STRAY NOTES, PREHISTORIC, SAXON, AND NORMAN. 235 



2 bordarii now $. Then i team now none, but there might be one there. Wood 

 for 50 swine, 2 acres of meadow. It was then worth 12s., and when he got 



possession 8s., now 15s." 



Should Mr. Marsh's surmise be correct that Astoca in this p^ace 

 represents Navestock (and the fact that Ralph de Marci belonged to 

 both adds strength to his theory) we gain further information con- 

 cerning the population of this parish in Saxon times in the name of 

 Gotil and the presence of two more bordarii, together with the 

 additional land and stock just descrii)ed. 



In 1043, the time approximately of which I am speaking, wheat 

 was sold at 60 pence the quarter, but 80 years later, owing to a 

 scarcity, it fetched 20s., and then fell again to 4s. in the following 

 century. I am not prepared to give you a quotation as to the value 

 of live stock in these days, but you may in some measure estimate 

 such value from the prices fetched early in the next century, e.g., 

 horses, 3s. to los. ; oxen, 2s. 4d. to 3s. ; goats, 4d. • sheep, 4d. to 

 6d. ; pigs, 4d. to is. ; a sow with 9 pigs, igd. 



IV. A^A VE STOCK IN NORMAN TIMES. 



The chief feature in the change experienced by Navestock after 

 the conquest is to be found in the return of the Dean and Chapter 

 to their possessions as Lords of the Manor. 



As they could only occupy that position by deputy they at a 

 very early date let out their property on lease to a duly qualified 

 tenant termed the Firmarius, who, as Archdeacon Hr.le tells us, 

 exercising all the duties of the Chapter as the Lord of the Manor, 

 took to his own use all the profits of such manor which were over 

 and above the firm^, which it was his due to renderand which con- 

 sisted of certain fixed money payments and so many quarters of 

 wheat, oats, and barley. The Firmarius thus held a beneficial lease. 

 The Anglo-Saxon noun feorme is not a farm but food, and the verb 

 feormian is not to farm or cultivate, but to supply with food, and 

 the Firmarius was so termed not because he cultivated the land but 

 because he was bound to furnish feorme or food of a certain amount 

 for the supply of the Cathedral body.'** Thus we find that in about 

 1 100 Navestock was called upon to supply firmse for S. Paul's for 

 three weeks and three and a half days in the course of the year to be 

 made in three instalments, viz., the first on the loth Sunday after 

 the Feast of S. Faith, October 6th, the second on the 22nd, and the 



18 Hale's S. p. D. p. xxxviii. 



