44 THE BREAK-UP OF THE MANOR 



the lord, could buy themselves out of their labour obligations on 

 payment of the cash values which are entered against their services 

 in the steward's book. In this event substitutes were provided 

 in the twelve cottagers, who paid a fixed money rent for their 

 cottages. Immediately after the " Great Death " the final stage 

 is reached. In 1352 the demesne was cut up into separate farms, 

 and let on money rents. Labour services were therefore no longer 

 needed, and were either merged in the copyhold rents or allowed 

 to die out. 



The second instance, that of the vast estates of the Berkeleys, 

 covers a wider area. The policy adopted by the family in the 

 management of their manors in Gloucestershire, Somersetshire, 

 Essex, and elsewhere, was in one important respect consistent from 

 1189 to 1417. Throughout the whole period, successive lords 

 aimed at increasing their enclosures. They began to withdraw 

 those portions of the demesne which lay in " common fields, here 

 one acre or ridge, and there an other, one man's intermixt with an 

 other," to consolidate them, free them from common, and enclose. 

 By exchange with free tenants, other lands were thrown together 

 and similarly treated. The skirts of woods and chases were taken 

 in hand, and hundreds of acres of " assart " land were enclosed. 

 Sometimes these enclosures were made by agreement ; sometimes 

 without. Maurice de Berkeley (1243-81) had within his manor of 

 Hame " a wood called whitclive wood, adioinynge whereunto were 

 his Tenants' arrable and pasture grounds and likewise of divers 

 freeholders. This hee fancieth to reduce into a parke ; hee treateth 

 with freeholder and tenant for buyinge or exchanginge of such of 

 their lands lyeing neere the said wood as hee fancied : In which 

 wood, also, many others had comon of pasture for theire cattle all 

 tymes of the yeare, (for noe woods or grounds, in effect, till the Eve 

 of this age, were inclosed or held in severalty :) with theis also hee 

 treatieth for releases of their comon : After some labor spent, and 

 not prevailinge to such effect as hee aymed at : hee remembered 

 (as it seemeth) the Adage, multa non laudantur nisi prius peracta : 

 many actions are not praisworthy till they bee done : Hee there- 

 fore on a sodaine resolutely incloseth soe much of each man's land 

 unto his sayd wood as hee desired : maketh it a parke, placeth 

 keepers, and storeth it with Deere, And called it, as to this day it is, 

 Whitclyve parke. They seeing what was done, and this lord 

 offeringe compositions and exchanges as before, most of them 



