Land Tenure and AgricultzLve. 8i 



fiscal and jurisdictory rights, sucli as were understood by the 

 expressions sac, soc, toll, and team — rights, be it borne in mind, 

 that could not be exercised over an uninhabited waste. When 

 a communal economy was replaced by a monarchical govern- 

 ment, the seignorial rights over all the land in the countr}^, 

 except those already appropriated by the allodialists, became 

 the kind's. Henceforth the extra-manorial waste assumed a 

 twofold aspect, being subject during the periods of its tempo- 

 rary use to royal jurisdiction, and by the side of this inter- 

 mittent authority to popular rights of pasturage, etc. 



This dual control of the national waste ground was very 

 different to the economy observed in the royal demesnes, which 

 were lands held and cultivated under the king's personal 

 direction, and entirely outside of and free from popular rights 

 and interference. Mr. Seebohm, therefore, in identifying the 

 Folcland with these royal demesnes, has made out that the 

 Anglo-Saxon dynasty was even more despotic than the Nor- 

 man. It is, however, an error into which any one who has 

 studied the terms contained in the Doomsday survey is liable 

 to fall. The terra regis is there interpreted by the Norman 

 lawyers as signifying the royal demesnes, whereas what it 

 really meant was the royal manors, over which the king occu- 

 pied the same position as any other lord, and this is tanta- 

 mount to saying that he held seignorial jurisdiction over the 

 entire district, and only proprietary rights over the small area 

 of lands in hand. 



Of the terms used in the Anglo-Saxon records, we find, it is 

 true, only once the Bocland contrasted with the Folcland in 

 the legislation of the period ; ^ but we have frequent allusions 

 to both terms singly in either laws or charters, ^ and one other 

 record of both together in the will of Duke Alfred.^ From 

 these we hope now to form some definite conclusion as to their 

 significance. Perhaps the various processes by which a new 

 manor was erected will best illustrate the distinctions between 

 these terms as used by the Anglo-Saxon lawyers. The forma- 

 tion of a new manor generally came about by the action of 



' Leg. JEd., 2. - Leg. Aelf., c. 41 ; Cod. D/plom., cclxxxi. 



^ Cod. Diplom. cccxvii. and Cod. Diplom. cclxxxv. 



