314
THE SAXONS IN ENGLAND.
[book i.
Helmstan’s estates mentioned above : he had depo-
sited his charters with Ordlaf as a security on an
occasion when this duke helped him to make oath
to some property. On Helmstan’s felony, Ordlaf
seized the land to himself, and the document from
which we learn this is obviously his appeal to Æ1-
fred’s son and successor, against an attempt to dis-
turb Helmstan’s original title, under a judgment
-given by Ælfred. N or was it unusual for books to
be thus retained as securities, by which the tenant
having only a læn could be evicted, if not at plea-
sure, at least by legal process ɪ. And the same re-
marks apply to a very common mode of disposing
of estates, where the clergy were grantees. Either
to avoid litigation with justly exasperated heirs,
or to escape from the commands of various synods,
the clergy used to take deeds of gift from living
tenants, impounding the books of course, and lea-
ving the life-interest only to the owner. Such an
estate in technical Latin was named j>raestaπβ ; but
it was obviously a læn, and was generally charged
with recognitory payments 2.
It may not be uninteresting, before I close this
chapter, to give some examples of the gafol or rent
paid upon lands whether held for lives, or as, more
strictly, lænland. They are extremely valuable from
the insight they give into the details of social life,
and the daily habits of our forefathers.
1 See the case of the estate at Cowling, in the trial between Queen
Eadgyfu and Goda. Cod. Dipl. No. 499.
2 Examples of this are found in Cod. Dipl. Nos. 429, 7δ4,1351,
1354, § 6.
CH. XI.]
L√E'NLAND.
315
Twenty hides of land at Sempringham were
leased by Peterborough to Wulfred for two lives,
on condition of his getting its freedom, and that
of Sleaford (both in Lincolnshire) : upon this estate
the following yearly rent was reserved. First, to
the monastery : two tons of bright ale, two oxen,
fit for slaughter, two mittan or measures of Welsh
ale, and six hundred loaves. Secondly to the ab-
bot’s private estate : one horse, thirty shillings of
silver or half a pound, one night’s pastus, fifteen
mittan of bright and five of Welsh ale, fifteen ses-
ters of mild ale ɪ.
A little earlier, Oswulf, a duke in Kent, devised
lands to Christchurch Canterbury, which he charged
with annual doles to the poor upon his anniver-
sary. Forty hides at Stanhampstead were to find
one hundred and twenty loaves of wheat, thirty
loaves of fine wheat2, one fat ox and four sheep,
two flitches of bacon, five geese, ten hens, and ten
pounds of cheese. If it fell on a fast-day, however,
there was to be (instead of the meat) a wey of
cheese, and fish, butter, eggs ad libitum. Moreover,
thirty ambers of good Welsh ale, on the footing of
fifteen mittan, and one mitta of honey (perhaps to
make into a drink) or two of wine. From his land
1 Cod. Dipl. No. 207. an. 852. The mitta and other measures are
unknown. However the sester of corn was one horse-load (Hen. Hunt,
ɪih. vi. an. 1044) ; quatre, What he could carry, or what he could draw ?
In the middle of the eleventh century, the sester of honey was thirty-
two ounces. Cod. Dipl. No. 950.
2 They are called clean. ’These probably were made of flour passed
oftener through the boulter. The common loaf had no doubt still much
bran in it, and answers to our seconds. But it is probable that bread
,was generally made of rye.