The English Village Community: Examined in its Relations to the Manorial and Tribal Systems and to the Common or Open Field System of Husbandry; An Essay in Economic History (Reprinted from the Fourth Edition)Seebohm, Frederic
History
The English Village Community: Examined in its Relations to the Manorial and Tribal Systems and to the Common or Open Field System of Husbandry; An Essay in Economic History (Reprinted from the Fourth Edition)
Seebohm, Frederic
Village communities -- Great Britain
[102] In the next place mentioned 20 men hold 20 virgates, and 13
hold 6½ virgates among them, or half a virgate each; and so on. In
one place 8 villani hold 1 hide and 1 virgate among them (_i.e._ 2
probably hold virgates, and 6 of them half-virgates), and 2 others
hold 1 virgate each. In another, 20 _pleni villani_ [of 1 virgate
each] and 29 _semi-villani_ [of half-virgate each] hold in all 34
virgates and a half. In another, 8 villani hold 8 bovates, and 3
bovates are waste. In the rest of the record it is generally assumed
that the 'pleni villani' have a virgate each, and the 'dimidii
villani' half a virgate each.
[103] The following are instances of the villein plough teams:--
The holders of 40 virgates hold 22 plough teams.
The holders of 20 virgates hold 12 plough teams.
The holders of 20 virgates hold 9 plough teams.
The holders of 8 virgates hold 2 plough teams.
There seems to have been as nearly as possible one plough team to
each two virgates, which at two oxen the virgate would give four oxen
to the plough instead of eight. Speaking generally, it may therefore
be said that there were on the Peterborough manors the greater
ploughs of the lord's demense with their separate teams of eight oxen
belonging to the lord, and the lesser ploughs of the villani, to work
which two clubbed together, for which four oxen made a sufficient
team; and it would seem, further, that not only had the villani to
work at the great manorial ploughs, but also to do service for their
lord with their own lesser ploughs in addition. This seems to explain
the expressions used in the Gloucester cartulary that the demesne
land of this or that manor can be ploughed with so many ploughs of
eight head of oxen in the team '_cum consuetudinibus villatæ_;' and
also the mention in Fleta of the '_carucæ adjutrices_' of the villani.
[104] 'Galfridus Snow tenet quoddam tenementum nativum vocatum
_Snowes_. . . . Willelmus Biesten tenet tenementum nativum vocatum
_Biestes_,' and so on.
Extent of 'Byrchsingeseie,' near Colchester.
_Leger Book of St. John the Baptist_, Colchester.
Wrest Park MSS., No. 57.
I am indebted to Earl Cowper for the opportunity of referring to this
interesting MS., containing valuable examples of extents of manors
from the reign of Edward I., and of the services of the tenants. See
particularly the extent of '_Wycham_,' 17 Ed. I., as a good example
of the three field system and serfdom.
[105] Pp. 162–4, &c.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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