By John Watson- Taylor. 89 



regard to the freedom of the class it must be observed that at the 

 period last mentioned a payment is recorded in the ministers' 

 accounts of 12^/. per annum made by Eoger Puryer, a customary 

 tenant, for licence to sojourn outside the lord's territory {commo- 

 randi extra Dominium). These tenants obtained their " estates " 

 by purchase for three lives, and held them under the title of a 

 copy of the roll of the court on which their admission was recorded 

 with the terms of the agreement and a schedule of the strips in 

 the different common fields which made up their holding. The 

 strips, or shots, as they are sometimes called, ran as a rule parallel 

 to the longest side of the field and were separated from each other 

 by grass baulks. Their length and width differed according to the 

 size of the field, but the standard length was an eighth of a mile — 

 a furrow-long, and the standard width a rood. The word rood, or 

 rod, supplies the meaning of the Norman-latin virgata, a holding 

 comprised of strips a rod (virga) wide, and the old English equivalent 

 for rod, yeard or yard, gives the meaning of the word yard-land, 

 which eventually took the place of virgate. The system of " inter- 

 mixed strip-holding " was probably introduced by the Saxons as 

 an ancient custom of the countries from which they came, and the 

 only explanation of such a wasteful and inefficient method of 

 dividing lands is that the desire for absolute equality out-weighed 

 all other principles. It was chiefly owing to the difficulties at- 

 tending the cultivation of land under such a system that the 

 accumulation of land by purchase into the hands of the lords of 

 the manor had resulted in 1777, at the time of the Erlestoke 

 Inclosure Act, in the elimination of all but three copy-holders, 

 whose total share of land was forty-two out of one thousand six 

 hundred and forty-two acres allotted. 



The widows of the lives could also hold for the period of their 

 widowhood, but in the case of their re-marriage the holding passed 

 to the next life, and in the case of laxity of morals the estate was 

 forfeited to the lord. On the death of the last life, if no renewal 

 had been purchased the executors enjoyed the profits of the holding 

 for one year, called the dead year, after which the tenements 

 passed into the hands of the lord. The consideration paid on 



