lordship nor take orders without the licence of the court, and his goods and chattels were in strict law considered the property of his lord. But the Ingoldmells villein who held land seems to have had no desire to leave it, and the landless man appears to have gone away[1] to get work, paying a small sum of money (chevagium) as an acknowledgement of the lord’s hold over him. And the fact that, during the time the rolls cover, there was no demesne farm at Ingoldmells must have made the villein more free to work where he liked, because the lord did not himself require his labour. The villein who took orders and thereby became free was particularly difficult to deal with. The court might, and did,[2] amerce him heavily, but to obtain the fine was quite another matter. And, as regards the personal goods of the villein, neither the court rolls nor the ministers’ accounts lead me to suppose that the lord insisted, as a rule, upon his strict legal rights, so as to seize upon his villein’s goods either during his life or at his death.
2. I now come to the advantages of the Ingoldmells villein. He had a house and small farm on a tenure that seems to me surprisingly good and secure. As early as 1291 he held his land by a settled money rent, which, however, could be increased by 8d. an acre according to the custom of the manor upon alienation. He held at first ‘to him and to his boys.’ In 19 Edw. III the form is ‘to him and to his heirs for ever,’ which seems to bring the lord into danger of losing his villein, so the words ‘according to the custom of the manor’ are added, and a little later ‘in bondage.’ We find him claiming bond land as ‘his inheritance,’ and settling it upon his wife and children. A widow could claim her dower, a third part of her deceased husband’s lands for life. A widower held his deceased wife's lands for life by the ‘curtesy of England.’ A villein could sell or purchase bond lands, and the fines on alienation, though at first uncertain, gradually became a fixed sum of 2s. an acre. He could, and often did, purchase free land. And in the fifteenth century, if not earlier, he disposed of his land and
- ↑ Pp. 40, 180 and 262. Fines imposed upon villeins who had left the manor show that they had left.
- ↑ Duchy of Lancaster, Ministers’ Accts. (Ingoldmells &c.), Bundle 1, no. 2. 32–33 Edw. I. 20s of chevage was put upon John Taunte, chaplain, a bondman of the king, who departed by night out of the country leaving nothing behind him.
