Through our manorial research we often come across references to serfdom, the ancient custom where people were owned by the lord of the manor. Though a complicated picture unfree people at this time largely fell into two types – villeins or bondsmen, who were unfree tenants that had some rights of inheritance over their home and land, and serfs, who were personally unfree. Some had far fewer rights and freedoms than others, and these are often hard to define as manorial structure differed from manor to manor.
After the Black Death the remaining workforce was in demand, and both groups were able to acquire better rights. This meant that in most places these sorts of ties to the land and the lord died out. However serfs could still be found in the 14th and 15th century in Woodhorn, Seaton, Hurst, Newbiggin and the barony of Mitford. These people formed the backbone of the manorial system, but leave very little trace in the historical record. However in the course of our research for our Manor Authority files (see this previous blog for how this is done) we sometimes find their names given, a fantastic insight into ordinary people’s lives in the medieval period. We will be looking at examples we have come across that help explain the lives of unfree serfs and bondsmen in Northumberland’s manors, and show what services to the lord of the manor were expected of them.
A representation of a medieval manor
Some serfs were made and some were born. Roger Maudut claimed Ralph le Lorimer as his ‘nief’. This is a term for a type of serf, from old French, and is often
We have covered a little about how law and order was kept by the manorial system when we looked at customs in a previous blog, but what about crimes that broke laws, not just customs? The manorial court or court Leet met around twice a year and dealt with minor boundary issues and scuffles. Most manor courts, though not usually recording such punishments, seem to have kept stocks, pillories and tumbrels for punishing those guilty of smaller crimes. Stocks trapped the prisoner around the ankles, while a pillory held them around the neck and wrists. In both the prisoner would be further subjected to abuse and refuse thrown from the crowd. The tumbrel was a two-wheeled manure cart, which would be used to transport the prisoner and perhaps tip them into a pond – the practice often referred to as ‘ducking’. Tuggal Manor was fined 1 shilling 8 pence in 1683 for not keeping a pair of stocks. Presumably they would have been a common sight as you travelled around the country, and some towns like Berwick still have theirs on display.
From an engraving of Defoe in the pillory in the early eighteenth century, SANT/BEQ/15/4/40. Daniel Defoe was pitied for his charge of seditious libel, and the crowd threw flowers, a vast improvement on their usual weapons of choice.
However in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries a manorial court could, with royal permission, become a franchised law court dealing with more serious cases, and we have found evidence of a few of these as we have been researching the manor authority files. The whole picture of medieval law is too complex to delve into in a short blog post, but the various parts of the machine can be grouped into three types of legal administration: the central courts of law; different types of smaller courts held by itinerant commissioned justices as they progressed around the country; and permanent local franchise courts. The franchise of the legal responsibility for a particular area might be given by the crown to a hundred, borough, or the feudal courts of the Court Baron or manorial court. Some lords held the ancient right of ‘infangthief’ and ‘outfangthief’, where if they caught thieves from within or from outside the manor red-handed on their land, they could try and fine them. Those whose manor was franchised held royal permission to maintain a gallows and tumbril to execute anyone found guilty. This was possibly a hangover from the Anglo-
Christmas as we understand it today has formed within the last two centuries, and is quite alien to the localised traditions of the medieval and Tudor periods. Though the religious importance of the day was celebrated, everyday business often still carried on. Documents still had to be signed, assizes and courts held, and yes, unfortunately even rents had to be paid at Christmas. This marked one of the four financial quarters of the year. The financial New Year began on Lady Day (25th March), with Midsummer (24th June), Michaelmas (29th September) and Christmas (25th December) forming the quarters. Rents, tithes, charity and other payments could be due quarterly, half-yearly or annually on these or other specified religious days. For example in 1296 the tenantry of West Chirton township annually paid 3s at Martinmas and Whitsuntide for fine of court, 1s 3d cornage at Michaelmas, one mark every seven years at Easter and Christmas, and 3s 4d on St Barnabas’s day.
However rents were often paid in supplies, or items that were more like presents. In the compilation of our Manor Authority files we often come across these payments in kind, so here are some of the more seasonal gifts we have spotted. If you have come across any others we would love to know.
Some of the rents we have come across – a peppercorn, chickens, cinnamon and a feast.
Peppercorns
These payments in kind were often made in edible commodities, such as the 11d., and a pound of pepper paid yearly by Robert Freman for land in Hadston. The services of tenants in Bywell were also worth £14 13s 3d and 4lbs of pepper.
Though pepper was an important commodity, we more commonly find payments of a single peppercorn. If you wished to give your son a house on one of your manors you needed some form of payment to be given to ensure you both had rights as landlord and tenant. Even a tiny sum ensured this, which gave birth to the ‘peppercorn rent’, where a property would be given in exchange for a single peppercorn annually. It was often used to provide family members with entitlement to property. John Salkeld, in his will in 1623, gave his new house at Rock to his son Thomas, who was required to pay ‘a peppercorn yearlie’ to his older brother John, the new owner of Rock. Thomas Forster rented a number of tithes and properties in Carham and Wark to his son for a peppercorn in 1711.
A peppercorn was paid by Elizabeth de Felton for part of ‘Thresterton’ (Thirston), and by Walter de Edlingham for an area of Edlingham. The request of a peppercorn was sometimes followed by ‘if demanded’, showing this was a symbolic gesture.
Hens
Unfree tenants often paid part of their rents through the year in crops, and this includes chickens. In Fenwick the eight bondmen paid sixteen hens to the lord of the manor, with the five cottars required to pay five hens. They also gave eggs at Easter. In Acklington a fowl (or a penny) was paid every Christmas by the bond tenants in addition to the rest of their rent, while the inhabitants of Thirston gave the Acklington park keeper a ‘wod henne’, to allow them to gather wood there through the year. In the sixteenth century Chatton’s bailiff also received a wood hen, allowing locals to take firewood from the lord’s wood, including an oak tree as a yule log. Free tenants in Thirston also paid a rent of hens and nuts at Christmas in the fourteenth century. In 1717 a description of Edward Riddell’s estate described the East Farm in Great Swinburne as let to four tenants for £95, a goose and a hen each year. Unfortunately the estate register does not say what time of year this was paid, but perhaps this was Edward’s Christmas goose.
Spices
Though spices have become closely connected to our traditional Christmas cooking, they have been an important commodity for longer than you think. In around 1280 Gilbert de Withill purchased land at Dunstan and was required to pay the overlord a pound of ‘cummin’ annually at Alnwick fair. Isoud and Aviz the widow held 12 acres in Felton for a pound of cumin, and this continued to the rent for this land later, likely in fealty to Mitford Castle. A pound of Cinnamon was paid, fittingly, by ‘William the cook’ for the two bovates of land he held in Belford. Heaton manor was held at different times for a payment of a sparrowhawk, or a rose, but after the land and the manor were divided into separate moieties Robert of Ryal paid Margery of Trewick a pound of cumin for land there and a root of ginger for the manor.
A festive feast
In return for his land Liulf of Middleton Hall was required to give four ‘waitinges’ yearly in 1154 to his lord Patrick I earl of Dunbar. Waitinges were where a leaseholder provided the lord and his household with hospitality, usually on feast days.
Robes
Though not quite a Christmas jumper, Titlington was granted for one robe at Christmas with 100 shillings and four quarters of corn and barley. Robes were also received at Christmas by the foresters of Rothbury Forest in addition to their wages.
We hope to put up more of these unusual rent payments that we have found soon, let us know if you have come across any. All of the above were sourced from the Northumberland County Histories series and Hodgson’s History of Northumberland, which are invaluable sources to our manorial research.
