This was the case with Peterborough, Ely and other ancient foundations restored in the time of Eádgar. He himself says of Ely: “Nú wæs se hálga stede yfele forlæten mid læssan þæówdóme ðonne ús gelícode nú on úrum tíman, and eác wæs gehwyrfed ðám cyninge tó handa, ic cweðe be me silfum.” Cod. Dip. No. 563. Footnote 551: Hist. Eccl. iii. 24. Footnote 552: Bed. Vit. Sci. Bened. § 1. (Op. Minor, ii. 140.) ----- The gaining of a hereditary character for lands, and especially the relief from heavy dues, were advantages which might speedily arouse the avarice and stimulate the invention even of barbarians. Accordingly those who could gain access to the ear of the king and his witan, bought, or begged or extorted grants of privileged land, which they either converted entirely into private estates, or upon which they erected monasteries, nominally such: and over these, which they filled with irregular and often profligate monks, they assumed the jurisdiction of abbots; with such little advantage to the service of religion, that we have seen Beda describe them as a public scandal, and recommend even the desperate remedy of cancelling, by royal and episcopal authority, the _privilegia_ or charters on which their immunities reposed. To the growing prevalence of this fraud we probably owe it that, at least in Wessex, the custom arose of confiscating land on which the conditions of the grant had not been fulfilled. Thus Ini called in the lands which Cissa had granted to Hean the abbot and Cille the abbess, his sister, because no religious buildings had been erected thereon: “Sed Ini rex eandem terram, postea dum regno potiretur, _diripiens ac reipublicae restituit_, nondum constructo monasterio in ea, nec ullo admodum oratorio erecto[553];” that is, as I understand it, folcland they had been, and folcland they again became. But even this did not meet all the exigencies of the case, and it therefore probably became necessary, even in bócland granted to the church, to reserve the military and other services, which the clergy could cause to be performed by their own dependent cultivators or tenants, even if they were not compelled to serve themselves,—a point which is by no means clear[554]. ----- Footnote 553: Cod. Dipl. No. 46. Footnote 554: “Quam videlicet terram Alhmundus abbas, expeditionem subterfugiens, mihi reconciliationis gratia dabat.” Cod. Dipl. No. 161. -----