298
THE SAXONS IN ENGLAND.
[book i.
freed all the bishopric of Worcester, “ tota parochia
Hwicciorum,”—in other words all the churches
belonging to it,—from the “pastus equorum régis,”
and their keepers1.
Many of the instances we meet with, both in
England and upon the Continent, are those of
churches or monasteries : this is natural, inasmuch
as the clergy were most likely to obtain and record
these exemptions. But how, it may be asked, did
it happen that such exemptions were necessary 1
It seems to me that, when Christianity was intro-
duced, and folcland was granted for the erection or
the endowment of a church, the burthens were not
always discharged ; and that the piety of later times
was occasionally appealed to, to remedy the care-
lessness or alter the policy of early founders.
Folcland may be considered the original and ge-
neral name of all estates save the hlot, sors or alod
of the first markmen : the whole country was di-
vided into Folclands, containing one or more hides,
subject to folcriht or the public law,—and hence
having no privilege or immunity of any sort; in
many instances where Beda uses terra unius tribu-
tarii, terra familiae unius, and similar expressions,
he can only mean to denote separate and distinct
portions of folcland, and the words of Ælfred’s
translation imply the same thing.
The power of disposal over this land lay in the
nation itself, or the state ; that is, in the king and
his witan ; but in what way, or by what ceremonies,
ɪ Cod. Dipl. No. 306, an. 875.
CH. XI.]
Folcland and bo,cland.
299
it was conferred, we no longer know. Still there
is great probability that it was done by some of
those well-known symbols, which survived both at
home and abroad in the familiar forms of livery pf
seisin,—by the straw, the rod or yard, the cespes
υiridis and the like1. We may however distinctly
assert that it was not given by book or charter, in-
asmuch as this form was reserved to pass estates
under very different circumstances.
The very fact that folcland was not the object of
a charter causes our information respecting it to be
meagre : it is merely incidentally and fortuitously
that it is mentioned in those documents from which
we derive so much valuable insight into the anti-
quities of Saxon England. But even from them we
may infer that it was not hereditary.
Towards the end of the ninth century, Ælfred,
who appears to have been ealdorman or duke of
Surrey, devised his lands by will. He left almost
all his property to his daughter; and to his son
ÆiSelwald (perhaps an illegitimate child,) he gave
only three hides of hereditary land, bocland, ex-
pressing however his hope that the king would
permit his son to hold the folcland he himself had
held. ' But as this was uncertain, in order to meet
the case of a disappointment, he directed that if
the king refused this, his daughter should choose
1 Perhaps in a case of this sort, even Ingulf may he trusted : he tells
us, with some reference however to the Norman forms of livery, with
which he was familiar, “ Conferehantur etiam primo multa praedia
nudo verbo, absque scripto vel charta, tantum cum domini gladio, vel
galea, vel cornu, vel cratera ; et plurima tenementa cum calcari, cum
Strigilij cum areu, et nonnulla cum sagitta.” Hist. Croyl. p. 70.