The Manor in England

THE MANOR IN ENGLAND The typical English Manor, if there be a recognized or definite type, is known to us through the records of the 13th century. There is much valuable material in the somewhat cryptic descrip tions in the Domesday survey ; there are admirable pictures of the custom and working of a manor in the 12th century extents, sur veys, custumals and cartularies, but in the 13th century we find in addition to these, systematic information as to the economic progress of the manor, in the Ministers' accounts, and as to the judicial proceedings of the manorial courts, in the court rolls. By the 14th century we are confronted with a picture of change and decay, emancipation and development.

a manor is a complex estat

e, consisting of (a) the lord's demesne, scattered in strips in the open fields, or in consolidated blocks of fields; (b) the land of the free tenants, who owe the lord small rents in money or in kind, and certain fixed labour-services; (c) the land of the vil leins, lying for the most part in the open fields, and owing more onerous and uncertain services, as well as rents in money and in kind. The land of the manor is partly arable, partly meadow (very highly valued), partly rough pasture, waste or wood. In central and southern England the arable land was divided into three great fields, arranged for a three year rotation of crops and fallow; the fields were divided into acre or 1-acre strips, grouped in "shots" or furlongs. The lord, the free tenants and the villeins all held more or less defined rights to a share in the meadow and the waste. Much of the communal administrative action of the manorial courts is connected with these rights. In the north and west, and again in Kent and East Anglia the three-field division is hardly to be found, and the whole agrarian system varies sharply from the "normal"; this fact is important in local investigations.

Inhabitants of the

inhabitants of the manor have all their separate rights, asserted and defended by the man orial court. The lord at the head of the society, in his hall or manor-house, enjoys his own demesne, holds a certain "superior ity" over the lands of the villeins (which, the later lawyers describe as ownership of the freehold of all villein or copyhold land) and possesses rights over the waste paramount to those enjoyed by the other inhabitants. These rights were to some extent limited by the Statute of Merton (1236) and the second Statute of West minster (1285). The lord's rights of jurisdiction will be better treated in connection with the courts. The free tenant is not yet a modern free-holder ; economically he is often hardly distinguish able from a villein, but his status is clearly marked by his power to appeal to the royal courts of justice, even against his lord. Be low the free-tenants came the villeins (nativi, rustici, bondmen, virgaters, customers, etc.)—customary tenants holding a house,

a virgate or half-virgate in acre strips, and a share in the meadows and waste. A virgate was normally about 3o acres—the fourth part of a hide; but it might vary from 10-15 acres up to 6o or 8o, while the acre itself varies in different districts. The villein was in certain respects unfree; in the eye of the law he had no rights against his lord, who "was protected from all suits by the exceptio villenagii" ; he might not leave the manor without permission, and he could be reclaimed if he did, by the writ "de nativo habendo" ; he could not, in theory, own any property, and he was subject to certain "base" incidents, such as the payment of merchet, and the need to ask permission to put his son to school or to allow him to seek ordination. But in practice the villein bought and sold like other men, after payment of a small fee ; he leased, ex changed or sold his land, through the very efficient machinery of the manorial court ; he made wills, and at times appears even to have disposed of his villein lands by will—proved in the lord's court. He could, no doubt, be ejected by the lord, but such ejec tion was very rare, and seemed to require a complete cessation of services, by physical or mental incapacity, before it could be accomplished "according to the custom of the manor." The vil lein was never exposed to the arbitrary will of the lord, but was always protected by the court, which interpreted the "custom" by the spoken witness of the villata (or the curia, the homagium, the jurati) or the written testimony of court roll or custumal. The inevitable confusion which arose between unfree status, and unfree tenure usually reacted to the advantage of the villein by blood, but on some estates (notably monastic lands) there was a deter mined attempt to impose the whole burden of unfree status upon free men holding villein tenements. Individual villeins, with their sequela, or villein brood, were sometimes bought and sold, but they could not be separated from their tenements, and all that is implied by sale is transfer from one lord to another as regards services and jurisdiction. The hardship or prosperity of a villein's lot depended mainly upon his economic position, which would seem to have steadily improved in the i4th century. His rents in money, in kind, and in services were for the most part fixed. The rents of assize (probably a commutation of earlier rents in kind rather than of services) varied considerably on different manors, but as they remained fixed for centuries, the advantage of any fall in the value of money remained with the villein. The dues in kind were gradually almost all commuted, or dropped.