to strengthen the tottering edifice of the Frankish Empire,
public authority had to compromise with aristocratic forces
in order to ensure regular government. As regards military
organization this is expressed in the recognition of the power
of seniores, called upon to lead their vassals in the host; as regards
jurisdiction, in the increase of the numbers of commended
freemen who seek to interpose the powerful patronage of lay
and secular magnates between themselves and the Crown.
Great estates arose not only on the lands belonging to the king,
but on that of churches and of lay potentates, and the constitution
of these estates, as described for instance in the
Polyptique of St Germain des Près or in the “Brevium
exempla ad describendas res ecclesiasticas et fiscales” (Capitularia,
ed. Boretius, i. 250), reminds us forcibly of that of
later feudal estates. They contain a home-farm, with a court
and a casa indominicata, or manor-house, some holdings (mansi)
of free men (ingenuiles), of serfs (serviles), and perhaps of half-free
people (lidiles). The rents and services of this dependent
population are stated in detail, as in later custumals, and there
is information about the agricultural implements, the stores and
stock on the home-farm. Thus the economic basis of the manor
exists in more or less complete order, but it cannot be said as
yet to form the prevailing type of land tenure in the country.
Holdings of independent free men and village organizations of
ancient type still surround the great estates, and in the case of
ecclesiastical possessions we are often in a position to watch
their gradual extension at the expense of the neighbouring
free settlers, by way of direct encroachment, and by that of
surrender and commendation on the part of the weaker citizens.
Another factor which plays a great part in the gradual process
of infeudation is the rise of private jurisdictions, which falls
chiefly into the 10th and 11th centuries. The struggle against
Northmen, Magyars and Slavs gave a crowning touch to the
process of localization of political life and of the aristocratic
constitution of society.
In order to describe the full-grown continental manor of the 11th century it is better to take French examples than German, Italian or Spanish. Feudalism in France attained the greatest extension and utmost regularity, while in other European countries it was hampered and intermixed with other institutional features. The expression best corresponding to the English “manor,” in the sense of an organized district, was seigneurie. Manoir is in use, and is, of course, a French word corresponding to manerium, but it meant strictly “mansion” or chief homestead in France. Baronie is another term which might be employed in some instances as an equivalent of the English manor, but, in a sense, it designates only one species of a larger genus, the estate of a full baron in contrast to a mere knight’s fee, as well as to a principality. Some of the attributes of a baron are, however, typical, as the purest expression of manorial rights, and may be used in a general characterization of the latter.
The seigneurie may be considered from three points of view—as a unit of administration, as an economic unit, and as a union of social classes.
(a) In principle the disruption of political life brought about by feudalism ought to have resulted in the complete administrative independence of the manor. Chaque baron est souverain dans sa baronie is a proverb meant to express this radical view of manorial separatism. As a matter of fact this separatism was never completely realized, and even at the time of the greatest prevalence of feudalism the little sovereigns of France were combined into a loose federation of independent fiefs. Still, the proverb was not a mere play of words, and it took a long time for the kings of France to break in potentates, like the little Sire de Coucy in the immediate vicinity of Paris, who sported in his crest the self-complacent motto: Je ne suis ni comte, ni marquis, je suis le sire de Coucy. The institutional expression of this aspect of feudalism in the life of the seigneurie was the jurisdiction combined with the latter. The principal origin of this jurisdiction was the dismemberment of royal justice, the acquisition by certain landowners of the right of holding royal pleas. The assumption of authority over public tribunals of any kind was naturally considered as equivalent to such a transmission of royal right. But other sources may be noticed also. It was assumed by French feudal law that in all cases when land was granted by a seigneur in subinfeudation the recipients would be bound to appear as members of a court of tenants for the settlement of conflicts in regard to land. A third source may be traced in the extension of the patrimonial justice of a person over his serfs and personal dependents to the classes of free and half-free population connected with the seigneurie in one way or another. There arose in consequence of these assumptions of jurisdiction a most bewildering confusion of tribunals and judicial rights. It happened sometimes that the question as to who should be the judge in some particular contest was decided by matter-of-fact seizure—the holder of pleas who was the first on the spot to proclaim himself judge in a case was deemed entitled to jurisdiction. In other cases one seigneur held the pleas in a certain place for six days in the week, while some competitor of his possessed jurisdiction during the seventh. A certain order was brought into this feudal chaos by the classification of judiciary functions according to the four categories of high, middle, low and tenurial justice. The scope of the first three subdivisions is sufficiently explained by their names; the fourth concerned cases arising from subinfeudation. As a rule the baron or seigneur sat in justice with a court of assessors or peers, but the constitution of such courts varied a great deal. They represented partly the succession of the old popular courts with their scabini, partly courts of vassals and tenants. In strict feudal law an appeal was allowed from a lower to a higher court only in a case of a denial of justice (dénie de justice), not in error or revision of sentence. This rule was, however, very often infringed, and gave way ultimately before the restoration of royal justice.
(b) The economic fabric of the French seigneurie varied greatly, according to localities. In the north of France it was not unlike that of the English manor. The capital messuage, or castle, and the home-farm of the lord, were surrounded by dependent holdings, censives, paying rent, and villein tenements burdened with services. Between these tenancies there were various ties of neighbourhood and economic solidarity recalling the open-field cultivation in England and Germany. When the harvest was removed from the open strips they returned to a state of undivided pasture in which the householders of the village exercised rights of common with their cattle. Wild pasture and woods were used more or less in the same fashion as in England (droit de pacage de vaine pâture). The inhabitants often formed courts and held meetings in order to settle the by-laws, and to adjudicate as to trespasses and encroachments (courts colongères). In the south, individual property was more prevalent and the villagers were not so closely united by ties of neighbourhood. Yet even there the dependent households were arranged into mansi or colonicae, subjected to approximately equal impositions in respect of rents and services. In any case the characteristic dualism of manorial life, the combined working of a central home-farm, and of its economic satellites providing necessary help in the way of services, and contributing towards the formation of manorial stores, is quite as much a feature of French as of English medieval husbandry.
(c) The social relations between the manorial lord and his subjects are marked by various forms of the exploitation of the latter by the former. Apart from jurisdictional profits, rents and agricultural services, dues of all kinds are exacted from the rural population. Some of these dues have to be traced to servile origins, although they were evidently gradually extended to groups of people who were not descended from downright serfs but had lapsed into a state of considerable subjection. The main morte of rustic tenants meant that they had no goods of their own, but held movable property on sufferance without the right of passing it on to their successors. As a matter of fact, sons were admitted to inheritance after their fathers, and sometimes succession was extended to other relatives, but the person taking inheritance paid a heavy fine for entering into possession, or gave up a horse, an ox, or some other especially valuable piece of property. The formariage corresponded to the English merchetum, and was exacted from rustics on the marriage of their daughters. Although this payment assumed very different shapes, and sometimes only appeared in case consorts belonged to different lords, it was considered a badge of serfdom. Chevage (capitagium) might be exacted as a poll-tax from all the unfree inhabitants of a seigneurie, or, more especially, from those who left it to look for sustenance abroad. The power of the lord as a landowner was more particularly expressed in his right of pre-emption (retrait seigneurial), and in taxes on alienation (lods et ventes). As a person wielding political authority, a kind of sovereignty, the lord enjoyed divers rights which are commonly attributed to the state—the right of coining money, of levying direct taxes and toll (tallagium, tolneta) and of instituting monopolies. These latter were of common occurrence, and might take the shape, for instance, of forcing the inhabitants to make use of the lord’s mill (moulin banal), or of his oven (four banal), or of his bull (taureau banal).
In Germany the history of the manorial system is bound up with the evolution of the Grundherrschaft (landlordship) as opposed to Gutsherrschaft (estate-ownership). The latter need not include any elements of public authority and aristocratic supremacy: the former is necessarily connected with public functions and aristocratic standing. The centre of the Grundherrschaft was the Hof, the court or hall of the lord, from which the political and economic rights of the lord radiated.
