And this fact seems naturally connected with some remarkable features of social organisation. No wonder that free land is cut up into irregular plots: we know that it may be divided and accumulated by inheritance and alienation, whereas villain land is held together in rigid unity by the fact that it is, properly speaking, the lord's and not the villain's land. Besides, all the variations of free tenure which we have discussed hitherto have one thing in common, they are produced by express agreement between lord and tenant as to the nature and amount of services required from the tenant. Whether we take the case of a villain receiving a few acres in addition to his holding, or that of a servant recompensed by the grant of a privileged plot, or that of a peasant confirmed in the possession of soil newly reclaimed from the waste, or that of a bondman who has succeeded in liberating his holding from the burdensome labour service of villainage, in all these instances we come across the same fundamental notion of a definite agreement between lord and tenant. And again, the capricious aspect of free tenements seems well in keeping with the fact that they are produced by separate and private agreements, by consecutive grants and feoffments, while the villain system of every manor is mapped out at one stroke, and managed as a whole by the lord and his steward. This contrast between the two arrangements may even seem to widen itself into a difference between a communal organization which is servile, and a system of freeholding which is not communal. All these inferences are natural enough, and all have been actually drawn.
A close inspection of the Surveys will, however, considerably modify our first impressions, and suggest conclusions widely different from those which I have just now stated. The importance of the subject requires a detailed discussion, even at the risk of tediousness. I shall take my instances from the Hundred Rolls, as from a survey which reflects the state of things in central counties and gives an insight into the organisation of secular as well as ecclesiastical estates.
We need not dwell much on the observation that the servile tenements sometimes display no perfect regularity. Sometimes the burdens incumbent on them are not quite equal. Sometimes again the holdings themselves are not quite equal. In Fulborne, Cambridgeshire, e.g., the villains of Alan de la Zuche are assessed very irregularly,(58*) although their tenements are described as virgates and halfvirgates. Of course, the general character of the virgate system remains unaltered by these exceptional deviations, which may be easily explained by the consideration that the social order was undergoing a process of change. The disruption of some of the villain holdings and the modification of certain duties are perhaps less strange than the fact that such alterations should be so decidedly exceptional.
Still, the occurrence of irregularities even within the range of villainage warns us not to be too hasty in our inferences about free tenements; it shows, at any rate, that irregularities may well arise even where there has once been a definite plan, and that it is worth while to enquire whether some traces of such an original plan may not still be discovered amidst the apparent disorder of free tenements.
And a little attention will show us many cases in which free tenements are arranged on the virgate system. There is hardly any need for quotations on this point: the Hundred Rolls of all the six counties of which we possess surveys, supply an unlimited number of instances. True, fundamental divisions of land and service may often be obscured and confused by the existence of plots which do not fit into the system; but as in the case of servile tenements we occasionally find irregularities, so in the case of free tenements we often see that below the superficial irregularities there lie traces of an ancient plan. The manor of Ayllington (Elton), Huntingdonshire, belonging to the Abbey of Ramsey, presents a good example in point.(59*) It is reckoned to contain thirteen hides and a half, each hide comprising six virgates, and each virgate twenty-four acres. The actual distribution of the holdings squares to a fraction with this computation, if we take into the reckoning the demesne, the free and the villain tenements. Three hides are in the lord's hand, one is held by a large tenant, John of Ayllington, eleven virgates and a half by other freeholders, forty-two virgates and a half by the villains; the grand total being exactly thirteen hides. The numerous cotters are not taken into account, and evidently left 'outside the hides' (extra hidam); this is a very common thing in the Surveys. If we neglect them, and turn to the holdings in the 'hidated' portion of the manor, we shall notice that the greater part of the free tenements are arranged on the same system as the servile tenements. We find six free tenants with a virgate apiece, one with half a virgate, three with a virgate and a half, and three jointly possessed of two virgates.
