DOMESDAY SURVEY 



record of his Suffolk estates.'"' The honours with local names, Clare and 

 Haughley and Eye, are of later growth. Lastly, the soke as a great terri- 

 torial aggregate, comprising many scattered fragments, and uniting them all 

 by the ties of jurisdiction and revenue, has a typical representative in Suffolk 

 in the royal manor and soke of Bergholt. To this manor belonged the 

 jurisdiction over the whole hundred and a half of Samford, and ' with that 

 which belonged to it, and with the soke of the hundred and a half, it rendered 

 in the time of King Edward twenty-four pounds.' "* 



There were various forces working for the feudalization and manorializa- 

 tion of I ith-century Suffolk. The three bonds, personal, tenurial, and juris- 

 dictional, which held society together in feudal days, commendation, tenure, 

 and soke, were all present in varying combinations. East Anglia, indeed, 

 with its numerous commended freemen, offers a specially fruitful field for the 

 study of commendation, the personal tie between lord and man."*' The 

 Survey records of many, though by no means of all of the Suffolk freemen, 

 half-freemen, and sokemen, that they are ' under' a lord ' by commendation,' 

 or 'commended to' a lord, or that a lord 'has their commendation' 

 {de quo or ex quo habet commendationem). Sometimes the lord had ' only the 

 commendation,' or ' mere commendation,' and this was the slightest tie be- 

 tween lord and man."" More frequently the same lord had soke as well as 

 commendation, or customs [consuetudines) and service {servitium) were com- 

 bined with commendation and soke.'" A man might be commended to 

 more than one lord,'"* or one lord might have the commendation and another 

 the soke.'"' Commendation over men came to be regarded as a kind of pro- 

 perty, which could be inherited, alienated, and divided. Hence it was 

 possible for Alwin the priest to be commended to one lord for a sixth of his 

 commendation, and to another for the remaining five-sixths."" At Wyver- 

 stone, in the hundred of Hartismere, three brothers and their mother held 

 30 acres for a manor. One brother, Aluric, was commended to the ante- 

 cessor of Robert Malet for one-sixth of his holding, and to the antecessor of 

 Robert Blund for five-sixths.'" Ulsin (W/sin), the antecessor of Roger Bigot, 

 had one-third of the commendation of the freeman Godric, and Ulsin's two 

 brothers had the other two-thirds.'" In this last instance Professor Maitland 

 sees a case of descent to three co-heirs.'" At Cotton, again, on the king's 

 land, the Abbot of St. Edmunds had half the commendation,"* and at 



"" Dom. Bk. 39815, 393*, ' de honore fint (Phin) ' ; 394, ' ad feudura phin ' ; 393^, ' Wisgar ' ; 426^, 427, 

 'Thedericus,' 'Teodericus' ; 310^, 321,'Regina' ; 379^, Bishop of Thetford ; 55*,Essex, Baignard ; 413^, 

 R.Baignard; 354/5, 'Terre Frodonis'; 355,*Frodoreclamat ad feudumsuum ' ; 41 1, ' feudum Ansgari ' ; 447, 

 Isteda. 



'°* Ibid. 287^ et seq. ; VinogradofF, op. cit. 379-80, 128 et seq., 320-3 ; Maitland, Dom. Bk. and 

 BeyonJ, 90. 



"•' Vinogradoff, op. cit. 348. 



'" Dom. Bk. 429 ; 'Qui fuit sub antecessore Roberti Malet comraendatione tantura,' 432^, Cratinga. 



'"Ibid. 356^, Risby, 'Super hos homines habuit Sanctus Edmundus sacam et socam et commenda- 

 tionem et omnem consuetudinem. Nee poterant dare et vendere terram sine concessu Abbatis ' ; ibid. Huepe- 

 stede [Whepstead], ' Hi poterant dare et vendere terram. Sad saca et soca commendatio remanebant 

 sancto et servitium.' 



""Ibid. 380^, 381, Barsham. Ten freemen : Aluric and Gurth had the commendation of eight and 

 a half. Bishop Ethelmaer of the remainder ; cf. 322^, Cotton. 



"" Ibid. 398, 'Helvedana ' [Elveden]. A freeman, of whom St. Etheldreda has the commendation 

 and St. Edmund the soke. 



""Ibid. 376*. '" Ibid 309. '"Ibid. 333<5. 



'" Dom. Bk. and Beyond, 74. '" Dom. Bk. 285^. 



I 377 48 



