172 Wisconsi7i Academy of /Sciences, Arts, and Letters. 



hardly bettor off than slaves ; and these serfs I have shown to 

 be probably the hordariioi Domesday Book. The " utdand " 

 [o^^^land, contrasted to wi-land] or upland, as it is generally 

 called, was that of which the lord was recognized as proprie- 

 tor, but only to the extent of receiving certain dues and ser- 

 vices, and exercising a certain degree of jurisdiction. Its 

 inhabitants were fi'cehold tenants, and it therefore came to be 

 known as the tenement lands ; these I have shown were proba- 

 bly the villani of Domesday Book. The upland, or tenement 

 lands, were also called the ybre?^w* land, as being in a certain 

 sense free and independent of the lord of the manor. Over 

 the demesne he was master ; over the tenement lands he was 

 onl}^ lord. The inhabitants of the inland or demesne were, so 

 to speak, members of his household ; those of the upland or 

 tenement lands came under his authority only in certain 

 specified points. 



Now it was to the upland, not to the inland, that the term 

 socf was applied ; that is, to the legal and special jurisdiction 

 over freemen, not the irres^Donsible mastership over serfs and 

 slaves. But I have shown that the inhabitants of the upland 

 or tenement lands were the villani of Domesday Book ; these 

 were, therefore, within the soc of the thegn, and were strictly 

 socmen. I will go a step further, and anticipate a point which 

 does not properly fall within the limits of this jjaper, by say- 

 ing that because they lived within the s6c, they were called 

 socage tenants. 



It appears then, from the etymology of the word, that the 

 sochemanni must have been people living within the soc or 

 jurisdiction of individual thegns, as contrasted with the slaves 

 and cottagers upon their demesne lands. It follows that the 

 villani, if they were, as I think is proved, the inhabitants of 

 the uplands, members of organized village communities, were 

 properly socmen, 2^'^ovided their thegn possessed the franchise of 

 sac and soc. Under the fully developed manorial system all 



*Bxtenta Manerii, 4 Edw. 1. 



t lu dominio aulte sunt x bovata de hac terra. Reliqua est soca./. 283a. 



