoned, though their falsehood might be proved by a few
days’ labour spent among the official archives. Counting hides is repulsive
work. If then these things happen in an age which is much closer to our own
than to Bede’s, ought we not to be surprised at the moderation of those
current estimates of tribal strength that he reports.
Thirdly, when Bede speaks not of a large province,
Size of Bede’s hide.
but of an estate acquired by a prelate, then his story
seems to require that ‘the land of one family’ should
be that big tenemental unit, the manse or hide of the land-books. Let us take
by way of example the largest act of liberality that he records. King Oswy,
going to battle, promises that if he be victorious he will devote to God his
daughter with twelve estates for the endowment of monasteries. He is
victorious; he fulfils his vow. He gives twelve estates, six in Deira, six in
Bernicia; each consists of ‘the possessions of ten families.’ His daughter
enters Hild’s monastery at Hartlepool. Two years afterwards she acquires an
estate of ten families at Streanaeshalch and founds a monastery there.
According to our reading of the story, Oswy bestows twelve ‘ten-hide vills’;
he gives, that is, his rights, his superiority, over twelve villages of about the
average size, some of which are in Deira, some in Bernicia. It is a
handsome gift made on a grand occasion and in return for a magnificent
victory; but it is on the scale of those gifts whereof we read in the West
Page 462
Saxon and Mercian land-books, where the hides are given away by fives
and tens, fifteens and twenties. We feel no temptation to make thirty-acre
yard-lands of the units that Oswy distributed. Were we to do this, we should
see him bestowing not entire villages (for a village of two-and-a-half hides
would, at all events in later days, be abnormally small) but a few of the
tenements that lie in one village and a few of those that lie in another, and
such a gift would not be like those gifts that the oldest land-books record.
And so we think that the unit which Bede employs is our large hide. When
he speaks of the estates given to those churches with whose affairs he is
conversant, he will state the hidage correctly; but when it comes to the
hidage of Sussex or Kent, he will report current beliefs which are far from
the truth. This is what we see in later days. The officers at the Exchequer
know perfectly well that this man has fifty knight’s fees and that man five,
but opine that there are 32,000, or, may be, 60,000 fees in England[1707].
Observe how moderate Bede’s estimate of hidage is
Evidence from Iona.
when he speaks of a small parcel of land of which he
had heard much, when he speaks of the holy island
of Hii or Iona. A Pictish king gave it to Columba, who received it as a site
for a monastery. ‘Neque enim magna est, sed quasi familiarum quinque,
iuxta aestimationem Anglorum[1708]’ ‘It is not a large island; we might
compare its size with that of one of our English five-hide túns.’ The
comparison would be apt. Iona has 1300 Scotch acres or thereabouts[1709].
Plough 600 acres; there will be ample pasture left[1710]. If, however, we
interpreted his statement about the 7000 hides of Sussex in a similar
fashion, the result would be ridiculous. The South Saxons had not 840,000
acres of arable; our Sussex has not 940,000 acres of any kind; their Sussex
was thickly wooded. The contrast, however, is not between two measures; it
is between knowledge and ignorance. Bede’s name is and ought to be
venerated, and to accuse him of talking nonsense may seem to some an act
of sacrilege. But about these matters he could only tell what was told him,
and we may be sure that his informants, were, to say the least, no better
provided with statistics than were the statesmen of the fourteenth
century[1711].
Also there is one case in which we have what may
Evidence from Selsey.
be called a very ancient, though not a contemporary,
exposition of Bede’s words. He tells us that
and tens, fifteens and twenties. We feel no temptation to make thirty-acre
yard-lands of the units that Oswy distributed. Were we to do this, we should
see him bestowing not entire villages (for a village of two-and-a-half hides
would, at all events in later days, be abnormally small) but a few of the
tenements that lie in one village and a few of those that lie in another, and
such a gift would not be like those gifts that the oldest land-books record.
And so we think that the unit which Bede employs is our large hide. When
he speaks of the estates given to those churches with whose affairs he is
conversant, he will state the hidage correctly; but when it comes to the
hidage of Sussex or Kent, he will report current beliefs which are far from
the truth. This is what we see in later days. The officers at the Exchequer
know perfectly well that this man has fifty knight’s fees and that man five,
but opine that there are 32,000, or, may be, 60,000 fees in England[1707].
Observe how moderate Bede’s estimate of hidage is
Evidence from Iona.
when he speaks of a small parcel of land of which he
had heard much, when he speaks of the holy island
of Hii or Iona. A Pictish king gave it to Columba, who received it as a site
for a monastery. ‘Neque enim magna est, sed quasi familiarum quinque,
iuxta aestimationem Anglorum[1708]’ ‘It is not a large island; we might
compare its size with that of one of our English five-hide túns.’ The
comparison would be apt. Iona has 1300 Scotch acres or thereabouts[1709].
Plough 600 acres; there will be ample pasture left[1710]. If, however, we
interpreted his statement about the 7000 hides of Sussex in a similar
fashion, the result would be ridiculous. The South Saxons had not 840,000
acres of arable; our Sussex has not 940,000 acres of any kind; their Sussex
was thickly wooded. The contrast, however, is not between two measures; it
is between knowledge and ignorance. Bede’s name is and ought to be
venerated, and to accuse him of talking nonsense may seem to some an act
of sacrilege. But about these matters he could only tell what was told him,
and we may be sure that his informants, were, to say the least, no better
provided with statistics than were the statesmen of the fourteenth
century[1711].
Also there is one case in which we have what may
Evidence from Selsey.
be called a very ancient, though not a contemporary,
exposition of Bede’s words. He tells us that
Page 463
Æthelwealh king of the South Saxons gave to Wilfrid the land of 87
families called Selsey[1712]. Then there comes to us from Chichester the
copy of a land-book which professes to tell us more touching the
whereabouts of these 87 hides[1713]. Ceadwealla with the approval of
Archbishop Wilfrid gives to a Bishop Wilfrid a little land for the
construction of a monastery in the place called Selsey: ‘that is to say 55
tributarii in the places that are called Seolesige, Medeminige, Wihttringes,
Iccannore, Bridham and Egesauude and also Bessenheie, Brimfastun and
Sidelesham with the other villae thereto belonging and their appurtenances;
also the land named Aldingburne and Lydesige 6 cassati, and in
Geinstedisgate 6, and in Mundham 8, and in Amberla and Hohtun 8, and in
Uualdham 4: that is 32 tributarii.’ This instrument bears date 683. Another
purporting to come from 957 describes the land in much the same
fashion[1714]. Where, let us ask, did the makers of these charters propose to
locate the 87 hides? Some, though not all, of the places that they mentioned
can be easily found on the map. We see Selsey itself; hard by are Medmeny
or Medmerry, Wittering, Itchenor, Birdham and Siddlesham. At these and
some other places that are not now to be found were 55 hides. Then we go
further afield and discover Aldingbourn, Lidsey, Mundham, Amberley,
Houghton and perhaps Upper Waltham. But we have travelled far. At
Amberley and Houghton we are fifteen miles as the crow flies from
Selsey[1715]. Apparently then, the 87 hides consist of a solid block of
villages at and around Selsey itself and of more distant villages that are
dotted about in the neighbourhood. Be it granted that these land-books are
forgeries; still in all probability they are a good deal older than Domesday
Book[1716]. Be it granted that the number of 87 hides was suggested to the
forgers by the words of Bede[1717]. Still we must ask what meaning they
gave to those words. They distributed the 87 hides over a territory which is
at least eighteen miles in diameter[1718]. Now it is by no means unlikely that
Æthelwealh’s gift really included some villages that were remote from
Selsey. We have seen before now that lands in one village may ‘lie into’
another and a distant village which is the moot-stow of a ‘hundred.’ But at
any rate the forgers were not going to attempt the impossible task of
cramming ‘the land of 87 families’ into the Selsey peninsula.
Therefore, in spite of Bede and The Tribal Hidage, we still remain faithful
to the big hide. We have seen reason for believing that in the oldest days the
families called Selsey[1712]. Then there comes to us from Chichester the
copy of a land-book which professes to tell us more touching the
whereabouts of these 87 hides[1713]. Ceadwealla with the approval of
Archbishop Wilfrid gives to a Bishop Wilfrid a little land for the
construction of a monastery in the place called Selsey: ‘that is to say 55
tributarii in the places that are called Seolesige, Medeminige, Wihttringes,
Iccannore, Bridham and Egesauude and also Bessenheie, Brimfastun and
Sidelesham with the other villae thereto belonging and their appurtenances;
also the land named Aldingburne and Lydesige 6 cassati, and in
Geinstedisgate 6, and in Mundham 8, and in Amberla and Hohtun 8, and in
Uualdham 4: that is 32 tributarii.’ This instrument bears date 683. Another
purporting to come from 957 describes the land in much the same
fashion[1714]. Where, let us ask, did the makers of these charters propose to
locate the 87 hides? Some, though not all, of the places that they mentioned
can be easily found on the map. We see Selsey itself; hard by are Medmeny
or Medmerry, Wittering, Itchenor, Birdham and Siddlesham. At these and
some other places that are not now to be found were 55 hides. Then we go
further afield and discover Aldingbourn, Lidsey, Mundham, Amberley,
Houghton and perhaps Upper Waltham. But we have travelled far. At
Amberley and Houghton we are fifteen miles as the crow flies from
Selsey[1715]. Apparently then, the 87 hides consist of a solid block of
villages at and around Selsey itself and of more distant villages that are
dotted about in the neighbourhood. Be it granted that these land-books are
forgeries; still in all probability they are a good deal older than Domesday
Book[1716]. Be it granted that the number of 87 hides was suggested to the
forgers by the words of Bede[1717]. Still we must ask what meaning they
gave to those words. They distributed the 87 hides over a territory which is
at least eighteen miles in diameter[1718]. Now it is by no means unlikely that
Æthelwealh’s gift really included some villages that were remote from
Selsey. We have seen before now that lands in one village may ‘lie into’
another and a distant village which is the moot-stow of a ‘hundred.’ But at
any rate the forgers were not going to attempt the impossible task of
cramming ‘the land of 87 families’ into the Selsey peninsula.
Therefore, in spite of Bede and The Tribal Hidage, we still remain faithful
to the big hide. We have seen reason for believing that in the oldest days the
Page 464
real number of the ‘real’ hides was largely over-
Conclusion in favour of
estimated. It would be an interesting, though perhaps the large hide.
an unanswerable, question whether any
governmental or fiscal arrangements were ever
based upon these inflated figures. A negative answer would seem the more
probable. In Bede’s day there was no one to tax all England or to force upon
all England a scheme of national defence. So soon as anything that we
could dare to call a government of England came into being, the truth, the
unpleasant truth, would become apparent bit by bit. All along bits of the
truth were well enough known. The number of hides in a village was known
to the villagers; the kingling knew the number of hides that contributed to
his maintenance. As the folks were fused together, these dispersed bits of
truth would be slowly pieced into a whole, though for a long while the work
of coordination would be hampered by old mythical estimates. Perhaps The
Burghal Hidage may represent one of the first attempts to arrange for
political purposes the hides of a large province. There is still exaggeration,
and, unfortunately for us, new causes of perplexity are introduced as the
older disappear. On the one hand, statesmen are beginning to know
something about the facts; on the other hand, they are beginning to perceive
that tenements of equal size are often of very unequal value, and to give the
name hide to whatever is taxed as such. Also there is privilege to be
reckoned with, and there is jobbery. It is a tangled skein. And yet they are
holding fast the equation 1H. = 120A
There is, however, another point of view from which
Continental analogies.
the evidence should be examined, though a point to
which we can not climb. How will our big hide
assort with the evidence that comes to us from abroad? Only a few words
about this question can we hazard.
If we look to the villages of Germany, or at any rate
The German Hufe.
of some parts of Germany, we see that the typical
fully endowed peasant holds a mass of dispersed
acre-strips, a Hufe, hoba mansus which, while it falls far short of our hide,
closely resembles our virgate. The resemblance is close. As our virgate is
compounded of acres, so this Hufe is compounded of acres, or day’s-works,
or mornings (Morgen). When the time for accurate measurement comes,
these day-work-units differ somewhat widely in extent as we pass from one
Conclusion in favour of
estimated. It would be an interesting, though perhaps the large hide.
an unanswerable, question whether any
governmental or fiscal arrangements were ever
based upon these inflated figures. A negative answer would seem the more
probable. In Bede’s day there was no one to tax all England or to force upon
all England a scheme of national defence. So soon as anything that we
could dare to call a government of England came into being, the truth, the
unpleasant truth, would become apparent bit by bit. All along bits of the
truth were well enough known. The number of hides in a village was known
to the villagers; the kingling knew the number of hides that contributed to
his maintenance. As the folks were fused together, these dispersed bits of
truth would be slowly pieced into a whole, though for a long while the work
of coordination would be hampered by old mythical estimates. Perhaps The
Burghal Hidage may represent one of the first attempts to arrange for
political purposes the hides of a large province. There is still exaggeration,
and, unfortunately for us, new causes of perplexity are introduced as the
older disappear. On the one hand, statesmen are beginning to know
something about the facts; on the other hand, they are beginning to perceive
that tenements of equal size are often of very unequal value, and to give the
name hide to whatever is taxed as such. Also there is privilege to be
reckoned with, and there is jobbery. It is a tangled skein. And yet they are
holding fast the equation 1H. = 120A
There is, however, another point of view from which
Continental analogies.
the evidence should be examined, though a point to
which we can not climb. How will our big hide
assort with the evidence that comes to us from abroad? Only a few words
about this question can we hazard.
If we look to the villages of Germany, or at any rate
The German Hufe.
of some parts of Germany, we see that the typical
fully endowed peasant holds a mass of dispersed
acre-strips, a Hufe, hoba mansus which, while it falls far short of our hide,
closely resembles our virgate. The resemblance is close. As our virgate is
compounded of acres, so this Hufe is compounded of acres, or day’s-works,
or mornings (Morgen). When the time for accurate measurement comes,
these day-work-units differ somewhat widely in extent as we pass from one
Page 465
district to another. The English statute acre is, as we have already said[1719],
an unusually large day-work-unit. It contains 40.46 ares, while in Germany,
if there is nothing exceptional in the case, the Morgen will have no more
than from 25 to 30 ares[1720]. This notwithstanding, the Hufe, is generally
supposed to contain either 30 or else 60 Morgen, the former reckoning
being the commoner. In the one case it would resemble our virgate, in the
other our half-hide.
Then, however, we see—and it has occurred to us
The Königshufe.
that some solution of our difficulty might lie in this
quarter—that in Germany there appears sporadically
a unit much larger than the ordinary Hufe, which is known as a Königshufe
or mansus regalis. This is sometimes reckoned to contain 160, but
sometimes 120 Morgen. It seems to be an unit accurately measured by a
virga regalis of 4·70 meters and to contain 21,600 square virgae. In size it
would closely resemble an English hide of 120 statute acres; the one would
contain 47·736, the other 48·56 hectares. To explain the appearance of these
large units by the side of the ordinary Hufen, it has been said that as the
Emperor or German king reigned over wide territories and had much land
to give away, he felt the need of some accurate standard for the
measurement of his own gifts, so that he might be able to dispose of ‘five
manses’ or ‘ten manses’ in some distant province and yet know exactly
what he was doing. This theory, however, does not tell us why the unit that
was thus chosen and called a king’s Hufe or ‘royal manse’ was much larger
than an ordinary manse or Hufe, and we seem invited to suppose that at
some time or another a notion had prevailed that when an allotment of land
in a village was made to a king, he should have for his tenement twice or
thrice or four times as many strips as would fall to the lot of the common
man[1721].
The suggestion then might be made that the manse,
The English hide and the
terra unius familiae, terra unius manentis, of our Königshufe.
English documents is not the typical manse of the
common man, but the typical king’s-manse. We
might construct the following story:—When England was being settled, the
practice was to give the common man about 30 acres to his manse, but to
give the king 120. Thus in the administration of the royal lands a ‘manse’
would stand for this large unit. Then this same unit was employed in the
an unusually large day-work-unit. It contains 40.46 ares, while in Germany,
if there is nothing exceptional in the case, the Morgen will have no more
than from 25 to 30 ares[1720]. This notwithstanding, the Hufe, is generally
supposed to contain either 30 or else 60 Morgen, the former reckoning
being the commoner. In the one case it would resemble our virgate, in the
other our half-hide.
Then, however, we see—and it has occurred to us
The Königshufe.
that some solution of our difficulty might lie in this
quarter—that in Germany there appears sporadically
a unit much larger than the ordinary Hufe, which is known as a Königshufe
or mansus regalis. This is sometimes reckoned to contain 160, but
sometimes 120 Morgen. It seems to be an unit accurately measured by a
virga regalis of 4·70 meters and to contain 21,600 square virgae. In size it
would closely resemble an English hide of 120 statute acres; the one would
contain 47·736, the other 48·56 hectares. To explain the appearance of these
large units by the side of the ordinary Hufen, it has been said that as the
Emperor or German king reigned over wide territories and had much land
to give away, he felt the need of some accurate standard for the
measurement of his own gifts, so that he might be able to dispose of ‘five
manses’ or ‘ten manses’ in some distant province and yet know exactly
what he was doing. This theory, however, does not tell us why the unit that
was thus chosen and called a king’s Hufe or ‘royal manse’ was much larger
than an ordinary manse or Hufe, and we seem invited to suppose that at
some time or another a notion had prevailed that when an allotment of land
in a village was made to a king, he should have for his tenement twice or
thrice or four times as many strips as would fall to the lot of the common
man[1721].
The suggestion then might be made that the manse,
The English hide and the
terra unius familiae, terra unius manentis, of our Königshufe.
English documents is not the typical manse of the
common man, but the typical king’s-manse. We
might construct the following story:—When England was being settled, the
practice was to give the common man about 30 acres to his manse, but to
give the king 120. Thus in the administration of the royal lands a ‘manse’
would stand for this large unit. Then this same unit was employed in the
Page 466
computation of the feorm, victus or pastus that was due to the king from
other lands, and finally the royal reckoning got so much the upper hand that
when men spoke of a ‘manse’ or a ‘family land’ they meant thereby, not the
typical estate of the common man, but a four times larger unit which was
thrust upon their notice by fiscal arrangements.
Some such suggestion as this may deserve
The large hide on the
consideration if all simpler theories break down. But Continent.
it is not easily acceptable. It supposes that in a very
early and rude age a natural use of words was utterly
and tracelessly expelled by a highly technical and artificial use. This might
happen in a much governed country which was full of royal officials; we
can hardly conceive it happening in the England of the seventh and eighth
centuries. Moreover, the continental evidence does not lie all on one side.
There was, for instance, one district in Northern Germany where the term
Hufe was given to an area that was but a trifle smaller than 120 acres of our
statute measure[1722]. Also there are the large Scandinavian allotments to be
considered. Even in Gaul on the estates of St. Germain the mansus
ingenuilis sometimes contained, if Guérard’s calculations are correct, fully
as much arable land as we are giving to the hide[1723]. Nor, though we may
dispute about the degree of difference, can it be doubted that the Germanic
conquest of a Britain that the legions had deserted was catastrophic when
compared with the slow process by which the Franks and other tribes
gained the mastery in Gaul. Just in the matter of agrarian allotment this
difference might show itself in a striking form. The more barbarous a man
is, the more land he must have to feed himself withal, if corn is to be his
staple food. There were no ecclesiastics in England to maintain the
continuity of agricultural tradition. Also the heathen Germans in England
had a far better chance of providing themselves with slaves than had their
cousins on the mainland. Also it seems very possible that throughout the
wide and always growing realm of the Frankish king, the fiscal
nomenclature would be fixed by the usages which obtained in the richest
and most civilized of those lands over which he reigned, and that the
‘manse’ that was taken as the unit for taxation was really a much smaller
tenement than supported a family in the wilder and ruder east. Besides,
when in Frankland a tax is imposed which closely resembles and may have
been the model for our danegeld, the mansus ingenuilis pays twice as much
other lands, and finally the royal reckoning got so much the upper hand that
when men spoke of a ‘manse’ or a ‘family land’ they meant thereby, not the
typical estate of the common man, but a four times larger unit which was
thrust upon their notice by fiscal arrangements.
Some such suggestion as this may deserve
The large hide on the
consideration if all simpler theories break down. But Continent.
it is not easily acceptable. It supposes that in a very
early and rude age a natural use of words was utterly
and tracelessly expelled by a highly technical and artificial use. This might
happen in a much governed country which was full of royal officials; we
can hardly conceive it happening in the England of the seventh and eighth
centuries. Moreover, the continental evidence does not lie all on one side.
There was, for instance, one district in Northern Germany where the term
Hufe was given to an area that was but a trifle smaller than 120 acres of our
statute measure[1722]. Also there are the large Scandinavian allotments to be
considered. Even in Gaul on the estates of St. Germain the mansus
ingenuilis sometimes contained, if Guérard’s calculations are correct, fully
as much arable land as we are giving to the hide[1723]. Nor, though we may
dispute about the degree of difference, can it be doubted that the Germanic
conquest of a Britain that the legions had deserted was catastrophic when
compared with the slow process by which the Franks and other tribes
gained the mastery in Gaul. Just in the matter of agrarian allotment this
difference might show itself in a striking form. The more barbarous a man
is, the more land he must have to feed himself withal, if corn is to be his
staple food. There were no ecclesiastics in England to maintain the
continuity of agricultural tradition. Also the heathen Germans in England
had a far better chance of providing themselves with slaves than had their
cousins on the mainland. Also it seems very possible that throughout the
wide and always growing realm of the Frankish king, the fiscal
nomenclature would be fixed by the usages which obtained in the richest
and most civilized of those lands over which he reigned, and that the
‘manse’ that was taken as the unit for taxation was really a much smaller
tenement than supported a family in the wilder and ruder east. Besides,
when in Frankland a tax is imposed which closely resembles and may have
been the model for our danegeld, the mansus ingenuilis pays twice as much
Page 467
as the mansus servilis[1724]. This suggests that the Frankish statesmen have
two different typical tenements in their minds, whereas in England all the
hides pay equally.
No doubt at first sight 120 arable acres seem a huge
The large hide not too
tenement for the maintenance of one family. But, large.
though the last word on this matter can not be
spoken by those ignorant alike of agriculture and
physiology, still they may be able to forward the formation of a sound
judgment by calling attention to some points which might otherwise be
neglected. In the first place, our ‘acre’ is a variable whose history is not yet
written. Perhaps when written it will tell us that the oldest English acres fell
decidedly short of the measure that now bears that name and even that a rod
of 12 feet was not very uncommon. Secondly, when our fancy is catering
for thriftless barbarians, we must remember that the good years will not
compensate for the bad. Every harvest, however poor, must support the race
for a twelvemonth. Thirdly, we must think away that atmosphere of secure
expectation in which we live. When wars and blood-feuds and marauding
forays are common, men must try to raise much food if they would eat a
little. Fourthly, we must not light-heartedly transport the three-course or
even the two-course programme of agriculture into the days of conquest and
settlement. It is not impossible that no more than one-third of the arable was
sown in any year[1725]. Fifthly, we may doubt whether Arthur Young was
further in advance of Walter of Henley than Walter was of the wild heathen
among whom the hides were allotted; and yet Walter, with all his learned
talk of marl and manure, of second-fallowing and additional furrows, faced
the possibility of garnering but six bushels from an acre[1726]. Sixthly, we
have to provide for men who love to drink themselves drunk with beer[1727].
Their fields of barley will be wide, for their thirst is unquenchable.
Seventhly, without speaking of ‘house-communities,’ we may reasonably
guess that the household was much larger in the seventh than it was in the
eleventh century. We might expect to find married brothers or even married
cousins under one roof. Eighthly, there seems no reason why we should not
allow the free family some slaves: perhaps a couple of huts inhabited by
slaves; there had been war enough. Ninthly, the villein of the thirteenth
century will often possess a full virgate of 30 acres, and yet will spend quite
half his time in cultivating his lord’s demesne. Tenthly, in Domesday Book
two different typical tenements in their minds, whereas in England all the
hides pay equally.
No doubt at first sight 120 arable acres seem a huge
The large hide not too
tenement for the maintenance of one family. But, large.
though the last word on this matter can not be
spoken by those ignorant alike of agriculture and
physiology, still they may be able to forward the formation of a sound
judgment by calling attention to some points which might otherwise be
neglected. In the first place, our ‘acre’ is a variable whose history is not yet
written. Perhaps when written it will tell us that the oldest English acres fell
decidedly short of the measure that now bears that name and even that a rod
of 12 feet was not very uncommon. Secondly, when our fancy is catering
for thriftless barbarians, we must remember that the good years will not
compensate for the bad. Every harvest, however poor, must support the race
for a twelvemonth. Thirdly, we must think away that atmosphere of secure
expectation in which we live. When wars and blood-feuds and marauding
forays are common, men must try to raise much food if they would eat a
little. Fourthly, we must not light-heartedly transport the three-course or
even the two-course programme of agriculture into the days of conquest and
settlement. It is not impossible that no more than one-third of the arable was
sown in any year[1725]. Fifthly, we may doubt whether Arthur Young was
further in advance of Walter of Henley than Walter was of the wild heathen
among whom the hides were allotted; and yet Walter, with all his learned
talk of marl and manure, of second-fallowing and additional furrows, faced
the possibility of garnering but six bushels from an acre[1726]. Sixthly, we
have to provide for men who love to drink themselves drunk with beer[1727].
Their fields of barley will be wide, for their thirst is unquenchable.
Seventhly, without speaking of ‘house-communities,’ we may reasonably
guess that the household was much larger in the seventh than it was in the
eleventh century. We might expect to find married brothers or even married
cousins under one roof. Eighthly, there seems no reason why we should not
allow the free family some slaves: perhaps a couple of huts inhabited by
slaves; there had been war enough. Ninthly, the villein of the thirteenth
century will often possess a full virgate of 30 acres, and yet will spend quite
half his time in cultivating his lord’s demesne. Tenthly, in Domesday Book
Page 468
the case of the villanus who holds an integral hide is by no means
unknown[1728], nor the case of the villanus who has a full team of oxen.
When all this has been thought over, let judgment be given. Meanwhile we
can not abandon that belief to which the evidence has brought us, namely,
that the normal tenement of the German settler was a hide, the type of
which had 120 acres of arable, little more or less.
If we are right about this matter, then, as already
The large hide and the
said[1729], some important consequences follow. We manor.
may once and for all dismiss as a dream any theory
which would teach us that from the first the main
and normal constitutive cell in the social structure of the English people has
been the manor. To call the ceorl’s tenement of 120 acres a manor, though it
may have a few slaves to till it, would be a grotesque misuse of words, nor,
if there is to be clear thinking, shall we call it an embryo manor, for by no
gradual process can a manor be developed from it. There must be a
coagulation of some three or four such tenements into a single proprietary
unit before that name can be fairly earned. That from the first there were
units which by some stretch of language might be called manors is possible.
The noble man, the eorl, may have usually had at least those five hides
which in later days were regarded as the proper endowment for a thegn, and
these large estates may have been cultivated somewhat after the manorial
fashion by the slaves and freed-men of their owners. But the language of
Bede and of the charters assures us that the arrangement which has been
prevalent enough to be typical has been that which gave to each free family,
to each house-father, to each tax-payer (tributarius) one hide and no more;
but no less. Such a use of words is not engendered by rarities and
anomalies.
However, we would not end this essay upon a
Last words.
discord. Therefore a last and peaceful word. There is
every reason why the explorers of ancient English
history should be hopeful. We are beginning to learn that there are intricate
problems to be solved and yet that they are not insoluble. A century hence
the student’s materials will not be in the shape in which he finds them now.
In the first place, the substance of Domesday Book will have been
rearranged. Those villages and hundreds which the Norman clerks tore into
shreds will have been reconstituted and pictured in maps, for many men
unknown[1728], nor the case of the villanus who has a full team of oxen.
When all this has been thought over, let judgment be given. Meanwhile we
can not abandon that belief to which the evidence has brought us, namely,
that the normal tenement of the German settler was a hide, the type of
which had 120 acres of arable, little more or less.
If we are right about this matter, then, as already
The large hide and the
said[1729], some important consequences follow. We manor.
may once and for all dismiss as a dream any theory
which would teach us that from the first the main
and normal constitutive cell in the social structure of the English people has
been the manor. To call the ceorl’s tenement of 120 acres a manor, though it
may have a few slaves to till it, would be a grotesque misuse of words, nor,
if there is to be clear thinking, shall we call it an embryo manor, for by no
gradual process can a manor be developed from it. There must be a
coagulation of some three or four such tenements into a single proprietary
unit before that name can be fairly earned. That from the first there were
units which by some stretch of language might be called manors is possible.
The noble man, the eorl, may have usually had at least those five hides
which in later days were regarded as the proper endowment for a thegn, and
these large estates may have been cultivated somewhat after the manorial
fashion by the slaves and freed-men of their owners. But the language of
Bede and of the charters assures us that the arrangement which has been
prevalent enough to be typical has been that which gave to each free family,
to each house-father, to each tax-payer (tributarius) one hide and no more;
but no less. Such a use of words is not engendered by rarities and
anomalies.
However, we would not end this essay upon a
Last words.
discord. Therefore a last and peaceful word. There is
every reason why the explorers of ancient English
history should be hopeful. We are beginning to learn that there are intricate
problems to be solved and yet that they are not insoluble. A century hence
the student’s materials will not be in the shape in which he finds them now.
In the first place, the substance of Domesday Book will have been
rearranged. Those villages and hundreds which the Norman clerks tore into
shreds will have been reconstituted and pictured in maps, for many men
Page 469
from over all England will have come within King William’s spell, will
have bowed themselves to him and become that man’s men. Then there will
be a critical edition of the Anglo-Saxon charters in which the philologist
and the palæographer, the annalist and the formulist will have winnowed
the grain of truth from the chaff of imposture. Instead of a few
photographed village maps, there will be many; the history of land-
measures and of field-systems will have been elaborated. Above all, by
slow degrees the thoughts of our forefathers, their common thoughts about
common things, will have become thinkable once more. There are
discoveries to be made; but also there are habits to be formed.
have bowed themselves to him and become that man’s men. Then there will
be a critical edition of the Anglo-Saxon charters in which the philologist
and the palæographer, the annalist and the formulist will have winnowed
the grain of truth from the chaff of imposture. Instead of a few
photographed village maps, there will be many; the history of land-
measures and of field-systems will have been elaborated. Above all, by
slow degrees the thoughts of our forefathers, their common thoughts about
common things, will have become thinkable once more. There are
discoveries to be made; but also there are habits to be formed.
Page 470
Page 471
INDEX.
Abbots, Secular, 242
Abingdon, Church of, 254, 295, 494
Abington, Vill of, 11
Acre, 369, 373–386,518
Acre, Fiscal, 475–490
Acreage, Medieval statements of, 392
Acreage of counties, 407
Adultery, 281
Advocatus of church, 303
Agrarian morphology, 15, 16, 222, 362
Aids of boroughs, 174–176
Aids of counties, 473
Alfred’s army, 189
Alfred, Will of Ealdorman, 245
Alfred, Will of King, 254
Alienable superiority, The King’s, 241, 357
Alienation, Lord’s consent to, 296
Alleu, Franc, 171
Almende, 348
Alodial ownership, 154
Alodium, 153, 256
Altitonantis, 268, 452
Amber (measure), 440
Amerciamenta hominum, 277
Anathema in land books, 230, 251
Ancient demesne, 65, 167, 255
Ancillae, 34
Angild, 274, 282, 290
Anglesey, 513
Anglo-Saxon history, Fundamental questions of, 221
Arable and appurtenances, 388
Arable, Extent of, 435–441
Arable, Reallotment of, 346–8
Archiductor, 306
Arenga of A.-S. book, 243
Arepennis, 375, 467
Armingford Hundred, 11, 12, 451
Army, Constitution of the, 156–7, 308
Arpentum, 375, 467
Ascripticii, 51, 53
Aston and Cote, 354
Athelney, Fort at, 188, 503
Attestation and consent, 247–252
Augustin’s, St, Canterbury, 466
Abbots, Secular, 242
Abingdon, Church of, 254, 295, 494
Abington, Vill of, 11
Acre, 369, 373–386,518
Acre, Fiscal, 475–490
Acreage, Medieval statements of, 392
Acreage of counties, 407
Adultery, 281
Advocatus of church, 303
Agrarian morphology, 15, 16, 222, 362
Aids of boroughs, 174–176
Aids of counties, 473
Alfred’s army, 189
Alfred, Will of Ealdorman, 245
Alfred, Will of King, 254
Alienable superiority, The King’s, 241, 357
Alienation, Lord’s consent to, 296
Alleu, Franc, 171
Almende, 348
Alodial ownership, 154
Alodium, 153, 256
Altitonantis, 268, 452
Amber (measure), 440
Amerciamenta hominum, 277
Anathema in land books, 230, 251
Ancient demesne, 65, 167, 255
Ancillae, 34
Angild, 274, 282, 290
Anglesey, 513
Anglo-Saxon history, Fundamental questions of, 221
Arable and appurtenances, 388
Arable, Extent of, 435–441
Arable, Reallotment of, 346–8
Archiductor, 306
Arenga of A.-S. book, 243
Arepennis, 375, 467
Armingford Hundred, 11, 12, 451
Army, Constitution of the, 156–7, 308
Arpentum, 375, 467
Ascripticii, 51, 53
Aston and Cote, 354
Athelney, Fort at, 188, 503
Attestation and consent, 247–252
Augustin’s, St, Canterbury, 466
Page 472
Automatic adjustment of taxes, 207
Avera, 130, 138, 169, 240
Aylesbury, 180
Balk, 364
Barley, 439
Barley-corns, 369
Bath, 229, 501
Battle Abbey, 97, 281
Beasts, Number of, 441
Bede, 228, 233, 242, 251, 358, 509–515
Beds or selions, 379, 383
Beer, Consumption of, 439, 519
Benefice, Ecclesiastical, 152
Beneficial hidation, 264, 448
Beneficium, 152, 300–1
Beneficium oblatum, 75
Berewicks, 114, 333
Bergholt, 90
Berkeley, 113
Berkshire, 79, 156, 505
Bishop, Soldiers of a, 306
Bishop’s cross, 251
Bishops-land, 286
Blythburg, 96
Blything, Hundred of, 96
Bodenregal, 240
Book-land, 154, 242, 244–258, 293
Boon-days, 77
Bordarii, 23–25, 38–41, 107, 363
Borough, 172–219
Boundaries in charters, 495
Bourg, The French, 214
Bovate, 395
Bracton on villeinage, 61
Brewing, 440
Bridge-work, 187
Broughton, Court at, 99
Brungar’s case, 104
Buckingham, 176, 180, 196
Burbium, 214
Burgage tenure, 198
Burgesses, 179, 190
Burghal Hidage, The, 187, 455, 502–6, 515
Burh, 183–6
Burh-bót, 186–8
Burh-bryce, 183–4
Burh-geat, 184, 190
Burh-gemót, 185
Burh-grið, 88, 184
Avera, 130, 138, 169, 240
Aylesbury, 180
Balk, 364
Barley, 439
Barley-corns, 369
Bath, 229, 501
Battle Abbey, 97, 281
Beasts, Number of, 441
Bede, 228, 233, 242, 251, 358, 509–515
Beds or selions, 379, 383
Beer, Consumption of, 439, 519
Benefice, Ecclesiastical, 152
Beneficial hidation, 264, 448
Beneficium, 152, 300–1
Beneficium oblatum, 75
Berewicks, 114, 333
Bergholt, 90
Berkeley, 113
Berkshire, 79, 156, 505
Bishop, Soldiers of a, 306
Bishop’s cross, 251
Bishops-land, 286
Blythburg, 96
Blything, Hundred of, 96
Bodenregal, 240
Book-land, 154, 242, 244–258, 293
Boon-days, 77
Bordarii, 23–25, 38–41, 107, 363
Borough, 172–219
Boundaries in charters, 495
Bourg, The French, 214
Bovate, 395
Bracton on villeinage, 61
Brewing, 440
Bridge-work, 187
Broughton, Court at, 99
Brungar’s case, 104
Buckingham, 176, 180, 196
Burbium, 214
Burgage tenure, 198
Burgesses, 179, 190
Burghal Hidage, The, 187, 455, 502–6, 515
Burh, 183–6
Burh-bót, 186–8
Burh-bryce, 183–4
Burh-geat, 184, 190
Burh-gemót, 185
Burh-grið, 88, 184
Page 473
Burh-riht, 214
Burhwaras, 190
Buri, 36, 329
Bury and barrow, 183
Cambridge, 181, 187, 191, 211
Cambridgeshire, 10, 12, 13, 62, 129–139, 445, 468, 476
Cambridgeshire Inquest, 1, 10
Campus, 380
Canterbury, 89, 184, 191, 201
Canterbury, Church of, 87, 97, 228, 466
Carucage of 1198, 127
Carucate, 395, 404, 483
Casati, 335, 359
Castle guard, 151
Causa of gifts, 293
Celtic rural economy, 338
Celtic villages, 15, 222, 467
Censarii, 57
Ceorl, The, 30, 44, 58
Cervisarii, 57
Charter and writ, 262–4
Chattels of the boor, 38
Chertsey, Church of, 492
Cheshire, 458
Chester, 188, 211
Chief, Tenants in, 170
Chilcombe, 449, 496
Church-right, 229, 242
Churches, Lands of the, 227–9, 253
Churches, Ownership of, 144
Church-scot, 290, 305, 321
Civitas, 183
Classification of mankind, 23, 30, 122, 140
Cniht, 8, 191, 303, 309
Cnihts, Gilds of, 191
Cnut, Laws of, 55, 87, 239, 261, 282
Cnut’s geld, 3, 55, 446
Cnut’s writs, 260
Co-aration, 142, 149
Cognizance, Claims of, 93, 97, 282–293
Colchester, 198, 201
Coleness, Hundred of, 355
Coliberti, 28, 33, 36, 329
Collective liability, 208
Coloni, 51
Colonization of villages, 365, 501
Colonization under Ine, 238, 367
Comes, 8
Comital manors, 167
Burhwaras, 190
Buri, 36, 329
Bury and barrow, 183
Cambridge, 181, 187, 191, 211
Cambridgeshire, 10, 12, 13, 62, 129–139, 445, 468, 476
Cambridgeshire Inquest, 1, 10
Campus, 380
Canterbury, 89, 184, 191, 201
Canterbury, Church of, 87, 97, 228, 466
Carucage of 1198, 127
Carucate, 395, 404, 483
Casati, 335, 359
Castle guard, 151
Causa of gifts, 293
Celtic rural economy, 338
Celtic villages, 15, 222, 467
Censarii, 57
Ceorl, The, 30, 44, 58
Cervisarii, 57
Charter and writ, 262–4
Chattels of the boor, 38
Chertsey, Church of, 492
Cheshire, 458
Chester, 188, 211
Chief, Tenants in, 170
Chilcombe, 449, 496
Church-right, 229, 242
Churches, Lands of the, 227–9, 253
Churches, Ownership of, 144
Church-scot, 290, 305, 321
Civitas, 183
Classification of mankind, 23, 30, 122, 140
Cniht, 8, 191, 303, 309
Cnihts, Gilds of, 191
Cnut, Laws of, 55, 87, 239, 261, 282
Cnut’s geld, 3, 55, 446
Cnut’s writs, 260
Co-aration, 142, 149
Cognizance, Claims of, 93, 97, 282–293
Colchester, 198, 201
Coleness, Hundred of, 355
Coliberti, 28, 33, 36, 329
Collective liability, 208
Coloni, 51
Colonization of villages, 365, 501
Colonization under Ine, 238, 367
Comes, 8
Comital manors, 167
Page 474
Commendation, 67–75, 102, 104, 326
Common fields, 15, 379
Common property of burgesses, 200
Common, Rights of, 143, 202, 348, 352
Communalism, 149, 203, 341
Community, The borough, 198, 200
Community, The village, 142–150, 340–356
Compound householders, 125
Confessor, see Edward
Conqueror, Writs of the, 266
Conquest, Norman, Effects of, 60, 135, 172
Consent of Witan, 247–252
Consuetudines, 67–8, 76–9
Continuity of hidation, 491, 509
Contract, Free, 171
Convertible husbandry, 366, 425
Conveyance in court, 323
Co-ownership, 143–4, 341
Cornage, 147
Cornwall, 410, 425, 428, 463, 467
Corporation, 204–209, 253, 341, 349, 351
Corroboration of land-books, 251
Cotarii, 23–25, 38–41
Cotlif, 334
>Cotseti, 39
Cotsetla, 328
Counties, Detached pieces of, 9
Counties, Farms of, 169
Counties, Geld of, in cent. xi. 448–475
Counties, Geld of, in cent. xii. 7, 474
Counties, Populousness of, 19, 20
County Hidage, The, 455
County towns, 176
Court, Borough, 185, 210
Court, Seignorial, 91, 94, 275–8
Court, Suit of, 85, 95, 140, 322
Crediton, 113, 228, 501
Criminal and civil, 83
Criminal law and revenue, 79
Criminal law and serfage, 29, 32
Crosses on charters, 251, 262–5
Crown, Pleas of the, 82, 261, 282
Cultura, 380
Curia, 94, 110, 125
Cursing clause, 230, 262
Customary acres, 373–6
Customary land, 78
Dairy farming, 115
Danegeld, see Geld
Common fields, 15, 379
Common property of burgesses, 200
Common, Rights of, 143, 202, 348, 352
Communalism, 149, 203, 341
Community, The borough, 198, 200
Community, The village, 142–150, 340–356
Compound householders, 125
Confessor, see Edward
Conqueror, Writs of the, 266
Conquest, Norman, Effects of, 60, 135, 172
Consent of Witan, 247–252
Consuetudines, 67–8, 76–9
Continuity of hidation, 491, 509
Contract, Free, 171
Convertible husbandry, 366, 425
Conveyance in court, 323
Co-ownership, 143–4, 341
Cornage, 147
Cornwall, 410, 425, 428, 463, 467
Corporation, 204–209, 253, 341, 349, 351
Corroboration of land-books, 251
Cotarii, 23–25, 38–41
Cotlif, 334
>Cotseti, 39
Cotsetla, 328
Counties, Detached pieces of, 9
Counties, Farms of, 169
Counties, Geld of, in cent. xi. 448–475
Counties, Geld of, in cent. xii. 7, 474
Counties, Populousness of, 19, 20
County Hidage, The, 455
County towns, 176
Court, Borough, 185, 210
Court, Seignorial, 91, 94, 275–8
Court, Suit of, 85, 95, 140, 322
Crediton, 113, 228, 501
Criminal and civil, 83
Criminal law and revenue, 79
Criminal law and serfage, 29, 32
Crosses on charters, 251, 262–5
Crown, Pleas of the, 82, 261, 282
Cultura, 380
Curia, 94, 110, 125
Cursing clause, 230, 262
Customary acres, 373–6
Customary land, 78
Dairy farming, 115
Danegeld, see Geld
Page 475
Danelaw, The, 139
Danish influence, 139, 339, 395, 397
Day’s labour, 377
Dearer birth, 163
Decuriae of slaves, 361, 512
Deer-hays, 169, 240, 307
Default of justice, 284
Default of service, 159
Defence, 123
Delegation of franchises, 84, 289
Demesne, Ancient, 65, 167
Demesne and geld, 55
Demesne, Boroughs on royal, 218
Demesne land of manor, 119
Denmark, King’s feorm in, 238
Derby, 200
Derbyshire, 90, 108, 166, 427
Devastation of villages, 363
Devonshire, 116, 215, 425, 428, 463, 467
Dialogus de Scaccario, on villeinage, 53, 61
Diet of Englishmen, 440
Diplomatics, 247–252, 262–5
Dispositive and evidentiary, 263
Divine service, Tenure by, 151
Division of acres, 384
Dog-bread, 146, 440
Dominium, 224
Dominium and dominicum, 53–4
Dominium and imperium, 342
Dona of boroughs, 174–176
Dona of counties, 473
Doomsmen, 95, 97, 102, 211
Dorset, 175, 461
Double hide, 393
Dover, 193, 209
Downton, 498
Drengage, 308
Dunwich, 96
Duxford, 136
Earl, 8, 168–170
Earl, Third penny of, 95
Eashing, 503
East and West, 22, 199, 339
Ecclesiastical jurisdiction, 279–282
Economic grades, 41
Edmund, Abbey of St., 55, 88, 240
Edward the Confessor and the geld, 3
Edward the Confessor’s charters, 259, 491
Edward the Elder builds burgs, 186, 504
Danish influence, 139, 339, 395, 397
Day’s labour, 377
Dearer birth, 163
Decuriae of slaves, 361, 512
Deer-hays, 169, 240, 307
Default of justice, 284
Default of service, 159
Defence, 123
Delegation of franchises, 84, 289
Demesne, Ancient, 65, 167
Demesne and geld, 55
Demesne, Boroughs on royal, 218
Demesne land of manor, 119
Denmark, King’s feorm in, 238
Derby, 200
Derbyshire, 90, 108, 166, 427
Devastation of villages, 363
Devonshire, 116, 215, 425, 428, 463, 467
Dialogus de Scaccario, on villeinage, 53, 61
Diet of Englishmen, 440
Diplomatics, 247–252, 262–5
Dispositive and evidentiary, 263
Divine service, Tenure by, 151
Division of acres, 384
Dog-bread, 146, 440
Dominium, 224
Dominium and dominicum, 53–4
Dominium and imperium, 342
Dona of boroughs, 174–176
Dona of counties, 473
Doomsmen, 95, 97, 102, 211
Dorset, 175, 461
Double hide, 393
Dover, 193, 209
Downton, 498
Drengage, 308
Dunwich, 96
Duxford, 136
Earl, 8, 168–170
Earl, Third penny of, 95
Eashing, 503
East and West, 22, 199, 339
Ecclesiastical jurisdiction, 279–282
Economic grades, 41
Edmund, Abbey of St., 55, 88, 240
Edward the Confessor and the geld, 3
Edward the Confessor’s charters, 259, 491
Edward the Elder builds burgs, 186, 504
Page 476
Edwardi Lex, 52
Ell (measure), 372
Ely, Church of, 77, 89, 92, 162, 269
Ely, Isle of, 476, 509
Embryo manors, 139, 519
Emendable crimes, 89
Eminent domain, 342
Enfranchisement, 31
English and French, 62
Epping Forest, 356
Escheat propter defectum, 295
Escheat propter delictum, 103, 295
Essex, 35, 64, 116, 363, 430, 480
Estrays, 148
Ethel, 256
Euti, 467
Evesham, Church of, 235, 453
Exaggeration, Medieval, 510
Exchequer Domesday, 2
Exeter, 156, 201
Exon Domesday, 2
Extra-hundredal places, 9
Fallowing, 399
Familiae, Terra unius, 358
Family, Size of, 437, 519
Famine, 364, 518
Fareham, 449
Farm of manors, 62, 146
Farthingland, 479
Fealty, 59, 293
Fee farm, 152
Feet as measures, 369
Feldgrasswirtschaft, 425
Feorm, The king’s, 234, 318, 324
Fertinus, 479
Festuca, 323
Feudalism, 223, 240, 307
Feudalism and clerical claims, 280
Feudalism and vassalism, 171
Feudum, 152–5, 301, 318
Field systems, 365, 425, 437, 486, 51
Fiht-wite, 88
Firma burgi, 204
Fission of vills, 14, 365, 367
Five hide unit, 121, 156–164
Fleta, 397
Flurzwang, 347
Fold-soke, 76, 91, 442
Foldworthiness, 77, 91
Ell (measure), 372
Ely, Church of, 77, 89, 92, 162, 269
Ely, Isle of, 476, 509
Embryo manors, 139, 519
Emendable crimes, 89
Eminent domain, 342
Enfranchisement, 31
English and French, 62
Epping Forest, 356
Escheat propter defectum, 295
Escheat propter delictum, 103, 295
Essex, 35, 64, 116, 363, 430, 480
Estrays, 148
Ethel, 256
Euti, 467
Evesham, Church of, 235, 453
Exaggeration, Medieval, 510
Exchequer Domesday, 2
Exeter, 156, 201
Exon Domesday, 2
Extra-hundredal places, 9
Fallowing, 399
Familiae, Terra unius, 358
Family, Size of, 437, 519
Famine, 364, 518
Fareham, 449
Farm of manors, 62, 146
Farthingland, 479
Fealty, 59, 293
Fee farm, 152
Feet as measures, 369
Feldgrasswirtschaft, 425
Feorm, The king’s, 234, 318, 324
Fertinus, 479
Festuca, 323
Feudalism, 223, 240, 307
Feudalism and clerical claims, 280
Feudalism and vassalism, 171
Feudum, 152–5, 301, 318
Field systems, 365, 425, 437, 486, 51
Fiht-wite, 88
Firma burgi, 204
Fission of vills, 14, 365, 367
Five hide unit, 121, 156–164
Fleta, 397
Flurzwang, 347
Fold-soke, 76, 91, 442
Foldworthiness, 77, 91
Page 477
Folk-land, 244–258
Food of beasts, 441
Food of the nation, 436, 518
Foreign precedents, 230, 249, 321
Forensic service, 50
Forest measures, 372, 376
Forfeiture of land, 103, 295
Forfeitures, The six, 88
Franchise, 1, 43, 50, 82
Francigena, 46
Francus, 46
Frankalmoin, 151
Frankish danegeld, 518
Frankish gifts of land, 297
Frankish manors, 321
Frankish military service, 161
Freda, 278
Freedom, see Liberty
Free-holding, 46–50
Free men, see Liberi homines
Free villages, 129, 339, 352
Freizügigkeit, 42, 51
French diplomatics, 265
French law of seignorial justice, 82, 94, 284
Freóls-bóc, 270
Frigesoca, 93
Furlong, 372, 379
Fyrdwite, 159, 161
Fyrdworthiness, 160
Gablaltores, 57
Gafol-land, 44
Gebúr, 28, 36, 59, 328
Geld, 3–8, 24, 54, 120–129, 206–8, 324, 391, 408, 446–490
Geld in cent. xii. 6, 460, 474
Geld Inquests, 478
Geneat, 59, 327
Genossenschaft, 342
Geography of D. B., 9, 407
Gerefa, The, 327, 392
German burgs, 189
Gersuma, 57, 147
Gift and loan, 299, 317
Gifts of land, 293
Gilds, 191, 201
Gloucester, 182, 205
Gloucestershire, 205, 395, 412
Goad (measure), 372, 377
Goats, 442
Godwin, House of, 168
Food of beasts, 441
Food of the nation, 436, 518
Foreign precedents, 230, 249, 321
Forensic service, 50
Forest measures, 372, 376
Forfeiture of land, 103, 295
Forfeitures, The six, 88
Franchise, 1, 43, 50, 82
Francigena, 46
Francus, 46
Frankalmoin, 151
Frankish danegeld, 518
Frankish gifts of land, 297
Frankish manors, 321
Frankish military service, 161
Freda, 278
Freedom, see Liberty
Free-holding, 46–50
Free men, see Liberi homines
Free villages, 129, 339, 352
Freizügigkeit, 42, 51
French diplomatics, 265
French law of seignorial justice, 82, 94, 284
Freóls-bóc, 270
Frigesoca, 93
Furlong, 372, 379
Fyrdwite, 159, 161
Fyrdworthiness, 160
Gablaltores, 57
Gafol-land, 44
Gebúr, 28, 36, 59, 328
Geld, 3–8, 24, 54, 120–129, 206–8, 324, 391, 408, 446–490
Geld in cent. xii. 6, 460, 474
Geld Inquests, 478
Geneat, 59, 327
Genossenschaft, 342
Geography of D. B., 9, 407
Gerefa, The, 327, 392
German burgs, 189
Gersuma, 57, 147
Gift and loan, 299, 317
Gifts of land, 293
Gilds, 191, 201
Gloucester, 182, 205
Gloucestershire, 205, 395, 412
Goad (measure), 372, 377
Goats, 442
Godwin, House of, 168
Page 478
Grantham, 213
Grass-swine, 57
Halimot, 82, 86, 91
Hall, The, 109–110, 125
Hám, 332
Hamlets, 15–16
Hamton, The suit about, 85, 124, 158
Hampshire, 153, 155
Harold, Rapacity of, 168
Harrow (Middlesex), 112
Hawgavel, 204
Hawks, Prices of, 169
Haws in boroughs, 114, 182, 196
Head-penny, 33
Hearth-penny, 38
Heir-land, 257
Heming’s Cartulary, 227
Henley, Walter of, 378, 397, 438, 441, 488, 519
Henry the Fowler, 189
Herdwicks, 333
Hereford, 199, 209
Heriot, 73, 155, 199, 298
Hertfordshire, 137–8
Heyford, Map of, 382
Hide, The, 336, 357–520
Hide, The, of Leicestershire, 468–470
Highways, Royal, 87
Hiwisc, 358
Hiwscipe, 358
Holtding, 355
Homage, 69
Homines dei, 275
Honour and manor, 81
Horses, 442
Hospites, 60
House communities, 349
House-peace and soke, 99
Hufe, German, 387, 515
Hundred, Elder of the, 147
Hundredal soke, 90, 94
Hundred-moot, 93, 97
Hundreds, 90, 148, 259, 267, 287, 451–5, 459
Huntingdon, 204
Husting, 211
Hyldáð, 69
Idealism, Archaic, 389
Ideas, Legal, 9, 224
Grass-swine, 57
Halimot, 82, 86, 91
Hall, The, 109–110, 125
Hám, 332
Hamlets, 15–16
Hamton, The suit about, 85, 124, 158
Hampshire, 153, 155
Harold, Rapacity of, 168
Harrow (Middlesex), 112
Hawgavel, 204
Hawks, Prices of, 169
Haws in boroughs, 114, 182, 196
Head-penny, 33
Hearth-penny, 38
Heir-land, 257
Heming’s Cartulary, 227
Henley, Walter of, 378, 397, 438, 441, 488, 519
Henry the Fowler, 189
Herdwicks, 333
Hereford, 199, 209
Heriot, 73, 155, 199, 298
Hertfordshire, 137–8
Heyford, Map of, 382
Hide, The, 336, 357–520
Hide, The, of Leicestershire, 468–470
Highways, Royal, 87
Hiwisc, 358
Hiwscipe, 358
Holtding, 355
Homage, 69
Homines dei, 275
Honour and manor, 81
Horses, 442
Hospites, 60
House communities, 349
House-peace and soke, 99
Hufe, German, 387, 515
Hundred, Elder of the, 147
Hundredal soke, 90, 94
Hundred-moot, 93, 97
Hundreds, 90, 148, 259, 267, 287, 451–5, 459
Huntingdon, 204
Husting, 211
Hyldáð, 69
Idealism, Archaic, 389
Ideas, Legal, 9, 224
Page 479
Identification of parcels, 493
Immunists, 277
Immunity, The English, 270, 292
Immunity, The Frankish, 278
Inclosure of common fields, 16, 436
Ine’s foster, 237
Ine’s laws, 237, 320, 332
Infangennethef, 82, 276
Ingeldable carucates, 409
Inheritance, 145
Inheritance, Precarious, 309
Inland, 55, 121, 331
Inquisitio Comitatus Cantabrigiae, 1
Inquisitio Eliensis, 1
Intercommoning of vills, 355
Intermixed manors, 136
Intermixed strips, 337
Inward, 130, 169, 240
Iona, 512
Ipswich, 211
Iron, Dues paid in, 45
Judices, 211
Jurisdiction, 101, 277
Justice, Feudal and Franchisal, 80
Justice, Seignorial, 52, 80–107, 258–292, 310
Kalenberg Hufe, 517
Kent, 360, 466, 484
Kind, Payments in, 57
King and crown, 167, 253, 300
King as immunist, 276
King as landlord, 65, 166–7
King’s land, 231–258, 351
King’s thegns, 162
Kingship, Elective, 254
Kinship, 349
Knight, see Cniht
Knight’s fees, Number of, 511
Knight’s service, 151
Königshufe, 516
Læn-land, 75, 160, 301–318
Læt, The Kentish, 27
Laeti, 27, 37
Land, Kinds of, 257
Land-books, 226–258, 261, 286–8, 520
Land-cóp, 323
Immunists, 277
Immunity, The English, 270, 292
Immunity, The Frankish, 278
Inclosure of common fields, 16, 436
Ine’s foster, 237
Ine’s laws, 237, 320, 332
Infangennethef, 82, 276
Ingeldable carucates, 409
Inheritance, 145
Inheritance, Precarious, 309
Inland, 55, 121, 331
Inquisitio Comitatus Cantabrigiae, 1
Inquisitio Eliensis, 1
Intercommoning of vills, 355
Intermixed manors, 136
Intermixed strips, 337
Inward, 130, 169, 240
Iona, 512
Ipswich, 211
Iron, Dues paid in, 45
Judices, 211
Jurisdiction, 101, 277
Justice, Feudal and Franchisal, 80
Justice, Seignorial, 52, 80–107, 258–292, 310
Kalenberg Hufe, 517
Kent, 360, 466, 484
Kind, Payments in, 57
King and crown, 167, 253, 300
King as immunist, 276
King as landlord, 65, 166–7
King’s land, 231–258, 351
King’s thegns, 162
Kingship, Elective, 254
Kinship, 349
Knight, see Cniht
Knight’s fees, Number of, 511
Knight’s service, 151
Königshufe, 516
Læn-land, 75, 160, 301–318
Læt, The Kentish, 27
Laeti, 27, 37
Land, Kinds of, 257
Land-books, 226–258, 261, 286–8, 520
Land-cóp, 323
Page 480
Land-loans, 75
Landríca, 59, 125
Language, Legal, 225, 267
Law Latin, 267
Lawmen, 88, 211
Leases, 301–318
Leges Edwardi on township, 148
Leges Henrici on serfage, 30
” ” on soke, 80
Lehn, The German, 301
Lehnrecht, 171, 311
Leicester, 156, 197, 218
Leicestershire, 409, 421, 468
Leis Williame on serfage, 51
Leominster, 56, 58
Letters patent, 263
Lewisham, 58
Lex equitandi, 305
Liberalis homo, 43, 59
Liber burgus, 217
Liberi homines, 23, 66–7, 90, 104
Liberties within boroughs, 210
Liberty, 42–47
Lincoln, 211
Lincoln, Church of, 92, 103
Lincolnshire, 90, 106, 139, 147, 428, 445
Linear measurement, 432
Little Domesday, 1
Loaf-eaters, 29
Loan and gift, 299, 317
Locus standi of villeins in court, 52
London, 174, 178, 180, 184, 191, 409
Lord and man, 67, 285–9
Lord, Duty of finding a, 70
Lord’s responsibility for crime, 38
Lord’s responsibility for taxes, 24, 54, 59, 122–128, 323
Lordless villages, 141, 149
Lordship and landlordship, 104, 172
Lug (measure), 372
Lyng (Somerset), 188, 503
Lysing, The Danish, 44
Mainpast, 29
Maintenance of quarrels, 71
Malmesbury, Church of, 72, 492
Man, Isle of, 513
Man-bót, 31, 54, 70
Manentes, 335, 359
Manerium, 64, 107, 500
Manor, 107–128, 326–340, 519
Landríca, 59, 125
Language, Legal, 225, 267
Law Latin, 267
Lawmen, 88, 211
Leases, 301–318
Leges Edwardi on township, 148
Leges Henrici on serfage, 30
” ” on soke, 80
Lehn, The German, 301
Lehnrecht, 171, 311
Leicester, 156, 197, 218
Leicestershire, 409, 421, 468
Leis Williame on serfage, 51
Leominster, 56, 58
Letters patent, 263
Lewisham, 58
Lex equitandi, 305
Liberalis homo, 43, 59
Liber burgus, 217
Liberi homines, 23, 66–7, 90, 104
Liberties within boroughs, 210
Liberty, 42–47
Lincoln, 211
Lincoln, Church of, 92, 103
Lincolnshire, 90, 106, 139, 147, 428, 445
Linear measurement, 432
Little Domesday, 1
Loaf-eaters, 29
Loan and gift, 299, 317
Locus standi of villeins in court, 52
London, 174, 178, 180, 184, 191, 409
Lord and man, 67, 285–9
Lord, Duty of finding a, 70
Lord’s responsibility for crime, 38
Lord’s responsibility for taxes, 24, 54, 59, 122–128, 323
Lordless villages, 141, 149
Lordship and landlordship, 104, 172
Lug (measure), 372
Lyng (Somerset), 188, 503
Lysing, The Danish, 44
Mainpast, 29
Maintenance of quarrels, 71
Malmesbury, Church of, 72, 492
Man, Isle of, 513
Man-bót, 31, 54, 70
Manentes, 335, 359
Manerium, 64, 107, 500
Manor, 107–128, 326–340, 519
Page 481
Manor and vill, 129–150, 334
Manorial organization, 319, 360, 391, 519
Mansa, 108, 359
Mansio, 109
Mansus indominicatus, 320
Mansus ingenuilis, 517
Mantal, Swedish, 387
Manumission, 31
Manure, 76, 442
Manusfirma, 309
Maps, 15, 16, 362, 381–3
Mark, The German, 354, 368
Market, 192–6
Marriage and wardship, 310
Marshland Fen, 367
Meadows, 348, 443
Measures, 368
Mediatization of boroughs, 212–218
Mellitarii, 57
Merchant gilds, 191
Merchet, 199
Mercia, Hides of, 507, 510
Merovingian Gaul, 224
Middlesex, 477
Migrantibus, Lex Salica de, 350
Miles, 8, 163
Military service, 156–164, 235, 273, 294
Mills, 144
Mill-soke, 77
Mixed tribunals, 275
Modern conveyances, 232
Monasticism, 325
Money rents in D. B., 57
Moneyers, 195
Moot-worthiness, 260
Morgen, 377, 516
Movability of land, 10, 13
Mufflae, 31
Mund and soke, 100
Mural houses, 188
Nation, Lands of the, 252
Nativi, 51
New vills, 14, 365, 367
Night’s farm, 146, 169, 236–8, 319
Nottinghamshire, 90, 108, 127, 166, 427
Norfolk, 106, 146, 429, 483
Norman perches, 376
Norman tenures, 154
Northampton, 204, 208
Manorial organization, 319, 360, 391, 519
Mansa, 108, 359
Mansio, 109
Mansus indominicatus, 320
Mansus ingenuilis, 517
Mantal, Swedish, 387
Manumission, 31
Manure, 76, 442
Manusfirma, 309
Maps, 15, 16, 362, 381–3
Mark, The German, 354, 368
Market, 192–6
Marriage and wardship, 310
Marshland Fen, 367
Meadows, 348, 443
Measures, 368
Mediatization of boroughs, 212–218
Mellitarii, 57
Merchant gilds, 191
Merchet, 199
Mercia, Hides of, 507, 510
Merovingian Gaul, 224
Middlesex, 477
Migrantibus, Lex Salica de, 350
Miles, 8, 163
Military service, 156–164, 235, 273, 294
Mills, 144
Mill-soke, 77
Mixed tribunals, 275
Modern conveyances, 232
Monasticism, 325
Money rents in D. B., 57
Moneyers, 195
Moot-worthiness, 260
Morgen, 377, 516
Movability of land, 10, 13
Mufflae, 31
Mund and soke, 100
Mural houses, 188
Nation, Lands of the, 252
Nativi, 51
New vills, 14, 365, 367
Night’s farm, 146, 169, 236–8, 319
Nottinghamshire, 90, 108, 127, 166, 427
Norfolk, 106, 146, 429, 483
Norman perches, 376
Norman tenures, 154
Northampton, 204, 208
Page 482
Northamptonshire, 204, 457, 468
Northamptonshire Geld Roll, 2, 457
Northumberland, 7
Norwich, 192, 199, 200
Nucleated villages, 15
Oaths of thegns, 163
Oaths of villeins, 53
Oats, 439, 441
Office and property, 168
Ordeal, 281
Orwell, 63, 95, 129, 133, 136, 352
Oswald, St., 268, 289, 304–313
Oswald’s law, 85, 227, 267–9, 308–310, 424
Oswy’s gift, 511
Overrating and underrating, 447, 461
Ownership, Ancient and modern, 397
Ownership and superiority, 231, 342
Ownership, Limited, 299
Ox, Price of, 44, 444
Oxford, 156, 179, 188, 198, 202
Oxfordshire, 92, 169, 445, 505
Oxgang, 395
Pannage, 57, 307
Parage, 143
Pardons of geld, 8
Parishes, Modern, 12, 499
Parishes, Number of, 511
Parliamentary boroughs, 173
Partible inheritance, 145
Partitionary taxation, 120, 206, 391, 450, 480
Pasture, 143, 170, 203, 348, 442, 446
Pastus, The King’s, 234, 272
Patria potestas, 349
Patronage of church, 303
Peace of borough, 184, 193
Peculium, 28
Penal stipulation, 230
Penenden, The suit at, 87
Perch (measure), 372–9, 518
Pershore, Church of, 290, 452
Persona ficta, 353, 356
Pertica, 274
Peter pence, 59, 125, 288
Petroc, Church of St., 55
Pipe Rolls, Geld in, 400, 460
Placita et forisfacturae, 84, 94
Plan of D. B., 9
Northamptonshire Geld Roll, 2, 457
Northumberland, 7
Norwich, 192, 199, 200
Nucleated villages, 15
Oaths of thegns, 163
Oaths of villeins, 53
Oats, 439, 441
Office and property, 168
Ordeal, 281
Orwell, 63, 95, 129, 133, 136, 352
Oswald, St., 268, 289, 304–313
Oswald’s law, 85, 227, 267–9, 308–310, 424
Oswy’s gift, 511
Overrating and underrating, 447, 461
Ownership, Ancient and modern, 397
Ownership and superiority, 231, 342
Ownership, Limited, 299
Ox, Price of, 44, 444
Oxford, 156, 179, 188, 198, 202
Oxfordshire, 92, 169, 445, 505
Oxgang, 395
Pannage, 57, 307
Parage, 143
Pardons of geld, 8
Parishes, Modern, 12, 499
Parishes, Number of, 511
Parliamentary boroughs, 173
Partible inheritance, 145
Partitionary taxation, 120, 206, 391, 450, 480
Pasture, 143, 170, 203, 348, 442, 446
Pastus, The King’s, 234, 272
Patria potestas, 349
Patronage of church, 303
Peace of borough, 184, 193
Peculium, 28
Penal stipulation, 230
Penenden, The suit at, 87
Perch (measure), 372–9, 518
Pershore, Church of, 290, 452
Persona ficta, 353, 356
Pertica, 274
Peter pence, 59, 125, 288
Petroc, Church of St., 55
Pipe Rolls, Geld in, 400, 460
Placita et forisfacturae, 84, 94
Plan of D. B., 9
Page 483
Plough, 142, 373
Ploughgang, 395
Ploughing, A day’s, 378
Ploughing, A year’s, 398, 435
Poleham, 485
Police of vills, 147
Population, 17–22, 408, 437
Port and burh, 195
Portmen, 195, 212
Portreeve, 202
Pound and hide, 465
Precarium, 300
Prediality of serfage, 28
Prices, 44, 169, 365, 444
Priest of village, 148, 437
Protection and commendation, 70
Provender rents, 146, 236, 316, 440
Pursuit of fugitive serfs, 42, 51
Purveyance, 239
Quasi hides, 409
Radchenistres, 44, 56, 66, 305
Radmanni, 57, 305
Ramsey, Church of, 260, 319, 393
Rapes of Sussex, 409
Recedere, 47, 68, 152, 162
Rectitudines, 37, 327
Reductions of hidage, 410, 506, 510
Redemption of land, 60
Reeve of borough, 209
Regio, 167
Relief, 153, 155, 310
Rents, Money, in D. B., 57
Restraint on alienation, 296
Reveland, 169
Ribble and Mersey, Land between, 458
Ridingmen, 305, 307
Rochester, Church of, 466
Rod or perch, 372–9
Rogatio testium, 250
Roman law, 224, 303
Roman taxation, 470
Roman villa, 327, 337
Romney, 89
Rood (measure), 372, 382
Rothley, 114
Rounceys, 442
Royal boroughs, 182
Ploughgang, 395
Ploughing, A day’s, 378
Ploughing, A year’s, 398, 435
Poleham, 485
Police of vills, 147
Population, 17–22, 408, 437
Port and burh, 195
Portmen, 195, 212
Portreeve, 202
Pound and hide, 465
Precarium, 300
Prediality of serfage, 28
Prices, 44, 169, 365, 444
Priest of village, 148, 437
Protection and commendation, 70
Provender rents, 146, 236, 316, 440
Pursuit of fugitive serfs, 42, 51
Purveyance, 239
Quasi hides, 409
Radchenistres, 44, 56, 66, 305
Radmanni, 57, 305
Ramsey, Church of, 260, 319, 393
Rapes of Sussex, 409
Recedere, 47, 68, 152, 162
Rectitudines, 37, 327
Reductions of hidage, 410, 506, 510
Redemption of land, 60
Reeve of borough, 209
Regio, 167
Relief, 153, 155, 310
Rents, Money, in D. B., 57
Restraint on alienation, 296
Reveland, 169
Ribble and Mersey, Land between, 458
Ridingmen, 305, 307
Rochester, Church of, 466
Rod or perch, 372–9
Rogatio testium, 250
Roman law, 224, 303
Roman taxation, 470
Roman villa, 327, 337
Romney, 89
Rood (measure), 372, 382
Rothley, 114
Rounceys, 442
Royal boroughs, 182
Page 484
Rutland, 471
Sake, 84
Sale of chattels, 147, 194
Sale of land, 47, 100, 105, 144
Sale of slaves, 33
Salica, Ownership in Lex, 347, 350
Salisbury, The oath at, 172
Sanford, Hundred of, 90
Sawston, 136, 387, 443
Scattered steads (Einzelhöfe), 15, 16, 140
Seal, 265
Secularizations, 301
Sedgebarrow, 227
Seignory over commended men, 74
Selions, 383
Selsey, 228, 234, 513
Semibos, 142
Senior and Vassus, 283, 300
Serfage, see Servi
Serfage, Transmission of, 31
Serjeanty, 151, 162
Servi, 23–25, 26–36, 325, 519
Servi, Price of, 44
Services due from book-land, 294
Services of geneat, 328–332
Services of Oswald’s tenants, 306
Services of sokemen, 76
Services of villeins, 56
Sextarius, 365
Sheep, 442
Sheriff, 8, 205, 255
Sheriff, Revenues of, 169
Shots in fields, 380
Shrewsbury, 199, 207
Singulare pretium, 274
Sinuous furrows, 379
Slavery, see Servi
Socage, Tenure in, 66
Sochemanni, 23–25, 62, 66–79, 95, 104, 125–6, 134–5, 213
Soke, 67–69, 80–107, 115, 258–292
Solta et persolta, 290
Somerset, 116, 166, 177, 215, 367, 479
Southwark, 98
Square measure, 370, 432
Staffordshire, 426
Stages, Theory of normal, 345
Stamford, 199, 200, 211
Staines, 111, 181
Staninghaw, 181
Sake, 84
Sale of chattels, 147, 194
Sale of land, 47, 100, 105, 144
Sale of slaves, 33
Salica, Ownership in Lex, 347, 350
Salisbury, The oath at, 172
Sanford, Hundred of, 90
Sawston, 136, 387, 443
Scattered steads (Einzelhöfe), 15, 16, 140
Seal, 265
Secularizations, 301
Sedgebarrow, 227
Seignory over commended men, 74
Selions, 383
Selsey, 228, 234, 513
Semibos, 142
Senior and Vassus, 283, 300
Serfage, see Servi
Serfage, Transmission of, 31
Serjeanty, 151, 162
Servi, 23–25, 26–36, 325, 519
Servi, Price of, 44
Services due from book-land, 294
Services of geneat, 328–332
Services of Oswald’s tenants, 306
Services of sokemen, 76
Services of villeins, 56
Sextarius, 365
Sheep, 442
Sheriff, 8, 205, 255
Sheriff, Revenues of, 169
Shots in fields, 380
Shrewsbury, 199, 207
Singulare pretium, 274
Sinuous furrows, 379
Slavery, see Servi
Socage, Tenure in, 66
Sochemanni, 23–25, 62, 66–79, 95, 104, 125–6, 134–5, 213
Soke, 67–69, 80–107, 115, 258–292
Solta et persolta, 290
Somerset, 116, 166, 177, 215, 367, 479
Southwark, 98
Square measure, 370, 432
Staffordshire, 426
Stages, Theory of normal, 345
Stamford, 199, 200, 211
Staines, 111, 181
Staninghaw, 181
Page 485
Statistical Tables, 400–3
Statistics, Domesday, 399
Stipulation, 250
Stock on manors, 116, 422
Stoke by Hisseburn, 330
Strip-holding, 337, 346
Sub-commendation, 74
Subinfeudation, 155
Subsidiary liability, 126
Suburbium, 214
Suffolk, 62, 77, 106, 117, 125–6, 147, 429, 483
Suit of court, 85, 95, 140, 322
Suitors borrowed, 95, 102
Sulung, 360, 395, 466, 484
Sunbury, 111
Superficial measurement, 370, 432
Surnames of vills, 14, 365, 367
Sussex, 510, 513
Swine, 419, 442
Tacitus on land-tenure, 347
Tackley, Map of, 381
Tagwerk, 377
Tailla, 57, 147
Taunton, 87, 102, 113, 158, 214, 272, 276, 499
Team, Plough, 142, 372, 416
Teamland, 404, 418–446
Tenure, Dependent, 46, 73, 151, 154, 171, 317
Tenure in boroughs, 178
Tenure, Kinds of, 151
Terminology of D. B., 8
Terra ad unam carucam, 404, 418–446
Testamentary power, 242, 297
Teste meipso, 264
Testimony of villeins, 53
Tewkesbury, 55
Thanet, Isle of, 509
Thegn, 64–5, 160–6
Thegnage, 308
xml:lang="ang">Theow, 26–36
Thing and person, 27
Third penny, 95, 170
Three field system, 365, 486
Three life leases, 303
Thumbs as measures, 369
Tidenham, 330
Tithe, 322
Torksey, 177
Township, see Vill
Township moot, 21, 350
Statistics, Domesday, 399
Stipulation, 250
Stock on manors, 116, 422
Stoke by Hisseburn, 330
Strip-holding, 337, 346
Sub-commendation, 74
Subinfeudation, 155
Subsidiary liability, 126
Suburbium, 214
Suffolk, 62, 77, 106, 117, 125–6, 147, 429, 483
Suit of court, 85, 95, 140, 322
Suitors borrowed, 95, 102
Sulung, 360, 395, 466, 484
Sunbury, 111
Superficial measurement, 370, 432
Surnames of vills, 14, 365, 367
Sussex, 510, 513
Swine, 419, 442
Tacitus on land-tenure, 347
Tackley, Map of, 381
Tagwerk, 377
Tailla, 57, 147
Taunton, 87, 102, 113, 158, 214, 272, 276, 499
Team, Plough, 142, 372, 416
Teamland, 404, 418–446
Tenure, Dependent, 46, 73, 151, 154, 171, 317
Tenure in boroughs, 178
Tenure, Kinds of, 151
Terminology of D. B., 8
Terra ad unam carucam, 404, 418–446
Testamentary power, 242, 297
Teste meipso, 264
Testimony of villeins, 53
Tewkesbury, 55
Thanet, Isle of, 509
Thegn, 64–5, 160–6
Thegnage, 308
xml:lang="ang">Theow, 26–36
Thing and person, 27
Third penny, 95, 170
Three field system, 365, 486
Three life leases, 303
Thumbs as measures, 369
Tidenham, 330
Tithe, 322
Torksey, 177
Township, see Vill
Township moot, 21, 350
Page 486
Townsmen, 59, 140, 288
Trevs, Celtic, 15, 340
Tribal Hidage, The, 455, 506–8
Tributarii, 335, 359
Tributum, 234, 239, 272
Trinoda necessitas, 240, 270–4
Tún, 59, 110
Twelfhindi, 44
Twelve-fold bót, 290, 322
Two field system, 365, 486
Ulna, The king’s, 370
Undersettles, 41
Unhidated estates, 448
Uniformity of villages, 390
Usufruct, 299
Utware, 158
Values, Domesday, 411, 444, 463–473
Vassallus, 293
Vavassores, 81
Vendible soke, 100
Verge of the palace, 184
Vicecomes, 8
Victus, The king’s, 234
Vicus, 333
Vill and borough, 173, 185, 216
Vill and village, 11–21, 129–150, 346–356
Villa and vicus, 333
Villa, The Roman, 221, 327, 337
Villages, Detached portions of, 367
Villani, 23, 36–66, 125–6, 172, 324
Villani, Teams of, 416
Villani and Servi, 26, 30, 172
Vineyards, 375
Virga regalis, 375, 516
Virgate, 384–7, 391
Wallingford, 98, 176, 179, 193
Wall-work, 188
Wara, 123
Wardship and marriage, 310
Warnode, 123
Warranty of man by lord, 71
Warwick, 98, 156, 209, 218
Warwickshire, 169, 459
Washingwell, The grant of, 245, 255
Week-work, 77
Trevs, Celtic, 15, 340
Tribal Hidage, The, 455, 506–8
Tributarii, 335, 359
Tributum, 234, 239, 272
Trinoda necessitas, 240, 270–4
Tún, 59, 110
Twelfhindi, 44
Twelve-fold bót, 290, 322
Two field system, 365, 486
Ulna, The king’s, 370
Undersettles, 41
Unhidated estates, 448
Uniformity of villages, 390
Usufruct, 299
Utware, 158
Values, Domesday, 411, 444, 463–473
Vassallus, 293
Vavassores, 81
Vendible soke, 100
Verge of the palace, 184
Vicecomes, 8
Victus, The king’s, 234
Vicus, 333
Vill and borough, 173, 185, 216
Vill and village, 11–21, 129–150, 346–356
Villa and vicus, 333
Villa, The Roman, 221, 327, 337
Villages, Detached portions of, 367
Villani, 23, 36–66, 125–6, 172, 324
Villani, Teams of, 416
Villani and Servi, 26, 30, 172
Vineyards, 375
Virga regalis, 375, 516
Virgate, 384–7, 391
Wallingford, 98, 176, 179, 193
Wall-work, 188
Wara, 123
Wardship and marriage, 310
Warnode, 123
Warranty of man by lord, 71
Warwick, 98, 156, 209, 218
Warwickshire, 169, 459
Washingwell, The grant of, 245, 255
Week-work, 77
Page 487
Well, Wapentake of, 103
Wergild of ceorl, 44
Wergild of serf, 31
Wergild of thegn, 16
Wessex, Hides of, 507
Westminster, Church of, 111, 290, 452
Westminster Hall, 192
Wetherley, Hundred of, 95, 131
Wheat, Yield of, 437
Whittlesford, 444–5
Wicks, 115, 333
Wight, Isle of, 233, 509
Wiggenhall, 367
Wihtræd, Privilege of, 271
Wikarii, 115
Wiltshire, 175, 215, 475, 479
Winchcombe, 174, 180
Winchester, 178, 180, 182, 190–1
Winchester, Church of, 272, 331, 496–9
Wintoniensis, Codex, 331, 499
Witan, 247–252
Wites, Ecclesiastical, 281
Wites, The right to, 87, 259, 274–9
Withdrawal from lord, 47, 48, 68, 100, 142, 153, 162
Witnesses of charters, 247–252, 262–4
Wong, 380
Woods, 348, 419
Worcester, 190, 194
Worcester, Church of, 88, 158–160, 194, 227, 424, 452
Worcestershire, 88, 159, 169, 267–8, 451, 506
Words of inheritance, 297
Works and rents, 57–8, 77
Writ and charter, 262–4
Wye, Hundred of, 97
Yard, 372, 385
Yardland, 385
Yield of corn, 437, 441, 444, 519
Yoke, 360
York, 211
York, Church of, 87
Yorkshire, 139, 397, 426, 468, 486
Young, Arthur, 378, 438
Wergild of ceorl, 44
Wergild of serf, 31
Wergild of thegn, 16
Wessex, Hides of, 507
Westminster, Church of, 111, 290, 452
Westminster Hall, 192
Wetherley, Hundred of, 95, 131
Wheat, Yield of, 437
Whittlesford, 444–5
Wicks, 115, 333
Wight, Isle of, 233, 509
Wiggenhall, 367
Wihtræd, Privilege of, 271
Wikarii, 115
Wiltshire, 175, 215, 475, 479
Winchcombe, 174, 180
Winchester, 178, 180, 182, 190–1
Winchester, Church of, 272, 331, 496–9
Wintoniensis, Codex, 331, 499
Witan, 247–252
Wites, Ecclesiastical, 281
Wites, The right to, 87, 259, 274–9
Withdrawal from lord, 47, 48, 68, 100, 142, 153, 162
Witnesses of charters, 247–252, 262–4
Wong, 380
Woods, 348, 419
Worcester, 190, 194
Worcester, Church of, 88, 158–160, 194, 227, 424, 452
Worcestershire, 88, 159, 169, 267–8, 451, 506
Words of inheritance, 297
Works and rents, 57–8, 77
Writ and charter, 262–4
Wye, Hundred of, 97
Yard, 372, 385
Yardland, 385
Yield of corn, 437, 441, 444, 519
Yoke, 360
York, 211
York, Church of, 87
Yorkshire, 139, 397, 426, 468, 486
Young, Arthur, 378, 438
Page 488
Cambridge:
PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A.
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A.
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
Page 489
NOTES
Page 490
[1] Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Westgermanen und Ostgermanen, der Kelten,
Römer, Finnen und Slawen, von August Meitzen, Berlin, 1895.
[2] Inquisitio Comitatus Cantabrigiae, ed. N. E. Hamilton. When, as sometimes
happens, the figures in this record differ from those given in Domesday Book,
the latter seem to be in general the more correct, for the arithmetic is better. Also
it seems plain that the compilers of Domesday had, even for districts comprised
in the Inquisitio, other materials besides those that the Inquisitio contains. For
example, that document says nothing of some of the royal manors. [Since this
note was written, Mr Round, Feudal England, pp. 10 ff. has published the same
result after an elaborate investigation.]
[3] This is printed in D. B. vol. iv. and given by Hamilton at the end of his Inq.
Com. Cantab. As to the manner in which it was compiled see Round, Feudal
England, 133 ff.
[4] The Exon Domesday is printed in D. B. vol. iv.
[5] Round, Domesday Studies, i. 91: ‘I am tempted to believe that these geld
rolls in the form in which we now have them were compiled at Winchester after
the close of Easter 1084, by the body which was the germ of the future
Exchequer.’
[6] Printed by Ellis, Introduction to Domesday, i. 184.
[7] Round, Feudal England, 147.
[8] Earle, Two Chronicles, 130–1.
[9] Ibid. 132–3.
[10] Ibid. 137.
[11] Ibid. 141.
[12] Ibid. 142.
[13] Ibid. 151.
[14] Ibid. 160–1.
[15] Ibid. 167.
[16] There is a valuable paper on this subject, A Short Account of Danegeld [by
P. C. Webb published in 1756.]
[17] D. B. iv. 26, 489.
[18] In 1194 the tax for Richard’s ransom seems, at least in Wiltshire, to have
been distributed in the main according to the assessment that prevailed in 1084;
Rolls of the King’s Court (Pipe Roll Soc.) i. Introduction, p. xxiv.
[19] The statement in Æthelred, II. 7 (Schmid, p. 209) as to a payment of
£22,000 is in a general way corroborative of the chronicler’s large figures.
[20] The figures will be given more accurately on a later page.
Römer, Finnen und Slawen, von August Meitzen, Berlin, 1895.
[2] Inquisitio Comitatus Cantabrigiae, ed. N. E. Hamilton. When, as sometimes
happens, the figures in this record differ from those given in Domesday Book,
the latter seem to be in general the more correct, for the arithmetic is better. Also
it seems plain that the compilers of Domesday had, even for districts comprised
in the Inquisitio, other materials besides those that the Inquisitio contains. For
example, that document says nothing of some of the royal manors. [Since this
note was written, Mr Round, Feudal England, pp. 10 ff. has published the same
result after an elaborate investigation.]
[3] This is printed in D. B. vol. iv. and given by Hamilton at the end of his Inq.
Com. Cantab. As to the manner in which it was compiled see Round, Feudal
England, 133 ff.
[4] The Exon Domesday is printed in D. B. vol. iv.
[5] Round, Domesday Studies, i. 91: ‘I am tempted to believe that these geld
rolls in the form in which we now have them were compiled at Winchester after
the close of Easter 1084, by the body which was the germ of the future
Exchequer.’
[6] Printed by Ellis, Introduction to Domesday, i. 184.
[7] Round, Feudal England, 147.
[8] Earle, Two Chronicles, 130–1.
[9] Ibid. 132–3.
[10] Ibid. 137.
[11] Ibid. 141.
[12] Ibid. 142.
[13] Ibid. 151.
[14] Ibid. 160–1.
[15] Ibid. 167.
[16] There is a valuable paper on this subject, A Short Account of Danegeld [by
P. C. Webb published in 1756.]
[17] D. B. iv. 26, 489.
[18] In 1194 the tax for Richard’s ransom seems, at least in Wiltshire, to have
been distributed in the main according to the assessment that prevailed in 1084;
Rolls of the King’s Court (Pipe Roll Soc.) i. Introduction, p. xxiv.
[19] The statement in Æthelred, II. 7 (Schmid, p. 209) as to a payment of
£22,000 is in a general way corroborative of the chronicler’s large figures.
[20] The figures will be given more accurately on a later page.
Page 491
[21] Cheshire pays no geld to the king. This loss is compensated by a sum which
is sometimes exacted from Northumberland.
[22] D. B. ii. 109 b: ‘Hundret de Grenehou 14 letis.’ Ib. 212 b: ‘Hundret et Dim.
de Clakelosa de 10 leitis.’ Round, Feudal England, 101.
[23] Some of them are mentioned by Ellis, Introduction, i. 34–9.
[24] D. B. i. 184 b: ‘Haec terra non geldat nec consuetudinem dat nec in aliquo
hundredo iacet’; i. 157 ‘Haec terra nunquam geldavit nec alicui hundredo
pertinet nec pertinuit’; i. 357 b ‘Hae duae carucatae non sunt in numero alicuius
hundredi neque habent pares in Lincolescyra.’
[25] D. B. i. 207 b: ‘Jacet in Bedefordscira set geldum dat in Huntedonscire’; i.
61 b ‘Jacet et appreciata est in Gratentun quod est in Oxenefordscire et tamen
dat scotum in Berchescire’; i. 132 b, the manor of Weston ‘lies in’ Hitchin which
is in Hertfordshire, but its wara ‘lies in’ Bedfordshire, i.e. it pays geld, it
‘defends itself’ in the latter county; i. 189 b, the wara of a certain hide ‘lies in’
Hinxton which is in Cambridgeshire, but the land belongs to the manor of
Chesterford and therefore is valued in Essex. D. B. i. 178; five hides ‘geld and
plead’ in Worcestershire, but pay their farm in Herefordshire.
[26] D. B. i. 157 b: ‘Has [terras in Oxenefordscire] coniunxit terrae suae in
Glowecestrescire’; i. 209 b ‘foris misit de hundredo ubi se defendebat T. R. E.’;
i. 50 ‘et misit foras comitatum et misit in Wiltesire.’ See also Ellis, i. 36.
[27] See Round, Feudal England, p. 118. Mr Round seems to think that the
commissioners made a circuit through the hundreds. I doubt they did more than
their successors the justices in eyre were wont to do, that is, they held in the
shire-town a moot which was attended by (1) the magnates of the shire who
spoke for the shire, (2) a jury from every hundred, (3) a deputation of villani
from every township. See the Yorkshire and Lincolnshire Clamores (i. 375)
where we may find successive entries beginning with (a) Scyra testatur, (b)
Westreding testatur, (c) Testatur wapentac. Strikingly similar entries are found
on the eyre rolls. As Sir F. Pollock (Eng. Hist. Rev. xi. 213) remarks, it is
misleading to speak of the Domesday ‘survey’; Domesday Inquest would be
better.
[28] See Round, Feudal England, p. 44.
[29] Inquis. Com. Cantab. 60.
[30] See the table in Round, Feudal England, p. 50. I had already selected this
beautiful specimen before Mr Round’s book appeared. He has given several
others that are quite as neat.
[31] Of course we take no account of urban parishes.
[32] Eyton’s laborious studies have made this plain as regards some counties
widely removed from each other; still, e.g. in his book on Somerset, he has now
and again to note that names which appear in D. B. are obsolete.
[33] Inq. Com. Cant. 60–1.
[34] D. B. i. 31.
is sometimes exacted from Northumberland.
[22] D. B. ii. 109 b: ‘Hundret de Grenehou 14 letis.’ Ib. 212 b: ‘Hundret et Dim.
de Clakelosa de 10 leitis.’ Round, Feudal England, 101.
[23] Some of them are mentioned by Ellis, Introduction, i. 34–9.
[24] D. B. i. 184 b: ‘Haec terra non geldat nec consuetudinem dat nec in aliquo
hundredo iacet’; i. 157 ‘Haec terra nunquam geldavit nec alicui hundredo
pertinet nec pertinuit’; i. 357 b ‘Hae duae carucatae non sunt in numero alicuius
hundredi neque habent pares in Lincolescyra.’
[25] D. B. i. 207 b: ‘Jacet in Bedefordscira set geldum dat in Huntedonscire’; i.
61 b ‘Jacet et appreciata est in Gratentun quod est in Oxenefordscire et tamen
dat scotum in Berchescire’; i. 132 b, the manor of Weston ‘lies in’ Hitchin which
is in Hertfordshire, but its wara ‘lies in’ Bedfordshire, i.e. it pays geld, it
‘defends itself’ in the latter county; i. 189 b, the wara of a certain hide ‘lies in’
Hinxton which is in Cambridgeshire, but the land belongs to the manor of
Chesterford and therefore is valued in Essex. D. B. i. 178; five hides ‘geld and
plead’ in Worcestershire, but pay their farm in Herefordshire.
[26] D. B. i. 157 b: ‘Has [terras in Oxenefordscire] coniunxit terrae suae in
Glowecestrescire’; i. 209 b ‘foris misit de hundredo ubi se defendebat T. R. E.’;
i. 50 ‘et misit foras comitatum et misit in Wiltesire.’ See also Ellis, i. 36.
[27] See Round, Feudal England, p. 118. Mr Round seems to think that the
commissioners made a circuit through the hundreds. I doubt they did more than
their successors the justices in eyre were wont to do, that is, they held in the
shire-town a moot which was attended by (1) the magnates of the shire who
spoke for the shire, (2) a jury from every hundred, (3) a deputation of villani
from every township. See the Yorkshire and Lincolnshire Clamores (i. 375)
where we may find successive entries beginning with (a) Scyra testatur, (b)
Westreding testatur, (c) Testatur wapentac. Strikingly similar entries are found
on the eyre rolls. As Sir F. Pollock (Eng. Hist. Rev. xi. 213) remarks, it is
misleading to speak of the Domesday ‘survey’; Domesday Inquest would be
better.
[28] See Round, Feudal England, p. 44.
[29] Inquis. Com. Cantab. 60.
[30] See the table in Round, Feudal England, p. 50. I had already selected this
beautiful specimen before Mr Round’s book appeared. He has given several
others that are quite as neat.
[31] Of course we take no account of urban parishes.
[32] Eyton’s laborious studies have made this plain as regards some counties
widely removed from each other; still, e.g. in his book on Somerset, he has now
and again to note that names which appear in D. B. are obsolete.
[33] Inq. Com. Cant. 60–1.
[34] D. B. i. 31.
Page 492
[35] D. B. i. 41. We shall return to this matter hereafter.
[36] A good many cases will be found in Essex and Suffolk.
[37] Inq. Com. Cantab. 51, 53.
[38] Ibid. 47.
[39] Ibid. 29.
[40] Maitland, Surnames of English Villages, Archaeological Review, iv. 233.
[41] We do not mean to imply that there were not wide stretches of waste land
which were regarded as being ‘extra-villar,’ or common to several vills.
[42] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 547.
[43] This of course would not be true of cases in which the lands of various
villages were intermixed in one large tract of common field. As to these ‘discrete
vills,’ see Hist. Eng. Law, i. 549.
[44] This name-giving cluster will usually contain the parish church and so will
enjoy a certain preeminence. But we are to speak of a time when parish churches
were novelties.
[45] See Meitzen, Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Germanen, especially ii. 119
ff.
[46] When the hamlets bear names with such ancient suffixes as -ton, -ham, -by,
-worth, -wick, -thorpe, this of course is in favour of their antiquity. On the other
hand, if they are known merely by family names such as Styles’s, Nokes’s,
Johnson’s or the like, this, though not conclusive evidence of, is compatible with
their modernity. Meitzen thinks that in Kent and along the southern shore the
German invaders founded but few villages. The map does not convince me that
this inference is correct.
[47] When more than five-and-twenty team-lands or thereabouts are ascribed to
a single place, we shall generally find reason to believe that what is being
described is not a single vill. See above, p. 13.
[48] Inq. Com. Cant. 51 fol. In a few cases our figures will involve a small
element of conjecture.
[49] D. B. i. 248. We have tried to avoid vills in which it is certain or probable
that some other tenant in chief had an estate.
[50] D. B. i. 88. We have tried to make sure that no tenant in chief save the
bishop had land in any of these vills, and this we think fairly certain, except as
regards Harptree and Norton. There are now two Harptrees, East and West, and
four or more Nortons.
[51] We take the figures from Ellis, Introduction, ii. 417 ff.
[52] Very possibly this figure is too low. There is reason to think that some of the
free men and sokemen of these counties get counted twice or thrice over because
they hold land under several different lords. On the other hand Ellis
[36] A good many cases will be found in Essex and Suffolk.
[37] Inq. Com. Cantab. 51, 53.
[38] Ibid. 47.
[39] Ibid. 29.
[40] Maitland, Surnames of English Villages, Archaeological Review, iv. 233.
[41] We do not mean to imply that there were not wide stretches of waste land
which were regarded as being ‘extra-villar,’ or common to several vills.
[42] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 547.
[43] This of course would not be true of cases in which the lands of various
villages were intermixed in one large tract of common field. As to these ‘discrete
vills,’ see Hist. Eng. Law, i. 549.
[44] This name-giving cluster will usually contain the parish church and so will
enjoy a certain preeminence. But we are to speak of a time when parish churches
were novelties.
[45] See Meitzen, Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Germanen, especially ii. 119
ff.
[46] When the hamlets bear names with such ancient suffixes as -ton, -ham, -by,
-worth, -wick, -thorpe, this of course is in favour of their antiquity. On the other
hand, if they are known merely by family names such as Styles’s, Nokes’s,
Johnson’s or the like, this, though not conclusive evidence of, is compatible with
their modernity. Meitzen thinks that in Kent and along the southern shore the
German invaders founded but few villages. The map does not convince me that
this inference is correct.
[47] When more than five-and-twenty team-lands or thereabouts are ascribed to
a single place, we shall generally find reason to believe that what is being
described is not a single vill. See above, p. 13.
[48] Inq. Com. Cant. 51 fol. In a few cases our figures will involve a small
element of conjecture.
[49] D. B. i. 248. We have tried to avoid vills in which it is certain or probable
that some other tenant in chief had an estate.
[50] D. B. i. 88. We have tried to make sure that no tenant in chief save the
bishop had land in any of these vills, and this we think fairly certain, except as
regards Harptree and Norton. There are now two Harptrees, East and West, and
four or more Nortons.
[51] We take the figures from Ellis, Introduction, ii. 417 ff.
[52] Very possibly this figure is too low. There is reason to think that some of the
free men and sokemen of these counties get counted twice or thrice over because
they hold land under several different lords. On the other hand Ellis
Page 493
(Introduction, ii. 491) would argue that the figure is too high. But the words Alii
ibi tenent which occur at the end of numerous entries mean, we believe, not that
there are in this vill other unenumerated tillers of the soil, but that the vill is
divided between several tenants in chief.
[53] D. B. i. 162 b.
[54] Ellis’s figures are: England 283,242: the three counties 72,883.
[55] We take these figures from Ellis.
[56] Lay Subsidy, 25 Edw. I. (Yorkshire Archaeological Society), pp. xxxi-xxxv.
Fractions of a pound are neglected.
[57] Powell, The Rising in East Anglia, 120–3. The great decrease between 1377
and 1381 in the number of persons taxed, we must not try to explain.
[58] See the serviceable maps in Seebohm, Village Community, 86. But they
seem to treat Yorkshire unfairly. It has 5·5 per cent. of sokemen.
[59] This is found at the beginning of the Inquisitio Eliensis; D. B. iv. 497;
Hamilton, Inquisitio, 97. See Round, Feudal England, 133 ff.
[60] We must not hastily draw the inference that every party of commissioners
received the same set of instructions. Perhaps, for example, carucates, not hides,
were mentioned in the instructions given to those commissioners who were to
visit the carucated counties. Perhaps the non-appearance of servi in Yorkshire
and Lincolnshire may be due to no deeper cause.
[61] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 398.
[62] D. B. i. 34, Limenesfeld.
[63] D. B. i. 132 b, Hiz.
[64] D. B. i. 132 b, Waldenei.
[65] D. B. i. 136, Sandone.
[66] Æthelb. 26.
[67] Tacitus, Germ. c. 25: ‘Caeteris servis non in nostrum morem, descriptis per
familiam ministeriis, utuntur. Suam quisque sedem, suos penates regit. Frumenti
modum dominus aut pecoris aut vestis ut colono iniungit, et servus hactenus
paret.’
[68] Haddan and Stubbs, Councils, iii. 202.
[69] See on the one hand Maurer, K. U. i. 410, on the other a learned essay by
Jastrow, Zur strafrechtlichen Stellung der Sklaven, in Gierke’s Untersuchungen
zur Deutsche Geschichte, vol. i. Maurer holds that the Anglo-Saxon slave is in
the main a chattel, that e.g. the master must answer for the delicts of his slave in
the same way that the owner answers for damage done by his beasts, and that
this liability can be clearly marked off from the duty of the lord of free retainers
who is merely bound to produce them in court. Jastrow, on the contrary, thinks
that even at a quite early time the Anglo-Saxon slave is treated as a person by
ibi tenent which occur at the end of numerous entries mean, we believe, not that
there are in this vill other unenumerated tillers of the soil, but that the vill is
divided between several tenants in chief.
[53] D. B. i. 162 b.
[54] Ellis’s figures are: England 283,242: the three counties 72,883.
[55] We take these figures from Ellis.
[56] Lay Subsidy, 25 Edw. I. (Yorkshire Archaeological Society), pp. xxxi-xxxv.
Fractions of a pound are neglected.
[57] Powell, The Rising in East Anglia, 120–3. The great decrease between 1377
and 1381 in the number of persons taxed, we must not try to explain.
[58] See the serviceable maps in Seebohm, Village Community, 86. But they
seem to treat Yorkshire unfairly. It has 5·5 per cent. of sokemen.
[59] This is found at the beginning of the Inquisitio Eliensis; D. B. iv. 497;
Hamilton, Inquisitio, 97. See Round, Feudal England, 133 ff.
[60] We must not hastily draw the inference that every party of commissioners
received the same set of instructions. Perhaps, for example, carucates, not hides,
were mentioned in the instructions given to those commissioners who were to
visit the carucated counties. Perhaps the non-appearance of servi in Yorkshire
and Lincolnshire may be due to no deeper cause.
[61] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 398.
[62] D. B. i. 34, Limenesfeld.
[63] D. B. i. 132 b, Hiz.
[64] D. B. i. 132 b, Waldenei.
[65] D. B. i. 136, Sandone.
[66] Æthelb. 26.
[67] Tacitus, Germ. c. 25: ‘Caeteris servis non in nostrum morem, descriptis per
familiam ministeriis, utuntur. Suam quisque sedem, suos penates regit. Frumenti
modum dominus aut pecoris aut vestis ut colono iniungit, et servus hactenus
paret.’
[68] Haddan and Stubbs, Councils, iii. 202.
[69] See on the one hand Maurer, K. U. i. 410, on the other a learned essay by
Jastrow, Zur strafrechtlichen Stellung der Sklaven, in Gierke’s Untersuchungen
zur Deutsche Geschichte, vol. i. Maurer holds that the Anglo-Saxon slave is in
the main a chattel, that e.g. the master must answer for the delicts of his slave in
the same way that the owner answers for damage done by his beasts, and that
this liability can be clearly marked off from the duty of the lord of free retainers
who is merely bound to produce them in court. Jastrow, on the contrary, thinks
that even at a quite early time the Anglo-Saxon slave is treated as a person by
Page 494
criminal law; he has a wergild; he can be fined; his trespasses are never
compared to the trespasses of beasts; the lord’s duty, if one of his men is charged
with crime, is much the same whether that man be free or bond. Any theory
involves an explanation of several passages that are obscure and perhaps corrupt.
[70] Cnut, II. 45–6.
[71] Schmid, Appendix V. (Of Ranks); Pseudoleges Canuti, 60 (Schmid, p. 431).
[72] Leg. Hen. 76 § 7: ‘Differentia tamen weregildi multa est in Cantia
villanorum et baronum.’
[73] Leg. Hen. 76 § 2.
[74] Leg. Hen. 76 § 3.
[75] Ibid. 76 § 3.
[76] Ibid. 77; see Hist. Eng. Law, i. 405.
[77] Ibid. 78 § 2. The difficult strublum we leave untouched.
[78] Ibid. 78 § 2 from Cnut, II. 20. On this see Jastrow’s comment, op. cit. p. 80.
[79] Ibid. 70 § 5.
[80] Ibid. 70 § 1; 76 § 4.
[81] Ibid. 69 § 2.
[82] Ibid. 70 § 4: ‘Si liber servum occidat similiter reddat parentibus 40 den. et
duas mufflas et unum pullum [al. billum] mutilatum.’ The mufflae are thick
gloves. Compare Ancient Laws of Wales, i. 239, 511; the bondman has no
galanas (wergild) but if injured he receives a saraad; ‘the saraad of a bondman
is twelve pence, six for a coat for him, three for trousers, one for buskins, one for
a hook and one for a rope, and if he be a woodman let the hook-penny be for an
axe.’ If we read billum instead of pullum the English rule may remind us of the
Welsh. His hedger’s gloves and bill-hook are the arms appropriate to the serf,
‘servitutis arma’; cf. Leg. Hen. 78 § 2. As to the man-bót see Liebermann, Leg.
Edwardi, p. 71.
[83] In Leg. Hen. 81 § 3 (a passage which seems to show that by his master’s
favour even the servus may sometimes sue for a wrong done to him) we have
this sum:—villanus : cothsetus : servus :: 30 : 15 : 6.
[84] Ibid. 75 § 4: ‘suum peccatum est et dampnum.’ See also 70 § 10, an
exceedingly obscure passage.
[85] Ibid. 59 § 23.
[86] Ibid. 70 § 5; but for this our author has to go back as far as Ine.
[87] Ibid. 59 § 25.
[88] Ibid. 59 § 24; 85 § 4: ‘solus furatur qui cum servo furatur.’
[89] Ibid. 78 § 3; 59 § 25.
compared to the trespasses of beasts; the lord’s duty, if one of his men is charged
with crime, is much the same whether that man be free or bond. Any theory
involves an explanation of several passages that are obscure and perhaps corrupt.
[70] Cnut, II. 45–6.
[71] Schmid, Appendix V. (Of Ranks); Pseudoleges Canuti, 60 (Schmid, p. 431).
[72] Leg. Hen. 76 § 7: ‘Differentia tamen weregildi multa est in Cantia
villanorum et baronum.’
[73] Leg. Hen. 76 § 2.
[74] Leg. Hen. 76 § 3.
[75] Ibid. 76 § 3.
[76] Ibid. 77; see Hist. Eng. Law, i. 405.
[77] Ibid. 78 § 2. The difficult strublum we leave untouched.
[78] Ibid. 78 § 2 from Cnut, II. 20. On this see Jastrow’s comment, op. cit. p. 80.
[79] Ibid. 70 § 5.
[80] Ibid. 70 § 1; 76 § 4.
[81] Ibid. 69 § 2.
[82] Ibid. 70 § 4: ‘Si liber servum occidat similiter reddat parentibus 40 den. et
duas mufflas et unum pullum [al. billum] mutilatum.’ The mufflae are thick
gloves. Compare Ancient Laws of Wales, i. 239, 511; the bondman has no
galanas (wergild) but if injured he receives a saraad; ‘the saraad of a bondman
is twelve pence, six for a coat for him, three for trousers, one for buskins, one for
a hook and one for a rope, and if he be a woodman let the hook-penny be for an
axe.’ If we read billum instead of pullum the English rule may remind us of the
Welsh. His hedger’s gloves and bill-hook are the arms appropriate to the serf,
‘servitutis arma’; cf. Leg. Hen. 78 § 2. As to the man-bót see Liebermann, Leg.
Edwardi, p. 71.
[83] In Leg. Hen. 81 § 3 (a passage which seems to show that by his master’s
favour even the servus may sometimes sue for a wrong done to him) we have
this sum:—villanus : cothsetus : servus :: 30 : 15 : 6.
[84] Ibid. 75 § 4: ‘suum peccatum est et dampnum.’ See also 70 § 10, an
exceedingly obscure passage.
[85] Ibid. 59 § 23.
[86] Ibid. 70 § 5; but for this our author has to go back as far as Ine.
[87] Ibid. 59 § 25.
[88] Ibid. 59 § 24; 85 § 4: ‘solus furatur qui cum servo furatur.’
[89] Ibid. 78 § 3; 59 § 25.
Page 495
[90] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 398, 402.
[91] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 457.
[92] See the Bath manumissions, Kemble, Saxons, i. 507 ff. Sometimes a pound
or a half-pound is paid.
[93] D. B. i. 26.
[94] Chron. Petrob. 163.
[95] D. B. i. 105 b, Devon: ‘Rolf tenet de B[alduino Boslie ... Terra est 8 carucis.
In dominio est 1 caruca et dimidia et 7 servi cum 1 caruca.’ D. B. iv. 265:
‘Balduinus habet 1 mansionem quae vocatur Bosleia ... hanc possunt arare 8
carrucae et modo tenet eam Roffus de Balduino. Inde habet R. 1 ferdinum et 1
carrucam et dimidiam in dominio et villani tenent aliam terram et habent ibi 1
carrucam. Ibi habet R. 7 servos.’ In the Exeter record these seven serfs seem to
get reckoned as being both servi and villani. So in the account of Rentis, D. B.
iv. 204–5, the lord is said to have one quarter of the arable in demesne and two
oxen, while the villani are said to have the rest of the arable and one team; but
the only villani are 8 coliberti and 4 servi.
[96] See last note.
[97] Ellis, Introduction, ii. 504–6.
[98] See, for example, the following Herefordshire entry, D. B. i. 180 b: ‘In
dominio sunt 2 carucae et 4 villani et 8 bordarii et prepositus et bedellus. Inter
omnes habent 4 carucas. Ibi 8 inter servos et ancillas et vaccarius et daia.’
[99] Mr Round has drawn attention to the great increase of bordarii: Antiquary
(1882) vi. 9. In the second of our two experiments the cases were taken from the
royal demesne and the lands of the churches. The surveys of Norfolk and Suffolk
profess to enumerate the various classes of peasants T. R. E.; but commonly each
entry reports that there has been no change. Without saying that we disbelieve
these reports, we nevertheless may say that a verdict which asserts that things
have always (semper) been as they now are may easily be the outcome of
nescience.
[100] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 53–4.
[101] D. B. i. 38, Coseham: ‘8 burs i. coliberti.’ Ib. 38 b Dene: ‘et coliberti [vel
bures interlined
.’]
[102] D. B. i. 65, Wintreburne.
[103] D. B. i. 75, Bridetone et Bere.
[104] D. B. i. 239 b, Etone.
[105] Guérard, Cartulaire de L’Abbaye de S. Père de Chartres, vol. i. p. xlii.
[106] The position of the coliberti is discussed by Guérard, loc. cit.., and by
Lamprecht, Geschichte des Französischen Wirthschaftslebens (in Schmoller’s
[91] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 457.
[92] See the Bath manumissions, Kemble, Saxons, i. 507 ff. Sometimes a pound
or a half-pound is paid.
[93] D. B. i. 26.
[94] Chron. Petrob. 163.
[95] D. B. i. 105 b, Devon: ‘Rolf tenet de B[alduino Boslie ... Terra est 8 carucis.
In dominio est 1 caruca et dimidia et 7 servi cum 1 caruca.’ D. B. iv. 265:
‘Balduinus habet 1 mansionem quae vocatur Bosleia ... hanc possunt arare 8
carrucae et modo tenet eam Roffus de Balduino. Inde habet R. 1 ferdinum et 1
carrucam et dimidiam in dominio et villani tenent aliam terram et habent ibi 1
carrucam. Ibi habet R. 7 servos.’ In the Exeter record these seven serfs seem to
get reckoned as being both servi and villani. So in the account of Rentis, D. B.
iv. 204–5, the lord is said to have one quarter of the arable in demesne and two
oxen, while the villani are said to have the rest of the arable and one team; but
the only villani are 8 coliberti and 4 servi.
[96] See last note.
[97] Ellis, Introduction, ii. 504–6.
[98] See, for example, the following Herefordshire entry, D. B. i. 180 b: ‘In
dominio sunt 2 carucae et 4 villani et 8 bordarii et prepositus et bedellus. Inter
omnes habent 4 carucas. Ibi 8 inter servos et ancillas et vaccarius et daia.’
[99] Mr Round has drawn attention to the great increase of bordarii: Antiquary
(1882) vi. 9. In the second of our two experiments the cases were taken from the
royal demesne and the lands of the churches. The surveys of Norfolk and Suffolk
profess to enumerate the various classes of peasants T. R. E.; but commonly each
entry reports that there has been no change. Without saying that we disbelieve
these reports, we nevertheless may say that a verdict which asserts that things
have always (semper) been as they now are may easily be the outcome of
nescience.
[100] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 53–4.
[101] D. B. i. 38, Coseham: ‘8 burs i. coliberti.’ Ib. 38 b Dene: ‘et coliberti [vel
bures interlined
.’]
[102] D. B. i. 65, Wintreburne.
[103] D. B. i. 75, Bridetone et Bere.
[104] D. B. i. 239 b, Etone.
[105] Guérard, Cartulaire de L’Abbaye de S. Père de Chartres, vol. i. p. xlii.
[106] The position of the coliberti is discussed by Guérard, loc. cit.., and by
Lamprecht, Geschichte des Französischen Wirthschaftslebens (in Schmoller’s
Page 496
Forschungen, Bd i.), p. 81. Guérard says, ‘Les coliberts peuvent se placer à peu
près indifferemment ou au dernier des hommes libres, ou à la tête des hommes
engagés dans les liens de la servitude.’
[107] Schmid, App. III. C. 4.
[108] Rectitudines, c. 3.
[109] Occasionally the coliberti of D. B. are put before us as paying rents in
money or in kind. Thus D. B. i. 38, Hants: ‘In Coseham sunt 4 hidae quae
pertinent huic manerio ubi T. R. E. erant 8 burs i. coliberti cum 4 carucis
reddentes 50 sol. 8 den. minus.’ D. B. i. 179 b, Heref.: ‘Villani dant de
consuetudine 13 sol. et 4 den. et [sex coliberti reddunt 3 sextarios frumenti et
ordei et 2 oves et dimidiam cum agnis et 2 den. et unum obolum.’ D. B. i. 165:
‘et in Glouucestre 1 burgensis reddens 5 den. et 2 coliberti reddentes 34 den.’ In
a charter coming from Bishop Denewulf (K. 1079) we read of three wite-
theówmen who were boor-born and three who were theów-born.
[110] Ellis, Introduction, ii. 511–14.
[111] For examples see D. B. iv. 211 and the following pages.
[112] Leg. Hen. 81, § 3: ‘Quidam villani qui sunt eiusmodi leierwitam et
blodwitam et huiusmodi minora forisfacta emerunt a dominis suis, vel quomodo
meruerunt de suis et in suos, quorum fletgefoth vel overseunessa est 30 den.;
cothseti 15 den.; servi 6 den.’
[113] D. B. i. 71, Haseberie: ‘5 villani et 13 coscez et 2 cotarii.’ Ibid. 80 b:
Chinestanestone: ‘18 villani et 14 coscez et 4 cotarii.’
[114] Worcester Register, 59 b (Sedgebarrow): four cotmanni, each of whom
pays 20d. or works one day a week and two in autumn; two cottarii, each of
whom pays 12d. or works one day a week. Ibid. 69 b (Shipston): two cotmanni,
each of whom pays 3s. or works like a virgater; two cottarii, each of whom pays
13d. Ibid. 76 a (Cropthorn): two cotmanni, each of whom pays 2s. or works like
a cottarius; two cottarii, each of whom pays 18d. or works one day a week.
[115] Vinogradoff, Villainage, 149, gives a few instances of its occurrence; but it
seems to be very rare.
[116] D. B. i. 127 b, Fuleham: ‘Ibi 5 villani quisque 1 hidam.’ There are a good
many other instances.
[117] D. B. i. 130, Hamntone; ‘et 4 bordarii quisque de dimidia virga.’
[118] D. B. i. 127, Herges: ‘et 2 cotarii de 13 acris.’
[119] D. B. i. 127 b, Fuleham: ‘et 22 cotarii de dimidia hida et 8 cotarii de suis
hortis.’
[120] D. B. ii. 75 b: ‘et 5 bordarii super aquam qui non tenent terram.’
[121] D. B. i. 163 b, Turneberie: ‘et 42 villani et 18 radchenistre cum 21 carucis
et 23 bordarii et 15 servi et 4 coliberti.’ Ibid. 164, Hechanestede: ‘et 5 villani et 8
bordarii cum 6 carucis; ibi 6 servi.’
près indifferemment ou au dernier des hommes libres, ou à la tête des hommes
engagés dans les liens de la servitude.’
[107] Schmid, App. III. C. 4.
[108] Rectitudines, c. 3.
[109] Occasionally the coliberti of D. B. are put before us as paying rents in
money or in kind. Thus D. B. i. 38, Hants: ‘In Coseham sunt 4 hidae quae
pertinent huic manerio ubi T. R. E. erant 8 burs i. coliberti cum 4 carucis
reddentes 50 sol. 8 den. minus.’ D. B. i. 179 b, Heref.: ‘Villani dant de
consuetudine 13 sol. et 4 den. et [sex coliberti reddunt 3 sextarios frumenti et
ordei et 2 oves et dimidiam cum agnis et 2 den. et unum obolum.’ D. B. i. 165:
‘et in Glouucestre 1 burgensis reddens 5 den. et 2 coliberti reddentes 34 den.’ In
a charter coming from Bishop Denewulf (K. 1079) we read of three wite-
theówmen who were boor-born and three who were theów-born.
[110] Ellis, Introduction, ii. 511–14.
[111] For examples see D. B. iv. 211 and the following pages.
[112] Leg. Hen. 81, § 3: ‘Quidam villani qui sunt eiusmodi leierwitam et
blodwitam et huiusmodi minora forisfacta emerunt a dominis suis, vel quomodo
meruerunt de suis et in suos, quorum fletgefoth vel overseunessa est 30 den.;
cothseti 15 den.; servi 6 den.’
[113] D. B. i. 71, Haseberie: ‘5 villani et 13 coscez et 2 cotarii.’ Ibid. 80 b:
Chinestanestone: ‘18 villani et 14 coscez et 4 cotarii.’
[114] Worcester Register, 59 b (Sedgebarrow): four cotmanni, each of whom
pays 20d. or works one day a week and two in autumn; two cottarii, each of
whom pays 12d. or works one day a week. Ibid. 69 b (Shipston): two cotmanni,
each of whom pays 3s. or works like a virgater; two cottarii, each of whom pays
13d. Ibid. 76 a (Cropthorn): two cotmanni, each of whom pays 2s. or works like
a cottarius; two cottarii, each of whom pays 18d. or works one day a week.
[115] Vinogradoff, Villainage, 149, gives a few instances of its occurrence; but it
seems to be very rare.
[116] D. B. i. 127 b, Fuleham: ‘Ibi 5 villani quisque 1 hidam.’ There are a good
many other instances.
[117] D. B. i. 130, Hamntone; ‘et 4 bordarii quisque de dimidia virga.’
[118] D. B. i. 127, Herges: ‘et 2 cotarii de 13 acris.’
[119] D. B. i. 127 b, Fuleham: ‘et 22 cotarii de dimidia hida et 8 cotarii de suis
hortis.’
[120] D. B. ii. 75 b: ‘et 5 bordarii super aquam qui non tenent terram.’
[121] D. B. i. 163 b, Turneberie: ‘et 42 villani et 18 radchenistre cum 21 carucis
et 23 bordarii et 15 servi et 4 coliberti.’ Ibid. 164, Hechanestede: ‘et 5 villani et 8
bordarii cum 6 carucis; ibi 6 servi.’
Page 497
[122] D. B. iv. 215–223; on p. 223 there are two villani with one ox.
[123] D. B. i. 164, Tedeneham: ‘Ibi erant 38 villani habentes 38 carucas.’ Ibid.
164 b, Nortune, ‘15 villani cum 15 carucis; Stanwelle, 5 villani cum 5 carucis.’
[124] Malden, Domesday Survey of Surrey (Domesday Studies, ii.) 469, says
that in Surrey ‘bordarii and cotarii only occur once together upon the same
manor, and very seldom in the same hundred.... There are three hundreds,
Godalming, Wallington and Elmbridge, where the cotarii are nearly universal to
the exclusion of bordarii. In the others the bordarii are nearly or quite universal,
to the exclusion of the cotarii.’
[125] Thorpe, Diplomatarium, 623. King Eadwig declares that a certain church-
ward of Exeter is ‘free and fare-worthy.’
[126] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 341 ff.
[127] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 354–8.
[128] Liebermann, Instituta Cnuti, Transact. Roy. Hist. Soc. vii. 93.
[129] Leg. Will. Conq. I. 8: ‘La were del thein 20 lib. in Merchenelahe, 25 lib. in
Westsexenelahe. La were del vilain 100 sol. en Merchenelahe e ensement en
Westsexene.’ Leg. Henr. 70, § 1: ‘In Westsexa quae caput regni est et legum,
twyhindi, i.e. villani, wera est 4 lib.; twelfhindi, i.e. thaini, 25 lib.’ Ibid. 76, § 2:
‘Omnis autem wera liberorum est aut servorum ... liberi alii twyhindi, alii
syxhindi, alii twelfhindi’; § 6, twihindus = cyrliscus = villanus. As to the 100
shillings in the first of these passages, see Schmid, p. 676. There is some other
evidence that the equation, 1 Norman shilling = 2 English shillings, was
occasionally treated as correct enough. As to the six-hynde man, see Schmid, p.
653; we may doubt whether he existed in the eleventh century, but according to
the Instituta Cnuti the radchenistres of the west may have been six-hynde. We
must not draw from Alfred’s treaty with the Danes (Schmid, p. 107) the
inference that the normal ceorl was seated on gafol-land. This international
instrument is settling an exceptionally high tariff for the maintenance of the
peace. Every man, whatever his rank, is to enjoy the handsome wergild of 8 half-
marks of pure gold, except the Danish lysing and the English ceorl who is seated
on gafol-land; these are to have but the common wer of 200 shillings. The
parallel passage in Æthelred’s treaty (Schmid, p. 207) sets £30 on every free man
if he is killed by a man of the other race. See Schmid, p. 676.
[130] Ine, 55: a sheep with a lamb until a fortnight after Easter is worth 1
shilling. Æthelstan, VI. 6: a horse 120 pence, an ox 30 pence, a cow 20, a sheep
1 shilling (5 pence). Ibid. 8, § 5: an ox 30 pence. Schmid, App. I. c. 7: a horse 30
shillings, a mare 20 shillings, an ox 30 pence, a cow 24 pence, a swine 8 pence,
a sheep 1 shilling, a goat 2 pence, a man (i.e. a slave) 1 pound. Schmid, App. iii.
c. 9: a sheep or 3 pence. D. B. i. 117 b: an ox or 30 pence. D. B. i. 26: Tolls at
Lewes; for a man 4 pence, an ox a halfpenny. This preserves the equation that
we have already seen, namely, 1 slave = 8 oxen. Thus the full team is worth one
pound. On the twelfth century Pipe Rolls the ox often costs 3 shillings (= 36
pence) or even more.
[123] D. B. i. 164, Tedeneham: ‘Ibi erant 38 villani habentes 38 carucas.’ Ibid.
164 b, Nortune, ‘15 villani cum 15 carucis; Stanwelle, 5 villani cum 5 carucis.’
[124] Malden, Domesday Survey of Surrey (Domesday Studies, ii.) 469, says
that in Surrey ‘bordarii and cotarii only occur once together upon the same
manor, and very seldom in the same hundred.... There are three hundreds,
Godalming, Wallington and Elmbridge, where the cotarii are nearly universal to
the exclusion of bordarii. In the others the bordarii are nearly or quite universal,
to the exclusion of the cotarii.’
[125] Thorpe, Diplomatarium, 623. King Eadwig declares that a certain church-
ward of Exeter is ‘free and fare-worthy.’
[126] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 341 ff.
[127] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 354–8.
[128] Liebermann, Instituta Cnuti, Transact. Roy. Hist. Soc. vii. 93.
[129] Leg. Will. Conq. I. 8: ‘La were del thein 20 lib. in Merchenelahe, 25 lib. in
Westsexenelahe. La were del vilain 100 sol. en Merchenelahe e ensement en
Westsexene.’ Leg. Henr. 70, § 1: ‘In Westsexa quae caput regni est et legum,
twyhindi, i.e. villani, wera est 4 lib.; twelfhindi, i.e. thaini, 25 lib.’ Ibid. 76, § 2:
‘Omnis autem wera liberorum est aut servorum ... liberi alii twyhindi, alii
syxhindi, alii twelfhindi’; § 6, twihindus = cyrliscus = villanus. As to the 100
shillings in the first of these passages, see Schmid, p. 676. There is some other
evidence that the equation, 1 Norman shilling = 2 English shillings, was
occasionally treated as correct enough. As to the six-hynde man, see Schmid, p.
653; we may doubt whether he existed in the eleventh century, but according to
the Instituta Cnuti the radchenistres of the west may have been six-hynde. We
must not draw from Alfred’s treaty with the Danes (Schmid, p. 107) the
inference that the normal ceorl was seated on gafol-land. This international
instrument is settling an exceptionally high tariff for the maintenance of the
peace. Every man, whatever his rank, is to enjoy the handsome wergild of 8 half-
marks of pure gold, except the Danish lysing and the English ceorl who is seated
on gafol-land; these are to have but the common wer of 200 shillings. The
parallel passage in Æthelred’s treaty (Schmid, p. 207) sets £30 on every free man
if he is killed by a man of the other race. See Schmid, p. 676.
[130] Ine, 55: a sheep with a lamb until a fortnight after Easter is worth 1
shilling. Æthelstan, VI. 6: a horse 120 pence, an ox 30 pence, a cow 20, a sheep
1 shilling (5 pence). Ibid. 8, § 5: an ox 30 pence. Schmid, App. I. c. 7: a horse 30
shillings, a mare 20 shillings, an ox 30 pence, a cow 24 pence, a swine 8 pence,
a sheep 1 shilling, a goat 2 pence, a man (i.e. a slave) 1 pound. Schmid, App. iii.
c. 9: a sheep or 3 pence. D. B. i. 117 b: an ox or 30 pence. D. B. i. 26: Tolls at
Lewes; for a man 4 pence, an ox a halfpenny. This preserves the equation that
we have already seen, namely, 1 slave = 8 oxen. Thus the full team is worth one
pound. On the twelfth century Pipe Rolls the ox often costs 3 shillings (= 36
pence) or even more.
Page 498
[131] In Leg. Will. Conq. I. 16, we hear of the forisfacturae (probably the ‘insult
fines’) due to archbishops, bishops, counts, barons and sokemen; the baron has
10 shillings, the sokeman 40 pence. In the same document, c. 20, § 2, we read of
the reliefs of counts, barons, vavassors and villeins. Leg. Edw. Conf. 12, § 4,
speaks of the manbót due in the Danelaw; on the death of a villanus or a
socheman 12 ores are paid, on the death of a liber homo 3 marks.
[132] D. B. i. 167 b, Heile: ‘ibi erant 12 servi quos Willelmus liberos fecit.’
[133] D. B. i. 263: ‘Si quis liber homo facit opera in die feriato inde episcopus
habet 8 solidos. De servo autem vel ancilla feriatum diem infringente, habet
episcopus 4 solidos.’ Compare Cnut, II. 45.
[134] D. B. i. 86: ‘Huic manerio reddebatur T. R. E. de Cruche per annum
consuetudo, hoc est 6 oves cum agnis totidem, et quisque liber homo i. blomam
ferri.’ South Perrott had belonged to the Confessor, Crewkerne to Edith,
probably ‘the rich and fair.’ For the description of Cruche see D. B. i. 86 b. As to
the ‘bloom’ of iron see Ellis, Introduction, i. 136.
[135] D. B. i. 92. See also p. 87 b, the account of Seveberge.
[136] D. B. ii. 145.
[137] D. B. ii. 1: ‘In hoc manerio erat tunc temporis quidam liber homo de
dimidia hida qui modo effectus est unus de villanis.’
[138] Thus D. B. i. 127, Mid.: ‘inter francos et villanos 45 carucae’; Ibid. 70,
Wilts: ‘4 villani et 3 bordarii et unus francus cum 2 carucis’; Ibid. 241, Warw.:
‘Ibi sunt 3 francones homines cum 4 villanis et 3 bordariis.’ Sometimes francus
may be an equivalent for francigena; e.g. i. 254 b, where in one entry we have
unus francigena and in the next unus francus homo. But an Englishman may be
francus; ii. 54 b ‘accepit 15 acras de uno franco teigno et misit cum terra sua.’
However, it is not an insignificant fact that the very name of Frenchman
(francigena) must have suggested free birth.
[139] For examples see the surveys of Warwick, Stafford and Shropshire.
[140] D. B. ii. 260: ‘et 7 homines qui possent vendere terram suam si eam prius
obtulissent domino suo.’
[141] D. B. ii. 278 b: ‘si vellent recedere daret quisque 2 solidos.’ Ibid. 207: ‘et
possent recedere si darent 2 solidos.’
[142] D. B. ii. 435: ‘Et super Vlnoht habuit commendationem antecessor R.
Malet, teste hundredo, et non potuit vendere nec dare de eo terram suam.’ Ibid.
397: ‘viderunt eum iurare quod non poterat dare [vel] vendere terram suam ab
antecessore Ricardi.’
[143] D. B. i. 145: ‘Hoc manerium tenuit Aluuinus homo Estan, non potuit dare
nec vendere extra Brichelle manerium Estani.’
[144] D. B. i. 133: ‘Hanc terram tenuit Aluric Blac 2 hidas de Abbate
Westmonasterii T. R. E.: non poterat separare ab aecclesia.’
fines’) due to archbishops, bishops, counts, barons and sokemen; the baron has
10 shillings, the sokeman 40 pence. In the same document, c. 20, § 2, we read of
the reliefs of counts, barons, vavassors and villeins. Leg. Edw. Conf. 12, § 4,
speaks of the manbót due in the Danelaw; on the death of a villanus or a
socheman 12 ores are paid, on the death of a liber homo 3 marks.
[132] D. B. i. 167 b, Heile: ‘ibi erant 12 servi quos Willelmus liberos fecit.’
[133] D. B. i. 263: ‘Si quis liber homo facit opera in die feriato inde episcopus
habet 8 solidos. De servo autem vel ancilla feriatum diem infringente, habet
episcopus 4 solidos.’ Compare Cnut, II. 45.
[134] D. B. i. 86: ‘Huic manerio reddebatur T. R. E. de Cruche per annum
consuetudo, hoc est 6 oves cum agnis totidem, et quisque liber homo i. blomam
ferri.’ South Perrott had belonged to the Confessor, Crewkerne to Edith,
probably ‘the rich and fair.’ For the description of Cruche see D. B. i. 86 b. As to
the ‘bloom’ of iron see Ellis, Introduction, i. 136.
[135] D. B. i. 92. See also p. 87 b, the account of Seveberge.
[136] D. B. ii. 145.
[137] D. B. ii. 1: ‘In hoc manerio erat tunc temporis quidam liber homo de
dimidia hida qui modo effectus est unus de villanis.’
[138] Thus D. B. i. 127, Mid.: ‘inter francos et villanos 45 carucae’; Ibid. 70,
Wilts: ‘4 villani et 3 bordarii et unus francus cum 2 carucis’; Ibid. 241, Warw.:
‘Ibi sunt 3 francones homines cum 4 villanis et 3 bordariis.’ Sometimes francus
may be an equivalent for francigena; e.g. i. 254 b, where in one entry we have
unus francigena and in the next unus francus homo. But an Englishman may be
francus; ii. 54 b ‘accepit 15 acras de uno franco teigno et misit cum terra sua.’
However, it is not an insignificant fact that the very name of Frenchman
(francigena) must have suggested free birth.
[139] For examples see the surveys of Warwick, Stafford and Shropshire.
[140] D. B. ii. 260: ‘et 7 homines qui possent vendere terram suam si eam prius
obtulissent domino suo.’
[141] D. B. ii. 278 b: ‘si vellent recedere daret quisque 2 solidos.’ Ibid. 207: ‘et
possent recedere si darent 2 solidos.’
[142] D. B. ii. 435: ‘Et super Vlnoht habuit commendationem antecessor R.
Malet, teste hundredo, et non potuit vendere nec dare de eo terram suam.’ Ibid.
397: ‘viderunt eum iurare quod non poterat dare [vel] vendere terram suam ab
antecessore Ricardi.’
[143] D. B. i. 145: ‘Hoc manerium tenuit Aluuinus homo Estan, non potuit dare
nec vendere extra Brichelle manerium Estani.’
[144] D. B. i. 133: ‘Hanc terram tenuit Aluric Blac 2 hidas de Abbate
Westmonasterii T. R. E.: non poterat separare ab aecclesia.’
Page 499
[145] D. B. ii. 216 b: ‘Ita est in monasterio quod nec vendere nec forisfacere
potest extra ecclesia.’
[146] For example, D. B. i. 201: ‘terram suam vendere potuerunt, soca vero
remansit Abbati.’ D. B. ii. 78: ‘et poterant vendere terram set soca et saca
remanebat antecessori Alberici.’ Ibid. ii. 92 b: ‘unus sochemannus fuit in hac
terra de 15 acris quas poterat vendere, set soca iacebat in Warleia terra S. Pauli.’
[147] But the consuetudo, rent or the like, may ‘remain’: D. B. ii. 181 b: ‘et
possent vendere terram suam set consuetudo remanebat in manerio.’ And so the
commendatio may ‘remain’; ii. 357 b: ‘Hi poterant dare et vendere terram, set
saca et soca et commendatio remanebant Sancto [Eadmundo.’]
[148] For example, D. B. i. 201: ‘Homines Abbatis de Ely fuerunt et 4 terram
suam vendere potuerunt, soca vero remansit Abbati, et quartus 1 virgam et
dimidiam habuit et recedere non potuit.’ See the important evidence produced
by Round, Feudal England, 24, as to the equivalence of these phrases.
[149] One of the commonest terms is recedere—‘potuit recedere’—‘non potuit
recedere’; i. 41, ‘non potuit cum terra recedere ad alium dominum’; i. 56 b, ‘10
liberi homines T. R. E. tenebant 12 hidas et dimidiam de terra eiusdem manerii
sed inde recedere non poterant’; ii. 19 b, ‘non poterant recedere a terra sine
licentia Abbatis’; ii. 57 b, ‘non poterant recedere ab illo manerio’; ii. 66, ‘non
poterant removere ab illo manerio’; ii. 41, ‘non poterant recedere a soca
Wisgari’; ii. 41 b, ‘nec poterant abire sine iussu domini’; i. 66 b, ‘qui tenuit T. R.
E. non poterat ab aecclesia diverti [separari’; ii. 116, ‘unus [burgensis] erat ita
dominicus ut non posset recedere nec homagium facere sine licentia [Stigandi]’;
ii. 119, ‘de istis hominibus erant 36 ita dominice Regis Edwardi ut non possent
esse homines cuiuslibet sed semper tamen consuetudo regis remanebat preter
herigete.’ A remarkable form is, ii. 57 b, ‘non potuit istam terram mittere in
aliquo loco nisi in abbatia.’ Then ‘potuit ire quo voluit,’ ‘non potuit ire quolibet’
are common enough.
[150] Ine, c. 39: He who leaves his lord without permission pays sixty shillings
to his lord.
[151] For example, D. B. i. 41: ‘Tres taini tenuerunt de episcopo et non
potuerunt ire quolibet.’
[152] D. B. i. 35 b, Tornecrosta.
[153] D. B. i. 212 b, Stanford.
[154] D. B. i. 249 b: ‘Tres taini tenuerunt et liberi homines fuerunt’; 256, ‘Ipsi
taini liberi erant’; 259 b, ‘Quatuor taini tenuerunt ante eum et liberi fuerunt.’
[155] Chron. Abingd. i. 490: ‘Nam quidam dives, Turkillus nomine, sub Haroldi
comitis testimonio et consultu, de se cum sua terra quae Kingestun dicitur,
ecclesiae Abbendonensi et abbati Ordrico homagium fecit; licitum quippe libero
cuique, illo in tempore, sic agere erat.’
[156] D. B. i. 180 b: ‘et poterant ire cum terra quo volebant, et habebant sub se 4
milites, ita liberos ut ipsi erant.’
potest extra ecclesia.’
[146] For example, D. B. i. 201: ‘terram suam vendere potuerunt, soca vero
remansit Abbati.’ D. B. ii. 78: ‘et poterant vendere terram set soca et saca
remanebat antecessori Alberici.’ Ibid. ii. 92 b: ‘unus sochemannus fuit in hac
terra de 15 acris quas poterat vendere, set soca iacebat in Warleia terra S. Pauli.’
[147] But the consuetudo, rent or the like, may ‘remain’: D. B. ii. 181 b: ‘et
possent vendere terram suam set consuetudo remanebat in manerio.’ And so the
commendatio may ‘remain’; ii. 357 b: ‘Hi poterant dare et vendere terram, set
saca et soca et commendatio remanebant Sancto [Eadmundo.’]
[148] For example, D. B. i. 201: ‘Homines Abbatis de Ely fuerunt et 4 terram
suam vendere potuerunt, soca vero remansit Abbati, et quartus 1 virgam et
dimidiam habuit et recedere non potuit.’ See the important evidence produced
by Round, Feudal England, 24, as to the equivalence of these phrases.
[149] One of the commonest terms is recedere—‘potuit recedere’—‘non potuit
recedere’; i. 41, ‘non potuit cum terra recedere ad alium dominum’; i. 56 b, ‘10
liberi homines T. R. E. tenebant 12 hidas et dimidiam de terra eiusdem manerii
sed inde recedere non poterant’; ii. 19 b, ‘non poterant recedere a terra sine
licentia Abbatis’; ii. 57 b, ‘non poterant recedere ab illo manerio’; ii. 66, ‘non
poterant removere ab illo manerio’; ii. 41, ‘non poterant recedere a soca
Wisgari’; ii. 41 b, ‘nec poterant abire sine iussu domini’; i. 66 b, ‘qui tenuit T. R.
E. non poterat ab aecclesia diverti [separari’; ii. 116, ‘unus [burgensis] erat ita
dominicus ut non posset recedere nec homagium facere sine licentia [Stigandi]’;
ii. 119, ‘de istis hominibus erant 36 ita dominice Regis Edwardi ut non possent
esse homines cuiuslibet sed semper tamen consuetudo regis remanebat preter
herigete.’ A remarkable form is, ii. 57 b, ‘non potuit istam terram mittere in
aliquo loco nisi in abbatia.’ Then ‘potuit ire quo voluit,’ ‘non potuit ire quolibet’
are common enough.
[150] Ine, c. 39: He who leaves his lord without permission pays sixty shillings
to his lord.
[151] For example, D. B. i. 41: ‘Tres taini tenuerunt de episcopo et non
potuerunt ire quolibet.’
[152] D. B. i. 35 b, Tornecrosta.
[153] D. B. i. 212 b, Stanford.
[154] D. B. i. 249 b: ‘Tres taini tenuerunt et liberi homines fuerunt’; 256, ‘Ipsi
taini liberi erant’; 259 b, ‘Quatuor taini tenuerunt ante eum et liberi fuerunt.’
[155] Chron. Abingd. i. 490: ‘Nam quidam dives, Turkillus nomine, sub Haroldi
comitis testimonio et consultu, de se cum sua terra quae Kingestun dicitur,
ecclesiae Abbendonensi et abbati Ordrico homagium fecit; licitum quippe libero
cuique, illo in tempore, sic agere erat.’
[156] D. B. i. 180 b: ‘et poterant ire cum terra quo volebant, et habebant sub se 4
milites, ita liberos ut ipsi erant.’
Page 500
[157] D. B. ii. 59.
[158] D. B. i. 172: ‘si ita liber homo est ut habeat socam suam et sacam et cum
terra sua possit ire quo voluerit.’
[159] D. B. i. 84 b.
[160] D. B. ii. 213: ‘Hanc terram calumpniatur esse liberam Vlchitel homo
Hermeri, quocunque modo iudicetur, vel bello vel iudicio, et alius est praesto
probare eo modo quod iacuit ad ecclesiam [S. Adeldredae die quo rex Edwardus
obiit. Set totus hundretus testatur eam fuisse T. R. E. ad S. Adeldredam.’
[161] See in particular the survey of Gloucestershire; D. B. i. 165 b: ‘Hoc
manerium quietum est a geldo et ab omni forensi servitio praeter aecclesiae’;
Ibid. ‘Haec terra libera fuit et quieta ab omni geldo et regali servitio’; 170, ‘Una
hida et dimidia libera a geldo.’ When after reading these passages we come upon
the following (167 b), ‘Isdem W. tenet Tatinton: Ulgar tenuit de rege Edwardo:
haec terra libera est,’ and when we observe that the land is not hidated, we shall
probably infer that ‘This land is free’ means ‘This land is exempt from geld, and
(perhaps) from all other royal service.’
[162] Dialogus, i. c. 11; ii. c. 14.
[163] Dialogus, i. c. 10.
[164] Will. Conq. I. 30, 31: ‘Si les seignurages ne facent altri gainurs venir a lour
terre, la justise le facet.’ The Latin version is ridiculous: ‘Si domini terrarum non
procurent idoneos cultores ad terras suas colendas, iustitiarii hoc faciant.’ The
translator seems to have been puzzled by the word altri or autrui.
[165] Ibid. 29.
[166] Schmid, App. v.; vii., 2, §§ 9–11; Pseudoleges Canuti, 60–1 (Schmid, p.
431).
[167] D. B. iv. 497.
[168] D. B. i. 44 b: ‘Istam terram calumpniatur Willelmus de Chernet, dicens
pertinere ad manerium de Cerneford feudum Hugonis de Port per hereditatem
sui antecessoris et de hoc suum testimonium adduxit de melioribus et antiquis
hominibus totius comitatus et hundredi; et Picot contraduxit suum testimonium
de villanis et vili plebe et de prepositis, qui volunt defendere per sacramentum
vel dei iudicium, quod ille qui tenuit terram liber homo fuit et potuit ire cum
terra sua quo voluit. Sed testes Willelmi nolunt accipere legem nisi regis
Edwardi usque dum diffiniatur per regem.’ It seems possible that William’s
witnesses wished to insist on the ancient rule that the oath of one thegn would
countervail the oaths of six ceorls. This was the old English law (lex Edwardi)
on which they relied.
[169] D. B. ii. 393: ‘et 5 villani de eodem manerio testantur ei et offerunt legem
qualem quis iudicaverit; set dimidium hundret de Gepeswiz testantur quod hoc
iacebat ad ecclesiam T. R. E. et Wisgarus tenebat et offert derationari.’
[170] Schmid, App. vi.; Leg. Hen. 61 § 2: ‘thaini iusiurandum contravalet
iusiurandum sex villanorum.’
[158] D. B. i. 172: ‘si ita liber homo est ut habeat socam suam et sacam et cum
terra sua possit ire quo voluerit.’
[159] D. B. i. 84 b.
[160] D. B. ii. 213: ‘Hanc terram calumpniatur esse liberam Vlchitel homo
Hermeri, quocunque modo iudicetur, vel bello vel iudicio, et alius est praesto
probare eo modo quod iacuit ad ecclesiam [S. Adeldredae die quo rex Edwardus
obiit. Set totus hundretus testatur eam fuisse T. R. E. ad S. Adeldredam.’
[161] See in particular the survey of Gloucestershire; D. B. i. 165 b: ‘Hoc
manerium quietum est a geldo et ab omni forensi servitio praeter aecclesiae’;
Ibid. ‘Haec terra libera fuit et quieta ab omni geldo et regali servitio’; 170, ‘Una
hida et dimidia libera a geldo.’ When after reading these passages we come upon
the following (167 b), ‘Isdem W. tenet Tatinton: Ulgar tenuit de rege Edwardo:
haec terra libera est,’ and when we observe that the land is not hidated, we shall
probably infer that ‘This land is free’ means ‘This land is exempt from geld, and
(perhaps) from all other royal service.’
[162] Dialogus, i. c. 11; ii. c. 14.
[163] Dialogus, i. c. 10.
[164] Will. Conq. I. 30, 31: ‘Si les seignurages ne facent altri gainurs venir a lour
terre, la justise le facet.’ The Latin version is ridiculous: ‘Si domini terrarum non
procurent idoneos cultores ad terras suas colendas, iustitiarii hoc faciant.’ The
translator seems to have been puzzled by the word altri or autrui.
[165] Ibid. 29.
[166] Schmid, App. v.; vii., 2, §§ 9–11; Pseudoleges Canuti, 60–1 (Schmid, p.
431).
[167] D. B. iv. 497.
[168] D. B. i. 44 b: ‘Istam terram calumpniatur Willelmus de Chernet, dicens
pertinere ad manerium de Cerneford feudum Hugonis de Port per hereditatem
sui antecessoris et de hoc suum testimonium adduxit de melioribus et antiquis
hominibus totius comitatus et hundredi; et Picot contraduxit suum testimonium
de villanis et vili plebe et de prepositis, qui volunt defendere per sacramentum
vel dei iudicium, quod ille qui tenuit terram liber homo fuit et potuit ire cum
terra sua quo voluit. Sed testes Willelmi nolunt accipere legem nisi regis
Edwardi usque dum diffiniatur per regem.’ It seems possible that William’s
witnesses wished to insist on the ancient rule that the oath of one thegn would
countervail the oaths of six ceorls. This was the old English law (lex Edwardi)
on which they relied.
[169] D. B. ii. 393: ‘et 5 villani de eodem manerio testantur ei et offerunt legem
qualem quis iudicaverit; set dimidium hundret de Gepeswiz testantur quod hoc
iacebat ad ecclesiam T. R. E. et Wisgarus tenebat et offert derationari.’
[170] Schmid, App. vi.; Leg. Hen. 61 § 2: ‘thaini iusiurandum contravalet
iusiurandum sex villanorum.’
Page 501
[171] Leg. Hen. 29, § 1.
[172] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 344.
[173] Dialogus, i. c. 11.
[174] D. B. i. 67 b: ‘De terra villanorum dedit abbatissa uni militi 3 hidas et
dimidiam.’ Ibid. 89: ‘tenet Johannes de episcopo 2 hidas de terra villanorum.’
Ibid. i. 169: ‘unus francigena tenet terram unius villani.’ Ibid. 164: ‘In Sauerna
11 piscariae in dominio et 42 piscariae villanorum.’ Ibid. 230: ‘Silva dominica 1
leu. long. et dim. leu. lat. Silva villanorum 4 quarent. long. et 3 quarent. lat.’
Ibid. 7 b: ‘5 molini villanorum.’ We have not seen dominicum used as a
substantive; but in the Exon. D. B. iv. 75 we have dominicatus Regis, for the
king’s demesne. There is already a slight ambiguity about the term dominium.
We may say that a church has a manor in dominio, meaning thereby that the
manor as a whole is held by the church itself and is not held of it by any tenant;
and then we may go on to say that only one half of the land comprised in this
manor is held by the church in dominio. Cf. Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 126.
[175] For example, D. B. i. 159: ‘Nunc in dominio 3 carucae et 6 servi, et 26
villani cum 3 bordariis et 15 liberi homines habent 30 carucas.’ Ibid. 165: ‘In
dominio 2 carucae et 9 villani et 6 bordarii et presbyter et unus rachenistre cum
10 carucis.’ Ibid. 258 b: ‘et 3 villani et 2 bordarii et 2 francigenae cum 2
carucis.’ But such entries are common enough.
[176] Round, Domesday Studies, i. 97.
[177] D. B. i. 28: ‘Ipse Willelmus de Braiose tenet Wasingetune.... De hac terra
tenet Gislebertus dim. hidam, Radulfus 1 hidam, Willelmus 3 virgas, Leuuinus
dim. hidam qui potuit recedere cum terra sua et dedit geldum domino suo et
dominus suus nichil dedit.’
[178] D. B. i. 163, 163 b.
[179] D. B. i. 121: ‘Omnes superius descriptas terras tenebant T. R. E. S.
Petrocus; huius sancti terrae nunquam reddiderunt geldum nisi ipsi aecclesiae.’
D. B. iv. 187: ‘Terrae S. Petrochi nunquam reddiderunt gildum nisi sancto.’
[180] D. B. ii. 372: ‘Et quando in hundreto solvitur ad geldum 1 libra tunc inde
exeunt 60 denarii ad victum monachorum.’
[181] Cnut, II. 79: ‘And se þe land gewerod hæbbe be scire gewitnisse....’ The
A.-S. werian is just the Latin defendere.
[182] Heming, Cartulary, i. 278; Round, Domesday Studies, i. 89. Compare the
story in D. B. i. 216 b: Osbern or Osbert the fisherman claims certain land as
having belonged to his ‘antecessor’; ‘sed postquam rex Willelmus in Angliam
venit, ille gablum de hac terra dare noluit et Radulfus Taillgebosc gablum dedit
et pro forisfacto ipsam terram sumpsit et cuidam suo militi tribuit.’
[183] D. B. iv. 245, Cruca.
[184] See above p. 54, note 175.
[172] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 344.
[173] Dialogus, i. c. 11.
[174] D. B. i. 67 b: ‘De terra villanorum dedit abbatissa uni militi 3 hidas et
dimidiam.’ Ibid. 89: ‘tenet Johannes de episcopo 2 hidas de terra villanorum.’
Ibid. i. 169: ‘unus francigena tenet terram unius villani.’ Ibid. 164: ‘In Sauerna
11 piscariae in dominio et 42 piscariae villanorum.’ Ibid. 230: ‘Silva dominica 1
leu. long. et dim. leu. lat. Silva villanorum 4 quarent. long. et 3 quarent. lat.’
Ibid. 7 b: ‘5 molini villanorum.’ We have not seen dominicum used as a
substantive; but in the Exon. D. B. iv. 75 we have dominicatus Regis, for the
king’s demesne. There is already a slight ambiguity about the term dominium.
We may say that a church has a manor in dominio, meaning thereby that the
manor as a whole is held by the church itself and is not held of it by any tenant;
and then we may go on to say that only one half of the land comprised in this
manor is held by the church in dominio. Cf. Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 126.
[175] For example, D. B. i. 159: ‘Nunc in dominio 3 carucae et 6 servi, et 26
villani cum 3 bordariis et 15 liberi homines habent 30 carucas.’ Ibid. 165: ‘In
dominio 2 carucae et 9 villani et 6 bordarii et presbyter et unus rachenistre cum
10 carucis.’ Ibid. 258 b: ‘et 3 villani et 2 bordarii et 2 francigenae cum 2
carucis.’ But such entries are common enough.
[176] Round, Domesday Studies, i. 97.
[177] D. B. i. 28: ‘Ipse Willelmus de Braiose tenet Wasingetune.... De hac terra
tenet Gislebertus dim. hidam, Radulfus 1 hidam, Willelmus 3 virgas, Leuuinus
dim. hidam qui potuit recedere cum terra sua et dedit geldum domino suo et
dominus suus nichil dedit.’
[178] D. B. i. 163, 163 b.
[179] D. B. i. 121: ‘Omnes superius descriptas terras tenebant T. R. E. S.
Petrocus; huius sancti terrae nunquam reddiderunt geldum nisi ipsi aecclesiae.’
D. B. iv. 187: ‘Terrae S. Petrochi nunquam reddiderunt gildum nisi sancto.’
[180] D. B. ii. 372: ‘Et quando in hundreto solvitur ad geldum 1 libra tunc inde
exeunt 60 denarii ad victum monachorum.’
[181] Cnut, II. 79: ‘And se þe land gewerod hæbbe be scire gewitnisse....’ The
A.-S. werian is just the Latin defendere.
[182] Heming, Cartulary, i. 278; Round, Domesday Studies, i. 89. Compare the
story in D. B. i. 216 b: Osbern or Osbert the fisherman claims certain land as
having belonged to his ‘antecessor’; ‘sed postquam rex Willelmus in Angliam
venit, ille gablum de hac terra dare noluit et Radulfus Taillgebosc gablum dedit
et pro forisfacto ipsam terram sumpsit et cuidam suo militi tribuit.’
[183] D. B. iv. 245, Cruca.
[184] See above p. 54, note 175.
Page 502
[185] D. B. i. 163: ‘Ibi erant villani 21 et 9 rachenistres habentes 26 carucas et 5
coliberti et unus bordarius cum 5 carucis. Hi rachenistres arabant et herciabant
ad curiam domini.’ Ibid. ‘Ibi 19 liberi homines rachenistres habentes 48 carucas
cum suis hominibus.’ Ibid. 166: ‘De terra huius manerii tenebant radchenistres,
id est liberi homines, T. R. E., qui tamen omnes ad opus domini arabant et
herciabant et falcabant et metebant.’
[186] D. B. i. 186, Ewias.
[187] D. B. i. 180.
[188] D. B. i. 179 b.
[189] D. B. i. 179 b.
[190] D. B. i. 174 b.
[191] D. B. i. 246 b. So the burgesses of Steyning (i. 17) ‘ad curiam operabantur
sicut villani T. R. E.’
[192] D. B. i. 219.
[193] D. B. i. 174 b: ‘Ipsi radmans secabant una die in anno et omne servitium
quod eis iubebatur faciebant.’ The position of these tenants will be discussed
hereafter in connexion with St. Oswald’s charters.
[194] D. B. i. 16 b: ‘De herbagio, unus porcus de unoquoque villano qui habet
septem porcos.’ In the margin stands ‘Similiter per totum Sussex.’
[195] D. B. i. 12 b: ‘Ibi tantum silvae unde exeunt de pasnagio 40 porci aut 54
denarii et unus obolus.’ Ibid. 191 b: ‘De presentacione piscium 12 solidi et 9
denarii.’ Ibid. 117 b: ‘aut unum bovem aut 30 denarios.’
[196] See above p. 56.
[197] D. B. i. 12 b.
[198] D. B. i. 11 b, Hamestede.
[199] D. B. i. 117 b, Colun.
[200] D. B. i. 127, Stibenhede.
[201] D. B. i. 179 b, Lene.
[202] D. B. i. 12 b, Norborne.
[203] D. B. i. 127 b: ‘Wellesdone tenent canonici S. Pauli.... Hoc manerium
tenent villani ad firmam canonicorum. In dominio nil habetur.’
[204] See above p. 36.
[205] This matter will be discussed when we deal with St. Oswald’s charters.
[206] Schmid, p. 263 (note). This document is Dr Liebermann’s Instituta Cnuti
(Trans. Roy. Hist. Soc. vii. 77).
[207] Schmid, App. II. 57–9.
coliberti et unus bordarius cum 5 carucis. Hi rachenistres arabant et herciabant
ad curiam domini.’ Ibid. ‘Ibi 19 liberi homines rachenistres habentes 48 carucas
cum suis hominibus.’ Ibid. 166: ‘De terra huius manerii tenebant radchenistres,
id est liberi homines, T. R. E., qui tamen omnes ad opus domini arabant et
herciabant et falcabant et metebant.’
[186] D. B. i. 186, Ewias.
[187] D. B. i. 180.
[188] D. B. i. 179 b.
[189] D. B. i. 179 b.
[190] D. B. i. 174 b.
[191] D. B. i. 246 b. So the burgesses of Steyning (i. 17) ‘ad curiam operabantur
sicut villani T. R. E.’
[192] D. B. i. 219.
[193] D. B. i. 174 b: ‘Ipsi radmans secabant una die in anno et omne servitium
quod eis iubebatur faciebant.’ The position of these tenants will be discussed
hereafter in connexion with St. Oswald’s charters.
[194] D. B. i. 16 b: ‘De herbagio, unus porcus de unoquoque villano qui habet
septem porcos.’ In the margin stands ‘Similiter per totum Sussex.’
[195] D. B. i. 12 b: ‘Ibi tantum silvae unde exeunt de pasnagio 40 porci aut 54
denarii et unus obolus.’ Ibid. 191 b: ‘De presentacione piscium 12 solidi et 9
denarii.’ Ibid. 117 b: ‘aut unum bovem aut 30 denarios.’
[196] See above p. 56.
[197] D. B. i. 12 b.
[198] D. B. i. 11 b, Hamestede.
[199] D. B. i. 117 b, Colun.
[200] D. B. i. 127, Stibenhede.
[201] D. B. i. 179 b, Lene.
[202] D. B. i. 12 b, Norborne.
[203] D. B. i. 127 b: ‘Wellesdone tenent canonici S. Pauli.... Hoc manerium
tenent villani ad firmam canonicorum. In dominio nil habetur.’
[204] See above p. 36.
[205] This matter will be discussed when we deal with St. Oswald’s charters.
[206] Schmid, p. 263 (note). This document is Dr Liebermann’s Instituta Cnuti
(Trans. Roy. Hist. Soc. vii. 77).
[207] Schmid, App. II. 57–9.
Page 503
[208] For the rest, the word túnesman appears in Edgar IV. 8, 13, in connexion
with provisions against the theft of cattle.
[209] D. B. i. 259, 259 b.
[210] Leg. Will. I. 29.
[211] D. B. ii. 360 b: ‘Hanc terram habet Abbas in vadimonio pro duabus marcis
auri concessu Engelrici quando redimebant Anglici terras suas.’ Sometimes the
Englishman gets back his land as a bedesman: i. 218, ‘Hanc terram tenuit pater
huius hominis et vendere poterit T. R. E. Hanc rex Willelmus in elemosina eidem
concessit’; i. 211, ‘Hanc terram tenuit Avigi et potuit dare cui voluit T. R. E.
Hanc ei postea rex Willelmus concessit et per breve R. Tallebosc commendavit
ut eum servaret’; i. 218 b, a similar case.
[212] Dialogus, i. c. 10; Bracton, f. 7. On both passages see Vinogradoff,
Villainage, p. 121.
[213] D. B. ii. 1: ‘In hoc manerio erat tunc temporis quidam liber homo ... qui
modo effectus est unus de villanis.’
[214] D. B. i. 148 b: ‘In Merse tenet Ailric de Willelmo 4 hidas pro uno
manerio.... Istemet tenuit T. R. E. sed modo tenet ad firmam de Willelmo
graviter et miserabiliter.’
[215] D. B. i. 141: ‘Hanc terram sumpsit Petrus vicecomes de isto sochemanno
Regis Willelmi in manu eiusdem Regis pro forisfactura de gildo Regis se non
reddidisse ut homines sui dicunt. Sed homines de scira non portant vicecomiti
testimonium, quia semper fuit quieta de gildo et de aliis erga Regem quamdiu
tenuit, testante hundret.’
[216] D. B. i. 30: ‘Ricardus de Tonebrige tenet de hoc manerio unam virgatam
cum silva unde abstulit rusticum qui ibi manebat.’
[217] D. B. ii. 282 b: ‘et istam consuetudinem constituit illis Aluricus prepositus
in tempore R. Bigot.’
[218] D. B. ii. 284 b.
[219] D. B. ii. 84 b.
[220] D. B. ii. 353 b: ‘omnes fuerunt confusi.’
[221] D. B. ii. 440 b: ‘sed homines inde fuerunt confusi.’
[222] D. B. i. 65, Aldeborne.
[223] D. B. ii. 18, Berdringas.
[224] D. B. ii. 88 b, Tachesteda.
[225] Ellis, Introduction, ii. 428. We give Ellis’s figures, but think that he has
exaggerated the number of sokemen who were to be found in 1086.
[226] We make considerably more than 900 by counting only those who are
expressly described as sokemen and excluding the many persons who are simply
with provisions against the theft of cattle.
[209] D. B. i. 259, 259 b.
[210] Leg. Will. I. 29.
[211] D. B. ii. 360 b: ‘Hanc terram habet Abbas in vadimonio pro duabus marcis
auri concessu Engelrici quando redimebant Anglici terras suas.’ Sometimes the
Englishman gets back his land as a bedesman: i. 218, ‘Hanc terram tenuit pater
huius hominis et vendere poterit T. R. E. Hanc rex Willelmus in elemosina eidem
concessit’; i. 211, ‘Hanc terram tenuit Avigi et potuit dare cui voluit T. R. E.
Hanc ei postea rex Willelmus concessit et per breve R. Tallebosc commendavit
ut eum servaret’; i. 218 b, a similar case.
[212] Dialogus, i. c. 10; Bracton, f. 7. On both passages see Vinogradoff,
Villainage, p. 121.
[213] D. B. ii. 1: ‘In hoc manerio erat tunc temporis quidam liber homo ... qui
modo effectus est unus de villanis.’
[214] D. B. i. 148 b: ‘In Merse tenet Ailric de Willelmo 4 hidas pro uno
manerio.... Istemet tenuit T. R. E. sed modo tenet ad firmam de Willelmo
graviter et miserabiliter.’
[215] D. B. i. 141: ‘Hanc terram sumpsit Petrus vicecomes de isto sochemanno
Regis Willelmi in manu eiusdem Regis pro forisfactura de gildo Regis se non
reddidisse ut homines sui dicunt. Sed homines de scira non portant vicecomiti
testimonium, quia semper fuit quieta de gildo et de aliis erga Regem quamdiu
tenuit, testante hundret.’
[216] D. B. i. 30: ‘Ricardus de Tonebrige tenet de hoc manerio unam virgatam
cum silva unde abstulit rusticum qui ibi manebat.’
[217] D. B. ii. 282 b: ‘et istam consuetudinem constituit illis Aluricus prepositus
in tempore R. Bigot.’
[218] D. B. ii. 284 b.
[219] D. B. ii. 84 b.
[220] D. B. ii. 353 b: ‘omnes fuerunt confusi.’
[221] D. B. ii. 440 b: ‘sed homines inde fuerunt confusi.’
[222] D. B. i. 65, Aldeborne.
[223] D. B. ii. 18, Berdringas.
[224] D. B. ii. 88 b, Tachesteda.
[225] Ellis, Introduction, ii. 428. We give Ellis’s figures, but think that he has
exaggerated the number of sokemen who were to be found in 1086.
[226] We make considerably more than 900 by counting only those who are
expressly described as sokemen and excluding the many persons who are simply
Page 504
described as homines capable of selling their land.
[227] Hamilton, Inquisitio, 65.
[228] Hamilton, Inquisitio, 77.
[229] Thus e.g. D. B. ii. 87 b: ‘Hidingham tenet Garengerus de Rogero pro 25
acris quas tenuerunt 15 liberi homines T. R. E.’
[230] D. B. i. 31.
[231] D. B. i. 31 b: ‘Et 10 hidas tenebant alodiarii villae.’
[232] D. B. i. 10 b.
[233] D. B. i. 13, Essella.
[234] D. B. i. 24.
[235] D. B. 83, 83 b.
[236] Vinogradoff, Villainage, 89 ff.; Hist. Engl. Law, i. 366 ff.
[237] D. B. i. 189 b.
[238] We shall see hereafter that some of these so-called ‘manors’ are but small
plots and their holders small folk.
[239] See above p. 24.
[240] D. B. i. 128 b, 129, 129 b.
[241] D. B. i. 34, 35 b.
[242] D. B. i. 13.
[243] D. B. ii. 287. There are free men, apparently 120 in number, of whom it is
written: ‘Hii liberi homines qui tempore regis Eduardi pertinebant in soca de
Bercolt, unusquisque gratis dabat preposito per annum 4 tantum denarios, et
reddebat socam sicut lex ferebat, et quando Rogerius Bigot prius habuit
vicecomitatum statuerunt ministri sui quod redderent 15 libras per annum, quod
non faciebant T. R. E. Et quando Robertus Malet habuit vicecomitatum sui
ministri creverunt illos ad 20 libras. Et quando Rogerius Bigot eos rehabuit
dederunt similiter 20 libras. Et modo tenet eos Aluricus Wanz tali consuetudine
qua erant T. R. E.’ This is a rare instance of a reestablishment of the status quo
ante conquestum.
[244] Compare Round, Feudal England, 33.
[245] D. B. ii. 187 b: ‘Ex his non habuit Ailwinus suus antecessor etiam
commendationem.’
[246] D. B. ii. 287: ‘De his hominibus ... non habuit Haroldus etiam
commendationem.’
[247] D. B. ii. 153 b: ‘Unde suus antecessor habuit commendationem tantum.’
Ibid. 154: ‘Alstan liber homo Edrici commend[atione] tantum.’
[227] Hamilton, Inquisitio, 65.
[228] Hamilton, Inquisitio, 77.
[229] Thus e.g. D. B. ii. 87 b: ‘Hidingham tenet Garengerus de Rogero pro 25
acris quas tenuerunt 15 liberi homines T. R. E.’
[230] D. B. i. 31.
[231] D. B. i. 31 b: ‘Et 10 hidas tenebant alodiarii villae.’
[232] D. B. i. 10 b.
[233] D. B. i. 13, Essella.
[234] D. B. i. 24.
[235] D. B. 83, 83 b.
[236] Vinogradoff, Villainage, 89 ff.; Hist. Engl. Law, i. 366 ff.
[237] D. B. i. 189 b.
[238] We shall see hereafter that some of these so-called ‘manors’ are but small
plots and their holders small folk.
[239] See above p. 24.
[240] D. B. i. 128 b, 129, 129 b.
[241] D. B. i. 34, 35 b.
[242] D. B. i. 13.
[243] D. B. ii. 287. There are free men, apparently 120 in number, of whom it is
written: ‘Hii liberi homines qui tempore regis Eduardi pertinebant in soca de
Bercolt, unusquisque gratis dabat preposito per annum 4 tantum denarios, et
reddebat socam sicut lex ferebat, et quando Rogerius Bigot prius habuit
vicecomitatum statuerunt ministri sui quod redderent 15 libras per annum, quod
non faciebant T. R. E. Et quando Robertus Malet habuit vicecomitatum sui
ministri creverunt illos ad 20 libras. Et quando Rogerius Bigot eos rehabuit
dederunt similiter 20 libras. Et modo tenet eos Aluricus Wanz tali consuetudine
qua erant T. R. E.’ This is a rare instance of a reestablishment of the status quo
ante conquestum.
[244] Compare Round, Feudal England, 33.
[245] D. B. ii. 187 b: ‘Ex his non habuit Ailwinus suus antecessor etiam
commendationem.’
[246] D. B. ii. 287: ‘De his hominibus ... non habuit Haroldus etiam
commendationem.’
[247] D. B. ii. 153 b: ‘Unde suus antecessor habuit commendationem tantum.’
Ibid. 154: ‘Alstan liber homo Edrici commend[atione] tantum.’
Page 505
[248] D. B. ii. 161 b.
[249] D. B. ii. 244.
[250] D. B. ii. 6: ‘De predicto sochemano habuit Rad. Piperellus consuetudinem
in unoquoque anno per 3 solidos, set in T. R. E. non habuit eius antecessor nisi
tantum modo commendationem.’
[251] D. B. ii. 171 b: ‘Calumpniatur R. Malet 18 liberos homines, 3
commendatione et alios de omni consuetudine.’
[252] D. B. ii. 250 b: ‘Huic manerio adiacent semper 4 homines de omni
consuetudine et alii 4 ad socham tantum.’
[253] D. B. ii. 356 b.
[254] D. B. ii. 357.
[255] D. B. ii. 353 b.
[256] D. B. ii. 362: ‘set soca remaneret sancto et servitium quicunque terram
emeret.’
[257] D. B. ii. 358.
[258] D. B. i. 58: ‘Pater Tori tenuit T. R. E. et potuit ire quo voluit sed pro sua
defensione se commisit Hermanno episcopo et Tori Osmundo episcopo
similiter.’
[259] D. B. i. 32 b: ‘set pro defensione se cum terra abbatiae summiserunt.’
[260] D. B. ii. 62 b: ‘et T. R. W. effectus est homo Goisfridi sponte sua.’
[261] D. B. i. 36 b: ‘T. R. W. femina quae hanc terram tenebat misit se cum ea in
manu reginae.’ Ibid. 36: ‘Quidam liber homo hanc terram tenens et quo vellet
abire valens commisit se in defensione Walterii pro defensione sua.’
[262] D. B. ii. 172: ‘Hos calumpniatur Drogo de Befrerere pro homagio tantum.’
This seems equivalent to the common ‘commendatione tantum.’ D. B. i. 225 b:
‘fuerunt homines Burred et iccirco G. episcopus clamat hominationem eorum.’
[263] Schmid, App. x.
[264] Æthelst. II. 2.
[265] Also it had declared that every man must have a pledge, and probably the
easiest way of fulfilling this command was to place oneself under a lord who
would put one into a tithing.
[266] Leg. Edw. Conf. 12, § 5; but this is contradicted by Leg. Henr. 87, § 4.
[267] Æthelr. I. 1, § 2; compare Æthelr. III. 3, § 4.
[268] Leg. Hen. 82, § 6; 85, § 2.
[269] D. B. ii. 18 b: ‘inde vocat dominum suum ad tutorem.’ Ibid. 103: ‘vocavit
Ilbodonem ad tutorem et postea non adduxit tutorem.’ Ibid. 31 b: ‘revocat eam
[249] D. B. ii. 244.
[250] D. B. ii. 6: ‘De predicto sochemano habuit Rad. Piperellus consuetudinem
in unoquoque anno per 3 solidos, set in T. R. E. non habuit eius antecessor nisi
tantum modo commendationem.’
[251] D. B. ii. 171 b: ‘Calumpniatur R. Malet 18 liberos homines, 3
commendatione et alios de omni consuetudine.’
[252] D. B. ii. 250 b: ‘Huic manerio adiacent semper 4 homines de omni
consuetudine et alii 4 ad socham tantum.’
[253] D. B. ii. 356 b.
[254] D. B. ii. 357.
[255] D. B. ii. 353 b.
[256] D. B. ii. 362: ‘set soca remaneret sancto et servitium quicunque terram
emeret.’
[257] D. B. ii. 358.
[258] D. B. i. 58: ‘Pater Tori tenuit T. R. E. et potuit ire quo voluit sed pro sua
defensione se commisit Hermanno episcopo et Tori Osmundo episcopo
similiter.’
[259] D. B. i. 32 b: ‘set pro defensione se cum terra abbatiae summiserunt.’
[260] D. B. ii. 62 b: ‘et T. R. W. effectus est homo Goisfridi sponte sua.’
[261] D. B. i. 36 b: ‘T. R. W. femina quae hanc terram tenebat misit se cum ea in
manu reginae.’ Ibid. 36: ‘Quidam liber homo hanc terram tenens et quo vellet
abire valens commisit se in defensione Walterii pro defensione sua.’
[262] D. B. ii. 172: ‘Hos calumpniatur Drogo de Befrerere pro homagio tantum.’
This seems equivalent to the common ‘commendatione tantum.’ D. B. i. 225 b:
‘fuerunt homines Burred et iccirco G. episcopus clamat hominationem eorum.’
[263] Schmid, App. x.
[264] Æthelst. II. 2.
[265] Also it had declared that every man must have a pledge, and probably the
easiest way of fulfilling this command was to place oneself under a lord who
would put one into a tithing.
[266] Leg. Edw. Conf. 12, § 5; but this is contradicted by Leg. Henr. 87, § 4.
[267] Æthelr. I. 1, § 2; compare Æthelr. III. 3, § 4.
[268] Leg. Hen. 82, § 6; 85, § 2.
[269] D. B. ii. 18 b: ‘inde vocat dominum suum ad tutorem.’ Ibid. 103: ‘vocavit
Ilbodonem ad tutorem et postea non adduxit tutorem.’ Ibid. 31 b: ‘revocat eam
Page 506
ad defensorem.’ D. B. i. 141 b: 142: ‘sed Harduinus reclamat Petrum
vicecomitem ad protectorem.’ Ibid. 227 b: ‘et dicit regem suum advocatum
esse.’
[270] D. B. ii. 71 b: ‘Phenge tenet idem Serlo de R[anulfo Piperello] quod tenuit
liber homo ... qui T. R. W. effectus est homo antecessoris Ranulfi Piperelli, set
terram suam sibi non dedit.’ This however is not quite to the point.
[271] D. B. i. 72: ‘Toti emit eam T. R. E. de aecclesia Malmesburiensi ad etatem
trium hominum et infra hunc terminum poterat ire cum ea ad quem vellet
dominum.’
[272] D. B. ii. 57 b: ‘Et haec terra quam modo tenet G. fuit in abbatia de
Berchingis sicuti hundret testatur; set ille qui tenuit hanc terram fuit tantum
modo homo [Leuild] antecessoris Goisfridi et non potuit istam terram mittere in
aliquo loco nisi in abbatia.’
[273] Leg. Hen. 82, § 3.
[274] D. B. ii. 118 b: ‘In burgo [de Tetfort] autem erant 943 burgenses T. R. E.
De his habuit Rex omnem consuetudinem. De istis hominibus erant 36 ita
dominice Regis E. ut non possent esse homines alicuius sine licentia Regis. Alii
omnes poterant esse homines cuiuslibet set semper tamen consuetudeo Regis
remanebat preter herigete.’ Compare D. B. i. 336 b, Stamford: ‘In his custodiis
sunt 72 mansi sochemanorum, qui habent terras suas in dominio, et qui petunt
dominos ubi volunt, super quos Rex nichil aliud habet nisi emendationem
forisfacturae eorum et heriete et theloneum.’ In this case commendation would
not carry the heriot with it.
[275] D. B. ii. 201: ‘Liber homo de 80 acris terrae Almari episcopi et Alwoldi
abbatis commend[atione] tantum, et hic homo erat ita in monasterio quod non
potuit dare terram suam nec vendere.’ See another entry of the same kind on the
same page.
[276] D. B. i. 50 b: ‘Hic Alwinus tenuit hanc terram T. R. E. sub Wigoto pro
tuitione; modo tenet eam sub Milone.’
[277] For example, D. B. ii. 353 b: ‘Hii poterant dare et vendere terram suam T.
R. E. set commend[atio] et soca et saca remanebat S. Edmundo.’
[278] D. B. ii. 182 b: ‘Ulchetel habuit dimidiam commendationem de illo T. R.
E. et de uxore ipsius totam commendationem.’ Ibid. 249 b: ‘Medietas istius
hominis fuit antecessoris Baingnardi commendatione tantum et alia medietas S.
Edmundi cum dimidia terra.’ The contrast between dimidii homines and integri
homines is common enough. See D. B. ii. 309: one man has a sixth and another
five-sixths of a commendation.
[279] D. B. ii. 333 b.
[280] D. B. ii. 125 b.
[281] D. B. i. 58. Tori ‘committed himself for defence’ to Bp. Herman; Tori’s
son has done the same to Osmund, the successor of Herman.
[282] D. B. i. 133: ‘sed pro aliis terris homo archiepiscopi Stigandi fuit.’
vicecomitem ad protectorem.’ Ibid. 227 b: ‘et dicit regem suum advocatum
esse.’
[270] D. B. ii. 71 b: ‘Phenge tenet idem Serlo de R[anulfo Piperello] quod tenuit
liber homo ... qui T. R. W. effectus est homo antecessoris Ranulfi Piperelli, set
terram suam sibi non dedit.’ This however is not quite to the point.
[271] D. B. i. 72: ‘Toti emit eam T. R. E. de aecclesia Malmesburiensi ad etatem
trium hominum et infra hunc terminum poterat ire cum ea ad quem vellet
dominum.’
[272] D. B. ii. 57 b: ‘Et haec terra quam modo tenet G. fuit in abbatia de
Berchingis sicuti hundret testatur; set ille qui tenuit hanc terram fuit tantum
modo homo [Leuild] antecessoris Goisfridi et non potuit istam terram mittere in
aliquo loco nisi in abbatia.’
[273] Leg. Hen. 82, § 3.
[274] D. B. ii. 118 b: ‘In burgo [de Tetfort] autem erant 943 burgenses T. R. E.
De his habuit Rex omnem consuetudinem. De istis hominibus erant 36 ita
dominice Regis E. ut non possent esse homines alicuius sine licentia Regis. Alii
omnes poterant esse homines cuiuslibet set semper tamen consuetudeo Regis
remanebat preter herigete.’ Compare D. B. i. 336 b, Stamford: ‘In his custodiis
sunt 72 mansi sochemanorum, qui habent terras suas in dominio, et qui petunt
dominos ubi volunt, super quos Rex nichil aliud habet nisi emendationem
forisfacturae eorum et heriete et theloneum.’ In this case commendation would
not carry the heriot with it.
[275] D. B. ii. 201: ‘Liber homo de 80 acris terrae Almari episcopi et Alwoldi
abbatis commend[atione] tantum, et hic homo erat ita in monasterio quod non
potuit dare terram suam nec vendere.’ See another entry of the same kind on the
same page.
[276] D. B. i. 50 b: ‘Hic Alwinus tenuit hanc terram T. R. E. sub Wigoto pro
tuitione; modo tenet eam sub Milone.’
[277] For example, D. B. ii. 353 b: ‘Hii poterant dare et vendere terram suam T.
R. E. set commend[atio] et soca et saca remanebat S. Edmundo.’
[278] D. B. ii. 182 b: ‘Ulchetel habuit dimidiam commendationem de illo T. R.
E. et de uxore ipsius totam commendationem.’ Ibid. 249 b: ‘Medietas istius
hominis fuit antecessoris Baingnardi commendatione tantum et alia medietas S.
Edmundi cum dimidia terra.’ The contrast between dimidii homines and integri
homines is common enough. See D. B. ii. 309: one man has a sixth and another
five-sixths of a commendation.
[279] D. B. ii. 333 b.
[280] D. B. ii. 125 b.
[281] D. B. i. 58. Tori ‘committed himself for defence’ to Bp. Herman; Tori’s
son has done the same to Osmund, the successor of Herman.
[282] D. B. i. 133: ‘sed pro aliis terris homo archiepiscopi Stigandi fuit.’
Page 507
[283] On the whole this seems to be the meaning of ‘sub-commendation.’ We
read a good deal of men who were sub-commended to the antecessor of Robert
Malet. This seems to be explained by such an entry as the following (ii. 313 b):
‘Eadric holds two free men who were commended to Eadric, who himself was
commended to (another) Eadric, the antecessor of Robert Malet.’
[284] D. B. i. 45 b: ‘Quidam frater Edrici tenuit tali conventione, quod quamdiu
bene se haberet erga eum [Edricum] tamdiu terram de eo teneret, et si vendere
vellet, non alicui nisi ei de quo tenebat vendere vel dare liceret.’
[285] Cases of life tenancies will be found in D. B. i. 47, Stantune; 67 b,
Newetone; 80, Catesclive; 177 b, Witune; ii. 373, 444 b.
[286] D. B. i. 46 b, 66 b, 72, 175. We shall return to this when in the next essay
we speak of loanland.
[287] D. B. i. 67 b: ‘Hanc terram reddidit sponte sua aecclesiae Hardingus qui in
vita sua per convent[ionem] debebat tenere.’ See also the case in i. 177 b. Again,
ii. 431: ‘terram quam cepit cum uxore sua ... misit in ecclesia concedente
muliere tali conventione quod non potuit vendere nec dare de aecclesia.’ For a
‘recognitio’ see i. 175, Persore.
[288] D. B. i. 57 b.
[289] D. B. i. 149: ‘De his tenuit Aluuid puella 2 hidas ... et de dominica firma
Regis Edwardi habuit ipsa dimidiam hidam quam Godricus vicecomes ei
concessit quamdiu vicecomes esset, ut illa doceret filiam ejus aurifrisium
operari.’
[290] D. B. i. 175: ‘Hanc emit quidam Godricus teinus regis Edwardi vita trium
haeredum et dabat in anno monachis unam firmam pro recognitione.’
[291] D. B. i. 269 b.
[292] See above p. 56. Their tenure will be discussed hereafter in connexion
with St. Oswald’s land-loans.
[293] D. B. ii. 187 b: ‘In Carletuna 27 liberi homines et dimidius sub Olfo
commendatione tantum et soca falde ... 15 liberi homines sub Olfo soca falde et
commendatione tantum.’
[294] D. B. ii. 203 b: ‘In eadem villa 12 homines 6 quorum erant in soca falde et
alii 6 erant liberi.’ Ibid. 361 b: ‘70 liberi ... super hos homines habet et semper
habuit sacam et socam et omnem consuetudinem et ad faldam pertinent omnes
preter 4.’ Ibid. ii. 207: ‘17 liberi homines consueti ad faldam et commendati.’
The term ‘fold-worthy’ occurs in a writ of Edward the Confessor; he gives to St.
Benet of Ramsey soke over such of the men of a certain district as are moot-
worthy, fyrd-worthy, and fold-worthy: Earle, Land Charters, p. 343; Kemble, iv.
p. 208.
[295] In later extents of East Anglian manors the fold-soke plays an important
part. Cart. Rams. iii. 267: ‘R. tenuit unam carucatam terrae cum falda sua pro
octo solidis. A. dabat pro terra sua quadraginta denarios et oves eius erant in
read a good deal of men who were sub-commended to the antecessor of Robert
Malet. This seems to be explained by such an entry as the following (ii. 313 b):
‘Eadric holds two free men who were commended to Eadric, who himself was
commended to (another) Eadric, the antecessor of Robert Malet.’
[284] D. B. i. 45 b: ‘Quidam frater Edrici tenuit tali conventione, quod quamdiu
bene se haberet erga eum [Edricum] tamdiu terram de eo teneret, et si vendere
vellet, non alicui nisi ei de quo tenebat vendere vel dare liceret.’
[285] Cases of life tenancies will be found in D. B. i. 47, Stantune; 67 b,
Newetone; 80, Catesclive; 177 b, Witune; ii. 373, 444 b.
[286] D. B. i. 46 b, 66 b, 72, 175. We shall return to this when in the next essay
we speak of loanland.
[287] D. B. i. 67 b: ‘Hanc terram reddidit sponte sua aecclesiae Hardingus qui in
vita sua per convent[ionem] debebat tenere.’ See also the case in i. 177 b. Again,
ii. 431: ‘terram quam cepit cum uxore sua ... misit in ecclesia concedente
muliere tali conventione quod non potuit vendere nec dare de aecclesia.’ For a
‘recognitio’ see i. 175, Persore.
[288] D. B. i. 57 b.
[289] D. B. i. 149: ‘De his tenuit Aluuid puella 2 hidas ... et de dominica firma
Regis Edwardi habuit ipsa dimidiam hidam quam Godricus vicecomes ei
concessit quamdiu vicecomes esset, ut illa doceret filiam ejus aurifrisium
operari.’
[290] D. B. i. 175: ‘Hanc emit quidam Godricus teinus regis Edwardi vita trium
haeredum et dabat in anno monachis unam firmam pro recognitione.’
[291] D. B. i. 269 b.
[292] See above p. 56. Their tenure will be discussed hereafter in connexion
with St. Oswald’s land-loans.
[293] D. B. ii. 187 b: ‘In Carletuna 27 liberi homines et dimidius sub Olfo
commendatione tantum et soca falde ... 15 liberi homines sub Olfo soca falde et
commendatione tantum.’
[294] D. B. ii. 203 b: ‘In eadem villa 12 homines 6 quorum erant in soca falde et
alii 6 erant liberi.’ Ibid. 361 b: ‘70 liberi ... super hos homines habet et semper
habuit sacam et socam et omnem consuetudinem et ad faldam pertinent omnes
preter 4.’ Ibid. ii. 207: ‘17 liberi homines consueti ad faldam et commendati.’
The term ‘fold-worthy’ occurs in a writ of Edward the Confessor; he gives to St.
Benet of Ramsey soke over such of the men of a certain district as are moot-
worthy, fyrd-worthy, and fold-worthy: Earle, Land Charters, p. 343; Kemble, iv.
p. 208.
[295] In later extents of East Anglian manors the fold-soke plays an important
part. Cart. Rams. iii. 267: ‘R. tenuit unam carucatam terrae cum falda sua pro
octo solidis. A. dabat pro terra sua quadraginta denarios et oves eius erant in
Page 508
falda Abbatis.... H. triginta acras pro quatuor solidis et oves eius sunt in manu
domini....’
[296] See the document printed by Hamilton at the end of the Inquisitio Com.
Cantabr. p. 192. ‘Isti solummodo arabunt et contererent messes eiusdem loci
quotienscunque abbas preceperit....’ ‘Ita proprie sunt abbati ut quotienscunque
ipse preceperit in anno arabunt suam terram, purgabunt et colligent segetes,
portabunt victum monachorum ad monasterium, equos eorum in suis
necessitatibus semper habebit.’ For more of this matter see Round, Feudal
England, 30.
[297] D. B. i. 141: there are four sokemen who are men of Æthelmær and who
can not sell their land without his consent; but they are under the king’s sake and
soke and jointly provide the sheriff with one avera every year or four pence.
[298] D. B. i. 249: ‘Haec terra fuit consuetudinaria solummodo de theloneo regis
sed aliam socam habebat.’
[299] D. B. ii. 273 b: ‘In eadem 8 consuetudinarii ad faldam sui antecessoris.’
Ibid. 215: ‘8 homines consuetudinarios ad hoc manerium.’
[300] D. B. i. 280: ‘Duae partes Regis et tercia comitis de censu et theloneo et
forisfactura et de omni consuetudine.’ Ibid. 42: ‘Unam aecclesiam et 6 capellas
cum omni consuetudine vivorum et mortuorum.’
[301] D. B. i. 10 b: ‘et sunt quieti pro servitio maris ab omni consuetudine preter
tribus, latrocinio, pace infracta, et forestel.’
[302] D. B. i. 61 b: ‘solutam ab omni consuetudine propter forestam
custodiendam excepta forisfactura Regis, sicut est latrocinium, et homicidium, et
heinfara, et fracta pax.’
[303] D. B. i. 52: ‘Hi infrascripti habent in Hantone consuetud[ines] domorum
suarum.’ Ibid. 249: ‘Haec terra fuit consuetudinaria solummodo de theloneo
Regis sed socam aliam habebat.’
[304] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 558. The terms here used were adopted when the
Introduction to the Selden Society’s Select Pleas in Manorial Courts (1888) was
being written. M. Esmein in his Cours d’histoire du droit français, ed. 2 (1895),
p. 259, has insisted on the same distinction but has used other and perhaps apter
terms. According to him ‘la justice rendue par les seigneurs’ (my seignorial
justice) is either ‘la justice seigneuriale’ (my franchisal justice) or ‘la justice
féodale’ (my feudal justice).
[305] See Liebermann, Leges Edwardi, p. 88.
[306] Leg. Hen. 9, § 9.
[307] Leg. Henr. 20 § 2.
[308] Leg. Henr. 27.
[309] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 532.
[310] Leg. Henr. 57 § 8. Cf. 59 § 19.
domini....’
[296] See the document printed by Hamilton at the end of the Inquisitio Com.
Cantabr. p. 192. ‘Isti solummodo arabunt et contererent messes eiusdem loci
quotienscunque abbas preceperit....’ ‘Ita proprie sunt abbati ut quotienscunque
ipse preceperit in anno arabunt suam terram, purgabunt et colligent segetes,
portabunt victum monachorum ad monasterium, equos eorum in suis
necessitatibus semper habebit.’ For more of this matter see Round, Feudal
England, 30.
[297] D. B. i. 141: there are four sokemen who are men of Æthelmær and who
can not sell their land without his consent; but they are under the king’s sake and
soke and jointly provide the sheriff with one avera every year or four pence.
[298] D. B. i. 249: ‘Haec terra fuit consuetudinaria solummodo de theloneo regis
sed aliam socam habebat.’
[299] D. B. ii. 273 b: ‘In eadem 8 consuetudinarii ad faldam sui antecessoris.’
Ibid. 215: ‘8 homines consuetudinarios ad hoc manerium.’
[300] D. B. i. 280: ‘Duae partes Regis et tercia comitis de censu et theloneo et
forisfactura et de omni consuetudine.’ Ibid. 42: ‘Unam aecclesiam et 6 capellas
cum omni consuetudine vivorum et mortuorum.’
[301] D. B. i. 10 b: ‘et sunt quieti pro servitio maris ab omni consuetudine preter
tribus, latrocinio, pace infracta, et forestel.’
[302] D. B. i. 61 b: ‘solutam ab omni consuetudine propter forestam
custodiendam excepta forisfactura Regis, sicut est latrocinium, et homicidium, et
heinfara, et fracta pax.’
[303] D. B. i. 52: ‘Hi infrascripti habent in Hantone consuetud[ines] domorum
suarum.’ Ibid. 249: ‘Haec terra fuit consuetudinaria solummodo de theloneo
Regis sed socam aliam habebat.’
[304] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 558. The terms here used were adopted when the
Introduction to the Selden Society’s Select Pleas in Manorial Courts (1888) was
being written. M. Esmein in his Cours d’histoire du droit français, ed. 2 (1895),
p. 259, has insisted on the same distinction but has used other and perhaps apter
terms. According to him ‘la justice rendue par les seigneurs’ (my seignorial
justice) is either ‘la justice seigneuriale’ (my franchisal justice) or ‘la justice
féodale’ (my feudal justice).
[305] See Liebermann, Leges Edwardi, p. 88.
[306] Leg. Hen. 9, § 9.
[307] Leg. Henr. 20 § 2.
[308] Leg. Henr. 27.
[309] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 532.
[310] Leg. Henr. 57 § 8. Cf. 59 § 19.
Page 509
[311] Leg. Henr. 55.
[312] Leg. Henr. 10 § 1.
[313] Leg. Henr. 11 § 1. This explains the ‘participatio’ of 9 § 9.
[314] Leg. Henr. 19.
[315] Leg. Henr. 20 § 2.
[316] Leg. Henr. 9 § 4; 20 § 2; 57 § 8; 78 § 2.
[317] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 574.
[318] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 571.
[319] See e.g. Geoffrey Clinton for Kenilworth, Monast. vi. 221: ‘Concedo ... ut
habeant curiam suam ... ita libere ... sicut ego meam curiam ... ex concessu regis
melius et firmius habeo.’ Robert of Ouilly for Osney, ibid. p. 251: ‘Volo ... quod
habeant curiam ipsorum liberam de suis hominibus de omnimodis
transgressionibus et defaltis, et quieti sint tam ipsi quam eorum tenentes de
omnimodis curiae meae sectis.’
[320] See Liebermann, Leg. Edw. p. 91.
[321] Thus in D.B. ii. 409 we find two successive entries, the ‘in saca regis et
comitis’ of the one, being to all seeming an equivalent for the ‘in soca regis et
comitis’ of the other. D. B. ii. 416: ‘de omnibus habuit antecessor Rannulfi
commendationem et sacam excepto uno qui est in soca S. Edmundi.’ Ibid. ii. 391
b: ‘liberi homines Wisgari cum saca ... liber homo ... sub Witgaro cum soca.’ In
the Inquisitio Eliensis (e.g. Hamilton, p. 109) saca is sometimes used instead of
soca in the common formula ‘sed soca remansit abbati.’ In D. B. ii. 264 b, a
scribe having written ‘sed habet sacam’ has afterwards substituted an o for the a;
we have noted no other instance of such care.
[322] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 566.
[323] D. B. i. 184, Ewias.
[324] Leg. Henr. 20 § 1. The author of Leg. Edw. Conf., c. 22, also attempts to
connect soke with seeking, but his words are exceedingly obscure: ‘Soche est
quod si aliquis quaerit aliquid in terra sua, etiam furtum, sua est iustitia, si
inventum sit an non.’ On the whole we take this nonsense to mean that my right
of soke is my right to do justice in case any one seeks (by way of legal
proceedings) anything in my land, even though the accusation that he brings be
one of theft, and even though the stolen goods have not been found on the thief.
Already the word is a prey to the etymologist.
[325] D. B. ii. 256.
[326] Heming Cart. i. 75–6: ‘quod illae 15 hidae inste pertinent ad
Osuualdeslaue hundredum episcopi et debent cum ipso episcopo censum regis
solvere et omnia alia servitia ad regem pertinentia et inde idem requirere ad
placitandum.’ Another account of the same transaction, ibid. 77, says ‘et
[episcopus] deraciocinavit socam et sacam de Hamtona ad suum hundred
[312] Leg. Henr. 10 § 1.
[313] Leg. Henr. 11 § 1. This explains the ‘participatio’ of 9 § 9.
[314] Leg. Henr. 19.
[315] Leg. Henr. 20 § 2.
[316] Leg. Henr. 9 § 4; 20 § 2; 57 § 8; 78 § 2.
[317] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 574.
[318] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 571.
[319] See e.g. Geoffrey Clinton for Kenilworth, Monast. vi. 221: ‘Concedo ... ut
habeant curiam suam ... ita libere ... sicut ego meam curiam ... ex concessu regis
melius et firmius habeo.’ Robert of Ouilly for Osney, ibid. p. 251: ‘Volo ... quod
habeant curiam ipsorum liberam de suis hominibus de omnimodis
transgressionibus et defaltis, et quieti sint tam ipsi quam eorum tenentes de
omnimodis curiae meae sectis.’
[320] See Liebermann, Leg. Edw. p. 91.
[321] Thus in D.B. ii. 409 we find two successive entries, the ‘in saca regis et
comitis’ of the one, being to all seeming an equivalent for the ‘in soca regis et
comitis’ of the other. D. B. ii. 416: ‘de omnibus habuit antecessor Rannulfi
commendationem et sacam excepto uno qui est in soca S. Edmundi.’ Ibid. ii. 391
b: ‘liberi homines Wisgari cum saca ... liber homo ... sub Witgaro cum soca.’ In
the Inquisitio Eliensis (e.g. Hamilton, p. 109) saca is sometimes used instead of
soca in the common formula ‘sed soca remansit abbati.’ In D. B. ii. 264 b, a
scribe having written ‘sed habet sacam’ has afterwards substituted an o for the a;
we have noted no other instance of such care.
[322] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 566.
[323] D. B. i. 184, Ewias.
[324] Leg. Henr. 20 § 1. The author of Leg. Edw. Conf., c. 22, also attempts to
connect soke with seeking, but his words are exceedingly obscure: ‘Soche est
quod si aliquis quaerit aliquid in terra sua, etiam furtum, sua est iustitia, si
inventum sit an non.’ On the whole we take this nonsense to mean that my right
of soke is my right to do justice in case any one seeks (by way of legal
proceedings) anything in my land, even though the accusation that he brings be
one of theft, and even though the stolen goods have not been found on the thief.
Already the word is a prey to the etymologist.
[325] D. B. ii. 256.
[326] Heming Cart. i. 75–6: ‘quod illae 15 hidae inste pertinent ad
Osuualdeslaue hundredum episcopi et debent cum ipso episcopo censum regis
solvere et omnia alia servitia ad regem pertinentia et inde idem requirere ad
placitandum.’ Another account of the same transaction, ibid. 77, says ‘et
[episcopus] deraciocinavit socam et sacam de Hamtona ad suum hundred
Page 510
Osuualdeslauue quod ibi debent placitare et geldum et expeditionem et cetera
legis servitia de illis 15 hidis secum debent persolvere.’
[327] Schmid, Glossar. s. v. sócen. The word, it would seem, first makes its way
into the vocabulary of the law as describing the act of seeking a sanctuary and
the protection that a criminal gains by that act. A forged charter of Edgar for
Thorney Abbey, Red Book of Thorney, Camb. Univ. Lib., f. 4, says that the word
is a Danish word—‘Regi vero pro consensu et eiusdem mercimonii licentia ac
pro reatus emendatione quam Dani socne nsitato nominant vocabulo, centum
dedit splendidissimi auri mancusas.’
[328] Leg. Henr. 9 § 4.
[329] Ibid.
[330] Ibid. 22.
[331] Ibid. 20 § 3.
[332] Ibid. 24.
[333] Selden’s Eadmer, p. 197; Bigelow, Placita Anglo-Norman. p. 7.
[334] D. B. i. 238 b, Alvestone.
[335] Cnut, II. 12. We may construe these terms by breach of the king’s special
peace, attacks on houses, ambush, neglect of the summons to the host. In
Hereford, D. B. i. 179, the king is accounted to have three pleas, breach of his
peace, hámfare, which is the same as hámsócn, and forsteal; and besides this he
receives the penalty from a man who makes default in military service.
[336] D. B. i. 298 b.
[337] D. B. i. 87 b: ‘Istae consuetudines pertinent ad Tantone, burgheristh,
latrones, pacis infractio, hainfare, denarii de hundret, et denarii S. Petri; ter in
anno teneri placita episcopi sine ammonitione; profectio in exercitum cum
hominibus episcopi.’ See also the English document, Kemble, Cod. Dipl. iv. p.
233. The odd word burgheristh looks like a corrupt form of burhgrið (the peace
of the burh), or of burhgerihta (burh-rights, borough-dues), which word occurs
in the English document.
[338] D. B. i. 172, 175.
[339] Cnut II. 12, 13, 14. Perhaps when in other parts of England the pleas of the
crown are reckoned to be but four, it is treated as self-evident that the outlaw
falls into the king’s hand, as also the man who harbours an outlaw. If fihtwíte is
the right word, we must suppose with Schmid (p. 586) that a fihtwíte was only
paid when there was homicide. A fine for mere fighting or drawing blood would
not have been a reserved plea.
[340] D. B. ii. 179 b: ‘Et iste Withri habebat sacham et socam super istam terram
et rex et comes 6 forisfacturas.’ Ibid. 223: ‘In Cheiunchala soca de 6
forisfacturis.’
legis servitia de illis 15 hidis secum debent persolvere.’
[327] Schmid, Glossar. s. v. sócen. The word, it would seem, first makes its way
into the vocabulary of the law as describing the act of seeking a sanctuary and
the protection that a criminal gains by that act. A forged charter of Edgar for
Thorney Abbey, Red Book of Thorney, Camb. Univ. Lib., f. 4, says that the word
is a Danish word—‘Regi vero pro consensu et eiusdem mercimonii licentia ac
pro reatus emendatione quam Dani socne nsitato nominant vocabulo, centum
dedit splendidissimi auri mancusas.’
[328] Leg. Henr. 9 § 4.
[329] Ibid.
[330] Ibid. 22.
[331] Ibid. 20 § 3.
[332] Ibid. 24.
[333] Selden’s Eadmer, p. 197; Bigelow, Placita Anglo-Norman. p. 7.
[334] D. B. i. 238 b, Alvestone.
[335] Cnut, II. 12. We may construe these terms by breach of the king’s special
peace, attacks on houses, ambush, neglect of the summons to the host. In
Hereford, D. B. i. 179, the king is accounted to have three pleas, breach of his
peace, hámfare, which is the same as hámsócn, and forsteal; and besides this he
receives the penalty from a man who makes default in military service.
[336] D. B. i. 298 b.
[337] D. B. i. 87 b: ‘Istae consuetudines pertinent ad Tantone, burgheristh,
latrones, pacis infractio, hainfare, denarii de hundret, et denarii S. Petri; ter in
anno teneri placita episcopi sine ammonitione; profectio in exercitum cum
hominibus episcopi.’ See also the English document, Kemble, Cod. Dipl. iv. p.
233. The odd word burgheristh looks like a corrupt form of burhgrið (the peace
of the burh), or of burhgerihta (burh-rights, borough-dues), which word occurs
in the English document.
[338] D. B. i. 172, 175.
[339] Cnut II. 12, 13, 14. Perhaps when in other parts of England the pleas of the
crown are reckoned to be but four, it is treated as self-evident that the outlaw
falls into the king’s hand, as also the man who harbours an outlaw. If fihtwíte is
the right word, we must suppose with Schmid (p. 586) that a fihtwíte was only
paid when there was homicide. A fine for mere fighting or drawing blood would
not have been a reserved plea.
[340] D. B. ii. 179 b: ‘Et iste Withri habebat sacham et socam super istam terram
et rex et comes 6 forisfacturas.’ Ibid. 223: ‘In Cheiunchala soca de 6
forisfacturis.’
Page 511
[341] D. B. ii. 413 b: ‘socam et sacam praeter 6 forisfacturas S. Eadmundi.’ Ibid.
373: ‘S. Eadmundus 6 forisfacturas.’ Ibid. 384 b: ‘Tota hec terra iacebat in
dominio Abbatiae [de Eli] T. R. E. cum omni consuetudine praeter sex
forisfacturas S. Eadmundi.’
[342] D. B. ii. 244: ‘sex liberi homines ... ex his habet S. Benedictus socam et de
uno commendationem et de 24 tres forisfacturas.’
[343] D. B. i. 336 b: ‘praeter geld et heriete et forisfacturam corporum suorum
de 40 oris argenti et praeter latronem.’ Such a phrase as ‘geld, heriot and thief’ is
instructive.
[344] D. B. i. 4 b.
[345] William I. for Ely, Hamilton, Inquisitio, p. xviii.: ‘omnes alias forisfacturas
quae emendabiles sunt.’
[346] D. B. ii. 195: ‘Super hos habuit T. R. E. Episcopus 6 forisfacturas sed
hundret nec vidit breve nec sigillum nec concessum Regis.’
[347] D. B. ii. 34 b.
[348] See e.g. D. B. i. 220.
[349] D. B. i. 336: ‘Rogerius de Busli habet unum mansum Sueni filii Suaue
cum saca et soca. Judita comitissa habet unum mansum Stori sine saca et soca.’
[350] D. B. i. 2.
[351] D. B. i. 1 b.
[352] D. B. i. 337.
[353] D. B. i. 280 b.
[354] D. B. ii. 185: ‘Super omnes liberos istius hundreti [de Northerpingeham]
habet Rex sacam et socam.’ Ibid. 188 b: ‘Rex et comes de omnibus istis liberis
hominibus socam.’ Ibid. 203: ‘Et de omnibus his liberis [Episcopi Osberni] soca
in hundreto.’
[355] D. B. ii. 210: ‘Super omnes istos liberos homines habuit Rex Eadwardus
socam et sacam, et postea Guert accepit per vim, sed Rex Willelmus dedit [S.
Eadmundo] cum manerio socam et sacam de omnibus liberis Guert sicut ipse
tenebat; hoc reclamant monachi.’
[356] Below, p. 105.
[357] D. B. ii. 425 b.
[358] D. B. ii. 287, 287 b: ‘Sanfort Hund. et dim.... Supradictum manerium
scilicet Bercolt ... cum soca de hundreto et dimidio reddebat T. R. E. 24 lib.’ On
subsequent pages it is often said that the soke of certain persons or lands is in
Bergholt.
[359] D. B. ii. 408 b: ‘Hagala tenuit Gutmundus sub Rege Edwardo pro manerio
8 car[ucatarum] terrae cum soca et saca super dominium hallae tantum. Tunc 32
373: ‘S. Eadmundus 6 forisfacturas.’ Ibid. 384 b: ‘Tota hec terra iacebat in
dominio Abbatiae [de Eli] T. R. E. cum omni consuetudine praeter sex
forisfacturas S. Eadmundi.’
[342] D. B. ii. 244: ‘sex liberi homines ... ex his habet S. Benedictus socam et de
uno commendationem et de 24 tres forisfacturas.’
[343] D. B. i. 336 b: ‘praeter geld et heriete et forisfacturam corporum suorum
de 40 oris argenti et praeter latronem.’ Such a phrase as ‘geld, heriot and thief’ is
instructive.
[344] D. B. i. 4 b.
[345] William I. for Ely, Hamilton, Inquisitio, p. xviii.: ‘omnes alias forisfacturas
quae emendabiles sunt.’
[346] D. B. ii. 195: ‘Super hos habuit T. R. E. Episcopus 6 forisfacturas sed
hundret nec vidit breve nec sigillum nec concessum Regis.’
[347] D. B. ii. 34 b.
[348] See e.g. D. B. i. 220.
[349] D. B. i. 336: ‘Rogerius de Busli habet unum mansum Sueni filii Suaue
cum saca et soca. Judita comitissa habet unum mansum Stori sine saca et soca.’
[350] D. B. i. 2.
[351] D. B. i. 1 b.
[352] D. B. i. 337.
[353] D. B. i. 280 b.
[354] D. B. ii. 185: ‘Super omnes liberos istius hundreti [de Northerpingeham]
habet Rex sacam et socam.’ Ibid. 188 b: ‘Rex et comes de omnibus istis liberis
hominibus socam.’ Ibid. 203: ‘Et de omnibus his liberis [Episcopi Osberni] soca
in hundreto.’
[355] D. B. ii. 210: ‘Super omnes istos liberos homines habuit Rex Eadwardus
socam et sacam, et postea Guert accepit per vim, sed Rex Willelmus dedit [S.
Eadmundo] cum manerio socam et sacam de omnibus liberis Guert sicut ipse
tenebat; hoc reclamant monachi.’
[356] Below, p. 105.
[357] D. B. ii. 425 b.
[358] D. B. ii. 287, 287 b: ‘Sanfort Hund. et dim.... Supradictum manerium
scilicet Bercolt ... cum soca de hundreto et dimidio reddebat T. R. E. 24 lib.’ On
subsequent pages it is often said that the soke of certain persons or lands is in
Bergholt.
[359] D. B. ii. 408 b: ‘Hagala tenuit Gutmundus sub Rege Edwardo pro manerio
8 car[ucatarum] terrae cum soca et saca super dominium hallae tantum. Tunc 32
Page 512
villani ... 8 bordarii ... 10 servi. Semper 4 carucae in dominio. Tunc et post 24
carucae hominum.... Sex sochemanni eiusdem Gutmundi de quibus soca est in
hundreto.’
[360] D. B. ii. 216: ‘De Redeham habebat Abbas socam super hos qui
sequebantur faldam, et de aliis soca in hundreto.’ Ibid. 129 b: ‘Super omnes istos
qui faldam Comitis requirebant habebat Comes socam et sacam, super alios
omnes Rex et Comes.’ Ibid. 194 b: ‘In Begetuna tenuit Episcopus Almarus per
emptionem T. R. E. cum soca et saca de Comite Algaro de bor[dariis] et
sequentibus faldam 3 carucatas terrae.’ Ibid. 350 b: ‘habebat socam et sacam
super hallam et bordarios.’
[361] D. B. ii. 130 b.
[362] D. B. i. 265 b: ‘Hoc manerium habet suum placitum in aula domini sui.’
[363] Above, p. 88.
[364] D. B. ii. 385 b.
[365] D. B. ii. 46 b.
[366] D. B. i. 283 b.
[367] D. B. i. 11 b.; Chron. de Bello (Anglia Christiana Soc.) p. 28; Battle
Custumals (Camd. Soc.), p. 126.
[368] D. B. i. 154 b.
[369] D. B. 39 b, Hants: ‘Huic manerio pertinet soca duorum hundredorum.’
Ibid. 64 b, Wilts: ‘In hac firma erant placita hundretorum de Cicementone et
Sutelesberg quae regi pertinebant.’ Ibid. ii. 185: ‘Super omnes liberos istius
hundreti habet rex sacam et socam.’ Ibid. ii. 113 b.: ‘Soca et sacha de Grenehou
hundreto pertinet ad Wistune manerium Regis, quicunque ibi teneat, et habent
Rex et Comes.’
[370] See above, note 367.
[371] Above, p. 88.
[372] D. B. ii. 379: ‘Super ferting de Almeham habet W. Episcopus socam et
sacam.’
[373] D. B. i. 184: ‘Haec terra non pertinet ... ad hundredum. De hac terra habet
Rogerius 15 sextarios mellis et 15 porcos quando homines sunt ibi et placita
super eos.’
[374] D. B. ii. 139 b.
[375] D. B. ii. 114.
[376] D. B. i. 340, 346, 357 b, 366, 368 b (ter). See also on f. 344, 344 b, the
symbol fð in the margin. The word friðsócn occurs in Æthelr. VIII. 1 and Cnut I.
2 § 3, where it seems to stand for a sanctuary, an asylum.
carucae hominum.... Sex sochemanni eiusdem Gutmundi de quibus soca est in
hundreto.’
[360] D. B. ii. 216: ‘De Redeham habebat Abbas socam super hos qui
sequebantur faldam, et de aliis soca in hundreto.’ Ibid. 129 b: ‘Super omnes istos
qui faldam Comitis requirebant habebat Comes socam et sacam, super alios
omnes Rex et Comes.’ Ibid. 194 b: ‘In Begetuna tenuit Episcopus Almarus per
emptionem T. R. E. cum soca et saca de Comite Algaro de bor[dariis] et
sequentibus faldam 3 carucatas terrae.’ Ibid. 350 b: ‘habebat socam et sacam
super hallam et bordarios.’
[361] D. B. ii. 130 b.
[362] D. B. i. 265 b: ‘Hoc manerium habet suum placitum in aula domini sui.’
[363] Above, p. 88.
[364] D. B. ii. 385 b.
[365] D. B. ii. 46 b.
[366] D. B. i. 283 b.
[367] D. B. i. 11 b.; Chron. de Bello (Anglia Christiana Soc.) p. 28; Battle
Custumals (Camd. Soc.), p. 126.
[368] D. B. i. 154 b.
[369] D. B. 39 b, Hants: ‘Huic manerio pertinet soca duorum hundredorum.’
Ibid. 64 b, Wilts: ‘In hac firma erant placita hundretorum de Cicementone et
Sutelesberg quae regi pertinebant.’ Ibid. ii. 185: ‘Super omnes liberos istius
hundreti habet rex sacam et socam.’ Ibid. ii. 113 b.: ‘Soca et sacha de Grenehou
hundreto pertinet ad Wistune manerium Regis, quicunque ibi teneat, et habent
Rex et Comes.’
[370] See above, note 367.
[371] Above, p. 88.
[372] D. B. ii. 379: ‘Super ferting de Almeham habet W. Episcopus socam et
sacam.’
[373] D. B. i. 184: ‘Haec terra non pertinet ... ad hundredum. De hac terra habet
Rogerius 15 sextarios mellis et 15 porcos quando homines sunt ibi et placita
super eos.’
[374] D. B. ii. 139 b.
[375] D. B. ii. 114.
[376] D. B. i. 340, 346, 357 b, 366, 368 b (ter). See also on f. 344, 344 b, the
symbol fð in the margin. The word friðsócn occurs in Æthelr. VIII. 1 and Cnut I.
2 § 3, where it seems to stand for a sanctuary, an asylum.
Page 513
[377] If one of A’s tenants is sued in a personal action in the hundred court he
will have to answer there unless A appears and ‘claims his court.’ This comes out
plainly in certain rolls of the court of Wisbeach Hundred, which by the kind
permission of the Bishop of Ely, I have examined. On a roll of 33 Edw. I. we
find Stephen Hamond sued for a debt; ‘et super hoc venit Prior Elyensis et petit
curiam suam; et Thomas Doreward petit curiam suam de dicto Stephano
residente suo et tenente suo.’ The prior’s petition is refused on the ground that
Stephen is not his tenant, and Doreward’s petition is refused on the ground that it
is unprecedented.
[378] D. B. ii. 291: ‘Et fuit in soca Regis. Postquam Briennus habuit, nullam
consuetudinem reddidit in hundreto.’ Ibid. 240: ‘Hoc totum tenuit Lisius pro uno
manerio; modo tenet Eudo successor illius et in T. R. E. soca et saca fuit in
hundreto; set modo tenet Eudo.’—Ibid. 240 b: ‘Soca istius terre T. R. E. iacuit in
Folsa Regis; modo habet Walterius [Giffardus].’—Ibid. 285 b: the hundred
testified that in truth the King and Earl had the soke and sake in the Confessor’s
day, but the men of the vill say that Burchard likewise (similiter) had the soke of
his free men as well as of his villeins.
[379] D. B. i. 35 b: ‘Duo fratres tenuerunt T. R. E.; unusquisque habuit domum
suam et tamen manserunt in una curia.’ Ibid. 103 b: ‘Ibi molendinum serviens
curiae.’ Ibid. 103: ‘arabant et herciabant ad curiam domini.’
[380] D. B. i. 87 b. Kemble, Cod. Dip., iv. p. 233: ‘and þriwa secan gemot on 12
monðum.’
[381] D. B. i. 193 b; Hamilton, Inquisitio, 77–8.
[382] D. B. i. 75.
[383] D. B. i. 238.
[384] D. B. i. 186.
[385] D. B. i. 38 b.
[386] D. B. i. 101.
[387] D. B. i. 280 b: ‘Hic notantur qui habuerunt socam et sacam et thol et thaim
et consuetudinem Regis 2 denariorum.... Horum omnium nemo habere potuit
tercium denarium comitis nisi eius concessu et hoc quamdiu viveret, preter
Archiepiscopum et Ulf Ferisc et Godeue Comitissam.’
[388] See above, p. 92, note 367.
[389] D. B. ii. 123 b: ‘De istis est soca in hundreto ad tercium denarium.’
[390] D. B. ii. 282.
[391] D. B. ii. 312: ‘Rex habet in Duneuuic consuetudinem hanc quod duo vel
tres ibunt ad hundret si recte moniti fuerint, et si hoc non faciunt, forisfacti sunt
de 2 oris, et si latro ibi fuerit captus ibi judicabitur, et corporalis iusticia in
Blieburc capietur, et sua pecunia remanebit dominio de Duneuuic.’ It seems to
us that the first ibi must refer to Dunwich and therefore that the second does so
likewise. Still the passage is ambiguous enough.
will have to answer there unless A appears and ‘claims his court.’ This comes out
plainly in certain rolls of the court of Wisbeach Hundred, which by the kind
permission of the Bishop of Ely, I have examined. On a roll of 33 Edw. I. we
find Stephen Hamond sued for a debt; ‘et super hoc venit Prior Elyensis et petit
curiam suam; et Thomas Doreward petit curiam suam de dicto Stephano
residente suo et tenente suo.’ The prior’s petition is refused on the ground that
Stephen is not his tenant, and Doreward’s petition is refused on the ground that it
is unprecedented.
[378] D. B. ii. 291: ‘Et fuit in soca Regis. Postquam Briennus habuit, nullam
consuetudinem reddidit in hundreto.’ Ibid. 240: ‘Hoc totum tenuit Lisius pro uno
manerio; modo tenet Eudo successor illius et in T. R. E. soca et saca fuit in
hundreto; set modo tenet Eudo.’—Ibid. 240 b: ‘Soca istius terre T. R. E. iacuit in
Folsa Regis; modo habet Walterius [Giffardus].’—Ibid. 285 b: the hundred
testified that in truth the King and Earl had the soke and sake in the Confessor’s
day, but the men of the vill say that Burchard likewise (similiter) had the soke of
his free men as well as of his villeins.
[379] D. B. i. 35 b: ‘Duo fratres tenuerunt T. R. E.; unusquisque habuit domum
suam et tamen manserunt in una curia.’ Ibid. 103 b: ‘Ibi molendinum serviens
curiae.’ Ibid. 103: ‘arabant et herciabant ad curiam domini.’
[380] D. B. i. 87 b. Kemble, Cod. Dip., iv. p. 233: ‘and þriwa secan gemot on 12
monðum.’
[381] D. B. i. 193 b; Hamilton, Inquisitio, 77–8.
[382] D. B. i. 75.
[383] D. B. i. 238.
[384] D. B. i. 186.
[385] D. B. i. 38 b.
[386] D. B. i. 101.
[387] D. B. i. 280 b: ‘Hic notantur qui habuerunt socam et sacam et thol et thaim
et consuetudinem Regis 2 denariorum.... Horum omnium nemo habere potuit
tercium denarium comitis nisi eius concessu et hoc quamdiu viveret, preter
Archiepiscopum et Ulf Ferisc et Godeue Comitissam.’
[388] See above, p. 92, note 367.
[389] D. B. ii. 123 b: ‘De istis est soca in hundreto ad tercium denarium.’
[390] D. B. ii. 282.
[391] D. B. ii. 312: ‘Rex habet in Duneuuic consuetudinem hanc quod duo vel
tres ibunt ad hundret si recte moniti fuerint, et si hoc non faciunt, forisfacti sunt
de 2 oris, et si latro ibi fuerit captus ibi judicabitur, et corporalis iusticia in
Blieburc capietur, et sua pecunia remanebit dominio de Duneuuic.’ It seems to
us that the first ibi must refer to Dunwich and therefore that the second does so
likewise. Still the passage is ambiguous enough.
Page 514
[392] See above, p. 91.
[393] Battle Custumals (Camden Soc.) 136. This is an interesting example, for it
suggests an explanation of the common claim to hold a court ‘outside’ the
hundred court (petit curiam suam extra hundredum). The claimant’s men will go
apart and hold a little court by themselves outside ‘the four benches’ of the
hundred.
[394] D. B. i. 32: ‘et si quis forisfaciens ibi calumpniatus fuisset, Regi
emendabat; si vero non calumpniatus abisset sub eo qui sacam et socam
habuisset, ille emendam de reo haberet.’ Compare with this the account of
Guildford, Ibid. 30.
[395] D. B. i. 56 b.
[396] D. B. i. 336 b.
[397] D. B. i. 238.
[398] The passages from the dooms are collected by Schmid s. v. Hausfriede,
Feohtan.
[399] Ine, 6 § 3: ‘If he fight in the house of a gavel-payer or boor, let him give
30 shillings by way of wite and 6 shillings to the boor.’
[400] D. B. i. 204.
[401] D. B. ii. 419 b: ‘Cercesfort tenuit Scapius teinnus Haroldi.... Scapius
habuit socam sub Haroldo.’—Ibid. 313: ‘Heroldus socam habuit et Stanuuinus
de eo.... Idem Stanuuinus socam habuit de Heroldo.’
[402] D. B. i. 142 b: ‘et vendere potuerunt praeter socam; unus autem eorum
etiam socam suam cum terra vendere poterat.’ Comp. D. B. ii. 230: ‘Huic
manerio iacent 5 liberi homines ad socam tantum commend[ati] et 2 de omni
consuetudine.’—Ibid. ii. 59: ‘In Cingeham tenuit Sauinus presbyter 15 acras ...
in eadem villa tenuit Etsinus 15 acras.... Isti supradicti fuerunt liberi ita quod ipsi
possent vendere terram cum soca et saca ut hundretus testatur.’—Ibid. ii. 40 b:
‘et iste fuit ita liber quod posset ire quo vellet cum soca et sacha set tantum fuit
homo Wisgari.’
[403] Leg. Henr. 81 § 3: ‘Quidam, villani qui sunt, eiusmodi leierwitam et
blodwitam et huiusmodi minora forisfacta emerunt a dominis suis, vel quomodo
meruerunt, de suis et in suos, quorum flet-gefoth vel overseunessa est 30 den.;
cothseti 15 den.; servi 6 (al. 5) den.’ The flet-gefoth seems to be the sum due for
fighting in a man’s flet or house.
[404] Munimenta Gildhallae, i. 66.
[405] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 580–2.
[406] D. B. ii. 424: ‘Et dicunt etiam quod istam terram R[anulfus] calumpniavit
supra Radulfum, et vicecomes Rogerius denominavit illis constitutum tempus
m[odo] ut ambo adfuissent; Ranulfo adveniente defuit Radulfus et iccirco
diiudicaverunt homines hundreti Rannulfum esse saisitum.’—Ibid. i. 165 b:
‘Modo iacet in Bernitone hundredo iudicio hominum eiusdem hundredi.’—Ibid.
[393] Battle Custumals (Camden Soc.) 136. This is an interesting example, for it
suggests an explanation of the common claim to hold a court ‘outside’ the
hundred court (petit curiam suam extra hundredum). The claimant’s men will go
apart and hold a little court by themselves outside ‘the four benches’ of the
hundred.
[394] D. B. i. 32: ‘et si quis forisfaciens ibi calumpniatus fuisset, Regi
emendabat; si vero non calumpniatus abisset sub eo qui sacam et socam
habuisset, ille emendam de reo haberet.’ Compare with this the account of
Guildford, Ibid. 30.
[395] D. B. i. 56 b.
[396] D. B. i. 336 b.
[397] D. B. i. 238.
[398] The passages from the dooms are collected by Schmid s. v. Hausfriede,
Feohtan.
[399] Ine, 6 § 3: ‘If he fight in the house of a gavel-payer or boor, let him give
30 shillings by way of wite and 6 shillings to the boor.’
[400] D. B. i. 204.
[401] D. B. ii. 419 b: ‘Cercesfort tenuit Scapius teinnus Haroldi.... Scapius
habuit socam sub Haroldo.’—Ibid. 313: ‘Heroldus socam habuit et Stanuuinus
de eo.... Idem Stanuuinus socam habuit de Heroldo.’
[402] D. B. i. 142 b: ‘et vendere potuerunt praeter socam; unus autem eorum
etiam socam suam cum terra vendere poterat.’ Comp. D. B. ii. 230: ‘Huic
manerio iacent 5 liberi homines ad socam tantum commend[ati] et 2 de omni
consuetudine.’—Ibid. ii. 59: ‘In Cingeham tenuit Sauinus presbyter 15 acras ...
in eadem villa tenuit Etsinus 15 acras.... Isti supradicti fuerunt liberi ita quod ipsi
possent vendere terram cum soca et saca ut hundretus testatur.’—Ibid. ii. 40 b:
‘et iste fuit ita liber quod posset ire quo vellet cum soca et sacha set tantum fuit
homo Wisgari.’
[403] Leg. Henr. 81 § 3: ‘Quidam, villani qui sunt, eiusmodi leierwitam et
blodwitam et huiusmodi minora forisfacta emerunt a dominis suis, vel quomodo
meruerunt, de suis et in suos, quorum flet-gefoth vel overseunessa est 30 den.;
cothseti 15 den.; servi 6 (al. 5) den.’ The flet-gefoth seems to be the sum due for
fighting in a man’s flet or house.
[404] Munimenta Gildhallae, i. 66.
[405] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 580–2.
[406] D. B. ii. 424: ‘Et dicunt etiam quod istam terram R[anulfus] calumpniavit
supra Radulfum, et vicecomes Rogerius denominavit illis constitutum tempus
m[odo] ut ambo adfuissent; Ranulfo adveniente defuit Radulfus et iccirco
diiudicaverunt homines hundreti Rannulfum esse saisitum.’—Ibid. i. 165 b:
‘Modo iacet in Bernitone hundredo iudicio hominum eiusdem hundredi.’—Ibid.
Page 515
i. 58 b: ‘unde iudicium non dixerunt, sed ante Regem ut iudicet dimiserunt.’—
Ibid. 182 b: ‘In isto hundredo ad placita conveniunt qui ibi manent ut rectum
faciant et accipiant.’
[407] Above, p. 95.
[408] D. B. ii. 186: ‘In Sterestuna tenuit 1 liber homo S. Aldrede T. R. E. et
Stigandi erat soca et saco in Hersam, set nec dare nec vendere poterat terram
suam sine licentia S. Aldrede et Stigandi.’
[409] D. B. ii. 376.
[410] D. B. ii. 401 b: ‘Eodem tempore fuerunt furati equi inventi in domo istius
Brungari, ita quod Abbas cuius fuit soca et saca et Rodbertus qui habuit
commendationem super istum venerunt de hoc furto ad placitum, et sicut
hundret testatur discesserunt amicabiliter sine iudicio quod vidissed (sic)
hundret.’
[411] E.g. D. B. ii. 35 b: ‘quas tenuerunt 2 sochemanni et 1 liber homo.’
[412] D. B. ii. 28 b: ‘Huic manerio iacent 5 sochemanni quorum 2 occupavit
Ingelricus tempore Regis Willelmi qui tune erant liberi homines.’
[413] D. B. ii. 83: ‘3 sochemanni tenentes libere.’—Ibid. 88 b: ‘tunc fuit 1
sochemannus qui libere tenuit 1 virgatam.’—Ibid. 58: ‘in hac terra sunt 13
sochemanni qui libere tenent.’
[414] D. B. i. 212 b, Bedf.: ‘Hanc terram tenuerunt 4 sochemanni quorum 3
liberi fuerunt, quartus vero unam hidam habuit, sed nec dare nec vendere potuit.’
[415] D. B. i. 35 b, ‘Isti liberi homines ita liberi fuerunt quod poterant ire quo
volebant.’—Ibid. ii. 187: ‘5 homines ... ex istis erant 4 liberi ut non possent
recedere nisi dando 2 solidos.’
[416] Round, Feudal England, 34.
[417] D. B. ii. 59 b, Essex: ‘quod tenuerunt 2 liberi homines ... set non poterant
recedere sine licentia illius Algari.’—Ibid. 216 b, Norf.: ‘Ibi sunt 5 liberi
homines S. Benedicti commendatione tantum ... et ita est in monasterio quod nec
vendere nec forisfacere pot[uerunt] extra ecclesia set soca est in hundredo.’—
Ibid. i. 137 b, Herts: ‘duo teigni ... vendere non potuerunt.’—Ibid. i. 30 b, Hants:
‘Duo liberi homines tenuerunt de episcopo T. R. E. sed recedere cum terra non
potuerunt.’
[418] Above, p. 103, note 417.
[419] E.g. D. B. i. 129 b: ‘In hac terra fuerunt 5 sochemanni de 6 hidis quas
potuerunt dare vel vendere sine licentia dominorum suorum.’
[420] Above, p. 100, note 402.
[421] E.g. D. B. ii. 358: ‘7 liberos homines ... hi poterant dare vel vendere terram
set saca et soca et commendatio et servitium remanebant Sancto [Edmundo].’
[422] D. B. ii. 186: ‘In Sterestuna tenuit unus liber homo S. Aldredae T. R. E. et
Stigandi erat soca et saco in Hersam.’—Ibid. 139 b: ‘habuit socam et sacam ...
Ibid. 182 b: ‘In isto hundredo ad placita conveniunt qui ibi manent ut rectum
faciant et accipiant.’
[407] Above, p. 95.
[408] D. B. ii. 186: ‘In Sterestuna tenuit 1 liber homo S. Aldrede T. R. E. et
Stigandi erat soca et saco in Hersam, set nec dare nec vendere poterat terram
suam sine licentia S. Aldrede et Stigandi.’
[409] D. B. ii. 376.
[410] D. B. ii. 401 b: ‘Eodem tempore fuerunt furati equi inventi in domo istius
Brungari, ita quod Abbas cuius fuit soca et saca et Rodbertus qui habuit
commendationem super istum venerunt de hoc furto ad placitum, et sicut
hundret testatur discesserunt amicabiliter sine iudicio quod vidissed (sic)
hundret.’
[411] E.g. D. B. ii. 35 b: ‘quas tenuerunt 2 sochemanni et 1 liber homo.’
[412] D. B. ii. 28 b: ‘Huic manerio iacent 5 sochemanni quorum 2 occupavit
Ingelricus tempore Regis Willelmi qui tune erant liberi homines.’
[413] D. B. ii. 83: ‘3 sochemanni tenentes libere.’—Ibid. 88 b: ‘tunc fuit 1
sochemannus qui libere tenuit 1 virgatam.’—Ibid. 58: ‘in hac terra sunt 13
sochemanni qui libere tenent.’
[414] D. B. i. 212 b, Bedf.: ‘Hanc terram tenuerunt 4 sochemanni quorum 3
liberi fuerunt, quartus vero unam hidam habuit, sed nec dare nec vendere potuit.’
[415] D. B. i. 35 b, ‘Isti liberi homines ita liberi fuerunt quod poterant ire quo
volebant.’—Ibid. ii. 187: ‘5 homines ... ex istis erant 4 liberi ut non possent
recedere nisi dando 2 solidos.’
[416] Round, Feudal England, 34.
[417] D. B. ii. 59 b, Essex: ‘quod tenuerunt 2 liberi homines ... set non poterant
recedere sine licentia illius Algari.’—Ibid. 216 b, Norf.: ‘Ibi sunt 5 liberi
homines S. Benedicti commendatione tantum ... et ita est in monasterio quod nec
vendere nec forisfacere pot[uerunt] extra ecclesia set soca est in hundredo.’—
Ibid. i. 137 b, Herts: ‘duo teigni ... vendere non potuerunt.’—Ibid. i. 30 b, Hants:
‘Duo liberi homines tenuerunt de episcopo T. R. E. sed recedere cum terra non
potuerunt.’
[418] Above, p. 103, note 417.
[419] E.g. D. B. i. 129 b: ‘In hac terra fuerunt 5 sochemanni de 6 hidis quas
potuerunt dare vel vendere sine licentia dominorum suorum.’
[420] Above, p. 100, note 402.
[421] E.g. D. B. ii. 358: ‘7 liberos homines ... hi poterant dare vel vendere terram
set saca et soca et commendatio et servitium remanebant Sancto [Edmundo].’
[422] D. B. ii. 186: ‘In Sterestuna tenuit unus liber homo S. Aldredae T. R. E. et
Stigandi erat soca et saco in Hersam.’—Ibid. 139 b: ‘habuit socam et sacam ...
Page 516
de commendatis suis.’
[423] D. B. i. 141.
[424] Liebermann, Leges Edwardi, p. 72. The most important passage is Leg.
Edw. 12 § 4: ‘Manbote in Danelaga de villano et de socheman 12 oras [= 20
sol.]: de liberis hominibus 3 marcas [= 40 sol.].’
[425] A study of the Hundred Rolls might prepare us for this result. One jury
will call servi those whom another jury would have called villani. See e.g. R. H.
ii. 688 ff.
[426] D. B. ii. 189 b, 190.
[427] D. B. ii. 318: ‘In Suttona tenet idem W. [de Cadomo] de R. Malet 2 liberos
homines commendatos Edrico 61 acr[arum] et sub 1 ex ipsis 5 liberi [sic]
homines.’—Ibid. 321 b: ‘In Caldecota 6 liberi homines commendati Leuuino de
Bachetuna 74 acr. et 7 liberi homines sub eis commend[ati] de 6 acr. et dim.’
[428] D. B. ii. 21, 26, 37 b, 59 b.
[429] D. B. i. 21.
[430] D. B. i. 45.
[431] D. B. i. 6 b.
[432] D. B. i. 27.
[433] D. B. i. 163.
[434] So in the Exeter record, D. B. iv. 390: ‘Tenuerunt 3 tegni pro 4
mansionibus, et Robertus habet illas pro 1 mansione.’
[435] D. B. i. 169 b. Similar interlineations in i. 98.
[436] D. B. i. 148; on f. 149 is a similar case.
[437] D. B. i. 45 b.
[438] D. B. i. 280 b.
[439] In several passages in D. B. the word seems to be manerius.
[440] D. B. ii. 96 b: ‘Huic manerio iacebant 3 liberi homines, unus tenuit dim.
hidam et potuit abire sine licentia domini ipsius mansionis.’
[441] D. B. i. 149, Wicombe.
[442] D. B. ii. 38 b, Hersam.
[443] D. B. i. 174 b, Poiwic.
[444] D. B. i. 268, Gretford.
[445] D. B. ii. 350 b.
[446] D. B. ii. 263: ‘sed fuerunt in aula S. Edmundi.’
[423] D. B. i. 141.
[424] Liebermann, Leges Edwardi, p. 72. The most important passage is Leg.
Edw. 12 § 4: ‘Manbote in Danelaga de villano et de socheman 12 oras [= 20
sol.]: de liberis hominibus 3 marcas [= 40 sol.].’
[425] A study of the Hundred Rolls might prepare us for this result. One jury
will call servi those whom another jury would have called villani. See e.g. R. H.
ii. 688 ff.
[426] D. B. ii. 189 b, 190.
[427] D. B. ii. 318: ‘In Suttona tenet idem W. [de Cadomo] de R. Malet 2 liberos
homines commendatos Edrico 61 acr[arum] et sub 1 ex ipsis 5 liberi [sic]
homines.’—Ibid. 321 b: ‘In Caldecota 6 liberi homines commendati Leuuino de
Bachetuna 74 acr. et 7 liberi homines sub eis commend[ati] de 6 acr. et dim.’
[428] D. B. ii. 21, 26, 37 b, 59 b.
[429] D. B. i. 21.
[430] D. B. i. 45.
[431] D. B. i. 6 b.
[432] D. B. i. 27.
[433] D. B. i. 163.
[434] So in the Exeter record, D. B. iv. 390: ‘Tenuerunt 3 tegni pro 4
mansionibus, et Robertus habet illas pro 1 mansione.’
[435] D. B. i. 169 b. Similar interlineations in i. 98.
[436] D. B. i. 148; on f. 149 is a similar case.
[437] D. B. i. 45 b.
[438] D. B. i. 280 b.
[439] In several passages in D. B. the word seems to be manerius.
[440] D. B. ii. 96 b: ‘Huic manerio iacebant 3 liberi homines, unus tenuit dim.
hidam et potuit abire sine licentia domini ipsius mansionis.’
[441] D. B. i. 149, Wicombe.
[442] D. B. ii. 38 b, Hersam.
[443] D. B. i. 174 b, Poiwic.
[444] D. B. i. 268, Gretford.
[445] D. B. ii. 350 b.
[446] D. B. ii. 263: ‘sed fuerunt in aula S. Edmundi.’
Page 517
[447] D. B. i. 337 b.
[448] D. B. ii. 408 b: ‘cum soca et saca super dominium hallae tantum.’
[449] D. B. i. 45, Wicheham, Werste.
[450] D. B. i. 20, Waliland.
[451] D. B. i. 11 b, Acres.
[452] D. B. i. 26 b, Eldretune.
[453] D. B. i. 27, Percinges.
[454] D. B. i. 284 b, Ættune.
[455] D. B. ii. 29 b, 30 b.
[456] D. B. i. 307 b, Burghedurum; 308, Ternusc.
[457] D. B. i. 63: ‘Ipse quoque transportavit hallam et alias domos et pecuniam
in alio manerio.’
[458] D. B. i. 338 b: ‘Ad huius manerii aulam pertinent Catenai et Usun 4 car.
terrae ad geldum. Terra ad 8 carucas. Ibi in dominio 2 carucae et 20 villani et 15
sochemanni et 10 bordarii habentes 9 carucas. Ibi 360 acre prati. Ad eundem
manerium iacet hec soca:—In Linberge 4 car. terrae etc.’
[459] Throughout Yorkshire the phrase is common, ‘Totum manerium x. leu.
long. et y. leu. lat.’
[460] D. B. i. 128.
[461] D. B. i. 128 b.
[462] D. B. i. 127.
[463] D. B. i. 128 b.
[464] D. B. i. 180.
[465] Compare the cases in Seebohm, Village Community, 267.
[466] D. B. i. 163.
[467] If we mistake not, the Osleuuorde of the record is Ashleworth, which,
though some miles to the north of Gloucester, either still is, or but lately was, a
detached piece of the Berkeley hundred.
[468] D. B. i. 163.
[469] D. B. i. 163 b: ‘Hanc terram dedit regina Rogerio de Buslei et geldabat pro
4 hidis in Tedechesberie.’
[470] D. B. i. 87 b; iv. 161.
[471] Eyton, Somerset, ii. 34.
[472] D. B. i. 101 b; iv. 107.
[448] D. B. ii. 408 b: ‘cum soca et saca super dominium hallae tantum.’
[449] D. B. i. 45, Wicheham, Werste.
[450] D. B. i. 20, Waliland.
[451] D. B. i. 11 b, Acres.
[452] D. B. i. 26 b, Eldretune.
[453] D. B. i. 27, Percinges.
[454] D. B. i. 284 b, Ættune.
[455] D. B. ii. 29 b, 30 b.
[456] D. B. i. 307 b, Burghedurum; 308, Ternusc.
[457] D. B. i. 63: ‘Ipse quoque transportavit hallam et alias domos et pecuniam
in alio manerio.’
[458] D. B. i. 338 b: ‘Ad huius manerii aulam pertinent Catenai et Usun 4 car.
terrae ad geldum. Terra ad 8 carucas. Ibi in dominio 2 carucae et 20 villani et 15
sochemanni et 10 bordarii habentes 9 carucas. Ibi 360 acre prati. Ad eundem
manerium iacet hec soca:—In Linberge 4 car. terrae etc.’
[459] Throughout Yorkshire the phrase is common, ‘Totum manerium x. leu.
long. et y. leu. lat.’
[460] D. B. i. 128.
[461] D. B. i. 128 b.
[462] D. B. i. 127.
[463] D. B. i. 128 b.
[464] D. B. i. 180.
[465] Compare the cases in Seebohm, Village Community, 267.
[466] D. B. i. 163.
[467] If we mistake not, the Osleuuorde of the record is Ashleworth, which,
though some miles to the north of Gloucester, either still is, or but lately was, a
detached piece of the Berkeley hundred.
[468] D. B. i. 163.
[469] D. B. i. 163 b: ‘Hanc terram dedit regina Rogerio de Buslei et geldabat pro
4 hidis in Tedechesberie.’
[470] D. B. i. 87 b; iv. 161.
[471] Eyton, Somerset, ii. 34.
[472] D. B. i. 101 b; iv. 107.
Page 518
[473] D. B. i. 41.
[474] D. B. i. 230.
[475] D. B. i. 338–9.
[476] D. B. i. 220, Tingdene.
[477] D. B. ii. 15 b, 17 b.
[478] D. B. ii. 385 b.
[479] The form bereuita is exceedingly common, but must, we think, be due to a
mistake; c has been read as t.
[480] D. B. i. 38 b, Edlinges. Some of the ‘wicks’ seem to have been dairy
farms. D. B. i. 58 b: ‘et wika de 10 pensis caseorum.’ On the Glastonbury estates
we find persons called wikarii, each of whom has a wika. Glastonbury Rentalia,
39: ‘Thomas de Wika tenet 5 acras et 50 oves matrices et 12 vaccas ... Philippus
de Wika tenet unum ferlingum et 50 oves matrices et 12 vaccas.’ Ibid. 44: ‘A. B.
tenet unum ferlingum et 50 oves matrices et 12 vaccas pro 1 sol. pro wika.’ Ibid.
48: ‘Ricardus de Wika tenet 5 acras et 50 oves matrices et 12 vaccas. Alanus de
Wika eodem modo.’ Ibid. p. 51
[481] D. B. i. 350: ‘In Osgotebi et Tauelebi 2 bo[vatae] inland et 1 bo[vata] soca
huius manerii.’ D. B. i. 338 b: ‘Hiboldeston est bereuuita non soca et in
Grangeham sunt 2 car[ucatae] inland et in Springetorp dim. car[ucata] est inland.
Reliqua omnis est soca.’
[482] When therefore, as is often the case, we find that the occupants of ‘the
soke’ are not sokemen but villeins, this seems to point to a recent depression of
the peasantry.
[483] D. B. ii. 330 b: ‘In illo manerio ... sunt 35 liberi homines.... Tunc valuerunt
liberi homines 4 libras. Manerium cum liberis hominibus valet modo 24 libras.’
[484] D. B. ii. 358 b: ‘Hoc manerium exceptis liberis tunc valuit 30 solidos.’
[485] D. B. ii. 289 b.
[486] D. B. ii. 285 b.
[487] D. B. iv. 397; i. 93 b, Ichetoca.
[488] D. B. iv. 411; i. 94 b, Tocheswilla.
[489] D. B. iv. 398; i. 93 b, Pilloc.
[490] D. B. iv. 341; i. 96, Sordemanneford.
[491] D. B. iv. 355; i. 116 b, Labera.
[492] D. B. iv. 367; i. 112 b, Oplomia.
[493] D. B. iv. 338; i. 95 b, Aisseforda.
[494] D. B. iv. 395; i. 93, Terra Colgrini.
[474] D. B. i. 230.
[475] D. B. i. 338–9.
[476] D. B. i. 220, Tingdene.
[477] D. B. ii. 15 b, 17 b.
[478] D. B. ii. 385 b.
[479] The form bereuita is exceedingly common, but must, we think, be due to a
mistake; c has been read as t.
[480] D. B. i. 38 b, Edlinges. Some of the ‘wicks’ seem to have been dairy
farms. D. B. i. 58 b: ‘et wika de 10 pensis caseorum.’ On the Glastonbury estates
we find persons called wikarii, each of whom has a wika. Glastonbury Rentalia,
39: ‘Thomas de Wika tenet 5 acras et 50 oves matrices et 12 vaccas ... Philippus
de Wika tenet unum ferlingum et 50 oves matrices et 12 vaccas.’ Ibid. 44: ‘A. B.
tenet unum ferlingum et 50 oves matrices et 12 vaccas pro 1 sol. pro wika.’ Ibid.
48: ‘Ricardus de Wika tenet 5 acras et 50 oves matrices et 12 vaccas. Alanus de
Wika eodem modo.’ Ibid. p. 51
[481] D. B. i. 350: ‘In Osgotebi et Tauelebi 2 bo[vatae] inland et 1 bo[vata] soca
huius manerii.’ D. B. i. 338 b: ‘Hiboldeston est bereuuita non soca et in
Grangeham sunt 2 car[ucatae] inland et in Springetorp dim. car[ucata] est inland.
Reliqua omnis est soca.’
[482] When therefore, as is often the case, we find that the occupants of ‘the
soke’ are not sokemen but villeins, this seems to point to a recent depression of
the peasantry.
[483] D. B. ii. 330 b: ‘In illo manerio ... sunt 35 liberi homines.... Tunc valuerunt
liberi homines 4 libras. Manerium cum liberis hominibus valet modo 24 libras.’
[484] D. B. ii. 358 b: ‘Hoc manerium exceptis liberis tunc valuit 30 solidos.’
[485] D. B. ii. 289 b.
[486] D. B. ii. 285 b.
[487] D. B. iv. 397; i. 93 b, Ichetoca.
[488] D. B. iv. 411; i. 94 b, Tocheswilla.
[489] D. B. iv. 398; i. 93 b, Pilloc.
[490] D. B. iv. 341; i. 96, Sordemanneford.
[491] D. B. iv. 355; i. 116 b, Labera.
[492] D. B. iv. 367; i. 112 b, Oplomia.
[493] D. B. iv. 338; i. 95 b, Aisseforda.
[494] D. B. iv. 395; i. 93, Terra Colgrini.
Page 519
[495] D. B. iv. 394; i. 93, Rima.
[496] D. B. iv. 338; i. 95 b, Aisseforda.
[497] As the term manerium is often represented by the mere letter M or m, we
will refer to some cases in which it is written in full. D. B. ii. 295 b: ‘40 acras
pro uno manerio’; Ibid. 311 b: ‘In eadem villa est 1 liber homo de 40 acris et
tenet pro manerio.’
[498] The question whether the acreage stated in the Suffolk survey is real or
rateable can not be briefly debated. We hope to return to it.
[499] D. B. ii. 322 b, 323.
[500] D. B. ii. 323.
[501] D. B. ii. 288.
[502] D. B. ii. 309.
[503] D. B. ii. 297 b.
[504] D. B. ii. 377.
[505] D. B. ii. 333.
[506] D. B. ii. 423.
[507] D. B. ii. 316: ‘In Aldeburc tenuit Uluricus sochemannus Edrici T. R. E. 80
acras pro manerio.’ Ibid. 353: ‘Nordberiam tenuit Eduinus presbyter
sochemannus Abbatis 30 acras pro manerio.’
[508] We have taken our examples of small manors from the east and the south-
west because Little Domesday and the Exeter Domesday give details which are
not to be had elsewhere. But instances may be found in many other parts of
England. Thus in Sussex, i. 24, two free men held as two manors land rated at a
hide and sufficient for one team; it is now tilled by four villeins. In the Isle of
Wight, D. B. i. 39 b, five free men held as five manors land sufficient for two
teams; it is now tilled by four villeins. In Gloucestershire, D. B. i. 170, is a
manor worth ten shillings with two serfs upon it; also a manor rated at one
virgate. In Derbyshire, D. B. i. 274 b, land sufficient for four teams and rated as
four carucates had formed eight manors. In Nottinghamshire, D. B. i. 285 b, land
sufficient for a team and a half and valued at ten shillings had formed five
manors for five thegns, each of whom had his hall.
[509] D. B. ii. 380: ‘In Thistledona tenet 1 liber homo Ulmarus commendatus S.
Eldrede 60 acras pro manerio et 5 liberi homines sub se.’
[510] D. B. i. 127 b: ‘Wellesdone tenent canonici S. Pauli.... Hoc manerium
tenent villani ad firmam canonicorum. In dominio nil habetur.’
[511] D. B. i. 235 b: Billesdone, ‘In dominio nil fuit nec est.’ Ibid. 166 b, Glouc.:
‘Isdem Willelmus [de Ow] tenet Alvredestone. Bondi tenuit T. R. E. Ibi 3 hidae
geldantes. Nil ibi est in dominio, sed 5 villani et 3 bordarii habent 3 carucas.’...
‘Isdem Willelmus tenet Odelavestone. Brictri filius Algari tenuit. Ibi nil in
dominio nisi 5 villani cum 5 carucis.’ D. B. iv. 396: ‘Rogerius habet 1
[496] D. B. iv. 338; i. 95 b, Aisseforda.
[497] As the term manerium is often represented by the mere letter M or m, we
will refer to some cases in which it is written in full. D. B. ii. 295 b: ‘40 acras
pro uno manerio’; Ibid. 311 b: ‘In eadem villa est 1 liber homo de 40 acris et
tenet pro manerio.’
[498] The question whether the acreage stated in the Suffolk survey is real or
rateable can not be briefly debated. We hope to return to it.
[499] D. B. ii. 322 b, 323.
[500] D. B. ii. 323.
[501] D. B. ii. 288.
[502] D. B. ii. 309.
[503] D. B. ii. 297 b.
[504] D. B. ii. 377.
[505] D. B. ii. 333.
[506] D. B. ii. 423.
[507] D. B. ii. 316: ‘In Aldeburc tenuit Uluricus sochemannus Edrici T. R. E. 80
acras pro manerio.’ Ibid. 353: ‘Nordberiam tenuit Eduinus presbyter
sochemannus Abbatis 30 acras pro manerio.’
[508] We have taken our examples of small manors from the east and the south-
west because Little Domesday and the Exeter Domesday give details which are
not to be had elsewhere. But instances may be found in many other parts of
England. Thus in Sussex, i. 24, two free men held as two manors land rated at a
hide and sufficient for one team; it is now tilled by four villeins. In the Isle of
Wight, D. B. i. 39 b, five free men held as five manors land sufficient for two
teams; it is now tilled by four villeins. In Gloucestershire, D. B. i. 170, is a
manor worth ten shillings with two serfs upon it; also a manor rated at one
virgate. In Derbyshire, D. B. i. 274 b, land sufficient for four teams and rated as
four carucates had formed eight manors. In Nottinghamshire, D. B. i. 285 b, land
sufficient for a team and a half and valued at ten shillings had formed five
manors for five thegns, each of whom had his hall.
[509] D. B. ii. 380: ‘In Thistledona tenet 1 liber homo Ulmarus commendatus S.
Eldrede 60 acras pro manerio et 5 liberi homines sub se.’
[510] D. B. i. 127 b: ‘Wellesdone tenent canonici S. Pauli.... Hoc manerium
tenent villani ad firmam canonicorum. In dominio nil habetur.’
[511] D. B. i. 235 b: Billesdone, ‘In dominio nil fuit nec est.’ Ibid. 166 b, Glouc.:
‘Isdem Willelmus [de Ow] tenet Alvredestone. Bondi tenuit T. R. E. Ibi 3 hidae
geldantes. Nil ibi est in dominio, sed 5 villani et 3 bordarii habent 3 carucas.’...
‘Isdem Willelmus tenet Odelavestone. Brictri filius Algari tenuit. Ibi nil in
dominio nisi 5 villani cum 5 carucis.’ D. B. iv. 396: ‘Rogerius habet 1
Page 520
mansionem quae vocatur P...et reddit gildum pro dimidia virgata; hanc potest
arare 1 carruca. Hanc tenet Anschetillus de Rogerio. Ibi habet Anschetillus 4
bordarios qui tenent totam illam terram et habent ibi 1 carrucam et 1 agrum prati,
et reddit 10 solidos.’
[512] D. B. ii. 31.
[513] D. B. ii. 59 b.
[514] I leave this sentence as it stood before Mr Round had published in his
Feudal England the results of his brilliant researches. Of the ‘five hide unit’ I
already knew a good deal; of the ‘six carucate unit’ I knew nothing.
[515] Round, Domesday Studies, i. 109.
[516] D. B. i. 35: ‘In Driteham tenet Ricardus [filius Gisleberti] 1 hidam et
dimidiam. Ælmar tenuit de Rege E. pro uno manerio.... In eadem Driteham est 1
hida et dimidia quam tenuit Aluric de Rege E. pro uno manerio, et postea dedit
illam terram uxori suae et filiae ad aecclesiam de Certesy, sicuti homines de
hundredo testantur. Ricardus [filius Gisleberti] calumniatur. Non iacet ulli
manerio, nec pro manerio tenet, set liberata fuit ei et modo 3 hidae geldant pro
una hida et dimidia.’ To say of the second of these two plots that it neither is a
manor nor yet belongs to a manor, is to say that it is shirking the geld. D. B. i.
48: ‘Walerannus tenet Dene.... Ista tera non adiacet ulli suo manerio.’ Here suo =
Waleranni. Waleran seems to be holding land without good title.
[517] D. B. i. 163 b, Clifort. D. B. i. 58 b: ‘In Winteham tenet Hubertus de
Abbate 5 hidas, de terra villanorum fuerunt 4, et geldaverunt cum hidis manerii.’
[518] The word wara means defence; it comes from a root which has given us,
wary, warrant, warn, guarantee, weir, etc. See Vinogradoff, Villainage, 243.
[519] D. B. i. 212.
[520] D. B. i. 340, 366, 368. Is not the last part of the word A.-S. notu, (business,
office)?
[521] D. B. i. 132 b: ‘Hoc manerium tenuit Heraldus Comes et iacuit et iacet in
Hiz [Hitchin, Herts] sed wara hujus manerii iacuit in Bedefordscire T. R. E. in
hundredo de Maneheue.’ D. B. i. 190, ‘Haec terra est bereuuicha in Neuport
[Essex] set wara ejus iacet in Grantebrige.’ When in the survey of Oxfordshire, i.
160, it is said, ‘Ibi 1 hida de warland in dominio,’ the taxed land is contrasted
with the inland, which in this county has gone untaxed.
[522] D. B. i. 28.
[523] See the cases of the monks of Bury and the canons of S. Petroc, above, p.
55.
[524] D. B. i. 4 b: ‘De terra huius manerii ten[uit] unus homo archiepiscopi
dimid. solin et cum his 6 solins geldabat T. R. E. quamvis non pertineret manerio
nisi de scoto quia libera terra erat.’ The scotum in this context seems to be or to
include the geld. Compare D. B. i. 61 b: ‘Haec terra iacet et appreciata est in
Gratentun quod est in Oxenefordscire et tamen dat scotum in Berchescire.’ D. B.
arare 1 carruca. Hanc tenet Anschetillus de Rogerio. Ibi habet Anschetillus 4
bordarios qui tenent totam illam terram et habent ibi 1 carrucam et 1 agrum prati,
et reddit 10 solidos.’
[512] D. B. ii. 31.
[513] D. B. ii. 59 b.
[514] I leave this sentence as it stood before Mr Round had published in his
Feudal England the results of his brilliant researches. Of the ‘five hide unit’ I
already knew a good deal; of the ‘six carucate unit’ I knew nothing.
[515] Round, Domesday Studies, i. 109.
[516] D. B. i. 35: ‘In Driteham tenet Ricardus [filius Gisleberti] 1 hidam et
dimidiam. Ælmar tenuit de Rege E. pro uno manerio.... In eadem Driteham est 1
hida et dimidia quam tenuit Aluric de Rege E. pro uno manerio, et postea dedit
illam terram uxori suae et filiae ad aecclesiam de Certesy, sicuti homines de
hundredo testantur. Ricardus [filius Gisleberti] calumniatur. Non iacet ulli
manerio, nec pro manerio tenet, set liberata fuit ei et modo 3 hidae geldant pro
una hida et dimidia.’ To say of the second of these two plots that it neither is a
manor nor yet belongs to a manor, is to say that it is shirking the geld. D. B. i.
48: ‘Walerannus tenet Dene.... Ista tera non adiacet ulli suo manerio.’ Here suo =
Waleranni. Waleran seems to be holding land without good title.
[517] D. B. i. 163 b, Clifort. D. B. i. 58 b: ‘In Winteham tenet Hubertus de
Abbate 5 hidas, de terra villanorum fuerunt 4, et geldaverunt cum hidis manerii.’
[518] The word wara means defence; it comes from a root which has given us,
wary, warrant, warn, guarantee, weir, etc. See Vinogradoff, Villainage, 243.
[519] D. B. i. 212.
[520] D. B. i. 340, 366, 368. Is not the last part of the word A.-S. notu, (business,
office)?
[521] D. B. i. 132 b: ‘Hoc manerium tenuit Heraldus Comes et iacuit et iacet in
Hiz [Hitchin, Herts] sed wara hujus manerii iacuit in Bedefordscire T. R. E. in
hundredo de Maneheue.’ D. B. i. 190, ‘Haec terra est bereuuicha in Neuport
[Essex] set wara ejus iacet in Grantebrige.’ When in the survey of Oxfordshire, i.
160, it is said, ‘Ibi 1 hida de warland in dominio,’ the taxed land is contrasted
with the inland, which in this county has gone untaxed.
[522] D. B. i. 28.
[523] See the cases of the monks of Bury and the canons of S. Petroc, above, p.
55.
[524] D. B. i. 4 b: ‘De terra huius manerii ten[uit] unus homo archiepiscopi
dimid. solin et cum his 6 solins geldabat T. R. E. quamvis non pertineret manerio
nisi de scoto quia libera terra erat.’ The scotum in this context seems to be or to
include the geld. Compare D. B. i. 61 b: ‘Haec terra iacet et appreciata est in
Gratentun quod est in Oxenefordscire et tamen dat scotum in Berchescire.’ D. B.
Page 521
ii. 11: ‘In Colecestra habet episcopus 14 domos et 4 acras non reddentes
consuetudinem praeter scotum nisi episcopo.’
[525] See above, p. 85.
[526] Hamilton, Inquisitio, 60.
[527] Above, p. 110.
[528] D. B. i. 35 b.
[529] Northumbrian Priests’ Law, 58, 59, (Schmid, p. 369.)
[530] An Act of 1869 (32–3 Vic. c. 41) allowed the owners of certain small
houses to agree to pay the rates which under the ordinary law would become due
from the occupiers, and authorized the vestries to allow such owners a
commission of 25 per cent. See also the instructive recital in 59 Geo. III. c. 12,
sec. 19:—The small occupiers are evading the poors’ rate, and the owners exact
higher rents than they would otherwise get, on the ground that the occupiers can
not be effectually assessed.
[531] See above, p. 24.
[532] E.g. D. B. ii. 389 b, ‘Clarum tenuit Aluricus pro manerio 24 car. terrae T.
R. E. Tunc 40 villani.... Tunc 12 carucae in dominio.... Tunc 36 carucae
hominum.... Huic manerio semper adiacent 5 sochemani cum omni consuetudine
1 car. terrae et dim. Semper 1 caruca et dimidia.’
[533] E.g. D. B. ii. 339: ‘In eadem villa 14 liberi homines commendati, Godricus
faber et Edricus et Ulnotus et Osulfus et Uluricus et Stanmarus et Leuietus et
Wihtricus et Blachemanus et Mansuna et Leuinus et Ulmarus et Ulfah et alter
Ulfah et Leofstanus de 40 acris et habent 2 carucas et valent 10 solidos.’
[534] Above, p. 115.
[535] Rolls of the King’s Court, Ric. I. (Pipe Roll. Soc.), p. xxiv. But apparently
there had been considerable rearrangements in some of the counties.
[536] Hoveden, iv. 46. The important words are these: ‘Statutum etiam fuit quod
quilibet baro cum vicecomite faceret districtiones super homines suos; et si per
defectum baronum districtiones factae non fuissent, caperetur de dominico
baronum quod super homines suos restaret reddendum, et ipsi barones ad
homines suos inde caperent.’ The baron’s homines we take to be freeholders; he
would be absolutely liable for the tax cast upon his villeinage. As to the tax of
1198 see Eng. Hist. Rev. iii. 501, 701; iv. 105, 108.
[537] In Dial. de Scac. ii. 14, the author tells us that until recently if a baron who
owed money to the crown was insolvent, the goods of his knights could be
seized. The idea of subsidiary liability is not too subtle for the time.
[538] Above, p. 108.
[539] D. B. ii. 9: ‘set Comes Eustachius 1 ex illis [hidis] tenet que non est de
suis c. [100] mansionibus.’
[540] D. B. ii. 233 b.
consuetudinem praeter scotum nisi episcopo.’
[525] See above, p. 85.
[526] Hamilton, Inquisitio, 60.
[527] Above, p. 110.
[528] D. B. i. 35 b.
[529] Northumbrian Priests’ Law, 58, 59, (Schmid, p. 369.)
[530] An Act of 1869 (32–3 Vic. c. 41) allowed the owners of certain small
houses to agree to pay the rates which under the ordinary law would become due
from the occupiers, and authorized the vestries to allow such owners a
commission of 25 per cent. See also the instructive recital in 59 Geo. III. c. 12,
sec. 19:—The small occupiers are evading the poors’ rate, and the owners exact
higher rents than they would otherwise get, on the ground that the occupiers can
not be effectually assessed.
[531] See above, p. 24.
[532] E.g. D. B. ii. 389 b, ‘Clarum tenuit Aluricus pro manerio 24 car. terrae T.
R. E. Tunc 40 villani.... Tunc 12 carucae in dominio.... Tunc 36 carucae
hominum.... Huic manerio semper adiacent 5 sochemani cum omni consuetudine
1 car. terrae et dim. Semper 1 caruca et dimidia.’
[533] E.g. D. B. ii. 339: ‘In eadem villa 14 liberi homines commendati, Godricus
faber et Edricus et Ulnotus et Osulfus et Uluricus et Stanmarus et Leuietus et
Wihtricus et Blachemanus et Mansuna et Leuinus et Ulmarus et Ulfah et alter
Ulfah et Leofstanus de 40 acris et habent 2 carucas et valent 10 solidos.’
[534] Above, p. 115.
[535] Rolls of the King’s Court, Ric. I. (Pipe Roll. Soc.), p. xxiv. But apparently
there had been considerable rearrangements in some of the counties.
[536] Hoveden, iv. 46. The important words are these: ‘Statutum etiam fuit quod
quilibet baro cum vicecomite faceret districtiones super homines suos; et si per
defectum baronum districtiones factae non fuissent, caperetur de dominico
baronum quod super homines suos restaret reddendum, et ipsi barones ad
homines suos inde caperent.’ The baron’s homines we take to be freeholders; he
would be absolutely liable for the tax cast upon his villeinage. As to the tax of
1198 see Eng. Hist. Rev. iii. 501, 701; iv. 105, 108.
[537] In Dial. de Scac. ii. 14, the author tells us that until recently if a baron who
owed money to the crown was insolvent, the goods of his knights could be
seized. The idea of subsidiary liability is not too subtle for the time.
[538] Above, p. 108.
[539] D. B. ii. 9: ‘set Comes Eustachius 1 ex illis [hidis] tenet que non est de
suis c. [100] mansionibus.’
[540] D. B. ii. 233 b.
Page 522
[541] D. B. ii. 242 b.
[542] D. B. ii. 258.
[543] D. B. ii. 258.
[544] D. B. ii. 447.
[545] D. B. i. 45 b.
[546] Two objections to our theory may be met by a note. (1) Some manors are
free of geld, and therefore to make our definition correct we ought to say that a
manor is a tenement which either pays its geld at a single place or which would
do so were it not freed from the tax by some special privilege. A manerium does
not cease to be a manerium by being freed from geld. (2) In later days we may
well find a manor holden of another manor, so that a plot of land may be within
two manors. If this usage of the term can be traced back into Domesday Book as
a common phenomenon, then our doctrine is in great jeopardy. But we have
noticed no passage which clearly and unambiguously says that a tract of land
was at one and the same time both a manerium and also a part of another
manerium. To this we must add that of the distribution of maneria T. R. E. we
only obtain casual and very imperfect tidings. If T. R. W. a free man has been
‘added to’ a manerium, the commissioners have no deep interest in the inquiry
whether T. R. E. his tenement was itself an independent manerium. A great
simplification has been effected and the number of maneria has been largely
reduced.
[547] D. B. ii. 174: ‘Hec villa fuit in duobus maneriis T. R. E.’ Ibid. i. 164: ‘De
his 2 villis fecit Comes W. unum manerium.’
[548] Inquisitio, 77–9.
[549] This result comes out correctly if 1 H=4V=120A. For the state of this vill
T. R. W. see Round, Feudal England, 40.
[550] His plot at Orwell is said to belong to Harlton. Then at Harlton we find an
Achil with sokemen under him, and though in D. B. he is described as a king’s
thegn, this is not incompatible with his being the man of Harold for some of his
lands. At Barrington Achillus Danaus homo Haroldi has a holding of 40 acres.
[551] Inquisitio, 86.
[552] Ibid. 68.
[553] Ibid. 43, 44, 45, 73, 76.
[554] D. B. i. 195.
[555] D. B. i. 139: ‘De consuetudine 1 averam inveniebat cum Rex in scyra
veniebat, si non 5 den. reddebat.’ D. B. i. 190, ‘[Sochemanni in Fuleberne]
reddunt per annum 8 libras arsas et pensatas et unoquoque anno 12 equos et 12
inguardos si Rex in vicecomitatu veniret, si non veniret 12 sol. et 8 den.; T. R. E.
non reddebant vicecomiti nisi averas et inguardos vel 12 sol. et 8 den. et
superplus invasit Picot [vicecomes] super Regem.’
[542] D. B. ii. 258.
[543] D. B. ii. 258.
[544] D. B. ii. 447.
[545] D. B. i. 45 b.
[546] Two objections to our theory may be met by a note. (1) Some manors are
free of geld, and therefore to make our definition correct we ought to say that a
manor is a tenement which either pays its geld at a single place or which would
do so were it not freed from the tax by some special privilege. A manerium does
not cease to be a manerium by being freed from geld. (2) In later days we may
well find a manor holden of another manor, so that a plot of land may be within
two manors. If this usage of the term can be traced back into Domesday Book as
a common phenomenon, then our doctrine is in great jeopardy. But we have
noticed no passage which clearly and unambiguously says that a tract of land
was at one and the same time both a manerium and also a part of another
manerium. To this we must add that of the distribution of maneria T. R. E. we
only obtain casual and very imperfect tidings. If T. R. W. a free man has been
‘added to’ a manerium, the commissioners have no deep interest in the inquiry
whether T. R. E. his tenement was itself an independent manerium. A great
simplification has been effected and the number of maneria has been largely
reduced.
[547] D. B. ii. 174: ‘Hec villa fuit in duobus maneriis T. R. E.’ Ibid. i. 164: ‘De
his 2 villis fecit Comes W. unum manerium.’
[548] Inquisitio, 77–9.
[549] This result comes out correctly if 1 H=4V=120A. For the state of this vill
T. R. W. see Round, Feudal England, 40.
[550] His plot at Orwell is said to belong to Harlton. Then at Harlton we find an
Achil with sokemen under him, and though in D. B. he is described as a king’s
thegn, this is not incompatible with his being the man of Harold for some of his
lands. At Barrington Achillus Danaus homo Haroldi has a holding of 40 acres.
[551] Inquisitio, 86.
[552] Ibid. 68.
[553] Ibid. 43, 44, 45, 73, 76.
[554] D. B. i. 195.
[555] D. B. i. 139: ‘De consuetudine 1 averam inveniebat cum Rex in scyra
veniebat, si non 5 den. reddebat.’ D. B. i. 190, ‘[Sochemanni in Fuleberne]
reddunt per annum 8 libras arsas et pensatas et unoquoque anno 12 equos et 12
inguardos si Rex in vicecomitatu veniret, si non veniret 12 sol. et 8 den.; T. R. E.
non reddebant vicecomiti nisi averas et inguardos vel 12 sol. et 8 den. et
superplus invasit Picot [vicecomes] super Regem.’
Page 523
[556] Wratworth has completely disappeared from the modern map; its territory
seems to be included in that of the present Orwell. See Rot. Hund. ii. 559 and
Lysons, Magna Britannia, ii. 243. A small hamlet called Malton seems to
represent it. Whitwell also is no longer the name of a village, while the modern
Coton is not mentioned in D. B. There is now a Whitwell Farm near the village
of Coton, but in the parish of Barton. The modern Coton does not seem to be the
ancient Whitwell, for on Subsidy Rolls we may find Whitwell annexed to Barton
and Coton to Grantchester.
[557] The figures in our first column represent the division of the vill among the
Norman lords. H. V. A. stand for Hides, Virgates, Acres. By C. and B. we signify
the Carucae and Boves for which ‘there was land.’
[558] There is some small error in this case.
[559] A small conjectural emendation.
[560] The Inq. Com. Cant. says 6 hides.
[561] An error of one hide in the particulars. The two records do not fully agree.
[562] A small emendation justified by Inq. Eliensis (Hamilton, p. 110).
[563] Ælfgar died before King Edward; Freeman, Norman Conquest, ed. 3, iii.
469, places his death in or about 1062.
[564] The history of the earldoms during Edward’s reign is exceedingly obscure.
See Freeman’s elaborate note: Ibid., 555. In particular Cambridgeshire seems to
have lain now in one and now in another earldom. Thus it comes about that
Cambridgeshire sokemen are commended some to Ælfgar, some to Waltheof,
some to Harold, some to Gyrth. Ælfgar, for example, had at one time been earl
in East Anglia. Men who had commended themselves to an earl would, unless
they ‘withdrew themselves,’ still be his men though he had ceased to be earl of
their county.
[565] See above, p. 105. Observe how frequently our record speaks of
‘sochemanni homines Algari’ and the like. These sokemen are Ælfgar’s men; but
are not properly his sokemen.
[566] Inq. Com. Cant. 110. This is from the Inquisitio Eliensis. Compare p. 83.
[567] Inq. Com. Cant. 77–8.
[568] Rot. Hund. ii. 558.
[569] One instance may suffice. In Sawston (Rot. Hund. ii. 575–80) are three
manors, A, B, C; A has a sub-manor. One Thomas Dovenel holds in villeinage of
the lord of A; in villeinage of the lord of B; in freehold of the lord of B; in
freehold of a tenant of the lord of B; in freehold of a tenant of a tenant of the lord
of B.
[570] Rot. Hund. ii. 580.
[571] On four out of the five manors the rent is 2s. 3d.; on the fifth 3s. 0d.
[572] Inq. Com. Cant. 41.
seems to be included in that of the present Orwell. See Rot. Hund. ii. 559 and
Lysons, Magna Britannia, ii. 243. A small hamlet called Malton seems to
represent it. Whitwell also is no longer the name of a village, while the modern
Coton is not mentioned in D. B. There is now a Whitwell Farm near the village
of Coton, but in the parish of Barton. The modern Coton does not seem to be the
ancient Whitwell, for on Subsidy Rolls we may find Whitwell annexed to Barton
and Coton to Grantchester.
[557] The figures in our first column represent the division of the vill among the
Norman lords. H. V. A. stand for Hides, Virgates, Acres. By C. and B. we signify
the Carucae and Boves for which ‘there was land.’
[558] There is some small error in this case.
[559] A small conjectural emendation.
[560] The Inq. Com. Cant. says 6 hides.
[561] An error of one hide in the particulars. The two records do not fully agree.
[562] A small emendation justified by Inq. Eliensis (Hamilton, p. 110).
[563] Ælfgar died before King Edward; Freeman, Norman Conquest, ed. 3, iii.
469, places his death in or about 1062.
[564] The history of the earldoms during Edward’s reign is exceedingly obscure.
See Freeman’s elaborate note: Ibid., 555. In particular Cambridgeshire seems to
have lain now in one and now in another earldom. Thus it comes about that
Cambridgeshire sokemen are commended some to Ælfgar, some to Waltheof,
some to Harold, some to Gyrth. Ælfgar, for example, had at one time been earl
in East Anglia. Men who had commended themselves to an earl would, unless
they ‘withdrew themselves,’ still be his men though he had ceased to be earl of
their county.
[565] See above, p. 105. Observe how frequently our record speaks of
‘sochemanni homines Algari’ and the like. These sokemen are Ælfgar’s men; but
are not properly his sokemen.
[566] Inq. Com. Cant. 110. This is from the Inquisitio Eliensis. Compare p. 83.
[567] Inq. Com. Cant. 77–8.
[568] Rot. Hund. ii. 558.
[569] One instance may suffice. In Sawston (Rot. Hund. ii. 575–80) are three
manors, A, B, C; A has a sub-manor. One Thomas Dovenel holds in villeinage of
the lord of A; in villeinage of the lord of B; in freehold of the lord of B; in
freehold of a tenant of the lord of B; in freehold of a tenant of a tenant of the lord
of B.
[570] Rot. Hund. ii. 580.
[571] On four out of the five manors the rent is 2s. 3d.; on the fifth 3s. 0d.
[572] Inq. Com. Cant. 41.
Page 524
[573] D. B. i. 137 b.
[574] D. B. i. 141 b.
[575] Inq. Com. Cant., pp. 108–110. As names of the Abbot of Ely’s sokemen in
Meldreth and neighbouring villages we have Grimmus, Alsi Cild, Wenesi, Alsi,
Leofwinus, Ædricus, Godwinus, Almarus, Aluricus frater Goduuini, Ædriz, Alsi
Berd, Alricus Godingessune, Wenestan, Alwin Blondus, Alfuuinus, Aluredus,
Alricus Brunesune, Alware, Hunuð, Hunwinus, Brizstanus. This does not point
to a preponderance of Norse or Danish blood.
[576] Owing to the wasted condition of Yorkshire, the information that we
obtain of the T. R. E. is meagre and perfunctory. But what seems characteristic
of this county is a holding of two or three ploughlands which we might fairly
call an embryo manor.
[577] See the early extents in Cart. Rams. iii. Thus (242) at Hemingford: ‘R. V.
tenet tres virgatas et dimidiam et sequitur hundredum et comitatum.... R. H. tenet
duas virgatas et sequitur hundredum et comitatum.’ Elsworth (249): ‘R. filius T.
duas virgatas. Pro altera sequitur comitatum et hundredum; pro altera solvit
quinque solidos.’ Brancaster (261): ‘Cnutus avus Petri tenebat terram suam
libere in tempore Regis Henrici et sequebatur comitatum et hundredum, et fuit
quietus ab omni servitio.’ See also Vinogradoff, Villainage, 411 ff.
[578] Some thirty years ago the whole political world of England was agitated
by controversy about ‘the compound householder.’ Was he to have a vote? The
historian of the nineteenth century will not treat the compound householders as
forming one homogeneous class of men whose general status could be marked
off from that of other classes. Nor, it is to be hoped, will etymological guesses
lead him to believe that the compound householder held a compound house. He
will say that a landlord ‘compounded for’ the rates of the aforesaid householder.
Mutatis mutandis may not the villein have been the compound householder of
the eleventh century?
[579] D. B. ii. 204: ‘3 liberi homines ... semper arant cum 3 bobus.’
[580] D. B. ii. 184 b.
[581] D. B. ii. 192 b.
[582] D. B. i. 211.
[583] D. B. i. 218 b. Compare the ‘dimidius porcus’ of ii. 287.
[584] D. B. i. 213 b: ‘Hanc terram tenuerunt homines villae communiter et
vendere potuerunt.’
[585] D. B. i. 210, 212 b, 213 b.
[586] D. B. i. 214: ‘In Meldone Johannes de Roches occupavit iniuste 25 acras
super homines qui villam tenent.’ This is a vague phrase.
[587] e.g. D. B. i. 112 b: ‘Colsuen homo Episcopi Constantiensis aufert ab hoc
manerio communem pasturam quae ibi adiacebat T. R. E. et etiam T. R. W.
quinque annis.’
[574] D. B. i. 141 b.
[575] Inq. Com. Cant., pp. 108–110. As names of the Abbot of Ely’s sokemen in
Meldreth and neighbouring villages we have Grimmus, Alsi Cild, Wenesi, Alsi,
Leofwinus, Ædricus, Godwinus, Almarus, Aluricus frater Goduuini, Ædriz, Alsi
Berd, Alricus Godingessune, Wenestan, Alwin Blondus, Alfuuinus, Aluredus,
Alricus Brunesune, Alware, Hunuð, Hunwinus, Brizstanus. This does not point
to a preponderance of Norse or Danish blood.
[576] Owing to the wasted condition of Yorkshire, the information that we
obtain of the T. R. E. is meagre and perfunctory. But what seems characteristic
of this county is a holding of two or three ploughlands which we might fairly
call an embryo manor.
[577] See the early extents in Cart. Rams. iii. Thus (242) at Hemingford: ‘R. V.
tenet tres virgatas et dimidiam et sequitur hundredum et comitatum.... R. H. tenet
duas virgatas et sequitur hundredum et comitatum.’ Elsworth (249): ‘R. filius T.
duas virgatas. Pro altera sequitur comitatum et hundredum; pro altera solvit
quinque solidos.’ Brancaster (261): ‘Cnutus avus Petri tenebat terram suam
libere in tempore Regis Henrici et sequebatur comitatum et hundredum, et fuit
quietus ab omni servitio.’ See also Vinogradoff, Villainage, 411 ff.
[578] Some thirty years ago the whole political world of England was agitated
by controversy about ‘the compound householder.’ Was he to have a vote? The
historian of the nineteenth century will not treat the compound householders as
forming one homogeneous class of men whose general status could be marked
off from that of other classes. Nor, it is to be hoped, will etymological guesses
lead him to believe that the compound householder held a compound house. He
will say that a landlord ‘compounded for’ the rates of the aforesaid householder.
Mutatis mutandis may not the villein have been the compound householder of
the eleventh century?
[579] D. B. ii. 204: ‘3 liberi homines ... semper arant cum 3 bobus.’
[580] D. B. ii. 184 b.
[581] D. B. ii. 192 b.
[582] D. B. i. 211.
[583] D. B. i. 218 b. Compare the ‘dimidius porcus’ of ii. 287.
[584] D. B. i. 213 b: ‘Hanc terram tenuerunt homines villae communiter et
vendere potuerunt.’
[585] D. B. i. 210, 212 b, 213 b.
[586] D. B. i. 214: ‘In Meldone Johannes de Roches occupavit iniuste 25 acras
super homines qui villam tenent.’ This is a vague phrase.
[587] e.g. D. B. i. 112 b: ‘Colsuen homo Episcopi Constantiensis aufert ab hoc
manerio communem pasturam quae ibi adiacebat T. R. E. et etiam T. R. W.
quinque annis.’
Page 525
[588] D. B. ii. 339 b.
[589] D. B. i. 140 b.
[590] D. B. i. 75: ‘tercia vero pars vel tercia quercus erat Comitis Eduini.’
[591] D. B. ii. 404 b: ‘et in tercio anno quarta pars mol[endini].’
[592] D. B. ii. 291 b.
[593] D. B. ii. 24 b.
[594] D. B. ii. 438.
[595] D. B. i. 83: ‘sex taini in paragio,’ ‘quatuor taini in paragio.’ Ibid. 83 b:
‘novem taini in paragio.’ Ibid. 168 b: ‘quinque fratres tenuerunt pro 5 maneriis et
poterant ire quo volebant et pares erant.’
[596] D. B. i. 96 b: ‘dim. hida quam tenebat T. R. E. unus tainus in paragio.’
Ibid. 40: ‘Brictric tenuit de episcopo in paragio.’
[597] But it was possible for several men to be holding in parage and yet for
each of them to have a separate manerium. This seems to imply that their
holdings were physically separate and that each holding was separately liable for
geld, though as regards other matters, e.g. military service, the division was
ignored.
[598] D. B. i. 291.
[599] D. B. i. 145 b.
[600] D. B. i. 341.
[601] D. B. i. 354.
[602] D. B. i. 375 b: ‘Siuuate et Alnod et Fenchel et Aschil equaliter et pariliter
diviserunt inter se terram patris sui T. R. E. et ita tenuerunt ut si opus fuit
expeditione Regis et Siuuate potuit ire, alii fratres iuverunt eum. Post istum, ivit
alter et Siuuate cum reliquis iuvit eum; et sic de omnibus. Siuuate tamen fuit
homo Regis.’
[603] D. B. i. 206: ‘sex sochemanni id est Aluuoldus et 5 fratres eius habuerunt 4
hid. et dim. ad geldum.’
[604] D. B. i. 233: ‘Hanc terram tenuerunt 2 fratres pro 2 maneriis, et postea
emit alter ab altero partem suam et fecit unum manerium de duobus T. R. E.’
[605] D. B. i. 127 b: ‘Hoc manerium tenent villani ad firmam canonicorum.’
[606] D. B. i. 162 b.
[607] D. B. i. 69.
[608] D. B. ii. 118 b Yarmouth: ‘De gersuma has 4 libras dant burgenses gratis et
amicitia.’
[589] D. B. i. 140 b.
[590] D. B. i. 75: ‘tercia vero pars vel tercia quercus erat Comitis Eduini.’
[591] D. B. ii. 404 b: ‘et in tercio anno quarta pars mol[endini].’
[592] D. B. ii. 291 b.
[593] D. B. ii. 24 b.
[594] D. B. ii. 438.
[595] D. B. i. 83: ‘sex taini in paragio,’ ‘quatuor taini in paragio.’ Ibid. 83 b:
‘novem taini in paragio.’ Ibid. 168 b: ‘quinque fratres tenuerunt pro 5 maneriis et
poterant ire quo volebant et pares erant.’
[596] D. B. i. 96 b: ‘dim. hida quam tenebat T. R. E. unus tainus in paragio.’
Ibid. 40: ‘Brictric tenuit de episcopo in paragio.’
[597] But it was possible for several men to be holding in parage and yet for
each of them to have a separate manerium. This seems to imply that their
holdings were physically separate and that each holding was separately liable for
geld, though as regards other matters, e.g. military service, the division was
ignored.
[598] D. B. i. 291.
[599] D. B. i. 145 b.
[600] D. B. i. 341.
[601] D. B. i. 354.
[602] D. B. i. 375 b: ‘Siuuate et Alnod et Fenchel et Aschil equaliter et pariliter
diviserunt inter se terram patris sui T. R. E. et ita tenuerunt ut si opus fuit
expeditione Regis et Siuuate potuit ire, alii fratres iuverunt eum. Post istum, ivit
alter et Siuuate cum reliquis iuvit eum; et sic de omnibus. Siuuate tamen fuit
homo Regis.’
[603] D. B. i. 206: ‘sex sochemanni id est Aluuoldus et 5 fratres eius habuerunt 4
hid. et dim. ad geldum.’
[604] D. B. i. 233: ‘Hanc terram tenuerunt 2 fratres pro 2 maneriis, et postea
emit alter ab altero partem suam et fecit unum manerium de duobus T. R. E.’
[605] D. B. i. 127 b: ‘Hoc manerium tenent villani ad firmam canonicorum.’
[606] D. B. i. 162 b.
[607] D. B. i. 69.
[608] D. B. ii. 118 b Yarmouth: ‘De gersuma has 4 libras dant burgenses gratis et
amicitia.’
Page 526
[609] Thus D. B. iv. 568: ‘Due ville reddunt 30 sol. de cornagio.’ Ib. 570:
‘Queryngdonshire reddit 76 sol. de cornagio.’
[610] Black Book of Peterborough, passim.
[611] Hist. Engl. Law, i. 550.
[612] Edgar IV. 8. 9.
[613] Ibid. 6.
[614] Leg. Edw. Conf. 24.
[615] Leg. Edw. Conf. 15. Compare Leg. Henr. 91; Leg. Will. Conq. I. 22; Leg.
Will. Conq. III.. 3.
[616] Leg. Henr. 7 § 7.
[617] It is possible that the entry (i. 204) which tells how the sokemen of
Broughton enjoyed the smaller wites points to a free village court; but we have
put another interpretation upon this; see above, p. 99.
[618] D. B. i. 91: ‘Ecclesia Romana beati Petri Apostoli tenet de Rege Peritone.’
Ib. 157: ‘Ecclesia Sancti Dyonisii Parisii tenet de Rege Teigtone. Rex Edwardus
ei dedit.’ Ib. 20 b: ‘Abbas de Grestain tenet de Comite 2 hidas in Bedingham.’
[619] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 220.
[620] D. B. i. 218 b: ‘Rex vero Willelmus sibi postea in elemosina concessit,
unde pro anima Regis et Regine omni ebdomada 2 feria missam persolvit.’ D. B.
ii. 133: ‘et cantat unaquaque ebdomada tres missas.’
[621] D. B. i. 3: ‘reddit unum militem in servitio Archiepiscopi.’ Ib. 10 b:
‘servitium unius militis.’ Ib. 32: ‘servitium unius militis.’ Ib. 151 b: ‘inveniebat
2 loricatos in custodiam de Windesores.’
[622] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 268.
[623] But D. B. i. 218 b gives us ‘tenet in ministerio Regis.’
[624] D. B. i. 4 b: ‘De terra huius manerii tenet Godefridus in feuo dimid. solin.’
Ib. 36 b: ‘Humfridus Camerarius tenet de feuo Reginae Cumbe.’ Ib. 336 b:
‘Ipsam [domum] clamat Normannus Crassus de feuo Regis.’
[625] D. B. i. 129 b: ‘Postea Willelmus Camerarius tenuit de Regina in feudo pro
3 lib. per annum de firma, et post mortem Reginae eodem modo tenuit de Rege.’
[626] But, as in general a farmer would have no heritable rights, holding in fee
may be contrasted with holding in farm. D. B. i. 230 b: ‘Has terras habet
Goduinus de Rege ad firmam, Dislea vero tenet de Rege in feudo.’ So again it
may be contrasted with the husband’s rights in his wife’s marriage portion. D. B.
i. 214 b: ‘De ista terra tenet Pirotus 3 hidas de maritagio suae feminae et unam
hidam et terciam partem unius hidae tenet in feudum de Nigello.’
[627] D. B. i. 158: Robert de Ouilly holds forty-two houses in Oxford, some
meadow-land and a mill ‘cum beneficio S. Petri,’ i.e. together with the benefice
‘Queryngdonshire reddit 76 sol. de cornagio.’
[610] Black Book of Peterborough, passim.
[611] Hist. Engl. Law, i. 550.
[612] Edgar IV. 8. 9.
[613] Ibid. 6.
[614] Leg. Edw. Conf. 24.
[615] Leg. Edw. Conf. 15. Compare Leg. Henr. 91; Leg. Will. Conq. I. 22; Leg.
Will. Conq. III.. 3.
[616] Leg. Henr. 7 § 7.
[617] It is possible that the entry (i. 204) which tells how the sokemen of
Broughton enjoyed the smaller wites points to a free village court; but we have
put another interpretation upon this; see above, p. 99.
[618] D. B. i. 91: ‘Ecclesia Romana beati Petri Apostoli tenet de Rege Peritone.’
Ib. 157: ‘Ecclesia Sancti Dyonisii Parisii tenet de Rege Teigtone. Rex Edwardus
ei dedit.’ Ib. 20 b: ‘Abbas de Grestain tenet de Comite 2 hidas in Bedingham.’
[619] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 220.
[620] D. B. i. 218 b: ‘Rex vero Willelmus sibi postea in elemosina concessit,
unde pro anima Regis et Regine omni ebdomada 2 feria missam persolvit.’ D. B.
ii. 133: ‘et cantat unaquaque ebdomada tres missas.’
[621] D. B. i. 3: ‘reddit unum militem in servitio Archiepiscopi.’ Ib. 10 b:
‘servitium unius militis.’ Ib. 32: ‘servitium unius militis.’ Ib. 151 b: ‘inveniebat
2 loricatos in custodiam de Windesores.’
[622] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 268.
[623] But D. B. i. 218 b gives us ‘tenet in ministerio Regis.’
[624] D. B. i. 4 b: ‘De terra huius manerii tenet Godefridus in feuo dimid. solin.’
Ib. 36 b: ‘Humfridus Camerarius tenet de feuo Reginae Cumbe.’ Ib. 336 b:
‘Ipsam [domum] clamat Normannus Crassus de feuo Regis.’
[625] D. B. i. 129 b: ‘Postea Willelmus Camerarius tenuit de Regina in feudo pro
3 lib. per annum de firma, et post mortem Reginae eodem modo tenuit de Rege.’
[626] But, as in general a farmer would have no heritable rights, holding in fee
may be contrasted with holding in farm. D. B. i. 230 b: ‘Has terras habet
Goduinus de Rege ad firmam, Dislea vero tenet de Rege in feudo.’ So again it
may be contrasted with the husband’s rights in his wife’s marriage portion. D. B.
i. 214 b: ‘De ista terra tenet Pirotus 3 hidas de maritagio suae feminae et unam
hidam et terciam partem unius hidae tenet in feudum de Nigello.’
[627] D. B. i. 158: Robert de Ouilly holds forty-two houses in Oxford, some
meadow-land and a mill ‘cum beneficio S. Petri,’ i.e. together with the benefice
Page 527
of S. Peter’s church. Elsewhere, i. 273, we read that King William gave a manor
to the monks of Burton ‘pro beneficio suo’; but the meaning of this is by no
means clear.
[628] D. B. i. 44 b: ‘Duo liberi homines tenuerunt de Alwino sed non fuit alod.’
The same phrase occurs on f. 46.
[629] D. B. i. 22: ‘Aluuard et Algar tenuerunt de Rege pro 2 maneriis in alodia ...
Ælueua tenuit de Rege Edwardo sicut alodium.’ Ib. 26: ‘Godwinus Comes tenuit
et de eo 7 aloarii.’
[630] D. B. i. 60 b: ‘Duo alodiarii tenuerunt T. R. E. ... unus servivit Reginae,
alter Bundino.’
[631] D. B. i. 1: ‘Quando moritur alodiarius, Rex inde habet relevationem
terrae.’
[632] D. B. i. 52 b: ‘Has hidas tenuerunt 7 alodiarii de Episcopo nec poterant
recedere alio vel ab illo.’
[633] D. B. i. 63 b: ‘Ibi sunt 5 alodiarii.’
[634] See charter of John for St Augustin’s, Canterbury, Rot. Cart. p. 105:
‘omnes allodiarios quos eis habemus datos.’ This phrase seems to descend
through a series of charters from two charters of the Conqueror in which the
‘swa fele þegna swa ic heom togeleton habbe’ of the one appears in the other as
‘omnes allodiarios.’ If so, we get from the Conqueror’s own chancery the
equation þegn=alodiarius. Hist. Mon. S. August. 349–50.
[635] D. B. i. 23: in two successive entries we have ‘Offa tenuit de Episcopo in
feudo.... Almar tenuit de Goduino Comite in alodium.’ So again, i. 59:
‘Blacheman tenuit de Heraldo Comite in alodio.... Blacheman tenuit in feudo T.
R. E.’ The suggestion has been made that alodium represents book-land; see
Pollock, Land Laws, ed. 3. p. 27; Eng. Hist. Rev. xi. 227; but we gravely doubt
whether the humbler alodiarii had books. The author of the Quadripartitus
renders bócland by terra hereditaria, terra testimentalis, terra libera, and even
by feudum (Edg. II. 2); alodium occurs in the Instituta Cnuti. After this we can
hardly say for certain that D. B. does not use alodium and feodum as equivalents,
both representing a heritable estate, as absolute an ownership of land as is
conceivable.
[636] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 46.
[637] D. B. i. 197.
[638] D. B. i. 238 b: ‘Reliquas autem 7 hidas et dimidiam tenuit [sic] Britnodus
et Aluui T. R. E., sed comitatus nescit de quo tenuerint.’
[639] D. B. i. 23: ‘Offa tenuit de episcopo in feudo.’ Ib. i. 59 b: ‘Blacheman
tenuit in feudo T. R. E.’
[640] D. B. i. 28 b: ‘Bricmar tenuit de Azor et Azor de Heraldo ... Terra est 2
carucis. In dominio est una et 2 villani et 2 bordarii cum dimidia caruca.’
to the monks of Burton ‘pro beneficio suo’; but the meaning of this is by no
means clear.
[628] D. B. i. 44 b: ‘Duo liberi homines tenuerunt de Alwino sed non fuit alod.’
The same phrase occurs on f. 46.
[629] D. B. i. 22: ‘Aluuard et Algar tenuerunt de Rege pro 2 maneriis in alodia ...
Ælueua tenuit de Rege Edwardo sicut alodium.’ Ib. 26: ‘Godwinus Comes tenuit
et de eo 7 aloarii.’
[630] D. B. i. 60 b: ‘Duo alodiarii tenuerunt T. R. E. ... unus servivit Reginae,
alter Bundino.’
[631] D. B. i. 1: ‘Quando moritur alodiarius, Rex inde habet relevationem
terrae.’
[632] D. B. i. 52 b: ‘Has hidas tenuerunt 7 alodiarii de Episcopo nec poterant
recedere alio vel ab illo.’
[633] D. B. i. 63 b: ‘Ibi sunt 5 alodiarii.’
[634] See charter of John for St Augustin’s, Canterbury, Rot. Cart. p. 105:
‘omnes allodiarios quos eis habemus datos.’ This phrase seems to descend
through a series of charters from two charters of the Conqueror in which the
‘swa fele þegna swa ic heom togeleton habbe’ of the one appears in the other as
‘omnes allodiarios.’ If so, we get from the Conqueror’s own chancery the
equation þegn=alodiarius. Hist. Mon. S. August. 349–50.
[635] D. B. i. 23: in two successive entries we have ‘Offa tenuit de Episcopo in
feudo.... Almar tenuit de Goduino Comite in alodium.’ So again, i. 59:
‘Blacheman tenuit de Heraldo Comite in alodio.... Blacheman tenuit in feudo T.
R. E.’ The suggestion has been made that alodium represents book-land; see
Pollock, Land Laws, ed. 3. p. 27; Eng. Hist. Rev. xi. 227; but we gravely doubt
whether the humbler alodiarii had books. The author of the Quadripartitus
renders bócland by terra hereditaria, terra testimentalis, terra libera, and even
by feudum (Edg. II. 2); alodium occurs in the Instituta Cnuti. After this we can
hardly say for certain that D. B. does not use alodium and feodum as equivalents,
both representing a heritable estate, as absolute an ownership of land as is
conceivable.
[636] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 46.
[637] D. B. i. 197.
[638] D. B. i. 238 b: ‘Reliquas autem 7 hidas et dimidiam tenuit [sic] Britnodus
et Aluui T. R. E., sed comitatus nescit de quo tenuerint.’
[639] D. B. i. 23: ‘Offa tenuit de episcopo in feudo.’ Ib. i. 59 b: ‘Blacheman
tenuit in feudo T. R. E.’
[640] D. B. i. 28 b: ‘Bricmar tenuit de Azor et Azor de Heraldo ... Terra est 2
carucis. In dominio est una et 2 villani et 2 bordarii cum dimidia caruca.’
Page 528
[641] D. B. i. 75 b: ‘De eadem terra ten[ent] 3 taini 3 hidas et reddunt 3 libras
excepto servicio.’ Ib. 86 b: ‘Huic manerio est addita dimidia hida. Tres taini
tenebant T. R. E. et serviebant preposito manerii per consuetudinem absque omni
firma donante.’
[642] D. B. i. 1: ‘Quando moritur alodiarius, Rex inde habet relevationem
terrae.’
[643] D. B. i. 179: ‘Burgensis cum caballo serviens, cum moriebatur, habebat
Rex equum et arma eius. De eo qui equum non habebat, si moreretur, habebat
Rex aut 10 solidos aut terram eius cum domibus.’
[644] D. B. i. 50 b: ‘Alric tenet dimidiam hidam. Hanc tenuit pater eius de Rege
E. Sed hic Regem non requisivit post mortem Godric sui avunculi qui eam
custodiebat.’
[645] D. B. i. 238 b: ‘Huic aecclesiae dedit Aluuinus vicecomes Cliptone
concessu Regis Edwardi et filiorum suorum pro anima sua.’ Ib. 59: ‘De hoc
manerio scira attestatur, quod Edricus qui eum tenebat deliberavit illum filio suo
qui erat in Abendone monachus ut ad firmam illud teneret et sibi donec viveret
necessaria vitae donaret; post mortem vero eius manerium haberet. Et ideo
nesciunt homines de scira quod abbatiae pertineat, neque enim inde viderunt
brevem Regis vel sigillum. Abbas vero testatur quod in T. R. E. misit ille
manerium ad aecclesiam unde erat et inde habet brevem et sigillum R. E.’
[646] D. B. i. 154: ‘Quando Rex ibat in expeditione, burgenses 20 ibant cum eo
pro omnibus aliis, vel 20 libras dabant Regi ut omnes essent liberi.’
[647] D. B. i. 230: ‘Quando Rex ibat in exercitu per terram, de ipso burgo 12
burgenses ibant cum eo.’
[648] D. B. i. 238: ‘Consuetudo Waruuic fuit, ut eunte rege per terram in
expeditionem, decem burgenses de Waruuic pro omnibus aliis irent.’
[649] D. B. i. 57 b.
[650] D. B. i. 64 b: ‘Quando Rex ibat in expeditione vel terra vel mari, habebat
de hoc burgo aut 20 solidos ad pascendos suos buzecarlos, aut unum hominem
ducebat secum pro honore 5 hidarum.’
[651] D. B. i. 100: ‘Quando expeditio ibat per terram aut per mare serviebat haec
civitas quantum 5 hidae terrae.’
[652] Above, p. 156, note 650.
[653] Schmid, App. VII. c. 2. § 9–12; App. V; Pseudoleges Canuti (i.e. Instituta
Cnuti) 60, 61 (Schmid, p. 431).
[654] Of this we shall speak in another Essay.
[655] D. B. i. 375 b; above, p. 145.
[656] D. B. i. 87 b: ‘Istae consuetudines pertinent ad Tantone ... profectio in
exercitum cum hominibus episcopi.... Hae duae terrae non debent exercitum.’
[657] See above, p. 85, note 326.
excepto servicio.’ Ib. 86 b: ‘Huic manerio est addita dimidia hida. Tres taini
tenebant T. R. E. et serviebant preposito manerii per consuetudinem absque omni
firma donante.’
[642] D. B. i. 1: ‘Quando moritur alodiarius, Rex inde habet relevationem
terrae.’
[643] D. B. i. 179: ‘Burgensis cum caballo serviens, cum moriebatur, habebat
Rex equum et arma eius. De eo qui equum non habebat, si moreretur, habebat
Rex aut 10 solidos aut terram eius cum domibus.’
[644] D. B. i. 50 b: ‘Alric tenet dimidiam hidam. Hanc tenuit pater eius de Rege
E. Sed hic Regem non requisivit post mortem Godric sui avunculi qui eam
custodiebat.’
[645] D. B. i. 238 b: ‘Huic aecclesiae dedit Aluuinus vicecomes Cliptone
concessu Regis Edwardi et filiorum suorum pro anima sua.’ Ib. 59: ‘De hoc
manerio scira attestatur, quod Edricus qui eum tenebat deliberavit illum filio suo
qui erat in Abendone monachus ut ad firmam illud teneret et sibi donec viveret
necessaria vitae donaret; post mortem vero eius manerium haberet. Et ideo
nesciunt homines de scira quod abbatiae pertineat, neque enim inde viderunt
brevem Regis vel sigillum. Abbas vero testatur quod in T. R. E. misit ille
manerium ad aecclesiam unde erat et inde habet brevem et sigillum R. E.’
[646] D. B. i. 154: ‘Quando Rex ibat in expeditione, burgenses 20 ibant cum eo
pro omnibus aliis, vel 20 libras dabant Regi ut omnes essent liberi.’
[647] D. B. i. 230: ‘Quando Rex ibat in exercitu per terram, de ipso burgo 12
burgenses ibant cum eo.’
[648] D. B. i. 238: ‘Consuetudo Waruuic fuit, ut eunte rege per terram in
expeditionem, decem burgenses de Waruuic pro omnibus aliis irent.’
[649] D. B. i. 57 b.
[650] D. B. i. 64 b: ‘Quando Rex ibat in expeditione vel terra vel mari, habebat
de hoc burgo aut 20 solidos ad pascendos suos buzecarlos, aut unum hominem
ducebat secum pro honore 5 hidarum.’
[651] D. B. i. 100: ‘Quando expeditio ibat per terram aut per mare serviebat haec
civitas quantum 5 hidae terrae.’
[652] Above, p. 156, note 650.
[653] Schmid, App. VII. c. 2. § 9–12; App. V; Pseudoleges Canuti (i.e. Instituta
Cnuti) 60, 61 (Schmid, p. 431).
[654] Of this we shall speak in another Essay.
[655] D. B. i. 375 b; above, p. 145.
[656] D. B. i. 87 b: ‘Istae consuetudines pertinent ad Tantone ... profectio in
exercitum cum hominibus episcopi.... Hae duae terrae non debent exercitum.’
[657] See above, p. 85, note 326.
Page 529
[658] D. B. i. 172: ‘Quando Rex in hostem pergit, si quis edictum eius vocatus
remanserit, si ita liber homo est ut habeat socam suam et sacam et cum terra sua
possit ire quo voluerit, de omni terra sua est in misericordia Regis. Cuiuscumque
vero alterius domini homo si de hoste remanserit et dominus eius pro eo alium
hominem duxerit, 40 sol. domino suo qui vocatus fuit emendabit. Quod si ex
toto nullus pro eo abierit, ipse quidem domino suo 40 sol. dabit, dominus autem
eius totidem solidis Regi emendabit.’
[659] See above, p. 77, note 294.
[660] See Round, Feudal England, 249.
[661] D. B. i. 208: ‘Testantur homines de comitatu quod Rex Edwardus dedit
Suineshefet Siuuardo Comiti soccam et sacam, et sic habuit Haroldus comes,
praeter quod geldabant in hundredo et in hostem cum eis ibant.’ It is here noted
that though Harold had sake and soke over Swineshead, it paid its geld and did
its military duty in the hundred. Our record would hardly mention such a point
unless very often the exaction of geld and military service was one of the rights
and duties of the lord who had sake and soke.
[662] In the next chapter we shall speak of the bishop’s land-loans.
[663] See the capitularies of 807 and 808 (ed. Boretius, pp. 134, 137). Also,
Fustel de Coulanges, Les transformations de la royauté, 515 ff. It may well be
doubted whether the five-hide rule had not been borrowed by English kings from
their Frankish neighbours. Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 208 ff.
[664] D. B. i. 152 b: ‘duo teigni homines Alrici filii Goding.’ Ib. ‘Hoc manerium
tenuit Azor filius Toti teignus Regis Edwardi et alter teignus homo eius tenuit
unam hidam et vendere potuit.’
[665] D. B. i. 84 b: at the end of a list of royal thegns ‘Omnes qui has terras T. R.
E. tenebant, poterant ire ad quem dominum volebant.’
[666] D. B. i. 41: ‘Tres taini tenuerunt de episcopo et non potuerunt ire quolibet.’
[667] D. B. i. 91: ‘Hae terrae erant tainland in Glastingberie T. R. E. nec poterant
ab aecclesia separari.’
[668] Hamilton, Inquisitio, pp. xviii. xix.
[669] D. B. i. 66 b: ‘De hac eadem terra 3 hidas vendiderat abbas cuidam taino
T. R. E. ad aetatem trium hominum, et ipse abbas habebat inde servitium, et
postea debet redire ad dominium.’ Ib. i. 83 b: ‘Ipsa femina tenet 2 hidas in
Tatentone quae erant de dominio abbatiae de Cernel; T. R. E. duo teini tenebant
prestito.’
remanserit, si ita liber homo est ut habeat socam suam et sacam et cum terra sua
possit ire quo voluerit, de omni terra sua est in misericordia Regis. Cuiuscumque
vero alterius domini homo si de hoste remanserit et dominus eius pro eo alium
hominem duxerit, 40 sol. domino suo qui vocatus fuit emendabit. Quod si ex
toto nullus pro eo abierit, ipse quidem domino suo 40 sol. dabit, dominus autem
eius totidem solidis Regi emendabit.’
[659] See above, p. 77, note 294.
[660] See Round, Feudal England, 249.
[661] D. B. i. 208: ‘Testantur homines de comitatu quod Rex Edwardus dedit
Suineshefet Siuuardo Comiti soccam et sacam, et sic habuit Haroldus comes,
praeter quod geldabant in hundredo et in hostem cum eis ibant.’ It is here noted
that though Harold had sake and soke over Swineshead, it paid its geld and did
its military duty in the hundred. Our record would hardly mention such a point
unless very often the exaction of geld and military service was one of the rights
and duties of the lord who had sake and soke.
[662] In the next chapter we shall speak of the bishop’s land-loans.
[663] See the capitularies of 807 and 808 (ed. Boretius, pp. 134, 137). Also,
Fustel de Coulanges, Les transformations de la royauté, 515 ff. It may well be
doubted whether the five-hide rule had not been borrowed by English kings from
their Frankish neighbours. Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 208 ff.
[664] D. B. i. 152 b: ‘duo teigni homines Alrici filii Goding.’ Ib. ‘Hoc manerium
tenuit Azor filius Toti teignus Regis Edwardi et alter teignus homo eius tenuit
unam hidam et vendere potuit.’
[665] D. B. i. 84 b: at the end of a list of royal thegns ‘Omnes qui has terras T. R.
E. tenebant, poterant ire ad quem dominum volebant.’
[666] D. B. i. 41: ‘Tres taini tenuerunt de episcopo et non potuerunt ire quolibet.’
[667] D. B. i. 91: ‘Hae terrae erant tainland in Glastingberie T. R. E. nec poterant
ab aecclesia separari.’
[668] Hamilton, Inquisitio, pp. xviii. xix.
[669] D. B. i. 66 b: ‘De hac eadem terra 3 hidas vendiderat abbas cuidam taino
T. R. E. ad aetatem trium hominum, et ipse abbas habebat inde servitium, et
postea debet redire ad dominium.’ Ib. i. 83 b: ‘Ipsa femina tenet 2 hidas in
Tatentone quae erant de dominio abbatiae de Cernel; T. R. E. duo teini tenebant
prestito.’
Page 530
[670] D. B. i. 64 b: ‘Herman et alii servientes Regis ... Odo et alii taini Regis ...
Herueus et alii ministri Regis.’ Ib. 75: ‘Guddmund et alii taini ... Willelmus
Belet et alii servientes Regis.’
[671] D. B. i. 56 b (Berkshire custom): ‘Tainus vel miles Regis dominicus
moriens, pro relevamento dimittebat Regi omnia arma sua et equum unum cum
sella, alium sine sella.’
[672] D. B. i. 83: ‘Bricsi tenuit miles Regis E.’ Such entries are rare. D. B. i. 66:
‘De eadem terra huius manerii ten[ent] duo Angli.... Unus ex eis est miles iussu
Regis et nepos fuit Hermanni episcopi.’ Here the king compels an Englishman to
become a miles. D. B. i. 180 b: ‘Quinque taini ... habebant sub se 4 milites.’ The
warrior was not necessarily of thegnly rank.
[673] See the passages collected by Schmid, Gesetze, p. 667.
[674] In their treatment of the thegnship of the last days before the Conquest,
Maurer lays stress upon the proprietary element, Schmid upon the hereditary.
See Little, Gesiths and Thegns, E. H. R. iv. 723.
[675] Cnut, ii. 71.
[676] D. B. i. 280 b.
[677] Hamilton, Inquisitio, 121.
[678] Eyton, Somerset, i. 84.
[679] D. B. iv. 75: ‘Dominicatus Regis ad Regnum pertinens in Devenescira.’ Ib.
99: ‘Mansiones de Comitatu.’ Eyton, Somerset, i. 78.
[680] D. B. ii. 119: ‘Hoc manerium fuit de regno, sed Rex Edwardus dedit
Radulfo Comiti.’ Ib. 144: ‘Suafham pertinuit ad regionem et Rex E. dedit R.
Comiti.’ Ib. 281 b: ‘Terra Regis de Regione quam Rogerus Bigotus servat.’ Ib.
408 b: ‘Tornei manerium Regis de regione.’ Mr Round, Feudal England, p. 140,
treats regio as a mere blunder; but it may well stand for kingship.
[681] D. B. i. 30 b: ‘Huius villae villani ab omni re vicecom[itis] sunt quieti.’
[682] D. B. iv. 99.
[683] Pseudoleges Canuti (= Liebermann’s Instituta Cnuti), 55 (Schmid, p. 430):
‘Comitis rectitudines secundum Anglos istae sunt communes cum rege: tertius
denarius in villis ubi mercatum convenerit, et in castigatione latronum, et
comitales villae, quae ad comitatum eius pertinent.’
[684] D. B. ii. 118 b: ‘Terre Regis in Tetford ... est una leugata terre in longa et
dim. in lato de qua Rex habet duas partes: de his autem duabus partibus tercia
pars in consulatu iacet.’ But this seems to mean that only this part of the land is
in the county of Norfolk. Ibid. i. 246: in Stafford the king has twenty-two houses
‘de honore comitum.’
[685] D. B. i. 246.
Herueus et alii ministri Regis.’ Ib. 75: ‘Guddmund et alii taini ... Willelmus
Belet et alii servientes Regis.’
[671] D. B. i. 56 b (Berkshire custom): ‘Tainus vel miles Regis dominicus
moriens, pro relevamento dimittebat Regi omnia arma sua et equum unum cum
sella, alium sine sella.’
[672] D. B. i. 83: ‘Bricsi tenuit miles Regis E.’ Such entries are rare. D. B. i. 66:
‘De eadem terra huius manerii ten[ent] duo Angli.... Unus ex eis est miles iussu
Regis et nepos fuit Hermanni episcopi.’ Here the king compels an Englishman to
become a miles. D. B. i. 180 b: ‘Quinque taini ... habebant sub se 4 milites.’ The
warrior was not necessarily of thegnly rank.
[673] See the passages collected by Schmid, Gesetze, p. 667.
[674] In their treatment of the thegnship of the last days before the Conquest,
Maurer lays stress upon the proprietary element, Schmid upon the hereditary.
See Little, Gesiths and Thegns, E. H. R. iv. 723.
[675] Cnut, ii. 71.
[676] D. B. i. 280 b.
[677] Hamilton, Inquisitio, 121.
[678] Eyton, Somerset, i. 84.
[679] D. B. iv. 75: ‘Dominicatus Regis ad Regnum pertinens in Devenescira.’ Ib.
99: ‘Mansiones de Comitatu.’ Eyton, Somerset, i. 78.
[680] D. B. ii. 119: ‘Hoc manerium fuit de regno, sed Rex Edwardus dedit
Radulfo Comiti.’ Ib. 144: ‘Suafham pertinuit ad regionem et Rex E. dedit R.
Comiti.’ Ib. 281 b: ‘Terra Regis de Regione quam Rogerus Bigotus servat.’ Ib.
408 b: ‘Tornei manerium Regis de regione.’ Mr Round, Feudal England, p. 140,
treats regio as a mere blunder; but it may well stand for kingship.
[681] D. B. i. 30 b: ‘Huius villae villani ab omni re vicecom[itis] sunt quieti.’
[682] D. B. iv. 99.
[683] Pseudoleges Canuti (= Liebermann’s Instituta Cnuti), 55 (Schmid, p. 430):
‘Comitis rectitudines secundum Anglos istae sunt communes cum rege: tertius
denarius in villis ubi mercatum convenerit, et in castigatione latronum, et
comitales villae, quae ad comitatum eius pertinent.’
[684] D. B. ii. 118 b: ‘Terre Regis in Tetford ... est una leugata terre in longa et
dim. in lato de qua Rex habet duas partes: de his autem duabus partibus tercia
pars in consulatu iacet.’ But this seems to mean that only this part of the land is
in the county of Norfolk. Ibid. i. 246: in Stafford the king has twenty-two houses
‘de honore comitum.’
[685] D. B. i. 246.
Page 531
[686] Ellis, Introduction. i. 313. When twenty years after Harold’s death a
question about the title to land is at issue, there seems no reason why the jurors
should tell lies about Harold.
[687] D. B. i. 154 b.
[688] D. B. i. 172.
[689] D. B. i. 238.
[690] D. B. i. 56 b: Berkshire custom, ‘Qui monitus ad stabilitionem venationis
non ibat 50 sol. Regi emendabat.’ See also the Hereford custom, Ib. 179; also
Rectitudines (Schmid, App. III.) c. 1.
[691] D. B. i. 69. But the meaning of reveland is obscure. The most important
passages about it are in D. B. i. 57 b (Eseldeborne), 181 (Getune). D. B. i. 83:
‘Hanc tenet Aiulf de Rege quamdiu erit vicecomes.’
[692] D. B. i. 100.
[693] D. B. i. 86, 86 b, 92, 97; so in Devonshire, 117 b: ‘Hoc manerium debet
per consuetudinem in Tavetone manerium Regis aut 1 bovem aut 30 denarios.’
[694] D. B. i. 38 b.
[695] D. B. i. 101: ‘Ipsi manerio pertinet tercius denarius de hundredis
Nortmoltone et Badentone et Brantone et tercium animal pasturae morarum.’
[696] Above, p. 155.
[697] Chron. ann. 1085.
[698] A sketch of the principal argument of this section was published in Eng.
Hist. Rev., xi. 13, as a review of Keutgen’s Untersuchungen über den Ursprung
der deutschen Stadtverfassung. The origin of the French and German towns has
become the theme of a large and very interesting literature. A good introduction
to this will be found in an article by M. Pirenne, L’origine des constitutions
urbaines, Revue historique, liii. 52, lvii. 293, and an article by Mr Ashley,
Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. x. July, 1896. The continuous survival of
Roman municipal institutions even in Gaul seems to be denied by almost all
modern students.
[699] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 625.
[700] Stubbs, Const. Hist. iii. 448.
[701] We must exclude cases in which the king takes an aid from his whole
demesne, e.g. for his daughter’s marriage, for in such a case many royal manors
which have no right to be called boroughs must make a gift.
[702] Round, Geoffrey de Mandeville, 347, has excellent remarks on this point.
[703] Nearly.
[704] This may come only from the Staffordshire part of Tamworth.
[705] Chichester pays in later years; but very little.
question about the title to land is at issue, there seems no reason why the jurors
should tell lies about Harold.
[687] D. B. i. 154 b.
[688] D. B. i. 172.
[689] D. B. i. 238.
[690] D. B. i. 56 b: Berkshire custom, ‘Qui monitus ad stabilitionem venationis
non ibat 50 sol. Regi emendabat.’ See also the Hereford custom, Ib. 179; also
Rectitudines (Schmid, App. III.) c. 1.
[691] D. B. i. 69. But the meaning of reveland is obscure. The most important
passages about it are in D. B. i. 57 b (Eseldeborne), 181 (Getune). D. B. i. 83:
‘Hanc tenet Aiulf de Rege quamdiu erit vicecomes.’
[692] D. B. i. 100.
[693] D. B. i. 86, 86 b, 92, 97; so in Devonshire, 117 b: ‘Hoc manerium debet
per consuetudinem in Tavetone manerium Regis aut 1 bovem aut 30 denarios.’
[694] D. B. i. 38 b.
[695] D. B. i. 101: ‘Ipsi manerio pertinet tercius denarius de hundredis
Nortmoltone et Badentone et Brantone et tercium animal pasturae morarum.’
[696] Above, p. 155.
[697] Chron. ann. 1085.
[698] A sketch of the principal argument of this section was published in Eng.
Hist. Rev., xi. 13, as a review of Keutgen’s Untersuchungen über den Ursprung
der deutschen Stadtverfassung. The origin of the French and German towns has
become the theme of a large and very interesting literature. A good introduction
to this will be found in an article by M. Pirenne, L’origine des constitutions
urbaines, Revue historique, liii. 52, lvii. 293, and an article by Mr Ashley,
Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. x. July, 1896. The continuous survival of
Roman municipal institutions even in Gaul seems to be denied by almost all
modern students.
[699] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 625.
[700] Stubbs, Const. Hist. iii. 448.
[701] We must exclude cases in which the king takes an aid from his whole
demesne, e.g. for his daughter’s marriage, for in such a case many royal manors
which have no right to be called boroughs must make a gift.
[702] Round, Geoffrey de Mandeville, 347, has excellent remarks on this point.
[703] Nearly.
[704] This may come only from the Staffordshire part of Tamworth.
[705] Chichester pays in later years; but very little.
Page 532
[706] Pipe Roll, 31 Hen. I. p. 139.
[707] Was the blank space in D. B. i. 246 left for the borough of Tamworth? This
borough is incidentally mentioned in D. B. i. 238, 246, 246 b.
[708] But the account of the two sister boroughs here falls between the accounts
of the two sister counties.
[709] D. B. i. 337. It is even called a suburbium of Lincoln, though it lies full 10
miles from the city.
[710] The one glimpse that I have had of the manuscript suggested to me (1) that
the accounts of some of the boroughs were postscripts, and (2) that space was
left for accounts of London and Winchester. The anatomy of the book deserves
examination by an expert.
[711] D. B. i. 154.
[712] D. B. i. 56.
[713] D. B. i. 58.
[714] D. B. i. 238.
[715] D. B. i. 143.
[716] Ellis, Introduction, ii. 446; Winchcombe Land-boc, ed. Royce, p. xiv;
Stevenson, Rental of Gloucester, p. ix.
[717] D. B. i. 128, 128 b; and above, p. 111.
[718] K. 855 (iv. 211).
[719] Stow, Survey, ed. Strype, Bk. iii. p. 121.
[720] D. B. i. 135 b.
[721] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 636.
[722] Rot. Hund. ii. 361.
[723] D. B. i. 189.
[724] Rental of Gloucester, ed. W. H. Stevenson: Gloucester, 1890, p. x.
[725] There are many examples in Kemble’s Codex.
[726] Pipe Roll, 31 Hen. I. p. 41: ‘Vicecomes reddit compotum de £80 de auxilio
civitatis.... Et in perdonis.... Comiti de Mellent 25 sol.... Comiti de Lerecestria 35
sol.... Comiti de Warenna 16 sol.... Comiti Gloecestriae 116 sol. et 8 den.’ See
also the Liber Wintoniae, D. B. iv. 531 ff.
[727] In the A.-S. land-books the word civitas is commonly applied to
Worcester, Winchester, Canterbury, and other such places, which are both
bishops’ sees and the head places of large districts. But (K. v. p. 180) Gloucester
is a civitas, and for some time after the Conquest it is rather the county town
than the cathedral town that bears this title. Did any one ever speak of Selsey or
[707] Was the blank space in D. B. i. 246 left for the borough of Tamworth? This
borough is incidentally mentioned in D. B. i. 238, 246, 246 b.
[708] But the account of the two sister boroughs here falls between the accounts
of the two sister counties.
[709] D. B. i. 337. It is even called a suburbium of Lincoln, though it lies full 10
miles from the city.
[710] The one glimpse that I have had of the manuscript suggested to me (1) that
the accounts of some of the boroughs were postscripts, and (2) that space was
left for accounts of London and Winchester. The anatomy of the book deserves
examination by an expert.
[711] D. B. i. 154.
[712] D. B. i. 56.
[713] D. B. i. 58.
[714] D. B. i. 238.
[715] D. B. i. 143.
[716] Ellis, Introduction, ii. 446; Winchcombe Land-boc, ed. Royce, p. xiv;
Stevenson, Rental of Gloucester, p. ix.
[717] D. B. i. 128, 128 b; and above, p. 111.
[718] K. 855 (iv. 211).
[719] Stow, Survey, ed. Strype, Bk. iii. p. 121.
[720] D. B. i. 135 b.
[721] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 636.
[722] Rot. Hund. ii. 361.
[723] D. B. i. 189.
[724] Rental of Gloucester, ed. W. H. Stevenson: Gloucester, 1890, p. x.
[725] There are many examples in Kemble’s Codex.
[726] Pipe Roll, 31 Hen. I. p. 41: ‘Vicecomes reddit compotum de £80 de auxilio
civitatis.... Et in perdonis.... Comiti de Mellent 25 sol.... Comiti de Lerecestria 35
sol.... Comiti de Warenna 16 sol.... Comiti Gloecestriae 116 sol. et 8 den.’ See
also the Liber Wintoniae, D. B. iv. 531 ff.
[727] In the A.-S. land-books the word civitas is commonly applied to
Worcester, Winchester, Canterbury, and other such places, which are both
bishops’ sees and the head places of large districts. But (K. v. p. 180) Gloucester
is a civitas, and for some time after the Conquest it is rather the county town
than the cathedral town that bears this title. Did any one ever speak of Selsey or
Page 533
Sherborne as a civitas? In 803 (K. v. p. 65) the bishops of Canterbury, Lichfield,
Leicester, Sidnacester, Worcester, Winchester, Dunwich, London and Rochester
style themselves bishops of civitates, while those of Hereford, Sherborne,
Elmham and Selsey do not use this word. But an inference from this would be
rash.
[728] An interesting example is this. In 779 Offa conveys to a thegn land at
Sulmonnesburg. The boundaries mentioned in the charter are those of the present
parish of Bourton-on-the-Water. ‘Sulmonnesburg ... is the ancient camp close to
Bourton which gave its name to the Domesday Hundred of Salmanesberie, and
at a gap in the rampart of which a Court Leet was held till recently.’ See C. S.
Taylor, Pre-Domesday Hide of Gloucestershire, Trans. Bristol and
Gloucestershire Archæol. Soc. vol. xviii. pt. 2. As regards the names of hills and
of villages named from hills there may occasionally be some difficulty in
marking off those which go back to beorh (berry, berrow, barrow) from those
which go back to burh (burgh, borough, bury). Mr Stevenson tells me that in the
West of England the termination -borough sometimes represents -beorh.
[729] Alfred, 40; Ine, 45.
[730] Aethelr. IV. 4. The Quadripartitus is our only authority for these Instituta;
but Dr Liebermann (Quadrip. p. 138) holds that the translator had in front of him
a document written before the Conquest. Schmid would read borh-bryce; see p.
541; but this emendation seems needless. Has not the sum been Normanized?
The king’s burh-bryce used to be 120 (i.e. in English ‘a hundred’) shillings, and
a hundred Norman shillings make £5. So according to the Berkshire custom (D.
B. i. 56 b) he who by night breaks a civitas pays 100 shillings to the king and not
(it is noted) to the sheriff.
[731] D. B. i. 2: ‘Concordatum est de rectis callibus quae habent per civitatem
introitum et exitum, quicunque in illis forisfecerit, regi emendabit.’ See the
important document contained in a St Augustin’s Cartulary and printed in
Larking, Domesday of Kent, Appendix, 35: ‘Et omnes vie civitatis que habent
duas portas, hoc est introitum et exitum, ille sunt de consuetudine Regis.’
[732] Schmid, App. XII; Leg. Henr. c. 16.
[733] Fleta, p. 66; see also 13 Ric. II. stat. 1. cap. 3.
[734] Edmund, II. 2.
[735] See also Schmid, App. IV. (Be griðe and be munde), § 15: ‘If any man
fights or steals in the king’s burh or the neighbourhood (the ‘verge’), he forfeits
his life, if the king will not concede that he be redeemed by a wergild.’
[736] Æthelstan, II. 20.
[737] K. 1334 (vi. p. 195): a contract made at Exeter before Earl Godwin and all
the shire.
[738] Edgar, III. 5; Cnut, II. 18.
[739] Mention is made of the walls of Rochester and Canterbury in various
charters from the middle of cent. viii onwards: K. vol. i. pp. 138, 183, 274; vol.
Leicester, Sidnacester, Worcester, Winchester, Dunwich, London and Rochester
style themselves bishops of civitates, while those of Hereford, Sherborne,
Elmham and Selsey do not use this word. But an inference from this would be
rash.
[728] An interesting example is this. In 779 Offa conveys to a thegn land at
Sulmonnesburg. The boundaries mentioned in the charter are those of the present
parish of Bourton-on-the-Water. ‘Sulmonnesburg ... is the ancient camp close to
Bourton which gave its name to the Domesday Hundred of Salmanesberie, and
at a gap in the rampart of which a Court Leet was held till recently.’ See C. S.
Taylor, Pre-Domesday Hide of Gloucestershire, Trans. Bristol and
Gloucestershire Archæol. Soc. vol. xviii. pt. 2. As regards the names of hills and
of villages named from hills there may occasionally be some difficulty in
marking off those which go back to beorh (berry, berrow, barrow) from those
which go back to burh (burgh, borough, bury). Mr Stevenson tells me that in the
West of England the termination -borough sometimes represents -beorh.
[729] Alfred, 40; Ine, 45.
[730] Aethelr. IV. 4. The Quadripartitus is our only authority for these Instituta;
but Dr Liebermann (Quadrip. p. 138) holds that the translator had in front of him
a document written before the Conquest. Schmid would read borh-bryce; see p.
541; but this emendation seems needless. Has not the sum been Normanized?
The king’s burh-bryce used to be 120 (i.e. in English ‘a hundred’) shillings, and
a hundred Norman shillings make £5. So according to the Berkshire custom (D.
B. i. 56 b) he who by night breaks a civitas pays 100 shillings to the king and not
(it is noted) to the sheriff.
[731] D. B. i. 2: ‘Concordatum est de rectis callibus quae habent per civitatem
introitum et exitum, quicunque in illis forisfecerit, regi emendabit.’ See the
important document contained in a St Augustin’s Cartulary and printed in
Larking, Domesday of Kent, Appendix, 35: ‘Et omnes vie civitatis que habent
duas portas, hoc est introitum et exitum, ille sunt de consuetudine Regis.’
[732] Schmid, App. XII; Leg. Henr. c. 16.
[733] Fleta, p. 66; see also 13 Ric. II. stat. 1. cap. 3.
[734] Edmund, II. 2.
[735] See also Schmid, App. IV. (Be griðe and be munde), § 15: ‘If any man
fights or steals in the king’s burh or the neighbourhood (the ‘verge’), he forfeits
his life, if the king will not concede that he be redeemed by a wergild.’
[736] Æthelstan, II. 20.
[737] K. 1334 (vi. p. 195): a contract made at Exeter before Earl Godwin and all
the shire.
[738] Edgar, III. 5; Cnut, II. 18.
[739] Mention is made of the walls of Rochester and Canterbury in various
charters from the middle of cent. viii onwards: K. vol. i. pp. 138, 183, 274; vol.
Page 534
ii. pp. 1, 26, 36, 57, 86; vol. v. p. 68.
[740] Green, Conquest of England, 189–207.
[741] For instance, K. iii. pp. 5, 50.
[742] K. 1154 (v. 302): ‘adiacent etiam agri quamplurimi circa castellum quod
Welingaford vocitatur.’—K. 152 (i. 183): ‘castelli quod nominatur
Hrofescester.’—K. 276 (ii. 57): ‘castelli Hrobi.’
[743] A beautiful example is given by Staffordshire and Warwickshire. Each has
its borough in its centre, while Tamworth on the border is partly in the one shire,
partly in the other. See Pipe Roll, 31 Hen. I. 75, 76, 107, 108. As to these
Mercian shires, see Stubbs, Const. Hist., i. 123; Green, Conquest of England,
237: ‘Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire are other instances of
purely military creation, districts assigned to the fortresses which Eadward
raised at these points.’
[744] See our index under Burghal Hidage. Mr W. H. Stevenson’s valuable aid
in the identification of these burgs is gratefully acknowledged.
[745] D. B. i. 154.
[746] D. B. i. 262 b.
[747] It will be understood that we are not contending for an exact
correspondence between civil and military geography. Oxford and Wallingford
are border towns. Berkshire men help to maintain Oxford, and Oxfordshire men
help to maintain Wallingford.
[748] Widukind, I. 35. For comments see Waitz, Heinrich V. 95; Richter,
Annalen, iii. 8; Giesebrecht, Kaiserzeit (ed. 5), i. 222, 811; Keutgen, Ursprung
der deutschen Stadtverfassung, p. 44. Giesebrecht holds that Edward’s measures
may well have been Henry’s model.
[749] A.-S. Chron. ann. 894.
[750] A charter of 899 (K. v. p. 141) professes to tell how King Alfred, Abp
Plegmund and Æthelred ealdorman of the Mercians held a moot ‘de
instauratione urbis Londoniae.’ One result of this moot was that two plots of
land inside the walls, with hythes outside the walls, were given by the king, the
one to the church of Canterbury, the other to the church of Worcester. How will
the instauratio of London be secured by such grants?
[751] K. 1144 (v. 280). Other cases: K. 663 (Chichester), 673 (Winchester), 705
(Warwick), 724 (Warwick), 746 (Oxford), 1235 (Winchester).
[752] K. 765–6, 805.
[753] Schmid, App. V. This might mean a seat (of justice) in the gate of his own
burh. But this document will hardly be older than, if so old as, cent. x., by which
time we should suppose that burh more often pointed to a borough than to a
strong house. We may guess that in the latter sense it was supplanted by the hall
of which we read a great deal in Domesday. See above, p. 109. However, it does
not seem certain that O. E. geat can mean street.
[740] Green, Conquest of England, 189–207.
[741] For instance, K. iii. pp. 5, 50.
[742] K. 1154 (v. 302): ‘adiacent etiam agri quamplurimi circa castellum quod
Welingaford vocitatur.’—K. 152 (i. 183): ‘castelli quod nominatur
Hrofescester.’—K. 276 (ii. 57): ‘castelli Hrobi.’
[743] A beautiful example is given by Staffordshire and Warwickshire. Each has
its borough in its centre, while Tamworth on the border is partly in the one shire,
partly in the other. See Pipe Roll, 31 Hen. I. 75, 76, 107, 108. As to these
Mercian shires, see Stubbs, Const. Hist., i. 123; Green, Conquest of England,
237: ‘Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire are other instances of
purely military creation, districts assigned to the fortresses which Eadward
raised at these points.’
[744] See our index under Burghal Hidage. Mr W. H. Stevenson’s valuable aid
in the identification of these burgs is gratefully acknowledged.
[745] D. B. i. 154.
[746] D. B. i. 262 b.
[747] It will be understood that we are not contending for an exact
correspondence between civil and military geography. Oxford and Wallingford
are border towns. Berkshire men help to maintain Oxford, and Oxfordshire men
help to maintain Wallingford.
[748] Widukind, I. 35. For comments see Waitz, Heinrich V. 95; Richter,
Annalen, iii. 8; Giesebrecht, Kaiserzeit (ed. 5), i. 222, 811; Keutgen, Ursprung
der deutschen Stadtverfassung, p. 44. Giesebrecht holds that Edward’s measures
may well have been Henry’s model.
[749] A.-S. Chron. ann. 894.
[750] A charter of 899 (K. v. p. 141) professes to tell how King Alfred, Abp
Plegmund and Æthelred ealdorman of the Mercians held a moot ‘de
instauratione urbis Londoniae.’ One result of this moot was that two plots of
land inside the walls, with hythes outside the walls, were given by the king, the
one to the church of Canterbury, the other to the church of Worcester. How will
the instauratio of London be secured by such grants?
[751] K. 1144 (v. 280). Other cases: K. 663 (Chichester), 673 (Winchester), 705
(Warwick), 724 (Warwick), 746 (Oxford), 1235 (Winchester).
[752] K. 765–6, 805.
[753] Schmid, App. V. This might mean a seat (of justice) in the gate of his own
burh. But this document will hardly be older than, if so old as, cent. x., by which
time we should suppose that burh more often pointed to a borough than to a
strong house. We may guess that in the latter sense it was supplanted by the hall
of which we read a great deal in Domesday. See above, p. 109. However, it does
not seem certain that O. E. geat can mean street.
Page 535
[754] A.-S. Chron. ann. 994.
[755] Thorpe, Diplomatarium, 610. When the Confessor sends a writ to London
he addresses it to the bishop, portreeve and burh-thegns. See K. iv. pp. 856, 857,
861, 872.
[756] Gross, Gild Merchant, i. 183, 189.
[757] Gross, op. cit. ii. 37.
[758] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 257.
[759] A.-S. Chron. ann. 1097: ‘Eac manege sciran þe mid weorce to Lundenne
belumpon ...’ Thorpe thought good to substitute scipan for sciran.
[760] D. B. i. 298. Outside York were some lands which gelded with the city; ‘et
in tribus operibus Regis cum civibus erant.’ This refers to the trinoda necessitas.
[761] Sohm, Die Entstehung des deutschen Städtewesens: Leipzig, 1890.
[762] Ellis, Introduction, i. 248–253.
[763] D. B. i. 56 b.
[764] D. B. i. 1. Black Book of the Admiralty, ii. 158: ‘the herring season, that is
from St. Michael’s Day to St. Clement’s (Nov. 23).’ St. Andrew’s Day is Dec. 1.
[765] Edward, I. 1; Æthelstan, II. 12, 13; IV. 2; VI. 10; Edmund, III. 5; Edgar,
IV. 7–11; Leg. Will. I. 45; Leg. Will. III. 10. See Schmid, Glossar. s.v.
Marktrecht.
[766] Edgar, IV. 3–6. We should expect rather 36 than 33, and xxxvi might easily
become xxxiii.
[767] K. 280 (ii. 63), 316 (ii. 118).
[768] Kemble, Cod. Dip. 1075 (v. 142); Kemble, Saxons, ii. 328; Thorpe, 136:
‘ge landfeoh, ge fihtwite, ge stale, ge wohceapung, ge burhwealles sceatinge.’ In
D. B. i. 173 it is said that the Bishop of Worcester had received the third penny
of the borough. Apparently in the Confessor’s day he received £6, the third of a
sum of £18. As to the early history of markets, see the paper contributed by Mr
C. I. Elton to the Report of the Royal Commission on Market Rights, 1889.
[769] Æthelstan, II. 14.
[770] The general equivalence of port and burh we may perhaps infer from
Æthelstan, II. 14: No one is to coin money outside a port, and there is to be a
moneyer in every burh.
[771] Stockport, Langport, Amport, Newport-Pagnell, Milborne Port, Littleport
are instances. But a very small river might be sufficient to make a place a haven.
[772] Seemingly if this O.-E. port is not Lat. portus, it is Lat. porta, and there is
some fascination about the suggestion that the burh-geat, or in modern German
the Burg-gasse, in which the market is held, was described in Latin as porta
burgi. In A.D. 762 (K. i. p. 133) we have a house ‘quae iam ad Quenegatum
[755] Thorpe, Diplomatarium, 610. When the Confessor sends a writ to London
he addresses it to the bishop, portreeve and burh-thegns. See K. iv. pp. 856, 857,
861, 872.
[756] Gross, Gild Merchant, i. 183, 189.
[757] Gross, op. cit. ii. 37.
[758] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 257.
[759] A.-S. Chron. ann. 1097: ‘Eac manege sciran þe mid weorce to Lundenne
belumpon ...’ Thorpe thought good to substitute scipan for sciran.
[760] D. B. i. 298. Outside York were some lands which gelded with the city; ‘et
in tribus operibus Regis cum civibus erant.’ This refers to the trinoda necessitas.
[761] Sohm, Die Entstehung des deutschen Städtewesens: Leipzig, 1890.
[762] Ellis, Introduction, i. 248–253.
[763] D. B. i. 56 b.
[764] D. B. i. 1. Black Book of the Admiralty, ii. 158: ‘the herring season, that is
from St. Michael’s Day to St. Clement’s (Nov. 23).’ St. Andrew’s Day is Dec. 1.
[765] Edward, I. 1; Æthelstan, II. 12, 13; IV. 2; VI. 10; Edmund, III. 5; Edgar,
IV. 7–11; Leg. Will. I. 45; Leg. Will. III. 10. See Schmid, Glossar. s.v.
Marktrecht.
[766] Edgar, IV. 3–6. We should expect rather 36 than 33, and xxxvi might easily
become xxxiii.
[767] K. 280 (ii. 63), 316 (ii. 118).
[768] Kemble, Cod. Dip. 1075 (v. 142); Kemble, Saxons, ii. 328; Thorpe, 136:
‘ge landfeoh, ge fihtwite, ge stale, ge wohceapung, ge burhwealles sceatinge.’ In
D. B. i. 173 it is said that the Bishop of Worcester had received the third penny
of the borough. Apparently in the Confessor’s day he received £6, the third of a
sum of £18. As to the early history of markets, see the paper contributed by Mr
C. I. Elton to the Report of the Royal Commission on Market Rights, 1889.
[769] Æthelstan, II. 14.
[770] The general equivalence of port and burh we may perhaps infer from
Æthelstan, II. 14: No one is to coin money outside a port, and there is to be a
moneyer in every burh.
[771] Stockport, Langport, Amport, Newport-Pagnell, Milborne Port, Littleport
are instances. But a very small river might be sufficient to make a place a haven.
[772] Seemingly if this O.-E. port is not Lat. portus, it is Lat. porta, and there is
some fascination about the suggestion that the burh-geat, or in modern German
the Burg-gasse, in which the market is held, was described in Latin as porta
burgi. In A.D. 762 (K. i. p. 133) we have a house ‘quae iam ad Quenegatum
Page 536
urbis Dorouernis in foro posita est.’ In A.D. 845 (K. ii. p. 26) we find a ‘publica
strata’ in Canterbury ‘ubi appellatur Weoweraget,’ that is, the gate of the men of
Wye. But what we have to account for is the adoption of port as an English
word, and if our ancestors might have used geat, they need not have borrowed.
In A.D. 857 (K. ii. p. 63) the king bestows on the church of Worcester certain
liberties at a spot in the town of London, ‘hoc est, quod habeat intus liberaliter
modium et pondera et mensura sicut in porto mos est ad fruendum.’ To have
public weights and measures is characteristic of a portus (= haven). The word
may have spread outwards from London. Dr Stubbs (Const. Hist. i. 439) gives a
weighty vote for porta; but the continental usage deserves attention. Pirenne,
Revue historique, lvii. 75: ‘Toutes les villes anciennes [en Flandre] s’y forment
au bord des eaux et portent le nom caractéristique de portus, c’est-à-dire de
débarcadères. C’est de ce mot portus que vient le mot flamand poorter, qui
désigne le bourgeois.’ See D. B. i. 181 b: ‘in Hereford Port.’
[773] D. B. i. 143.
[774] D. B. i. 230.
[775] Cutts, Colchester, 65; Round in The Antiquary, vol. vi. (1882) p. 5.
[776] D. B. ii. 106–7. See Round, op. cit., p. 252.
[777] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 629.
[778] D. B. i. 252.
[779] D. B. i. 179. So at Chester (i. 262 b) it is considered possible that the heir
will not be able to pay the relief of ten shillings and will forfeit the tenement.
[780] D. B. i. 336.
[781] D. B. ii. 116. See also the case of Thetford (D. B. ii. 119), where there had
been numerous burgesses who could choose their lords.
[782] D. B. i. 280.
[783] D. B. i. 336 b.
[784] D. B. ii. 117.
[785] D. B. i. 2. In 923 (K. v. p. 186) we hear of land outside Canterbury called
Burhuuare bocaceras, apparently acres booked to [certain] burgesses.
[786] D. B. i. 100.
[787] D. B. ii. 107: ‘In commune burgensum iiii. xx. acrae terrae; et circa
murum viii. percae; de quo toto per annum habent burgenses lx. sol. ad
servicium regis si opus fuerit, sin autem, in commune dividunt.’ As to this most
difficult passage, see Round, Antiquary, vol. vi. (1882) p. 97. Perhaps the most
natural interpretation of it is that the community or commune of the burgesses
holds this land and receives by way of rent from tenants, to whom it is let, the
sum of 60 shillings a year, which, if this be necessary, goes to make up what the
borough has to pay to the king, or otherwise is divisible among the burgesses.
strata’ in Canterbury ‘ubi appellatur Weoweraget,’ that is, the gate of the men of
Wye. But what we have to account for is the adoption of port as an English
word, and if our ancestors might have used geat, they need not have borrowed.
In A.D. 857 (K. ii. p. 63) the king bestows on the church of Worcester certain
liberties at a spot in the town of London, ‘hoc est, quod habeat intus liberaliter
modium et pondera et mensura sicut in porto mos est ad fruendum.’ To have
public weights and measures is characteristic of a portus (= haven). The word
may have spread outwards from London. Dr Stubbs (Const. Hist. i. 439) gives a
weighty vote for porta; but the continental usage deserves attention. Pirenne,
Revue historique, lvii. 75: ‘Toutes les villes anciennes [en Flandre] s’y forment
au bord des eaux et portent le nom caractéristique de portus, c’est-à-dire de
débarcadères. C’est de ce mot portus que vient le mot flamand poorter, qui
désigne le bourgeois.’ See D. B. i. 181 b: ‘in Hereford Port.’
[773] D. B. i. 143.
[774] D. B. i. 230.
[775] Cutts, Colchester, 65; Round in The Antiquary, vol. vi. (1882) p. 5.
[776] D. B. ii. 106–7. See Round, op. cit., p. 252.
[777] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 629.
[778] D. B. i. 252.
[779] D. B. i. 179. So at Chester (i. 262 b) it is considered possible that the heir
will not be able to pay the relief of ten shillings and will forfeit the tenement.
[780] D. B. i. 336.
[781] D. B. ii. 116. See also the case of Thetford (D. B. ii. 119), where there had
been numerous burgesses who could choose their lords.
[782] D. B. i. 280.
[783] D. B. i. 336 b.
[784] D. B. ii. 117.
[785] D. B. i. 2. In 923 (K. v. p. 186) we hear of land outside Canterbury called
Burhuuare bocaceras, apparently acres booked to [certain] burgesses.
[786] D. B. i. 100.
[787] D. B. ii. 107: ‘In commune burgensum iiii. xx. acrae terrae; et circa
murum viii. percae; de quo toto per annum habent burgenses lx. sol. ad
servicium regis si opus fuerit, sin autem, in commune dividunt.’ As to this most
difficult passage, see Round, Antiquary, vol. vi. (1882) p. 97. Perhaps the most
natural interpretation of it is that the community or commune of the burgesses
holds this land and receives by way of rent from tenants, to whom it is let, the
sum of 60 shillings a year, which, if this be necessary, goes to make up what the
borough has to pay to the king, or otherwise is divisible among the burgesses.
Page 537
But, as Mr Round rightly remarks, 60 shillings for this land would be a large
rent.
[788] D. B. i. 2: ‘Ipsi quoque burgenses habebant de rege 33 acras terrae in
gildam suam.’ Another version says, ‘33 agros terre quos burgenses semper
habuerunt in gilda eorum de donis omnium regum.’ The document here cited is
preserved in a cartulary of St Augustin, and is printed in Larking, Domesday of
Kent, App. 35. It is closely connected with the Domesday Survey and is of the
highest interest.
[789] Gross, Gild Merchant, ii. 37.
[790] We do not even know for certain that when our record says that the
burgesses and the clerks held land ‘in gildam suam,’ more was meant than that
the land was part of their geldable property. See Gross, Gild Merchant, i. 189. In
the Exon Domesday the geld is gildum.
[791] D. B. i. 154.
[792] See above, p. 179.
[793] In modern York the freemen inhabiting the different wards had rights of
pasture varying from ward to ward: Appendix to Report of Municipal
Corporations’ Commissioners, 1835, p. 1745. York is one of the towns in which
we may perhaps suppose that there has been a gradual union of several
communities which were at one time agrarianly distinct. See D. B. i. 298. Dr
Stubbs seems to regard this as a common case and speaks of ‘the townships
which made up the burh’ (Const. Hist. i. 101). We can not think that the evidence
usually points in this direction, and have grave doubts as to the existence within
the walls of various communities that were called townships. Within borough
walls we must not leap from parish to township.
[794] D. B. i. 203. As to the whole of this matter see Mr Round’s paper on
Domesday Finance in Domesday Studies, vol. i.
[795] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 635.
[796] D. B. i. 219.
[797] The case of London is anomalous; but not so anomalous as it is often
supposed to be. On this point see Round, Geoffrey de Mandeville, 347 ff. On the
Pipe Roll of 2 Hen. II. (pp. 24, 28) the citizens of Lincoln are accounting for a
farm of £180, while the sheriff in consequence of this arrangement is credited
with £140 (blanch) when he accounts for the farm of the shire. This is as yet a
rare phenomenon.
[798] As to the round sums cast on the boroughs, see Round in Domesday
Studies, i. 117 ff.; also Round, Feudal England, 156.
[799] This may not have been the case in East Anglia.
[800] D. B. i. 252.
[801] D. B. i. 298. Of York we read: ‘In the geld of the city are 84 carucates of
land, each of which gelds as much as one house in the city.’ This seems to point
rent.
[788] D. B. i. 2: ‘Ipsi quoque burgenses habebant de rege 33 acras terrae in
gildam suam.’ Another version says, ‘33 agros terre quos burgenses semper
habuerunt in gilda eorum de donis omnium regum.’ The document here cited is
preserved in a cartulary of St Augustin, and is printed in Larking, Domesday of
Kent, App. 35. It is closely connected with the Domesday Survey and is of the
highest interest.
[789] Gross, Gild Merchant, ii. 37.
[790] We do not even know for certain that when our record says that the
burgesses and the clerks held land ‘in gildam suam,’ more was meant than that
the land was part of their geldable property. See Gross, Gild Merchant, i. 189. In
the Exon Domesday the geld is gildum.
[791] D. B. i. 154.
[792] See above, p. 179.
[793] In modern York the freemen inhabiting the different wards had rights of
pasture varying from ward to ward: Appendix to Report of Municipal
Corporations’ Commissioners, 1835, p. 1745. York is one of the towns in which
we may perhaps suppose that there has been a gradual union of several
communities which were at one time agrarianly distinct. See D. B. i. 298. Dr
Stubbs seems to regard this as a common case and speaks of ‘the townships
which made up the burh’ (Const. Hist. i. 101). We can not think that the evidence
usually points in this direction, and have grave doubts as to the existence within
the walls of various communities that were called townships. Within borough
walls we must not leap from parish to township.
[794] D. B. i. 203. As to the whole of this matter see Mr Round’s paper on
Domesday Finance in Domesday Studies, vol. i.
[795] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 635.
[796] D. B. i. 219.
[797] The case of London is anomalous; but not so anomalous as it is often
supposed to be. On this point see Round, Geoffrey de Mandeville, 347 ff. On the
Pipe Roll of 2 Hen. II. (pp. 24, 28) the citizens of Lincoln are accounting for a
farm of £180, while the sheriff in consequence of this arrangement is credited
with £140 (blanch) when he accounts for the farm of the shire. This is as yet a
rare phenomenon.
[798] As to the round sums cast on the boroughs, see Round in Domesday
Studies, i. 117 ff.; also Round, Feudal England, 156.
[799] This may not have been the case in East Anglia.
[800] D. B. i. 252.
[801] D. B. i. 298. Of York we read: ‘In the geld of the city are 84 carucates of
land, each of which gelds as much as one house in the city.’ This seems to point
Page 538
to an automatic adjustment. To find out how much geld any house pays, divide
the total sum that is thrown upon York by the number of houses + 84.
[802] Mr Round (Domesday Studies, i. 129) who has done more than anyone
else for the elucidation of the finance of Domesday, has spoken of ‘the great
Anglo-Saxon principle of collective liability.’ This may be a useful term,
provided that we distinguish (a) liability of a corporation for the whole tax
whenever it is levied; (b) joint and several liability of all the burgesses for the
whole tax whenever it is levied; (c) liability of each burgess for a share of the
whole tax, the amount that he must pay in any year being affected by an increase
or decrease in the number of contributories.
[803] See the entry touching Colchester, above, p. 201, note 787.
[804] D. B. i. 1.
[805] D. B. i. 238. The custom of Warwick was that when the king made an
expedition by land ten burgesses of Warwick should go for all the rest. He who
did not go when summoned [summoned by whom?
paid 100 shillings to the king; [so his offence was against the king not against
the town.] And if the king went against his enemies by sea, they sent him four
boat-swains or four pounds in money.]
[806] D. B. i. 56 b.
[807] D. B. i. 179.
[808] At Chester (D. B. i. 262 b) the twelve civic iudices paid a fine if they were
absent without excuse from the ‘hundret.’ This seems to mean that their court
was called a hundred moot. It is very possible that, at least in the earliest time,
the moot that was held in the borough had jurisdiction over a territory
considerably larger than the walled space, and in this case the urban would
hardly differ from the rural hundred. A somewhat new kind of ‘hundred’ might
be formed without the introduction of any new idea.
[809] D. B. i. 336.
[810] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 631.
[811] Green, Town Life, vol. i. ch. xi.
[812] D. B. i. 189.
[813] D. B. i. 336 b.
[814] D. B. i. 336 b.
[815] D. B. i. 298.
[816] D. B. i. 262 b.
[817] R. H. i. 354–6.
[818] Besides the well known English books, see a paper by Konrad Maurer,
Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften zu München, Philosoph.-
the total sum that is thrown upon York by the number of houses + 84.
[802] Mr Round (Domesday Studies, i. 129) who has done more than anyone
else for the elucidation of the finance of Domesday, has spoken of ‘the great
Anglo-Saxon principle of collective liability.’ This may be a useful term,
provided that we distinguish (a) liability of a corporation for the whole tax
whenever it is levied; (b) joint and several liability of all the burgesses for the
whole tax whenever it is levied; (c) liability of each burgess for a share of the
whole tax, the amount that he must pay in any year being affected by an increase
or decrease in the number of contributories.
[803] See the entry touching Colchester, above, p. 201, note 787.
[804] D. B. i. 1.
[805] D. B. i. 238. The custom of Warwick was that when the king made an
expedition by land ten burgesses of Warwick should go for all the rest. He who
did not go when summoned [summoned by whom?
paid 100 shillings to the king; [so his offence was against the king not against
the town.] And if the king went against his enemies by sea, they sent him four
boat-swains or four pounds in money.]
[806] D. B. i. 56 b.
[807] D. B. i. 179.
[808] At Chester (D. B. i. 262 b) the twelve civic iudices paid a fine if they were
absent without excuse from the ‘hundret.’ This seems to mean that their court
was called a hundred moot. It is very possible that, at least in the earliest time,
the moot that was held in the borough had jurisdiction over a territory
considerably larger than the walled space, and in this case the urban would
hardly differ from the rural hundred. A somewhat new kind of ‘hundred’ might
be formed without the introduction of any new idea.
[809] D. B. i. 336.
[810] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 631.
[811] Green, Town Life, vol. i. ch. xi.
[812] D. B. i. 189.
[813] D. B. i. 336 b.
[814] D. B. i. 336 b.
[815] D. B. i. 298.
[816] D. B. i. 262 b.
[817] R. H. i. 354–6.
[818] Besides the well known English books, see a paper by Konrad Maurer,
Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften zu München, Philosoph.-
Page 539
philolog. Classe, 1887, vol. ii. p. 363. In the Leges Edw. Conf. 38 § 2, the
‘lagemanni et meliores homines de burgo’ seem to serve as inquest men, rather
than doomsmen; while the lahmen of the document concerning the Dunsetan
(Schmid, App. I.) seem to be doomsmen.
[819] Gross, Gild Merchant, ii. 114 ff.; Hist. Eng. Law, i. 642.
[820] D. B. ii. 290, Ipswich: ‘Modo vero sunt 110 burgenses qui consuetudinem
reddunt et 100 pauperes burgenses qui non possunt reddere ad geltum Regis nisi
unum denarium de suis capitibus.’ D. B. ii. 116, Norwich: ‘Modo sunt in burgo
665 burgenses anglici et consuetudines reddunt, et 480 bordarii qui propter
pauperiem nullam reddunt consuetudinem.’
[821] D. B. i. 108 b.
[822] Whether the novum burgum mentioned in D. B. i. 17 is Winchelsea or Rye
or a new town at Hastings seems to be disputable. See Round, Feudal England,
568.
[823] D. B. i. 26 b, 27.
[824] D. B. i. 4 b.
[825] D. B. i. 4 b. See also, 10 b.
[826] D. B. i. 12.
[827] D. B. i. 345, 283 b. It has been said that Leofric gave Newark to the see.
[828] Dodsworth’s Yorkshire Notes, ed. R. Holmes (reprinted from Yorkshire
Archaeological Journal), p. 126.
[829] D. B. i. 316 b. The estate is ingeldable and therefore looks like an ancient
possession of the king.
[830] D. B. 337 b: ‘Toftes sochemanorum teignorum.’ Some commentators have
seen here ‘sokemen thegns’; but the other interpretation seems far more
probable.
[831] Had these towns been described in Great Domesday, they would probably
have been definitely placed outside the Terra Regis.
[832] D. B. ii. 311, 312, 385.
[833] D. B. ii. 319 b.
[834] D. B. ii. 389 b: ‘semper unum mercatum modo 43 burgenses.’ For
Sudbury, see D. B. ii. 286 b; for Beccles, 369 b.
[835] D. B. i. 136 b: ‘In burbio huius villae 52 burgenses.’ The word burbium
looks as if some one had argued that as suburbium means an annex to a town,
therefore burbium must mean a town. But the influence of burh, burg, bourg
may be suspected. A few pages back (132) the burgum of Hertford seems to be
spoken of as ‘hoc suburbium.’ It is of course to be remembered that burgus or
burgum was a word with which the Normans were familiar: it was becoming the
French bourg. It is difficult to unravel any distinctively French thread in the
‘lagemanni et meliores homines de burgo’ seem to serve as inquest men, rather
than doomsmen; while the lahmen of the document concerning the Dunsetan
(Schmid, App. I.) seem to be doomsmen.
[819] Gross, Gild Merchant, ii. 114 ff.; Hist. Eng. Law, i. 642.
[820] D. B. ii. 290, Ipswich: ‘Modo vero sunt 110 burgenses qui consuetudinem
reddunt et 100 pauperes burgenses qui non possunt reddere ad geltum Regis nisi
unum denarium de suis capitibus.’ D. B. ii. 116, Norwich: ‘Modo sunt in burgo
665 burgenses anglici et consuetudines reddunt, et 480 bordarii qui propter
pauperiem nullam reddunt consuetudinem.’
[821] D. B. i. 108 b.
[822] Whether the novum burgum mentioned in D. B. i. 17 is Winchelsea or Rye
or a new town at Hastings seems to be disputable. See Round, Feudal England,
568.
[823] D. B. i. 26 b, 27.
[824] D. B. i. 4 b.
[825] D. B. i. 4 b. See also, 10 b.
[826] D. B. i. 12.
[827] D. B. i. 345, 283 b. It has been said that Leofric gave Newark to the see.
[828] Dodsworth’s Yorkshire Notes, ed. R. Holmes (reprinted from Yorkshire
Archaeological Journal), p. 126.
[829] D. B. i. 316 b. The estate is ingeldable and therefore looks like an ancient
possession of the king.
[830] D. B. 337 b: ‘Toftes sochemanorum teignorum.’ Some commentators have
seen here ‘sokemen thegns’; but the other interpretation seems far more
probable.
[831] Had these towns been described in Great Domesday, they would probably
have been definitely placed outside the Terra Regis.
[832] D. B. ii. 311, 312, 385.
[833] D. B. ii. 319 b.
[834] D. B. ii. 389 b: ‘semper unum mercatum modo 43 burgenses.’ For
Sudbury, see D. B. ii. 286 b; for Beccles, 369 b.
[835] D. B. i. 136 b: ‘In burbio huius villae 52 burgenses.’ The word burbium
looks as if some one had argued that as suburbium means an annex to a town,
therefore burbium must mean a town. But the influence of burh, burg, bourg
may be suspected. A few pages back (132) the burgum of Hertford seems to be
spoken of as ‘hoc suburbium.’ It is of course to be remembered that burgus or
burgum was a word with which the Normans were familiar: it was becoming the
French bourg. It is difficult to unravel any distinctively French thread in the
Page 540
institutional history of our boroughs during the Norman age; but the little knot of
traders clustered outside a lord’s castle at Clare or Berkhampstead, at Tutbury,
Wigmore or Rhuddlan may have for its type rather a French bourg than an
English burh. Indeed at Rhuddlan (i. 269) the burgesses have received the law of
Breteuil.
[836] For Taunton, see D. B. i. 87 b: ‘Istae consuetudines pertinent ad Tantone:
burgeristh, latrones, pacis infractio, hainfare, denarii de hundred, denarii S. Petri,
ciricieti.’ Compare the document which stands as K. 897 (iv. 233): ‘Ðæt is ærest
... seo men redden into Tantune cirhsceattas and burhgerihtu.’ See also K. 1084
(v. 157): ‘ut episcopi homines [apud Tantun] tam nobiles quam ignobiles ... hoc
idem ius in omni haberent dignitate quo regis homines perfruuntur, regalibus
fiscis commorantes.’
[837] D. B. ii. 5 b.
[838] D. B. ii. 104.
[839] D. B. i. 163.
[840] D. B. i. 75.
[841] D. B. i. 100, 108 b.
[842] D. B. i. 86 b.
[843] D. B. i. 87.
[844] See above, p. 188.
[845] D. B. 38 b, 44.
[846] D. B. 64 b.
[847] D. B. 66.
[848] The burgesses belonging to Ramsbury are really at Cricklade: D. B. i. 66.
[849] It seems very possible that already before the Conquest some boroughs
had fallen out of the list. In cent. x. we read, for example, of a burh at Towcester
and of a burh at Witham in Essex. We must not indeed contend that a shire-
supported town with tenurial heterogeneity came into existence wherever
Edward the Elder or the Lady of the Mercians ‘wrought a burh.’ But still during
a time of peace the walls of a petty burh would be neglected, and, if the great
majority of the inhabitants were the king’s tenants, there would be little to
distinguish this place from a royal village of the common kind. See for
Towcester, D. B. i. 219 b; for Witham, D. B. ii. 1 b. In later days we may see an
old borough, such as Buckingham, falling very low and sending no burgesses to
parliament. It will be understood that we have not pledged ourselves to any list
of the places that were boroughs in 1066. There are difficult cases such as that of
St Albans; see above, p. 181. But, we are persuaded that few places were
deemed burgi, except the shire towns.
[850] A last relic of the old borough peace may be found in Britton’s definition
of burglary (i. 42): ‘Burglars are those who feloniously in time of peace break
traders clustered outside a lord’s castle at Clare or Berkhampstead, at Tutbury,
Wigmore or Rhuddlan may have for its type rather a French bourg than an
English burh. Indeed at Rhuddlan (i. 269) the burgesses have received the law of
Breteuil.
[836] For Taunton, see D. B. i. 87 b: ‘Istae consuetudines pertinent ad Tantone:
burgeristh, latrones, pacis infractio, hainfare, denarii de hundred, denarii S. Petri,
ciricieti.’ Compare the document which stands as K. 897 (iv. 233): ‘Ðæt is ærest
... seo men redden into Tantune cirhsceattas and burhgerihtu.’ See also K. 1084
(v. 157): ‘ut episcopi homines [apud Tantun] tam nobiles quam ignobiles ... hoc
idem ius in omni haberent dignitate quo regis homines perfruuntur, regalibus
fiscis commorantes.’
[837] D. B. ii. 5 b.
[838] D. B. ii. 104.
[839] D. B. i. 163.
[840] D. B. i. 75.
[841] D. B. i. 100, 108 b.
[842] D. B. i. 86 b.
[843] D. B. i. 87.
[844] See above, p. 188.
[845] D. B. 38 b, 44.
[846] D. B. 64 b.
[847] D. B. 66.
[848] The burgesses belonging to Ramsbury are really at Cricklade: D. B. i. 66.
[849] It seems very possible that already before the Conquest some boroughs
had fallen out of the list. In cent. x. we read, for example, of a burh at Towcester
and of a burh at Witham in Essex. We must not indeed contend that a shire-
supported town with tenurial heterogeneity came into existence wherever
Edward the Elder or the Lady of the Mercians ‘wrought a burh.’ But still during
a time of peace the walls of a petty burh would be neglected, and, if the great
majority of the inhabitants were the king’s tenants, there would be little to
distinguish this place from a royal village of the common kind. See for
Towcester, D. B. i. 219 b; for Witham, D. B. ii. 1 b. In later days we may see an
old borough, such as Buckingham, falling very low and sending no burgesses to
parliament. It will be understood that we have not pledged ourselves to any list
of the places that were boroughs in 1066. There are difficult cases such as that of
St Albans; see above, p. 181. But, we are persuaded that few places were
deemed burgi, except the shire towns.
[850] A last relic of the old borough peace may be found in Britton’s definition
of burglary (i. 42): ‘Burglars are those who feloniously in time of peace break
Page 541
churches, or the houses of others, or the walls or gates of our cities or boroughs
(de nos citez ou de nos burgs).’
[851] By a charter of enfranchisement a lord might introduce burgage tenure and
abolish ‘servile customs’; but it must be, to say the least, doubtful whether he
could, without the king’s licence, confer upon a village the public status of a
borough and e.g. authorize it to behave like a hundred before the justices in eyre.
This is one of the reasons why sheriffs can draw the line where they please, and
why some towns which have been enfranchised never obtain a secure place in
the list of parliamentary boroughs.
[852] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 630. When it is being said that if land in the borough
escheats, it always escheats to the king, the mesne tenures are already being
forgotten within the borough, just as in modern times we have forgotten them in
the open country. The burgher’s power of devising his land made escheat a rare
event, and so destroyed the evidence of mesne tenure.
[853] See above, p. 212. Also the king might give away an undivided share of
the borough. Apparently the church of Worcester had received the third penny of
the city ever since the day when the burh was wrought by the ealdorman and
lady of the Mercians. See above, p. 194.
[854] Ashley, Introduction to Fustel de Coulanges, Origin of Property in Land, p.
vii.
[855] The gradual disappearance in recent times of the Irish language is no
parallel case, for this is a triumph of the printing press. Mr Stevenson tells me
that the number of unquestioned cases of a word borrowed from Celtic in very
ancient times is now reduced to less than ten.
[856] Meitzen, Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Germanen, especially ii. 120 ff.
[857] We shall use, and cite by the letter K., Kemble’s Codex Diplomaticus Aevi
Saxonici. We shall refer by the letters H. & S. to the third volume of the
Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents edited by Haddan and Stubbs, by the
letter T. to Thorpe’s Diplomatarium, by the letter B. to Birch’s Cartularium, by
the letter E. to Earle’s Land Charters. Reference will also be made to the two
collections of facsimiles, namely, the four volumes which come from the British
Museum and the two which come from the Ordnance Survey. We are yet a long
way off a satisfactory edition of the land-books. A model has been lately set by
Prof. Napier and Mr Stevenson in their edition of the Crawford Collection of
Early Charters, Oxford, 1895.
[858] Heming’s Cartulary was published by Hearne. It has been said that some
of the documents in this collection which Kemble accepted as genuine commit
the fault of supposing that the old episcopal minster was dedicated to St. Mary,
whereas it was dedicated to St. Peter. See Robertson, Historical Essays, 195.
However, where Heming’s work can be tested it generally gains credit.
[859] D. B. i. 173 b; K. 131 (i. 158); B. i. 311.
[860] D. B. i. 127; K. 230 (i. 297); B. i. 558.
[861] Hist. Eccl. iv. 13 (ed. Plummer, i. 232).
(de nos citez ou de nos burgs).’
[851] By a charter of enfranchisement a lord might introduce burgage tenure and
abolish ‘servile customs’; but it must be, to say the least, doubtful whether he
could, without the king’s licence, confer upon a village the public status of a
borough and e.g. authorize it to behave like a hundred before the justices in eyre.
This is one of the reasons why sheriffs can draw the line where they please, and
why some towns which have been enfranchised never obtain a secure place in
the list of parliamentary boroughs.
[852] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 630. When it is being said that if land in the borough
escheats, it always escheats to the king, the mesne tenures are already being
forgotten within the borough, just as in modern times we have forgotten them in
the open country. The burgher’s power of devising his land made escheat a rare
event, and so destroyed the evidence of mesne tenure.
[853] See above, p. 212. Also the king might give away an undivided share of
the borough. Apparently the church of Worcester had received the third penny of
the city ever since the day when the burh was wrought by the ealdorman and
lady of the Mercians. See above, p. 194.
[854] Ashley, Introduction to Fustel de Coulanges, Origin of Property in Land, p.
vii.
[855] The gradual disappearance in recent times of the Irish language is no
parallel case, for this is a triumph of the printing press. Mr Stevenson tells me
that the number of unquestioned cases of a word borrowed from Celtic in very
ancient times is now reduced to less than ten.
[856] Meitzen, Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Germanen, especially ii. 120 ff.
[857] We shall use, and cite by the letter K., Kemble’s Codex Diplomaticus Aevi
Saxonici. We shall refer by the letters H. & S. to the third volume of the
Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents edited by Haddan and Stubbs, by the
letter T. to Thorpe’s Diplomatarium, by the letter B. to Birch’s Cartularium, by
the letter E. to Earle’s Land Charters. Reference will also be made to the two
collections of facsimiles, namely, the four volumes which come from the British
Museum and the two which come from the Ordnance Survey. We are yet a long
way off a satisfactory edition of the land-books. A model has been lately set by
Prof. Napier and Mr Stevenson in their edition of the Crawford Collection of
Early Charters, Oxford, 1895.
[858] Heming’s Cartulary was published by Hearne. It has been said that some
of the documents in this collection which Kemble accepted as genuine commit
the fault of supposing that the old episcopal minster was dedicated to St. Mary,
whereas it was dedicated to St. Peter. See Robertson, Historical Essays, 195.
However, where Heming’s work can be tested it generally gains credit.
[859] D. B. i. 173 b; K. 131 (i. 158); B. i. 311.
[860] D. B. i. 127; K. 230 (i. 297); B. i. 558.
[861] Hist. Eccl. iv. 13 (ed. Plummer, i. 232).
Page 542
[862] See the spurious charter of Cædwalla, K. 992 (v. 32) which purports to
show where the 87 manses lay. According to it, the gift comprised some places
which lay well outside the promontory of Selsey. But more of this hereafter.
[863] Napier and Stevenson, Crawford Charters, p. 43. Some of the best work
that has been done towards connecting Domesday Book with the A.-S. land-
books will be found in a paper on the Pre-Domesday Hide of Gloucestershire:
Transactions of Bristol and Gloucestershire Arch. Soc. vol. xviii., by Mr C. S.
Taylor.
[864] K. 12 (i. 16); B. i. 69; H. & S. 129; Plummer, Bede, ii. 247. The charter
itself is open to grave suspicion.
[865] C. S. Taylor, The Pre-Domesday Hide of Gloucestershire.
[866] E. p. 4; B. M. Facsim. iv. 1.
[867] K. 83 (i. 100): ‘in possessionem aecclesiasticae rationis et regulae ... in ius
monasticae rationis.’ K. 90 (i. 108): ‘in possessionem iuris ecclesiastici.’ K. 101
(i. 122): ‘ut sit aecclesiastici iuris potestate subdita in perpetuum.’
[868] K. 54 (i. 60) is a gift to an abbess, for compare K. 36 (i. 41). We here leave
out of account the early lease for lives granted by Bp. Wilfrid, K. 91 (i. 109), an
important document, but one which must be mentioned in another context.
[869] An accusative absolute.
[870] Eadric’s deed is K. 27 (i. 30). See also Hlothar’s charter K. 16 (i. 20) and
Snaebraed’s, K. 52 (i. 59); B.M. Facs. i. plates 1, 3. With these should be
compared the forms in Rozière, Formules, i. 208–255. On pp. 235, 253 will be
found instances, one from the very ancient Angevin collection, another from
Marculf, in which the breaker of the charter is threatened, not only with a money
penalty, but also with excommunication and damnation.
[871] K. Nos. 12, 16, 32, 36, 48, 52, 56, 67, etc.
[872] K. 131 (i. 158).
[873] K. 1.
[874] K. Nos. 27, 35, 77, 79, 999, 1006, 1007.
[875] K. 35 (i. 39); E. 13; B. M. Facs. i. 2.
[876] K. 52 (i. 59); E. 16; B. M. Facs. i. 3.
[877] E. 4; B. M. Facs. iv. 1.
[878] Davidson, Precedents in Conveyancing, i. 88 (ed. 1874): ‘In conveying
estates, it is not usual to refer to the leases affecting the same, unless the leases
are for a long term, of years, or beneficial, or otherwise not of the ordinary type.’
[879] Hist. Eccl. iv. c. 13 (ed. Plummer, i. 230). In the O. E. version the words
are: ‘Ond se cyning ... him to godsuna onfeng and to tacne ðære sibbe him twa
mægþe forgeaf, ðæt is Wiht ealond and Meanwara mægþe on West Seaxna
ðeode.’
show where the 87 manses lay. According to it, the gift comprised some places
which lay well outside the promontory of Selsey. But more of this hereafter.
[863] Napier and Stevenson, Crawford Charters, p. 43. Some of the best work
that has been done towards connecting Domesday Book with the A.-S. land-
books will be found in a paper on the Pre-Domesday Hide of Gloucestershire:
Transactions of Bristol and Gloucestershire Arch. Soc. vol. xviii., by Mr C. S.
Taylor.
[864] K. 12 (i. 16); B. i. 69; H. & S. 129; Plummer, Bede, ii. 247. The charter
itself is open to grave suspicion.
[865] C. S. Taylor, The Pre-Domesday Hide of Gloucestershire.
[866] E. p. 4; B. M. Facsim. iv. 1.
[867] K. 83 (i. 100): ‘in possessionem aecclesiasticae rationis et regulae ... in ius
monasticae rationis.’ K. 90 (i. 108): ‘in possessionem iuris ecclesiastici.’ K. 101
(i. 122): ‘ut sit aecclesiastici iuris potestate subdita in perpetuum.’
[868] K. 54 (i. 60) is a gift to an abbess, for compare K. 36 (i. 41). We here leave
out of account the early lease for lives granted by Bp. Wilfrid, K. 91 (i. 109), an
important document, but one which must be mentioned in another context.
[869] An accusative absolute.
[870] Eadric’s deed is K. 27 (i. 30). See also Hlothar’s charter K. 16 (i. 20) and
Snaebraed’s, K. 52 (i. 59); B.M. Facs. i. plates 1, 3. With these should be
compared the forms in Rozière, Formules, i. 208–255. On pp. 235, 253 will be
found instances, one from the very ancient Angevin collection, another from
Marculf, in which the breaker of the charter is threatened, not only with a money
penalty, but also with excommunication and damnation.
[871] K. Nos. 12, 16, 32, 36, 48, 52, 56, 67, etc.
[872] K. 131 (i. 158).
[873] K. 1.
[874] K. Nos. 27, 35, 77, 79, 999, 1006, 1007.
[875] K. 35 (i. 39); E. 13; B. M. Facs. i. 2.
[876] K. 52 (i. 59); E. 16; B. M. Facs. i. 3.
[877] E. 4; B. M. Facs. iv. 1.
[878] Davidson, Precedents in Conveyancing, i. 88 (ed. 1874): ‘In conveying
estates, it is not usual to refer to the leases affecting the same, unless the leases
are for a long term, of years, or beneficial, or otherwise not of the ordinary type.’
[879] Hist. Eccl. iv. c. 13 (ed. Plummer, i. 230). In the O. E. version the words
are: ‘Ond se cyning ... him to godsuna onfeng and to tacne ðære sibbe him twa
mægþe forgeaf, ðæt is Wiht ealond and Meanwara mægþe on West Seaxna
ðeode.’
Page 543
[880] Hist. Eccl. iv. c. 13 (ed. Plummer, i. 232).
[881] K. 114 (i. 139); E. 49: ‘et cum omni tributo quod regibus inde dabatur.’ So
by a deed of A.D. 762, K. 109 (i. 133), B. i. 272, a thegn states that king
Æthelbert gave him a villa ‘cum tributo illius possidendam’ and then proceeds to
give this villa to a church ‘cum tributo illius.’
[882] E. 4; B. M. Facs. iv. 1: ‘et semper liber permaneat omnibus habentibus ab
omnibus duris secularibus, notis et ignotis, praeter arcem et pontem ac vulgare
militiam.’
[883] K. 77 (i. 92); E. 24; B. M. Facs. i. 6: ‘Et ius regium in ea deinceps nullum
repperiatur omnino, excepto dumtaxat tale quale generale est in universis
ecclesiasticis terris quae in hac Cantia esse noscuntur.’
[884] K. 90 (i. 108); E. 40: ‘Et ut ab omni tributo vectigalium operum
onerumque saecularium sit libera in perpetuum, pro mercede aeternae
retributionis, regali potestate decernens statuo; tantum ut deo omnipotenti ex
eodem agello aecclesiasticae servitutis famulatum impendat.’
[885] K. 56 (i. 64); H. & S. iii. 278; B. i. 171. The charter is of fairly good
repute, but nothing that comes from Evesham is beyond suspicion. It is almost
impossible to translate these early books without making their language too
definite. How, for instance shall we render ‘nulli, neque principi, neque
praefecto, neque tiranno alicui pascui constituantur’?
[886] Ine, 70, § 1.
[887] Thorpe, Gloss, s. v. Foster, thinks that this law has to do with the fostering
of a child. Schmid is inclined to hold that it speaks of a rent payable to a
landlord.
[888] Ine, 64–6: ‘He who has 20 hides must show 12 hides of cultivated land if
he wishes to go away. He who has 10 hides shall show 6 hides of cultivated land.
He who has 3 hides let him show one and a half.’ The persons with whom these
laws deal are certainly not ascripti glebae; they are very great men. Then we
must read c. 63: ‘If a gesithcundman go away, then may he have his reeve with
him and his smith and his child’s fosterer’; and then c. 68: ‘If a gesithcundman
be driven off, let him be driven from the dwelling (botle), not from the set land
(naes þaere setene).’ The king’s gesiths have been taking up large grants of waste
land and putting under-tenants on the soil. These great folk must not fling up
their holdings until they have brought the land into cultivation. If they do
abandon their land, they may take away with them only three of their
dependants. If they are evicted by some adverse claimant this is not to harm their
under-tenants; they are to be driven from the botl, that is from the chief house,
but not from the land that they have set out to husbandmen. These last are to
enjoy a secure title. We must leave to linguists the question whether we have
rightly understood the difficult seten; but these chapters, together with c. 67,
which deals with the relations between these lords and their husbandmen, seem
to point to some great scheme for colonizing a newly-conquered district.
[889] Kemble, Saxons, i. 294–8; ii. 58.
[881] K. 114 (i. 139); E. 49: ‘et cum omni tributo quod regibus inde dabatur.’ So
by a deed of A.D. 762, K. 109 (i. 133), B. i. 272, a thegn states that king
Æthelbert gave him a villa ‘cum tributo illius possidendam’ and then proceeds to
give this villa to a church ‘cum tributo illius.’
[882] E. 4; B. M. Facs. iv. 1: ‘et semper liber permaneat omnibus habentibus ab
omnibus duris secularibus, notis et ignotis, praeter arcem et pontem ac vulgare
militiam.’
[883] K. 77 (i. 92); E. 24; B. M. Facs. i. 6: ‘Et ius regium in ea deinceps nullum
repperiatur omnino, excepto dumtaxat tale quale generale est in universis
ecclesiasticis terris quae in hac Cantia esse noscuntur.’
[884] K. 90 (i. 108); E. 40: ‘Et ut ab omni tributo vectigalium operum
onerumque saecularium sit libera in perpetuum, pro mercede aeternae
retributionis, regali potestate decernens statuo; tantum ut deo omnipotenti ex
eodem agello aecclesiasticae servitutis famulatum impendat.’
[885] K. 56 (i. 64); H. & S. iii. 278; B. i. 171. The charter is of fairly good
repute, but nothing that comes from Evesham is beyond suspicion. It is almost
impossible to translate these early books without making their language too
definite. How, for instance shall we render ‘nulli, neque principi, neque
praefecto, neque tiranno alicui pascui constituantur’?
[886] Ine, 70, § 1.
[887] Thorpe, Gloss, s. v. Foster, thinks that this law has to do with the fostering
of a child. Schmid is inclined to hold that it speaks of a rent payable to a
landlord.
[888] Ine, 64–6: ‘He who has 20 hides must show 12 hides of cultivated land if
he wishes to go away. He who has 10 hides shall show 6 hides of cultivated land.
He who has 3 hides let him show one and a half.’ The persons with whom these
laws deal are certainly not ascripti glebae; they are very great men. Then we
must read c. 63: ‘If a gesithcundman go away, then may he have his reeve with
him and his smith and his child’s fosterer’; and then c. 68: ‘If a gesithcundman
be driven off, let him be driven from the dwelling (botle), not from the set land
(naes þaere setene).’ The king’s gesiths have been taking up large grants of waste
land and putting under-tenants on the soil. These great folk must not fling up
their holdings until they have brought the land into cultivation. If they do
abandon their land, they may take away with them only three of their
dependants. If they are evicted by some adverse claimant this is not to harm their
under-tenants; they are to be driven from the botl, that is from the chief house,
but not from the land that they have set out to husbandmen. These last are to
enjoy a secure title. We must leave to linguists the question whether we have
rightly understood the difficult seten; but these chapters, together with c. 67,
which deals with the relations between these lords and their husbandmen, seem
to point to some great scheme for colonizing a newly-conquered district.
[889] Kemble, Saxons, i. 294–8; ii. 58.
Page 544
[890] Karl Lehmann, Abhandlungen zur Germanischen Rechtsgeschichte, 1888;
Liber Census Daniae, ed. O. Nielsen, 1879.
[891] Cnut’s law (II. 62) about this matter seems to imply that in consequence of
the immunities lavishly bestowed by his predecessors, the old ‘king’s feorm’ was
only leviable from lands which were deemed to be the king’s lands, but that
Cnut’s reeves had been demanding that this feorm should be supplemented by
other lands. The king of his grace forbids them to do this. The old feorm has
been changed into a rent of crown lands; a vague claim to ‘purveyance’ is
abolished, but will appear again after the Conquest.
[892] In the A.-S. Chron. ann. 991, 1007, 1011, the Danegeld appears as a gafol;
but this is the common word for a rent paid by a tenant to his landlord.
[893] Kemble, Saxons ii. 73–6.
[894] Already in 749 Æthelbald of Mercia in a general privilege for the churches
(H. & S. iii. 386) says, ‘Sed nec hoc praetermittendum est, cum necessarium
constat aecclesiis Dei, quia Æthelbaldus Rex, pro expiatione delictorum suorum
et retributione mercedis aeternae, famulis Dei propriam libertatem in fructibus
silvarum agrorumque, sive in caeteris utilitatibus fluminum vel raptura piscium,
habere donavit.’
[895] See above, p. 55.
[896] Rectitudines c. 1 (Schmid, App. III.).
[897] See above, p. 169.
[898] Schröder, Die Franken und ihr Recht, Zeitsch. d. Savigny Stiftung, iii. 62–
82, has argued that, from the first times of the Frankish settlement onwards, the
king has a Bodenregal, an Obereigenthum over all land.
[899] Epistola ad Ecgbertum (ed. Plummer, i. 405).
[900] K. 131 (i. 158).
[901] K. 137 (i. 164); B. M. Facs. i. 10. A few words are illegible, but the land is
given ‘in ius ecclesiasticae liberalitatis in perpetuum possid[endam].’
[902] Æthelwulf makes a grant to a thegn, K. 269 (ii. 48), ‘pro expiatione
piaculorum meorum et absolutione criminum meorum.’ In course of time the
piety of the recitals becomes more and more perfunctory. It becomes a
philosophic reflection on the transitoriness of earthly affairs and finally
evaporates, leaving behind some commonplace about the superiority of written
over unwritten testimony.
[903] Bede (ed. Plummer, i. 415): ‘ipsas quoque litteras privilegiorum suorum.’
[904] Vinogradoff, Folkland, Eng. Hist. Rev. viii. 1.
[905] Edw. I. 2.
[906] Schmid, p. 575.
[907] K. 281 (ii. 64); B. M. Facs. ii. 33.
Liber Census Daniae, ed. O. Nielsen, 1879.
[891] Cnut’s law (II. 62) about this matter seems to imply that in consequence of
the immunities lavishly bestowed by his predecessors, the old ‘king’s feorm’ was
only leviable from lands which were deemed to be the king’s lands, but that
Cnut’s reeves had been demanding that this feorm should be supplemented by
other lands. The king of his grace forbids them to do this. The old feorm has
been changed into a rent of crown lands; a vague claim to ‘purveyance’ is
abolished, but will appear again after the Conquest.
[892] In the A.-S. Chron. ann. 991, 1007, 1011, the Danegeld appears as a gafol;
but this is the common word for a rent paid by a tenant to his landlord.
[893] Kemble, Saxons ii. 73–6.
[894] Already in 749 Æthelbald of Mercia in a general privilege for the churches
(H. & S. iii. 386) says, ‘Sed nec hoc praetermittendum est, cum necessarium
constat aecclesiis Dei, quia Æthelbaldus Rex, pro expiatione delictorum suorum
et retributione mercedis aeternae, famulis Dei propriam libertatem in fructibus
silvarum agrorumque, sive in caeteris utilitatibus fluminum vel raptura piscium,
habere donavit.’
[895] See above, p. 55.
[896] Rectitudines c. 1 (Schmid, App. III.).
[897] See above, p. 169.
[898] Schröder, Die Franken und ihr Recht, Zeitsch. d. Savigny Stiftung, iii. 62–
82, has argued that, from the first times of the Frankish settlement onwards, the
king has a Bodenregal, an Obereigenthum over all land.
[899] Epistola ad Ecgbertum (ed. Plummer, i. 405).
[900] K. 131 (i. 158).
[901] K. 137 (i. 164); B. M. Facs. i. 10. A few words are illegible, but the land is
given ‘in ius ecclesiasticae liberalitatis in perpetuum possid[endam].’
[902] Æthelwulf makes a grant to a thegn, K. 269 (ii. 48), ‘pro expiatione
piaculorum meorum et absolutione criminum meorum.’ In course of time the
piety of the recitals becomes more and more perfunctory. It becomes a
philosophic reflection on the transitoriness of earthly affairs and finally
evaporates, leaving behind some commonplace about the superiority of written
over unwritten testimony.
[903] Bede (ed. Plummer, i. 415): ‘ipsas quoque litteras privilegiorum suorum.’
[904] Vinogradoff, Folkland, Eng. Hist. Rev. viii. 1.
[905] Edw. I. 2.
[906] Schmid, p. 575.
[907] K. 281 (ii. 64); B. M. Facs. ii. 33.
Page 545
[908] K. 317 (ii. 120); T. 480; B. ii. 195.
[909] K. 260 (ii. 28); B. ii. 33; B. M. Facs. ii. 30.
[910] In K. 1019 (v. 58) there is talk of Offa having booked land to himself, and
in K. 1245 (vi. 58) Edgar seems to perform a similar feat without mentioning the
consent of the witan, though they attest the deed. See Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 145.
[911] From Alfred and Edward the Elder we have hardly enough genuine
charters to serve as materials for an induction, but Edward’s reign seems the
turning point.
[912] A.D. 838, K. 1044 (v. 90): Egbert gives ‘aliquantulam terrae partem meae
propriae hereditatis ... cum consilio et testimonio optimatum meorum.’ A.D.
863, K. 1059 (v. 116): Æthelred ‘cum consensu ac licentia episcoporum ac
principum meorum’ gives ‘aliquam partem agri quae ad me rite pertinebat.’
[913] Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 212.
[914] We know of but four specimens earlier than 750. The first is a deed
whereby Wulfhere of Mercia makes a grant ‘cum consensu et licentia amicorum
et optimatum meorum’: E. 4; B. M. Facs. iv. 1. The second is a deed whereby
Hlothar of Kent makes a grant with the consent of Abp Theodore, his (Hlothar’s)
brother’s son Eadric and all the princes; K. 16 (i. 20); B. M. Facs. i. 1. The third,
known to us only through a copy, is one by which Æthelbald of Mercia makes a
grant ‘cum consensu vel episcoporum vel optimatum meorum’; K. 83 (i. 100).
By a fourth deed, K. 27 (i. 30), Eadric grants land ‘cum consensu meorum
patriciorum’; but this also we only get from a copy.
[915] K. 1 (i. 1); A.D. 604. Æthelbert for Rochester.
[916] K. 43 (i. 50); B. i. 140: A.D. 697, Wihtræd.—K. 47 (i. 54); E. 17; B. M.
Facs. i. 4: Wihtræd.—K. 77 (i. 92); E. 24; B. M. Facs. i. 6: A.D. 732, Æthelbert.
—K. 132 (i. 160); E. 54; B. M. Facs. ii. 4: A.D. 778, Egbert.
[917] K. 85 (i. 102); E. 32: Eadbert for Rochester. Of this deed we have but a
transcript. The formula of attestation is very curious and may have been
distorted either by the original scribe or the copyist.
[918] K. 157 (i. 189), Offa of Mercia uses this eschatocol, but in a Kentish gift.
[919] K. 1006–7 (v. 47–8); B. i. 256–7.
[920] K. 79 (i. 95).
[921] Brunner, Rechtsgeschichte der Röm. u. German. Urkunde, pp. 220–8;
Giry, Manuel de diplomatique, 614. Bede in his famous letter (ed. Plummer, i.
417) uses the technical astipulari to describe the action of the prelates who set
their crosses to the king’s charters. It occurs also in a charter of 791, K. 1015 (v.
53–4). See also K. 691 (iii. 289), ‘constipulatores.’
[922] Brunner, op. cit. 158. Dr Brunner thinks that the precedents for A.-S.
charters came direct from Rome rather than from any other quarter (p. 187); but
he fully admits that these charters when compared with foreign instruments
show a certain formlessness.
[909] K. 260 (ii. 28); B. ii. 33; B. M. Facs. ii. 30.
[910] In K. 1019 (v. 58) there is talk of Offa having booked land to himself, and
in K. 1245 (vi. 58) Edgar seems to perform a similar feat without mentioning the
consent of the witan, though they attest the deed. See Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 145.
[911] From Alfred and Edward the Elder we have hardly enough genuine
charters to serve as materials for an induction, but Edward’s reign seems the
turning point.
[912] A.D. 838, K. 1044 (v. 90): Egbert gives ‘aliquantulam terrae partem meae
propriae hereditatis ... cum consilio et testimonio optimatum meorum.’ A.D.
863, K. 1059 (v. 116): Æthelred ‘cum consensu ac licentia episcoporum ac
principum meorum’ gives ‘aliquam partem agri quae ad me rite pertinebat.’
[913] Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 212.
[914] We know of but four specimens earlier than 750. The first is a deed
whereby Wulfhere of Mercia makes a grant ‘cum consensu et licentia amicorum
et optimatum meorum’: E. 4; B. M. Facs. iv. 1. The second is a deed whereby
Hlothar of Kent makes a grant with the consent of Abp Theodore, his (Hlothar’s)
brother’s son Eadric and all the princes; K. 16 (i. 20); B. M. Facs. i. 1. The third,
known to us only through a copy, is one by which Æthelbald of Mercia makes a
grant ‘cum consensu vel episcoporum vel optimatum meorum’; K. 83 (i. 100).
By a fourth deed, K. 27 (i. 30), Eadric grants land ‘cum consensu meorum
patriciorum’; but this also we only get from a copy.
[915] K. 1 (i. 1); A.D. 604. Æthelbert for Rochester.
[916] K. 43 (i. 50); B. i. 140: A.D. 697, Wihtræd.—K. 47 (i. 54); E. 17; B. M.
Facs. i. 4: Wihtræd.—K. 77 (i. 92); E. 24; B. M. Facs. i. 6: A.D. 732, Æthelbert.
—K. 132 (i. 160); E. 54; B. M. Facs. ii. 4: A.D. 778, Egbert.
[917] K. 85 (i. 102); E. 32: Eadbert for Rochester. Of this deed we have but a
transcript. The formula of attestation is very curious and may have been
distorted either by the original scribe or the copyist.
[918] K. 157 (i. 189), Offa of Mercia uses this eschatocol, but in a Kentish gift.
[919] K. 1006–7 (v. 47–8); B. i. 256–7.
[920] K. 79 (i. 95).
[921] Brunner, Rechtsgeschichte der Röm. u. German. Urkunde, pp. 220–8;
Giry, Manuel de diplomatique, 614. Bede in his famous letter (ed. Plummer, i.
417) uses the technical astipulari to describe the action of the prelates who set
their crosses to the king’s charters. It occurs also in a charter of 791, K. 1015 (v.
53–4). See also K. 691 (iii. 289), ‘constipulatores.’
[922] Brunner, op. cit. 158. Dr Brunner thinks that the precedents for A.-S.
charters came direct from Rome rather than from any other quarter (p. 187); but
he fully admits that these charters when compared with foreign instruments
show a certain formlessness.
Page 546
[923] Under our own law we may conceive a case in which a man would be
compelled to die unwillingly intestate because one of the two people present at
his death-bed capriciously refused to witness a will.
[924] The transition is marked by the following charters.—K. 104, 105, 108,
113, in these we have the mere rogation of fit and proper witnesses.—K. 114 (a
Kentish deed which Kemble ascribes to 759–765), in this the clause of
attestation speaks of the counsel and consent of the optimates and principes.—
K. 118, Uhtred of the Hwiccas makes a grant with the consent and licence of
Offa king of the Mercians and of his (Offa‘s) bishops and principes.—K. 120,
the witnesses are described as condonantes.—K. 121, 122, (A.D. 774) the clause
of attestation says ‘cum sacerdotibus et senioribus populi more testium
subscribendo.’—K. 131, ‘testium ergo et consentientium episcoporum ac
principum meorum signa et nomina pro firmitatis stabilimento hic infra
notabo.’—A clause of this kind becomes common with Offa, see K. 134, 137,
138, 148, 151, but occasionally there are relapses and the signatories merely
appear as ‘fit and proper’ or ‘religious’ witnesses. But it is not until after 800
that, save as a rare exception, the consent of the magnates is brought into
connexion with the operative words.
[925] Bresslau, Urkundenlehre, i. 697.
[926] Bede’s letter to Egbert (ed. Plummer, i. 405) and his account of Benedict
Biscop (ib. 364) show that it was expected of the king that he should provide
land for young warriors of noble race; but no word implies that the land out of
which the provision was to be made was ‘folk-land,’ nor is it clear that the young
warrior was to have a book.
[927] See William’s charter for Fécamp, Neustria Pia, p. 224.
[928] A.D. 692–3, K. 35 (i. 39); B. M. Facs. i. 2: a grant by ‘Hodilredus parens
Sebbi ... cum ipsius consensu’; ‘ego Sebbi rex Eastsaxonorum pro confirmatione
subscripsi.’—A.D. 704, K. 52 (i. 59); B. M. Facs. i. 3: ‘Ego Sueabræd rex
Eastsaxonorum et ego Pæogthath cum licentia Ædelredi regis.’—A.D. 706, K.
56 (i. 64), ‘Ego Æthiluueard subregulus ... consentiente Coenredo rege
Merciorum.’—A.D. 721–46, K. 91 (i. 109), Æthelbald of Mercia attests a lease
made by the bishop of Worcester.—A.D. 759, K. 105 (i. 128); B. M. Facs. ii. 2:
three brothers, each of whom is a regulus, make a gift ‘cum licentia et
permissione Regis Offan Merciorum.’—A.D. 767, 770, K. 117–8 (i. 144–5): two
gifts by Uhtred, regulus of the Hwiccas, ‘cum consensu et licentia Offani Regis
Merciorum.’—A.D. 791? K. 1016 (v. 54): ‘Ego Aldwlfus dux Suð-Saxonum ...
cum consensu et licentia Offae regis Merciorum.’
[929] K. 113 (i. 137).
[930] K. 314 (ii. 112); 1067 (v. 127); Liber de Hyda, 57. On the death of
Æthelbald, two of his sons, Æthelred and Alfred, seem to have made over the
lands which had been devised to them by their father to Æthelbert, the reigning
king, so that he might enjoy them during his life. Then again, on Æthelbert’s
death, Alfred would not insist upon a partition but allowed his share to remain in
the possession of Æthelred, the reigning king. See also Eadred’s will, Liber de
Hyda, 153; he seems to have a good deal of land of which he can dispose freely.
compelled to die unwillingly intestate because one of the two people present at
his death-bed capriciously refused to witness a will.
[924] The transition is marked by the following charters.—K. 104, 105, 108,
113, in these we have the mere rogation of fit and proper witnesses.—K. 114 (a
Kentish deed which Kemble ascribes to 759–765), in this the clause of
attestation speaks of the counsel and consent of the optimates and principes.—
K. 118, Uhtred of the Hwiccas makes a grant with the consent and licence of
Offa king of the Mercians and of his (Offa‘s) bishops and principes.—K. 120,
the witnesses are described as condonantes.—K. 121, 122, (A.D. 774) the clause
of attestation says ‘cum sacerdotibus et senioribus populi more testium
subscribendo.’—K. 131, ‘testium ergo et consentientium episcoporum ac
principum meorum signa et nomina pro firmitatis stabilimento hic infra
notabo.’—A clause of this kind becomes common with Offa, see K. 134, 137,
138, 148, 151, but occasionally there are relapses and the signatories merely
appear as ‘fit and proper’ or ‘religious’ witnesses. But it is not until after 800
that, save as a rare exception, the consent of the magnates is brought into
connexion with the operative words.
[925] Bresslau, Urkundenlehre, i. 697.
[926] Bede’s letter to Egbert (ed. Plummer, i. 405) and his account of Benedict
Biscop (ib. 364) show that it was expected of the king that he should provide
land for young warriors of noble race; but no word implies that the land out of
which the provision was to be made was ‘folk-land,’ nor is it clear that the young
warrior was to have a book.
[927] See William’s charter for Fécamp, Neustria Pia, p. 224.
[928] A.D. 692–3, K. 35 (i. 39); B. M. Facs. i. 2: a grant by ‘Hodilredus parens
Sebbi ... cum ipsius consensu’; ‘ego Sebbi rex Eastsaxonorum pro confirmatione
subscripsi.’—A.D. 704, K. 52 (i. 59); B. M. Facs. i. 3: ‘Ego Sueabræd rex
Eastsaxonorum et ego Pæogthath cum licentia Ædelredi regis.’—A.D. 706, K.
56 (i. 64), ‘Ego Æthiluueard subregulus ... consentiente Coenredo rege
Merciorum.’—A.D. 721–46, K. 91 (i. 109), Æthelbald of Mercia attests a lease
made by the bishop of Worcester.—A.D. 759, K. 105 (i. 128); B. M. Facs. ii. 2:
three brothers, each of whom is a regulus, make a gift ‘cum licentia et
permissione Regis Offan Merciorum.’—A.D. 767, 770, K. 117–8 (i. 144–5): two
gifts by Uhtred, regulus of the Hwiccas, ‘cum consensu et licentia Offani Regis
Merciorum.’—A.D. 791? K. 1016 (v. 54): ‘Ego Aldwlfus dux Suð-Saxonum ...
cum consensu et licentia Offae regis Merciorum.’
[929] K. 113 (i. 137).
[930] K. 314 (ii. 112); 1067 (v. 127); Liber de Hyda, 57. On the death of
Æthelbald, two of his sons, Æthelred and Alfred, seem to have made over the
lands which had been devised to them by their father to Æthelbert, the reigning
king, so that he might enjoy them during his life. Then again, on Æthelbert’s
death, Alfred would not insist upon a partition but allowed his share to remain in
the possession of Æthelred, the reigning king. See also Eadred’s will, Liber de
Hyda, 153; he seems to have a good deal of land of which he can dispose freely.
Page 547
[931] K. 1312 (vi. 172).
[932] The violated books are in Chron. Abingd. i. 314, 317, 334.
[933] Were it possible for us to say that the kingship was elective, this would be
but a beginning of difficulties. For example, we should raise a question which in
all probability has no answer, were we to ask whether a majority could bind a
minority.
[934] Adams, The Anglo-Saxon Courts of Law (Essays in Anglo-Saxon Law, p.
1). Hallam, Middle Ages (ed. 1837), vol. ii. p. 416, says that of the right of
territorial jurisdiction ‘we meet frequent instances in the laws and records of the
Anglo-Saxons, though not in those of early date.’ The one charter older than
Edward the Confessor that he cites is one of the Croyland forgeries. Kemble’s
opinion seems to have fluctuated; Saxons, i. 177 note, ii. 397, Cod. Dipl. i. xliv-
xlvii. K. Maurer, Krit. Ueberschau, ii. 57, thinks that the existence of the private
court is proved for Cnut’s reign, but not for any earlier time. Dr Stubbs, Const.
Hist. i. 119, seems to doubt whether it can be traced far beyond the days of Cnut.
Zinkeisen, Die Anfänge der Lehngerichtsbarkeit in England (1893, a Berlin
doctoral dissertation), criticizes Mr Adams’s theory.
[935] Essays, pp. 43–4.
[936] See above, p. 84.
[937] K. 853 (iv. 208); E. 343.
[938] The clearest instance is in the Waltham charter, K. 813 (iv. 154), but some
details of this are not beyond suspicion. See also the writs for Westminster, K.
828 (iv. 191), 857 (iv. 213); Ordn. Facs. vol. ii. pl. 9.
[939] Charter for St. Edmund’s, K. 1346 (vi. 205). See the account of Bury St.
Edmunds in D. B. ii. 372: ‘et quaudo in hundreto solvitur ad geltum 1 lib. tunc
inde exeunt 60 den. ad victum monachorum.’
[940] First printed from a copy in the MacDurnan Gospels by J. O. Westwood in
Palaeographia Sacra, with a facsimile, plate 11. Accepted by Kemble and printed
by him in Archaeological Journal, xiv. 61; Earle, 232; Freeman, Norman
Conquest, ii. 52.
[941] See the writ for St. Paul’s, K. 1319 (vi. 183). Mr Adams (p. 44) stigmatizes
this as an evident forgery; but the reasons for this severe judgment are not
apparent. See also K. 1321 (vi. 190), and the Latin writ of Harthacnut K. 1330
(vi. 192), which may have a genuine basis.
[942] Cnut, II. 12 (Schmid, p. 276).
[943] Thus if a statute requires written and signed evidence of an agreement, a
letter in which the writer says, ‘True, I made such and such an agreement, but I
am not going to keep it,’ may be evidence enough; see Bailey v. Sweeting, 9 C.
B. N. S. 843.
[944] Brunner, Carta und Notitia (Commentationes in honorem T. Mommsen);
Brunner, Zur Rechtsgeschichte der Röm. u. Germ. Urkunde.
[932] The violated books are in Chron. Abingd. i. 314, 317, 334.
[933] Were it possible for us to say that the kingship was elective, this would be
but a beginning of difficulties. For example, we should raise a question which in
all probability has no answer, were we to ask whether a majority could bind a
minority.
[934] Adams, The Anglo-Saxon Courts of Law (Essays in Anglo-Saxon Law, p.
1). Hallam, Middle Ages (ed. 1837), vol. ii. p. 416, says that of the right of
territorial jurisdiction ‘we meet frequent instances in the laws and records of the
Anglo-Saxons, though not in those of early date.’ The one charter older than
Edward the Confessor that he cites is one of the Croyland forgeries. Kemble’s
opinion seems to have fluctuated; Saxons, i. 177 note, ii. 397, Cod. Dipl. i. xliv-
xlvii. K. Maurer, Krit. Ueberschau, ii. 57, thinks that the existence of the private
court is proved for Cnut’s reign, but not for any earlier time. Dr Stubbs, Const.
Hist. i. 119, seems to doubt whether it can be traced far beyond the days of Cnut.
Zinkeisen, Die Anfänge der Lehngerichtsbarkeit in England (1893, a Berlin
doctoral dissertation), criticizes Mr Adams’s theory.
[935] Essays, pp. 43–4.
[936] See above, p. 84.
[937] K. 853 (iv. 208); E. 343.
[938] The clearest instance is in the Waltham charter, K. 813 (iv. 154), but some
details of this are not beyond suspicion. See also the writs for Westminster, K.
828 (iv. 191), 857 (iv. 213); Ordn. Facs. vol. ii. pl. 9.
[939] Charter for St. Edmund’s, K. 1346 (vi. 205). See the account of Bury St.
Edmunds in D. B. ii. 372: ‘et quaudo in hundreto solvitur ad geltum 1 lib. tunc
inde exeunt 60 den. ad victum monachorum.’
[940] First printed from a copy in the MacDurnan Gospels by J. O. Westwood in
Palaeographia Sacra, with a facsimile, plate 11. Accepted by Kemble and printed
by him in Archaeological Journal, xiv. 61; Earle, 232; Freeman, Norman
Conquest, ii. 52.
[941] See the writ for St. Paul’s, K. 1319 (vi. 183). Mr Adams (p. 44) stigmatizes
this as an evident forgery; but the reasons for this severe judgment are not
apparent. See also K. 1321 (vi. 190), and the Latin writ of Harthacnut K. 1330
(vi. 192), which may have a genuine basis.
[942] Cnut, II. 12 (Schmid, p. 276).
[943] Thus if a statute requires written and signed evidence of an agreement, a
letter in which the writer says, ‘True, I made such and such an agreement, but I
am not going to keep it,’ may be evidence enough; see Bailey v. Sweeting, 9 C.
B. N. S. 843.
[944] Brunner, Carta und Notitia (Commentationes in honorem T. Mommsen);
Brunner, Zur Rechtsgeschichte der Röm. u. Germ. Urkunde.
Page 548
[945] Both the Angevin charter and the Angevin letters patent are in what we
call ‘writ-form.’ The main formal difference is that the charter professes to be
witnessed by a number of the king’s councillors, while Teste Meipso does for
letters patent. This distinction is coming to the front about the year 1200.
[946] K. 731 (iv. 9); T. 308.
[947] K. 642 (iii. 203); compare D. B. i. 41.
[948] The Conqueror’s charter for Exeter reproduced in Ordnance Facsimiles,
vol. ii. is a fine specimen of the solemn charters referred to above. A
considerable number of specimens, genuine and spurious (for our present
purpose a forgery is almost as valuable as a true charter), will be found in the
Monasticon, e.g. i. 174, Rufus for Rochester; i. 266, Rufus for Bath; ii. 109–111,
126, Henry I. for Abingdon; i. 163, Henry I. for Rochester; ii. 65–6, Henry I. for
Evesham; ii. 267, Henry I. for Bath; ii. 539, Henry I. for Exeter; iii. 448, Henry
I. for Malvern; vi. (1) 247, Henry I. for Merton; iii. 406, Stephen for Eye. Nor
was this solemn form employed only by kings:—See Monast. ii. 385–6, Earl
Hugh for Chester; iii. 404, Robert Malet for Eye; v. 121, Hugh de la Val for
Pontefract; v. 167, William of Mortain for Montacute; v. 190, Simon of Senlis
for St. Andrew Northampton; v. 247, Stephen of Boulogne for Furness; v. 316,
Richard Earl of Exeter for Quarr; v. 628, Ranulf of Chester for Pulton. As to
Normandy, see the charters in the Neustria Pia and the Gallia Christiana. A
charter of Henry II. for Fontenay recites a charter by which the ancestors of
Jordan Tesson founded the abbey with the consent of Duke William, also a
charter of Duke William, ‘quae cartae crucibus sunt signatae secundum antiquam
consuetudinem’; Neustria Pia, p. 80; Gallia Christiana, xi. Ap. col. 82. It is
probable that during the Norman reigns the king’s cross was considered more
valuable even than the king’s seal; Monast. iv. p. 18, Henry I. says, ‘hanc
donationem confirmo ego Henricus rex et astipulatione sanctae crucis et
appositione sigilli mei’; Ibid. ii. 385–6, Earl Hugh confirms a gift ‘non solum
sigillo meo sed etiam sigillo Dei omnipotentis, id est, signo sanctae crucis.’ It is
not implied in our text that every specimen of each of the two forms of
instrument that we have mentioned will always display all the characteristics that
have been noticed. There is no reason, for example, why in a solemn charter the
king should not speak in the past tense of the act of gift, and as a matter of fact
he does so in some of the Anglo-Saxon books, while, on the other hand, an
instrument which begins with a salutation may well have the words of gift in the
present tense (this is by no means uncommon in Anglo-Norman documents); nor
of course is it necessary that an instrument in writ-form should be authenticated
by a seal instead of a cross. Again, a solemn charter with crosses and pious
recitals may begin with a salutation. We merely point out that the diplomata of
Edward the Confessor and his Norman successors tend to conform to two
distinct types. As to this matter see the remarks of Hickes, Dissertatio
Epistolaris, p. 77; Hardy, Introduction to Charter Rolls, xiv., xxxvi.
[949] The curious formula, Schmid, App. XI., already has ‘ne sace ne socne.’
This seems to suppose that it is a common thing for a man to have sake and soke
over his land.
[950] R. H. ii. 231.
call ‘writ-form.’ The main formal difference is that the charter professes to be
witnessed by a number of the king’s councillors, while Teste Meipso does for
letters patent. This distinction is coming to the front about the year 1200.
[946] K. 731 (iv. 9); T. 308.
[947] K. 642 (iii. 203); compare D. B. i. 41.
[948] The Conqueror’s charter for Exeter reproduced in Ordnance Facsimiles,
vol. ii. is a fine specimen of the solemn charters referred to above. A
considerable number of specimens, genuine and spurious (for our present
purpose a forgery is almost as valuable as a true charter), will be found in the
Monasticon, e.g. i. 174, Rufus for Rochester; i. 266, Rufus for Bath; ii. 109–111,
126, Henry I. for Abingdon; i. 163, Henry I. for Rochester; ii. 65–6, Henry I. for
Evesham; ii. 267, Henry I. for Bath; ii. 539, Henry I. for Exeter; iii. 448, Henry
I. for Malvern; vi. (1) 247, Henry I. for Merton; iii. 406, Stephen for Eye. Nor
was this solemn form employed only by kings:—See Monast. ii. 385–6, Earl
Hugh for Chester; iii. 404, Robert Malet for Eye; v. 121, Hugh de la Val for
Pontefract; v. 167, William of Mortain for Montacute; v. 190, Simon of Senlis
for St. Andrew Northampton; v. 247, Stephen of Boulogne for Furness; v. 316,
Richard Earl of Exeter for Quarr; v. 628, Ranulf of Chester for Pulton. As to
Normandy, see the charters in the Neustria Pia and the Gallia Christiana. A
charter of Henry II. for Fontenay recites a charter by which the ancestors of
Jordan Tesson founded the abbey with the consent of Duke William, also a
charter of Duke William, ‘quae cartae crucibus sunt signatae secundum antiquam
consuetudinem’; Neustria Pia, p. 80; Gallia Christiana, xi. Ap. col. 82. It is
probable that during the Norman reigns the king’s cross was considered more
valuable even than the king’s seal; Monast. iv. p. 18, Henry I. says, ‘hanc
donationem confirmo ego Henricus rex et astipulatione sanctae crucis et
appositione sigilli mei’; Ibid. ii. 385–6, Earl Hugh confirms a gift ‘non solum
sigillo meo sed etiam sigillo Dei omnipotentis, id est, signo sanctae crucis.’ It is
not implied in our text that every specimen of each of the two forms of
instrument that we have mentioned will always display all the characteristics that
have been noticed. There is no reason, for example, why in a solemn charter the
king should not speak in the past tense of the act of gift, and as a matter of fact
he does so in some of the Anglo-Saxon books, while, on the other hand, an
instrument which begins with a salutation may well have the words of gift in the
present tense (this is by no means uncommon in Anglo-Norman documents); nor
of course is it necessary that an instrument in writ-form should be authenticated
by a seal instead of a cross. Again, a solemn charter with crosses and pious
recitals may begin with a salutation. We merely point out that the diplomata of
Edward the Confessor and his Norman successors tend to conform to two
distinct types. As to this matter see the remarks of Hickes, Dissertatio
Epistolaris, p. 77; Hardy, Introduction to Charter Rolls, xiv., xxxvi.
[949] The curious formula, Schmid, App. XI., already has ‘ne sace ne socne.’
This seems to suppose that it is a common thing for a man to have sake and soke
over his land.
[950] R. H. ii. 231.
Page 549
[951] R. H. ii. 458.
[952] D. B. i. 172 b.
[953] R. H. ii. 283.
[954] Hale, Worcester Register, pp. xxx, 21 b; K. Appendix, 514 (vi. 237);
Hickes, Dissertatio Epistolaris, i. 86; at the end of his dissertation Hickes gives a
facsimile of the instrument.
[955] A record of 825 (H. & S. iii. 596–601) mentions a place ‘in provincia
Huicciorum’ called Oslafeshlau; the editors of the Councils say ‘Oslafeshlau is
probably the original name of the hundred which now, either from some act of
St. Oswald or by an easy corruption, is called Oswaldslaw.’ One of Oswald’s
books (K. iii. 160) mentions ‘Oswald’s hlaw’ among the boundaries of
Wulfringtune, i.e. Wolverton, a few miles east of Worcester. It is very likely that
the true name of the hundred is Oswald’s hlaw, i.e. Oswald’s hill, not Oswald’s
law, though the mistake was made at an early time. But the story told by the
charter as to the fusion of three old hundreds is corroborated by Domesday, and
in the thirteenth century one of the three courts was still held at Wimborntree.
[956] But Dr Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 118, relies on part of this charter and it is not
like ordinary forger’s work. If, as is highly probable, there has been some
‘improvement’ of the charter, such improvement seems to have favoured, not the
church of Worcester as against the king, but the monks as against the bishop.
[957] ‘cum tolle et teame, saca et socne, et infangenetheof, et proprii iuris
debitum transgressionis, et poenam delicti quae Anglice dicitur ofersæwnesse, et
gyltwyte.’
[958] D. B. i. 172 b: ‘Ecclesia S. Mariae de Wirecestre habet unum hundret quod
vocatur Oswaldeslau in quo iacent ccc. hidae. De quibus episcopus ipsius
ecclesiae a constitutione antiquorum temporum habet omnes redditiones
socharum et omnes consuetudines inibi pertinentes ad dominicum victum et
regis servitium et suum, ita ut nullus vicecomes ullam ibi habere possit
querelam, nec in aliquo placito, nec in alia qualibet causa. Hoc testatur totus
comitatus.’
[959] Another example is Edgar’s charter for Ely, A.D. 970 K. 563 (iii. 56),
which bestows the soke over the two hundreds which lie within the Isle, five
hundreds in Essex, and all other lands of the monastery. Kemble was inclined to
accept the A.-S. version of the charter. It purports to be obtained by bishop
Æthelwold and, if genuine, is closely connected with the Oswaldslaw charter;
both testify to unusual privileges obtained by the founders of the new
monasticism.
[960] E.g. K. 1298 (vi. 149), ‘Dis is seo freolsboc to ðan mynstre æt Byrtune.’
[961] E.g. K. 277 (ii. 58), 278 (ii. 60).
[962] A.D. 875; K. 306 (ii. 101); B. ii. 159.
[963] Unsuspected charters of the seventh and eighth centuries are so few, that
we hardly dare venture on any generalities about their wording. But already in a
[952] D. B. i. 172 b.
[953] R. H. ii. 283.
[954] Hale, Worcester Register, pp. xxx, 21 b; K. Appendix, 514 (vi. 237);
Hickes, Dissertatio Epistolaris, i. 86; at the end of his dissertation Hickes gives a
facsimile of the instrument.
[955] A record of 825 (H. & S. iii. 596–601) mentions a place ‘in provincia
Huicciorum’ called Oslafeshlau; the editors of the Councils say ‘Oslafeshlau is
probably the original name of the hundred which now, either from some act of
St. Oswald or by an easy corruption, is called Oswaldslaw.’ One of Oswald’s
books (K. iii. 160) mentions ‘Oswald’s hlaw’ among the boundaries of
Wulfringtune, i.e. Wolverton, a few miles east of Worcester. It is very likely that
the true name of the hundred is Oswald’s hlaw, i.e. Oswald’s hill, not Oswald’s
law, though the mistake was made at an early time. But the story told by the
charter as to the fusion of three old hundreds is corroborated by Domesday, and
in the thirteenth century one of the three courts was still held at Wimborntree.
[956] But Dr Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 118, relies on part of this charter and it is not
like ordinary forger’s work. If, as is highly probable, there has been some
‘improvement’ of the charter, such improvement seems to have favoured, not the
church of Worcester as against the king, but the monks as against the bishop.
[957] ‘cum tolle et teame, saca et socne, et infangenetheof, et proprii iuris
debitum transgressionis, et poenam delicti quae Anglice dicitur ofersæwnesse, et
gyltwyte.’
[958] D. B. i. 172 b: ‘Ecclesia S. Mariae de Wirecestre habet unum hundret quod
vocatur Oswaldeslau in quo iacent ccc. hidae. De quibus episcopus ipsius
ecclesiae a constitutione antiquorum temporum habet omnes redditiones
socharum et omnes consuetudines inibi pertinentes ad dominicum victum et
regis servitium et suum, ita ut nullus vicecomes ullam ibi habere possit
querelam, nec in aliquo placito, nec in alia qualibet causa. Hoc testatur totus
comitatus.’
[959] Another example is Edgar’s charter for Ely, A.D. 970 K. 563 (iii. 56),
which bestows the soke over the two hundreds which lie within the Isle, five
hundreds in Essex, and all other lands of the monastery. Kemble was inclined to
accept the A.-S. version of the charter. It purports to be obtained by bishop
Æthelwold and, if genuine, is closely connected with the Oswaldslaw charter;
both testify to unusual privileges obtained by the founders of the new
monasticism.
[960] E.g. K. 1298 (vi. 149), ‘Dis is seo freolsboc to ðan mynstre æt Byrtune.’
[961] E.g. K. 277 (ii. 58), 278 (ii. 60).
[962] A.D. 875; K. 306 (ii. 101); B. ii. 159.
[963] Unsuspected charters of the seventh and eighth centuries are so few, that
we hardly dare venture on any generalities about their wording. But already in a
Page 550
charter attributed to 674, E. p. 4, Brit. Mus. Facs. iv. 1, something very like the
‘common form’ of later days appears; it appears also in a charter of A.D. 691–2,
K. 32 (i. 35), E. p. 12, of which we have but a fragmentary copy, and before the
end of the eighth century it appears with some frequency; see e.g. Offa’s charter
of 774, K. 123 (i. 150): ‘sit autem terra illa libera ab omni saecularis rei negotio,
praeter pontis, arcisve restaurationem et contra hostes communem
expeditionem.’
[964] Occasionally the contrast is expressly drawn, e.g. by Æthelbald, K. 90 (i.
108): ‘ut ab omni tributo vectigalium operum onerumque saecularium sit libera
... tantum ut Deo omnipotenti ex eodem agello aecclesiasticae servitutis
famulatum inpendat.’
[965] See above, p. 229.
[966] Privilege of Wihtræd, A.D. 696–716, Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 238: ‘Adhuc
addimus maiorem libertatem. Inprimis Christi ecclesiae cum omnibus agris ad
eam pertinentibus, similiter Hrofensi ecclesiae cum suis, caeterisque praedictis
omnibus ecclesiis Dei nostri, subiciantur pro salute animae meae, meorumque
praedecessorum, et pro spe caelestis regni ex hac die, et deinceps concedimus et
donamus ab omnibus difficultatibus saecularium servitutis, a pastu Regis,
principum, comitum, nec non ab operibus, maioribus minoribusve gravitatibus:
et ab omni debitu vel pulsione regum tensuris liberos eos esse perpetua libertate
statuimus.’ See also the act by which Æthelbald confirmed this privilege in 742,
H. & S. iii. 340, B. i. 233–6. According to one version of this act, the trinoda
necessitas is, according to another it is not, excepted. The learned editors of the
Councils speak of ‘the suspicions common to every record that notices the
Privilege of Wihtræd.’ We are treading on treacherous ground. See also the less
suspicious Act of Æthelbald, A.D. 749, H. & S. iii. 386: ‘Concedo ut monasteria
et aecclesiae a publicis vectigalibus et ab omnibus operibus oneribusque, auctore
Deo, servientes absoluti maneant, nisi sola quae communiter fruenda sunt,
omnique populo, edicto regis, facienda iubentur, id est, instructionibus pontium,
vel necessariis defensionibus arcium contra hostes, non sunt renuenda.’
[967] A.D. 1066, Edward the Confessor for Westminster, K. 828 (iv. 191):
‘scotfre and gavelfre.’
[968] Kemble, Codex, vol. i. Introduction liii-lvi., collects some of the best
instances. Offa for a valuable consideration frees certain lands belonging to the
church of Worcester from pastiones; ‘nec non et trium annorum ad se pertinentes
pastiones, id est sex convivia, libenter concedendo largitus est’: K. 143 (i. 173),
B. i. 335.
[969] A.D. 904, K. 1084 (v. 157).
[970] A.D. 826, Egbert for Winchester, K. 1037 (v. 81): ‘Volo etiam ut haec terra
libera semper sit ... nullique serviat nisi soli episcopo Wentano.’
[971] K. 1346 (vi. 205). Compare Fustel de Coulanges, L’Immunité
Mérovingienne, Revue historique, xxiii. 21.
[972] E.g. K. 1117 (v. 231): ‘tribus semotis causis a quibus nullus nostrorum
poterit expers fore’; K. v. pp. 259, 283, 334.
‘common form’ of later days appears; it appears also in a charter of A.D. 691–2,
K. 32 (i. 35), E. p. 12, of which we have but a fragmentary copy, and before the
end of the eighth century it appears with some frequency; see e.g. Offa’s charter
of 774, K. 123 (i. 150): ‘sit autem terra illa libera ab omni saecularis rei negotio,
praeter pontis, arcisve restaurationem et contra hostes communem
expeditionem.’
[964] Occasionally the contrast is expressly drawn, e.g. by Æthelbald, K. 90 (i.
108): ‘ut ab omni tributo vectigalium operum onerumque saecularium sit libera
... tantum ut Deo omnipotenti ex eodem agello aecclesiasticae servitutis
famulatum inpendat.’
[965] See above, p. 229.
[966] Privilege of Wihtræd, A.D. 696–716, Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 238: ‘Adhuc
addimus maiorem libertatem. Inprimis Christi ecclesiae cum omnibus agris ad
eam pertinentibus, similiter Hrofensi ecclesiae cum suis, caeterisque praedictis
omnibus ecclesiis Dei nostri, subiciantur pro salute animae meae, meorumque
praedecessorum, et pro spe caelestis regni ex hac die, et deinceps concedimus et
donamus ab omnibus difficultatibus saecularium servitutis, a pastu Regis,
principum, comitum, nec non ab operibus, maioribus minoribusve gravitatibus:
et ab omni debitu vel pulsione regum tensuris liberos eos esse perpetua libertate
statuimus.’ See also the act by which Æthelbald confirmed this privilege in 742,
H. & S. iii. 340, B. i. 233–6. According to one version of this act, the trinoda
necessitas is, according to another it is not, excepted. The learned editors of the
Councils speak of ‘the suspicions common to every record that notices the
Privilege of Wihtræd.’ We are treading on treacherous ground. See also the less
suspicious Act of Æthelbald, A.D. 749, H. & S. iii. 386: ‘Concedo ut monasteria
et aecclesiae a publicis vectigalibus et ab omnibus operibus oneribusque, auctore
Deo, servientes absoluti maneant, nisi sola quae communiter fruenda sunt,
omnique populo, edicto regis, facienda iubentur, id est, instructionibus pontium,
vel necessariis defensionibus arcium contra hostes, non sunt renuenda.’
[967] A.D. 1066, Edward the Confessor for Westminster, K. 828 (iv. 191):
‘scotfre and gavelfre.’
[968] Kemble, Codex, vol. i. Introduction liii-lvi., collects some of the best
instances. Offa for a valuable consideration frees certain lands belonging to the
church of Worcester from pastiones; ‘nec non et trium annorum ad se pertinentes
pastiones, id est sex convivia, libenter concedendo largitus est’: K. 143 (i. 173),
B. i. 335.
[969] A.D. 904, K. 1084 (v. 157).
[970] A.D. 826, Egbert for Winchester, K. 1037 (v. 81): ‘Volo etiam ut haec terra
libera semper sit ... nullique serviat nisi soli episcopo Wentano.’
[971] K. 1346 (vi. 205). Compare Fustel de Coulanges, L’Immunité
Mérovingienne, Revue historique, xxiii. 21.
[972] E.g. K. 1117 (v. 231): ‘tribus semotis causis a quibus nullus nostrorum
poterit expers fore’; K. v. pp. 259, 283, 334.
Page 551
[973] To this class belong the foundation charter of Evesham mentioned above,
p. 235, and Offa’s charter for St. Albans, K. 161 (i. 195), which Haddan and
Stubbs, iii. 469, are unwilling to decisively reject. Cenwulf’s charter for
Abingdon, K. 214 (i. 269), H. & S. iii. 556, sets a limit to the amount of military
service that is to be demanded. Æthelstan’s charter for Crediton, recently printed
by Napier and Stevenson, Crawford Charters, p. 5, frees land from the trinoda
necessitas.
[974] E.g. K. i. p. 274; ii. pp. 14, 15, 24, 26, 83; v. pp. 53, 62, 81.
[975] Observe how Bede describes a gift made by Oswy in the middle of the
seventh century; Hist. Eccl. iii. 24 (ed. Plummer, i. 178): ‘donatis insuper
duodecim possessiunculis terrarum in quibus ablato studio militiae terrestris, ad
exercendam militiam caelestem etc.’
[976] The passages in the dooms which mention it are collected in Schmid,
Glossar, s. v. ángild. They are discussed by Maurer, Krit. Ueberschau, ii. 32.
[977] The clauses of immunity which mention the ángild will be collected in a
note at the end of this section.
[978] K. 210 (i. 265); B. i. 497; H. & S. iii. 585. The clause in question is not
found in every copy of the charter. If some monk is to be accused of tampering
with the book, there seems just as much reason for charging him with having
omitted a clause which limited, as for charging him with inserting a clause
which recognized, the jurisdiction of the church.
[979] These clauses will be discussed in a note at the end of this section.
[980] A.D. 841, K. 250 (ii. 14): ‘Liberabo ab omnibus saecularibus servitutibus
... regis et principis vel iuniorum eorum, nisi in confinio reddant rationem contra
alium.’ Compare K. 117 (i. 144): ‘nisi specialiter pretium pro pretio ad
terminum.’ Also Leg. Henr. 57 § 1: ‘Si inter compares vicinos utrinque sint
querelae, conveniant ad divisas.’ Ibid. 57 § 8: ‘aliquando in divisis vel in
erthmiotis.’ Ibid. 9 § 4: ‘Et omnis causa terminetur, vel hundreto, vel comitatu,
vel hallimoto soccam habentium, vel dominorum curiis, vel divisis parium.’ See
above, p. 97.
[981] A.D. 828, K. 223 (i. 287): ‘cum furis comprehensione intus et foris’; A.D.
842, K. 253 (ii. 16) ‘ut ... furis comprehensione ... terra secura et immunis ...
permaneat’; A.D. 850, K. 1049 (v. 95) a similar form; A.D. 858, K. 281 (ii. 64), a
similar form; A.D. 869, K. 300 (ii. 95), a similar form; A.D. 880, K. 312 (ii.
109): ‘cum furis comprehensione.’ See Kemble’s remarks, C. D. vol. i. p. xlvi.
[982] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 565.
[983] K. 1084 (v. 157); B. ii. 272: ‘Christo concessi ut episcopi homines tam
nobiles quam ignobiles in praefato rure degentes hoc idem ius in omni haberent
dignitate quo regis homines perfruuntur regalibus fiscis commorantes, et omnia
saecularium rerum iudicia ad usus praesulum exerceantur eodem modo quo
regalium negotiorum discutiuntur iudicia.’ Similar words occur in a
confirmation by Edgar, K. 598 (iii. 136), which Kemble rejects. This contains an
English paraphrase of the Latin text.
p. 235, and Offa’s charter for St. Albans, K. 161 (i. 195), which Haddan and
Stubbs, iii. 469, are unwilling to decisively reject. Cenwulf’s charter for
Abingdon, K. 214 (i. 269), H. & S. iii. 556, sets a limit to the amount of military
service that is to be demanded. Æthelstan’s charter for Crediton, recently printed
by Napier and Stevenson, Crawford Charters, p. 5, frees land from the trinoda
necessitas.
[974] E.g. K. i. p. 274; ii. pp. 14, 15, 24, 26, 83; v. pp. 53, 62, 81.
[975] Observe how Bede describes a gift made by Oswy in the middle of the
seventh century; Hist. Eccl. iii. 24 (ed. Plummer, i. 178): ‘donatis insuper
duodecim possessiunculis terrarum in quibus ablato studio militiae terrestris, ad
exercendam militiam caelestem etc.’
[976] The passages in the dooms which mention it are collected in Schmid,
Glossar, s. v. ángild. They are discussed by Maurer, Krit. Ueberschau, ii. 32.
[977] The clauses of immunity which mention the ángild will be collected in a
note at the end of this section.
[978] K. 210 (i. 265); B. i. 497; H. & S. iii. 585. The clause in question is not
found in every copy of the charter. If some monk is to be accused of tampering
with the book, there seems just as much reason for charging him with having
omitted a clause which limited, as for charging him with inserting a clause
which recognized, the jurisdiction of the church.
[979] These clauses will be discussed in a note at the end of this section.
[980] A.D. 841, K. 250 (ii. 14): ‘Liberabo ab omnibus saecularibus servitutibus
... regis et principis vel iuniorum eorum, nisi in confinio reddant rationem contra
alium.’ Compare K. 117 (i. 144): ‘nisi specialiter pretium pro pretio ad
terminum.’ Also Leg. Henr. 57 § 1: ‘Si inter compares vicinos utrinque sint
querelae, conveniant ad divisas.’ Ibid. 57 § 8: ‘aliquando in divisis vel in
erthmiotis.’ Ibid. 9 § 4: ‘Et omnis causa terminetur, vel hundreto, vel comitatu,
vel hallimoto soccam habentium, vel dominorum curiis, vel divisis parium.’ See
above, p. 97.
[981] A.D. 828, K. 223 (i. 287): ‘cum furis comprehensione intus et foris’; A.D.
842, K. 253 (ii. 16) ‘ut ... furis comprehensione ... terra secura et immunis ...
permaneat’; A.D. 850, K. 1049 (v. 95) a similar form; A.D. 858, K. 281 (ii. 64), a
similar form; A.D. 869, K. 300 (ii. 95), a similar form; A.D. 880, K. 312 (ii.
109): ‘cum furis comprehensione.’ See Kemble’s remarks, C. D. vol. i. p. xlvi.
[982] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 565.
[983] K. 1084 (v. 157); B. ii. 272: ‘Christo concessi ut episcopi homines tam
nobiles quam ignobiles in praefato rure degentes hoc idem ius in omni haberent
dignitate quo regis homines perfruuntur regalibus fiscis commorantes, et omnia
saecularium rerum iudicia ad usus praesulum exerceantur eodem modo quo
regalium negotiorum discutiuntur iudicia.’ Similar words occur in a
confirmation by Edgar, K. 598 (iii. 136), which Kemble rejects. This contains an
English paraphrase of the Latin text.
Page 552
[984] Compare K. 821 (iv. 171): ‘swa freols on eallan thingan eall swa thaes
cinges agen innland.’
[985] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 570.
[986] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 580.
[987] Few questions in Frankish history have been more warmly contested than
this, whether the immunist had a jurisdiction within his territory. On the one
hand, it has been contended that there is no evidence older than 840 that he
exercised jurisdiction even as between the inhabitants of that territory. On the
other hand, it has been said that already in 614 he has civil jurisdiction in
disputes between these inhabitants, besides a criminal jurisdiction over them,
which however does not extend to the graver crimes. A few references will
suffice to put the reader in the current of this discussion; Löning, Geschichte des
Deutschen Kirchenrechts, ii. 731; Brunner, D. R. G. ii. 298; Schröder, D. R. G.
174; Beauchet, Histoire de l’organisation judiciaire en France, 74; Beaudoin,
Étude sur les origines du regime féodal (Annales de l’enseignement supérieur de
Grenoble, vol. i. p. 43); Fustel de Coulanges, L’Immunité Mérovingienne
(Revue Historique, xxii. 249, xxiii. I). One of the most disputed points is the
character of the court held by an abbot, which is put before us by the very
ancient Formulae Andecavenses, a collection attributed to the sixth or, at the
latest, to the early years of the seventh century. It has been asserted and denied
that this abbot of Angers is exercising the powers given to him by an immunity;
some have said that he, or rather his steward, is merely acting as an arbitrator;
Brunner, Forschungen, 665, explains him as one of the mediocres iudices of
decaying Roman law. On the whole, the balance of learning is inclining to the
opinion that, even in the Merovingian time, there were great churches and other
lords with courts which wielded power over free men, and that the ‘immunities,’
even if they were not intended to create such courts, at all events made them
possible, or, as Fustel says, consecrated them.
[988] Madox, Hist. Exch. i. 109; Bigelow, Placita Anglo-Normannica, 114.
[989] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 224–30.
[990] Nissl, Der Gerichtsstand des Clerus im Fränkischen Reich, 247.
[991] K. 214 (i. 269); 236 (i. 312).
[992] Edw. & Guth. 4; Leg. Henr. II, § 5.
[993] D. B. i. 26.
[994] Chron. de Bello, 26–7: ‘Et si forisfacturae Christianitatis quolibet modo
infra leugam contigerint, coram abbate definiendae referantur. Habeatque
ecclesia S. Martini emendationem forisfacturae; poenitentiam vero reatus sui rei
ab episcopo percipiant.’
[995] Battle Custumals (Camden Soc.), 126: ‘Septem hundreda non habent
fossas nisi apud Wy, et ideo habemus ij. denarios: Archiepiscopus tamen et Prior
de novo trahunt homines suos ad fossas: Abbas de S. Augustino non habet.’
cinges agen innland.’
[985] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 570.
[986] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 580.
[987] Few questions in Frankish history have been more warmly contested than
this, whether the immunist had a jurisdiction within his territory. On the one
hand, it has been contended that there is no evidence older than 840 that he
exercised jurisdiction even as between the inhabitants of that territory. On the
other hand, it has been said that already in 614 he has civil jurisdiction in
disputes between these inhabitants, besides a criminal jurisdiction over them,
which however does not extend to the graver crimes. A few references will
suffice to put the reader in the current of this discussion; Löning, Geschichte des
Deutschen Kirchenrechts, ii. 731; Brunner, D. R. G. ii. 298; Schröder, D. R. G.
174; Beauchet, Histoire de l’organisation judiciaire en France, 74; Beaudoin,
Étude sur les origines du regime féodal (Annales de l’enseignement supérieur de
Grenoble, vol. i. p. 43); Fustel de Coulanges, L’Immunité Mérovingienne
(Revue Historique, xxii. 249, xxiii. I). One of the most disputed points is the
character of the court held by an abbot, which is put before us by the very
ancient Formulae Andecavenses, a collection attributed to the sixth or, at the
latest, to the early years of the seventh century. It has been asserted and denied
that this abbot of Angers is exercising the powers given to him by an immunity;
some have said that he, or rather his steward, is merely acting as an arbitrator;
Brunner, Forschungen, 665, explains him as one of the mediocres iudices of
decaying Roman law. On the whole, the balance of learning is inclining to the
opinion that, even in the Merovingian time, there were great churches and other
lords with courts which wielded power over free men, and that the ‘immunities,’
even if they were not intended to create such courts, at all events made them
possible, or, as Fustel says, consecrated them.
[988] Madox, Hist. Exch. i. 109; Bigelow, Placita Anglo-Normannica, 114.
[989] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 224–30.
[990] Nissl, Der Gerichtsstand des Clerus im Fränkischen Reich, 247.
[991] K. 214 (i. 269); 236 (i. 312).
[992] Edw. & Guth. 4; Leg. Henr. II, § 5.
[993] D. B. i. 26.
[994] Chron. de Bello, 26–7: ‘Et si forisfacturae Christianitatis quolibet modo
infra leugam contigerint, coram abbate definiendae referantur. Habeatque
ecclesia S. Martini emendationem forisfacturae; poenitentiam vero reatus sui rei
ab episcopo percipiant.’
[995] Battle Custumals (Camden Soc.), 126: ‘Septem hundreda non habent
fossas nisi apud Wy, et ideo habemus ij. denarios: Archiepiscopus tamen et Prior
de novo trahunt homines suos ad fossas: Abbas de S. Augustino non habet.’
Page 553
[996] c. 3, X. 5, 37: ‘Accepimus ... quod archidiaconi Conventrensis episcopatus
... in examinatione ignis et aquae triginta denarios a viro et muliere quaerere
praesumunt.’
[997] Cnut II. 12–15.
[998] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 564.
[999] Beaudoin, op. cit. p. 94 ff.
[1000] Æthelstan, II. 2.
[1001] Konrad Maurer, Krit. Ueberschau, ii. 30 ff.
[1002] Æthelstan, II. 3. Observe how in the Latin version ‘se blaford the rihtes
wyrne’ becomes ‘dominus qui rectum difforciabit.’
[1003] K. Maurer, Krit. Ueberschau, ii. 32, 40, 41. Ine, 22, is of great importance
on account of its antiquity.
[1004] D. B. ii. 18 b: ‘inde vocat dominum suum ad tutorem.’ See above, p. 71.
[1005] Leg. Henr. 57, § 8; 82, §§ 4, 5, 6.
[1006] See above, p. 89.
[1007] Æthelstan, VI. (Iudicia Civitatis Lundoniae), 1.
[1008] Æthelred, I. 1, § 7.
[1009] Edgar, I. 2, 3; III. 7; IV. 2, § 8; Æthelred, I. 1; III. 3, 4, 7.
[1010] Æthelred, III. 3, 4.
[1011] Æthelred, III. 7.
[1012] Edgar, IV..= 2, § 11; Æthelred, I. 3.
[1013] D. B. i. 154. See above, p. 92.
[1014] See above, p. 275.
[1015] Northumbrian Priests’ Law, Schmid, App. II. 48–9.
[1016] Ibid. 57, 58. See also the texts which give the lord a share with the bishop
in the penalty for neglect to pay tithe, viz. Edgar, II. 3; Æthelred, VIII. 8; Cnut, I.
8.
[1017] K. 498 (ii. 386).
[1018] See above, p. 100.
[1019] The Archbishop of York, the bishops of Durham, Chester, Lincoln and
(for one manor) Salisbury, the abbots of York, Peterborough, Ramsey, Croyland,
Burton and (for one manor) Westminster.
[1020] D. B. i. 280 b; i. 337.
[1021] K. 729 (iv. 3).
... in examinatione ignis et aquae triginta denarios a viro et muliere quaerere
praesumunt.’
[997] Cnut II. 12–15.
[998] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 564.
[999] Beaudoin, op. cit. p. 94 ff.
[1000] Æthelstan, II. 2.
[1001] Konrad Maurer, Krit. Ueberschau, ii. 30 ff.
[1002] Æthelstan, II. 3. Observe how in the Latin version ‘se blaford the rihtes
wyrne’ becomes ‘dominus qui rectum difforciabit.’
[1003] K. Maurer, Krit. Ueberschau, ii. 32, 40, 41. Ine, 22, is of great importance
on account of its antiquity.
[1004] D. B. ii. 18 b: ‘inde vocat dominum suum ad tutorem.’ See above, p. 71.
[1005] Leg. Henr. 57, § 8; 82, §§ 4, 5, 6.
[1006] See above, p. 89.
[1007] Æthelstan, VI. (Iudicia Civitatis Lundoniae), 1.
[1008] Æthelred, I. 1, § 7.
[1009] Edgar, I. 2, 3; III. 7; IV. 2, § 8; Æthelred, I. 1; III. 3, 4, 7.
[1010] Æthelred, III. 3, 4.
[1011] Æthelred, III. 7.
[1012] Edgar, IV..= 2, § 11; Æthelred, I. 3.
[1013] D. B. i. 154. See above, p. 92.
[1014] See above, p. 275.
[1015] Northumbrian Priests’ Law, Schmid, App. II. 48–9.
[1016] Ibid. 57, 58. See also the texts which give the lord a share with the bishop
in the penalty for neglect to pay tithe, viz. Edgar, II. 3; Æthelred, VIII. 8; Cnut, I.
8.
[1017] K. 498 (ii. 386).
[1018] See above, p. 100.
[1019] The Archbishop of York, the bishops of Durham, Chester, Lincoln and
(for one manor) Salisbury, the abbots of York, Peterborough, Ramsey, Croyland,
Burton and (for one manor) Westminster.
[1020] D. B. i. 280 b; i. 337.
[1021] K. 729 (iv. 3).
Page 554
[1022] It is noticeable that the verb syllan usually means ‘to give.’ Words such as
vendere are avoided.
[1023] A.D. 941, K. 390 (ii. 234) condemned by Kemble: ‘amabili vassallo
meo.’—A.D. 952, K. 431 (ii. 302): ‘cuidam vassallo.’—A.D. 956? K. 462 (ii.
338): ‘meo fideli vassallo.’—A.D. 967, K. 534 (iii. 11): ‘meo fideli vassallo.’—
A.D. 821, K. 214 (i. 269): ‘expeditionem cum 12 vassallis et cum tantis scutis
exerceant.’ After the Norman Conquest the word is very rare in our legal texts.
[1024] K. 179 (i. 216): ‘eo videlicet iure si ipse nobis et optimatibus nostris
fidelis manserit minister et inconvulsus amicus.’
[1025] K. 408 (ii. 263): ‘eatenus ut vita comite tam fidus mente quam subditus
operibus mihi placabile obsequium praebeat, et meum post obitum cuicunque
meorum amicorum voluero eadem fidelitate immobilis obediensque fiat.’
[1026] The terms of the oath are given in Schmid, App. X.
[1027] See above, p. 69.
[1028] See above, p. 69.
[1029] K. 214 (i. 269); H. & S. iii. 556.
[1030] D. B. i. 172; see above, p. 159.
[1031] Cnut, II. 13, 77.
[1032] See above, p. 156.
[1033] K. 1035 (v. 76). The charter is not beyond suspicion, but Kemble has
received, and the editors of the Councils (H. & S. iii. 607) have refused to
condemn it.
[1034] K. 1020 (v. 60); B. i. 409; H. & S. iii. 528.
[1035] See Brunner, Die Landschenkungen der Merowinger und der
Agilolfinger, Forschungen, p. 6: ‘He who receives an order acquires in the
insignia of the order which are delivered to him an ownership of an extremely
attenuated kind. He can not give them away or sell them or let them out or give
them in dowry. When he dies they go back to the giver.’ We are not aware of any
English decision on such matters as these. In a charter for Winchester (B. ii. 238)
Edward the Elder is represented as saying that the land that he gives to the
church is never to be alienated. If, however, the monks must sell or exchange it,
then they may return it ‘to that royal family by whom it was given to them.’
[1036] Brunner, Zur Rechtsgeschichte d. röm. u. germ. Urkunde, p. 190; Hist.
Eng. Law, ii. 12.
[1037] See Brunner, Landschenkungen, Forschungen, p. 1. In this paper Dr
Brunner appealed to our English law, in order that he might settle the famous
controversy between Waitz and Roth as to the character of the gifts of land made
by the Merovingians. On p. 5 he denies that our rule about ‘words of
inheritance’ should be called feudal. Its starting point is the principle that the
quality [an English lawyer would add—and the quantity also]of the ‘estate’
vendere are avoided.
[1023] A.D. 941, K. 390 (ii. 234) condemned by Kemble: ‘amabili vassallo
meo.’—A.D. 952, K. 431 (ii. 302): ‘cuidam vassallo.’—A.D. 956? K. 462 (ii.
338): ‘meo fideli vassallo.’—A.D. 967, K. 534 (iii. 11): ‘meo fideli vassallo.’—
A.D. 821, K. 214 (i. 269): ‘expeditionem cum 12 vassallis et cum tantis scutis
exerceant.’ After the Norman Conquest the word is very rare in our legal texts.
[1024] K. 179 (i. 216): ‘eo videlicet iure si ipse nobis et optimatibus nostris
fidelis manserit minister et inconvulsus amicus.’
[1025] K. 408 (ii. 263): ‘eatenus ut vita comite tam fidus mente quam subditus
operibus mihi placabile obsequium praebeat, et meum post obitum cuicunque
meorum amicorum voluero eadem fidelitate immobilis obediensque fiat.’
[1026] The terms of the oath are given in Schmid, App. X.
[1027] See above, p. 69.
[1028] See above, p. 69.
[1029] K. 214 (i. 269); H. & S. iii. 556.
[1030] D. B. i. 172; see above, p. 159.
[1031] Cnut, II. 13, 77.
[1032] See above, p. 156.
[1033] K. 1035 (v. 76). The charter is not beyond suspicion, but Kemble has
received, and the editors of the Councils (H. & S. iii. 607) have refused to
condemn it.
[1034] K. 1020 (v. 60); B. i. 409; H. & S. iii. 528.
[1035] See Brunner, Die Landschenkungen der Merowinger und der
Agilolfinger, Forschungen, p. 6: ‘He who receives an order acquires in the
insignia of the order which are delivered to him an ownership of an extremely
attenuated kind. He can not give them away or sell them or let them out or give
them in dowry. When he dies they go back to the giver.’ We are not aware of any
English decision on such matters as these. In a charter for Winchester (B. ii. 238)
Edward the Elder is represented as saying that the land that he gives to the
church is never to be alienated. If, however, the monks must sell or exchange it,
then they may return it ‘to that royal family by whom it was given to them.’
[1036] Brunner, Zur Rechtsgeschichte d. röm. u. germ. Urkunde, p. 190; Hist.
Eng. Law, ii. 12.
[1037] See Brunner, Landschenkungen, Forschungen, p. 1. In this paper Dr
Brunner appealed to our English law, in order that he might settle the famous
controversy between Waitz and Roth as to the character of the gifts of land made
by the Merovingians. On p. 5 he denies that our rule about ‘words of
inheritance’ should be called feudal. Its starting point is the principle that the
quality [an English lawyer would add—and the quantity also]of the ‘estate’
Page 555
(Besitzrecht) can be determined by the donor’s words, by a lex donationis
imposed by the donor on the land.
[1038] Brunner, Geschichte der Urkunde, p. 200.
[1039] Heming’s Cartulary, i. 259. ‘Post mortem autem eius, filius eius ...
testamentum patris sui irritum faciens....’ Ibid. p. 263: ‘Brihtwinus ... eandem
terram Deo et Sanctae Mariae obtulit, eundemque nepotem suum monachum
fecit. Filius eius etiam, Brihtmarus nomine, pater ipsius iam dicti Edwini
monachi, cum heres patris extitisset, ... ipsam ... villam monasterio dedit.’ Hist.
Eng. Law, ii. 250.
[1040] Brunner, Forschungen, p. 22; Hist. Eng. Law, i. 292.
[1041] Crawford Charters (ed. Napier and Stevenson), pp. 23, 126. Early in cent.
xi. a bishop in his testament declares how he gives ‘to each retainer his steed
which he had lent him.’
[1042] See the wills collected by Thorpe; p. 501: Gift to the queen for her
mediation that the will may stand. Ibid. p. 505: ‘And bishop Theodred and
ealdorman Eadric informed me, when I gave my lord the sword that king
Edmund gave me ... that I might be worthy of my testament (mine quides wirde).
And I never ... have done any wrong to my lord that it may not so be.’ Ibid. p.
519: ‘And I pray my dear lord for the love of God that my testament may stand.’
See also pp. 528, 539, 543, 552, 576.
[1043] Thus ealdorman Alfred disposes (but with the consent of the king and all
his witan) of his ‘heritage’ as well as of his book-land; Thorpe, 480. Lodge,
Essays on A.-S. Law, p. 108, supposes a certain power of regulating the descent
of ‘family land’ within the family.
[1044] K. 414 (ii. 273): ‘Ego Wulfricus annuente et sentiente et praesente
domino meo rege ... concessi ... terram iuris mei ... quam praefatus rex Eadredus
mihi dedit in perpetuam hereditatem cum libro eiusdem terrae.’—K. 1130 (v.
254): ‘Ego Eadulfus dux per concessionem domini mei regis ... concedo ... has
terras de propria possessione mea quas idem ... rex dedit in perpetuam
hereditatem.’—K. 1226 (vi. 25): ‘Ego Ælfwordus minister Regis Eadgari
concedo ... annuente domino meo rege ... villam unam de patrimonio meo.’
[1045] Except in the cases, comparatively rare before the statute Quia Emptores,
in which the feoffee is to hold of the feoffor’s lord.
[1046] Fustel de Coulanges, Les origines du système féodal; Brunner, D. R. G. i.
209–12.
[1047] K. 1058 (v. 115); B. ii. 89: ‘et nullus iam licentiam ulterius habeat Christi
neque sancti Petri ... neque ausus sit ulterius illam terram praedictam rogandi in
beneficium.’
[1048] K. 1089 (v. 166); B. ii. 281. See also K. 262 (ii. 33); B. ii. 40; Birhtwulf
of Mercia takes a lease for five lives from the church of Worcester and assigns it
to a thegn. The consideration for this lease is a promise that for the future he will
not make gifts out of the goods of the church.
imposed by the donor on the land.
[1038] Brunner, Geschichte der Urkunde, p. 200.
[1039] Heming’s Cartulary, i. 259. ‘Post mortem autem eius, filius eius ...
testamentum patris sui irritum faciens....’ Ibid. p. 263: ‘Brihtwinus ... eandem
terram Deo et Sanctae Mariae obtulit, eundemque nepotem suum monachum
fecit. Filius eius etiam, Brihtmarus nomine, pater ipsius iam dicti Edwini
monachi, cum heres patris extitisset, ... ipsam ... villam monasterio dedit.’ Hist.
Eng. Law, ii. 250.
[1040] Brunner, Forschungen, p. 22; Hist. Eng. Law, i. 292.
[1041] Crawford Charters (ed. Napier and Stevenson), pp. 23, 126. Early in cent.
xi. a bishop in his testament declares how he gives ‘to each retainer his steed
which he had lent him.’
[1042] See the wills collected by Thorpe; p. 501: Gift to the queen for her
mediation that the will may stand. Ibid. p. 505: ‘And bishop Theodred and
ealdorman Eadric informed me, when I gave my lord the sword that king
Edmund gave me ... that I might be worthy of my testament (mine quides wirde).
And I never ... have done any wrong to my lord that it may not so be.’ Ibid. p.
519: ‘And I pray my dear lord for the love of God that my testament may stand.’
See also pp. 528, 539, 543, 552, 576.
[1043] Thus ealdorman Alfred disposes (but with the consent of the king and all
his witan) of his ‘heritage’ as well as of his book-land; Thorpe, 480. Lodge,
Essays on A.-S. Law, p. 108, supposes a certain power of regulating the descent
of ‘family land’ within the family.
[1044] K. 414 (ii. 273): ‘Ego Wulfricus annuente et sentiente et praesente
domino meo rege ... concessi ... terram iuris mei ... quam praefatus rex Eadredus
mihi dedit in perpetuam hereditatem cum libro eiusdem terrae.’—K. 1130 (v.
254): ‘Ego Eadulfus dux per concessionem domini mei regis ... concedo ... has
terras de propria possessione mea quas idem ... rex dedit in perpetuam
hereditatem.’—K. 1226 (vi. 25): ‘Ego Ælfwordus minister Regis Eadgari
concedo ... annuente domino meo rege ... villam unam de patrimonio meo.’
[1045] Except in the cases, comparatively rare before the statute Quia Emptores,
in which the feoffee is to hold of the feoffor’s lord.
[1046] Fustel de Coulanges, Les origines du système féodal; Brunner, D. R. G. i.
209–12.
[1047] K. 1058 (v. 115); B. ii. 89: ‘et nullus iam licentiam ulterius habeat Christi
neque sancti Petri ... neque ausus sit ulterius illam terram praedictam rogandi in
beneficium.’
[1048] K. 1089 (v. 166); B. ii. 281. See also K. 262 (ii. 33); B. ii. 40; Birhtwulf
of Mercia takes a lease for five lives from the church of Worcester and assigns it
to a thegn. The consideration for this lease is a promise that for the future he will
not make gifts out of the goods of the church.
Page 556
[1049] K. 1287 (vi. 124). The verb praestare was the regular term for describing
the action of one who was constituting a precarium or beneficium. In K. 1071 (v.
138) Bp Werferth of Worcester obtains a lease for three lives having petitioned
for it; ‘terram ... humili prece deprecatus fui.’
[1050] For commodare see K. v. pp. 166, 169, 171; for lǽnan, ibid. 162; for
lǽtan, ibid. 164.
[1051] See Bp Oswald’s leases.
[1052] K. 91 (i. 109).
[1053] K. 165 (i. 201).
[1054] K. 279 (ii. 61).
[1055] K. 339 (ii. 149).
[1056] See the charter of Cenwulf for Winchcombe, H. & S. iii. 572 and the
editors’ note at 575. See also K. 610 (iii. 157), 1058 (v. 115), 1090 (v. 169).
[1057] K. 262 (ii. 33) is a lease for five lives by the church of Worcester; but the
lessee is a king.
[1058] Nov. 7, 3. See Brunner, Zur Rechtsgeschichte der röm. u. germ. Urkunde,
187. Theodore of Tarsus would perhaps have known this rule. It does not belong
to the general western tradition of Roman law, but is distinctly Justinianic.
[1059] K. 165 (i. 201). The ‘limitation’ is not very plain; but we seem to have
here a lease for two lives.
[1060] K. 182 (i. 220).
[1061] K. 262 (ii. 33); B. ii. 40: lease by church of Worcester to the king for five
lives: ‘et illi dabant terram illam ea tamen conditione ut ipse rex firmius amicus
sit episcopo praefato et familia in omnibus bonis eorum.’ K. 279 (ii. 61): lease
by the same church to a dux and his wife with stipulation for amicitia.
[1062] These are preserved in Heming’s Cartulary; see K. 494–673.
[1063] In K. 498 (ii. 386) the aecclesiasticus census is two modii of clean grain;
in K. 511 (ii. 400) the lessee must mow once and reap once ‘with all his craft’; in
K. 508 (ii. 398) he must sow two acres with his own seed and reap it; in K. 661
(iii. 233) is a similar stipulation.
[1064] In many cases the clause of immunity has become very obscure owing to
a copyist’s blunder. It is made to run thus: ‘Sit autem terra ista libera omni regi
nisi aecclesiastici censi.’ Some mistake between rei and regi may be suspected.
What we want is what we get in some other cases, e.g. K. 651, 652, viz. ‘libera
ab omni saecularis rei negotio.’ The following forms are somewhat exceptional;
K. 530 and 612, ‘butan ferdfare and walgeworc and brycgeworc and
circanlade’; K. 623, 666, ‘excepta sanctae dei basilicae suppeditatione et
ministratione’; K. 625, ‘exceptis sanctae dei aecclesiae necessitatibus et
utilitatibus.’
the action of one who was constituting a precarium or beneficium. In K. 1071 (v.
138) Bp Werferth of Worcester obtains a lease for three lives having petitioned
for it; ‘terram ... humili prece deprecatus fui.’
[1050] For commodare see K. v. pp. 166, 169, 171; for lǽnan, ibid. 162; for
lǽtan, ibid. 164.
[1051] See Bp Oswald’s leases.
[1052] K. 91 (i. 109).
[1053] K. 165 (i. 201).
[1054] K. 279 (ii. 61).
[1055] K. 339 (ii. 149).
[1056] See the charter of Cenwulf for Winchcombe, H. & S. iii. 572 and the
editors’ note at 575. See also K. 610 (iii. 157), 1058 (v. 115), 1090 (v. 169).
[1057] K. 262 (ii. 33) is a lease for five lives by the church of Worcester; but the
lessee is a king.
[1058] Nov. 7, 3. See Brunner, Zur Rechtsgeschichte der röm. u. germ. Urkunde,
187. Theodore of Tarsus would perhaps have known this rule. It does not belong
to the general western tradition of Roman law, but is distinctly Justinianic.
[1059] K. 165 (i. 201). The ‘limitation’ is not very plain; but we seem to have
here a lease for two lives.
[1060] K. 182 (i. 220).
[1061] K. 262 (ii. 33); B. ii. 40: lease by church of Worcester to the king for five
lives: ‘et illi dabant terram illam ea tamen conditione ut ipse rex firmius amicus
sit episcopo praefato et familia in omnibus bonis eorum.’ K. 279 (ii. 61): lease
by the same church to a dux and his wife with stipulation for amicitia.
[1062] These are preserved in Heming’s Cartulary; see K. 494–673.
[1063] In K. 498 (ii. 386) the aecclesiasticus census is two modii of clean grain;
in K. 511 (ii. 400) the lessee must mow once and reap once ‘with all his craft’; in
K. 508 (ii. 398) he must sow two acres with his own seed and reap it; in K. 661
(iii. 233) is a similar stipulation.
[1064] In many cases the clause of immunity has become very obscure owing to
a copyist’s blunder. It is made to run thus: ‘Sit autem terra ista libera omni regi
nisi aecclesiastici censi.’ Some mistake between rei and regi may be suspected.
What we want is what we get in some other cases, e.g. K. 651, 652, viz. ‘libera
ab omni saecularis rei negotio.’ The following forms are somewhat exceptional;
K. 530 and 612, ‘butan ferdfare and walgeworc and brycgeworc and
circanlade’; K. 623, 666, ‘excepta sanctae dei basilicae suppeditatione et
ministratione’; K. 625, ‘exceptis sanctae dei aecclesiae necessitatibus et
utilitatibus.’
Page 557
[1065] Kemble gives it in Cod. Dipl. 1287 (vi. 124) and in an appendix to vol. i.
of his history. Also he speaks of it in Cod. Dipl. i. xxxv., and there says that it is
‘a laboured justification’ by Bp Oswald of his proceedings. To my mind it is
nothing of the kind. Oswald is proud of what he has done and wishes that a
memorial of his acts may be carefully preserved for the benefit of the church. Of
course, if regarded from our modern point of view, the form of the document is
curious. The bishop seems engaged in an attempt to bind his lessees by his own
unilateral account of the terms to which they have agreed. But his object is to
have of the contract a record which has been laid before the king and the witan
and which, if we are to use modern terms, will have all the force of an act of
parliament, to say nothing of the anathema.
[1066] In places its language becomes turbid and well-nigh untranslatable.
[1067] It may be that the bishop has just obtained from the king a grant or
confirmation of the hundredal jurisdiction over what is to be Oswaldslaw.
[1068] K. vi. 125: ‘hoc est ut omnis equitandi lex ab eis impleatur quae ad
equites pertinet.’
[1069] K. vi. 125: ‘et ad totum piramiticum opus aecclesiae calcis atque ad
pontis aedificium ultro inveniantur parati.’ The translation here given is but
guesswork; we suppose that piramiticus means ‘of or belonging to fire (πῦρ).’
[1070] Ibid.: ‘insuper ad multas alias indigentiae causas quibus opus est domino
antistiti frunisci, sive ad suum servitium sive ad regale explendum, semper illius
archiductoris dominatui et voluntati qui episcopatui praesidet ... subditi fiant.’ Is
archiductor but a fine name for the bishop? We think not. In the Confessor’s day
Eadric the Steersman was ‘ductor exercitus episcopi ad servitium regis’
(Heming, i. 81), and it would seem from this that the tenants were to be subject
to a captain set over them by the bishop. But in the famous, if spurious, charter
for Oswaldslaw (see above, p. 268) Edgar says that on a naval expedition the
bishop’s men are not to serve under the ordinary officers ‘sed cum suo
archiductore, videlicet episcopo, qui eos defendere et protegere debet ab omni
perturbatione et inquietudine.’ This would settle the question, could we be
certain that the words ‘videlicet episcopo’ were not the gloss of a forger who
was improving an ancient instrument. For our present purpose, however, it is no
very important question whether the archiductor, the commander in chief of
these tenants, is the bishop himself or an officer of his.
[1071] Ibid.: ‘praevaricationis delictum secundum quod praesulis ius est
emendet.’
[1072] D. B. 174. Compare the entry on f. 175 b relating to the church-scot of
Pershore.
[1073] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 217. See also D. B. i. 165 b, Hinetune.
[1074] Heming, i. 81: ‘Edricus qui fuit, tempore regis Edwardi, stermannus
navis episcopi et ductor exercitus eiusdem episcopi ad servitium regis.’ D. B. i.
173 b: ‘Edricus stirman’ held five hides of the bishop.
[1075] Heming, i. 77: ‘Et [episcopus] deracionavit socam et sacam de Hamtona
ad suum hundred de Oswaldes lawe, quod ibi debent placitare et geldum et
of his history. Also he speaks of it in Cod. Dipl. i. xxxv., and there says that it is
‘a laboured justification’ by Bp Oswald of his proceedings. To my mind it is
nothing of the kind. Oswald is proud of what he has done and wishes that a
memorial of his acts may be carefully preserved for the benefit of the church. Of
course, if regarded from our modern point of view, the form of the document is
curious. The bishop seems engaged in an attempt to bind his lessees by his own
unilateral account of the terms to which they have agreed. But his object is to
have of the contract a record which has been laid before the king and the witan
and which, if we are to use modern terms, will have all the force of an act of
parliament, to say nothing of the anathema.
[1066] In places its language becomes turbid and well-nigh untranslatable.
[1067] It may be that the bishop has just obtained from the king a grant or
confirmation of the hundredal jurisdiction over what is to be Oswaldslaw.
[1068] K. vi. 125: ‘hoc est ut omnis equitandi lex ab eis impleatur quae ad
equites pertinet.’
[1069] K. vi. 125: ‘et ad totum piramiticum opus aecclesiae calcis atque ad
pontis aedificium ultro inveniantur parati.’ The translation here given is but
guesswork; we suppose that piramiticus means ‘of or belonging to fire (πῦρ).’
[1070] Ibid.: ‘insuper ad multas alias indigentiae causas quibus opus est domino
antistiti frunisci, sive ad suum servitium sive ad regale explendum, semper illius
archiductoris dominatui et voluntati qui episcopatui praesidet ... subditi fiant.’ Is
archiductor but a fine name for the bishop? We think not. In the Confessor’s day
Eadric the Steersman was ‘ductor exercitus episcopi ad servitium regis’
(Heming, i. 81), and it would seem from this that the tenants were to be subject
to a captain set over them by the bishop. But in the famous, if spurious, charter
for Oswaldslaw (see above, p. 268) Edgar says that on a naval expedition the
bishop’s men are not to serve under the ordinary officers ‘sed cum suo
archiductore, videlicet episcopo, qui eos defendere et protegere debet ab omni
perturbatione et inquietudine.’ This would settle the question, could we be
certain that the words ‘videlicet episcopo’ were not the gloss of a forger who
was improving an ancient instrument. For our present purpose, however, it is no
very important question whether the archiductor, the commander in chief of
these tenants, is the bishop himself or an officer of his.
[1071] Ibid.: ‘praevaricationis delictum secundum quod praesulis ius est
emendet.’
[1072] D. B. 174. Compare the entry on f. 175 b relating to the church-scot of
Pershore.
[1073] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 217. See also D. B. i. 165 b, Hinetune.
[1074] Heming, i. 81: ‘Edricus qui fuit, tempore regis Edwardi, stermannus
navis episcopi et ductor exercitus eiusdem episcopi ad servitium regis.’ D. B. i.
173 b: ‘Edricus stirman’ held five hides of the bishop.
[1075] Heming, i. 77: ‘Et [episcopus] deracionavit socam et sacam de Hamtona
ad suum hundred de Oswaldes lawe, quod ibi debent placitare et geldum et
Page 558
expeditionem ... persolvere.’
[1076] Maitland, Northumbrian Tenures, Eng. Hist. Rev. v. 625.
[1077] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 288.
[1078] In this respect Oswald’s leases seem to have closely resembled a form of
lease, known as manusfirma, which became common in the France of the
eleventh century: Lamprecht, Beiträge zur Geschichte des französischen
Wirthschaftslebens, pp. 59, 60.
[1079] Heming, i. 259: ‘Ac primo videndum quae terrae trium heredum
temporibus accommodatae sint, post quorum decessum iuri monasterii
redderentur, quaeve postea iuxta hanc conventionem redditae, quaeve iniuste
sunt retentae, sive ipsorum, qui eas exigere deberent, negligentia, sive denegatae
sint iniquorum hominum potentia.’ See also the story told by Heming on p. 264.
[1080] Lamprecht, op. cit. p. 61, says that it was quite uncommon for the French
landlord to get back his land if once he let it for three lives. One of the Worcester
leases, but one stigmatized by Kemble (ii. 152), is a lease for three lives ‘nisi
haeredes illius tempus prolixius a pontifice sedis illius adipisci poterint.’
[1081] K. 637 (iii. 194): ‘si in viduitate manere decreverit, vel magis nubere
voluerit, ei tamen viro qui episcopali dignitati supradictae aecclesiae sit
subiectus.’
[1082] D. B. i. 173: ‘Hanc terram tenuit Sirof de episcopo T. R. E., quo mortuo
dedit episcopus filiam eius cum hac terra cuidam suo militi, qui et matrem
pasceret et episcopo inde serviret.’
[1083] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 214.
[1084] See above, p. 267.
[1085] D. B. i. 172 b: ‘Hae praedictae ccc. hidae fuerunt de ipso dominio
aecclesiae, et si quid de ipsis cuicunque homini quolibet modo attributum vel
praestitum fuisset ad serviendum inde episcopo, ille qui eam terram praestitam
sibi tenebat nullam omnino consuetudinem sibimet inde retinere poterat nisi per
episcopum, neque terram retinere nisi usque ad impletum tempus quod ipsi inter
se constituerant, et nusquam cum ea terra se vertere poterat ... Kenewardus tenuit
et deserviebat sicut episcopus volebat ... Ricardus tenuit ad servitium quod
episcopus voluit ... Godricus tenuit serviens inde episcopo ut poterat deprecari ...
Godricus tenuit ad voluntatem episcopi.’
[1086] D. B. 173 b.
[1087] Oswald’s tenants closely resemble the ministeriales of foreign bishops;
see Waitz, Verfassungsgeschichte, v. 283–350. Oswald’s lex equitandi may be
compared with what is said (ibid. p. 293) of a bishop of Constance: ‘quibus
omnibus hoc ius constituit, ut cum abbate equitarent eique domi forisque
ministrarent, equos suos tam abbati quam fratribus suis quocumque necesse esset
praestarent, monasterium pro posse suo defensarent.’
[1088] Kemble, Saxons, i. 310 ff.; K. Maurer, Krit. Ueb. i. 104; Essays in Anglo-
Saxon Law, No. ii. (Lodge); Brunner, Geschichte d. röm. u. germ. Urkunde, 182.
[1076] Maitland, Northumbrian Tenures, Eng. Hist. Rev. v. 625.
[1077] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 288.
[1078] In this respect Oswald’s leases seem to have closely resembled a form of
lease, known as manusfirma, which became common in the France of the
eleventh century: Lamprecht, Beiträge zur Geschichte des französischen
Wirthschaftslebens, pp. 59, 60.
[1079] Heming, i. 259: ‘Ac primo videndum quae terrae trium heredum
temporibus accommodatae sint, post quorum decessum iuri monasterii
redderentur, quaeve postea iuxta hanc conventionem redditae, quaeve iniuste
sunt retentae, sive ipsorum, qui eas exigere deberent, negligentia, sive denegatae
sint iniquorum hominum potentia.’ See also the story told by Heming on p. 264.
[1080] Lamprecht, op. cit. p. 61, says that it was quite uncommon for the French
landlord to get back his land if once he let it for three lives. One of the Worcester
leases, but one stigmatized by Kemble (ii. 152), is a lease for three lives ‘nisi
haeredes illius tempus prolixius a pontifice sedis illius adipisci poterint.’
[1081] K. 637 (iii. 194): ‘si in viduitate manere decreverit, vel magis nubere
voluerit, ei tamen viro qui episcopali dignitati supradictae aecclesiae sit
subiectus.’
[1082] D. B. i. 173: ‘Hanc terram tenuit Sirof de episcopo T. R. E., quo mortuo
dedit episcopus filiam eius cum hac terra cuidam suo militi, qui et matrem
pasceret et episcopo inde serviret.’
[1083] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 214.
[1084] See above, p. 267.
[1085] D. B. i. 172 b: ‘Hae praedictae ccc. hidae fuerunt de ipso dominio
aecclesiae, et si quid de ipsis cuicunque homini quolibet modo attributum vel
praestitum fuisset ad serviendum inde episcopo, ille qui eam terram praestitam
sibi tenebat nullam omnino consuetudinem sibimet inde retinere poterat nisi per
episcopum, neque terram retinere nisi usque ad impletum tempus quod ipsi inter
se constituerant, et nusquam cum ea terra se vertere poterat ... Kenewardus tenuit
et deserviebat sicut episcopus volebat ... Ricardus tenuit ad servitium quod
episcopus voluit ... Godricus tenuit serviens inde episcopo ut poterat deprecari ...
Godricus tenuit ad voluntatem episcopi.’
[1086] D. B. 173 b.
[1087] Oswald’s tenants closely resemble the ministeriales of foreign bishops;
see Waitz, Verfassungsgeschichte, v. 283–350. Oswald’s lex equitandi may be
compared with what is said (ibid. p. 293) of a bishop of Constance: ‘quibus
omnibus hoc ius constituit, ut cum abbate equitarent eique domi forisque
ministrarent, equos suos tam abbati quam fratribus suis quocumque necesse esset
praestarent, monasterium pro posse suo defensarent.’
[1088] Kemble, Saxons, i. 310 ff.; K. Maurer, Krit. Ueb. i. 104; Essays in Anglo-
Saxon Law, No. ii. (Lodge); Brunner, Geschichte d. röm. u. germ. Urkunde, 182.
Page 559
[1089] K. 617 (iii. 164).
[1090] K. 651 (iii. 216).
[1091] K. 679 (iii. 258).
[1092] K. 1287 (vi. 125): ‘propter beneficium quod eis praestitum est.’ D. B. i.
173 b. It may cross the reader’s mind that the leases of which Oswald speaks in
his letter to Edgar are not the transactions recorded in the charters that have
come down to us, but other and unwritten leases. But Domesday Book and the
stories told by Heming make against this explanation.
[1093] Æthelr. I. 1, § 14.
[1094] Cnut, II. 13, 77.
[1095] K. 328 (ii. 133): A certain Helmstan is guilty of theft ‘and mon gerehte
ðæt yrfe cinge forðon he wes cinges mon and Ordlaf feng to his londe forðan hit
wæs his læn ðæt he on sæt.’
[1096] K. 330 (ii. 136).
[1097] K. 414 (ii. 273): conveyance by Wulfric with the king’s consent.—K. 491
(ii. 379): conveyance by Wulfstan with consent of king and witan, who execute
the deed.—K. 690–1 (iii. 286–8): conveyances by Æscwig executed by king and
witan.—K. 1124, 1130 (v. 246–54): conveyances confirmed by king and
bishops.—K. 1201 (v. 378): exchange with king’s consent.—K. 1226 (vi. 25):
conveyance by a thegn reciting king’s consent. A few documents we must leave
unclassified; K. 499, 591, 693; we do not know how they were executed or what
was their evidential value.
[1098] Brunner, Geschichte d. röm. u. germ. Urkunde, p. 175.
[1099] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 212.
[1100] K. 843 (iv. 201): ‘swa full and swa forð swa Ðurstan min huskarll hit
furmest of me heold.’—K. 846 (iv. 205): ‘swa full and swa forð swa Sweyn mi
may hit formest of me held.’—K. 826 (iv. 190): ‘swa Ælfwin sy nunne it heold
of ðan minstre.’—K. 827 (iv. 190): ‘swa Sihtric eorll of ðan minstre þeowlic it
heold.’ If K. 1237 (vi. 44) be genuine (and Kemble has not condemned it) then
already in the middle of the tenth century ‘Goda princeps tenuit terram de rege,’
nor only so, ‘tenuit honorem de rege’; but this document is unacceptable. At best
it may be a late Latin translation of an English original.
[1101] K. 313 (ii. 110); T. 129; B. ii. 172.
[1102] In many cases the one night’s farm is reckoned at £100 or thereabouts;
Round, Feudal England, 112.
[1103] K. 477 (ii. 354); T. 509.
[1104] Vinogradoff, Villainage, 301.
[1105] Even T. R. W. and in a thoroughly manorial county such as Hampshire
we may find a village in which the lord has no demesne. See e.g. D. B. i. 41 b,
Alwarestoch.
[1090] K. 651 (iii. 216).
[1091] K. 679 (iii. 258).
[1092] K. 1287 (vi. 125): ‘propter beneficium quod eis praestitum est.’ D. B. i.
173 b. It may cross the reader’s mind that the leases of which Oswald speaks in
his letter to Edgar are not the transactions recorded in the charters that have
come down to us, but other and unwritten leases. But Domesday Book and the
stories told by Heming make against this explanation.
[1093] Æthelr. I. 1, § 14.
[1094] Cnut, II. 13, 77.
[1095] K. 328 (ii. 133): A certain Helmstan is guilty of theft ‘and mon gerehte
ðæt yrfe cinge forðon he wes cinges mon and Ordlaf feng to his londe forðan hit
wæs his læn ðæt he on sæt.’
[1096] K. 330 (ii. 136).
[1097] K. 414 (ii. 273): conveyance by Wulfric with the king’s consent.—K. 491
(ii. 379): conveyance by Wulfstan with consent of king and witan, who execute
the deed.—K. 690–1 (iii. 286–8): conveyances by Æscwig executed by king and
witan.—K. 1124, 1130 (v. 246–54): conveyances confirmed by king and
bishops.—K. 1201 (v. 378): exchange with king’s consent.—K. 1226 (vi. 25):
conveyance by a thegn reciting king’s consent. A few documents we must leave
unclassified; K. 499, 591, 693; we do not know how they were executed or what
was their evidential value.
[1098] Brunner, Geschichte d. röm. u. germ. Urkunde, p. 175.
[1099] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 212.
[1100] K. 843 (iv. 201): ‘swa full and swa forð swa Ðurstan min huskarll hit
furmest of me heold.’—K. 846 (iv. 205): ‘swa full and swa forð swa Sweyn mi
may hit formest of me held.’—K. 826 (iv. 190): ‘swa Ælfwin sy nunne it heold
of ðan minstre.’—K. 827 (iv. 190): ‘swa Sihtric eorll of ðan minstre þeowlic it
heold.’ If K. 1237 (vi. 44) be genuine (and Kemble has not condemned it) then
already in the middle of the tenth century ‘Goda princeps tenuit terram de rege,’
nor only so, ‘tenuit honorem de rege’; but this document is unacceptable. At best
it may be a late Latin translation of an English original.
[1101] K. 313 (ii. 110); T. 129; B. ii. 172.
[1102] In many cases the one night’s farm is reckoned at £100 or thereabouts;
Round, Feudal England, 112.
[1103] K. 477 (ii. 354); T. 509.
[1104] Vinogradoff, Villainage, 301.
[1105] Even T. R. W. and in a thoroughly manorial county such as Hampshire
we may find a village in which the lord has no demesne. See e.g. D. B. i. 41 b,
Alwarestoch.
Page 560
[1106] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 315
[1107] Ine, 67. See Schmid’s note.
[1108] See above, p. 15.
[1109] See Meitzen, Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Germanen, ii. 97 ff.
[1110] Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 223.
[1111] The subject is treated at length by Kemble, Saxons, ii. 490 and App. D,
and Schmid, p. 545.
[1112] D. B. i. 174. Compare Ine, 4; Æthelr. VIII. 11; Cnut, I. 10.
[1113] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 95.
[1114] Æthelred, III. 3; Schmid, App. II. 67 and Schmid, Glossar, s. v. land-
ceáp.
[1115] See above, pp. 55, 122, 125.
[1116] See above, p. 6. In a charter of Æthelred, K. 689 (iii. 284), Abp. Sigeric,
the reputed inventor of the danegeld, is represented as pledging a village of
thirty manses in order that he may pay the money demanded by the pirates. He
thus raises 90 pounds of purest silver and 200 mancuses of purest gold. If the
mancus was the eighth of a pound (Schmid, p. 595) we have 90 pounds of silver
and 25 of gold, or in all perhaps £390. The whole danegeld of Kent under Henry
II. was less than £106. For other transactions of a similar kind, see Crawford
Charters, 76.
[1117] See above, p. 27.
[1118] Hist. Eng. Law, i. p. 416.
[1119] K. 1327 (iv. 190): ‘swa full and swa forð swa Sihtric eorll of ðan ministre
þeowlic it heold.’
[1120] Cnut, II. 20.
[1121] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. p. 458.
[1122] Chron. Petrob. 166: ‘Sunt etiam in eadem scira 15 undersetes qui nullum
servicium faciunt nisi husbondis in quorum terra sedent.’
[1123] See above, p. 136.
[1124] Schmid, App. III. p. 370; Seebohm, English Village Community, p. 129.
See also Liebermann’s article in Anglia, ix. 251, where the Gerefa, which seems
to be a second part of this document, is printed.
[1125] We here adopt Schmid’s conjecture: ‘and scorp to friðscipe [corr.
fyrdscipe].’
[1126] Ibid.: ‘and hlaford feormian,’ and supply a feorm (firma) for his lord.
[1107] Ine, 67. See Schmid’s note.
[1108] See above, p. 15.
[1109] See Meitzen, Siedelung und Agrarwesen der Germanen, ii. 97 ff.
[1110] Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 223.
[1111] The subject is treated at length by Kemble, Saxons, ii. 490 and App. D,
and Schmid, p. 545.
[1112] D. B. i. 174. Compare Ine, 4; Æthelr. VIII. 11; Cnut, I. 10.
[1113] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 95.
[1114] Æthelred, III. 3; Schmid, App. II. 67 and Schmid, Glossar, s. v. land-
ceáp.
[1115] See above, pp. 55, 122, 125.
[1116] See above, p. 6. In a charter of Æthelred, K. 689 (iii. 284), Abp. Sigeric,
the reputed inventor of the danegeld, is represented as pledging a village of
thirty manses in order that he may pay the money demanded by the pirates. He
thus raises 90 pounds of purest silver and 200 mancuses of purest gold. If the
mancus was the eighth of a pound (Schmid, p. 595) we have 90 pounds of silver
and 25 of gold, or in all perhaps £390. The whole danegeld of Kent under Henry
II. was less than £106. For other transactions of a similar kind, see Crawford
Charters, 76.
[1117] See above, p. 27.
[1118] Hist. Eng. Law, i. p. 416.
[1119] K. 1327 (iv. 190): ‘swa full and swa forð swa Sihtric eorll of ðan ministre
þeowlic it heold.’
[1120] Cnut, II. 20.
[1121] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. p. 458.
[1122] Chron. Petrob. 166: ‘Sunt etiam in eadem scira 15 undersetes qui nullum
servicium faciunt nisi husbondis in quorum terra sedent.’
[1123] See above, p. 136.
[1124] Schmid, App. III. p. 370; Seebohm, English Village Community, p. 129.
See also Liebermann’s article in Anglia, ix. 251, where the Gerefa, which seems
to be a second part of this document, is printed.
[1125] We here adopt Schmid’s conjecture: ‘and scorp to friðscipe [corr.
fyrdscipe].’
[1126] Ibid.: ‘and hlaford feormian,’ and supply a feorm (firma) for his lord.
Page 561
[1127] The text says that he must lie at his lord’s fold; but probably it refers to
the soca faldae. See above, p. 76.
[1128] Of the serfs we hear (c. 8, 9) what they are to receive, but not what they
ought to do; their services are unlimited.
[1129] Schmid, p. 596: Maurer, K. U. ii. 405.
[1130] See above, p. 305, also Maurer, K. U. ii. 406.
[1131] He is to ‘work’ for his lord; but then see how Oswald speaks of his
knights and radmen: ‘semper illius ... dominatui et voluntati ... cum omni
humilitate et subiectione subditi fiant secundum ipsius voluntatem.’ Cf. D. B. i.
172 b: ‘deserviebat sicut episcopus volebat’ ... ‘tenuit ad servitium quod
episcopus voluit.’ The translator who turned him into a villanus was capable of
turning the king’s geneat of Ine’s law into a colonus, a colonus with a wergild of
1200 shillings! See Schmid, p. 29.
[1132] See above, p. 36.
[1133] See e.g. cap. i., where it is pretty clear that he can not translate scorp. So
in the Latin version of Edgar II. c. 1 he renders geneatland by terra villanorum.
But about such a matter as this the testimony of the Quadripartitus is of no value.
See Liebermann, Gerefa, Anglia, ix. 258.
[1134] Mr Seebohm, p. 130, commits what seems to me the mistake of saying
that the cottiers and boors are ‘various classes of geneats.’ To my thinking a
great contrast is drawn between the geneat and the gebúr both in this document
and in the account of Tidenham. So in Edgar II. c. 1 the contrast is between land
which the great man has in hand and land which he has let to his ‘fellows,’ his
equites and ministri. See Konrad Maurer, K. U. ii. 405–6. Such words as gebúr
and burus are obviously very loose words and it is likely that many a man who
answered to the description of the gebúr given by the Rectitudines appears in
Domesday Book, which in general cares only about fiscal distinctions, as a
villanus or bordarius. But we have clear proof that the surveyors saw a class of
buri ( = coliberti) who were distinct from the ordinary villani. See above, p. 36.
[1135] K. 452 (ii. 327). See also Two Chartularies of Bath Abbey (Somerset
Record Society), pp. 5, 18, 19.
[1136] K. iii. 449; E. 375: Seebohm, 148. Both documents come from MS.
C.C.C. Camb. cxi. The conveyance is on f. 57, the statement of services on f. 73.
The statement of services immediately precedes the lease of Tidenham to
Stigand, K. 822 (iv. 171). Thus we have really better reason for referring that
statement to the very eve of the Norman Conquest than to 956. See also Kemble,
Saxons, i. 321, and Maurer, K. U. ii. 406.
[1137] K. 1077 (v. 146; iv. 306); T. 143; Kemble, Saxons, i. 319; Seebohm, 160.
But the form of the instrument as given in the Codex Wintoniensis is best seen in
B. ii. 240. We have quoted above the estimate of this Codex formed by Mr
Haddan and Dr Stubbs (Councils, iii. 638).
[1138] B. ii. 238.
the soca faldae. See above, p. 76.
[1128] Of the serfs we hear (c. 8, 9) what they are to receive, but not what they
ought to do; their services are unlimited.
[1129] Schmid, p. 596: Maurer, K. U. ii. 405.
[1130] See above, p. 305, also Maurer, K. U. ii. 406.
[1131] He is to ‘work’ for his lord; but then see how Oswald speaks of his
knights and radmen: ‘semper illius ... dominatui et voluntati ... cum omni
humilitate et subiectione subditi fiant secundum ipsius voluntatem.’ Cf. D. B. i.
172 b: ‘deserviebat sicut episcopus volebat’ ... ‘tenuit ad servitium quod
episcopus voluit.’ The translator who turned him into a villanus was capable of
turning the king’s geneat of Ine’s law into a colonus, a colonus with a wergild of
1200 shillings! See Schmid, p. 29.
[1132] See above, p. 36.
[1133] See e.g. cap. i., where it is pretty clear that he can not translate scorp. So
in the Latin version of Edgar II. c. 1 he renders geneatland by terra villanorum.
But about such a matter as this the testimony of the Quadripartitus is of no value.
See Liebermann, Gerefa, Anglia, ix. 258.
[1134] Mr Seebohm, p. 130, commits what seems to me the mistake of saying
that the cottiers and boors are ‘various classes of geneats.’ To my thinking a
great contrast is drawn between the geneat and the gebúr both in this document
and in the account of Tidenham. So in Edgar II. c. 1 the contrast is between land
which the great man has in hand and land which he has let to his ‘fellows,’ his
equites and ministri. See Konrad Maurer, K. U. ii. 405–6. Such words as gebúr
and burus are obviously very loose words and it is likely that many a man who
answered to the description of the gebúr given by the Rectitudines appears in
Domesday Book, which in general cares only about fiscal distinctions, as a
villanus or bordarius. But we have clear proof that the surveyors saw a class of
buri ( = coliberti) who were distinct from the ordinary villani. See above, p. 36.
[1135] K. 452 (ii. 327). See also Two Chartularies of Bath Abbey (Somerset
Record Society), pp. 5, 18, 19.
[1136] K. iii. 449; E. 375: Seebohm, 148. Both documents come from MS.
C.C.C. Camb. cxi. The conveyance is on f. 57, the statement of services on f. 73.
The statement of services immediately precedes the lease of Tidenham to
Stigand, K. 822 (iv. 171). Thus we have really better reason for referring that
statement to the very eve of the Norman Conquest than to 956. See also Kemble,
Saxons, i. 321, and Maurer, K. U. ii. 406.
[1137] K. 1077 (v. 146; iv. 306); T. 143; Kemble, Saxons, i. 319; Seebohm, 160.
But the form of the instrument as given in the Codex Wintoniensis is best seen in
B. ii. 240. We have quoted above the estimate of this Codex formed by Mr
Haddan and Dr Stubbs (Councils, iii. 638).
[1138] B. ii. 238.
Page 562
[1139] B. ii. 239.
[1140] See above, p. 129.
[1141] Ine, 67.
[1142] Ine, 39. The man who leaves his lord (not his lord’s land, but his lord)
without license, or steals himself away into another shire, is to pay 60 shillings
(no trivial sum) to his lord.
[1143] Surely the law, Hloth. and Ead. c. 15, which begins ‘If a man receive a
guest three nights in his own home (an his agenum hame)’ is not directed only
against the lords of manors. See Meitzen, Siedelung und Agrarwesen, ii. 123.
[1144] Ashley, Translation of Fustel de Coulanges, Origin of Property, p. xvi.
[1145] K. 220 (i. 280): ‘ad regalem villam Lundoniae perveniens.’
[1146] Fustel de Coulanges, L’Alleu, ch. vi. There is much to be said on the
other side; see Flach, Les origines de l’ancienne France, ii. pp. 47–62. As to the
villa of the Lex Salica, see Blumenstok, Entstehung des deutschen
Immobiliareigenthums, i. 219 ff.
[1147] The suggestion that villa appears in some of our place-names as the
termination -well runs counter, so Mr Stevenson tells me, to rules of phonology.
[1148] See Bosworth’s Dictionary; Kemble, Cod. Dipl. iii. p. xli. In the
translation of St. Mark viii. 23, 26 both wíc and tun are used as equivalents for
vicus:—‘eduxit eum extra vicum ... et si in vicum introieris’ = ‘and lædde hine
butan þa wic ... and ðeah þu on tun ga.’ Even in France the word vicus becomes
part of numerous place-names: see Flach, op. cit. i. p. 53.
[1149] There is something curious about the use made of wick. It is often used to
distinguish a hamlet or small cluster of houses separate from the main village.
Thus in the parish of X we shall find X-wick. The berewicks and herdwicks of D.
B. (see above, p. 114) seem to be small clusters. On the other hand London is a
wíc; Hloth. and Ead. 16.
[1150] K. 1041 (v. 88): ‘in Dorobernia etiam civitate unam villam donabo ad
quam pertinet quinque iugera terrae et duo prata.’ K. 276 (ii. 57): ‘dabo unam
villam, quod nos Saxonice an haga dicimus.’ K. 259 (ii. 26): ‘villam unam ab
orientale parte muri Doroverniae civitatis.’
[1151] K. 829 (iv. 191).
[1152] K. 845 (iv. 204). In a passage which has been interpolated into one copy
of the A.-S. Chronicle (Thorpe, p. 220) we read ‘And se biscop ... bohte þa feala
cotlif æt se king.’
[1153] Crawford Charters, pp. 22, 125; K. 1293 (vi. 138).
[1154] Thus K. 109 (i. 133): ‘villam unam ... quae iam ad Quenegatum urbis
Dorovernensis in foro posita est.‘ It is not denied that in some quite early
charters a king gives a villa or villula, e.g. K. 209 (i. 264): ‘Heallingan cum
[1140] See above, p. 129.
[1141] Ine, 67.
[1142] Ine, 39. The man who leaves his lord (not his lord’s land, but his lord)
without license, or steals himself away into another shire, is to pay 60 shillings
(no trivial sum) to his lord.
[1143] Surely the law, Hloth. and Ead. c. 15, which begins ‘If a man receive a
guest three nights in his own home (an his agenum hame)’ is not directed only
against the lords of manors. See Meitzen, Siedelung und Agrarwesen, ii. 123.
[1144] Ashley, Translation of Fustel de Coulanges, Origin of Property, p. xvi.
[1145] K. 220 (i. 280): ‘ad regalem villam Lundoniae perveniens.’
[1146] Fustel de Coulanges, L’Alleu, ch. vi. There is much to be said on the
other side; see Flach, Les origines de l’ancienne France, ii. pp. 47–62. As to the
villa of the Lex Salica, see Blumenstok, Entstehung des deutschen
Immobiliareigenthums, i. 219 ff.
[1147] The suggestion that villa appears in some of our place-names as the
termination -well runs counter, so Mr Stevenson tells me, to rules of phonology.
[1148] See Bosworth’s Dictionary; Kemble, Cod. Dipl. iii. p. xli. In the
translation of St. Mark viii. 23, 26 both wíc and tun are used as equivalents for
vicus:—‘eduxit eum extra vicum ... et si in vicum introieris’ = ‘and lædde hine
butan þa wic ... and ðeah þu on tun ga.’ Even in France the word vicus becomes
part of numerous place-names: see Flach, op. cit. i. p. 53.
[1149] There is something curious about the use made of wick. It is often used to
distinguish a hamlet or small cluster of houses separate from the main village.
Thus in the parish of X we shall find X-wick. The berewicks and herdwicks of D.
B. (see above, p. 114) seem to be small clusters. On the other hand London is a
wíc; Hloth. and Ead. 16.
[1150] K. 1041 (v. 88): ‘in Dorobernia etiam civitate unam villam donabo ad
quam pertinet quinque iugera terrae et duo prata.’ K. 276 (ii. 57): ‘dabo unam
villam, quod nos Saxonice an haga dicimus.’ K. 259 (ii. 26): ‘villam unam ab
orientale parte muri Doroverniae civitatis.’
[1151] K. 829 (iv. 191).
[1152] K. 845 (iv. 204). In a passage which has been interpolated into one copy
of the A.-S. Chronicle (Thorpe, p. 220) we read ‘And se biscop ... bohte þa feala
cotlif æt se king.’
[1153] Crawford Charters, pp. 22, 125; K. 1293 (vi. 138).
[1154] Thus K. 109 (i. 133): ‘villam unam ... quae iam ad Quenegatum urbis
Dorovernensis in foro posita est.‘ It is not denied that in some quite early
charters a king gives a villa or villula, e.g. K. 209 (i. 264): ‘Heallingan cum
Page 563
villulis suis’; see also K. 140 (i. 169), in which villula and viculus are used as
synonyms.
[1155] A good example is that abominable forgery K. 984 (v. 2), Wulfhere’s
charter for Peterborough.
[1156] For example, K. 117–8–20 (i. 144–7).
[1157] One of the earliest instances of what looks like manorial organization will
be found in K. 201 (i. 253); B. i. 485. In 814 Cenwulf gives to the Abp. of
Canterbury a plough-land: ‘et hoc aratrum cum omnibus utensilibus bonis ad
mansionem in grafon æa [Graveney] æternaliter concessum est.’
[1158] A.D. 880, K. 311 (ii. 107): ‘Insuper etiam huic donationi in augmentum
sex homines, qui prius pertinebant ad villam regiam in Beonsinctune, cum omni
prole stirpeque eorum ad eandem conscripsimus aecclesiam.’ A.D. 889, K. 315
(ii. 117): ‘cum hominibus ad illam pertinentibus.’ A.D. 962, K. 1239 (vi. 49):
‘vineam ... cum vinitoribus.’ In late documents penned in English it is common
to convey land ‘with meat and with man.’ Instances are collected in Crawford
Charters, 127.
[1159] Therefore we sometimes meet with the form cassata, while manens is
treated as a feminine word; K. i. 301; B. i. 573: ‘has x. manentes ... dividendas
dimisit.’ So Asser (ed. Camden, p. 4) says that Æthelwulf ordered that one poor
man should be fed and clothed ‘per omnem hereditariam terram suam semper in
x. manentibus.’
[1160] K. 1033 (v. 73): ‘aliquam portionem terrae ... in modum videlicet ut
autumo v. cassatorum.’ K. 1308 (v. 83): ‘aliquam portionem terrae ... in modum
videlicet ut autumo xx. manentium.’ K. 565 (iii. 64): ‘quoddam ruris clima sub
aestimatione decem cassatorum.’ K. 573 (iii. 87): ‘ruris quandam particulam,
denis ab accolis aestimatam mansiunculis.’ K. 602 (iii. 146): ‘quoddam rus x.
videlicet mansarum quantitate taxatum.’
[1161] Let us open the Cod. Dipl. at the beginning of Edmund’s reign (ii. 218).
The number of manses given in twenty-five consecutive charters is as follows:
10, 20, 10, 10, 9, 10, 15, 7, 8, 20, 10, 3, 5, 20, 30, 3, 6, 5, 3, 7, 20, 20, 5, 8, 5.
[1162] It seems almost necessary to protest that to-day our landowners are not
semi-servile occupants of the soil, though they pay land taxes, house taxes,
income taxes and rates innumerable.
[1163] I can not but think that Fustel de Coulanges knew his business thoroughly
well, and that if the German is to be taught his proper and insignificant place, the
less that is said of intermixed ‘strip-holding’ the better, though to ignore it utterly
was, even in France, a bold course.
[1164] Meitzen, op. cit. i. 431–41.
[1165] See above, p. 139.
[1166] This seems to me the net outcome of the long and interesting controversy
which has divided the Germanists as to the nature of the German
Genossenschaft.
synonyms.
[1155] A good example is that abominable forgery K. 984 (v. 2), Wulfhere’s
charter for Peterborough.
[1156] For example, K. 117–8–20 (i. 144–7).
[1157] One of the earliest instances of what looks like manorial organization will
be found in K. 201 (i. 253); B. i. 485. In 814 Cenwulf gives to the Abp. of
Canterbury a plough-land: ‘et hoc aratrum cum omnibus utensilibus bonis ad
mansionem in grafon æa [Graveney] æternaliter concessum est.’
[1158] A.D. 880, K. 311 (ii. 107): ‘Insuper etiam huic donationi in augmentum
sex homines, qui prius pertinebant ad villam regiam in Beonsinctune, cum omni
prole stirpeque eorum ad eandem conscripsimus aecclesiam.’ A.D. 889, K. 315
(ii. 117): ‘cum hominibus ad illam pertinentibus.’ A.D. 962, K. 1239 (vi. 49):
‘vineam ... cum vinitoribus.’ In late documents penned in English it is common
to convey land ‘with meat and with man.’ Instances are collected in Crawford
Charters, 127.
[1159] Therefore we sometimes meet with the form cassata, while manens is
treated as a feminine word; K. i. 301; B. i. 573: ‘has x. manentes ... dividendas
dimisit.’ So Asser (ed. Camden, p. 4) says that Æthelwulf ordered that one poor
man should be fed and clothed ‘per omnem hereditariam terram suam semper in
x. manentibus.’
[1160] K. 1033 (v. 73): ‘aliquam portionem terrae ... in modum videlicet ut
autumo v. cassatorum.’ K. 1308 (v. 83): ‘aliquam portionem terrae ... in modum
videlicet ut autumo xx. manentium.’ K. 565 (iii. 64): ‘quoddam ruris clima sub
aestimatione decem cassatorum.’ K. 573 (iii. 87): ‘ruris quandam particulam,
denis ab accolis aestimatam mansiunculis.’ K. 602 (iii. 146): ‘quoddam rus x.
videlicet mansarum quantitate taxatum.’
[1161] Let us open the Cod. Dipl. at the beginning of Edmund’s reign (ii. 218).
The number of manses given in twenty-five consecutive charters is as follows:
10, 20, 10, 10, 9, 10, 15, 7, 8, 20, 10, 3, 5, 20, 30, 3, 6, 5, 3, 7, 20, 20, 5, 8, 5.
[1162] It seems almost necessary to protest that to-day our landowners are not
semi-servile occupants of the soil, though they pay land taxes, house taxes,
income taxes and rates innumerable.
[1163] I can not but think that Fustel de Coulanges knew his business thoroughly
well, and that if the German is to be taught his proper and insignificant place, the
less that is said of intermixed ‘strip-holding’ the better, though to ignore it utterly
was, even in France, a bold course.
[1164] Meitzen, op. cit. i. 431–41.
[1165] See above, p. 139.
[1166] This seems to me the net outcome of the long and interesting controversy
which has divided the Germanists as to the nature of the German
Genossenschaft.
Page 564
[1167] This is no extravagant hypothesis. See e.g. Stat. 7 Hen. VIII. c. 1 Thacte
advoidyng pullyng downe of townes.
[1168] See Army Act, 1881, 44 and 45 Vic. c. 58, sec. 115.
[1169] Flach, Les origines de l’ancienne France, ii. 45, referring to the classical
passages in Cæsar and Tacitus, says: ‘Ce serait un abus de mots de dire que la
tribu ou que le clan sont propriétaires. La tribu (civitas) a la souveraineté du
territoire, les clans de leurs subdivisions ont l’usage des parts qui leur sont
assignées. La conception même de la propriété est exclue par la nature des
terres: étendue de friches toujours renaissantes et en surabondance toujours:
superest ager.’ See also Dargun, Ursprung des Eigenthums, Zeitschrift für
vergleichende Rechtswissenschaft, v. 55.
[1170] Dargun, Ursprung des Eigenthums, Zeitschrift für vergleichende
Rechtswissenschaft, v. 1 (1884). See also Hildebrand, Recht und Sitte, Jena,
1896.
[1171] In the A.-S. laws about tithes there is really no hint of communalism.
When a landowner has ploughed his tenth acre, he is to assign that acre, or rather
the crop that it will bear next year, to the church. That is all; and though it may
be a rude plan, it is compatible with the most absolute individualism. Mr
Seebohm, Village Community, 114, however, seems to think otherwise. As to the
Welsh laws, we beg an enormous question if we introduce them into this context.
A distribution of acres when the ploughing is done is just what we do not see in
England.
[1172] As to the famous words of Tacitus ‘Agri pro numero cultorum ab
uniuersis in uices [al. inuicem] occupantur’ and the proposal to read uniuersis
vicis, one of the best suggestions yet made (Meitzen, Siedelung, iii. 586) is that
Tacitus wrote merely ab uniuersis occupantur, that a copyist repeated the word
uniuersis, and that other copyists tried to make sense of nonsense.
[1173] As to the state of things represented by the Lex Salica see Blumenstok,
Entstehung des deutschen Immobiliareigenthums, Innsbruck, 1894, pp. 196 ff.
[1174] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 155. It may be convenient now-a-days to say that
ownership implies a power of alienation. See Pollock, Jurisprudence, 166. But to
insist on this usage in such discussions as that in which we are engaged would
lead to needless circumlocution. The question that is before us is whether as a
complaint to which a court of law will give audience ‘This acre is mine’ is more
modern than ‘This acre is ours.’
[1175] As to the whole of this matter see Meitzen, op. cit., especially iii. 574–
589. As regards arable land in this country the only ‘survivals’ which point to
anything that should be called communal ownership are singularly inconclusive.
They relate to small patches of arable land held by burgesses: that is to say, they
relate to places in which a strong communal sentiment was developed during the
later middle ages, and they do not relate to communities that ought to be called
agricultural. The ‘burgess plot’ is not large enough to have been any man’s
livelihood when cultivated in medieval fashion, and it may well be modern. It is
demonstrable that in one case a very ‘archaic’ arrangement was deliberately
adopted in the nineteenth century by burgesses who preferred ‘allotment
advoidyng pullyng downe of townes.
[1168] See Army Act, 1881, 44 and 45 Vic. c. 58, sec. 115.
[1169] Flach, Les origines de l’ancienne France, ii. 45, referring to the classical
passages in Cæsar and Tacitus, says: ‘Ce serait un abus de mots de dire que la
tribu ou que le clan sont propriétaires. La tribu (civitas) a la souveraineté du
territoire, les clans de leurs subdivisions ont l’usage des parts qui leur sont
assignées. La conception même de la propriété est exclue par la nature des
terres: étendue de friches toujours renaissantes et en surabondance toujours:
superest ager.’ See also Dargun, Ursprung des Eigenthums, Zeitschrift für
vergleichende Rechtswissenschaft, v. 55.
[1170] Dargun, Ursprung des Eigenthums, Zeitschrift für vergleichende
Rechtswissenschaft, v. 1 (1884). See also Hildebrand, Recht und Sitte, Jena,
1896.
[1171] In the A.-S. laws about tithes there is really no hint of communalism.
When a landowner has ploughed his tenth acre, he is to assign that acre, or rather
the crop that it will bear next year, to the church. That is all; and though it may
be a rude plan, it is compatible with the most absolute individualism. Mr
Seebohm, Village Community, 114, however, seems to think otherwise. As to the
Welsh laws, we beg an enormous question if we introduce them into this context.
A distribution of acres when the ploughing is done is just what we do not see in
England.
[1172] As to the famous words of Tacitus ‘Agri pro numero cultorum ab
uniuersis in uices [al. inuicem] occupantur’ and the proposal to read uniuersis
vicis, one of the best suggestions yet made (Meitzen, Siedelung, iii. 586) is that
Tacitus wrote merely ab uniuersis occupantur, that a copyist repeated the word
uniuersis, and that other copyists tried to make sense of nonsense.
[1173] As to the state of things represented by the Lex Salica see Blumenstok,
Entstehung des deutschen Immobiliareigenthums, Innsbruck, 1894, pp. 196 ff.
[1174] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 155. It may be convenient now-a-days to say that
ownership implies a power of alienation. See Pollock, Jurisprudence, 166. But to
insist on this usage in such discussions as that in which we are engaged would
lead to needless circumlocution. The question that is before us is whether as a
complaint to which a court of law will give audience ‘This acre is mine’ is more
modern than ‘This acre is ours.’
[1175] As to the whole of this matter see Meitzen, op. cit., especially iii. 574–
589. As regards arable land in this country the only ‘survivals’ which point to
anything that should be called communal ownership are singularly inconclusive.
They relate to small patches of arable land held by burgesses: that is to say, they
relate to places in which a strong communal sentiment was developed during the
later middle ages, and they do not relate to communities that ought to be called
agricultural. The ‘burgess plot’ is not large enough to have been any man’s
livelihood when cultivated in medieval fashion, and it may well be modern. It is
demonstrable that in one case a very ‘archaic’ arrangement was deliberately
adopted in the nineteenth century by burgesses who preferred ‘allotment
Page 565
grounds’ to pasture rights. Maitland, Survival of Archaic Communities, Law
Quarterly Review, ix. 36.
[1176] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 610–12.
[1177] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 238. A hypothetical practice of endogamy will hardly
give us the requisite explanation, for on the whole the church seems to have
encountered little difficulty in imposing its extravagantly exogamous canons. To
persuade the converts not to marry their affines was a much harder task.
[1178] Heusler, Institutionen, 229.
[1179] As to the ownership of land by ‘families,’ see Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 242.
[1180] See above, p. 147.
[1181] Of this in the next essay.
[1182] A valuable and interesting discussion of the proprietary system of the Lex
Salica will be found in Blumenstok, Entstehung des deutschen
Immobiliareigenthums, Innsbruck, 1894. This will serve as a good introduction
to the large literature which surrounds the De migrantibus. The least probable of
all interpretations seems that given by Fustel de Coulanges.
[1183] See Meitzen, op. cit. i. 526–35.
[1184] Meitzen, i. 517 and the Maps 66 a, 66 b in the Atlas.
[1185] Meitzen, ii. 97–122.
[1186] See above, p. 237.
[1187] See above, p. 129.
[1188] Throughout the historical time, so far as we know, the right of every
commoner has been well protected against strangers. He might drive off the
stranger’s beasts, impound them, and, at all events if he had been incommoded,
might sue for damages. See Marys’s case, 9 Coke’s Reports, 111 b; Wells v.
Watling, 2 W. Blackstone’s Reports, 1233. He needed no help from his
neighbours.
[1189] See above, pp. 13, 124.
[1190] I refer to the much discussed case of Aston and Cote. See Law Quarterly
Review, ix. 214.
[1191] Meitzen, op. cit. i. 573.
[1192] Ibid. i. 122–60.
[1193] Therefore its assembly is a Holtding, and a Holzgraf presides there:
Meitzen, op. cit. i. 125.
[1194] D. B. ii. 339 b: ‘In hundret de Coleness est quedam pastura communis
omnibus hominibus de hundret.’ At Rhuddlan (D. B. i. 269) Earl Hugh has given
to Robert half the castle, half the burg, and ‘half of the forests which do not
pertain to any vill of the said manor.’ This, however, is in Wales.
Quarterly Review, ix. 36.
[1176] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 610–12.
[1177] Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 238. A hypothetical practice of endogamy will hardly
give us the requisite explanation, for on the whole the church seems to have
encountered little difficulty in imposing its extravagantly exogamous canons. To
persuade the converts not to marry their affines was a much harder task.
[1178] Heusler, Institutionen, 229.
[1179] As to the ownership of land by ‘families,’ see Hist. Eng. Law, ii. 242.
[1180] See above, p. 147.
[1181] Of this in the next essay.
[1182] A valuable and interesting discussion of the proprietary system of the Lex
Salica will be found in Blumenstok, Entstehung des deutschen
Immobiliareigenthums, Innsbruck, 1894. This will serve as a good introduction
to the large literature which surrounds the De migrantibus. The least probable of
all interpretations seems that given by Fustel de Coulanges.
[1183] See Meitzen, op. cit. i. 526–35.
[1184] Meitzen, i. 517 and the Maps 66 a, 66 b in the Atlas.
[1185] Meitzen, ii. 97–122.
[1186] See above, p. 237.
[1187] See above, p. 129.
[1188] Throughout the historical time, so far as we know, the right of every
commoner has been well protected against strangers. He might drive off the
stranger’s beasts, impound them, and, at all events if he had been incommoded,
might sue for damages. See Marys’s case, 9 Coke’s Reports, 111 b; Wells v.
Watling, 2 W. Blackstone’s Reports, 1233. He needed no help from his
neighbours.
[1189] See above, pp. 13, 124.
[1190] I refer to the much discussed case of Aston and Cote. See Law Quarterly
Review, ix. 214.
[1191] Meitzen, op. cit. i. 573.
[1192] Ibid. i. 122–60.
[1193] Therefore its assembly is a Holtding, and a Holzgraf presides there:
Meitzen, op. cit. i. 125.
[1194] D. B. ii. 339 b: ‘In hundret de Coleness est quedam pastura communis
omnibus hominibus de hundret.’ At Rhuddlan (D. B. i. 269) Earl Hugh has given
to Robert half the castle, half the burg, and ‘half of the forests which do not
pertain to any vill of the said manor.’ This, however, is in Wales.
Page 566
[1195] Hist. Eng. Law, i. 608.
[1196] Ibid. i. 547.
[1197] Blomefield, Hist. Norfolk, iv. 691 gives an account of an extremely
fertile tract of pasture known as Tilney Smeeth upon which the cattle of seven
‘towns’ intercommoned.
[1198] If we are right in supposing that very generally a royal land-book
disposes of a whole village, then if it proceeds to give rights in the communis
silva, it is probably speaking of a wood that is not regarded as annexed to that
village but of one which is common to various villages. The intercommoning of
vills in a forest is illustrated by the famous Epping case, Commissioners of
Sewers v. Glasse, Law Reports, 19 Equity, 134. But for the king’s rights in forest
land, a ‘mark community’ might have grown up in Epping. On the other hand,
but for the king’s rights, the land might long ago have been partitioned among
the mark-men.
[1199] The word tenement will be often employed hereafter. Has it become
needful to protest that a tenement need not be a house? If my body is my soul’s
‘frail tenement,’ that is not because my body holds my soul (a reprobate error),
but because (for this is better philosophy and sound law) my soul holds my body.
But, to descend from these heights, it will be a thousand pities if a vulgar
blunder compels us to abandon the excellent tenement in favour of the feeble
holding or the over-worked estate.
[1200] Hist. Eccl. lib. 4, c. 21 (23), ed. Plummer, i. 253.
[1201] Ibid. lib. 3, c. 24, ed. cit. i. 178.
[1202] Ibid. lib. 4, c. 13, ed. cit. i. 230.
[1203] Ibid. lib. 4, c. 14 (16), ed. cit. i. 237.
[1204] Ibid. lib. 1, c. 25, ed. cit. i. 45.
[1206] If, as Mr Seebohm suggests (Village Community, p. 398), this word
meant the skin of an ox, some one would assuredly have Latined it by corium,
and not by terra unius familiae (manentis etc.)
[1206] Schmid, App. VII. (Wergilds), 2, § 7. By comparing this with Ine 32 we
get an even more explicit equation: ‘Gif Wylisc mon hæbbe hide londes’ = ‘Gif
Wilisc mon geþeo þæt he hæbbe hiwisc landes.’
[1207] K. 271 (ii. 52), a forgery: ‘æt Cemele tien hyda, æt Domeccesige
þriddehalf hiwisce.’—K. 1077 (v. 146): ‘æt hilcan hiwisce feowerti penega.’—
K. iii. 431: ‘ðæs anes hiwisces boc ... ðas oðres hiwisces.’—K. 1050 (v. 98). See
also Crawford Charters, 127, for hiwscipe.
[1208] K. 1006 (v. 47): ‘de terra iuris mei aliquantulam portionem, iuxta
mensuram scilicet decem familiarum.’ See also K. 1007.
[1209] The would-be Latin hida occurs already in K. 230 (i. 297), but is rare
before the Conquest. On the other hand, as an English word híd is in constant
use.
[1196] Ibid. i. 547.
[1197] Blomefield, Hist. Norfolk, iv. 691 gives an account of an extremely
fertile tract of pasture known as Tilney Smeeth upon which the cattle of seven
‘towns’ intercommoned.
[1198] If we are right in supposing that very generally a royal land-book
disposes of a whole village, then if it proceeds to give rights in the communis
silva, it is probably speaking of a wood that is not regarded as annexed to that
village but of one which is common to various villages. The intercommoning of
vills in a forest is illustrated by the famous Epping case, Commissioners of
Sewers v. Glasse, Law Reports, 19 Equity, 134. But for the king’s rights in forest
land, a ‘mark community’ might have grown up in Epping. On the other hand,
but for the king’s rights, the land might long ago have been partitioned among
the mark-men.
[1199] The word tenement will be often employed hereafter. Has it become
needful to protest that a tenement need not be a house? If my body is my soul’s
‘frail tenement,’ that is not because my body holds my soul (a reprobate error),
but because (for this is better philosophy and sound law) my soul holds my body.
But, to descend from these heights, it will be a thousand pities if a vulgar
blunder compels us to abandon the excellent tenement in favour of the feeble
holding or the over-worked estate.
[1200] Hist. Eccl. lib. 4, c. 21 (23), ed. Plummer, i. 253.
[1201] Ibid. lib. 3, c. 24, ed. cit. i. 178.
[1202] Ibid. lib. 4, c. 13, ed. cit. i. 230.
[1203] Ibid. lib. 4, c. 14 (16), ed. cit. i. 237.
[1204] Ibid. lib. 1, c. 25, ed. cit. i. 45.
[1206] If, as Mr Seebohm suggests (Village Community, p. 398), this word
meant the skin of an ox, some one would assuredly have Latined it by corium,
and not by terra unius familiae (manentis etc.)
[1206] Schmid, App. VII. (Wergilds), 2, § 7. By comparing this with Ine 32 we
get an even more explicit equation: ‘Gif Wylisc mon hæbbe hide londes’ = ‘Gif
Wilisc mon geþeo þæt he hæbbe hiwisc landes.’
[1207] K. 271 (ii. 52), a forgery: ‘æt Cemele tien hyda, æt Domeccesige
þriddehalf hiwisce.’—K. 1077 (v. 146): ‘æt hilcan hiwisce feowerti penega.’—
K. iii. 431: ‘ðæs anes hiwisces boc ... ðas oðres hiwisces.’—K. 1050 (v. 98). See
also Crawford Charters, 127, for hiwscipe.
[1208] K. 1006 (v. 47): ‘de terra iuris mei aliquantulam portionem, iuxta
mensuram scilicet decem familiarum.’ See also K. 1007.
[1209] The would-be Latin hida occurs already in K. 230 (i. 297), but is rare
before the Conquest. On the other hand, as an English word híd is in constant
use.
Page 567
[1210] K. 131 (i. 159); K. 140 (i. 169).
[1211] Thus, to give one early example, K. 1008 (v. 49): ‘duodecim tributarios
terrae quae appellantur Ferrinig.’ So in K. 124 (i. 151) we have the neuter form
manentia.
[1212] A good instance in Egbert’s Dialogue, H. & S. iii. 404. For how many
hides may the clergy swear? A priest may swear ‘secundum numerum 120
tributariorum’; a deacon ‘iuxta numerum 60 manentium’; a monk ‘secundum
numerum 30 tributariorum.’ Here tributarii alternates with manentes for the
same reason that secundum alternates with iuxta. So K. 143 (i. 173): ‘manentes
... casati ... manentes ... casati.’
[1213] See Schmid, p. 611.
[1214] See, for instance, Werhard’s testament (A.D. 832), K. 230 (i. 297):
‘Otteford 100 hidas, Grauenea 32 hidas.’ These are Kentish estates. Hereafter we
shall give some reasons for thinking that the Kentish sullung may have a history
that is all its own.
[1215] Mr Seebohm, Village Community, p. 395, admits that the familia of Bede
and the casatum of the charters is the hide, and that the hide has 120 acres. This
does not prevent him from holding (p. 266) that when Bede speaks of king Oswy
giving to a church twelve possessiunculae, each of ten families, we must see
decuriae of slaves, ‘the bundle of ten slaves or semi-servile tenants.’ He seems
also to think that while the hide was ‘the holding of the full free landholder,’ the
hiwisc was the holding of a servile family. But the passage which he cites in a
note (Wergilds, § 7) seems to disprove this, for there undoubtedly, as he remarks,
hiwisc=hide. It is the passage quoted above on p. 359. The Welshman gets a
wergild of 120 shillings (three-fifths of an English ceorl’s wergild) by acquiring
a hiwisc or (Ine 32) hide of land. Why the hide should not here mean what it
admittedly means elsewhere is not apparent.
[1216] Though Eyton has (for some reason that we can not find in his published
works) allowed but 48 ‘gheld acres’ to the ‘gheld hide,’ he can hardly be
reckoned as an advocate of the Small Hide. His doctrine, if we have caught it, is
that the hide has never been a measure of size. This raises the question—How
comes it then that the fractions into which a hide breaks are indubitably called
(gheld) ‘acres’? Why not ounces, pints, pence?
[1217] D. B. ii. 47 b.
[1218] Ibid. 61.
[1219] Ibid. 64.
[1220] Ibid. 65.
[1221] Ibid. 69 b.
[1222] See above, p. 35.
[1223] For this reason I do not feel sure that Mr F. Baring (Eng. Hist. Rev. xi.
98) has conclusively proved his case when he accuses D. B. of omitting to notice
the free tenants on the estates of the Abbey of Burton.
[1211] Thus, to give one early example, K. 1008 (v. 49): ‘duodecim tributarios
terrae quae appellantur Ferrinig.’ So in K. 124 (i. 151) we have the neuter form
manentia.
[1212] A good instance in Egbert’s Dialogue, H. & S. iii. 404. For how many
hides may the clergy swear? A priest may swear ‘secundum numerum 120
tributariorum’; a deacon ‘iuxta numerum 60 manentium’; a monk ‘secundum
numerum 30 tributariorum.’ Here tributarii alternates with manentes for the
same reason that secundum alternates with iuxta. So K. 143 (i. 173): ‘manentes
... casati ... manentes ... casati.’
[1213] See Schmid, p. 611.
[1214] See, for instance, Werhard’s testament (A.D. 832), K. 230 (i. 297):
‘Otteford 100 hidas, Grauenea 32 hidas.’ These are Kentish estates. Hereafter we
shall give some reasons for thinking that the Kentish sullung may have a history
that is all its own.
[1215] Mr Seebohm, Village Community, p. 395, admits that the familia of Bede
and the casatum of the charters is the hide, and that the hide has 120 acres. This
does not prevent him from holding (p. 266) that when Bede speaks of king Oswy
giving to a church twelve possessiunculae, each of ten families, we must see
decuriae of slaves, ‘the bundle of ten slaves or semi-servile tenants.’ He seems
also to think that while the hide was ‘the holding of the full free landholder,’ the
hiwisc was the holding of a servile family. But the passage which he cites in a
note (Wergilds, § 7) seems to disprove this, for there undoubtedly, as he remarks,
hiwisc=hide. It is the passage quoted above on p. 359. The Welshman gets a
wergild of 120 shillings (three-fifths of an English ceorl’s wergild) by acquiring
a hiwisc or (Ine 32) hide of land. Why the hide should not here mean what it
admittedly means elsewhere is not apparent.
[1216] Though Eyton has (for some reason that we can not find in his published
works) allowed but 48 ‘gheld acres’ to the ‘gheld hide,’ he can hardly be
reckoned as an advocate of the Small Hide. His doctrine, if we have caught it, is
that the hide has never been a measure of size. This raises the question—How
comes it then that the fractions into which a hide breaks are indubitably called
(gheld) ‘acres’? Why not ounces, pints, pence?
[1217] D. B. ii. 47 b.
[1218] Ibid. 61.
[1219] Ibid. 64.
[1220] Ibid. 65.
[1221] Ibid. 69 b.
[1222] See above, p. 35.
[1223] For this reason I do not feel sure that Mr F. Baring (Eng. Hist. Rev. xi.
98) has conclusively proved his case when he accuses D. B. of omitting to notice
the free tenants on the estates of the Abbey of Burton.
Page 568
[1224] The antiquity and universality of the balk must not be taken for granted;
see Meitzen, op. cit. i. 86; iii. 319. However, in recent times balks did occur
within the shots (this Meitzen seems to doubt) as may be seen to-day at Upton
St. Leonards, Co. Gloucester. Mr Seebohm, op. cit. 4, 382, claims the word balk
for the Welsh; but see New Eng. Dict. and Skeat, Etymol. Dict. In this, as in
many another case, the Welsh claim to an English word has broken down.
[1225] A.-S. Chron. ad ann. 1043. Henry of Huntingdon, p. 192, took the sestar
of this passage to be a horse-load. Even if we accept his version, the price would
be high when compared with the prices recorded on the Pipe Rolls of Henry II.;
for which see Hall, Court Life, 219, 220. But, though the point can not be argued
here, we may strongly suspect that the chronicler meant something that is almost
infinitely worse, and that his sestar was at the very least as small as our bushel.
We know of no English document which suggests a sextarius that would be
comparable with a horse-load.
[1226] Geatfled’s will, K. 925 (iv. 263).
[1227] See above, p. 14.
[1228] Observe the clumsy nomenclature illustrated by K. 816 (iv. 164), a deed
forged for the Confessor:—‘Middletun et oðer Middletun ... Horningdun et oðer
Horningdun ... Fifehyda et oðer Fifehyda.’
[1229] See in this context the interesting letter of Bp. Denewulf to Edward the
Elder, K. 1089 (v. 166). An estate of 72 hides, a very large estate, came to the
bishop almost waste. He prides himself on having now tilled 90 acres!
[1230] A good programme of this system is given by Cunningham, Growth of
English Industry, i. 71.
[1231] Rectitudines, 4, § 3; Seebohm, Village Community, 141. Mr Seebohm’s
inference is ingenious and plausible. See also Andrews, Old English Manor, 218.
[1232] K. 259 (ii. 26), A.D. 845: Gift of 19 acres near the city of Canterbury, 6
acres in one place, 6 in another, 7 in a third.
[1233] K. 241 (ii. 1), A.D. 839: Gift of 24 acres, 10 in one place, 14 in another.
—K. 339 (ii. 149), A.D. 904: Gift of 60 acres of arable to the south and 60 to the
north of a certain stream.—K. 586 (iii. 118): ‘and 30 æcra on ðæm twæm feldan
dallandes.’
[1234] See e.g. Glastonbury Rentalia (Somerset Record Soc.) pp. 14, 15, 55, 67,
89, 119, 128–9, 137–8, 155, 166, 192, 195, 208, 219. A system which leaves half
the land idle in every year is of course quite compatible with the growth of both
winter and spring corn. When, as is not uncommon, the villeins have to do
between Michaelmas and Christmas twice as much ploughing as they will do
between Christmas and Lady Day, this seems to point to a scheme which leaves
one field idle and divides the other between winter and spring corn in the
proportion of 2:1. Even in the fourteenth century a three-field system seems to
have been regarded in some places as ‘high farming.’ Larking, Domesday of
Kent, App. p. 23: Extent of Addington, A.D. 1361: ‘Et sunt ibidem 60 acrae
terrae arabilis, de quibus duae partes possunt seminari per annum, si bene
see Meitzen, op. cit. i. 86; iii. 319. However, in recent times balks did occur
within the shots (this Meitzen seems to doubt) as may be seen to-day at Upton
St. Leonards, Co. Gloucester. Mr Seebohm, op. cit. 4, 382, claims the word balk
for the Welsh; but see New Eng. Dict. and Skeat, Etymol. Dict. In this, as in
many another case, the Welsh claim to an English word has broken down.
[1225] A.-S. Chron. ad ann. 1043. Henry of Huntingdon, p. 192, took the sestar
of this passage to be a horse-load. Even if we accept his version, the price would
be high when compared with the prices recorded on the Pipe Rolls of Henry II.;
for which see Hall, Court Life, 219, 220. But, though the point can not be argued
here, we may strongly suspect that the chronicler meant something that is almost
infinitely worse, and that his sestar was at the very least as small as our bushel.
We know of no English document which suggests a sextarius that would be
comparable with a horse-load.
[1226] Geatfled’s will, K. 925 (iv. 263).
[1227] See above, p. 14.
[1228] Observe the clumsy nomenclature illustrated by K. 816 (iv. 164), a deed
forged for the Confessor:—‘Middletun et oðer Middletun ... Horningdun et oðer
Horningdun ... Fifehyda et oðer Fifehyda.’
[1229] See in this context the interesting letter of Bp. Denewulf to Edward the
Elder, K. 1089 (v. 166). An estate of 72 hides, a very large estate, came to the
bishop almost waste. He prides himself on having now tilled 90 acres!
[1230] A good programme of this system is given by Cunningham, Growth of
English Industry, i. 71.
[1231] Rectitudines, 4, § 3; Seebohm, Village Community, 141. Mr Seebohm’s
inference is ingenious and plausible. See also Andrews, Old English Manor, 218.
[1232] K. 259 (ii. 26), A.D. 845: Gift of 19 acres near the city of Canterbury, 6
acres in one place, 6 in another, 7 in a third.
[1233] K. 241 (ii. 1), A.D. 839: Gift of 24 acres, 10 in one place, 14 in another.
—K. 339 (ii. 149), A.D. 904: Gift of 60 acres of arable to the south and 60 to the
north of a certain stream.—K. 586 (iii. 118): ‘and 30 æcra on ðæm twæm feldan
dallandes.’
[1234] See e.g. Glastonbury Rentalia (Somerset Record Soc.) pp. 14, 15, 55, 67,
89, 119, 128–9, 137–8, 155, 166, 192, 195, 208, 219. A system which leaves half
the land idle in every year is of course quite compatible with the growth of both
winter and spring corn. When, as is not uncommon, the villeins have to do
between Michaelmas and Christmas twice as much ploughing as they will do
between Christmas and Lady Day, this seems to point to a scheme which leaves
one field idle and divides the other between winter and spring corn in the
proportion of 2:1. Even in the fourteenth century a three-field system seems to
have been regarded in some places as ‘high farming.’ Larking, Domesday of
Kent, App. p. 23: Extent of Addington, A.D. 1361: ‘Et sunt ibidem 60 acrae
terrae arabilis, de quibus duae partes possunt seminari per annum, si bene
Page 569
coluntur.’ For evidence of the three-field system, see Nasse, Agricultural
Community, Engl. transl. 53.
[1235] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 592.
[1236] Turton, Forest of Pickering (North Riding Record Society), 148 ff.
Twenty years ago A. E. enclosed an acre; sown eight times with spring corn;
value of a sown acre 1s., of an unsown, 4d. Twenty-two years ago E. C. enclosed
a rood; sown seven times with oats, value 6d. a year; value, when unsown, 1d. a
year. In the same book are many instances of a husbandry which alternates oats
with hay.
[1237] Scrutton, Commons and Common Fields, 118, citing a Report to the
Board of Agriculture.
[1238] Ine, 63–68, 70. See above, p. 238.
[1239] A very fine instance is found on the north coast of Norfolk:—Burnham
Deepdale, B. Norton, B. Westgate, B. Sutton, B. Thorpe, B. Overy. As to this see
Stevenson, E. H. R. xi. 304.
[1240] Index Map of Ordnance Survey of Norfolk. Six inch Map of Norfolk,
LVI. Another instance occurs near Yarmouth along the banks of the Waveney.
Even if the allotment was the result of modern schemes of drainage, it still might
be a satisfaction of very ancient claims.
[1241] See above, p. 355.
[1242] Fines (ed. Hunter) i. 242: ‘sex acras terrae mensuratas per legalem
perticam eiusdem villae [de Haveresham].’
[1243] Acts of Parliament of Scotland, i. 309.
[1244] Schmid, Gesetze, App. XII.: ‘three feet and three hand breadths and three
barley corns.’
[1245] Acts of Parliament of Scotland, i. 309. Compare Statutes of the Realm, i.
206: ‘Tria grana ordei sicca et rotunda faciunt pollicem.’ This so-called Statute
of Admeasurement has not been traced to any authoritative source. Probably, like
many of the documents with which it is associated, it is a mere note which
lawyers copied into their statute books.
[1246] Hoveden, iv. 33: ‘et ulna sit ferrea.’
[1247] Britton, ii. 189.
[1248] Magna Carta is careful of wine, beer, corn and cloth; not of land.
[1249] Gloucester Corporation Records, ed. Stevenson, p. 80. Near the year
1200 a grant is made of land in Gloucester measuring in breadth 30 feet ‘iuxta
ferratam virgam Regis.’ Ducange, s. v. ulna, gives examples from the
Monasticon. The iron rod was an iron ell. Were standard perches ever made and
distributed? Apparently the only measure of length of which any standard was
made was the ulna or cloth-yard.
[1250] See the apocryphal Statute of Admeasurement, Stat., vol. i. p. 206.
Community, Engl. transl. 53.
[1235] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 592.
[1236] Turton, Forest of Pickering (North Riding Record Society), 148 ff.
Twenty years ago A. E. enclosed an acre; sown eight times with spring corn;
value of a sown acre 1s., of an unsown, 4d. Twenty-two years ago E. C. enclosed
a rood; sown seven times with oats, value 6d. a year; value, when unsown, 1d. a
year. In the same book are many instances of a husbandry which alternates oats
with hay.
[1237] Scrutton, Commons and Common Fields, 118, citing a Report to the
Board of Agriculture.
[1238] Ine, 63–68, 70. See above, p. 238.
[1239] A very fine instance is found on the north coast of Norfolk:—Burnham
Deepdale, B. Norton, B. Westgate, B. Sutton, B. Thorpe, B. Overy. As to this see
Stevenson, E. H. R. xi. 304.
[1240] Index Map of Ordnance Survey of Norfolk. Six inch Map of Norfolk,
LVI. Another instance occurs near Yarmouth along the banks of the Waveney.
Even if the allotment was the result of modern schemes of drainage, it still might
be a satisfaction of very ancient claims.
[1241] See above, p. 355.
[1242] Fines (ed. Hunter) i. 242: ‘sex acras terrae mensuratas per legalem
perticam eiusdem villae [de Haveresham].’
[1243] Acts of Parliament of Scotland, i. 309.
[1244] Schmid, Gesetze, App. XII.: ‘three feet and three hand breadths and three
barley corns.’
[1245] Acts of Parliament of Scotland, i. 309. Compare Statutes of the Realm, i.
206: ‘Tria grana ordei sicca et rotunda faciunt pollicem.’ This so-called Statute
of Admeasurement has not been traced to any authoritative source. Probably, like
many of the documents with which it is associated, it is a mere note which
lawyers copied into their statute books.
[1246] Hoveden, iv. 33: ‘et ulna sit ferrea.’
[1247] Britton, ii. 189.
[1248] Magna Carta is careful of wine, beer, corn and cloth; not of land.
[1249] Gloucester Corporation Records, ed. Stevenson, p. 80. Near the year
1200 a grant is made of land in Gloucester measuring in breadth 30 feet ‘iuxta
ferratam virgam Regis.’ Ducange, s. v. ulna, gives examples from the
Monasticon. The iron rod was an iron ell. Were standard perches ever made and
distributed? Apparently the only measure of length of which any standard was
made was the ulna or cloth-yard.
[1250] See the apocryphal Statute of Admeasurement, Stat., vol. i. p. 206.
Page 570
[1251] If the jurors had superficial measure in their heads and were stating this
by reference to two straight lines, they would make the length of one of these
lines a constant (e.g. one league or one furlong). This is not done: the space is 6
furlongs in length by 3 in breadth, 14 furlongs in length by 4 in breadth, 9
furlongs and 1 perch in length by 5 furlongs and 2 perches in breadth (instances
from Norfolk) or the like. They are endeavouring to indicate shape as well as
size. See the method of measurement adopted in K. 594 (iii. 129): ‘and ðær ðæt
land unbradest is ðer hit sceol beon eahtatyne fota brad.’
[1252] The league of 12 furlongs has dropped out of modern usage; it is very
prominent in D. B., where miles, though not unknown, are rare.
[1253] Our foot is ·30479 meters. Our perch is very close to 5 meters. Our acre
40·467 ares. A hide of 120 acres would be 48·56 hectares.
[1254] Statutes of the Realm, i. 206: ‘Tres pedes faciunt ulnam.’ Though this
equation gets established, the ulna or cloth-yard seems to start by being an arm’s
length. See the story that Henry I. made his own arm a standard: Will. Malmesb.
Gesta Regum., ii. 487. Britton, i. 189, tells us that the aune contains two cubits
and two thumbs (inches). Our yard seems too long to be a step.
[1255] Second Report of Commissioners for Weights and Measures,
Parliamentary Papers, 1820, Reports, vol. vii.
[1256] As to all this see Meitzen, op. cit. i. 272 fol.
[1257] The ratio 10:1 is not the only one that is well represented in Germany.
The practice of making the acre four rods wide is more universal. As we shall
see below, length must take its chance.
[1258] Morgan, England under the Normans, 19.
[1259] Pollock, E. H. R. xi. 218.
[1260] Morgan, op. cit. 19, citing Monasticon, iv. 421.
by reference to two straight lines, they would make the length of one of these
lines a constant (e.g. one league or one furlong). This is not done: the space is 6
furlongs in length by 3 in breadth, 14 furlongs in length by 4 in breadth, 9
furlongs and 1 perch in length by 5 furlongs and 2 perches in breadth (instances
from Norfolk) or the like. They are endeavouring to indicate shape as well as
size. See the method of measurement adopted in K. 594 (iii. 129): ‘and ðær ðæt
land unbradest is ðer hit sceol beon eahtatyne fota brad.’
[1252] The league of 12 furlongs has dropped out of modern usage; it is very
prominent in D. B., where miles, though not unknown, are rare.
[1253] Our foot is ·30479 meters. Our perch is very close to 5 meters. Our acre
40·467 ares. A hide of 120 acres would be 48·56 hectares.
[1254] Statutes of the Realm, i. 206: ‘Tres pedes faciunt ulnam.’ Though this
equation gets established, the ulna or cloth-yard seems to start by being an arm’s
length. See the story that Henry I. made his own arm a standard: Will. Malmesb.
Gesta Regum., ii. 487. Britton, i. 189, tells us that the aune contains two cubits
and two thumbs (inches). Our yard seems too long to be a step.
[1255] Second Report of Commissioners for Weights and Measures,
Parliamentary Papers, 1820, Reports, vol. vii.
[1256] As to all this see Meitzen, op. cit. i. 272 fol.
[1257] The ratio 10:1 is not the only one that is well represented in Germany.
The practice of making the acre four rods wide is more universal. As we shall
see below, length must take its chance.
[1258] Morgan, England under the Normans, 19.
[1259] Pollock, E. H. R. xi. 218.
[1260] Morgan, op. cit. 19, citing Monasticon, iv. 421.
Page 571
[1261] Second Report of the Commissioners for Weights and Measures,
Parliamentary Papers, 1820, Reports, vol. vii. The information thus obtained
might have been better sifted. When it is said that a certain customary perch
contains 15 feet 1 inch, these feet and inches are statute feet and statute inches.
Probably this perch had exactly 15 ‘customary’ feet. So, again, it is likely that
every ‘customary’ acre contained 160 ‘customary’ perches.
[1262] See below, p. 382.
[1263] Compare Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 560.
[1264] Morgan, op. cit. 22.
[1265] Anonymous Husbandry, see Walter of Henley, ed. Lamond, p. 69.
[1266] K. 296 (ii. 87): 6 virgae in length and 3 in breadth.—K. 339 (ii. 149): 28
roda lang and 24 roda brad.—K. 507 (ii. 397): 12 gerda lang and 9 gerda brad.—
K. 558 (iii. 229): ‘tres perticas’ = ‘þreo gyrda.’—K. 772 (iv. 84): 12 perticae.—
K. 787 (iv. 115): a pertica and a half.—K. 814 (iv. 160): dimidiam virgam et
dimidiam quatrentem.—K. 1103 (v. 199): 75 gyrda.—K. 1141 (v. 275): 6 gyrda.
—K. 1087 (v. 163): 3 furlongs and 3 mete-yards = an unknown quantity + 12
yards + 13 yards + 43 yards and 6 feet + 20 yards and 6 feet + 7 yards and 6 feet
+ 5 yards. This charter is commended to geometers. We see, however, that the
‘yard’ in question is longer than 6 feet; it is connected with our perch, not with
our cloth yard. Schmid, App. XII.: 3 miles, 3 furlongs, 3 acre-breadths, 9 feet, 9
hand-breadths and 9 barley-corns.
[1267] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 554. This virga regalis is set down at 4·70 meters; our
statute perch stands very close to 5 meters.
[1268] Meitzen, op. cit. i. 278.
[1269] Ellis, Introduction, i. 116.
[1270] The use of quarentina for furlong may be due to the Normans.
[1271] Delisle, Études sur la condition de la classe agricole en Normandie, 531–
2.
[1272] We find from D. B. i. 166 that there was a royal sextarius; but (i. 162,
238) other sextarii were in use.
[1273] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 564. Thus in Köln, the Morgen is 31·72 ares, the
Waldmorgen 38·06 ares. In Brunswick the Feldmorgen is 25·02 ares, the
Waldmorgen 33·35 ares. So in Sussex the common acres are small; the forest
acre = 180 (instead of 160) perches. So in Herefordshire the common acre is put
down at two-thirds of the statute acre, but an acre of wood is more than an acre
and a half of statute measure.
[1274] Registr. Honor. Richemund., Ap., p. 11, Agard says: ‘In the Arrentation of
Assarts of Forests made in Henry III.’s and Edward I.’s times, for forest ground
the commissioners let the land per perticam xx. pedum,’ though by this time the
16·5 foot perch was the established royal measure for ordinary purposes. In a
Buckinghamshire Fine levied in John’s reign (Hunter, i. 242) we find acres of
Parliamentary Papers, 1820, Reports, vol. vii. The information thus obtained
might have been better sifted. When it is said that a certain customary perch
contains 15 feet 1 inch, these feet and inches are statute feet and statute inches.
Probably this perch had exactly 15 ‘customary’ feet. So, again, it is likely that
every ‘customary’ acre contained 160 ‘customary’ perches.
[1262] See below, p. 382.
[1263] Compare Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 560.
[1264] Morgan, op. cit. 22.
[1265] Anonymous Husbandry, see Walter of Henley, ed. Lamond, p. 69.
[1266] K. 296 (ii. 87): 6 virgae in length and 3 in breadth.—K. 339 (ii. 149): 28
roda lang and 24 roda brad.—K. 507 (ii. 397): 12 gerda lang and 9 gerda brad.—
K. 558 (iii. 229): ‘tres perticas’ = ‘þreo gyrda.’—K. 772 (iv. 84): 12 perticae.—
K. 787 (iv. 115): a pertica and a half.—K. 814 (iv. 160): dimidiam virgam et
dimidiam quatrentem.—K. 1103 (v. 199): 75 gyrda.—K. 1141 (v. 275): 6 gyrda.
—K. 1087 (v. 163): 3 furlongs and 3 mete-yards = an unknown quantity + 12
yards + 13 yards + 43 yards and 6 feet + 20 yards and 6 feet + 7 yards and 6 feet
+ 5 yards. This charter is commended to geometers. We see, however, that the
‘yard’ in question is longer than 6 feet; it is connected with our perch, not with
our cloth yard. Schmid, App. XII.: 3 miles, 3 furlongs, 3 acre-breadths, 9 feet, 9
hand-breadths and 9 barley-corns.
[1267] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 554. This virga regalis is set down at 4·70 meters; our
statute perch stands very close to 5 meters.
[1268] Meitzen, op. cit. i. 278.
[1269] Ellis, Introduction, i. 116.
[1270] The use of quarentina for furlong may be due to the Normans.
[1271] Delisle, Études sur la condition de la classe agricole en Normandie, 531–
2.
[1272] We find from D. B. i. 166 that there was a royal sextarius; but (i. 162,
238) other sextarii were in use.
[1273] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 564. Thus in Köln, the Morgen is 31·72 ares, the
Waldmorgen 38·06 ares. In Brunswick the Feldmorgen is 25·02 ares, the
Waldmorgen 33·35 ares. So in Sussex the common acres are small; the forest
acre = 180 (instead of 160) perches. So in Herefordshire the common acre is put
down at two-thirds of the statute acre, but an acre of wood is more than an acre
and a half of statute measure.
[1274] Registr. Honor. Richemund., Ap., p. 11, Agard says: ‘In the Arrentation of
Assarts of Forests made in Henry III.’s and Edward I.’s times, for forest ground
the commissioners let the land per perticam xx. pedum,’ though by this time the
16·5 foot perch was the established royal measure for ordinary purposes. In a
Buckinghamshire Fine levied in John’s reign (Hunter, i. 242) we find acres of
Page 572
land which are measured ‘by the lawful perch of the vill,’ while acres of wood
are measured ‘by the perch of the king.’ Ibid. 13, 178: a perch of 20 feet was
being used in the counties of Bedford and Buckingham, though Bedfordshire is
notorious for small acres. The obscure processes that go on in the history of
measures might be illustrated from the report cited above, p. 374, note 1261; the
length of the ‘customary’ perch varies inversely with the difficulty of the work to
be done. In Herefordshire a perch of fencing was 21 feet, a perch of walling
16·5. And so forth.
[1275] Morgan, op. cit. 27, suggests a double goad. The gād of modern
Cambridgeshire has been a stick 9 feet long; but the surveyor put eight into the
acre-breadth, reckoning two of these gāds to the customary pole of 18 feet. See
Pell, in Domesday Studies, i. 276, 296. A rod that is 18 feet long is a clumsy
thing and perhaps for practical purposes it has been cut in half. Meitzen, op. cit.,
i. 90: Two hunting-spears would make a measuring rod. See also Hanssen,
Abhandlungen, ii. 210.
[1276] Seebohm, op. cit. 119. Welsh evidence seems to point this way.
[1277] K. 529 (iii. 4): ‘12 æceras mædwa.’—K. 549 (iii. 33).—K. 683 (iii. 263).
[1278] When Walter of Henley, p. 8, is making his calculations as to the amount
of land that can be ploughed in a day, he assumes that the work will be over a
noune. The ‘by three o’clock’ of his translator is too precise and too late. At
whatever hour nones should have been said, the word noon became our name for
twelve o’clock. See also Seebohm, op. cit. 124.
[1279] Meitzen, op. cit., ii. 565. The rods known in Germany range upwards
from very short South German rods which descend from the Roman pertica to
much longer rods which lie between 4 meters and 5. Our statute perch just
exceeds 5 meters. Then the ordinary (not forest) Morgen rarely approaches 40
ares, while our statute acre is equivalent to 40·46 ares. However, the
Scandinavian Tonne is yet larger and recalls the big acres of northern England.
In France perches of 18 feet were common, and in Normandy yet longer perches
were used, but we do not know that the French acre or journal contained 160
square perches.
[1280] Seebohm, op. cit. 166.
[1281] Seebohm, op. cit. 19.
[1282] Thus e.g. Glastonbury Rentalia, 68: ‘if he has eight oxen he shall plough
every Thursday [during certain seasons] three roods [perticatas].’
[1283] Walter of Henley, 9.
[1284] Tour through the Southern Counties, ed. 3 (1772), pp. 298–301.
[1285] Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 127.
[1286] Walter of Henley, 9.
[1287] Young, View of Agriculture of Oxfordshire, p. 104. In Oxfordshire in the
early years of this century many ploughs with four horses ‘go out for 3 roods,’
after all improvements in ploughs and in horses.
are measured ‘by the perch of the king.’ Ibid. 13, 178: a perch of 20 feet was
being used in the counties of Bedford and Buckingham, though Bedfordshire is
notorious for small acres. The obscure processes that go on in the history of
measures might be illustrated from the report cited above, p. 374, note 1261; the
length of the ‘customary’ perch varies inversely with the difficulty of the work to
be done. In Herefordshire a perch of fencing was 21 feet, a perch of walling
16·5. And so forth.
[1275] Morgan, op. cit. 27, suggests a double goad. The gād of modern
Cambridgeshire has been a stick 9 feet long; but the surveyor put eight into the
acre-breadth, reckoning two of these gāds to the customary pole of 18 feet. See
Pell, in Domesday Studies, i. 276, 296. A rod that is 18 feet long is a clumsy
thing and perhaps for practical purposes it has been cut in half. Meitzen, op. cit.,
i. 90: Two hunting-spears would make a measuring rod. See also Hanssen,
Abhandlungen, ii. 210.
[1276] Seebohm, op. cit. 119. Welsh evidence seems to point this way.
[1277] K. 529 (iii. 4): ‘12 æceras mædwa.’—K. 549 (iii. 33).—K. 683 (iii. 263).
[1278] When Walter of Henley, p. 8, is making his calculations as to the amount
of land that can be ploughed in a day, he assumes that the work will be over a
noune. The ‘by three o’clock’ of his translator is too precise and too late. At
whatever hour nones should have been said, the word noon became our name for
twelve o’clock. See also Seebohm, op. cit. 124.
[1279] Meitzen, op. cit., ii. 565. The rods known in Germany range upwards
from very short South German rods which descend from the Roman pertica to
much longer rods which lie between 4 meters and 5. Our statute perch just
exceeds 5 meters. Then the ordinary (not forest) Morgen rarely approaches 40
ares, while our statute acre is equivalent to 40·46 ares. However, the
Scandinavian Tonne is yet larger and recalls the big acres of northern England.
In France perches of 18 feet were common, and in Normandy yet longer perches
were used, but we do not know that the French acre or journal contained 160
square perches.
[1280] Seebohm, op. cit. 166.
[1281] Seebohm, op. cit. 19.
[1282] Thus e.g. Glastonbury Rentalia, 68: ‘if he has eight oxen he shall plough
every Thursday [during certain seasons] three roods [perticatas].’
[1283] Walter of Henley, 9.
[1284] Tour through the Southern Counties, ed. 3 (1772), pp. 298–301.
[1285] Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 127.
[1286] Walter of Henley, 9.
[1287] Young, View of Agriculture of Oxfordshire, p. 104. In Oxfordshire in the
early years of this century many ploughs with four horses ‘go out for 3 roods,’
after all improvements in ploughs and in horses.
Page 573
[1288] Meitzen, op. cit. 88. Dr Taylor in Domesday Studies, i. 61, gives a
somewhat different explanation. The ploughman walked backwards in front of
the beasts, and, when near the end of the furrow, used his right arm to pull them
round.
[1289] Among the land-books those that most clearly indicate the intermixture of
strips are K. 538 (iii. 19),—648 (iii. 210),—692 (iii. 290),—1158 (v. 310),—
1169 (v. 326),—1234 (vi. 39),—1240 (vi. 51),—1276 (vi. 108),—1278 (vi. 111).
[1290] As to the names of culturæ the Ramsey Cartulary may be profitably
consulted. Such names as Horsepelfurlange, Wodefurlonge, Benefurlange,
Stapelfurlange (i. 307), Mikellefurlange (321), Stanweyfurlange, Longefurlange
(331) are common. We meet also with -wong: Redewonge (321), Langiwange,
Stoniwonge, Schortewonge, Semareswonge (341–2). Also with -leuge
(apparently O. E. léah, gen. dat. léage): Wolnothesleuge, Edriches Leuge. Often
the cultura is known as the Five (Ten, Twenty) Acres. Sometimes in Latin this
sense of furlong is rendered by quarentina: ‘unam rodam in quarentina de
Newedich’: Fines, ed. Hunter, i. 42.
[1291] Glastonbury Rentalia, 180, 195, 208.
[1292] Sixteen Old Maps: Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1888.
[1293] The rod, however, must have been very short; perhaps it had as few as 12
feet.
[1294] For many reasons this must not be taken as a typical map. We refer to it
merely as showing the relation of ‘estimated’ (that is of ‘real’) acres to an acre-
measure.
[1295] Instructive evidence about this matter was given in a Chancery suit of
James I.’s reign. The deponent speaking of the fen round Ely says ‘it is the use
and custom ... to measure the fen grounds by four poles in breadth for an acre,
by a pole of 18 feet ... and in length for an acre of the said grounds as it
happeneth, according to the length of the furlong of the same fens, which is
sometimes shorter and sometimes longer.’ Quoted by O. C. Pell in Domesday
Studies, i. 296.
[1296] For an explanation of this mode of ploughing, see Meitzen, op. cit. 84.
[1297] Meitzen gives 6 feet as a usual width for the beds in Germany. I think
that in cent. xiii. our selions were usually wider than this.
[1298] The Gloucester Corporation Records, ed. Stevenson (1893), should be
consulted. When small pieces of land were being conveyed, the selions were
often enumerated. Thus (p. 124): ‘and 13 acres of arable land ... whereof one
acre lies upon þistelege near Durand’s land ... an acre and a half being three
selions ... half an acre being two selions ... an acre of five selions ... an acre
being one selion and a gore ... four selions and two little gores ... an acre being
three selions and a head-land.’ In Mr Seebohm’s admirable account of the open
fields there seems to me to be some confusion between the selions and the acre
or half-acre strips.
[1299] On Mr Mowat’s map of Roxton a quarter-acre strip is a yeard.
somewhat different explanation. The ploughman walked backwards in front of
the beasts, and, when near the end of the furrow, used his right arm to pull them
round.
[1289] Among the land-books those that most clearly indicate the intermixture of
strips are K. 538 (iii. 19),—648 (iii. 210),—692 (iii. 290),—1158 (v. 310),—
1169 (v. 326),—1234 (vi. 39),—1240 (vi. 51),—1276 (vi. 108),—1278 (vi. 111).
[1290] As to the names of culturæ the Ramsey Cartulary may be profitably
consulted. Such names as Horsepelfurlange, Wodefurlonge, Benefurlange,
Stapelfurlange (i. 307), Mikellefurlange (321), Stanweyfurlange, Longefurlange
(331) are common. We meet also with -wong: Redewonge (321), Langiwange,
Stoniwonge, Schortewonge, Semareswonge (341–2). Also with -leuge
(apparently O. E. léah, gen. dat. léage): Wolnothesleuge, Edriches Leuge. Often
the cultura is known as the Five (Ten, Twenty) Acres. Sometimes in Latin this
sense of furlong is rendered by quarentina: ‘unam rodam in quarentina de
Newedich’: Fines, ed. Hunter, i. 42.
[1291] Glastonbury Rentalia, 180, 195, 208.
[1292] Sixteen Old Maps: Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1888.
[1293] The rod, however, must have been very short; perhaps it had as few as 12
feet.
[1294] For many reasons this must not be taken as a typical map. We refer to it
merely as showing the relation of ‘estimated’ (that is of ‘real’) acres to an acre-
measure.
[1295] Instructive evidence about this matter was given in a Chancery suit of
James I.’s reign. The deponent speaking of the fen round Ely says ‘it is the use
and custom ... to measure the fen grounds by four poles in breadth for an acre,
by a pole of 18 feet ... and in length for an acre of the said grounds as it
happeneth, according to the length of the furlong of the same fens, which is
sometimes shorter and sometimes longer.’ Quoted by O. C. Pell in Domesday
Studies, i. 296.
[1296] For an explanation of this mode of ploughing, see Meitzen, op. cit. 84.
[1297] Meitzen gives 6 feet as a usual width for the beds in Germany. I think
that in cent. xiii. our selions were usually wider than this.
[1298] The Gloucester Corporation Records, ed. Stevenson (1893), should be
consulted. When small pieces of land were being conveyed, the selions were
often enumerated. Thus (p. 124): ‘and 13 acres of arable land ... whereof one
acre lies upon þistelege near Durand’s land ... an acre and a half being three
selions ... half an acre being two selions ... an acre of five selions ... an acre
being one selion and a gore ... four selions and two little gores ... an acre being
three selions and a head-land.’ In Mr Seebohm’s admirable account of the open
fields there seems to me to be some confusion between the selions and the acre
or half-acre strips.
[1299] On Mr Mowat’s map of Roxton a quarter-acre strip is a yeard.
Page 574
[1300] D. B. i. 364: ‘In Staintone habuit Jalf 5 bovatas terrae et 14 acras terrae et
1 virgatam ad geldum.’ This virgate is a quarter-acre. The continuous use of
virgata in this sense is attested by Glastonbury Rentalia, 27. So in Normandy:
Delisle, Études sur la condition de la classe agricole, 535. So in France:
Ducange, s. v. virgata from a Register of the Chamber of Accounts:
‘Quadraginta perticae faciunt virgatam: quatuor virgatae faciunt acram.’
Meitzen, op. cit. i. 95: in Kalenberg a strip that is one rod in breadth is called a
Gert (our yard).
[1301] In the Exeter Domesday virga not virgata is the common word. In the
Exchequer book an abbreviated form is used; but virga appears in i. 216 b.
[1302] So again, if a iugum is quartered, its quarter can be called a virgate. See
Denman Ross, Hist. of Landholding, 140; Round, Feudal England, 108.
[1303] See above, p. 372.
[1304] K. 205 (i. 259): ‘circiter 30 iugera.’—K. 217 (i. 274): ‘30 iugera.’—K.
225 (i. 290): ‘hoc est 30 iugerum’ ... ‘hoc est 85 segetum.’—K. 234 (i. 308):
‘150 iugera.’—K. 241 (ii. 1): ‘24 iugeras.’—K. 259 (ii. 26): ‘19 iugera.’—K 264
(ii. 36): ‘unum dimidium agrum ... healve aker.’—K. 276 (ii. 57): ‘10 iugera.’—
K. 285 (ii. 70): ‘80 æcra.’—K. 339 (ii. 150): ‘sextig æcera earðlondes ... oðer
sextig.’—K. 586 (iii. 118): ‘30 æcra on ðæm twæm feldan.’—K. 612 (iii. 159):
‘2 hida buton 60 æcran.’—K. 633 (iii. 188): ‘3 mansas ac 30 iugerum
dimensionem.’—K. 695 (iii. 295): ‘40 agros.’—K. 759 (iv. 59): ‘30 akera.’—K.
782 (iv. 106): ‘fiftig æcera.’—K. 1154 (v. 303): ‘36 ækera yrðlandes.’—K. 1161
(v. 315): ‘ter duodenas segetes’ = ‘36 æcera yrðlandes.’—K. 1211 (v. 393): ‘25
segetes.’—K. 1218 (vi. 1): ‘14 hida and ... 40 æcera.’
[1305] Probably it occurs in Ine 67; certainly in Rectitudines 4, § 3, and in the
late document about Tidenham (above, p. 330).—K. 369 (ii. 205): Boundary of a
gyrd at Ashurst which belongs to a hide at Topsham (A.D. 937).—K. 521 (ii.
418): Edgar grants ‘tres virgas.’—K. 658 (iii. 229): Æthelred grants ‘3 mansas et
3 perticas.’—K. 1306 (vi. 163): Æthelred grants land ‘trium sub aestimatione
perticarum.’—K. 772 (iv. 84): Edward Conf. grants ‘5 perticas.’—K. 787 (iv.
115): He grants ‘unam perticam et dimidiam.’—K. 814 (iv. 160): He grants
‘dimidiam virgam et dimidiam quatrentem.’—Crawford Charters, 5, 9, mortgage
in 1018 of a yard of land.—K. 949 (iv. 284); 979 (iv. 307): two other examples
from the eve of the Conquest.—It is more likely that these ‘yards’ and ‘perches’
of land are quarter-hides than that they are quarter-acres; ‘square’ perches seem
to be out of the question. There are of course many instances in the charters of a
pertica, virga, gyrd used as a measure of mere length. See above, p. 375, note
1266, where a few are cited.
[1306] Meitzen, op. cit. 74. In Germany the Hufe, hoba, huoba, huba, etc. is the
unit. This word is said to be connected with the modern German Behuf, our
behoof; it is the sors, the portion that behoves a man. In Sweden, the unit is the
Mantal, a man’s share. The last word about the tenmannetale of Yorkshire has
not been said.
[1307] K. 633 (iii. 188).
1 virgatam ad geldum.’ This virgate is a quarter-acre. The continuous use of
virgata in this sense is attested by Glastonbury Rentalia, 27. So in Normandy:
Delisle, Études sur la condition de la classe agricole, 535. So in France:
Ducange, s. v. virgata from a Register of the Chamber of Accounts:
‘Quadraginta perticae faciunt virgatam: quatuor virgatae faciunt acram.’
Meitzen, op. cit. i. 95: in Kalenberg a strip that is one rod in breadth is called a
Gert (our yard).
[1301] In the Exeter Domesday virga not virgata is the common word. In the
Exchequer book an abbreviated form is used; but virga appears in i. 216 b.
[1302] So again, if a iugum is quartered, its quarter can be called a virgate. See
Denman Ross, Hist. of Landholding, 140; Round, Feudal England, 108.
[1303] See above, p. 372.
[1304] K. 205 (i. 259): ‘circiter 30 iugera.’—K. 217 (i. 274): ‘30 iugera.’—K.
225 (i. 290): ‘hoc est 30 iugerum’ ... ‘hoc est 85 segetum.’—K. 234 (i. 308):
‘150 iugera.’—K. 241 (ii. 1): ‘24 iugeras.’—K. 259 (ii. 26): ‘19 iugera.’—K 264
(ii. 36): ‘unum dimidium agrum ... healve aker.’—K. 276 (ii. 57): ‘10 iugera.’—
K. 285 (ii. 70): ‘80 æcra.’—K. 339 (ii. 150): ‘sextig æcera earðlondes ... oðer
sextig.’—K. 586 (iii. 118): ‘30 æcra on ðæm twæm feldan.’—K. 612 (iii. 159):
‘2 hida buton 60 æcran.’—K. 633 (iii. 188): ‘3 mansas ac 30 iugerum
dimensionem.’—K. 695 (iii. 295): ‘40 agros.’—K. 759 (iv. 59): ‘30 akera.’—K.
782 (iv. 106): ‘fiftig æcera.’—K. 1154 (v. 303): ‘36 ækera yrðlandes.’—K. 1161
(v. 315): ‘ter duodenas segetes’ = ‘36 æcera yrðlandes.’—K. 1211 (v. 393): ‘25
segetes.’—K. 1218 (vi. 1): ‘14 hida and ... 40 æcera.’
[1305] Probably it occurs in Ine 67; certainly in Rectitudines 4, § 3, and in the
late document about Tidenham (above, p. 330).—K. 369 (ii. 205): Boundary of a
gyrd at Ashurst which belongs to a hide at Topsham (A.D. 937).—K. 521 (ii.
418): Edgar grants ‘tres virgas.’—K. 658 (iii. 229): Æthelred grants ‘3 mansas et
3 perticas.’—K. 1306 (vi. 163): Æthelred grants land ‘trium sub aestimatione
perticarum.’—K. 772 (iv. 84): Edward Conf. grants ‘5 perticas.’—K. 787 (iv.
115): He grants ‘unam perticam et dimidiam.’—K. 814 (iv. 160): He grants
‘dimidiam virgam et dimidiam quatrentem.’—Crawford Charters, 5, 9, mortgage
in 1018 of a yard of land.—K. 949 (iv. 284); 979 (iv. 307): two other examples
from the eve of the Conquest.—It is more likely that these ‘yards’ and ‘perches’
of land are quarter-hides than that they are quarter-acres; ‘square’ perches seem
to be out of the question. There are of course many instances in the charters of a
pertica, virga, gyrd used as a measure of mere length. See above, p. 375, note
1266, where a few are cited.
[1306] Meitzen, op. cit. 74. In Germany the Hufe, hoba, huoba, huba, etc. is the
unit. This word is said to be connected with the modern German Behuf, our
behoof; it is the sors, the portion that behoves a man. In Sweden, the unit is the
Mantal, a man’s share. The last word about the tenmannetale of Yorkshire has
not been said.
[1307] K. 633 (iii. 188).
Page 575
[1308] K. 612 (iii. 159): ‘landes sumne dæl, ðæt synd 2 hida, buton 60 æcran
ðæt hæft se arcebisceop genumen into Cymesige to his hame him to
hwætelande.’
[1309] Rot. Hund. ii. 575. After going through the whole calculation, I have
satisfied myself that the sum is worked in this way.
[1310] Hence in our law Latin the word terra means arable land. To claim unam
acram terrae when you meant an acre of meadow (prati) would have been a
fatal error.
[1311] K. 1222 (vi. 12); T. 508: ‘And ic Æðelgar an an hide lond ðes ðe Æulf
hauede be hundtuelti acren, ateo so he wille.’ Kemble, Saxons, 117.
[1312] See above, p. 386, note 1304.
[1313] There can be little need of examples. Glastonbury Rentalia, 152: ‘S. tenet
unam virgatam terrae et dimidiam, quae computantur pro una virgata.’ Ibid. p.
160: ‘H. tenet unam virgatam et 5 acras, quae omnia computantur pro una
virgata.’ Worcester Register, 62: A virgate consists of 13 acres in one field and
121⁄2 in the other; the next virgate of 16 acres in one field and 12 in the other. In
other cases the numbers are 16 and 14; 145⁄8 and 11; 13 and 121⁄2; 14 and 11;
143⁄4 and 111⁄4. Yet every virgate is a virgate.
[1314] At the date of Domesday we are a long way from the first danegeld and a
very long way from any settlement of Cambridgeshire; still if we analyze a
symmetrical hundred, such as Armingford, we shall find that the average ten-
hide vill is just about twice as rich as the average five-hide vill in men, in teams
and in annual valet, though there will be some wide aberrations from this norm.
[1315] See above, p. 336, note 1160.
[1316] See above, p. 237.
[1317] This is proved by ‘The Burghal Hidage’ of which we spoke above, p.
187, and shall speak again hereafter.
[1318] See the Gerefa published by Dr Liebermann in Anglia, ix. 251. Andrews,
Old English Manor, 246.
[1319] The manner in which the old hides have really fallen to pieces but are
preserving a notional existence is well illustrated by Domesday of St. Paul’s, 41–
47. In one case a hide forms nine tenements containing respectively 30, 30, 15,
15, 5, 5, 71⁄2, 5, 71⁄2 acres. See Vinogradoff, Villainage, 249.
[1320] Vinogradoff, Villainage, 242; Maitland, History of an English Manor,
Eng. Hist. Rev. ix. 418.
[1321] See Pell, in Domesday Studies, i. 357. Almost at one and the same
moment, but in two different ‘extents,’ the same tenements are being described
as containing 15 and as containing 18 acres. Domesday of St. Paul’s, 69: ‘In this
manor the hide contains 120 acres; the old inquest said that it used not to contain
more than 80; but afterwards the lands were sought out and measured (exquisitae
sunt terrae et mensuratae).’
ðæt hæft se arcebisceop genumen into Cymesige to his hame him to
hwætelande.’
[1309] Rot. Hund. ii. 575. After going through the whole calculation, I have
satisfied myself that the sum is worked in this way.
[1310] Hence in our law Latin the word terra means arable land. To claim unam
acram terrae when you meant an acre of meadow (prati) would have been a
fatal error.
[1311] K. 1222 (vi. 12); T. 508: ‘And ic Æðelgar an an hide lond ðes ðe Æulf
hauede be hundtuelti acren, ateo so he wille.’ Kemble, Saxons, 117.
[1312] See above, p. 386, note 1304.
[1313] There can be little need of examples. Glastonbury Rentalia, 152: ‘S. tenet
unam virgatam terrae et dimidiam, quae computantur pro una virgata.’ Ibid. p.
160: ‘H. tenet unam virgatam et 5 acras, quae omnia computantur pro una
virgata.’ Worcester Register, 62: A virgate consists of 13 acres in one field and
121⁄2 in the other; the next virgate of 16 acres in one field and 12 in the other. In
other cases the numbers are 16 and 14; 145⁄8 and 11; 13 and 121⁄2; 14 and 11;
143⁄4 and 111⁄4. Yet every virgate is a virgate.
[1314] At the date of Domesday we are a long way from the first danegeld and a
very long way from any settlement of Cambridgeshire; still if we analyze a
symmetrical hundred, such as Armingford, we shall find that the average ten-
hide vill is just about twice as rich as the average five-hide vill in men, in teams
and in annual valet, though there will be some wide aberrations from this norm.
[1315] See above, p. 336, note 1160.
[1316] See above, p. 237.
[1317] This is proved by ‘The Burghal Hidage’ of which we spoke above, p.
187, and shall speak again hereafter.
[1318] See the Gerefa published by Dr Liebermann in Anglia, ix. 251. Andrews,
Old English Manor, 246.
[1319] The manner in which the old hides have really fallen to pieces but are
preserving a notional existence is well illustrated by Domesday of St. Paul’s, 41–
47. In one case a hide forms nine tenements containing respectively 30, 30, 15,
15, 5, 5, 71⁄2, 5, 71⁄2 acres. See Vinogradoff, Villainage, 249.
[1320] Vinogradoff, Villainage, 242; Maitland, History of an English Manor,
Eng. Hist. Rev. ix. 418.
[1321] See Pell, in Domesday Studies, i. 357. Almost at one and the same
moment, but in two different ‘extents,’ the same tenements are being described
as containing 15 and as containing 18 acres. Domesday of St. Paul’s, 69: ‘In this
manor the hide contains 120 acres; the old inquest said that it used not to contain
more than 80; but afterwards the lands were sought out and measured (exquisitae
sunt terrae et mensuratae).’
Page 576
[1322] Cart. Rams. iii. 208. See also the table given by Seebohm, op. cit. 37.
[1323] A ‘double hide’ of 240 acres plays a part in Mr Seebohm’s speculations.
His instances of it hardly bear examination. On p. 37 he produces from Rot.
Hund. ii. 629 the equation 1 H.=6 V. of 40 A. apiece. This apparently refers to
the Ramsey manor of Brington; but Cart. Rams. ii. 43 gives 1 H.=4 V. of 40 A.,
while Cart. Rams. iii. 209 gives 1 H.=4 V. of 34 A. Then Mr Seebohm, p. 51,
cites from ‘the documents of Battle Abbey given by Dugdale’ the equation 1
H.=8 V.; but this seems to refer to the statement now printed in the Battle
Cartulary (Camd. Soc.) p. xiii., where 1 H.=4 V. As to the supposed solanda of
two hides, see Round, Feudal England, 103.
[1324] The virgates on the Gloucestershire manors of Gloucester Abbey contain
the following numbers of acres: 36, 40, 36, 38, 48, 48, 48, 48, 50, 48, 40, 64, 64,
64, 48, 50, 60, 48, 48, 64, 18 (?), 44, 80, 48, 48, 72. See Gloucester Cartulary,
vol. iii. Of the taxation and wealth of the various counties we shall speak
hereafter.
[1325] Napier and Stevenson, Crawford Charters, p. 47: The O. E. sulh (plough)
is ‘cognate with Lat. sulcus.’
[1326] Both terms were in use in Normandy and some other parts of France:
Delisle, Études, 538; also Ducange. In a would-be English charter of the days
before the Conquest these words would be ground for suspicion. In K. 283 and
455 Kemble has printed (in documents which he stigmatizes) caractorum. But
apparently (see B. ii. 104, iii. 94) what stands in the cartulary is carattorum, and
this seems a mistake for the common casatorum. To mistake O. E. s for r is easy.
[1327] See Stevenson, E. H. R. v. 143.
[1328] In D. B. the iugum appears as a portion of a solin; probably as a quarter
of the solin. D. B. i. 13: ‘pro uno solin se defendit. Tria iuga sunt infra
divisionem Hugonis et quartum iugum est extra.’ The iugum has already
appeared in a few Kentish land-books. In K. 199 (i. 249), B. i. 476, we find an
ioclet which seems to be half a manse (mansiuncula). In K. 407 (iii. 262), B. ii.
572, we find ‘an iuclæte et insuper 10 segetes (acres).’
[1329] D. B. ii. 389: ‘In Cratingas 24 liberi homines 1 carr. terrae et 1 virg.’
[1330] Yorkshire Inquisitions (Yorks. Archæeol. Soc.) passim. On p. 77 in an
account of Catterick we read of ‘a capital messuage worth 5s.; 32 bovates of
arable land in demesne (each bovate of 6 acres at 8s.) £12. 16s.; 311⁄2 bovates
held by bondmen (each bovate of 10 acres at 13s. 4d.) £21; ... 2 bovates which
contain 24 acres and 32 acres called Inland worth 74s. 8d.’
[1331] See above, p. 375.
[1332] A bovate of 13 acres seems to have prevailed in Scotland: Acts of
Parliament of Scotland, i. 387.
[1333] The immediate source is the Seneschaucie. See Walter of Henley, ed.
Lamond, p. 84. Fleta, p. 159.
[1323] A ‘double hide’ of 240 acres plays a part in Mr Seebohm’s speculations.
His instances of it hardly bear examination. On p. 37 he produces from Rot.
Hund. ii. 629 the equation 1 H.=6 V. of 40 A. apiece. This apparently refers to
the Ramsey manor of Brington; but Cart. Rams. ii. 43 gives 1 H.=4 V. of 40 A.,
while Cart. Rams. iii. 209 gives 1 H.=4 V. of 34 A. Then Mr Seebohm, p. 51,
cites from ‘the documents of Battle Abbey given by Dugdale’ the equation 1
H.=8 V.; but this seems to refer to the statement now printed in the Battle
Cartulary (Camd. Soc.) p. xiii., where 1 H.=4 V. As to the supposed solanda of
two hides, see Round, Feudal England, 103.
[1324] The virgates on the Gloucestershire manors of Gloucester Abbey contain
the following numbers of acres: 36, 40, 36, 38, 48, 48, 48, 48, 50, 48, 40, 64, 64,
64, 48, 50, 60, 48, 48, 64, 18 (?), 44, 80, 48, 48, 72. See Gloucester Cartulary,
vol. iii. Of the taxation and wealth of the various counties we shall speak
hereafter.
[1325] Napier and Stevenson, Crawford Charters, p. 47: The O. E. sulh (plough)
is ‘cognate with Lat. sulcus.’
[1326] Both terms were in use in Normandy and some other parts of France:
Delisle, Études, 538; also Ducange. In a would-be English charter of the days
before the Conquest these words would be ground for suspicion. In K. 283 and
455 Kemble has printed (in documents which he stigmatizes) caractorum. But
apparently (see B. ii. 104, iii. 94) what stands in the cartulary is carattorum, and
this seems a mistake for the common casatorum. To mistake O. E. s for r is easy.
[1327] See Stevenson, E. H. R. v. 143.
[1328] In D. B. the iugum appears as a portion of a solin; probably as a quarter
of the solin. D. B. i. 13: ‘pro uno solin se defendit. Tria iuga sunt infra
divisionem Hugonis et quartum iugum est extra.’ The iugum has already
appeared in a few Kentish land-books. In K. 199 (i. 249), B. i. 476, we find an
ioclet which seems to be half a manse (mansiuncula). In K. 407 (iii. 262), B. ii.
572, we find ‘an iuclæte et insuper 10 segetes (acres).’
[1329] D. B. ii. 389: ‘In Cratingas 24 liberi homines 1 carr. terrae et 1 virg.’
[1330] Yorkshire Inquisitions (Yorks. Archæeol. Soc.) passim. On p. 77 in an
account of Catterick we read of ‘a capital messuage worth 5s.; 32 bovates of
arable land in demesne (each bovate of 6 acres at 8s.) £12. 16s.; 311⁄2 bovates
held by bondmen (each bovate of 10 acres at 13s. 4d.) £21; ... 2 bovates which
contain 24 acres and 32 acres called Inland worth 74s. 8d.’
[1331] See above, p. 375.
[1332] A bovate of 13 acres seems to have prevailed in Scotland: Acts of
Parliament of Scotland, i. 387.
[1333] The immediate source is the Seneschaucie. See Walter of Henley, ed.
Lamond, p. 84. Fleta, p. 159.
Page 577
[1334] Walter of Henley, pp. 6, 8, 44–5. With a three-course system the figures
will be somewhat different. Plough 60 acres for winter seed, 60 for spring seed,
60 for fallow (total 180) at the rate of 7/8th of an acre per day:—Total, 2051⁄7
days. In second fallowing plough 60 acres at an acre per day:—Grand total,
2655⁄7 days. Whichever system is adopted, the plough ‘goes’ 240 acres.
[1335] Walter of Henley, p. 13.
[1336] Domesday of St. Paul’s, 38.
[1337] Meitzen, op. cit. i. 277; Andrews, op. cit. 260.
[1338] Gerefa, 9 (Anglia, ix. 261): ‘Me mæig in Maio and Junio and Julio on
sumera fealgian.’ Andrews, op. cit. 257.
[1339] Thus e.g. Domesday of St. Paul’s, 59, Tillingham. Is it possible to fallow,
when, as in this case, there is no pasture for the oxen except such as is afforded
by the idle field? ‘Non est ibi pastura nisi cum quiescit dominicum per
wainagium.... (69) Non est ibi certa pastura nisi quando terrae dominici
quiescunt alternatim incultae.’
[1340] D. B. i. 307 b, 308.
[1341] It will be convenient for us to adopt this term a ‘teamland’ as an
equivalent for the Terra ad unam carucam of our record, so that ‘b teamlands’
shall translate Terra ad b carucas. The reader is asked to accept this note as an
‘interpretation clause.’
[1342] D. B. i. 353.
[1343] D. B. i. 308, Trectone.
[1344] D. B. i. 275 b, Burnulfestune.
[1345] D. B. i 337 b.
[1346] See pp. 400–403.
[1347] We shall not complain of our tools; but Domesday Book is certainly not
impeccable. As to its omissions see Eyton, Notes on Domesday (1880); also
Round, Feudal England, 43.
[1348] Agricultural Returns, 1895 (Board of Agriculture) p. 34. Tidal water is
excluded.
[1349] The received figures are: Middlesex, 149,046, London, 75,442. From
older sources we give Middlesex, 180,480: Population Abstract, 1833, vol. i. p.
376.
[1350] For some good remarks on these matters see Eyton, Notes on Domesday.
Lincoln, Nottingham and Northampton would require correction because of the
treatment that Rutland has received. The boundary of Shropshire has undergone
changes. The inclusion of stretches of Welsh ground increases the population
without adding to the hidage of some western counties.
[1351] See above, p. 7.
will be somewhat different. Plough 60 acres for winter seed, 60 for spring seed,
60 for fallow (total 180) at the rate of 7/8th of an acre per day:—Total, 2051⁄7
days. In second fallowing plough 60 acres at an acre per day:—Grand total,
2655⁄7 days. Whichever system is adopted, the plough ‘goes’ 240 acres.
[1335] Walter of Henley, p. 13.
[1336] Domesday of St. Paul’s, 38.
[1337] Meitzen, op. cit. i. 277; Andrews, op. cit. 260.
[1338] Gerefa, 9 (Anglia, ix. 261): ‘Me mæig in Maio and Junio and Julio on
sumera fealgian.’ Andrews, op. cit. 257.
[1339] Thus e.g. Domesday of St. Paul’s, 59, Tillingham. Is it possible to fallow,
when, as in this case, there is no pasture for the oxen except such as is afforded
by the idle field? ‘Non est ibi pastura nisi cum quiescit dominicum per
wainagium.... (69) Non est ibi certa pastura nisi quando terrae dominici
quiescunt alternatim incultae.’
[1340] D. B. i. 307 b, 308.
[1341] It will be convenient for us to adopt this term a ‘teamland’ as an
equivalent for the Terra ad unam carucam of our record, so that ‘b teamlands’
shall translate Terra ad b carucas. The reader is asked to accept this note as an
‘interpretation clause.’
[1342] D. B. i. 353.
[1343] D. B. i. 308, Trectone.
[1344] D. B. i. 275 b, Burnulfestune.
[1345] D. B. i 337 b.
[1346] See pp. 400–403.
[1347] We shall not complain of our tools; but Domesday Book is certainly not
impeccable. As to its omissions see Eyton, Notes on Domesday (1880); also
Round, Feudal England, 43.
[1348] Agricultural Returns, 1895 (Board of Agriculture) p. 34. Tidal water is
excluded.
[1349] The received figures are: Middlesex, 149,046, London, 75,442. From
older sources we give Middlesex, 180,480: Population Abstract, 1833, vol. i. p.
376.
[1350] For some good remarks on these matters see Eyton, Notes on Domesday.
Lincoln, Nottingham and Northampton would require correction because of the
treatment that Rutland has received. The boundary of Shropshire has undergone
changes. The inclusion of stretches of Welsh ground increases the population
without adding to the hidage of some western counties.
[1351] See above, p. 7.
Page 578
[1352] Thus Leicester is charged with £100. 0s. 0d., with £99. 19s. 11d. and with
£99. 19s. 4d.
[1353] In 8 Hen. II. several of the counties answer for about £10 less than had
formerly been demanded from them.
[1354] The inclusion of the boroughs would have led to many difficulties.
London, for example, though no account is taken of it in D. B., seems to have
gelded for 1200 hides. (Brit. Mus. MS. Add. 14,252, f. 126.)
[1355] We omit the ‘ingeldable carucates’ which occur in some hidated counties.
This may introduce a little caprice. If the jurors in one of these counties ascribe
twelve carucates to a manor, we do not count them. If they had spoken of hides
which never gelded, we should have counted them; and yet we may agree with
Eyton that the two phrases would mean much the same thing. But this source of
error or caprice is not very important in our present context. Thus we take
Dorset. Eyton gives it 2321 hides and then by adding ‘quasi-hides’ brings up the
number to 2650. The difference between these two figures is not large when
regarded from the point that we are occupying. I have thought that the difficulty
would be better met by the warning that Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset and Devon
contain considerable stretches of unhidated royal demesne, than by my
reckoning as hides what Eyton called ‘quasi-hides.’ In the case of Dorset,
Somerset and Stafford I have placed Eyton’s figures below my own and signed
them with the letter E. I know full well that his are much more accurate than
mine. He probably gave to each county that he examined more months than I
have given weeks to the whole of England. In comparing our results, it should be
remembered that, at least in Staffordshire, he dealt with the county boundary in a
manner which, in my ignorance, I dare not adopt.
[1356] My calculations about Leicestershire are more than usually rough, owing
to the appearance of the curious ‘hide’ or ‘hundred’ or whatever it is. See on the
one hand Stevenson, E. H. R. v. 95, and on the other Round, Feudal England, 82.
Whether this unit contained 12 or 18 carucates is not of very great importance to
us at the moment. But there are other difficulties in Leicestershire. In Cornwall I
was compelled to make an assumption as to the peculiar ager or acra of that
county; but no reasonable theory about this matter would seriously affect the
number of Cornwall’s hides.
[1357] The usual formula is: ‘Tunc se defendit pro a hidis, modo pro a´.’ We
place a in Col. IV., a´ in Col. V.
[1358] The usual formula is: ‘T. R. E. geldabat pro a hidis; ibi tamen sunt a´
hidae.’ We place a in Col. IV. and a´ in Col. V.; and we shall argue hereafter,
with some hesitation, that the taxation of this county has been increased under
William.
[1359] The words Terra est are written and are followed by a blank space. Many
instances in Kent and Sussex.
[1360] On the other hand, when I find a statement about B and none about C, I
do not assume that C = B; on the contrary, I read the entry to mean that C = 0. In
other words, it is very possible that there should be teamlands without teams; but
I do not think that for Domesday’s purposes there can be teams (i.e. teams at
£99. 19s. 4d.
[1353] In 8 Hen. II. several of the counties answer for about £10 less than had
formerly been demanded from them.
[1354] The inclusion of the boroughs would have led to many difficulties.
London, for example, though no account is taken of it in D. B., seems to have
gelded for 1200 hides. (Brit. Mus. MS. Add. 14,252, f. 126.)
[1355] We omit the ‘ingeldable carucates’ which occur in some hidated counties.
This may introduce a little caprice. If the jurors in one of these counties ascribe
twelve carucates to a manor, we do not count them. If they had spoken of hides
which never gelded, we should have counted them; and yet we may agree with
Eyton that the two phrases would mean much the same thing. But this source of
error or caprice is not very important in our present context. Thus we take
Dorset. Eyton gives it 2321 hides and then by adding ‘quasi-hides’ brings up the
number to 2650. The difference between these two figures is not large when
regarded from the point that we are occupying. I have thought that the difficulty
would be better met by the warning that Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset and Devon
contain considerable stretches of unhidated royal demesne, than by my
reckoning as hides what Eyton called ‘quasi-hides.’ In the case of Dorset,
Somerset and Stafford I have placed Eyton’s figures below my own and signed
them with the letter E. I know full well that his are much more accurate than
mine. He probably gave to each county that he examined more months than I
have given weeks to the whole of England. In comparing our results, it should be
remembered that, at least in Staffordshire, he dealt with the county boundary in a
manner which, in my ignorance, I dare not adopt.
[1356] My calculations about Leicestershire are more than usually rough, owing
to the appearance of the curious ‘hide’ or ‘hundred’ or whatever it is. See on the
one hand Stevenson, E. H. R. v. 95, and on the other Round, Feudal England, 82.
Whether this unit contained 12 or 18 carucates is not of very great importance to
us at the moment. But there are other difficulties in Leicestershire. In Cornwall I
was compelled to make an assumption as to the peculiar ager or acra of that
county; but no reasonable theory about this matter would seriously affect the
number of Cornwall’s hides.
[1357] The usual formula is: ‘Tunc se defendit pro a hidis, modo pro a´.’ We
place a in Col. IV., a´ in Col. V.
[1358] The usual formula is: ‘T. R. E. geldabat pro a hidis; ibi tamen sunt a´
hidae.’ We place a in Col. IV. and a´ in Col. V.; and we shall argue hereafter,
with some hesitation, that the taxation of this county has been increased under
William.
[1359] The words Terra est are written and are followed by a blank space. Many
instances in Kent and Sussex.
[1360] On the other hand, when I find a statement about B and none about C, I
do not assume that C = B; on the contrary, I read the entry to mean that C = 0. In
other words, it is very possible that there should be teamlands without teams; but
I do not think that for Domesday’s purposes there can be teams (i.e. teams at
Page 579
work) without land that is being ploughed, though it is true that often, and in
some counties habitually, C will be slightly greater than B.
[1361] One of the chief difficulties in the way of accurate computation is
occasioned by what we may call the complex entries. We start with some such
statement as this: ‘The Bishop holds Norton. It defends itself for a hides. There
is land for b teams. There are d teams on the demesne and the villeins have e
teams.’ But then we read: ‘Of this land [or of these a hides] Roger holds m
hides; there are n teams on the demesne and the villeins have o teams.’ Here the
total number of hides is a, and not a + m; and I think that the total number of
teamlands is b, and not b + some unstated number held by Roger; but the total
number of teams is d + e + n + o. Entries in this form are not very uncommon,
and therefore this explanation seemed to be required.
[1362] Pearson, History of England, ii. 665.
[1363] Col. IX. gives I. divided by II. Col. X. gives I. divided by VI. Col. XI.
gives I. divided by VII. Col. XII. gives II. divided by VI. Col. XIII. gives II.
divided by VII. Col. XIV. gives VI. divided by VII. Col. XV. gives VIII. divided
by VI. [or if there is no VI. for this county, then by VII.].
[1364] In Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford and Shropshire I was compelled to
adopt as the divisor the number of teams instead of the number of teamlands. As
it is fairly certain that these counties were ‘underteamed’ (B > C), the resulting
quotient (annual value of land actually tilled by a team) should be diminished
before it is compared with the figures given for other counties.
[1365] C. S. Taylor, Analysis of Gloucestershire Domesday (Bristol and
Gloucestershire Archaeol. Soc. 1887–9).
[1366] But this is intended to include males only: the ancillae are left out.
[1367] Mr Taylor says in his preface: ‘The work has occupied a large part of my
leisure time for five years.’ There is therefore some audacity in my printing my
figures beside his. It is clear that we have put different constructions upon some
of the composite entries concerning large manors. See below, p. 457. Mr Taylor,
like Eyton, computes only 48 ‘geld acres’ to the hide; I reckon 120 acres to the
hide; that, however, is in this context a trifling matter.
[1368] Mr Taylor has brought out 15s. 5d. as the average valet of land tilled by a
team. By taking Pearson’s valet and my teams I have brought out 15s. 0d.
[1369] For Dorset and Somerset my figures can be checked by Eyton’s. For
Wiltshire, Devon, Cornwall, by the Geld Inquests. These give for Wiltshire (see
W. H. Jones, Domesday for Wiltshire, 158 ff.) 3955 H. 3 V.; for Devon (see
Devonshire Domesday, ed. Devonsh. Assoc. p. xlix.) 1029 H. 1 V. 3 F.; for
Cornwall 401 H. 3 V. 1 F. I give for Wiltshire 4050 H., for Devon 1119 H., for
Cornwall 399 H.
[1370] Lincoln, 5·0; Nottingham, 4·4; Derby, 3·9; Surrey, 3·7; Hampshire, 3·6;
Middlesex, 3·4; Dorset, 3·3; Cambridge, 3·1; Berkshire, 3·0; Wiltshire, 2·9;
Hertford, Northampton, Warwick, Somerset, 2·8; Huntingdon, 2·6; Oxford, 2·5;
Bedford and Buckingham, 2·4; Cornwall and Stafford, 2·2; Devon, 2·1. For
Kent the figure would be near 3·9, for Sussex near 3·3, for apparently in these
some counties habitually, C will be slightly greater than B.
[1361] One of the chief difficulties in the way of accurate computation is
occasioned by what we may call the complex entries. We start with some such
statement as this: ‘The Bishop holds Norton. It defends itself for a hides. There
is land for b teams. There are d teams on the demesne and the villeins have e
teams.’ But then we read: ‘Of this land [or of these a hides] Roger holds m
hides; there are n teams on the demesne and the villeins have o teams.’ Here the
total number of hides is a, and not a + m; and I think that the total number of
teamlands is b, and not b + some unstated number held by Roger; but the total
number of teams is d + e + n + o. Entries in this form are not very uncommon,
and therefore this explanation seemed to be required.
[1362] Pearson, History of England, ii. 665.
[1363] Col. IX. gives I. divided by II. Col. X. gives I. divided by VI. Col. XI.
gives I. divided by VII. Col. XII. gives II. divided by VI. Col. XIII. gives II.
divided by VII. Col. XIV. gives VI. divided by VII. Col. XV. gives VIII. divided
by VI. [or if there is no VI. for this county, then by VII.].
[1364] In Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford and Shropshire I was compelled to
adopt as the divisor the number of teams instead of the number of teamlands. As
it is fairly certain that these counties were ‘underteamed’ (B > C), the resulting
quotient (annual value of land actually tilled by a team) should be diminished
before it is compared with the figures given for other counties.
[1365] C. S. Taylor, Analysis of Gloucestershire Domesday (Bristol and
Gloucestershire Archaeol. Soc. 1887–9).
[1366] But this is intended to include males only: the ancillae are left out.
[1367] Mr Taylor says in his preface: ‘The work has occupied a large part of my
leisure time for five years.’ There is therefore some audacity in my printing my
figures beside his. It is clear that we have put different constructions upon some
of the composite entries concerning large manors. See below, p. 457. Mr Taylor,
like Eyton, computes only 48 ‘geld acres’ to the hide; I reckon 120 acres to the
hide; that, however, is in this context a trifling matter.
[1368] Mr Taylor has brought out 15s. 5d. as the average valet of land tilled by a
team. By taking Pearson’s valet and my teams I have brought out 15s. 0d.
[1369] For Dorset and Somerset my figures can be checked by Eyton’s. For
Wiltshire, Devon, Cornwall, by the Geld Inquests. These give for Wiltshire (see
W. H. Jones, Domesday for Wiltshire, 158 ff.) 3955 H. 3 V.; for Devon (see
Devonshire Domesday, ed. Devonsh. Assoc. p. xlix.) 1029 H. 1 V. 3 F.; for
Cornwall 401 H. 3 V. 1 F. I give for Wiltshire 4050 H., for Devon 1119 H., for
Cornwall 399 H.
[1370] Lincoln, 5·0; Nottingham, 4·4; Derby, 3·9; Surrey, 3·7; Hampshire, 3·6;
Middlesex, 3·4; Dorset, 3·3; Cambridge, 3·1; Berkshire, 3·0; Wiltshire, 2·9;
Hertford, Northampton, Warwick, Somerset, 2·8; Huntingdon, 2·6; Oxford, 2·5;
Bedford and Buckingham, 2·4; Cornwall and Stafford, 2·2; Devon, 2·1. For
Kent the figure would be near 3·9, for Sussex near 3·3, for apparently in these
Page 580
counties there was approximate equality between the number of teams and the
number of teamlands.
[1371] One word about the meaning of the valets. I think it very clear from
thousands of examples that an estate is valued ‘as a going concern.’ The question
that the jurors put to themselves is: ‘What will this estate bring in, peopled as it
is and stocked as it is?’ In other words, they do not endeavour to make
abstraction of the villeins, oxen, etc. and to assign to the land what would be its
annual value if it were stocked or peopled according to some standard of average
culture. Consequently in a few years the value of an estate may leap from one
pound to three pounds or to five shillings or even to zero. Eyton, Dorset, 56, has
good remarks on this matter.
[1372] Seebohm, Village Community, 85–6. To the contrary Round, in
Domesday Studies, i. 209, and Feudal England, 35.
[1373] Round, Feudal England, 35.
[1374] See e.g. D. B. i. 222: ‘Terra est 2 car. Has habent ibi 3 sochemanni et 12
bordarii.’ ... ‘Terra est 3 car. Ibi sunt ipsae cum 9 sochemannis et 9 bordariis.’
Ibid. i. 223: ‘Terra est 1 car. quam habent ibi 4 bordarii.’ Ibid. i. 107 b: ‘Terra est
7 car. et tot ibi sunt.’
[1375] D. B. i. 222. Codestoche, Lidintone.
[1376] D. B. i. 289; 339 b, Bechelinge.
[1377] D. B. i. 342 b, Toresbi.
[1378] D. B. i. 339, Agetorne.
[1379] D. B. i. 174, Lappewrte.
[1380] D. B. i. 163, Berchelai.
[1381] D. B. i. 218 b, Stanford. Or let us take this case (D. B. i. 148): ‘Terra est 3
car. In dominio est una et 4 villani habent aliam et tercia potest fieri.’ Is this third
team to be a team of four or a team of eight?
[1382] Seebohm, Village Community, 85.
[1383] As a specimen we take 10 consecutive entries from the royal demesne in
Surrey in which it is said that x villeins and y bordiers have z teams. We add half
of y to x and divide the result by z. The quotients are 10·3, 4·0, 3·7, 3·5, 3·4, 2·7,
2·2, 1·9, 1·8, 1·4. If we massed the ten cases together, the quotient would be 2·8.
We can easily find averages; but, even if we omit cases in which there is an
exceptional dearth of oxen, the variations are so considerable that we must not
speak of a type or norm.
[1384] Glastonbury Rentalia, 51–2: ‘S. tenet 1 virgatam terre ... et si habet 8
boves debet warectare ... 7 acras. Si autem pauciores habet, warectabit pro
unoquoque bove octavam partem 7 acrarum.’ Ibid. 61: ‘R. C. tenet unam
virgatam ... et habebit 4 boves cum bobus domini.’ Ibid. 68: ‘G. tenet dimidiam
hidam ... et si habuerit 8 boves...’ Ibid. 78: ‘L. tenet 5 acras ... et bis debet venire
cum 1 bove et cum pluribus si habuerit...’ Ibid. 98–9: ‘M. tenet 1 virgatam ... si
number of teamlands.
[1371] One word about the meaning of the valets. I think it very clear from
thousands of examples that an estate is valued ‘as a going concern.’ The question
that the jurors put to themselves is: ‘What will this estate bring in, peopled as it
is and stocked as it is?’ In other words, they do not endeavour to make
abstraction of the villeins, oxen, etc. and to assign to the land what would be its
annual value if it were stocked or peopled according to some standard of average
culture. Consequently in a few years the value of an estate may leap from one
pound to three pounds or to five shillings or even to zero. Eyton, Dorset, 56, has
good remarks on this matter.
[1372] Seebohm, Village Community, 85–6. To the contrary Round, in
Domesday Studies, i. 209, and Feudal England, 35.
[1373] Round, Feudal England, 35.
[1374] See e.g. D. B. i. 222: ‘Terra est 2 car. Has habent ibi 3 sochemanni et 12
bordarii.’ ... ‘Terra est 3 car. Ibi sunt ipsae cum 9 sochemannis et 9 bordariis.’
Ibid. i. 223: ‘Terra est 1 car. quam habent ibi 4 bordarii.’ Ibid. i. 107 b: ‘Terra est
7 car. et tot ibi sunt.’
[1375] D. B. i. 222. Codestoche, Lidintone.
[1376] D. B. i. 289; 339 b, Bechelinge.
[1377] D. B. i. 342 b, Toresbi.
[1378] D. B. i. 339, Agetorne.
[1379] D. B. i. 174, Lappewrte.
[1380] D. B. i. 163, Berchelai.
[1381] D. B. i. 218 b, Stanford. Or let us take this case (D. B. i. 148): ‘Terra est 3
car. In dominio est una et 4 villani habent aliam et tercia potest fieri.’ Is this third
team to be a team of four or a team of eight?
[1382] Seebohm, Village Community, 85.
[1383] As a specimen we take 10 consecutive entries from the royal demesne in
Surrey in which it is said that x villeins and y bordiers have z teams. We add half
of y to x and divide the result by z. The quotients are 10·3, 4·0, 3·7, 3·5, 3·4, 2·7,
2·2, 1·9, 1·8, 1·4. If we massed the ten cases together, the quotient would be 2·8.
We can easily find averages; but, even if we omit cases in which there is an
exceptional dearth of oxen, the variations are so considerable that we must not
speak of a type or norm.
[1384] Glastonbury Rentalia, 51–2: ‘S. tenet 1 virgatam terre ... et si habet 8
boves debet warectare ... 7 acras. Si autem pauciores habet, warectabit pro
unoquoque bove octavam partem 7 acrarum.’ Ibid. 61: ‘R. C. tenet unam
virgatam ... et habebit 4 boves cum bobus domini.’ Ibid. 68: ‘G. tenet dimidiam
hidam ... et si habuerit 8 boves...’ Ibid. 78: ‘L. tenet 5 acras ... et bis debet venire
cum 1 bove et cum pluribus si habuerit...’ Ibid. 98–9: ‘M. tenet 1 virgatam ... si
Page 581
habuerit quatuor boves...’ Ibid. 129: ‘S. tenet 1 virgatam ... et debet invenire
domino 1 carrum et 6 boves ad cariandum fenum.’ Ibid. 130: ‘M. tenet dimidiam
virgatam ... et debet invenire 2 boves.’ Ibid. 189: Three cases in which a virgater
comes to the boon days with eight oxen. Larking, Domesday of Kent, App. 33:
Customs of Hedenham: ‘...habebit unam virgatam terrae ... item habebit quatuor
boves in pasturam domini.’
[1385] D. B. i. 211: ‘Terra est dim. car. et unus bos ibi arat.’
[1386] D. B. i. 342 b, Toresbi.
[1387] Pollock, E. H. R. xi. 813. I venture to think that Sir F. Pollock has not
answered his own argument (p. 220) for a constant caruca.
[1388] Inq. Com. Cant. 70.
[1389] Another example from a Northamptonshire column (D. B. i. 226) will
show what we mean. Let H stand for hides and T for teamlands, and let the
virgate be a quarter of a hide, then we have this series: 2 H (5 T), 21⁄2 H (4 T), 4
H (8 T), 11⁄4 H (3 T), 17⁄12 H (4 T), 3/8 H (1⁄2 T), 1⁄2 H (1 T), 21⁄2 H (6 T), 11⁄4 H
(3 T), 2 H (4 T), 7⁄8 H (3 T). We see that T is integral where H is fractional.
[1390] Exceptionally we read in Kent (i. 9): ‘Terra est dim. car. et ibidem sunt
adhuc 30 acrae terrae.’ And is not this a rule-proving exception? The jurors can
not say simply ‘land for half a team and thirty acres.’ They say ‘land for half a
team and there are thirty acres in addition.’
[1391] D. B. iv. 497; Inq. Com. Cant. 97.
[1392] There can be little doubt that this is the right reading. See Round. Feudal
England, 134.
[1393] Thus, D. B. ii. 39: ‘Tunc 4 carucae in dominio, post et modo 2 ... et 2
carucae possunt restaurari.’ To use our symbols, in Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk
we obtain statements about A and about C, but learn nothing about B, unless this
is to be inferred from the increase or decrease that has taken place in C. We shall
hereafter argue that, in spite of some appearances to the contrary, the carucates
of East Anglia belong to the order A and not to the order B.
[1394] Thus, D. B. i. 231: ‘Rad. tenet de episcopo 4 car. terrae in Partenei. Terra
est 4 car. In dominio sunt 2 et ... villani habent 2 car.’ Just before this we have
the other common formula: ‘Rad. tenet ... 2 car. terrae in Toniscote. Duae car.
possunt esse et ibi sunt.’
[1395] Thus, D. B. i. 231 b: ‘Ipsa Comitissa tenuit Dunitone. Ibi 22 car. et dimid.
T. R. E. erant ibi 12 car. Modo in dominio sunt 3 et ... villani ... habent 12 car.’
[1396] To me it looks as if the variations were due to a clerk’s caprice. The
Leicestershire survey fills 30 columns. Not until the top of col. 5 has the
compiler, except as a rare exception, the requisite information. Then, after
hesitating as to whether he shall adopt the ‘x car. possunt esse’ formula, he
decides in favour of ‘Terra est x car.’ This we will call Formula I. It reigns
throughout cols. 5–13, though broken on three or four occasions by what we will
call Formula II, namely ‘T. R. E. erant ibi x car.’ At the top of col. 14 Formula II.
domino 1 carrum et 6 boves ad cariandum fenum.’ Ibid. 130: ‘M. tenet dimidiam
virgatam ... et debet invenire 2 boves.’ Ibid. 189: Three cases in which a virgater
comes to the boon days with eight oxen. Larking, Domesday of Kent, App. 33:
Customs of Hedenham: ‘...habebit unam virgatam terrae ... item habebit quatuor
boves in pasturam domini.’
[1385] D. B. i. 211: ‘Terra est dim. car. et unus bos ibi arat.’
[1386] D. B. i. 342 b, Toresbi.
[1387] Pollock, E. H. R. xi. 813. I venture to think that Sir F. Pollock has not
answered his own argument (p. 220) for a constant caruca.
[1388] Inq. Com. Cant. 70.
[1389] Another example from a Northamptonshire column (D. B. i. 226) will
show what we mean. Let H stand for hides and T for teamlands, and let the
virgate be a quarter of a hide, then we have this series: 2 H (5 T), 21⁄2 H (4 T), 4
H (8 T), 11⁄4 H (3 T), 17⁄12 H (4 T), 3/8 H (1⁄2 T), 1⁄2 H (1 T), 21⁄2 H (6 T), 11⁄4 H
(3 T), 2 H (4 T), 7⁄8 H (3 T). We see that T is integral where H is fractional.
[1390] Exceptionally we read in Kent (i. 9): ‘Terra est dim. car. et ibidem sunt
adhuc 30 acrae terrae.’ And is not this a rule-proving exception? The jurors can
not say simply ‘land for half a team and thirty acres.’ They say ‘land for half a
team and there are thirty acres in addition.’
[1391] D. B. iv. 497; Inq. Com. Cant. 97.
[1392] There can be little doubt that this is the right reading. See Round. Feudal
England, 134.
[1393] Thus, D. B. ii. 39: ‘Tunc 4 carucae in dominio, post et modo 2 ... et 2
carucae possunt restaurari.’ To use our symbols, in Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk
we obtain statements about A and about C, but learn nothing about B, unless this
is to be inferred from the increase or decrease that has taken place in C. We shall
hereafter argue that, in spite of some appearances to the contrary, the carucates
of East Anglia belong to the order A and not to the order B.
[1394] Thus, D. B. i. 231: ‘Rad. tenet de episcopo 4 car. terrae in Partenei. Terra
est 4 car. In dominio sunt 2 et ... villani habent 2 car.’ Just before this we have
the other common formula: ‘Rad. tenet ... 2 car. terrae in Toniscote. Duae car.
possunt esse et ibi sunt.’
[1395] Thus, D. B. i. 231 b: ‘Ipsa Comitissa tenuit Dunitone. Ibi 22 car. et dimid.
T. R. E. erant ibi 12 car. Modo in dominio sunt 3 et ... villani ... habent 12 car.’
[1396] To me it looks as if the variations were due to a clerk’s caprice. The
Leicestershire survey fills 30 columns. Not until the top of col. 5 has the
compiler, except as a rare exception, the requisite information. Then, after
hesitating as to whether he shall adopt the ‘x car. possunt esse’ formula, he
decides in favour of ‘Terra est x car.’ This we will call Formula I. It reigns
throughout cols. 5–13, though broken on three or four occasions by what we will
call Formula II, namely ‘T. R. E. erant ibi x car.’ At the top of col. 14 Formula II.
Page 582
takes possession and keeps it into col. 16. Then I. has a short turn. Then (col. 17)
II. is back again. Then follow many alternations. At the top of col. 24, however,
a simplified version of II. appears; the express reference to the T. R. E. vanishes,
and we have merely ‘ibi fuerunt x car.’ In the course of col. 26 this is changed to
‘ibi x car. fuerunt.’ These two versions of II. prevail throughout the last six
columns, though there is one short relapse to I. (col. 28).
[1397] The proof of this lies in the Inq. Com. Cant. and the Exon Domesday.
[1398] This appears on a collation of D. B. with the two records mentioned in
our last note. See Round, Feudal England, 26.
[1399] D. B. i. 174: ‘In omnibus his maneriis non possunt esse plus carucae
quam dictum est.’
[1400] When C varies from B, the statement about C will sometimes be
introduced by a sed or a tamen which tells us that things are not what they might
be expected to be. D. B. i. 77 b: ‘Terra est dimid. car. et tamen est ibi 1 car.’ D.
B. i. 222: ‘Terra est dim. car. tamen 2 villani habent 1 car.’
[1401] As a wheat-grower Devon stands in our own day at the very bottom of
the English counties. Its average yield per acre in 1885–95 was 21 bushels, while
Cambridge’s was 32. Next above Devon stands Monmouth and then comes
Cornwall.
[1402] Marshall, Review of Reports to Board of Agriculture from Southern
Departments, 524: ‘The management of the land is uniform; here and there an
exception will be found. The whole is convertible, sometimes into arable, and
sometimes pasture. Arable is sown with wheat, barley, or oats, as long as it will
bear any; and then grass for eight or ten years, until the land is recovered, and
capable again of bearing corn.’ See also p. 531: the lands go back to the waste
‘in tenfold worse condition than [that wherein] they were in a state of nature.’ It
is just in the country which is not a country of village communities that we find
this ‘aration of the waste.’
[1403] Some parts of Worcestershire, for example, show a marked deficiency in
oxen. On the lands of Osbern Fitz Richard (14 entries) there are about 102
teams, and there ‘could be’ 32 more. See D. B. i. 176 b. In some parts of
Cheshire also there is a great deficiency.
[1404] D. B. i. 122 b: ‘Luduham ... Terra 15 car. vel 30 car.’ In the Exeter book
(D. B. iv. 240) two conflicting estimates are recorded: ‘Luduam ... In ea sunt 3
hidae terrae et reddidit gildum pro 1 hida. hanc possunt arare 15 carrucae. hanc
tenet Ricardus de Comite. in ea sunt 3 hidae terrae et reddidit gildum pro 1 hida.
hanc possunt arare 30 carrucae. hanc tenet Ricardus de Comite.’
[1405] D. B. i. 246 b.
[1406] Often a Yorkshire entry touching a waste vill gives no B. Therefore in my
Tables I have omitted the number of the Yorkshire teamlands, lest hasty
inferences should be drawn from it. I believe it falls between 5000 and 6000. It
is much smaller than A, much greater than C.
II. is back again. Then follow many alternations. At the top of col. 24, however,
a simplified version of II. appears; the express reference to the T. R. E. vanishes,
and we have merely ‘ibi fuerunt x car.’ In the course of col. 26 this is changed to
‘ibi x car. fuerunt.’ These two versions of II. prevail throughout the last six
columns, though there is one short relapse to I. (col. 28).
[1397] The proof of this lies in the Inq. Com. Cant. and the Exon Domesday.
[1398] This appears on a collation of D. B. with the two records mentioned in
our last note. See Round, Feudal England, 26.
[1399] D. B. i. 174: ‘In omnibus his maneriis non possunt esse plus carucae
quam dictum est.’
[1400] When C varies from B, the statement about C will sometimes be
introduced by a sed or a tamen which tells us that things are not what they might
be expected to be. D. B. i. 77 b: ‘Terra est dimid. car. et tamen est ibi 1 car.’ D.
B. i. 222: ‘Terra est dim. car. tamen 2 villani habent 1 car.’
[1401] As a wheat-grower Devon stands in our own day at the very bottom of
the English counties. Its average yield per acre in 1885–95 was 21 bushels, while
Cambridge’s was 32. Next above Devon stands Monmouth and then comes
Cornwall.
[1402] Marshall, Review of Reports to Board of Agriculture from Southern
Departments, 524: ‘The management of the land is uniform; here and there an
exception will be found. The whole is convertible, sometimes into arable, and
sometimes pasture. Arable is sown with wheat, barley, or oats, as long as it will
bear any; and then grass for eight or ten years, until the land is recovered, and
capable again of bearing corn.’ See also p. 531: the lands go back to the waste
‘in tenfold worse condition than [that wherein] they were in a state of nature.’ It
is just in the country which is not a country of village communities that we find
this ‘aration of the waste.’
[1403] Some parts of Worcestershire, for example, show a marked deficiency in
oxen. On the lands of Osbern Fitz Richard (14 entries) there are about 102
teams, and there ‘could be’ 32 more. See D. B. i. 176 b. In some parts of
Cheshire also there is a great deficiency.
[1404] D. B. i. 122 b: ‘Luduham ... Terra 15 car. vel 30 car.’ In the Exeter book
(D. B. iv. 240) two conflicting estimates are recorded: ‘Luduam ... In ea sunt 3
hidae terrae et reddidit gildum pro 1 hida. hanc possunt arare 15 carrucae. hanc
tenet Ricardus de Comite. in ea sunt 3 hidae terrae et reddidit gildum pro 1 hida.
hanc possunt arare 30 carrucae. hanc tenet Ricardus de Comite.’
[1405] D. B. i. 246 b.
[1406] Often a Yorkshire entry touching a waste vill gives no B. Therefore in my
Tables I have omitted the number of the Yorkshire teamlands, lest hasty
inferences should be drawn from it. I believe it falls between 5000 and 6000. It
is much smaller than A, much greater than C.
Page 583
[1407] Be it remembered that these waste vills can not send deputations to meet
the justices, and that the representatives of the wapentakes may never have seen
some of those deserts of which they have to speak. ‘All of these vills,’ they say
on one occasion (i. 301), ‘belong to Preston. In sixteen of them there are a few
inhabitants; but how many we do not know. The rest are waste.’
[1408] See below, p. 471.
[1409] Devon, 2·1; Cornwall, 2·2; Derby, 3·9; Nottingham, 4·4; Lincoln, 5·0.
The figure for Stafford is about as low as that for Cornwall; but Stafford has
been devastated. See Eyton, Staffordshire, 30. Kent and Surrey would stand
high. Kent would perhaps stand as high as Derby. But Lincoln has no peer,
unless it be Norfolk, Suffolk, or Essex. Our reason for not speaking of these last
three counties will appear by and by.
[1410] An essay by Mr W. J. Corbett which I had the advantage of seeing some
time ago, and which will I hope soon be in print, will throw much new light on
this matter.
[1411] I have roughly added up the carucates and teams of Norfolk, a laborious
task, and have seen reason to believe that the figures for Suffolk would be of the
same kind.
[1412] In dealing with Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk an equation connecting the
hide or (as the case may be) carucate with the acre becomes of vast importance. I
have throughout assumed that 120 acres make the hide or carucate. If this
assumption, about which something will be said hereafter, is unjustified, my
whole computation breaks down. Then in Norfolk there are (especially I think in
certain particular hundreds) a good many estates for which no extent (real or
rateable) is given. I have made no allowance for this. On the other hand, I
believe that I have carried to an extreme in Norfolk the principle of including
everything. I doubt, for example, whether some of the acres held by the parish
churches have not been reckoned twice over. Also both in Essex and Norfolk I
reckoned in the lands that are mentioned among the Invasiones, and in so doing
ran the danger of counting them for a second time.
[1413] Also we may remark that in many respects the survey of Essex is closely
akin to the survey of East Anglia; but in Essex nothing is said about the
geldability of vills and therefore, unless the Essex hides and acres belong to the
order of geldable units (A), our record tells us nothing as to the geld of Essex: an
unacceptable conclusion.
[1414] Dorset, 15, 23–24.
[1415] In Dorset 22,000 acres are ‘designedly omitted’; in Somerset nearly
178,000; in Staffordshire nearly 246,000. Mr C. S. Taylor puts the deficiency in
Gloucestershire at 200,000 or thereabouts.
[1416] See above, p. 370.
[1417] D. B. ii. 160 b: A certain vill is 1 league 10 perches long, and 1 league
41⁄2 feet wide. Surely such a statement would never come from men who could
use and were intending to use a system of superficial measurement.
the justices, and that the representatives of the wapentakes may never have seen
some of those deserts of which they have to speak. ‘All of these vills,’ they say
on one occasion (i. 301), ‘belong to Preston. In sixteen of them there are a few
inhabitants; but how many we do not know. The rest are waste.’
[1408] See below, p. 471.
[1409] Devon, 2·1; Cornwall, 2·2; Derby, 3·9; Nottingham, 4·4; Lincoln, 5·0.
The figure for Stafford is about as low as that for Cornwall; but Stafford has
been devastated. See Eyton, Staffordshire, 30. Kent and Surrey would stand
high. Kent would perhaps stand as high as Derby. But Lincoln has no peer,
unless it be Norfolk, Suffolk, or Essex. Our reason for not speaking of these last
three counties will appear by and by.
[1410] An essay by Mr W. J. Corbett which I had the advantage of seeing some
time ago, and which will I hope soon be in print, will throw much new light on
this matter.
[1411] I have roughly added up the carucates and teams of Norfolk, a laborious
task, and have seen reason to believe that the figures for Suffolk would be of the
same kind.
[1412] In dealing with Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk an equation connecting the
hide or (as the case may be) carucate with the acre becomes of vast importance. I
have throughout assumed that 120 acres make the hide or carucate. If this
assumption, about which something will be said hereafter, is unjustified, my
whole computation breaks down. Then in Norfolk there are (especially I think in
certain particular hundreds) a good many estates for which no extent (real or
rateable) is given. I have made no allowance for this. On the other hand, I
believe that I have carried to an extreme in Norfolk the principle of including
everything. I doubt, for example, whether some of the acres held by the parish
churches have not been reckoned twice over. Also both in Essex and Norfolk I
reckoned in the lands that are mentioned among the Invasiones, and in so doing
ran the danger of counting them for a second time.
[1413] Also we may remark that in many respects the survey of Essex is closely
akin to the survey of East Anglia; but in Essex nothing is said about the
geldability of vills and therefore, unless the Essex hides and acres belong to the
order of geldable units (A), our record tells us nothing as to the geld of Essex: an
unacceptable conclusion.
[1414] Dorset, 15, 23–24.
[1415] In Dorset 22,000 acres are ‘designedly omitted’; in Somerset nearly
178,000; in Staffordshire nearly 246,000. Mr C. S. Taylor puts the deficiency in
Gloucestershire at 200,000 or thereabouts.
[1416] See above, p. 370.
[1417] D. B. ii. 160 b: A certain vill is 1 league 10 perches long, and 1 league
41⁄2 feet wide. Surely such a statement would never come from men who could
use and were intending to use a system of superficial measurement.
Page 584
[1418] D. B. ii. 170. Or take Westbruge (ii. 206): Two carucates; two teams and
a half; ‘this vill is 5 furlongs in length by 3 in breadth.’ If every inch of the vill is
ploughed, the carucate can only have 75 acres, and each team tills but 60. I have
noted many cases in which this method will not leave 120 acres for the team.
[1419] D. B. i. 310.
[1420] D. B. i. 307 b.
[1421] D. B. i. 310. In these Yorkshire cases it is needless for us to raise the
question whether the totum that is being measured is the manor or the vill.
[1422] D. B. ii. 118 b.
[1423] D. B. i. 303 b (Yorkshire, Oleslec).
[1424] D. B. i. 303 b (Othelai).
[1425] D. B. i. 346 b (Bastune); 4 carucates for geld; land for 4 teams; arable
land 8 quar. by 8.
[1426] D. B. i. 346 b (Langetof); 6 carucates for geld; land for 6 teams; arable
land 15 quar. long and 9 wide.
[1427] D. B. i. 248 b (Rolvestune); 21⁄2 hides; land for 8 teams; 18 teams
existing; arable land 2 leagues long and 1 [league] wide. Eyton (Staffordshire,
48) has a long note on this entry which makes against his doctrine that the
teamland is 120 acres. He suggests that the statement by linear measure is a
correction of the previous statement that there is land for 8 teams. Unfortunately,
as we have seen, this entry does not stand alone. Morgan, op. cit. 34, speaks of
some of these entries. Those which he mentions and which we have not noticed
do not seem quite to the point. Thus (D. B. i. 263 b) of Edesberie we read ‘land
for 6 ploughs ... this land is a league long and equally wide.’ We are not here
expressly told that all the ‘land’ thus measured by lineal measure is arable. The
cases of Dictune, Winetun, Grif and Bernodebi, which he then cites, are beside
the mark, for what is here measured by lineal measure seems to be the whole
area of the manor.
[1428] To make safer, I take the Dorset and Somerset teamlands from Eyton, the
Gloucester teams from Mr Taylor. In the modern statistics the ‘arable’ covers
‘bare fallow’ and ‘grasses under rotation’; the ‘permanent pasture’ includes
‘grass for hay,’ but excludes ‘mountain and heath land used for grazing’; the
total acreage includes everything but ‘tidal water.’ To bring up the particulars to
the total, we should have to add (1) a little for orchards and market gardens, and
having thus obtained the sum of all the land that is within the purview of the
Board of Agriculture, we should still have to add (2) the sites of towns, houses,
factories, etc., (3) tenements of less than an acre whereof no statistics are
obtained, (4) roads, railways, etc., (5) waste not used for pasture, rocks, sea-
shore, etc., (6) non-tidal water. The area not accounted for by our figures will be
smallest in an inland county which has no large towns; it will be raised by sea-
shore or by manufacturing industry.
[1429] Agricultural Returns, 1895, p. xiii: ‘The actual loss of arable area in the
interval covered by the last two decades ... is 2,137,000 acres.’
a half; ‘this vill is 5 furlongs in length by 3 in breadth.’ If every inch of the vill is
ploughed, the carucate can only have 75 acres, and each team tills but 60. I have
noted many cases in which this method will not leave 120 acres for the team.
[1419] D. B. i. 310.
[1420] D. B. i. 307 b.
[1421] D. B. i. 310. In these Yorkshire cases it is needless for us to raise the
question whether the totum that is being measured is the manor or the vill.
[1422] D. B. ii. 118 b.
[1423] D. B. i. 303 b (Yorkshire, Oleslec).
[1424] D. B. i. 303 b (Othelai).
[1425] D. B. i. 346 b (Bastune); 4 carucates for geld; land for 4 teams; arable
land 8 quar. by 8.
[1426] D. B. i. 346 b (Langetof); 6 carucates for geld; land for 6 teams; arable
land 15 quar. long and 9 wide.
[1427] D. B. i. 248 b (Rolvestune); 21⁄2 hides; land for 8 teams; 18 teams
existing; arable land 2 leagues long and 1 [league] wide. Eyton (Staffordshire,
48) has a long note on this entry which makes against his doctrine that the
teamland is 120 acres. He suggests that the statement by linear measure is a
correction of the previous statement that there is land for 8 teams. Unfortunately,
as we have seen, this entry does not stand alone. Morgan, op. cit. 34, speaks of
some of these entries. Those which he mentions and which we have not noticed
do not seem quite to the point. Thus (D. B. i. 263 b) of Edesberie we read ‘land
for 6 ploughs ... this land is a league long and equally wide.’ We are not here
expressly told that all the ‘land’ thus measured by lineal measure is arable. The
cases of Dictune, Winetun, Grif and Bernodebi, which he then cites, are beside
the mark, for what is here measured by lineal measure seems to be the whole
area of the manor.
[1428] To make safer, I take the Dorset and Somerset teamlands from Eyton, the
Gloucester teams from Mr Taylor. In the modern statistics the ‘arable’ covers
‘bare fallow’ and ‘grasses under rotation’; the ‘permanent pasture’ includes
‘grass for hay,’ but excludes ‘mountain and heath land used for grazing’; the
total acreage includes everything but ‘tidal water.’ To bring up the particulars to
the total, we should have to add (1) a little for orchards and market gardens, and
having thus obtained the sum of all the land that is within the purview of the
Board of Agriculture, we should still have to add (2) the sites of towns, houses,
factories, etc., (3) tenements of less than an acre whereof no statistics are
obtained, (4) roads, railways, etc., (5) waste not used for pasture, rocks, sea-
shore, etc., (6) non-tidal water. The area not accounted for by our figures will be
smallest in an inland county which has no large towns; it will be raised by sea-
shore or by manufacturing industry.
[1429] Agricultural Returns, 1895, p. xiii: ‘The actual loss of arable area in the
interval covered by the last two decades ... is 2,137,000 acres.’
Page 585
[1430] Mr Seebohm, Village Community, p. 103, seems to think that D. B.
testifies to no more than 5 million acres of arable. But, even if we stop at the
Humber, we shall have 9 million if a team tills 120.
[1431] D. B. ii. 116: T. R. E. there were 1320 burgenses.
[1432] D. B. ii 372.
[1433] It seems probable that in many cases the parish priest is reckoned among
the townsmen, the villani.
[1434] See above, p. 20.
[1435] While historical economists can still dispute as to whether the population
in 1346 was 5 millions, or only 21⁄2 (Cunningham, Eng. Industry, i. 301) guesses
about 1085 are premature. M. Fabre has lately estimated the population of
England under Henry II. at 2,880,000. But as to this calculation, see
Liebermann, Eng. Hist. Rev. xi. 746.
[1436] See above, p. 366.
[1437] Walter of Henley, pp. 67, 71.
[1438] Walter of Henley, p. 19.
[1439] Rogers, Hist. Agric. i. 50–1.
[1440] Tour in the Southern Counties, ed. 3 (1767), p. 158. See also p. 242.
[1441] Agricultural Returns, 1895, p. 239. The figures given under the year 1894
which express the average yield of a statute acre in imperial bushels are for
Australasia, 8·18; India, 9·00; Russia in Europe, 10·76; United States, 12·79.
Apparently in South Australia 1,577,000 acres can produce as little as 7,781,000
bushels. As I understand, Sir J. B. Lawes and Sir J. H. Gilbert reckon that for an
unmanured acre in England 16 bushels would be an average return, but that if
the same acre is continuously sown with wheat, the yield will decline at the rate
of nearly a quarter of a bushel every year. See Journ. Agricult. Soc., 3rd Ser. vol.
iv. p. 87.
[1442] This calculus was officially adopted in 1891; see a paper by Sir J. B.
Lawes and Sir J. H. Gilbert in Journ. Agric. Soc., 3rd Ser., vol iv. p. 102. I desire
to express my thanks to the Secretary of the Board of Agriculture for directing
my attention to this paper.
[1443] I understand that the average number of loaves that can be made from
280 lbs. of flour may be put at about 90.
[1444] Agricultural Returns, 1895, pp. 166, 90, 198. The old rough estimate of a
quarter of wheat per head is much too high; the average is about 5·65 bushels.
See the paper cited in note 1442. Now-a-days we can further allot to each
inhabitant of the United Kingdom an amount of cereal matter other than wheat,
to wit, barley, oats, beans, peas, maize, etc. which would take for its production
perhaps as much as 1·5 times the area of the land that is required for the growth
of the wheat that we have allotted to him. But much of this only feeds him by
feeding animals that he eats; much only feeds him very indirectly by feeding
testifies to no more than 5 million acres of arable. But, even if we stop at the
Humber, we shall have 9 million if a team tills 120.
[1431] D. B. ii. 116: T. R. E. there were 1320 burgenses.
[1432] D. B. ii 372.
[1433] It seems probable that in many cases the parish priest is reckoned among
the townsmen, the villani.
[1434] See above, p. 20.
[1435] While historical economists can still dispute as to whether the population
in 1346 was 5 millions, or only 21⁄2 (Cunningham, Eng. Industry, i. 301) guesses
about 1085 are premature. M. Fabre has lately estimated the population of
England under Henry II. at 2,880,000. But as to this calculation, see
Liebermann, Eng. Hist. Rev. xi. 746.
[1436] See above, p. 366.
[1437] Walter of Henley, pp. 67, 71.
[1438] Walter of Henley, p. 19.
[1439] Rogers, Hist. Agric. i. 50–1.
[1440] Tour in the Southern Counties, ed. 3 (1767), p. 158. See also p. 242.
[1441] Agricultural Returns, 1895, p. 239. The figures given under the year 1894
which express the average yield of a statute acre in imperial bushels are for
Australasia, 8·18; India, 9·00; Russia in Europe, 10·76; United States, 12·79.
Apparently in South Australia 1,577,000 acres can produce as little as 7,781,000
bushels. As I understand, Sir J. B. Lawes and Sir J. H. Gilbert reckon that for an
unmanured acre in England 16 bushels would be an average return, but that if
the same acre is continuously sown with wheat, the yield will decline at the rate
of nearly a quarter of a bushel every year. See Journ. Agricult. Soc., 3rd Ser. vol.
iv. p. 87.
[1442] This calculus was officially adopted in 1891; see a paper by Sir J. B.
Lawes and Sir J. H. Gilbert in Journ. Agric. Soc., 3rd Ser., vol iv. p. 102. I desire
to express my thanks to the Secretary of the Board of Agriculture for directing
my attention to this paper.
[1443] I understand that the average number of loaves that can be made from
280 lbs. of flour may be put at about 90.
[1444] Agricultural Returns, 1895, pp. 166, 90, 198. The old rough estimate of a
quarter of wheat per head is much too high; the average is about 5·65 bushels.
See the paper cited in note 1442. Now-a-days we can further allot to each
inhabitant of the United Kingdom an amount of cereal matter other than wheat,
to wit, barley, oats, beans, peas, maize, etc. which would take for its production
perhaps as much as 1·5 times the area of the land that is required for the growth
of the wheat that we have allotted to him. But much of this only feeds him by
feeding animals that he eats; much only feeds him very indirectly by feeding
Page 586
horses engaged in the production or transport of food; and some of it can not be
said to feed him at all. Then, on the other hand, large quantities of potatoes,
sugar and rice are being eaten.
[1445] Wheat, oats, barley and peas are mentioned in D. B.; also rye (i. 257 b).
[1446] Hale, Worcester Register, p. civ.
[1447] Boldon Book, D. B. iv. 580–5. So in D. B. i. 69 the sheriff of Wiltshire
receives equal quantities of wheat and malt and a larger quantity of oats. See
also D. B. i. 179 b.
[1448] Domesday of St. Paul’s, 164*. See also Cart. Rams. iii. 231.
[1449] Ibid, cxxxiv. 173.
[1450] Ibid. 173.
[1451] Calculations are difficult and may be misleading, not only because of the
variability of medieval measures, but also because of the varying strength of
beer. Mr Steele, the Chief Inspector of Excise, has been good enough to inform
me that a bushel of unmalted barley weighing 42 lbs. would yield about 19·5
gallons of beer at 58°. The figures from St. Paul’s seem to point to a strong brew,
since they apparently derive but 8 gallons from the bushel of mixed grain. The
ordinances of cent. xiii. (Statutes, i. 200, 202) seem to suppose that, outside the
cities, the brewer, after deducting expenses and profit, could sell 8 to 12 gallons
of beer for the price of a bushel of barley. If we suppose that the bushel of barley
gives 18 gallons, the man who drinks his gallon a day consumes 20 bushels a
year, and when the acre yields but 6 bushels of wheat, it will hardly yield more
than 7 of barley. There is valuable learning in J. Bickerdyke, The Curiosities of
Ale, pp. 54, 106, 154.
[1452] As to both meat and drink see Ine 70, § 1; T. 460, 468, 471, 473, 474; E.
118; Æthelstan, II. 1. § 1; D. B. i. 169, rents of the shrievalty of Wiltshire.
Attempts to measure the flood of beer break down before the uncertain content
of the amber, modius, sextarius, etc. In particular I can not believe that the
amber of ale contained (Schmid, p. 530; Robertson, Hist. Essays, 68) 4 of our
bushels; but, do all we can to reduce it, the allowance of beer seems large.
[1453] D. B. ii. 162 b: Cheltenham and King’s Barton.
[1454] D. B. i. 205. The abbot of Peterborough is bound to find pasture for 120
pigs for the abbot of Thorney. If he can not do this, he must feed and fatten 60
pigs with corn (de annona pascit et impinguat 60 porcos).
[1455] Walter of Henley, 13. Every week each ox is to have 31⁄2 garbs of oats,
and 10 garbs would yield a bushel.
[1456] Now-a-days the average acre in England will produce about 29 bushels
of wheat or 40 of oats. Agricultural Returns, 1895, pp. 66, 70.
[1457] See above, p. 398.
[1458] Rogers, op. cit. i. 51.
said to feed him at all. Then, on the other hand, large quantities of potatoes,
sugar and rice are being eaten.
[1445] Wheat, oats, barley and peas are mentioned in D. B.; also rye (i. 257 b).
[1446] Hale, Worcester Register, p. civ.
[1447] Boldon Book, D. B. iv. 580–5. So in D. B. i. 69 the sheriff of Wiltshire
receives equal quantities of wheat and malt and a larger quantity of oats. See
also D. B. i. 179 b.
[1448] Domesday of St. Paul’s, 164*. See also Cart. Rams. iii. 231.
[1449] Ibid, cxxxiv. 173.
[1450] Ibid. 173.
[1451] Calculations are difficult and may be misleading, not only because of the
variability of medieval measures, but also because of the varying strength of
beer. Mr Steele, the Chief Inspector of Excise, has been good enough to inform
me that a bushel of unmalted barley weighing 42 lbs. would yield about 19·5
gallons of beer at 58°. The figures from St. Paul’s seem to point to a strong brew,
since they apparently derive but 8 gallons from the bushel of mixed grain. The
ordinances of cent. xiii. (Statutes, i. 200, 202) seem to suppose that, outside the
cities, the brewer, after deducting expenses and profit, could sell 8 to 12 gallons
of beer for the price of a bushel of barley. If we suppose that the bushel of barley
gives 18 gallons, the man who drinks his gallon a day consumes 20 bushels a
year, and when the acre yields but 6 bushels of wheat, it will hardly yield more
than 7 of barley. There is valuable learning in J. Bickerdyke, The Curiosities of
Ale, pp. 54, 106, 154.
[1452] As to both meat and drink see Ine 70, § 1; T. 460, 468, 471, 473, 474; E.
118; Æthelstan, II. 1. § 1; D. B. i. 169, rents of the shrievalty of Wiltshire.
Attempts to measure the flood of beer break down before the uncertain content
of the amber, modius, sextarius, etc. In particular I can not believe that the
amber of ale contained (Schmid, p. 530; Robertson, Hist. Essays, 68) 4 of our
bushels; but, do all we can to reduce it, the allowance of beer seems large.
[1453] D. B. ii. 162 b: Cheltenham and King’s Barton.
[1454] D. B. i. 205. The abbot of Peterborough is bound to find pasture for 120
pigs for the abbot of Thorney. If he can not do this, he must feed and fatten 60
pigs with corn (de annona pascit et impinguat 60 porcos).
[1455] Walter of Henley, 13. Every week each ox is to have 31⁄2 garbs of oats,
and 10 garbs would yield a bushel.
[1456] Now-a-days the average acre in England will produce about 29 bushels
of wheat or 40 of oats. Agricultural Returns, 1895, pp. 66, 70.
[1457] See above, p. 398.
[1458] Rogers, op. cit. i. 51.
Page 587
[1459] Clearly so in some cases. See e. g. the first entry in Inq. Com. Cant. The
teams of lord and villeins having been mentioned, we then read that the ‘pecunia
in dominio’ consists of so many pigs, sheep, etc. Moreover, if all the cattle not of
the plough were enumerated under the title animalia, there would not be nearly
enough to renew the number of beasts of the plough. Again, when the capacity
of the wood is stated in terms of the pigs that it will maintain, the number thus
given will in general vastly exceed the number of pigs whose existence is
recorded. Lastly, we see that at Crediton (iv. 107) where the lord has but 57 pigs,
he receives every year 150 pigs from certain porcarii, whose herds are not
counted. Throughout Sussex the lord takes one pig from every villein who has
seven (i. 16 b). See also Morgan, op. cit. 56.
[1460] See above, p. 76.
[1461] Before we have gone through a tenth of the account of Essex, we have
read of ‘wood for’ near 10,000 pigs. If the woods were full and this rate were
maintained throughout the country, the swine of England would be as numerous
T. R. W. as they now are. No doubt Essex was exceptionally wooded and many
woods were understocked; still this mode of reckoning the capacity of wood-
land would only occur to men who were accustomed to see large herds.
[1462] In the thirteenth century it is common to find that the acre of meadow is
deemed to be twice or three times as valuable as the best arable acre of the same
village, and a much higher ratio is sometimes found.
[1463] This appears from the parallel account of Westley given in D. B. and Inq.
Com. Cant. (p. 19) where ‘pratum 2 bobus’ = ‘2 ac. prati.’ Entries such as the
following are not uncommon (I. C. C. p. 13): ‘Terra est 4 car.; in dominio est una
et villani habent 3 car. Pratum 1 car.’ See Morgan, op. cit. 53–5.
[1464] Eyton, Dorset, 146.
[1465] In the above table all vaccae, animalia and animalia ociosa are reckoned
in the third column. I believe that the two last of these terms cover all beasts of
the bovine race that are not beasts of the plough. The horses are mostly runcini
and are kept for agricultural purposes. It may be doubted whether destriers and
palfreys are enumerated.
[1466] Rot. Hund. ii. 570, 575. The calculation which gave these results was
laborious; but I believe that they are pretty correct.
[1467] On the whole, the valet of D. B., so far as it is precise, seems to me an
answer to the question, What rent would a firmarius pay for this estate stocked
as it is? But there are many difficulties.
[1468] See the important but difficult account of the mill at Arundel: D. B. i. 23.
[1469] Hall, Court Life, 221–3. The Glastonbury Inquests (Roxburgh Club)
show that 36d. is the settled price for the ox.
[1470] Rogers, Hist. Agric. i. 226, 342.
[1471] See above, p. 382.
[1472] Inq. Com. Cant. 38.
teams of lord and villeins having been mentioned, we then read that the ‘pecunia
in dominio’ consists of so many pigs, sheep, etc. Moreover, if all the cattle not of
the plough were enumerated under the title animalia, there would not be nearly
enough to renew the number of beasts of the plough. Again, when the capacity
of the wood is stated in terms of the pigs that it will maintain, the number thus
given will in general vastly exceed the number of pigs whose existence is
recorded. Lastly, we see that at Crediton (iv. 107) where the lord has but 57 pigs,
he receives every year 150 pigs from certain porcarii, whose herds are not
counted. Throughout Sussex the lord takes one pig from every villein who has
seven (i. 16 b). See also Morgan, op. cit. 56.
[1460] See above, p. 76.
[1461] Before we have gone through a tenth of the account of Essex, we have
read of ‘wood for’ near 10,000 pigs. If the woods were full and this rate were
maintained throughout the country, the swine of England would be as numerous
T. R. W. as they now are. No doubt Essex was exceptionally wooded and many
woods were understocked; still this mode of reckoning the capacity of wood-
land would only occur to men who were accustomed to see large herds.
[1462] In the thirteenth century it is common to find that the acre of meadow is
deemed to be twice or three times as valuable as the best arable acre of the same
village, and a much higher ratio is sometimes found.
[1463] This appears from the parallel account of Westley given in D. B. and Inq.
Com. Cant. (p. 19) where ‘pratum 2 bobus’ = ‘2 ac. prati.’ Entries such as the
following are not uncommon (I. C. C. p. 13): ‘Terra est 4 car.; in dominio est una
et villani habent 3 car. Pratum 1 car.’ See Morgan, op. cit. 53–5.
[1464] Eyton, Dorset, 146.
[1465] In the above table all vaccae, animalia and animalia ociosa are reckoned
in the third column. I believe that the two last of these terms cover all beasts of
the bovine race that are not beasts of the plough. The horses are mostly runcini
and are kept for agricultural purposes. It may be doubted whether destriers and
palfreys are enumerated.
[1466] Rot. Hund. ii. 570, 575. The calculation which gave these results was
laborious; but I believe that they are pretty correct.
[1467] On the whole, the valet of D. B., so far as it is precise, seems to me an
answer to the question, What rent would a firmarius pay for this estate stocked
as it is? But there are many difficulties.
[1468] See the important but difficult account of the mill at Arundel: D. B. i. 23.
[1469] Hall, Court Life, 221–3. The Glastonbury Inquests (Roxburgh Club)
show that 36d. is the settled price for the ox.
[1470] Rogers, Hist. Agric. i. 226, 342.
[1471] See above, p. 382.
[1472] Inq. Com. Cant. 38.
Page 588
[1473] Or a little less.
[1474] Perhaps too small. One estate was valued in Essex.
[1475] See above, p. 443.
[1476] Domesday of St. Paul’s, 59, 64, 69. See above, p. 399 note 1339.
[1477] Hanssen, Abhandlungen, i. 163.
[1478] After making an allowance of 22,000 for Suffolk (which I have not
counted) and adding 500 for the land between Ribble and Mersey (which owing
to some difficult problems, I have omitted), the sum would fall a little short of
68,000. The hides of London and other boroughs would raise the total. Pearson,
History, i. 658, guessed 90,000 to 100,000.
[1479] Above, p. 3.
[1480] As to the magnum pondus Normannorum, see Crawford Charters, 78.
[1481] D. B. i. 351.
[1482] D. B. i. 77.
[1483] D. B. i. 165, Alvestone.
[1484] D. B. i. 165 b, Malgeresberiae.
[1485] D. B. i. 252 b, Wenloch.
[1486] D. B. i. 40 b.
[1487] D. B. i. 32: ‘postquam habuit pro 16 hidis ad libitum Heraldi.’
[1488] Round, in Domesday Studies, i. 98–110.
[1489] K. 642 (iii. 203).
[1490] D. B. i. 41.
[1491] See above, p. 362.
[1492] I have chosen ‘subpartitioned,’ because ‘repartitioned’ might have
introduced the idea of periodical or occasional rearrangement, and this it is
desirable to exclude in the present state of our knowledge.
[1493] See a speech by the Chancellor of the Exchequer reported in The Times
for 10 July, 1896.
[1494] Round, Feudal England, 50.
[1495] See also Pollock, E. H. R. xi. 222.
[1496] D. B. i. 172.
[1497] See above, p. 268.
[1498] The estate at Matma which is in the Dodingtree hundred will be
accounted for below.
[1474] Perhaps too small. One estate was valued in Essex.
[1475] See above, p. 443.
[1476] Domesday of St. Paul’s, 59, 64, 69. See above, p. 399 note 1339.
[1477] Hanssen, Abhandlungen, i. 163.
[1478] After making an allowance of 22,000 for Suffolk (which I have not
counted) and adding 500 for the land between Ribble and Mersey (which owing
to some difficult problems, I have omitted), the sum would fall a little short of
68,000. The hides of London and other boroughs would raise the total. Pearson,
History, i. 658, guessed 90,000 to 100,000.
[1479] Above, p. 3.
[1480] As to the magnum pondus Normannorum, see Crawford Charters, 78.
[1481] D. B. i. 351.
[1482] D. B. i. 77.
[1483] D. B. i. 165, Alvestone.
[1484] D. B. i. 165 b, Malgeresberiae.
[1485] D. B. i. 252 b, Wenloch.
[1486] D. B. i. 40 b.
[1487] D. B. i. 32: ‘postquam habuit pro 16 hidis ad libitum Heraldi.’
[1488] Round, in Domesday Studies, i. 98–110.
[1489] K. 642 (iii. 203).
[1490] D. B. i. 41.
[1491] See above, p. 362.
[1492] I have chosen ‘subpartitioned,’ because ‘repartitioned’ might have
introduced the idea of periodical or occasional rearrangement, and this it is
desirable to exclude in the present state of our knowledge.
[1493] See a speech by the Chancellor of the Exchequer reported in The Times
for 10 July, 1896.
[1494] Round, Feudal England, 50.
[1495] See also Pollock, E. H. R. xi. 222.
[1496] D. B. i. 172.
[1497] See above, p. 268.
[1498] The estate at Matma which is in the Dodingtree hundred will be
accounted for below.
Page 589
[1499] Possibly this and the four next entries should be omitted.
[1500] We here omit the estates at Hamton and Bengeworth, about which the
churches of Worcester and Evesham were disputing, for we believe that they
have already been included in the Worcester estate of Cropthorn. See Round in
Domesday Studies, ii. 545.
[1501] Perhaps add 5 hides at Suchelei; but apparently these have been already
included in the account of the King’s Land.
[1502] A large hundred called Halfshire Hundred was formed. In Latin records it
is Hundredum Dimidii Comitatus. For some light on the constitution of
Dodingtree, see Round, Feudal England, 61.
[1503] ‘In Huntedunescyre sunt dccc hide et dimid.’ This means eight and a half
hundreds.
[1504] Leges Anglorum, p. 7.
[1505] On a re-count I made 1185.
[1506] Mr Charles Taylor gives 2595. See above, p. 412. Therefore I have once
more gone through the county with his book before me. The difference between
us is not altogether due to my faulty arithmetic; but arises from the different
constructions that we put upon a few composite entries. In particular I can not
allow the bishop of Worcester anything like the 231 hides that Mr Taylor gives
him. When I find an entry in this form: ‘Sancta Maria tenet H. Ibi sunt x hidae ...
De hac terra huius manerii Turstinus tenet y hidas in O,’ I believe that x includes
y, and this no matter how far the place called O may be from the place called H.
My 2388 is I think a trifle too low; but I believe the number lies very close to
2400 on one side or the other.
[1507] Ellis, Introduction, i. 184.
[1508] Feudal England, 148.
[1509] After a re-count I think that my 1356 is a little too large, and should not
be surprised if the 26631⁄2 had been exactly halved.
[1510] See above, p. 451. This is but one instance. Several other hundreds had
been similarly relieved. See Round, Feudal England, 51.
[1511] My 500 (or a trifle more) for Cheshire does not include the land between
the Ribble and the Mersey. The figures given for that district are, as is well
known, very difficult. If we take the final statement (D. B. i. 270) about the 79
‘hides’ as a grand total and hold that each of these contains 6 carucates (Feudal
England, 86) and that each of these carucates pays geld equivalent to that of one
ordinary hide, then we have here 474 units to be added to the Cestrian 500, and
yet more northerly lands may have been gelding along with Chester in Cnut’s
day.
[1512] The various copies disagree as to whether Herefordshire shall have 1200
or 1500 hides. My figure stands about halfway between these two; but many
hides were not gelding in 1086. I can not bring the Warwickshire hides down to
1200.
[1500] We here omit the estates at Hamton and Bengeworth, about which the
churches of Worcester and Evesham were disputing, for we believe that they
have already been included in the Worcester estate of Cropthorn. See Round in
Domesday Studies, ii. 545.
[1501] Perhaps add 5 hides at Suchelei; but apparently these have been already
included in the account of the King’s Land.
[1502] A large hundred called Halfshire Hundred was formed. In Latin records it
is Hundredum Dimidii Comitatus. For some light on the constitution of
Dodingtree, see Round, Feudal England, 61.
[1503] ‘In Huntedunescyre sunt dccc hide et dimid.’ This means eight and a half
hundreds.
[1504] Leges Anglorum, p. 7.
[1505] On a re-count I made 1185.
[1506] Mr Charles Taylor gives 2595. See above, p. 412. Therefore I have once
more gone through the county with his book before me. The difference between
us is not altogether due to my faulty arithmetic; but arises from the different
constructions that we put upon a few composite entries. In particular I can not
allow the bishop of Worcester anything like the 231 hides that Mr Taylor gives
him. When I find an entry in this form: ‘Sancta Maria tenet H. Ibi sunt x hidae ...
De hac terra huius manerii Turstinus tenet y hidas in O,’ I believe that x includes
y, and this no matter how far the place called O may be from the place called H.
My 2388 is I think a trifle too low; but I believe the number lies very close to
2400 on one side or the other.
[1507] Ellis, Introduction, i. 184.
[1508] Feudal England, 148.
[1509] After a re-count I think that my 1356 is a little too large, and should not
be surprised if the 26631⁄2 had been exactly halved.
[1510] See above, p. 451. This is but one instance. Several other hundreds had
been similarly relieved. See Round, Feudal England, 51.
[1511] My 500 (or a trifle more) for Cheshire does not include the land between
the Ribble and the Mersey. The figures given for that district are, as is well
known, very difficult. If we take the final statement (D. B. i. 270) about the 79
‘hides’ as a grand total and hold that each of these contains 6 carucates (Feudal
England, 86) and that each of these carucates pays geld equivalent to that of one
ordinary hide, then we have here 474 units to be added to the Cestrian 500, and
yet more northerly lands may have been gelding along with Chester in Cnut’s
day.
[1512] The various copies disagree as to whether Herefordshire shall have 1200
or 1500 hides. My figure stands about halfway between these two; but many
hides were not gelding in 1086. I can not bring the Warwickshire hides down to
1200.
Page 590
[1513] I take the numbers of the hundreds from Dr Stubbs, Const. Hist. 106. I
take them thence in order that I may not be tempted to make them rounder than
they are.
[1514] See above, p. 457.
[1515] Mr C. S. Taylor, op. cit. 31, finds 41.
[1516] Round, Feudal England, 44 ff.
[1517] Both statements might be illustrated from the Dorsetshire accounts.
Between 2 and 8 Hen. II. the geld seems to rise from £228. 5s. to £248. 5s. but
there is a blunder in the addition of the pardons in the latter roll. I believe that
Mr Round has already mentioned this case somewhere. The correspondence
between the Pipe Rolls and Domesday is sufficiently close to warrant our saying
that the story told by Orderic of a new and severer valuation made by Rufus can
have but little, if any, truth behind it. See Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 327.
[1518] The common formula is: ‘T. R. E. geldabat pro a hidis; ibi tamen sunt a´
hidae’ and a´ is largely greater than a. I infer that a´ represents a new and
increased assessment, for the Geld Inquest seems to show Cornwall paying for
401 hides and a fraction while I make a´=399.
[1519] For these three counties we can not give any B, but must draw inferences
from C. Clearly in Hereford C was often thought to be much less than B.
[1520] As already said (above, p. 420) what we take to be Leicester’s equivalent
for B is sometimes given by an unusual formula.
[1521] Rogers, Hist. Agricult. i. 110.
[1522] Yorkshire Lay Subsidy (Yorksh. Archæol. Soc.) p. xxxii.
[1523] Total acreage under all kinds of crops, bare fallow and grass, excluding
(1) nursery gardens, (2) woods and plantations, (3) mountain and heath land.
[1524] Powell, East Anglia Rising, 121–3.
[1525] As we are giving or trying to give the fullest number of hides whose
existence is attested by D. B., and not the number gelding in 1086, we compare
with it the values given by Pearson (Hist. Engl. i. 665) for the T. R. E. His values
for the T. R. W. are given above, p. 401.
[1526] Suffolk and Norfolk are omitted because the relation between their
carucates and the villar geld pence is as yet uncertain. Stafford does not provide
valuits enough to give a stable average; but in general the valets and valuits for
its hides are high. I have excluded (1) royal demesne, (2) cases in which there is
any talk of ‘waste,’ (3) cases in which a particular manor is obviously privileged.
In Lincolnshire it is difficult to obtain good figures, because of the way in which
the sokes are valued.
[1527] See above, p. 386, note 1304.
[1528] Werhard’s testament, K. 230 (i. 297), tells us of a great estate of 100
hides at Otford, of 30 hides at Graveney and so forth. The figures are so little in
take them thence in order that I may not be tempted to make them rounder than
they are.
[1514] See above, p. 457.
[1515] Mr C. S. Taylor, op. cit. 31, finds 41.
[1516] Round, Feudal England, 44 ff.
[1517] Both statements might be illustrated from the Dorsetshire accounts.
Between 2 and 8 Hen. II. the geld seems to rise from £228. 5s. to £248. 5s. but
there is a blunder in the addition of the pardons in the latter roll. I believe that
Mr Round has already mentioned this case somewhere. The correspondence
between the Pipe Rolls and Domesday is sufficiently close to warrant our saying
that the story told by Orderic of a new and severer valuation made by Rufus can
have but little, if any, truth behind it. See Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 327.
[1518] The common formula is: ‘T. R. E. geldabat pro a hidis; ibi tamen sunt a´
hidae’ and a´ is largely greater than a. I infer that a´ represents a new and
increased assessment, for the Geld Inquest seems to show Cornwall paying for
401 hides and a fraction while I make a´=399.
[1519] For these three counties we can not give any B, but must draw inferences
from C. Clearly in Hereford C was often thought to be much less than B.
[1520] As already said (above, p. 420) what we take to be Leicester’s equivalent
for B is sometimes given by an unusual formula.
[1521] Rogers, Hist. Agricult. i. 110.
[1522] Yorkshire Lay Subsidy (Yorksh. Archæol. Soc.) p. xxxii.
[1523] Total acreage under all kinds of crops, bare fallow and grass, excluding
(1) nursery gardens, (2) woods and plantations, (3) mountain and heath land.
[1524] Powell, East Anglia Rising, 121–3.
[1525] As we are giving or trying to give the fullest number of hides whose
existence is attested by D. B., and not the number gelding in 1086, we compare
with it the values given by Pearson (Hist. Engl. i. 665) for the T. R. E. His values
for the T. R. W. are given above, p. 401.
[1526] Suffolk and Norfolk are omitted because the relation between their
carucates and the villar geld pence is as yet uncertain. Stafford does not provide
valuits enough to give a stable average; but in general the valets and valuits for
its hides are high. I have excluded (1) royal demesne, (2) cases in which there is
any talk of ‘waste,’ (3) cases in which a particular manor is obviously privileged.
In Lincolnshire it is difficult to obtain good figures, because of the way in which
the sokes are valued.
[1527] See above, p. 386, note 1304.
[1528] Werhard’s testament, K. 230 (i. 297), tells us of a great estate of 100
hides at Otford, of 30 hides at Graveney and so forth. The figures are so little in
Page 591
harmony with D. B. and with the other Canterbury charters that we may suspect
the 100 manses at Otford of covering many smaller estates, each of which
appears elsewhere with a name of its own.
[1529] In D. B. i. 12 b St. Augustin holds 30 solins at Norborne. In 618 Eadbald
of Kent, K. 6 (i. 9), gave 30 aratra at Nortburne; but the deed is spurious. In D.
B. 5 b, Rochester has 3 solins at Totesclive, 6 at Hallinges, 21⁄2 at Coclestane, 3
at Mellingetes, 6 at Bronlei. In 788 Offa, K. 152 (i. 183), gave 6 aratra at
Trottesclib. Egbert, K. 160 (i. 193), gave 10 at Hallingas. In 880 Æthelstan, K.
312 (ii. 109), B. ii. 168, gave 3 at Cucolanstan. Edmund, K. 409 (ii. 265), gave 3
at Meallingas. In 998 Æthelred, K. 700 (iii. 305), gave 6 at Brunleage. The
Rochester deeds therefore may point to some reduction; but they do not tell of
any startling change.
[1530] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 101, holds that the Euti who invaded Kent fitted
themselves into an agrarian framework prepared by Celts. They came not, like
the great mass of Saxons and Angles, from a country in which villages of the
Germanic type had grown up, but from an originally Celtic land, which they
while still in the pastoral state had seized and subjugated. It is an interesting
though hazardous speculation. Certainly some cause or another keeps Kent apart
from the rest of England.
[1531] Thus, K. 371 (ii. 207): Æthelstan gives to the church of Exeter 6 perticae
(yard-lands?). B. ii. 433: he gives one cassate to St Petroc. K. 787 (iv. 115): the
Confessor gives a pertica and a half in Cornwall. Crawford Charters, pp. 1–43:
Æthelheard gives 20 cassates at Crediton; that is, a dozen of our parishes. Ibid.
p. 9: a single yard of land is gaged for 30 mancuses of gold. K. 1306 (vi. 163): in
739 Æthelred gives 3 perticae to Athelney. K. 1324 (vi. 188): Cnut gives to
Athelney duas mansas siue (= et) unam perticam.
[1532] K. 1143 (v. 278); B. ii. 527. For the arepennis see Meitzen, op. cit. i. 278,
where an explanation derived from the Irish laws is given of its name.
[1533] See above, p. 451.
[1534] The lords of Cambridgeshire may have done good service during the
campaign in the Isle of Ely.
[1535] Pearson’s valuit is £491; his valet £736.
[1536] The appearance of the curious hida may lead to the guess that if the geld
be at two shillings, it is the Leicestershire hida, not the Leicestershire carucata
which pays this sum. But (1) if the hida contains 18, or even 12, carucates we
shall then have on our hands a case of extreme under-taxation; and (2) this will
not account for the fact that an exceedingly small value is given to the land that a
team ploughs.
[1537] D. B. i. 233.
[1538] At the end of the account of the land between Ribble and Mersey (i. 240)
we are told that there were altogether 79 hidae which T. R. E. were worth £145.
2s. 2d. This would give a very small value for the carucate, if the hida of this
district had six carucates; and in many cases 2s. 8d. is the value assigned to the
carucate. If to a two-shilling geld the hida paid but two shillings, this is a bad,
the 100 manses at Otford of covering many smaller estates, each of which
appears elsewhere with a name of its own.
[1529] In D. B. i. 12 b St. Augustin holds 30 solins at Norborne. In 618 Eadbald
of Kent, K. 6 (i. 9), gave 30 aratra at Nortburne; but the deed is spurious. In D.
B. 5 b, Rochester has 3 solins at Totesclive, 6 at Hallinges, 21⁄2 at Coclestane, 3
at Mellingetes, 6 at Bronlei. In 788 Offa, K. 152 (i. 183), gave 6 aratra at
Trottesclib. Egbert, K. 160 (i. 193), gave 10 at Hallingas. In 880 Æthelstan, K.
312 (ii. 109), B. ii. 168, gave 3 at Cucolanstan. Edmund, K. 409 (ii. 265), gave 3
at Meallingas. In 998 Æthelred, K. 700 (iii. 305), gave 6 at Brunleage. The
Rochester deeds therefore may point to some reduction; but they do not tell of
any startling change.
[1530] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 101, holds that the Euti who invaded Kent fitted
themselves into an agrarian framework prepared by Celts. They came not, like
the great mass of Saxons and Angles, from a country in which villages of the
Germanic type had grown up, but from an originally Celtic land, which they
while still in the pastoral state had seized and subjugated. It is an interesting
though hazardous speculation. Certainly some cause or another keeps Kent apart
from the rest of England.
[1531] Thus, K. 371 (ii. 207): Æthelstan gives to the church of Exeter 6 perticae
(yard-lands?). B. ii. 433: he gives one cassate to St Petroc. K. 787 (iv. 115): the
Confessor gives a pertica and a half in Cornwall. Crawford Charters, pp. 1–43:
Æthelheard gives 20 cassates at Crediton; that is, a dozen of our parishes. Ibid.
p. 9: a single yard of land is gaged for 30 mancuses of gold. K. 1306 (vi. 163): in
739 Æthelred gives 3 perticae to Athelney. K. 1324 (vi. 188): Cnut gives to
Athelney duas mansas siue (= et) unam perticam.
[1532] K. 1143 (v. 278); B. ii. 527. For the arepennis see Meitzen, op. cit. i. 278,
where an explanation derived from the Irish laws is given of its name.
[1533] See above, p. 451.
[1534] The lords of Cambridgeshire may have done good service during the
campaign in the Isle of Ely.
[1535] Pearson’s valuit is £491; his valet £736.
[1536] The appearance of the curious hida may lead to the guess that if the geld
be at two shillings, it is the Leicestershire hida, not the Leicestershire carucata
which pays this sum. But (1) if the hida contains 18, or even 12, carucates we
shall then have on our hands a case of extreme under-taxation; and (2) this will
not account for the fact that an exceedingly small value is given to the land that a
team ploughs.
[1537] D. B. i. 233.
[1538] At the end of the account of the land between Ribble and Mersey (i. 240)
we are told that there were altogether 79 hidae which T. R. E. were worth £145.
2s. 2d. This would give a very small value for the carucate, if the hida of this
district had six carucates; and in many cases 2s. 8d. is the value assigned to the
carucate. If to a two-shilling geld the hida paid but two shillings, this is a bad,
Page 592
though not unprecedented, case of under-taxation. On the other hand, if the
carucate paid two shillings, its value has been stated in some abnormal fashion. I
do not think it out of the question that the hidae of Leicestershire and Lancashire
are modern arrangements designed to give relief in some manner or another to
districts which have been too heavily burdened with carucates.
[1539] It may, however, have been applied to the conquered West Wales from an
early time. See above, p. 467.
[1540] See above, p. 427.
[1541] D. B. i. 293 b.
[1542] And two sokemen with two teams.
[1543] The artificiality or traditionality of the teamland is even more obvious in
D. B. than it is in our statement. At Okeham are 4 hides; land for 16 teams. The
men have 37. The king has 2 in his demesne ‘et tamen aliae quatuor possunt
esse.’ So what is land for 16 teams is not only stocked but insufficiently stocked
with 39. The manor of one carucate held by Leuenot seems to be another
infringement of the traditional scheme, unless that carucate has been already
reckoned among the four at Okeham.
[1544] Many other instances suggesting the artificiality of B might be given
from northern counties; e.g. in Northampton (i. 227) we have five consecutive
entries in which A = 2, 2, 2, 0·5, 4; B = 5, 5, 5, 1·25, 10; C = 3, 2, 5, 1, 8. See
also Round, Feudal England, 90.
[1545] D. B. i. 323 b.
[1546] D. B. i. 299 Walesgrif £56; 299 b Poclinton £56; 309 Ghellinghes £56;
305 Witebi £112. It will be remembered that, as our hundred-weight (112 lbs)
shows, 112 can be called a hundred.
[1547] Pipe Rolls, 2. 3. 4. 5. Hen. II. In a few cases the earlier donum includes a
composition ‘for murders and pleas.’ That from Yorkshire is partly paid by York,
that from Gloucestershire by Gloucester.
[1548] Nearly.
[1549] Except the ‘hides,’ if hides they be, of Leicestershire and Lancashire.
[1550] D. B. i. 35 (Surrey).
[1551] D. B. i. 49 b (Hants).
[1552] D. B. i. 364 (Lincoln).
[1553] See above, p. 394.
[1554] This part of the evidence is set out in Mr Round’s Feudal England, 37–
44. I have gone through all the calculations. His results are hardly different from
those which I have obtained and therefore I dwell no longer on this part of the
case, for it has been well stated.
carucate paid two shillings, its value has been stated in some abnormal fashion. I
do not think it out of the question that the hidae of Leicestershire and Lancashire
are modern arrangements designed to give relief in some manner or another to
districts which have been too heavily burdened with carucates.
[1539] It may, however, have been applied to the conquered West Wales from an
early time. See above, p. 467.
[1540] See above, p. 427.
[1541] D. B. i. 293 b.
[1542] And two sokemen with two teams.
[1543] The artificiality or traditionality of the teamland is even more obvious in
D. B. than it is in our statement. At Okeham are 4 hides; land for 16 teams. The
men have 37. The king has 2 in his demesne ‘et tamen aliae quatuor possunt
esse.’ So what is land for 16 teams is not only stocked but insufficiently stocked
with 39. The manor of one carucate held by Leuenot seems to be another
infringement of the traditional scheme, unless that carucate has been already
reckoned among the four at Okeham.
[1544] Many other instances suggesting the artificiality of B might be given
from northern counties; e.g. in Northampton (i. 227) we have five consecutive
entries in which A = 2, 2, 2, 0·5, 4; B = 5, 5, 5, 1·25, 10; C = 3, 2, 5, 1, 8. See
also Round, Feudal England, 90.
[1545] D. B. i. 323 b.
[1546] D. B. i. 299 Walesgrif £56; 299 b Poclinton £56; 309 Ghellinghes £56;
305 Witebi £112. It will be remembered that, as our hundred-weight (112 lbs)
shows, 112 can be called a hundred.
[1547] Pipe Rolls, 2. 3. 4. 5. Hen. II. In a few cases the earlier donum includes a
composition ‘for murders and pleas.’ That from Yorkshire is partly paid by York,
that from Gloucestershire by Gloucester.
[1548] Nearly.
[1549] Except the ‘hides,’ if hides they be, of Leicestershire and Lancashire.
[1550] D. B. i. 35 (Surrey).
[1551] D. B. i. 49 b (Hants).
[1552] D. B. i. 364 (Lincoln).
[1553] See above, p. 394.
[1554] This part of the evidence is set out in Mr Round’s Feudal England, 37–
44. I have gone through all the calculations. His results are hardly different from
those which I have obtained and therefore I dwell no longer on this part of the
case, for it has been well stated.
Page 593
[1555] D. B. i. 192; iv. 107. The Inquisitio Eliensis puts the number of cottiers at
18, while Domesday gives 28. See Hamilton’s edition, p. 119.
[1556] Downham, Witchford, Sutton, ‘Helle,’ Wilburton, Stretham, Stuntney,
Doddington.
[1557] Wichford, D. B. i. 192; iv. 507; Hamilton, 119.
[1558] Witcham, Whittlesey, Lindon, Wentworth, Chatteris, Wisbeach,
Littleport.
[1559] Wisbeach, 31⁄2 H. + 1 V. + 150 A. + 21⁄21⁄2 H. = 10 H.
[1560] In giving the sum of the particulars I add hides to hides, virgates to
virgates, acres to acres, but I make no assumption as to the number of acres or
virgates in the hide.
[1561] D. B. iv. 4, 9, 16.
[1562] D. B. iv. 22.
[1563] D. B. iv. 1, 6, 13.
[1564] D. B. iv. 3, 8, 15 (Melchesham).
[1565] D. B. iv. 3–4, 9, 15 (Chinbrige).
[1566] D. B. iv. 61–2–3.
[1567] D. B. iv. 23 (Hunesberge); see also Langeberge on the same page.
[1568] Round in Domesday Studies, i. 212: ‘I have worked through the
Inquisitio Geldi with this special object, but found to my disappointment that the
odd acres which paid geld on this occasion did not pay at a uniform rate, some
paying twice as much as others.’
[1569] D. B. ii. 19: ‘Ratendunam tenuit S. Adelred T. R. E. ... pro 20 hidis.
Modo pro 16 hidis et dimidia.... Et 30 acras tenet Siward de S. Adelred. Modo
tenet Ranulfus Piperellus de rege, set hundret testatur de abbatia. Et 3 hidas et 30
acras quas tenuit ecclesia et Leuesunus de ea T. R. E. modo tenet Eudo de
abbate.’ I think that this involves the statement:
16½ H. + 30 A. + 3 H. + 30 A. = 20 H.
[1570] D. B. ii. 3, 11, 33, 63 b, 78 b, and in many other places.
[1571] Ibid. 31.
[1572] Ibid. 6 b, 42 b.
[1573] Ibid. 46.
[1574] Ibid. 48.
[1575] Ibid. 6 b, 49, 60.
[1576] Ibid. 43.
18, while Domesday gives 28. See Hamilton’s edition, p. 119.
[1556] Downham, Witchford, Sutton, ‘Helle,’ Wilburton, Stretham, Stuntney,
Doddington.
[1557] Wichford, D. B. i. 192; iv. 507; Hamilton, 119.
[1558] Witcham, Whittlesey, Lindon, Wentworth, Chatteris, Wisbeach,
Littleport.
[1559] Wisbeach, 31⁄2 H. + 1 V. + 150 A. + 21⁄21⁄2 H. = 10 H.
[1560] In giving the sum of the particulars I add hides to hides, virgates to
virgates, acres to acres, but I make no assumption as to the number of acres or
virgates in the hide.
[1561] D. B. iv. 4, 9, 16.
[1562] D. B. iv. 22.
[1563] D. B. iv. 1, 6, 13.
[1564] D. B. iv. 3, 8, 15 (Melchesham).
[1565] D. B. iv. 3–4, 9, 15 (Chinbrige).
[1566] D. B. iv. 61–2–3.
[1567] D. B. iv. 23 (Hunesberge); see also Langeberge on the same page.
[1568] Round in Domesday Studies, i. 212: ‘I have worked through the
Inquisitio Geldi with this special object, but found to my disappointment that the
odd acres which paid geld on this occasion did not pay at a uniform rate, some
paying twice as much as others.’
[1569] D. B. ii. 19: ‘Ratendunam tenuit S. Adelred T. R. E. ... pro 20 hidis.
Modo pro 16 hidis et dimidia.... Et 30 acras tenet Siward de S. Adelred. Modo
tenet Ranulfus Piperellus de rege, set hundret testatur de abbatia. Et 3 hidas et 30
acras quas tenuit ecclesia et Leuesunus de ea T. R. E. modo tenet Eudo de
abbate.’ I think that this involves the statement:
16½ H. + 30 A. + 3 H. + 30 A. = 20 H.
[1570] D. B. ii. 3, 11, 33, 63 b, 78 b, and in many other places.
[1571] Ibid. 31.
[1572] Ibid. 6 b, 42 b.
[1573] Ibid. 46.
[1574] Ibid. 48.
[1575] Ibid. 6 b, 49, 60.
[1576] Ibid. 43.
Page 594
[1577] Ibid. 74.
[1578] Ibid. 1 b.
[1579] Ibid. 11 b, 30 b, 31, 47 b.
[1580] Ibid. 72.
[1581] Ibid. 21 b.
[1582] Ibid. 16, 15.
[1583] D. B. ii. 79.
[1584] Some other fractions into which a hide would easily break by inheritance
and partition can be expressed in various ways. Thus two-thirds of a hide can be
expressed as 80 A. or as ‘half a hide and 20 acres.’ Three-quarters of a hide
appears sometimes as ‘half a hide and 30 A.,’ sometimes as ‘a hide less 30 A.’
We might add to our other arguments derived from Essex that used by Morgan
(op. cit., p. 31). It seems fairly clear that the holding of Roger ‘God Bless the
Dames’, which is called 3 V. in one place is called 1⁄2 H. + 30 A. in another place
(D. B. iv. 21 b, 96 b).
[1585] D. B. i. 141 b, Wallingtone.
[1586] D. B. i. 141, Stuterehele.
[1587] D. B. i. 165. There is here a transition from geldable area to real area.
This land is rated at a hide, but when you come to plough it, you will find only
64 acres.
[1588] D. B. i. 93 b, Dudesham; iv. 396.
[1589] D. B. i. 79 b. Eyton, Dorset, 16, says that this is a clumsy way of
describing 1 H. + 1 A. Round, Domesday Studies, i. 213, makes some just
remarks on Eyton’s treatment of this passage.
[1590] D. B. i. 95 b, Ecewiche; iv. 333.
[1591] D. B. ii. 389 (Cratingas). In Northamptonshire also there is talk of
virgates; e.g. D. B. 225 b, 226 b: 3V. - 1 B.; 2 V. + 1 B.
[1592] D. B. ii. 377 b.
[1593] D. B. i. 276 b, 278.
[1594] If I hold two and a half acres in one place and three roods in a
neighbouring place and you ask me how much land I have, I may tell you that I
have two and a half acres and three roods. If you ask me how much money I
have in my purse, I may tell you that I have half-a-crown and three shillings. But
returns to governmental inquiries would not be habitually made in this way.
[1595] D. B. i. 13: ‘pro uno solin se defendit; tria iuga sunt infra divisionem
Hugonis et quartum iugum est extra.’
[1596] D. B. i. 2.
[1578] Ibid. 1 b.
[1579] Ibid. 11 b, 30 b, 31, 47 b.
[1580] Ibid. 72.
[1581] Ibid. 21 b.
[1582] Ibid. 16, 15.
[1583] D. B. ii. 79.
[1584] Some other fractions into which a hide would easily break by inheritance
and partition can be expressed in various ways. Thus two-thirds of a hide can be
expressed as 80 A. or as ‘half a hide and 20 acres.’ Three-quarters of a hide
appears sometimes as ‘half a hide and 30 A.,’ sometimes as ‘a hide less 30 A.’
We might add to our other arguments derived from Essex that used by Morgan
(op. cit., p. 31). It seems fairly clear that the holding of Roger ‘God Bless the
Dames’, which is called 3 V. in one place is called 1⁄2 H. + 30 A. in another place
(D. B. iv. 21 b, 96 b).
[1585] D. B. i. 141 b, Wallingtone.
[1586] D. B. i. 141, Stuterehele.
[1587] D. B. i. 165. There is here a transition from geldable area to real area.
This land is rated at a hide, but when you come to plough it, you will find only
64 acres.
[1588] D. B. i. 93 b, Dudesham; iv. 396.
[1589] D. B. i. 79 b. Eyton, Dorset, 16, says that this is a clumsy way of
describing 1 H. + 1 A. Round, Domesday Studies, i. 213, makes some just
remarks on Eyton’s treatment of this passage.
[1590] D. B. i. 95 b, Ecewiche; iv. 333.
[1591] D. B. ii. 389 (Cratingas). In Northamptonshire also there is talk of
virgates; e.g. D. B. 225 b, 226 b: 3V. - 1 B.; 2 V. + 1 B.
[1592] D. B. ii. 377 b.
[1593] D. B. i. 276 b, 278.
[1594] If I hold two and a half acres in one place and three roods in a
neighbouring place and you ask me how much land I have, I may tell you that I
have two and a half acres and three roods. If you ask me how much money I
have in my purse, I may tell you that I have half-a-crown and three shillings. But
returns to governmental inquiries would not be habitually made in this way.
[1595] D. B. i. 13: ‘pro uno solin se defendit; tria iuga sunt infra divisionem
Hugonis et quartum iugum est extra.’
[1596] D. B. i. 2.
Page 595
[1597] Elton, Tenures of Kent, 133–4.
[1598] D. B. i. 12 b.
[1599] D. B. i. 9 b.
[1600] D. B. i. 12.
[1601] Kemble, Saxons, ch. iv. and App. B.
[1602] Saxons, i. 490.
[1603] D. B. iv. 42. Cf. D. B. i. 81 b.
[1604] Robertson, Hist. Essays, 95, 96. He has entirely misunderstood the entry
touching the hundred of Ailestebba. The equation involved in it is merely the
following: 16 H. (i.e. 10 + 41⁄2 + 11⁄2) + 37 H. + 20 H. = 73 H.
[1605] Eyton, Dorset, 15; Bound in Domesday Studies, i. 213.
[1606] Dr Isaac Taylor, The Ploughland and the Plough, in Domesday Studies, i.
143. Of this paper there is an excellent review by W. H. Stevenson in Engl. Hist.
Rev. v. 142.
[1607] Domesday Studies, 150; D. B. i. 324.
[1608] D. B. i. 311 b.
[1609] Round, Feudal England, 60.
[1610] See above, p. 397.
[1611] See above, pp. 402, 435.
[1612] See above, p. 471.
[1613] See above, p. 480.
[1614] Dial. de Scac. i. 17.
[1615] The appearance in D. B. of a few ‘hides’ which apparently consist
altogether of wood-land (e.g. ii. 55 b) is one of the many signs that the fiscal
hide has diverged from its original pattern. A block of wood-land would not be
‘the land of one family.’
[1616] See above, p. 389.
[1617] See above, p. 393.
[1618] Dr Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 79, has endeavoured to find a via media. To me
it seems that his suggestion is open to almost all the objections that can be urged
against our Big Hide, for he seems prepared to give the normal household of the
oldest day its 120 acres. Mr Seebohm’s adhesion to the party of the Big Hide is
of importance, for I can not but think that a small hide (which afterwards was
called a virgate) would have assorted better with his general theory. Conversely,
it is curious that Kemble, the champion of the free ceorls, was also the
champion, if not the inventor, of the Little Hide.
[1598] D. B. i. 12 b.
[1599] D. B. i. 9 b.
[1600] D. B. i. 12.
[1601] Kemble, Saxons, ch. iv. and App. B.
[1602] Saxons, i. 490.
[1603] D. B. iv. 42. Cf. D. B. i. 81 b.
[1604] Robertson, Hist. Essays, 95, 96. He has entirely misunderstood the entry
touching the hundred of Ailestebba. The equation involved in it is merely the
following: 16 H. (i.e. 10 + 41⁄2 + 11⁄2) + 37 H. + 20 H. = 73 H.
[1605] Eyton, Dorset, 15; Bound in Domesday Studies, i. 213.
[1606] Dr Isaac Taylor, The Ploughland and the Plough, in Domesday Studies, i.
143. Of this paper there is an excellent review by W. H. Stevenson in Engl. Hist.
Rev. v. 142.
[1607] Domesday Studies, 150; D. B. i. 324.
[1608] D. B. i. 311 b.
[1609] Round, Feudal England, 60.
[1610] See above, p. 397.
[1611] See above, pp. 402, 435.
[1612] See above, p. 471.
[1613] See above, p. 480.
[1614] Dial. de Scac. i. 17.
[1615] The appearance in D. B. of a few ‘hides’ which apparently consist
altogether of wood-land (e.g. ii. 55 b) is one of the many signs that the fiscal
hide has diverged from its original pattern. A block of wood-land would not be
‘the land of one family.’
[1616] See above, p. 389.
[1617] See above, p. 393.
[1618] Dr Stubbs, Const. Hist. i. 79, has endeavoured to find a via media. To me
it seems that his suggestion is open to almost all the objections that can be urged
against our Big Hide, for he seems prepared to give the normal household of the
oldest day its 120 acres. Mr Seebohm’s adhesion to the party of the Big Hide is
of importance, for I can not but think that a small hide (which afterwards was
called a virgate) would have assorted better with his general theory. Conversely,
it is curious that Kemble, the champion of the free ceorls, was also the
champion, if not the inventor, of the Little Hide.
Page 596
[1619] See above, p. 385.
[1620] D. B. i. 32 b.
[1621] K. 812 (iv. 151).
[1622] K. 986–988 (v. 14–21); B. i. 55–9, 64.
[1623] Plummer, Bede, ii. 217.
[1624] K. 917 (iv. 165).
[1625] D. B. i. 66 b, 67.
[1626] K. 355 (ii. 179).
[1627] K. 263 (ii. 35). Accepted by Kemble.
[1628] K. 174 (i. 209).
[1629] K. 24 (i. 28).
[1630] It is fair to say that the instances here given are picked instances and that
the Malmesbury title to some other lands is not so exceedingly neat.
[1631] See above, p. 112.
[1632] This is so even in the case of the Kentish churches, see above, p. 466.
The Chronicle of Abingdon affords good materials for comparison with D. B. As
a general rule the charters will account for just about the right number of
manses, if the manses are to be the hides. There are exceptions; but not more
than might be fairly explained by changes such as those recorded in the
following words (Chron. Abingd. i. 270):—‘Fuerunt autem Witham, Seouecurt,
Henstesie, Eatun membra de Cumenora temporibus Eadgari regis Angliae,
habentes cassatos xxv; nunc vero Hensteseie membrum est de Bertona;
Witheham et Seouecurt militibus datae; Eatun omnìmodo ablata.’ See also an
excellent paper by Mr C. S. Taylor, The Pre-Domesday Hide of Gloucestershire,
Trans. Brist, and Glouc. Archæol. Soc. vol. xvíii.
[1633] Round, Feudal England, 44 ff.
[1634] Nasse, Agricultural Community, Engl. transl., 23–5. Seebohm, Village
Community. 111.
[1635] K. 552 (iii. 35).
[1636] K. 617 (iii. 164).
[1637] Charter of Æthelwulf, K. 1057 (v. 113); T. p. 115; H. & S. 646. We
should not be surprised if at least one part of the mysterious ‘decimation’ turned
out to be an early act of ‘beneficial hidation.’
[1638] Charter of Edward, K. 342 (ii. 153).
[1639] Charter of Æthelstan, K. 1113 (v. 224).
[1640] Charters of Edgar, K. 512 (ii. 401); K. 583 (iii. 111).
[1620] D. B. i. 32 b.
[1621] K. 812 (iv. 151).
[1622] K. 986–988 (v. 14–21); B. i. 55–9, 64.
[1623] Plummer, Bede, ii. 217.
[1624] K. 917 (iv. 165).
[1625] D. B. i. 66 b, 67.
[1626] K. 355 (ii. 179).
[1627] K. 263 (ii. 35). Accepted by Kemble.
[1628] K. 174 (i. 209).
[1629] K. 24 (i. 28).
[1630] It is fair to say that the instances here given are picked instances and that
the Malmesbury title to some other lands is not so exceedingly neat.
[1631] See above, p. 112.
[1632] This is so even in the case of the Kentish churches, see above, p. 466.
The Chronicle of Abingdon affords good materials for comparison with D. B. As
a general rule the charters will account for just about the right number of
manses, if the manses are to be the hides. There are exceptions; but not more
than might be fairly explained by changes such as those recorded in the
following words (Chron. Abingd. i. 270):—‘Fuerunt autem Witham, Seouecurt,
Henstesie, Eatun membra de Cumenora temporibus Eadgari regis Angliae,
habentes cassatos xxv; nunc vero Hensteseie membrum est de Bertona;
Witheham et Seouecurt militibus datae; Eatun omnìmodo ablata.’ See also an
excellent paper by Mr C. S. Taylor, The Pre-Domesday Hide of Gloucestershire,
Trans. Brist, and Glouc. Archæol. Soc. vol. xvíii.
[1633] Round, Feudal England, 44 ff.
[1634] Nasse, Agricultural Community, Engl. transl., 23–5. Seebohm, Village
Community. 111.
[1635] K. 552 (iii. 35).
[1636] K. 617 (iii. 164).
[1637] Charter of Æthelwulf, K. 1057 (v. 113); T. p. 115; H. & S. 646. We
should not be surprised if at least one part of the mysterious ‘decimation’ turned
out to be an early act of ‘beneficial hidation.’
[1638] Charter of Edward, K. 342 (ii. 153).
[1639] Charter of Æthelstan, K. 1113 (v. 224).
[1640] Charters of Edgar, K. 512 (ii. 401); K. 583 (iii. 111).
Page 597
[1641] Writ of Æthelred, K. 642 (iii. 203).
[1642] D. B. i. 40–41.
[1643] Kitchin, Winchester, 7: ‘Cenwalh built the church, the parent of
Winchester cathedral ... The monks at once set themselves to ennoble toil, to
wed tillage with culture; and it is interesting to note that the first endowment of
the Church in Wessex fell to them in the form of a great grant of all the land for
some leagues around the city, given for the building of the church.’ Did the
monks till the land for some leagues around the city? I think not. Was it all
occupied by their serfs? I think not. What was given was a superiority. One last
question:—Did the monks really ennoble toil by appropriating its proceeds?
[1644] D. B. i. 65 b: ‘Episcopus Wintoniensis tenet Duntone. T. R. E. geldavit
pro 100 hidis tribus minus. Duae ex his non sunt episcopi, quia ablatae fuerunt
cum aliis tribus de aecclesia et de manu episcopi tempore Cnut Regis.’
[1645] K. 985 (v. 12).
[1646] K. 1036 (v. 80).
[1647] K. 342 (ii. 153).
[1648] K. 1108 (v. 211).
[1649] K. 421 (ii. 287).
[1650] K. 599 (iii. 139).
[1651] K. 698 (iii. 299).
[1652] As to the limits of Downton, see W. H. Jones, Domesday for Wiltshire,
213.
[1653] D. B. i. 31; K. 1058 (v. 114); 1093 (v. 176); 605 (iii. 149).
[1654] D. B. i. 40. Forty hides said to have been given by Cenwealla. K. 997 (v.
39); 1039 (v. 85); 1086 (v. 162); 1090 (v. 162); 601 (iii. 144).
[1655] D. B. i. 42 b. This belongs to the New Minster. In K. 336 (ii. 144)
Edward the Elder is made to give ‘quendam fundum quem indigenae Myceldefer
appellant cum suo hundredo et appendicibus, habens centum cassatos et
aecclesiam.’ The territory has 100 hides and is a ‘hundred.’
[1656] D. B. i. 87 b. K. 1002 (v. 44); 1051–2 (v. 99, 101); 1084 (v. 157); 374 (ii.
209); 598 (iii. 136).
[1657] They are hardly the worse witnesses about this matter for having been
much ‘improved.’ They do not look like late forgeries. Those which bear the
earliest dates seem to be treated as genuine in charters of the tenth century which
are not (if anything that comes from Winchester is not) suspected.
[1658] Kemble, Saxons, i. 487; D. B. i. 87 b.
[1659] Eyton, Somerset, ii. 34.
[1660] See above, p. 499, note 1656.
[1642] D. B. i. 40–41.
[1643] Kitchin, Winchester, 7: ‘Cenwalh built the church, the parent of
Winchester cathedral ... The monks at once set themselves to ennoble toil, to
wed tillage with culture; and it is interesting to note that the first endowment of
the Church in Wessex fell to them in the form of a great grant of all the land for
some leagues around the city, given for the building of the church.’ Did the
monks till the land for some leagues around the city? I think not. Was it all
occupied by their serfs? I think not. What was given was a superiority. One last
question:—Did the monks really ennoble toil by appropriating its proceeds?
[1644] D. B. i. 65 b: ‘Episcopus Wintoniensis tenet Duntone. T. R. E. geldavit
pro 100 hidis tribus minus. Duae ex his non sunt episcopi, quia ablatae fuerunt
cum aliis tribus de aecclesia et de manu episcopi tempore Cnut Regis.’
[1645] K. 985 (v. 12).
[1646] K. 1036 (v. 80).
[1647] K. 342 (ii. 153).
[1648] K. 1108 (v. 211).
[1649] K. 421 (ii. 287).
[1650] K. 599 (iii. 139).
[1651] K. 698 (iii. 299).
[1652] As to the limits of Downton, see W. H. Jones, Domesday for Wiltshire,
213.
[1653] D. B. i. 31; K. 1058 (v. 114); 1093 (v. 176); 605 (iii. 149).
[1654] D. B. i. 40. Forty hides said to have been given by Cenwealla. K. 997 (v.
39); 1039 (v. 85); 1086 (v. 162); 1090 (v. 162); 601 (iii. 144).
[1655] D. B. i. 42 b. This belongs to the New Minster. In K. 336 (ii. 144)
Edward the Elder is made to give ‘quendam fundum quem indigenae Myceldefer
appellant cum suo hundredo et appendicibus, habens centum cassatos et
aecclesiam.’ The territory has 100 hides and is a ‘hundred.’
[1656] D. B. i. 87 b. K. 1002 (v. 44); 1051–2 (v. 99, 101); 1084 (v. 157); 374 (ii.
209); 598 (iii. 136).
[1657] They are hardly the worse witnesses about this matter for having been
much ‘improved.’ They do not look like late forgeries. Those which bear the
earliest dates seem to be treated as genuine in charters of the tenth century which
are not (if anything that comes from Winchester is not) suspected.
[1658] Kemble, Saxons, i. 487; D. B. i. 87 b.
[1659] Eyton, Somerset, ii. 34.
[1660] See above, p. 499, note 1656.
Page 598
[1661] Compare, for instance, the account of the estates of the Bishop of Wells,
D. B. i. 89, with the charter ascribed to the Confessor, K. 816 (iv. 163). In the
former we read of 50 hides at Wells; in the latter we see that these hides cover 24
villages or hamlets, each of which has its name. According to Eyton (Somerset,
24) this estate extends over nearly 22,000 acres. The Malmesbury charter, K.
817 (iv. 165) is another good illustration. Kemble’s identifications were hasty
and have fared ill at the hands of those who have made local researches. A few
examples follow:—Keynsham, 50 H. = 3330 A. (Kemble), 11,138 A. and more
(Eyton). Dowlish, 9 H. = 680 A. (Kemble), 1282 (Eyton). Road, 9 H. = 1010 A.
(Kemble), 1664 (Eyton). Portishead, 11 H. = 1610 (Kemble), 2093 (Eyton). The
instances that Kemble gives (vol. i. p. 106) from the A.-S. land-books are
equally unfortunate. Thus he reads of 50 H. at Brokenborough, Wilts, and seeks
for them all in a modern parish which has 2950 A.; but the Domesday manor of
this name covered ‘at least 6000 or perhaps 7000 acres’ (W. H. Jones, Domesday
for Wilts, p. xxvii.). In several instances Kemble tries to force into a single
parish all the hides of a hundred which takes its name from that parish.
[1662] Hanssen, Abhandlungen, i. 499.
[1663] See above, p. 229, and Mr Taylor’s paper there mentioned.
[1664] Napier and Stevenson, Crawford Charters, 43. Compare D. B. i. 101 b. In
the Confessor’s time ‘Crediton’ gelded for 15 hides. There was land for 185
teams, and teams to that number existed. There were 264 villeins, 73 bordiers
and 40 serfs. Æthelheard’s charter suggests either that in his day this part of
Devon was very sparsely peopled, or that already, under a system of partitionary
taxation, a small number of fiscal units had been cast upon a poor district. When
at a later time Eadnoth bishop of Crediton mortgages a yardland for 30 mancuses
of gold (Ibid. p. 5), this yardland will be a fiscal virgate of wide extent. See
above, p. 467, note 1531.
[1665] See above, p. 445.
[1666] See above, p. 400.
[1667] See above, p. 458.
[1668] See above, p. 188.
[1669] Birch, Cart. Sax. iii. 671; Munimenta Gildhallae, ii. 627; Gale, Scriptores
xv., i. 748; Liebermann, Leges Anglorum, 9. 10.
[1670] This we can not find. If Kent were included in the scheme, we should
read of Canterbury, Rochester etc. Therefore we probably start in Sussex, but at
some point east of Hastings. In any case, unless a name has dropped out, we can
not make the five Sussex burgs correspond to the six rapes of a later day, which,
going from east to west, are Hastings, Pevensey, Lewes, Bramber, Arundel,
Chichester.
[1671] See the Læwe, Læwes of K. 499, 1237.
[1672] A confusion of P and W is common.
D. B. i. 89, with the charter ascribed to the Confessor, K. 816 (iv. 163). In the
former we read of 50 hides at Wells; in the latter we see that these hides cover 24
villages or hamlets, each of which has its name. According to Eyton (Somerset,
24) this estate extends over nearly 22,000 acres. The Malmesbury charter, K.
817 (iv. 165) is another good illustration. Kemble’s identifications were hasty
and have fared ill at the hands of those who have made local researches. A few
examples follow:—Keynsham, 50 H. = 3330 A. (Kemble), 11,138 A. and more
(Eyton). Dowlish, 9 H. = 680 A. (Kemble), 1282 (Eyton). Road, 9 H. = 1010 A.
(Kemble), 1664 (Eyton). Portishead, 11 H. = 1610 (Kemble), 2093 (Eyton). The
instances that Kemble gives (vol. i. p. 106) from the A.-S. land-books are
equally unfortunate. Thus he reads of 50 H. at Brokenborough, Wilts, and seeks
for them all in a modern parish which has 2950 A.; but the Domesday manor of
this name covered ‘at least 6000 or perhaps 7000 acres’ (W. H. Jones, Domesday
for Wilts, p. xxvii.). In several instances Kemble tries to force into a single
parish all the hides of a hundred which takes its name from that parish.
[1662] Hanssen, Abhandlungen, i. 499.
[1663] See above, p. 229, and Mr Taylor’s paper there mentioned.
[1664] Napier and Stevenson, Crawford Charters, 43. Compare D. B. i. 101 b. In
the Confessor’s time ‘Crediton’ gelded for 15 hides. There was land for 185
teams, and teams to that number existed. There were 264 villeins, 73 bordiers
and 40 serfs. Æthelheard’s charter suggests either that in his day this part of
Devon was very sparsely peopled, or that already, under a system of partitionary
taxation, a small number of fiscal units had been cast upon a poor district. When
at a later time Eadnoth bishop of Crediton mortgages a yardland for 30 mancuses
of gold (Ibid. p. 5), this yardland will be a fiscal virgate of wide extent. See
above, p. 467, note 1531.
[1665] See above, p. 445.
[1666] See above, p. 400.
[1667] See above, p. 458.
[1668] See above, p. 188.
[1669] Birch, Cart. Sax. iii. 671; Munimenta Gildhallae, ii. 627; Gale, Scriptores
xv., i. 748; Liebermann, Leges Anglorum, 9. 10.
[1670] This we can not find. If Kent were included in the scheme, we should
read of Canterbury, Rochester etc. Therefore we probably start in Sussex, but at
some point east of Hastings. In any case, unless a name has dropped out, we can
not make the five Sussex burgs correspond to the six rapes of a later day, which,
going from east to west, are Hastings, Pevensey, Lewes, Bramber, Arundel,
Chichester.
[1671] See the Læwe, Læwes of K. 499, 1237.
[1672] A confusion of P and W is common.
Page 599
[1673] Tisbury lies between Wilton and Shaftesbury. See K. 104, 641. Mr
Stevenson suggests that the word may be Cysanbyrig, thereby being meant
Chiselbury Camp. This also lies in the right quarter.
[1674] Tweoxneam, A.-S. Chron. ann. 901.
[1675] See Bridian in K. 656. Bredy lies about eight miles west of Dorchester. It
seems to contain a ‘Kingston.’
[1676] There is a Halwell a little to the south of Totness. Already in 1018
(Crawford Charters, pp. 9, 79) the Devonshire burgs are Exeter, Lidford, Totness
and Barnstaple.
[1677] Pilton lies close to Barnstaple.
[1678] A.-S. Chron. ann. 915: ‘be eastan Weced.’
[1679] A little to the west of Langport; close to Athelney. A.-S. Chron. ann. 878:
‘And þæs on Eastron worhte Ælfred cyning lytle werede geweorc æt Æþelinga
eigge.’ Green, Conquest of England, 110. Observe that a very small district is
assigned to Lyng.
[1680] After seeing Oxford and Wallingford together, we should naturally expect
Bedford with Buckingham. See A.-S. Chron. ann. 918–9. Or we might look for
Hertford. Ibid. ann. 913.
[1681] Eashing is a tithing in the parish of Godalming. See King Alfred’s will
(K. 314): ‘æt Æscengum.’ Eashing may have been supplanted by Guildford.
[1682] Taking in the particulars the figures which seem the more probable, we
make a larger total.
[1683] If Essex is meant this figure seems impossibly small. Gale gives ‘Ast
Saxhum et Wygeaceastrum 1200 hidas.’ This may give Essex and Worcester
1200 hides apiece.
[1684] Mr Stevenson tells me that, though the document is very corrupt, some of
the verbal forms seem to speak of this date.
[1685] Such a document is apt to be tampered with. Some bits of it may be older
than other bits, but the reign of Edward the Elder seems the latest to which we
could ascribe its core. If we compare it with the list of Domesday boroughs we
shall be struck by the absence of Dorchester, Bridport, Ilchester, Totness,
Hertford, Bedford and Guildford, as well as by the appearance of Burpham,
Tisbury, Bredy, Halwell, Watchet, Lyng and Eashing.
[1686] See above, p. 189, note 747.
[1687] ‘Heorepeburan,’ Hastings, Lewes, Burpham, Chichester.
[1688] Eashing, Southwark.
[1689] Porchester, Southampton, Winchester, Twyneham.
[1690] Wallingford.
Stevenson suggests that the word may be Cysanbyrig, thereby being meant
Chiselbury Camp. This also lies in the right quarter.
[1674] Tweoxneam, A.-S. Chron. ann. 901.
[1675] See Bridian in K. 656. Bredy lies about eight miles west of Dorchester. It
seems to contain a ‘Kingston.’
[1676] There is a Halwell a little to the south of Totness. Already in 1018
(Crawford Charters, pp. 9, 79) the Devonshire burgs are Exeter, Lidford, Totness
and Barnstaple.
[1677] Pilton lies close to Barnstaple.
[1678] A.-S. Chron. ann. 915: ‘be eastan Weced.’
[1679] A little to the west of Langport; close to Athelney. A.-S. Chron. ann. 878:
‘And þæs on Eastron worhte Ælfred cyning lytle werede geweorc æt Æþelinga
eigge.’ Green, Conquest of England, 110. Observe that a very small district is
assigned to Lyng.
[1680] After seeing Oxford and Wallingford together, we should naturally expect
Bedford with Buckingham. See A.-S. Chron. ann. 918–9. Or we might look for
Hertford. Ibid. ann. 913.
[1681] Eashing is a tithing in the parish of Godalming. See King Alfred’s will
(K. 314): ‘æt Æscengum.’ Eashing may have been supplanted by Guildford.
[1682] Taking in the particulars the figures which seem the more probable, we
make a larger total.
[1683] If Essex is meant this figure seems impossibly small. Gale gives ‘Ast
Saxhum et Wygeaceastrum 1200 hidas.’ This may give Essex and Worcester
1200 hides apiece.
[1684] Mr Stevenson tells me that, though the document is very corrupt, some of
the verbal forms seem to speak of this date.
[1685] Such a document is apt to be tampered with. Some bits of it may be older
than other bits, but the reign of Edward the Elder seems the latest to which we
could ascribe its core. If we compare it with the list of Domesday boroughs we
shall be struck by the absence of Dorchester, Bridport, Ilchester, Totness,
Hertford, Bedford and Guildford, as well as by the appearance of Burpham,
Tisbury, Bredy, Halwell, Watchet, Lyng and Eashing.
[1686] See above, p. 189, note 747.
[1687] ‘Heorepeburan,’ Hastings, Lewes, Burpham, Chichester.
[1688] Eashing, Southwark.
[1689] Porchester, Southampton, Winchester, Twyneham.
[1690] Wallingford.
Page 600
[1691] Wilton, Tisbury, Shaftesbury, Malmesbury, Cricklade.
[1692] Wareham, Bredy.
[1693] Watchet, Axbridge, Lyng, Langport, Bath.
[1694] Exeter, Halwell, Lidford, Barnstaple.
[1695] A good deal of doubt hangs over the entries touching Buckingham, Essex
and Warwick.
[1696] Birch, Cartularium, i. 414; Birch, Journal Brit. Archæol. Assoc. xl. 29
(1884); Earle, Land Charters, 458; Liebermann, Leges Anglorum, 8; Stevenson,
Engl. Hist. Rev., 1889, 354.
[1697] Unless the mention of Wessex is interpolated (and if it be interpolated
then the grand total has been tampered with) it is difficult to suppose that ‘Wiht
gara 600’ points to the Isle of Wight, ‘Gifla 300’ to the district round Ilchester, or
the like. I owe this observation to Mr W. J. Corbett.
[1698] It is a little curious that if we multiply the 244,100 hides by 120 we
obtain 29,292,000, a figure which is not very far off from the 32,543,890 which
gives the total acreage (tidal water excepted) of modern England. However, it is
in the highest degree improbable that the computer of hides was aiming at pure
areal measurement. Nor could his credit be saved in that way, for the area of
Kent is to that of Sussex as 975:932, not as 15:7. The total of ‘cultivated land’ in
England is less than 25 million acres, that of arable is less than 12 million.
[1699] Bede, Hist. Eccl. ii. 9 (ed. Plummer, i. 97): ‘... Meuanias insulas ...
quarum prior ... nongentarum lx. familiarum mensuram iuxta aestimationem
Anglorum, secunda trecentarum et ultra spatium tenet.’ Ibid. iii. 24 (p. 180): ‘...
regnum Australium Merciorum, qui sunt, ut dicunt, familiarum quinque millium
... Aquilonaribus Merciis quorum terra est familiarum vii. milium.’ Ibid. i. 25 (p.
45): ‘Est autem ad orientalem Cantiae plagam Tanatos insula non modica, id est,
magnitudinis iuxta consuetudinem aestimationis Anglorum familiarum
sexcentarum (þæt is syx hund hida micel æfter Angel cynnes æhta).’ Ibid. iv. 13
(p. 230): ‘ad provinciam Australium Saxonum, quae post Cantuarios ad austrum
et ad occidentem usque ad Occidentales Saxones pertingit, habens terram
familiarum septem millium (is þæs landes seofen þusendo [hida]).’ Ibid. iv. 14
(p. 237): ‘Est autem mensura eiusdem insulae [Vectae] iuxta aestimationem
Anglorum mille ducentarum familiarum: unde data est episcopo possessio terrae
trecentarum familiarum (æfter Angel cynnes æhta twelf hund hida, and he þa
þam biscop gesealde on æht þreo hund hida).’ Ibid. iv. 17 (p. 246): ‘Est autem
Elge in provincia Orientalium Anglorum regio familiarum circiter sexcentarum
(six hund hida) in similitudinem insulae.’ Ibid. iii. 25 (pp. 182–3): ‘donaverat
monasterium quadraginta familiarum in loco qui dicitur Inrhypum.’ Ibid. v. 19:
‘mox donavit terram decem familiarum in loco qui dicitur Stanford, et non multo
post monasterium triginta familiarum in loco qui vocatur Inrhypum (tyn hiwisca
landes on þære stowe þe is cweðon Stanford ... minster xxx. hiwisca.)’ Ibid. iv.
13 (p. 232): ‘donavit ... Uilfrido terram lxxxvii. familiarum (seofan and hund
eahtig hida landes) ... vocabulo Selæseu.’ Historia Abbatum (p. 380): ‘terram
octo familiarum iuxta fluvium Fresca ab Aldfrido rege ... comparavit ... terram
xx. familiarum in loco qui incolarum lingua Ad villam Sambuce vocatur ...
[1692] Wareham, Bredy.
[1693] Watchet, Axbridge, Lyng, Langport, Bath.
[1694] Exeter, Halwell, Lidford, Barnstaple.
[1695] A good deal of doubt hangs over the entries touching Buckingham, Essex
and Warwick.
[1696] Birch, Cartularium, i. 414; Birch, Journal Brit. Archæol. Assoc. xl. 29
(1884); Earle, Land Charters, 458; Liebermann, Leges Anglorum, 8; Stevenson,
Engl. Hist. Rev., 1889, 354.
[1697] Unless the mention of Wessex is interpolated (and if it be interpolated
then the grand total has been tampered with) it is difficult to suppose that ‘Wiht
gara 600’ points to the Isle of Wight, ‘Gifla 300’ to the district round Ilchester, or
the like. I owe this observation to Mr W. J. Corbett.
[1698] It is a little curious that if we multiply the 244,100 hides by 120 we
obtain 29,292,000, a figure which is not very far off from the 32,543,890 which
gives the total acreage (tidal water excepted) of modern England. However, it is
in the highest degree improbable that the computer of hides was aiming at pure
areal measurement. Nor could his credit be saved in that way, for the area of
Kent is to that of Sussex as 975:932, not as 15:7. The total of ‘cultivated land’ in
England is less than 25 million acres, that of arable is less than 12 million.
[1699] Bede, Hist. Eccl. ii. 9 (ed. Plummer, i. 97): ‘... Meuanias insulas ...
quarum prior ... nongentarum lx. familiarum mensuram iuxta aestimationem
Anglorum, secunda trecentarum et ultra spatium tenet.’ Ibid. iii. 24 (p. 180): ‘...
regnum Australium Merciorum, qui sunt, ut dicunt, familiarum quinque millium
... Aquilonaribus Merciis quorum terra est familiarum vii. milium.’ Ibid. i. 25 (p.
45): ‘Est autem ad orientalem Cantiae plagam Tanatos insula non modica, id est,
magnitudinis iuxta consuetudinem aestimationis Anglorum familiarum
sexcentarum (þæt is syx hund hida micel æfter Angel cynnes æhta).’ Ibid. iv. 13
(p. 230): ‘ad provinciam Australium Saxonum, quae post Cantuarios ad austrum
et ad occidentem usque ad Occidentales Saxones pertingit, habens terram
familiarum septem millium (is þæs landes seofen þusendo [hida]).’ Ibid. iv. 14
(p. 237): ‘Est autem mensura eiusdem insulae [Vectae] iuxta aestimationem
Anglorum mille ducentarum familiarum: unde data est episcopo possessio terrae
trecentarum familiarum (æfter Angel cynnes æhta twelf hund hida, and he þa
þam biscop gesealde on æht þreo hund hida).’ Ibid. iv. 17 (p. 246): ‘Est autem
Elge in provincia Orientalium Anglorum regio familiarum circiter sexcentarum
(six hund hida) in similitudinem insulae.’ Ibid. iii. 25 (pp. 182–3): ‘donaverat
monasterium quadraginta familiarum in loco qui dicitur Inrhypum.’ Ibid. v. 19:
‘mox donavit terram decem familiarum in loco qui dicitur Stanford, et non multo
post monasterium triginta familiarum in loco qui vocatur Inrhypum (tyn hiwisca
landes on þære stowe þe is cweðon Stanford ... minster xxx. hiwisca.)’ Ibid. iv.
13 (p. 232): ‘donavit ... Uilfrido terram lxxxvii. familiarum (seofan and hund
eahtig hida landes) ... vocabulo Selæseu.’ Historia Abbatum (p. 380): ‘terram
octo familiarum iuxta fluvium Fresca ab Aldfrido rege ... comparavit ... terram
xx. familiarum in loco qui incolarum lingua Ad villam Sambuce vocatur ...
Page 601
accepit ... Terram decem familiarum quam ab Aldfrido rege in possessionem
aceeperat in loco villae quae Daltun nuncupatur ...’ Hist. Eccl. iv. 21 (p. 253):
‘accepit locum unius familiae ad septentrionalem plagam Uiuri fluminis (onfeng
heo anes hiwscipes stowe to norð dæle Wire ðære ea).’ Ibid. iii. 4 (p. 133):
‘Neque enim magna est [Iona] sed quasi familiarum quinque, iuxta
aestimationem Anglorum.’ Ibid. iii. 24 (p. 178): ‘Singulae vero possessiones x.
erant familiarum, id est simul omnes cxx.’
[1700] If the ‘Wiht gara 600’ of The Tribal Hidage refers to Wight, we have here
a discord, for Bede gives the Island 1200. The North and South Mercians have
together but 1200 according to Bede; the Mercians have 30,000 according to The
Tribal Hidage: but the territory of ‘the Mercians’ is a variable.
[1701] B. i. 4 b, 12; Elton, Tenures of Kent, 135.
[1702] See above, p. 359.
[1703] Round, Feudal England, 289.
[1704] Stubbs, Const. Hist. ii. 422—3; Rot. Parl. ii. 302.
[1705] Bright, Hist. Engl. ii. 386; Hall’s Chronicle, ed. 1809, p. 656.
[1706] Some of them seem to start from The Tribal Hidage and take the number
of hides to be 303,201 (Liebermann, Leges Anglorum, 10). Divide this by 5 to
find the knight’s fees. You have 60,640. In MS. Camb. Univ. Ii. vi. 25, f. 108 we
find 60,215 knight’s fees, 45,011 parish churches, 52,080 vills. Another note,
printed by Hearne, Rob. of Avesbury, 264, gives 53,215 knight’s fees, 46,822
parish churches, 52,285 vills.
[1707] Bede, Hist. Eccl. iii. 24 (p. 178): ‘donatis insuper xii. possessiunculis
terrarum, in quibus ablato studio militiae terrestris, ad exercendam militiam
caelestem, supplicandumque pro pace gentis eius aeterna, devotioni sedulae
monachorum locus facultasque suppeteret ... Singulae vero possessiones x. erant
familiarum, id est simul omnes cxx.’ In these villages there have been men who
owed military service; they are not being ousted from their homes; they are
being turned over as tenants to the church; henceforth they will no longer be
bound to fight, and in consideration of this precious immunity, they will have to
supply the monks with provender. That is how I read this passage. Others can
and will read it to mean something very different. But if Bede were speaking of
decuriae of slaves, how could there be talk of military service? The slaves would
not fight, and if the slaves belonged to eorls who fought, then how comes it that
Oswy can expropriate his nobles?
[1708] Hist. Eccl. iii. 4 (p. 133).
[1709] Keith Johnston, Gazetteer.
[1710] I do not suggest, nor does Bede suggest, that Hii was laid out in hides. He
is speaking only of size.
[1711] Bede gives to Anglesey the size of 960 families, to Man that of 300 ‘or
more.’ Anglesey has 175,836 acres; Man 145,011. Anglesey in 1895 had ‘under
all kinds of crops, bare fallow and grass (mountain and heath land excluded)’
aceeperat in loco villae quae Daltun nuncupatur ...’ Hist. Eccl. iv. 21 (p. 253):
‘accepit locum unius familiae ad septentrionalem plagam Uiuri fluminis (onfeng
heo anes hiwscipes stowe to norð dæle Wire ðære ea).’ Ibid. iii. 4 (p. 133):
‘Neque enim magna est [Iona] sed quasi familiarum quinque, iuxta
aestimationem Anglorum.’ Ibid. iii. 24 (p. 178): ‘Singulae vero possessiones x.
erant familiarum, id est simul omnes cxx.’
[1700] If the ‘Wiht gara 600’ of The Tribal Hidage refers to Wight, we have here
a discord, for Bede gives the Island 1200. The North and South Mercians have
together but 1200 according to Bede; the Mercians have 30,000 according to The
Tribal Hidage: but the territory of ‘the Mercians’ is a variable.
[1701] B. i. 4 b, 12; Elton, Tenures of Kent, 135.
[1702] See above, p. 359.
[1703] Round, Feudal England, 289.
[1704] Stubbs, Const. Hist. ii. 422—3; Rot. Parl. ii. 302.
[1705] Bright, Hist. Engl. ii. 386; Hall’s Chronicle, ed. 1809, p. 656.
[1706] Some of them seem to start from The Tribal Hidage and take the number
of hides to be 303,201 (Liebermann, Leges Anglorum, 10). Divide this by 5 to
find the knight’s fees. You have 60,640. In MS. Camb. Univ. Ii. vi. 25, f. 108 we
find 60,215 knight’s fees, 45,011 parish churches, 52,080 vills. Another note,
printed by Hearne, Rob. of Avesbury, 264, gives 53,215 knight’s fees, 46,822
parish churches, 52,285 vills.
[1707] Bede, Hist. Eccl. iii. 24 (p. 178): ‘donatis insuper xii. possessiunculis
terrarum, in quibus ablato studio militiae terrestris, ad exercendam militiam
caelestem, supplicandumque pro pace gentis eius aeterna, devotioni sedulae
monachorum locus facultasque suppeteret ... Singulae vero possessiones x. erant
familiarum, id est simul omnes cxx.’ In these villages there have been men who
owed military service; they are not being ousted from their homes; they are
being turned over as tenants to the church; henceforth they will no longer be
bound to fight, and in consideration of this precious immunity, they will have to
supply the monks with provender. That is how I read this passage. Others can
and will read it to mean something very different. But if Bede were speaking of
decuriae of slaves, how could there be talk of military service? The slaves would
not fight, and if the slaves belonged to eorls who fought, then how comes it that
Oswy can expropriate his nobles?
[1708] Hist. Eccl. iii. 4 (p. 133).
[1709] Keith Johnston, Gazetteer.
[1710] I do not suggest, nor does Bede suggest, that Hii was laid out in hides. He
is speaking only of size.
[1711] Bede gives to Anglesey the size of 960 families, to Man that of 300 ‘or
more.’ Anglesey has 175,836 acres; Man 145,011. Anglesey in 1895 had ‘under
all kinds of crops, bare fallow and grass (mountain and heath land excluded)’
Page 602
152,004 acres. Man 96,098. Anglesey had 24,798 acres growing corn crops and
9,305 growing green crops, while the corresponding figures for Man were
22,666 and 11,580. Rationalistic explanation of Bede’s statements would be
useless. He is reporting vague guesses.
[1712] Hist. Eccl. iv. 13 (p. 232): ‘Quo tempore Rex Ædilualch donavit
reverentissimo antistiti Vilfrido terram lxxxvii familiarum, ubi suos homines, qui
exules vagabantur, recipere posset, vocabulo Selæsu, quod dicitur Latine Insula
Vituli Marini.’ Bede goes on to describe the Selsey peninsula and Wilfrid’s
foundation of a monastery. Wilfrid proceeded to convert the men who were
given him. They included two hundred and fifty male and female slaves whom
he set at liberty.
[1713] K. 992 (v. 32); B. i. 98.
[1714] K. 464 (ii. 341). The 55 hides are reduced to 42, no mention is made of
Medemenige, Egesauude or Bessanheie, and the 32 hides are somewhat
differently distributed.
[1715] D. B. i. 17. The Bp of Chichester has 24 hides at Amberley.
[1716] I infer this from the thorough discrepancy that there is between these
charters and D. B. A forger at work after or soon before the Conquest would
have arranged the church’s estates in a manner similar to that which we see in
King William’s record.
[1717] As a matter of fact, however, it is not very easy to reconcile the earlier
charter with Bede’s story. The charter makes the land proceed from the West-
Saxon Ceadwealla and says nothing of Æthelwealh, who, according to Bede,
was the donor. Mr Plummer, Bedae Opera, ii. 226, says that the forger betrays
his hand by calling Wilfrid archbishop. Really he seems to cut Wilfrid into two,
making of him (1) an archbishop, and (2) a bishop of the South Saxons. See the
attestations.
[1718] In D. B. i. 17 the bishop’s manor at Selsey has but 10 hides and but 7
teamlands.
[1719] See above, p. 378.
[1720] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 563.
[1721] Meitzen, op. cit., ii. 553–69; iii. 557–61; Lamprecht, Deutsches
Wirtschaftsleben, i. 348.
[1722] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 566. The Kalenberger Hufe was a measure prevalent
in the district of Braunschweig-Lüneberg. It contained 180 Morgen or 47.147
hectares. A hide made of 120 statute acres would contain about 48.56 hectares.
Apparently Dr Meitzen (ii. 113) has found no difficulty in accepting a hide of
120 acres as the normal share of the English settler. See also Lamprecht,
Deutsches Wirtschaftsleben, i. 348.
[1723] Polyptyque de l’abbaye de S. Germain des Prés, ed. Longnon, i. 102.
[1724] Pertz, Leges, i. 536; Ann. Bertin. (ed. Waitz) 81, 135; Richter, Annalen,
ii. 400, 443; Dümmler, Gesch. d. Ostfränk. Reichs, i. 585.
9,305 growing green crops, while the corresponding figures for Man were
22,666 and 11,580. Rationalistic explanation of Bede’s statements would be
useless. He is reporting vague guesses.
[1712] Hist. Eccl. iv. 13 (p. 232): ‘Quo tempore Rex Ædilualch donavit
reverentissimo antistiti Vilfrido terram lxxxvii familiarum, ubi suos homines, qui
exules vagabantur, recipere posset, vocabulo Selæsu, quod dicitur Latine Insula
Vituli Marini.’ Bede goes on to describe the Selsey peninsula and Wilfrid’s
foundation of a monastery. Wilfrid proceeded to convert the men who were
given him. They included two hundred and fifty male and female slaves whom
he set at liberty.
[1713] K. 992 (v. 32); B. i. 98.
[1714] K. 464 (ii. 341). The 55 hides are reduced to 42, no mention is made of
Medemenige, Egesauude or Bessanheie, and the 32 hides are somewhat
differently distributed.
[1715] D. B. i. 17. The Bp of Chichester has 24 hides at Amberley.
[1716] I infer this from the thorough discrepancy that there is between these
charters and D. B. A forger at work after or soon before the Conquest would
have arranged the church’s estates in a manner similar to that which we see in
King William’s record.
[1717] As a matter of fact, however, it is not very easy to reconcile the earlier
charter with Bede’s story. The charter makes the land proceed from the West-
Saxon Ceadwealla and says nothing of Æthelwealh, who, according to Bede,
was the donor. Mr Plummer, Bedae Opera, ii. 226, says that the forger betrays
his hand by calling Wilfrid archbishop. Really he seems to cut Wilfrid into two,
making of him (1) an archbishop, and (2) a bishop of the South Saxons. See the
attestations.
[1718] In D. B. i. 17 the bishop’s manor at Selsey has but 10 hides and but 7
teamlands.
[1719] See above, p. 378.
[1720] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 563.
[1721] Meitzen, op. cit., ii. 553–69; iii. 557–61; Lamprecht, Deutsches
Wirtschaftsleben, i. 348.
[1722] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 566. The Kalenberger Hufe was a measure prevalent
in the district of Braunschweig-Lüneberg. It contained 180 Morgen or 47.147
hectares. A hide made of 120 statute acres would contain about 48.56 hectares.
Apparently Dr Meitzen (ii. 113) has found no difficulty in accepting a hide of
120 acres as the normal share of the English settler. See also Lamprecht,
Deutsches Wirtschaftsleben, i. 348.
[1723] Polyptyque de l’abbaye de S. Germain des Prés, ed. Longnon, i. 102.
[1724] Pertz, Leges, i. 536; Ann. Bertin. (ed. Waitz) 81, 135; Richter, Annalen,
ii. 400, 443; Dümmler, Gesch. d. Ostfränk. Reichs, i. 585.
Page 603
[1725] Meitzen, op. cit. ii. 592–3.
[1726] See above, p. 438.
[1727] Tacitus, Germania, c. 15, 23. The very lenient treatment by Abp Theodore
of the monk who gets drunk upon a festival tells a curious tale: Haddan and
Stubbs, Councils, iii. 177; Robertson, Hist. Essays, 68.
[1728] Thus, e.g., D. B. i. 127, Fuleham: ‘ibi 5 villani, quisque 1 hidam.’
[1729] See above, p. 360.
[1726] See above, p. 438.
[1727] Tacitus, Germania, c. 15, 23. The very lenient treatment by Abp Theodore
of the monk who gets drunk upon a festival tells a curious tale: Haddan and
Stubbs, Councils, iii. 177; Robertson, Hist. Essays, 68.
[1728] Thus, e.g., D. B. i. 127, Fuleham: ‘ibi 5 villani, quisque 1 hidam.’
[1729] See above, p. 360.
Page 604
Transcriber’s Note
There are numerous technical terms employed. Most terms, when being discussed as
such, were italicized, and are tagged as Anglo-Saxon, Latin, French, etc. But where the
terms are employed in the author's voice, without emphasis, in otherwise English
passages, no tags were added. Hence, ‘soke’, ‘sake’, ‘hide’, ‘carucate’, ‘villein’, ‘geld’, and
certain others are, in effect, accepted as English. Extended Latin, French and Anglo-
Saxon phrases are always tagged as such.
The 3rd note on p. 79 is referenced twice on the page. Only the second reference seems
pertinent. The first instance has been removed.
In footnote 1448 there is an unexplained asterisk: “St. Paul’s, 164*”
Punctuation which was obviously missing has been supplied. The following table lists any
corrections made or possible printer errors that should be noted. The bracketed text
indicates what has been removed, added or noted.
p. viii. the royal deme[ns]e/deme[sn]e Corrected.
p. 96 ad tercium denarium.[’] Added.
p. 121 such [as] we are familiar with sic
p. 128 [‘]in Berningham a free man Added.
p. 200 we read [“/‘]Lagemanni et burgenses Corrected.
The closing
p. 257 be it in ‘folk-land[’] must pay a penalty.’ quote has been
added.
p. 391 in the thirteenth century when[,] we begin Deleted.
p. 396 terrae et 1 virg.[’] Added.
Purpose of
p. 440 Note 1448 Domesday of St. Paul’s, 164[*]
asterisk?
p. 448 royal estates do not stand alone[.] Added.
p. 522 Deme[ns]e/Deme[sn]e, Ancient Corrected.
There are numerous technical terms employed. Most terms, when being discussed as
such, were italicized, and are tagged as Anglo-Saxon, Latin, French, etc. But where the
terms are employed in the author's voice, without emphasis, in otherwise English
passages, no tags were added. Hence, ‘soke’, ‘sake’, ‘hide’, ‘carucate’, ‘villein’, ‘geld’, and
certain others are, in effect, accepted as English. Extended Latin, French and Anglo-
Saxon phrases are always tagged as such.
The 3rd note on p. 79 is referenced twice on the page. Only the second reference seems
pertinent. The first instance has been removed.
In footnote 1448 there is an unexplained asterisk: “St. Paul’s, 164*”
Punctuation which was obviously missing has been supplied. The following table lists any
corrections made or possible printer errors that should be noted. The bracketed text
indicates what has been removed, added or noted.
p. viii. the royal deme[ns]e/deme[sn]e Corrected.
p. 96 ad tercium denarium.[’] Added.
p. 121 such [as] we are familiar with sic
p. 128 [‘]in Berningham a free man Added.
p. 200 we read [“/‘]Lagemanni et burgenses Corrected.
The closing
p. 257 be it in ‘folk-land[’] must pay a penalty.’ quote has been
added.
p. 391 in the thirteenth century when[,] we begin Deleted.
p. 396 terrae et 1 virg.[’] Added.
Purpose of
p. 440 Note 1448 Domesday of St. Paul’s, 164[*]
asterisk?
p. 448 royal estates do not stand alone[.] Added.
p. 522 Deme[ns]e/Deme[sn]e, Ancient Corrected.
Page 605
*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DOMESDAY
BOOK AND BEYOND: THREE ESSAYS IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF
ENGLAND ***
Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.
Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
States without permission and without paying copyright royalties.
Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license,
apply to copying and distributing Project Gutenberg™ electronic
works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ concept and
trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not
be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following the terms of
the trademark license, including paying royalties for use of the Project
Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything for copies of this
eBook, complying with the trademark license is very easy. You may
use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative
works, reports, performances and research. Project Gutenberg eBooks
may be modified and printed and given away—you may do practically
ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks not protected by U.S.
copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the trademark license,
especially commercial redistribution.
START: FULL LICENSE
BOOK AND BEYOND: THREE ESSAYS IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF
ENGLAND ***
Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.
Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
States without permission and without paying copyright royalties.
Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license,
apply to copying and distributing Project Gutenberg™ electronic
works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ concept and
trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not
be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following the terms of
the trademark license, including paying royalties for use of the Project
Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything for copies of this
eBook, complying with the trademark license is very easy. You may
use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative
works, reports, performances and research. Project Gutenberg eBooks
may be modified and printed and given away—you may do practically
ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks not protected by U.S.
copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the trademark license,
especially commercial redistribution.
START: FULL LICENSE
Page 606
THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work (or
any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
Gutenberg License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.
Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing
Project Gutenberg electronic works
1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg electronic
work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to and accept
all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
all copies of Project Gutenberg electronic works in your possession. If
you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project Gutenberg
electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the terms of this
agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or entity to whom
you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people
who agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg electronic
works. See paragraph 1.E below.
1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work (or
any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
Gutenberg License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.
Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing
Project Gutenberg electronic works
1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg electronic
work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to and accept
all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
all copies of Project Gutenberg electronic works in your possession. If
you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project Gutenberg
electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the terms of this
agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or entity to whom
you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people
who agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg electronic
works. See paragraph 1.E below.
1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the
Page 607
collection of Project Gutenberg electronic works. Nearly all the
individual works in the collection are in the public domain in the
United States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in
the United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
that you will support the Project Gutenberg mission of promoting free
access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg works
in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the Project
Gutenberg name associated with the work. You can easily comply with
the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the same format
with its attached full Project Gutenberg License when you share it
without charge with others.
1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
other Project Gutenberg work. The Foundation makes no
representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
country other than the United States.
1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
access to, the full Project Gutenberg License must appear prominently
whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg work (any work on which
the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the phrase
“Project Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed,
viewed, copied or distributed:
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States
and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no
restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it
under the terms of the Project Gutenberg™ License included with
individual works in the collection are in the public domain in the
United States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in
the United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
that you will support the Project Gutenberg mission of promoting free
access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg works
in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the Project
Gutenberg name associated with the work. You can easily comply with
the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the same format
with its attached full Project Gutenberg License when you share it
without charge with others.
1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
other Project Gutenberg work. The Foundation makes no
representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
country other than the United States.
1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
access to, the full Project Gutenberg License must appear prominently
whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg work (any work on which
the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the phrase
“Project Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed,
viewed, copied or distributed:
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States
and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no
restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it
under the terms of the Project Gutenberg™ License included with
Page 608
this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located
in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the
country where you are located before using this eBook.
1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is derived
from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not contain a
notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the copyright
holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in the United
States without paying any fees or charges. If you are redistributing or
providing access to a work with the phrase “Project Gutenberg”
associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply either with
the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or obtain
permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg
trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg License for all works posted
with the permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of
this work.
1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg.
1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg License.
1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide
access to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg work in a format
other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the
country where you are located before using this eBook.
1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is derived
from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not contain a
notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the copyright
holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in the United
States without paying any fees or charges. If you are redistributing or
providing access to a work with the phrase “Project Gutenberg”
associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply either with
the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or obtain
permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg
trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg License for all works posted
with the permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of
this work.
1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg.
1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg License.
1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide
access to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg work in a format
other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
Page 609
version posted on the official Project Gutenberg website
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of
obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the
full Project Gutenberg License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg electronic works provided
that:
• You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from the
use of Project Gutenberg works calculated using the method you
already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed to the
owner of the Project Gutenberg trademark, but he has agreed to donate
royalties under this paragraph to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid within 60 days
following each date on which you prepare (or are legally required to
prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty payments should be clearly
marked as such and sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
Foundation at the address specified in Section 4, “Information about
donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.”
• You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he does
not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg™ License. You
must require such a user to return or destroy all copies of the works
possessed in a physical medium and discontinue all use of and all
access to other copies of Project Gutenberg™ works.
• You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
receipt of the work.
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of
obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the
full Project Gutenberg License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg electronic works provided
that:
• You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from the
use of Project Gutenberg works calculated using the method you
already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed to the
owner of the Project Gutenberg trademark, but he has agreed to donate
royalties under this paragraph to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid within 60 days
following each date on which you prepare (or are legally required to
prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty payments should be clearly
marked as such and sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
Foundation at the address specified in Section 4, “Information about
donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.”
• You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he does
not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg™ License. You
must require such a user to return or destroy all copies of the works
possessed in a physical medium and discontinue all use of and all
access to other copies of Project Gutenberg™ works.
• You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
receipt of the work.
Page 610
• You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free distribution
of Project Gutenberg™ works.
1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg™
electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set forth
in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from the
Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the manager of the
Project Gutenberg™ trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in
Section 3 below.
1.F.
1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend
considerable effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and
proofread works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the
Project Gutenberg™ collection. Despite these efforts, Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works, and the medium on which they may be
stored, may contain “Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete,
inaccurate or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
cannot be read by your equipment.
1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES -
Except for the “Right of Replacement or Refund” described in
paragraph 1.F.3, the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation,
the owner of the Project Gutenberg™ trademark, and any other party
distributing a Project Gutenberg™ electronic work under this
agreement, disclaim all liability to you for damages, costs and
expenses, including legal fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO
REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY, BREACH
OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE
FOUNDATION, THE TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY
DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT,
CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES
of Project Gutenberg™ works.
1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg™
electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set forth
in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from the
Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the manager of the
Project Gutenberg™ trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in
Section 3 below.
1.F.
1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend
considerable effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and
proofread works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the
Project Gutenberg™ collection. Despite these efforts, Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works, and the medium on which they may be
stored, may contain “Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete,
inaccurate or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
cannot be read by your equipment.
1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES -
Except for the “Right of Replacement or Refund” described in
paragraph 1.F.3, the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation,
the owner of the Project Gutenberg™ trademark, and any other party
distributing a Project Gutenberg™ electronic work under this
agreement, disclaim all liability to you for damages, costs and
expenses, including legal fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO
REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY, BREACH
OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE
FOUNDATION, THE TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY
DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT,
CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES
Page 611
EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
DAMAGE.
1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you
discover a defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it,
you can receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by
sending a written explanation to the person you received the work
from. If you received the work on a physical medium, you must return
the medium with your written explanation. The person or entity that
provided you with the defective work may elect to provide a
replacement copy in lieu of a refund. If you received the work
electronically, the person or entity providing it to you may choose to
give you a second opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu
of a refund. If the second copy is also defective, you may demand a
refund in writing without further opportunities to fix the problem.
1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth in
paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’, WITH NO
OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED,
INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. If
any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the law
of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any
provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the
Foundation, the trademark owner, any agent or employee of the
Foundation, anyone providing copies of Project Gutenberg™
electronic works in accordance with this agreement, and any
volunteers associated with the production, promotion and distribution
of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works, harmless from all liability,
costs and expenses, including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly
from any of the following which you do or cause to occur: (a)
DAMAGE.
1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you
discover a defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it,
you can receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by
sending a written explanation to the person you received the work
from. If you received the work on a physical medium, you must return
the medium with your written explanation. The person or entity that
provided you with the defective work may elect to provide a
replacement copy in lieu of a refund. If you received the work
electronically, the person or entity providing it to you may choose to
give you a second opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu
of a refund. If the second copy is also defective, you may demand a
refund in writing without further opportunities to fix the problem.
1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth in
paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’, WITH NO
OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED,
INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. If
any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the law
of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any
provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the
Foundation, the trademark owner, any agent or employee of the
Foundation, anyone providing copies of Project Gutenberg™
electronic works in accordance with this agreement, and any
volunteers associated with the production, promotion and distribution
of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works, harmless from all liability,
costs and expenses, including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly
from any of the following which you do or cause to occur: (a)
Page 612
distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg work, (b) alteration,
modification, or additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg work,
and (c) any Defect you cause.
Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project
Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
from people in all walks of life.
Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg’s goals
and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg collection will remain freely
available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure and
permanent future for Project Gutenberg and future generations. To
learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 and
the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org.
Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation
The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the state
of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal Revenue
Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification number is
64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by U.S.
federal laws and your state’s laws.
The Foundation’s business office is located at 41 Watchung Plaza
#516, Montclair NJ 07042, USA, +1 (862) 621-9288. Email contact
modification, or additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg work,
and (c) any Defect you cause.
Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project
Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
from people in all walks of life.
Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg’s goals
and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg collection will remain freely
available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure and
permanent future for Project Gutenberg and future generations. To
learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 and
the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org.
Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation
The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the state
of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal Revenue
Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification number is
64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by U.S.
federal laws and your state’s laws.
The Foundation’s business office is located at 41 Watchung Plaza
#516, Montclair NJ 07042, USA, +1 (862) 621-9288. Email contact
Page 613
links and up to date contact information can be found at the
Foundation’s website and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact
Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
Project Gutenberg™ depends upon and cannot survive without
widespread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine-readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small
donations ($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax
exempt status with the IRS.
The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United States.
Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a considerable
effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up with these
requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations where we have
not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular
state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate.
While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.
International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
Please check the Project Gutenberg web pages for current donation
methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate.
Foundation’s website and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact
Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
Project Gutenberg™ depends upon and cannot survive without
widespread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine-readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small
donations ($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax
exempt status with the IRS.
The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United States.
Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a considerable
effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up with these
requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations where we have
not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular
state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate.
While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.
International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
Please check the Project Gutenberg web pages for current donation
methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate.
Page 614
Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg
electronic works
Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg
concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
with anyone. For forty years, he produced and distributed Project
Gutenberg eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
edition.
Most people start at our website which has the main PG search facility:
www.gutenberg.org.
This website includes information about Project Gutenberg, including
how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
electronic works
Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg
concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
with anyone. For forty years, he produced and distributed Project
Gutenberg eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
edition.
Most people start at our website which has the main PG search facility:
www.gutenberg.org.
This website includes information about Project Gutenberg, including
how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
Page 615
Page 616
back
Page 617
Page 618
back