172 On the ORIGIN and STRUCTURE of 



find there people poflefling fingle manfes, or fingle roods or half 

 roods of land, and fometimes larger quantities, as ploughgates, 

 and yielding military fervice, and various cuftoms, to the king 

 or individuals. The rights of the owners of thefe lands like- 

 \vife appear to have differed in the fame way as thofe of bur- 

 gefles, and to have been fubjecled to a fimilar diverfity of bur- 

 dens*. I need not add, that we find the whole country a- 

 bounding with foccomanni, bordarii, porcarii, bovarii, who ap- 

 pear to have been in fbme degree of fervile condition, and di- 

 ftinguifhed from each other chiefly by names derived from the 

 particular fpecies of rent or fervice yielded by them, or other 

 fuch little circumftances. 



THE above particulars, and the authorities on which they are 

 ftated, appear to me, when maturely confidered, to leave no rea- 

 fonable doubt, that the towns enjoyed no peculiar fyftem of ad- 

 mini ftration, but were diftinguifhed merely as places of fome 

 flrength, where authority was better enforced, and where the 

 fmaller proprietors, and perfons of fervile condition, who had 

 preferved or obtained a degree of liberty, reforted in numbers, 

 for the fake of mutual protection. If the town belonged to an 

 individual, it was governed in the fame manner as the reft of 

 his eftate. If the town belonged to different people, it formed, 

 along with what was afterwards called its liberty (i. e. the ban- 

 lieue or territory adjoining and belonging to it), a divifion of 

 the country, or a political community, and was ranked and go- 

 verned accordingly. 



AUTHORS feem, in general, to have fleered very wide of this 

 fimple and natural conclufion. Some, ftruck with the oppreflive 



reftraints 



* IN the furvey of a manor, it is faid, " ANSGOT, homo comitis, tenet dimid. virg. 

 " terrae. Et UI.VIET unam hidam Hberx terr*." P. 180. In the manor ofArken- 

 felde, the king had 96 men, who, with their men, held 76 caruc. " et dant de con- 

 " fuetud. 4 fextar. mellis, 20 fol. pro ovibus, qas foleb. dare, et 10 fol. profumagio; 

 " nee dant geld, aut aliam confuet. nifi quod pugnant in exercitu regis, (i ju/Tum eis 

 " fuerit." If a villein died in this manor, the king had an ox j if a freeman, his horle 

 and arms. But a page of Doomfday cannot be perilled without perceiving abundant 

 evidence of the afTertion in the text. 



