14 HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE [TV. 



IV. 



THE SOKE. SOCAGE TENURE. 



ALTHOUGH the properties mentioned in Domesday 

 are generally considerable, and often very large, 

 notices of smaller possessions, held by freemen, are 

 not infrequent. The owners are usually said to be 

 the men, homines, of some Saxon or Norman noble, 

 and are termed socmanni, sokemen. The word soke 

 at this time signified jurisdiction, and a landowner 

 who, by prescription, or grant from the sovereign, was 

 entitled to hold a court of justice, was said to have a 

 soke. His men, that is the freemen who acknow- 

 ledged that he was their lord for he of whom 

 another was man, was styled his lord were legally 

 bound to attend the Court of Justice held in the 

 hall of the lord's residence, and, if not themselves 

 parties, plaintiffs or defendants, to decide on matters 

 arising within the limits of the soke. 



The existence of these private jurisdictions was a 

 matter almost of necessity, since without them, re- 

 mote districts, from the feebleness of the state 

 judicial institutions, and the difficulties of commu- 



