32 BOROUGH OF LEWISHAM. 
as coming in the ordinary course of things. The rolls are the 
records of the proceedings held in these courts, and we shall find 
that the matters dealt with included trespass, theft, assault, 
damage, encroachment, breaking the assize of bread and beer, 
z.e., selling under weight and quality, and similar misdemeanours. 
At these courts, which as a rule were held once every three weeks, 
all transfers of land were recorded and fines for the privilege paid 
to the lord. The court also took cognizance of all cases of 
nuisance arising out of drains or watercourses being stopped up 
or roads left in bad repair, and any attempt to carry gravel or 
turf or furze from the common or heath lands was met by the 
imposition of a fine. The bailiff of the manor, as representing 
the lord, presided over the court, and was assisted by a jury 
elected by the tenants, who also elected a headman or ‘‘ Boroughs- 
elder” or ‘‘Borsholder,” as he was called, for each division of the 
manor, the aletaster, the appraisors or assessors, and other 
officials. 
It will thus be seen that there was in each manor a very com- 
plete system of local government, and that nearly all those who 
carried on the work were elected by the people themselves. No 
doubt the power possessed by the lord of the manor could have 
been exercised in a tyrannical manner, but we have evidence that 
in some manors at least the lord was answerable to his own court 
and carried out its decrees. 
In Lewisham the people had the advantage, if indeed it really 
was one, of having an absentee foreign abbot as lord of the 
manor, viz., the Abbot of St. Peter at Ghent. His place here was 
taken by the prior of the cell or house which, as we have 
seen, was established at Lewisham to look after the estates and 
collect the revenues. It is more than probable that the compara- 
tively mild sway of the prior was overbalanced by the fact that 
he had no further interest in the place than that of sending as 
much money as he could collect to his foreign master. At the 
same time he was willing to make grants of land to free tenants, 
and this is evidenced from the fact that out of the 5,773 acres of 
the old parish of Lewisham only 396 acres eventually remained 
in the hands of the lord of the manor, and this included the 
lammas lands. 
The courts are frequently called the View of Frankpledge, 
the Anglo-Saxon system by which all freemen were pledged for 
the good behaviour of one another. 
Before giving some specimens of the cases brought before the 
courts, it will be of interest to see what light the rolls throw on 
the place names of the parish. There are several references to 
Blackheath, principally in connection with persons cutting turf 
without authority. It is generally alluded to as ‘‘la Blakehethe,” 
or the ‘‘Common de la Blakehethe”’ (1301). 
At the further end of the parish we have to-day Beckenham 
Lane, the summit of which is known as Stumps Hill. This name 
