CHAPTER XXIV. THE FEUDAL SYSTEM-THE MANOR AND ITS COURT. WE Ante, p. 219. E have seen in Chapter XXI. how small a portion CHAP. XXIV. of the Weald was included by name in the Domesday of Kent, compiled twenty years after the conquest, and shortly before King William's death-at which time only four churches (so far as this Survey is an authority) had reared their heads. During this eventful period, the feudal system (previously existing only in embryo) had become firmly established throughout England.* In the following simple entry in the Survey of Middlesex, we find the recognition of the Sovereign as lord paramount, or supreme feudal lord of all the land in the kingdom: "King William holds twelve and a half acres of land not claimed by any one ('nanesmansland,' or no man's land)." Here we see in force that wise and orderly maxim of assigning to every acre of the soil, and every other thing capable of ownership, a legal owner-such were the forests and waste grounds, which, up to this time, had not been appropriated in the general distribution of lands, and which the law vested in the Sovereign as part of the ancient demesne lands of the Crown, or else in his representatives, who thenceforth became the lords of manors; this would include such of the unreclaimed portions of the Weald as were not under the dominion of any tenant in capite or lord of a manor at this time. The feudal system, as a system, cannot, says Creasy, be said to have p. 85. existed in England before the overthrow of Saxon independence at Hastings. CHAP. XXIV. I now proceed to give a short outline of the feudal system, divested as much as possible of professional technicalities. Feudal land (and the land itself so held was called a feud or fief) was a circuit of land which a baron or ecclesiastic held of the King, from whom the holder had received permission to possess and enjoy it under the protection of the giver, while the actual dominion over it remained in such giver, who was technically called the lord paramount; to whom, in return, fealty or fidelity was sworn, and certain services were rendered, chiefly military at this time. This was feudalism in its simplest form. But subinfeudation soon became common, and then a more complex state of things arose, for the feudatory or tenant in capite had dependents of his own, for whom he carved out and granted smaller manors and portions of his fief, to be held of himself on terms similar to those by which he held of the king. These dependents again might subdivide their sub-fiefs, and grant them to others, and so on almost ad infinitum.† Many links in the feudal chain might thus intervene between the King as original grantor, or lord paramount, and the tenant paravail (per availe), the lowest and actual tenant of the fee, which was productive of great confusion, and occasioned an endless conflict of obligations and rights; as the same two men might be, and often were, lords and vassals of each other in respect of different lands. This system of subinfeudation, however, was permitted in England for about 130 years after the conquest. The practice, be it remembered, was not confined to the lay population, but ecclesiastics, as we have seen in Domesday, were also feudal tenants to the King, and swore fealty to him, and exercised the same jurisdiction as the lay lords among whom they dwelt; the peasantry still continued in a state of servitude, being forced to till the soil as abject de "There can be no tenure without some service, because the service makes the tenure."-1 Inst., I. 93. + All these lesser manors conferred the rights of chase, which made them so attractive. pendents, while the stores of the merchant, and the earn- CHAP. XXIV. ings of the artizan, were too often treated as the legitimate objects of knightly rapacity and violence. Guizot states that if we investigate feudalism in its social aspects, we shall find ample cause for the inextinguishable hatred with which it has ever been regarded by the common people. But this ought not to make us blind to its brighter features, including its chivalry, its desire to protect the fair sex, and its encouragement to literature and the arts. The district, which in Saxon times was known as the vill, ham, burgh, or tun, with a court of justice for all who lived in it, was now held by the Norman tenant in capite, or his under tenants, and acquired the name of a 'manor,' which term, it has been already stated, does not occur in genuine Anglo-Saxon charters or laws. It was so called because the chief baron or lord usually resided there, the aula, halla, or haula, being the hall or chief mansion. Thus "Geoffrey, Bishop of Coutances, obtained, by the gift of King William, 280 vills, which we commonly call manors, from the word manendo.” On which Baron Maseres makes the following observations: "Here we have the derivation and original meaning of the word manor ; namely, the mansion-house of a country gentleman. The French use word manoir in the same sense, at this day. But in England, the word manor now denotes a parcel of land (with or without a house upon it), of which a part remains in the lord's or owner's hands, and is called his demesne-land, terra dominica, or terra domini, and another part has been granted away before the eighteenth year of the reign of King Edward I., or the year of Christ 1290, to two or more other persons, to hold to them and their heirs for ever, of the grantor, or lord, and his heirs, for ever, either by knight-service, or in free and common socage." Ordericus Vitalis, The manor might be of almost any size. Acres (Acrise), Pearson, p. 30. situate in this county, for many years held by Mr. Papillon's family, and now belonging to Mr. Mackinnon, only answered or was rated for one suling (160 acres) "which two brothers held, and each had a hall; now it is for one *Maseres, Historic Anglicana Monumenta, p. 256, quoted by Mr. Larking, Appendix xx. T CHAP. XXIV. manor;" while Setlinges (Selling), which then belonged to the Abbot of St. Augustine, is returned as a manor without a hall, which was not indispensable if the owner had one elsewhere. Under Hortune (Horton, in Axton hundred) we find, "these four manors are now for one." With the mansion the lord held, as we have just seen (and it is of sufficient importance to bear repeating), portions of land called his demesne, part of which he retained for occupation, and farmed it by the labour of his serfs; the remainder was distributed among his tenants, who were often mesne or inferior lords, possessing their tenants, all of whom held either by military service or socage tenure, and these lands the lord could not resume or encroach upon so long as the services were fulfilled. The waste and uncultivated lands were left for common of pasture, recreation ground, and roads. One of the earliest appendages to a mansion was a domestic court, called a court baron, where the tenure was freehold, and a customary court, where the tenure was copyhold; which cach lord was empowered to hold for the protection of his own rights, and for settling the disputes of his tenants. It could only be held within the manor, and was usually held in the lord's hall; but I must defer for the present any further observations on this part of our history. Elton's Tenures of Thus I have endeavoured to show in a few plain words how a new order of things was consummated by the Conqueror, the founder of a new dynasty, and also of "the royal feudal system," which has never been wholly abolished. The effect, so far as Kent was concerned, was not to increase or diminish the quantity of gavelkind land. The tenures of the vast territories belonging to the Church, with a few exceptions, however, became military, the lesser thanes knights, and the socage tenure of the yeomen and rustics was altered, though to a much less extent here than in the rest of England. The only descriptive terms used in the Domesday of Kent, we have seen, were laths, hundreds, and manors; the |