222
THE SAXONS IN ENGLAND.
[book I.
appears that the master, even though he gave the
free roads, might reserve the mund of his freedman,
by which he retained the right of inheriting from
him, if he died childless1 ; and this recalls to us
the provision already cited from the Kentish law 2.
The history of Ramsey informs us that ÆSelstan,
the son of Manni, adopted this form in a very ex-
tensive emancipation of his serfs3, and we may
therefore suppose it to have been a mode usual
among the Saxons. Among the Franks, the fullest
and completes! act of emancipation was that which
took place before the king, or in a popular court ;
the freedman, from the ceremonies adopted on the
occasion, was called Denarialis, or Denariatus, “qui
denarium ante regem iactavit.” He became capa-
ble of a wergyld, of contracting marriage with a
free woman, and in general obtained all the rights
of a free citizen, But he still remained in some
degree under the mund of the king, who received
his wergyld, and had certain rights over his inherit-
ance4. I do not know whether this has any con-
nexion with a law of Henry the First, which pro-
vides that in any case of manumission, the serf
shall give thirty pence to the lord, as a witness,
namely the price of his skin, for a testimony that
ɪ Leg. Roth. Langob. Reg. cap. 226. 2 Leg. Wiht. § 8.
3 “Per oɪnnes terras suas, de triginta hominibus nunιeratis, tredeeiɪn
ɪnanumisit, quemadmodum eunɪ sors doeuɪt, ut in quadrivio pυsiti
pergerent quocunque voluissent." Hist. Ram. 29.
1 See Eichhorn, i. 333. Such a person resembles the Langobardic
freedman per impans. Ibid. p. 331. I imagine the principle upon
which the wergyld went to the king, to be this : the freedman either
never had a free m⅛gtS, or they had forfeited the mégsceaft by suffer-
ing him to be reduced to serfage. Compare Leg. Eadw. § 0.
ся. vin.]
THE UNFREE. THE SERF.
223
he is thenceforth himself its master1. There was a
form of manumission among the Franks by charter2,
which however did not confer all the privileges of
the denarialis. The holder of such a charter was
thence called Chartularius : I will not assert that
such a system prevailed here, although it is possible
that some of the many charters of emancipation,
printed in the Codex Diplomaticus, may be of this
nature. Their general character however is that of
a record of bargain and sale between different par-
ties : it may be indeed presumed that emancipation
would follow, but there is no positive statement
that it did. The following class of cases perhaps
approaches nearest to such a chaτta ingenuitatis :
“By this book of the Gospels it appeareth that
Ælfwig the Red hath bought himself out, from Ab-
bat Ælfsige and all the convent, with one pound.
Whereof is witness all the brotherhood at Bath.
Christ blind him who turneth away this record 3 ! ”
But this is only a memorandum in a copy of the
Gospels, no charter of manumission ; and I presume
that the sheriff would have required some much
more definite and legal act, before he looked upon
Ælfwig the Red as a freeman. Probably he was
duly made free at the altar of the abbey church or
at the door 4. Of this subsequent process we have
a good example in the book of St. Petroc.
Leg. Hen. I. Ixxviii. § 3. That is, that he is no longer liable to
corporal punishment like a serf.
“ Qui vero per chartam ingenuitatis dimissi sunt Iiberi,” etc. Capit
Bajuvar. an. 788. cap. 7 (Georgisch. p. 648). Eichhorn, i. 332.
’ Cod. Dipl. 1350.
Every lawyer knows the value of the ad oβtium aecclesiae, at any
rate in matters of dower. It implies perfect publicity.