ii8 History of the English Landed Interest. 



be the first definite attempt to regulate the custom, while the 

 Statute of 2 and 3 Ed. VI. limits its range and power ; and the 

 survival up to the present day of a few grants made from 

 time to time of " things not titheable at common law "^ de- 

 monstrates its existence. An examination of this particular 

 impost does not by any means exhaust the sum of ecclesiastical 

 dues derivable from the land or the land's produce. 



There were the Church estates, generally consisting of one 

 manse or hide in extent, which formed the glebe of the rural 

 clergy ; and there were the voluntary offerings, but about 

 these we need not trouble. Besides tithes, however, there 

 were certain other dues more or less compulsory, such as the 

 Cyriesceat, or Church schot, Peter's pence, the Plough alms, 

 Leoh schot, and Soul schot. The first of these obtained the 

 earliest protection of the Legislature. It was mostly paid in 

 kind, and consisted of a " seame " or horse-load of winnowed 

 grass, sometimes also poultry, paid at Martinmas on every 

 hide occupied by a free tenant,- From this duty the religious 

 often purchased an exemption for themselves and their tenants. 

 That it was compulsory there can be no doubt, for in the fourth 

 law of King Ina's code, it is enacted that " If any do not pay 

 this due, let him forfeit sixty shillings and render the Church 

 schot twelvefold," which penalty continued till after the 

 Conquest. 



Peter's pence was an institution of King Ina or King OJBfa, 

 and was a charge of one penny upon every household in the 

 kingdom, except the most destitute, for the purposes of sup- 

 porting an English college at Rome. The vicissitudes of tliis 

 charge mark the ebb and flow of Romanist tendencies up to 

 Stuart times, it having been prohibited by Edward III., 

 revived by Philip and Mary, and wholly abrogated by Eliza- 

 beth.3 



' Fuller, Our Title Deeds, p. 250. 



- Lingard, Sources of lievenue, Hist, and Antiquities of Anglo-Saxon 

 Church ; also Selborne, Facts and Fictions, p. 181, ed. I. ; aud Jacobs, Law 

 Diet., .sub. vac. Church Schot. 



^ Jacob's Diet., sub. voc. Peter's Pence ; also Fuller, Our Title Deeds, 

 pp. 52, 82. 



