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Status of “Villani” and Other Tenants in Danish East Anglia in Pre-Conquest Times

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2009

W. Hudson
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Extract

In the Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 4th Series, Vol. I., pp. 28, etc., I commented upon a thirteenth-century Survey of the Manor of Martham, Norfolk, which seemed to carry back the conditions then existing (both as regards the tenants and the agriculture) to a very much earlier period. The use of the old English word “eriung” (ploughing), to describe a full villein land, implied its continuous use from Angle times all through the Danish occupation. The universal intermixture of lands held by the two classes of villeins and sokemen (by which terms alone the tenants were called), together with the obvious inter-relation of their families, pointed to a common origin and a generally accepted equality of status which was apparently still existent in the thirteenth century. In view of the fact that the manorial conditions of compulsory service had been introduced by the Bishop in 1101 for his newly-founded monastery at Norwich, it was felt not unreasonable to date back to that period the conditions disclosed in the Survey. This would bring us to within a few years of Domesday Book, where the lands are described as almost exclusively held by freemen.

Type
Research Article
Information
Transactions of the Royal Historical Society , Volume 4 , December 1921 , pp. 23 - 48
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1921

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References

page 24 note 1 Besides Mr. H. W. Saunders, mentioned in Transactions of Roy. Hist. Soc, l.c., p. 31, my thanks are due to Mr. H. Morgan-Browne, of Streatham Hill, to whose exceptionally retentive memory we are indebted for the linking up of many isolated references and the following out of many clues.

page 24 note 2 1 have intentionally used the word “villani” to dissociate its meaning from that usually attached to the word “villein.”

page 25 note 1 For these persons, see post., pp. 27, 28.

page 26 note 1 “In dominio” must here mean “under his lordship.” The 3 plough-lands would include the lands of the tenants as well as the lord's “demesne.” It may be well to mention here that a Domesday ploughland (carucata), though used rather as a basis of assessment than an exact measurement of land, appears to mean 120 acres of arable land, and is so taken by the present writer. A plough-team land is used by the writer for the amount of arable land worked on their own account by the tenants of equal sections of land combining to provide a plough-team. The sections differed in size in different vills. Roughly, each section found 2 oxen for a team of 8.

page 26 note 2 These words are added above the line. The person is probably Richard, son of Alwin, mentioned under Ormesby.

page 26 note 3 This, which is one of the largest values in this district, must include Hemsby and the berewite.

page 27 note 1 See post., p. 38.

page 28 note 1 Trans. Roy. Hist. Soc, l.c., pp. 55–6.

page 28 note 2 They will be found so set out in a Paper contributed by the writer to the Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society's Collections, vol. xx., pp. 282–285.

page 28 note 3 The 3 extra tenants above 107 are accounted for by the fact that 3 of the Villeins are also reckoned as among the 27 Sokemen. It is necessary to count them in both lists.

page 29 note 1 The word “eriung” is always incorrectly spelt “eruing” in the Survey, as then pronounced. See Transactions Roy. Hist. Soc., l.c., p. 35Google Scholar.

page 29 note 2 Nos. 27–30 and No. 54 on the list.

page 29 note 3 In the Paper just mentioned, p. 300, can be seen a Plan of Martham, conjecturally showing the site of these fields.

page 29 note 4 Transactions Roy. Hist. Soc, l.c., p. 33.

page 29 note 5 A Simon de Len is mentioned in the “Camera” Roll of Norwich Priory in 1272 as going to London on the business of the Priory, and also in other succeeding Rolls.

page 30 note 1 Ibid., Transactions, etc., p. 47.

page 31 note 1 In my former Paper (p. 46) I thought the number of these special sokemen was 19, and as each sokeman was bound to harrow for ½ day, I concluded that 27 days referred not to them, but to 54 sokemen on the whole list.

page 31 note 2 These and the Bailiffs' Rolls are in possession of the Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society.

page 31 note 3 The Cellarer's Aid was a charge on the manors specially appropriated to the Office of the Prior. It went towards the monastic “Larder,” to provide a sufficient stock of meat for the winter. The “Mole” was the Rent, paid by all the tenants and was so called from O.E. mal, a payment. All the Socage tenants in the Stowe Survey are described in the margin as “Mutt” (for Mule land), and the Villenage tenants as “Werk”.

page 32 note 1 See post., p. 37.

page 33 note 1 It certainly seems as though these charges date back to the time when the villani and the 27 sokemen were the only manorial tenants, that is, to the very beginning of the Manor.

page 34 note 1 Maitland (Domesday Book and Beyond, pp. 24–5), remarking that the Commissioners were to enquire (amongst others) of the “priest, reeve and 6 villani of every vill,” observes that they were to enquire “how much land was held by Freemen and Sokemen, not by Villains. Why? For geld purposes. The villain's lord may be answerable for the land the villain holds, the sokeman's lord may not be”. Of “villanus” he says (p. 59), “When the Norman clerks wrote down villanus, the English jurors had said túnesman. The villa is the tún and the men of the villa are the men of the tún”.

page 35 note 1 A good illustration of this statement and of co-operative ploughing by tenants on their lands occurs in Stowe MS. 936, fol. 31 in the survey of the Prior of Norwich's Manor of Elmham, c. 1290. Of the Homagers (villeins) it is said, “They shall do 6 boons with their plough in time of sowing barley, rye and oats, if they have a whole plough. And they shall have for each boon 1½d. And if they have only ½ plough then they shall do 3 boons with their plough and receive as above. And if they join with one of the lord's homage they shall do their boons wholly as above. And if they join with one of another lord's homage (alieni homagii) who is unwilling to plough with them on the lord's land then they shall harrow for 3 days and have each day ½d.”

page 37 note 1 Westwong. Wong is a Danish word for a comparatively small division of cultivated land.

page 38 note 1 D.B. 113b.

page 38 note 2 D.B. 129b.

page 38 note 3 D.B. 146b.

page 38 note 4 D.B. 217.

page 38 note 5 D.B. 272.

page 40 note 1 D.B. 134.

page 40 note 2 D.B. 221.

page 42 note 1 This outlet was called Grubbs Haven and was blocked up by the twelfth century. Salt-pans, for obtaining sea salt by evaporation, were much valued as providing the means to preserve meat and other foods through the winter.

page 42 note 2 D.B. 115b.

page 42 note 3 D.B. 197.

page 43 note 1 D.B. 133b.

page 43 note 2 D.B. 150.

page 44 note 1 D.B. 248.

page 45 note 1 D.B. 218b.

page 45 note 2 D.B. 220.

page 45 note 3 D.B. 220b.

page 45 note 4 D.B. 150.

page 46 note 1 E.B. 148.

page 46 note 2 John de Oxenedes in his Chronicle (p. 292) states that the 1st Abbot in 1046 replaced a church formerly built of mud (luteam) with one of stone. His successors vigorously continued the work of supplying monastic offices.

page 47 note 1 See ante, p. 34 n. 1.