Page:VCH Sussex 1.djvu/453

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

DOMESDAY SURVEY within the rape.' This points to the importance of Lewes as a market town at this early date, and is also a grim reminder of the status of serfs. The remaining customs refer to the payment of fines of ']s. d!^ for bloodshed, 8j. d. (i.e. loo^/.) for prison breaking, and the same for rape or adultery ; in the case of the last-named offence, the criminous man, or rather his fine, belonged to the king and the woman to the arch- bishop.^ There was also a payment of 20J. due from each moneyer, ' cum moneta renovatur ' — that is to say, when new dies were issued by the central authorities. Of all these occasional issues, or perquisites as they would be termed at a later date, two-thirds went to the king and the remainder (the well-known third penny so closely connected with earldoms) to the earl. Of the total fixed rents and issues which in King Edward's time amounted to ^^26, the king had received half, and the earl, to whom William de Warenne succeeded, the other half The value had risen in 1086 to >C34' with an additional .ii2j. ' de nova moneta,' which would seem to be the new farm paid for the mint, either by private moneyers or possibly by the burgesses. Details of the fixed issues are not given in the case of Lewes, though we are told that in King Edward's time the i 27 burgesses used to pay ^6 s. d. for burgage rents {de gahlo) and market dues (de theloned). These two items recur in connection with Pevensey, where twenty-four burgesses had formerly paid 14^. bd. in burgage rents, 20J. market dues, 35J. harbour dues, and 75J. T^d. for the use of the common pasture. As the burgesses at Pevensey had increased to the number of sixty in 1086, the first two of these items had risen respec- tively to 39J. and £^. Here also there was a mint paying 20J., but it had been newly set up since the Conquest, unlike the ancient mint of Lewes,' or those of Hastings, Steyning, and Chichester, all of which are passed over unnoticed by the survey. At Arundel again we have a glimpse of ancient customs, for we are told that in the time of King Edward ' Castle Arundel ' used to pay 40J. from a mill ' et de tribus conviviis xx solidos et de uno pasticio XX solidos.' The ' convivium ' appears to be the obligation of providing food and lodging for the lord of the manor once, or in this case three times, in the year ; it continued as an incident of feudal tenure in some parts as late at least as the thirteenth century, for in 1202 William of Billinghurst held half a hide of land from Henry Tregoze by service of the tenth part of a knight's fee and the render of ' unum convivium per annum ad summonicionem suam.'* The ' pasticium ' seems to have been a custom of similar nature, but • Probably a scribal error for %$. d. ' The appearance of the archbishop instead of the Bishop of Chichester (or rather Selsey) was pro- bably due to the propinquity of his great manor and peculiar of South Mailing, though it is just possible that these customs may carry us back as far as the early part of the eighth century, when there was no bishop's seat in the county. 3 The early importance of Lewes is shown by the decree of Ethelstan, about 930, establishing two mints in the borough.

  • Cah Feet of F. (Suss. Rec. Soc), No. 79.