The constant denomination for those who have no part in the common arable fields, but hold only crofts or small plots with their homesteads, is 'cotters' (_cotsetle_, _cottagiarii_, _cottarii_[287], etc.). They get opposed to villains as to owners of normal holdings[288]. Exceptionally the term is used for those who have very small holdings in the open fields. In this case the authorities distinguish between greater and lesser cotters[289], between the owners of a 'full cote' and of 'half a cote[290].' The _bordarii_, so conspicuous in Domesday, and evidently representing small tenants of the same kind as the cottagers, disappear almost entirely in later times[291]. [Results as to terminology.] We may start from this last observation in our general estimate of the terminology. One might expect to find traces of very strong French influence in this respect, if in any. Even if the tradition of facts had not been interrupted by the Conquest, names were likely to be altered for the convenience of the new upper class. And the Domesday Survey really begins a new epoch in terminology by its use of _villani_ and _bordarii_. But, curiously enough, only the first of these terms takes root on English soil. Now it is not a word transplanted by the Conquest; it was in use before the Conquest as the Latin equivalent of _ceorl_, _geneat_, and probably _gebúr_. Its success in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries is a success of Latin, and not of French, of the half-literary record language over conversational idioms, and not of foreign over vernacular notions. The peculiarly French '_bordier_,' on the other hand, gets misunderstood and eliminated. Looking to Saxon and Danish terms, we find that they hold their ground tenaciously enough; but still the one most prevalent before the Conquest--_ceorl_-- disappears entirely, and all the others taken together cannot balance the diffusion of the 'villains.' The disappearance of _ceorl_ may be accounted for by the important fact that it was primarily the designation of a free man, and had not quite lost this sense even in the time immediately before the Conquest. The spread of the Latin term is characteristic enough in any case. It is well in keeping with a historical development which, though it cannot be reduced to an importation of foreign manners, was by no means a mere sequel to Saxon history[292]. A new turn had been given towards centralisation and organisation from above, and _villanus_, the Latin record term, illustrates very aptly the remodelling of the lower stratum of society by the influence of the curiously centralised English feudalism.