Part 8

As a last question we may ask: What was the 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,' 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].

[Summary.]

The class of villeins may well be heterogeneous. It 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 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.

[Depression of the villeins.]

We are not left to speculate about this matter. In after days those who were likely to hold a true tradition, 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.

[The Normans and the peasants.]

Here we may read of a free man with half a hide who has now been made one of the villeins[213], 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 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. 15_s_. but the men were thereby ruined and now it is valued at only 45_s._[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.

[Depression of the sokemen.]

But the most convincing proof of the depression of the peasantry comes to us from Cambridgeshire. The 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 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.

[Further illustrations of depression.]

Evidence so cogent as this we shall hardly find in any part of the record save that which relates to 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 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.

[The peasants on the royal demesne.]

A last argument must be added. What we see in the thirteenth century of the ancient demesne of the 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 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?

FOOTNOTES:

[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 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 20_d._ or works one day a week and two in autumn; two _cottarii_, each of whom pays 12_d._ or works one day a week. Ibid. 69 b (Shipston): two _cotmanni_, each of whom pays 3_s._ or works like a virgater; two _cottarii_, each of whom pays 13_d._ Ibid. 76 a (Cropthorn): two _cotmanni_, each of whom pays 2_s._ or works like a _cottarius_; two _cottarii_, each of whom pays 18_d._ 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.'

[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.