This process of commendation was nothing new. It was an old tribal practice at work long before Roman times in Gaul, and destined not only to outlast the Roman rule, but also to receive a fresh impulse afterwards from the German invasions. And as its progress can be traced step by step from Roman times, through the period of conquest into the times of settled Frankish rule, and its history is closely mixed up with the history of the growth of the Roman villa into the mediæval manor, and with the change of the '_sordida munera_' from public burdens into manorial services, it presents useful stepping-stones over a gulf not otherwise to be easily crossed with security. «Cæsar. Subjection to an overlordship a means of escape from oppression.» Cæsar describes how in Gaul, even before the Roman conquest, the free tribesmen, overburdened by the exactions of chieftains and the tributes imposed upon them (probably by way of 'gwestva' or food-rents), surrendered their freedom, and became little more than 'servi' of the chiefs. And so far had this practice proceeded that he describes the people of Gaul as practically divided into two classes--the chiefs, whom he likened to the Roman 'equites;' [p306] and the common people, who were in a position little removed from slavery.[452] «Tacitus.» Further, there is the evidence of Tacitus himself that oppressive Roman exactions were forcing free tribesmen, even in _Frisia_, to surrender their lands and their children into a condition of servitude.[453] «Gregory of Tours.» Again, Gregory of Tours[454] describes how, in a year of famine, the poor surrendered their freedom--_subdebant se servitio_--to escape starvation. [p307] «Salvian's complaint in the fifth century.» Lastly, in the fifth century (A.D. 450–90) Salvian[455] describes at great length the process by which Roman freemen were in the practice of surrendering their possessions to great men and becoming tributary to them, in order to escape the exactions of the officers who collected the 'tributum.' He narrates how the rich Romans threw upon the poor the weight of the public tribute, and made extra exactions of their own; how multitudes in consequence deserted their property and became _bagaudæ_--rebels and outlaws;--how, in districts conquered by the Franks and Goths, there was no such oppression; how Romans living in these districts had their rights respected; how people even fled for safety and freedom from the districts still under Roman rule into these Teutonic districts; and he expresses his wonder why more did not do this. «The effect of surrenders to an overlord.»