"Whereas divers have complained that they be grieved by reason of
purchasing of lands and tenements, which have been holden of the king's
progenitors that now is, as of honors; and the same lands have been
taken into the king's hands, as though they had been holden in chief of
the king as of his crown: (2.) The king will that from henceforth no man
be grieved by any such purchase."
De Lolme, chap. iii., sec. 3, remarks on these laws that they took from
the king all power of preventing alienation or of purchase. They left
him the reversionary right on the failure of heirs.
These changes in the relative power of the sovereign and the nobles took
place to enable Edward to enter upon the conquest of France; but that
monarch, conferred a power upon the barons, which was used to the
detriment of his descendants, and led to the dethronement of the
Plantagenets.
The line of demarcation between the two sets of titles, those derived
through the ANGLO-SAXON laws and those derived through the grants of the
Norman sovereigns, was gradually being effaced. The people looked back
to the laws of Edward the Confessor, and forced them upon Edward II.
But after passing the laws which prevented nobles from selling, and
empowering FREEMEN to do so, Edward III. found it needful to assert his
claims to the entire land of England, and enacted in the twenty-fourth
year of his reign:
"That the king is the universal lord and original proprietor of all land
in his kingdom; that no man doth or can possess, any part of it but what
has mediately or immediately been derived as a gift from him to be held
on feodal service."
Those who obtained gifts of land, only held or had the use of them; the
ownership rested in the Crown. Feodal service, the maintenance of armed
men, and the bringing them into the field, was the rent paid.
The wealth which came into England after the conquest of France
influenced all classes, but none more than the family of the king. His
own example seems to have affected his descendants. The invasion of
France and the captivity of its king reappear in the invasion of England
by Henry IV., and the capture and dethronement of Richard II. The
prosperity of England during the reign of Edward had passed away in that
of his grandson. Very great distress pervaded the land, and it led to
efforts to get rid of villeinage. The 1st Richard II. recites:
"That grievous complaints had been made to the Lords and Commons, that
villeins and land tenants daily withdraw into cities and towns, and a
special commission was appointed to hear the case, and decide thereon."
The complaint was renewed, and appears in Act 9 Richard II., cap. 2:
"Whereas divers villeins and serfs, as well of the great Lords as of
other people, as well spiritual as temporal, do fly within the cities,
towns, and places entfranched, as the city of London, and other like,
and do feign divers suits against their Lords, to the intent to make
them free by the answer of the Lords, it is accorded and assented that
the Lords and others shall not be forebound of their villeins, because
of the answer of the Lords."
Serfdom or slavery may have existed previous to the ANGLO-SAXON
invasion, but I am disposed to think that the Saxon, the Jutes, and the
Angles reduced the inhabitants of the lands which they conquered, into
serfdom. The history of that period shows that men, women, and children
were constantly sold, and that there were established markets. One at
Bristol, which was frequented by Irish buyers, was put down, owing to
the remonstrance of the Bishop. After the Norman invasion the name of
Villein, a person attached to the villa, was given to the serfs. The
village was their residence. Occasional instances of enfranchisement
took place; the word signified being made free, and at that time every
FREEMAN was entitled to a vote. The word enfranchise has latterly come
to bear a different meaning, and to apply solely to the possession of a
vote, but it originally meant the elevation of a serf into the condition
of a FREEMAN. The act of enfranchisement was a public ceremony usually
performed at the church door. The last act of ownership performed by the
master was the piercing of the right ear with an awl. Many serfs fled
into the towns, where they were enfranchised and became FREEMEN.
The disaffection of the common people increased; they were borne down
with oppression. They struggled against their masters, and tried to
secure their personal liberty, and the freedom of their land. The
population rose in masses in the reign of Richard II., and demanded--
1st. The total abolition of slavery for themselves and their children
forever;
2d. The reduction of the rent of good land to 4d. per acre;
3d. The right of buying and selling, like other men, in markets and
fairs;
4th. The pardon of all offences.
The monarch acted upon insidious advice; he spoke them fair at first, to
gain time, but did not fulfil his promises. Ultimately the people gained
part of their demands. To limit or defeat them, an act was passed,
fixing the wages of laborers to 4d. per day, with meat and drink, or 6d.
per day, without meat and drink, and others in proportion; but with the
proviso, that if any one refused to serve or labor on these terms, every
justice was at liberty to send him to jail, there to remain until he
gave security to serve and labor as by law required. A subsequent act
prevents their being employed by the week, or paid for holidays.
Previous to this period, the major barons and great lords tilled their
land by serfs, and had very large flocks and herds of cattle. On the
death of the Bishop of Winchester, 1367, his executors delivered to
Bishop Wykeham, his successor in the see, the following: 127 draught
horses, 1556 head of cattle, 3876 wedders, 4777 ewes, and 3541 lambs.
Tillage was neglected; and in 1314 there was a severe dearth; wheat sold
at a price equal to L30 per quarter, the brewing of ale was discontinued
by proclamation, in order "to prevent those of middle rank from
perishing for want of food."
The dissensions among the descendants of Edward III. as to the right
to the Crown aided the nobles in their efforts to make their estates
hereditary, and the civil wars which afflicted the nation tended to
promote that object. Kings were crowned and discrowned at the will of
the nobles, who compelled the FREEMEN to part with their small estates.
The oligarchy dictated to the Crown, and oppressed and kept down
the FREEMEN. The nobles allied themselves with the serfs, who were
manumitted that they might serve as soldiers in the conflicting armies.
From the Conquest to the time of Richard II., only barons-by-tenure, the
descendants of the companions of the Conqueror, were invited by writ to
Parliament. That monarch made an innovation, and invited others who were
not barons-by-tenure. The first dukedom was created the 11th of Edward
III., and the first viscount the 18th Henry VI.
Edward IV. seized upon the lands granted by former kings, and gave them
to his own followers, and thus created a feeling of uneasiness in the
minds of the nobility, and paved the way for the events which were
accomplished by a succeeding dynasty. The decision in the Taltarum case
opened the question of succession; and Edward's efforts to put down
retainers was the precursor of the Tudor policy.
We have a picture of the state of society in the reign of Edward IV.
in the Paston Memoirs, written by Margaret Paston. Her husband, John
Paston, was heir to Sir John Fastolf. He was bound by the will to
establish in Caister Castle, Fastolf s own mansion, a college of
religious men to pray for his benefactor's soul. But in those days might
was right, and the Duke of Norfolk, fancying that he should like the
house for himself, quietly took possession of it. At that time, Edward
was just seated on the throne, and Edward had just been reported to
Paston to have said in reference to another suit, that
"He would be your good lord therein as he would to the poorest man in
England. He would hold with you in your right; and as for favor, he will
not be understood that he shall show favor more to one man to another,
not to one in England."
This was a true expression of the king's intentions. But either he
was changeable in his moods, or during these early years he was hardly
settled enough on the throne always to be able to carry out his wishes.
This time, however, in some way or another, the great duke was reduced
to submission, and Caister was restored to Paston.
In 1465 a new claimant appeared; and claimants, though as troublesome
in the fifteenth as the nineteenth century, proceeded in a different
fashion. This time it was the Duke of Suffolk, who asserted a right to
the manor of Drayton in his own name, and who had bought up the assumed
rights of another person to the manor of Hellesdon. John Paston was
away, and his wife had to bear the brunt. An attempt to levy rent
at Drayton was followed by a threat from the duke's men, that if her
servants "ventured to take any further distresses at Drayton, even if
it were but of the value of a pin, they would take the value of an ox in
Hellesdon."
Paston and the duke alike professed to be under the law. But each was
anxious to retain that possession which in those days seems really to
have been nine points of the law. The duke got hold of Drayton, while
Hellesdon was held for Paston. One day Paston's men made a raid upon
Drayton, and carried off seventy-seven head of cattle. Another day the
duke's bailiff came to Hellesdon with 300 men to see if the place
were assailable. Two servants of Paston, attempting to keep a court at
Drayton in their master's name, were carried off by force. At last the
duke mustered his retainers and marched against Hellesdon. The garrison,
too weak to resist, at once surrendered.
"The duke's men took possession, and set John Paston's own tenants to
work, very much against their wills, to destroy the mansion and break
down the walls of the lodge, while they themselves ransacked the church,
turned out the parson, and spoiled the images. They also pillaged very
completely every house in the village. As for John Paston's own place,
they stripped it completely bare; and whatever there was of lead,
brass, pewter, iron, doors or gates, or other things that they could not
conveniently carry off, they hacked and hewed them to pieces. The duke
rode through Hellesdon to Drayton the following day, while his men were
still busy completing the wreck of destruction by the demolition of the
lodge. The wreck of the building, with the rents they made in its walls,
is visible even now" (Introd. xxxv.).
The meaning of all this is evident. We have before us a state of society
in which the anarchical element is predominant. But it is not pure
anarchy. The nobles were determined to reduce the middle classes to
vassalage.
The reign of the Plantagenets witnessed the elevation of the nobility.
The descendants of the Norman barons menaced, and sometimes proved too
powerful for the Crown. In such reigns as those of Edward I., Edward
III., and Henry VI., the barons triumphed. The power wielded by the
first Edward fell from the feeble grasp of his son and successor. The
beneficent rule of Edward III. was followed by the anarchy of Richard
II. Success led to excess. The triumphant party thinned the ranks of its
opponents, and in turn experienced the same fate. The fierce struggle
of the Red and White Roses weakened each. Guy, Earl of Warwick, "the
king-maker," sank overpowered on the field of Tewkesbury, and with
him perished many of the most powerful of the nobles. The jealousy
of Richard III. swept away his own friends, and the bloody contest on
Bosworth field destroyed the flower of the nobility. The sun of the
Plantagenets went down, leaving the country weak and impoverished, from
a contest in which the barons sought to establish their own power, to
the detriment alike of the Crown and the FREEMEN. The latter might have
exclaimed:
"Till half a patriot, half a coward, grown, We fly from meaner tyrants
to the throne."
The long contest terminated in the defeat alike of the Crown and the
nobles, but the nation suffered severely from the struggle.
The rule of this family proved fatal to the interest of a most important
class, whose rights were jealously guarded by the Normans. The Liberi
Homines, the FREEMEN, who were Odhal occupiers, holding in capite from
the sovereign, nearly disappeared in the Wars of the Roses. Monarchs who
owed their crown to the favor of the nobles were too weak to uphold
the rights of those who held directly from the Crown, and who, in their
isolation, were almost powerless.
The term FREEMAN, originally one of the noblest in the land, disappeared
in relation to urban tenures, and was applied solely to the personal
rights of civic burghers; instead thereof arose the term FREEHOLDER from
FREE HOLD, which was originally a grant free from all rent, and only
burdened with military service. The term was subsequently applied to
land held for leases for lives as contradistinguished from leases for
years, the latter being deemed base tenures, and insufficient to qualify
a man to vote; the theory being that no man was free whose tenure could
be disturbed during his life. Though the Liberi Homines or FREEMEN were,
as a class, overborne in this struggle, and reduced to vassalage, yet
their descendants were able, under the leadership of Cromwell, to regain
some of the rights and influence of which they had been despoiled under
the Plantagenets.
Fortescue, Lord Chief-Justice to Henry VI., thus describes the condition
of the English people:
"They drunk no water, unless it be that some for devotion, and upon a
rule of penance, do abstain from other drink. They eat plentifully
of all kinds of flesh and fish. They wear woollen cloth in all their
apparel. They have abundance of bed covering in their houses, and
all other woollen stuff. They have great store of all implements of
household. They are plentifully furnished with all instruments of
husbandry, and all other things that are requisite to the accomplishment
of a great and wealthy life, according to their estates and degrees."
This flattering picture is not supported by the existing disaffection
and the repeated applications for redress from the serfs and the smaller
farmers, and the simple fact that the population had increased under
the Normans--a period of 88 years--from 2,150,000 to 3,350,000, while
under the Plantagenets--a period of 300 years--it only increased to
4,000,000, the addition to the population in that period being only
650,000. The average increase in the former period was nearly 14,000 per
annum, while in the latter it did not much exceed 2000 per annum. This
goes far to prove the evil from civil wars, and the oppression of the
oligarchy.