THE DEGRADING OF THE PEOPLE 19 



the estate-holder needed men to cultivate his land and 

 could not obtain free labour, there is little doubt that 

 men were forced to work for a certain number of days 

 in the year on such of the land as he had appropriated 

 for his own use. 



The growth of military needs was a further cause of 

 the degradation of the people. The constant struggles 

 among the various Anglo-Saxon states, and the greater 

 struggles between the Anglo-Saxons and Danes which 

 went on intermittently in the Vlllth, IXth, Xth and 

 even the Xlth centuries, made regular armies a 

 necessity. Soldiers "more skilful than the old-fashioned 

 Anglo-Saxon fighting farmers were required. Fully 

 armed men on horseback, with lightly equipped men- 

 at-arms, accustomed to war, were wanted, and the 

 kings looked to the country estate-holders to supply 

 their needs. The estate-holders were therefore on the 

 look out for retainers to fight for them when required, 

 and it became a common practice for men, otherwise 

 free, to be attached to the estate or to the person of 

 someone of higher rank than themselves. These bonds 

 sometimes involved the men in the duty of working on 

 their superior's estate, sometimes in performing other 

 obligations, such as folding sheep on his land. In other 

 cases they involved the definite duty, already referred to, 

 of attending the superior's court of law and of acting as 

 one of a committee of judges. The title of 'socman,' 

 so common in the eastern side of England, seems to 

 have arisen from this last custom, the word ' soc ' or 

 ' soke ' usually implying, in early days, the duty of 

 attending at a superior's court. But all men were not 

 so bound, a large number being simply 'commended,' 

 as it was called, to a superior. Such men appear to 

 have been subject to one definite obligation only to 



