82 THE STATUS OF PEASANTRY IN PORTLAND. 



of near kin to his own ancestor, Rollo the Northman, or, what is 

 more likely, because it was a valuable trading possession within 

 easy access of his own Channel Islands. Be that as it may, the 

 manorial inhabitants had been fused seemingly into what to all 

 intents and purposes must have been considered an Anglo- 

 Saxon colony, and Saxon it remained, keeping its old traditions, 

 privileges, institutions, and land system with its Celtic substratum 

 until well on in the nineteenth century, almost free from traces 

 of Norman influence, save for certain Feudal terms and the 

 remains of one or two important Norman buildings. 



Stowe comments upon the Portland women having the freedom 

 of the isle as well as the men, thereby showing the estimation 

 in which the sex had been held. 



Therefore, we think it likely that, though the island must 

 necessarily have contained some peasantry according to the 

 social system of the times, yet the inhabitants were placed on so 

 favourable a footing as to justify somewhat the old traditionary 

 belief in superior social status to those of the same classification 

 on the mainland. 



