§ I. PERSONS.
(1.) After the bishops and abbats, the highest persons in rank were the
Norman barons.
(2.) _Taini_, tegni, teigni, teini, or teinni, are next to be mentioned,
because those of the highest class were in fact nobility, or barons of
the Saxon times. Archbishops, bishops, and abbats, as well as the great
barons, are also called thanes.
(3.) _Vavassores_, in dignity, were next to the barons, and higher
thanes. Selden says, they either held of a mesne lord, and not
immediately of the king, or at least of the king as of an honour or
manor and not in chief. The grantees, says sir Henry Spelman, that
received their estates from the barons or capitanei, and not from the
king, were called valvasores, (a degree above knights.)
(4.) The _aloarii_, alodarii, or alodiarii, tenants in allodium, (a free
estate “possessio libera.”) The _dinges_ mentioned, tom i. fol. 298, are
supposed to have been persons of the same description.
(5.) _Milites._ The term miles appears not to have acquired a precise
meaning at the time of the Survey, sometimes implying a soldier, or mere
military servant, and sometimes a person of higher distinction.
(6.) _Liberi Homines_ appears to have been a term of considerable
latitude; signifying not merely the freeman, or freeholders of a manor,
but occasionally including all the ranks of society already mentioned,
and indeed all persons holding in military tenure. “The ordinary
freemen, before the conquest,” says Kelham, “and at the time of
compiling Doomsday, were under the protection of great men; but what
their quality was, further than that their persons and blood were free,
that is, that they were not nativi, or bondmen, it will give a knowing
man trouble to discover to us.” These freemen are called in the Survey
_liberi homines comendati_. They appear to have placed themselves, by
voluntary homage, under this protection: their lord or patron undertook
to secure their estates and persons, and for this protection and
security they paid to him an annual stipend, or performed some annual
service. Some appear to have sought a patron or protector, for the sake
of obtaining their freedom only; such _the liberi homines comendatione
tantum_ may be interpreted. According to the laws of the Conqueror, a
quiet residence of a year and a day, upon the king’s demesne lands,
would enfranchise a villan who had fled from his lord. “_Item si servi
permanserint sine calumnia per annum et diem in civitatibus nostris vel
burgis in muro vallatis, vel in castris nostris, a die illa liberi
afficiuntur et liberi a jugo servitutis suæ sunt in perpetuum._” The
_commendati dimidii_ were persons who depended upon two protectors, and
paid half to one and half to the other. _Sub commendati_ were under the
command of those who were themselves depending upon some superior lord.
_Sub commendati dimidii_ were those who were under the _commendati
dimidii_, and had two patrons or protectors, and the same as they had.
_Liberi homines integri_ were those who were under the _full_ protection
of one lord, in contradistinction to the _liberi homines dimidii_.
Commendatio sometimes signified the annual rent paid for the protection.
_Liberi homines ad nullam firmam pertinentes_ were those who held their
lands independent of any lord. Of others it is said, “qui remanent in
manu regis.” In a few entries of the Survey, we have _liberæ feminæ_,
and one or two of _liberæ feminæ commendatæ_.
(7.) _Sochmanni_, or _socmens_, were those inferior landowners who had
lands in the soc or franchise of a great baron; privileged villans, who,
though their tenures were absolutely copyhold, yet had an interest equal
to a freehold.
(8.) Of this description of tenantry also were the _rachenistres_, or
_radchenistres_, who appear likewise to have been called _radmanni_, or
_radmans_. It appears that some of the radchenistres, like the sochmen,
were less free than others. Dr. Nash conjectured that the radmanni and
radchenistres were probably a kind of freemen who served on horseback.
Rad-cnihꞇ is usually interpreted by our glossarists _equestris homo sive
miles_, and Raðheꞃe _equestris exercitus_.
(9.) _Villani._ The clearest notion of the tenure of villani is probably
to be obtained from sir W. Blackstone’s Commentaries. “With regard to
folk-land,” says he, “or estates held in villenage, this was a species
of tenure neither strictly Feodal, Norman, nor Saxon, but mixed or
compounded of them all; and which also, on account of the heriots that
usually attend it, may seem to have somewhat Danish in its composition.
Under the Saxon government, there were, as sir William Temple speaks, a
sort of people in a condition of downright servitude, used and employed
in the most servile works, and belonging, both they and their children,
and their effects, to the lord of the soil, like the rest of the cattle
or stock upon it. These seem to have been those who held what was called
the _folk-land_, from which they were removable at the lord’s pleasure.
On the arrival of the Normans here, it seems not improbable that they,
who were strangers to any other than a feodal state, might give some
sparks of enfranchisement to such wretched persons as fell to their
share, by admitting them, as well as others, to the oath of fealty,
which conferred a right of protection, and raised the tenant to a kind
of estate superior to downright slavery, but inferior to every other
condition. This they called _villenage_, and the tenants villeins;
either from the word _vilis_, or else, as sir Edward Coke tells us, a
villa; because they lived chiefly in villages, and were employed in
rustic works of the most sordid kind. They could not leave their lord
without his permission; but if they ran away, or were purloined from
him, might be claimed and recovered by action, like beasts or other
chatels. The villeins could acquire no property either in lands or
goods; but if he purchased either, the lord might enter upon them, oust
the villein, and seize them to his own use, unless he contrived to
dispose of them before the lord had seized them; for the lord had then
lost his opportunity. The law however protected the persons of villeins,
as king’s subjects, against atrocious injuries of the lord.”
(10.) _Bordarii_ of the Survey appear at various times to have received
a great variety of interpretations. Lord Coke calls them “boors, holding
a little house, with some land of husbandry, bigger than a cottage.”
Some have considered them as cottagers, taking their name from living on
the borders of a village or manor; but this is sufficiently refuted by
Doomsday itself, where we find them not only mentioned generally among
the agricultural occupiers of land, but in one instance as “circa aulam
manentes,” dwelling near the manor-house; and even residing in some of
the larger towns. Boꞃð, bishop Kennett notices, was a cottage. The
_cos-cets_, corcez, cozets, or cozez, were apparently the same as the
cottarii and cotmanni; cottagers who paid a certain rent for very small
parcels of land.
(11.) _Bures_, buri, or burs, are noticed in the first volume of
Doomsday itself, as synonymous with _coliberti_. The name of coliberti
was unquestionably derived from the Roman civil law. They are described
by lord Coke as tenants in free socage by free rent. Cowel says, they
were certainly a middle sort of tenants, between servile and free, or
such as held their freedom of tenure under condition of such works and
services, and were therefore the same landholders whom we meet with (in
aftertimes) under the name of conditionales.
Such are the different descriptions of tenantry, and their rights more
particularly noticed in Doomesday.
(12.) _Servi._ It is observed by bishop Kennett, and by Morant after
him, in his History of Essex, that the servi and villani are, all along
in Doomsday, divided from each other; but that no author has fixed the
exact distinction between them. The servi, bishop Kennett adds, might be
the pure villanes, and villanes in gross, who, without any determined
tenure of land, were, at the arbitrary pleasure of the lord, appointed
to servile works, and received their wages and maintenance at the
discretion of the lord. The other were of a superior degree, and were
called villani, because they were villæ or glebæ adscripti, i. e. held
some cottage and lands, for which they were burthened with such stated
servile works as their lords had annexed to them. The Saxon name for
servus was Eꞅne. The ancillæ of the Survey were females, under
circumstances nearly similar to the servi. These were disposed of in the
same way, at the pleasure of the lord. The laws, however, protected
their chastity; they could not be violated with impunity, even by their
owners.
(13.) _Censarii_, _censores_, or _censorii_, were also among the
occupiers of land. They appear to have been free persons, _censum
reddentes_.
(14.) _Porcarii._ Although in one or two instances in Doomsday Survey
mere swine-herds seem to have been intended by _Porcarii_, yet in the
generality of entries in which they are mentioned, they appear in the
rank of free occupiers, who rented the privilege of feeding pigs in the
woodlands, some for money, and some for payments in kind.
(15.) The _homines_, who are so frequently mentioned, included all sorts
of feudatory tenants. They claimed a privilege of having their causes
and persons tried only in the court of their lord, to whom they owed the
duty of submission, and professed dependance.
(16.) _Angli_ and _Anglici_ occur frequently in the Survey among the
under tenants, holding in different capacities.
(17.) Among the _offices_ attached to names, we find accipitrarii or
ancipitrarii, arbalistarii or balistarii arcarii biga, camerarii campo,
constabularius, cubicularius, dapifer, dispensator, equarius, forestarii
huscarli ingeniator, interpres, lagemanni, Latinarius, legatus
liberatores marescal, or marescalcus medici, monitor, pincerna recter
navis regis, scutularius, stalre, stirman or stiremannus regis,
thesaurarius and venatores of a higher description.
(18.) _Offices_ of an _inferior_ description, and trades, are aurifabri,
carpentarii, cemetarii, cervisiarii, coci, coqui, or koci, fabri,
ferrarii, figuli fossarii, fossator, granetarius, hostarius, inguardi,
joculator regis, joculatrix, lanatores, loricati, lorimarius, loripes,
mercatores, missatici, monetarii, parcher, parm’t piscatores, pistores,
portarius potarii, or poters, prebendarii prefecti, prepositi salinarii
servientes, sutores, tonsor, and vigilantes homines. Among
ecclesiastical offices, we have Capicerius, Æcel. Winton the sacrist,
and Matricularias, Æcel. S. Johannis Cestriæ. Buzecarts were mariners.
Hospites, occupiers of houses.
Among the assistants in husbandry, we find apium custos, avantes
homines, berquarii bovarii caprarum mediator daia granatarius
mellitarii, mercennarius, porcarii, and vacarius.