CHAPTER VII. 



THE TENANTS AND THEIR LAND. 1400-1575. 



The material for this chapter consists of a series of Court Rolls 

 that begins with 1400 and continues with only two considerable 

 interruptions throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. For 

 the period between March, 141 3, and November, 1422, the record 

 of only a single court remains, and the rolls from 1509 to 1524 were 

 lost as early as 1527^ Otherwise the series is fairly complete, 

 though some rolls are missing. 



It has been shown '^ that by 1373 the former arable demesne was 

 let in two large parcels at money rents for terms of years, that later 

 it was let in small parcels for increasingly longer terms, and that, by 

 the end of the fifteenth century, it had been granted to divers 

 tenants to hold in fee farm. 



In like manner the 250 acres of tenants' land that by 1376-8 had 

 reverted to the lord and had been let by him for terms of years or 

 from year to year^ were afterwards let for successively longer terms, 

 and were finally granted to many different tenants at fee farm rents. 



By 1500 practically all of the land that had reverted to the lord 

 had been let at fee farm^ In the sixteenth century the cases are 

 very rare in which the lord lets land for terms of years or at 

 fee farm. 



The following tables show the gradual lengthening of the terms 

 and the gradual change from the tenure at terms of years to tenure 

 at a perpetual fixed rent. 



^ See Court roll, 19 Henry VHL, grant of lands of Robert Pyllet to Robert Adams. 

 2 See above, pp. 52, 53, 57, 58. 



* In 1376 nearly equal areas were held at terms of years and from year to year. 



* The land entered in the extant rolls as granted at fee farm between 1429 when the grants 

 begin and 1500 is about 570 acres, including West wood Ridding, the other demesne lands 

 and tenants' land. 



