I, Thiebault, count palatine of Troyes,[312] make known to those present and to come that I have given in fee[313] to Jocelyn d'Avalon and his heirs the manor which is called Gillencourt,[314] which is of the castellanerie[315] of La Ferte-sur-Aube; and whatever the same Jocelyn shall be able to acquire in the same manor I have granted to him and his heirs in enlargement of that fief. I have granted, moreover, to him that in no free manor of mine will I retain men who are of this gift.[316] The same Jocelyn, moreover, on account of this has become my liege man, saving, however, his allegiance to Gerad d'Arcy, and to the lord duke of Burgundy, and to Peter, count of Auxerre.[317] Done at Chouaude, by my own witness, in the year of the Incarnation of our Lord 1200, in the month of January. Given by the hand of Walter, my chancellor. 36. The Ceremonies of Homage and Fealty The personal relation between lord and vassal was established by the double ceremony of homage and fealty. Homage was the act by which the vassal made himself the man (_homo_) of the lord, while fealty was the oath of fidelity to the obligations which must ordinarily be assumed by such a man. The two were really distinct, though because they almost invariably went together they finally became confounded in the popular mind. The details of the ceremonies varied much in different times and places, but, in general, when homage was to be performed, the prospective vassal presented himself before his future seigneur bareheaded and without arms; knelt, placed his hands in those of the seigneur, and declared himself his man; then he was kissed by the seigneur and lifted to his feet. In the act of fealty, the vassal placed his hand upon sacred relics, or upon the Bible, and swore eternal faithfulness to his seigneur. The so-called "act of investiture" generally followed, the seigneur handing over to the vassal a bit of turf, a stick, or some other object symbolizing the transfer of the usufruct of the property in question. The whole process was merely a mode of establishing a binding contract between the two parties. Below we have: (_a_) a mediaeval definition of homage, taken from the customary law of Normandy; (_b_) an explanation of fealty, given in an old English law-book; (_c_) a French chronicler's account of the rendering of homage and fealty to the count of Flanders in the year 1127; and (_d_) a set of laws governing homage and fealty, written down in a compilation of the ordinances of Saint Louis (king of France, 1226-1270), but doubtless showing substantially the practice in France for a long time before King Louis's day. Sources--(a) _L'Ancienne Coutume de Normandie_ ["The Old Custom of Normandy"], Chap. 29. (b) Sir Thomas Lyttleton, _Treatise of Tenures in French and English_ (London, 1841), Bk. II., Chap. 2, p. 123.