BOLDON BOOK 



might be reconciled. 1 The earliest texts come from the reign of Henry I. 

 They consist of a charter of Bishop Ranulf Flambard,* restoring to the prior 

 and convent certain lands of which he had deprived them, and the king's 

 confirmation of that charter. The bishop conveys, inter alia, 'Burtun cum 

 solitis consuetudinibus ' ; the King is more explicit: 'cornagium de Bortona 

 quod Unspac tenet, scilicet, de unoquoque animali ad.' 8 Here, then, is a point 

 of departure ; cornage was a payment made by a vill not by the lord of the 

 vill on beasts at the rate of twopence per head. The natural inference 

 that in this case at least the payment was made for the right to pasture cattle 

 would be confirmed by the fact that in 1296 the * communitas ' of Burton 

 was permitting the tenant of every bovate in the vill to turn out two beasts 

 on the pasture.* After the death of Flambard, in 1128, the see was vacant 

 for five years, and its revenues therefore figure in the national accounts. In 

 the Pipe Roll of 31 Henry I., accordingly, we may read in the account of 

 Geoffrey Escolland, who was keeper of the temporalities sede vacanfe, ' de 

 cornagio animalium episcopatus, iio/. $s. 5^.' 6 



It must not be supposed, however, that all the bishop's vills paid him 

 for the pasture of their cattle and that cornage was therefore a universal 

 institution and a source of considerable revenue. This may be shown from 

 testimony of Boldon Book. It will be remembered that the Boldon entry, 

 after enumerating the rents and services of the villeins, adds, ' Tota villa reddit 

 ijs. de cornagio et i. vaccam de metride.' The bishop's unfree tenants at 

 Boldon, that is, are making a payment for what we have inferred to be the 

 right to pasture cattle, and, further, are making it partly in money and partly 

 in kind, by the render of a milch cow. The villeins of many other of the 

 bishop's manors were also paying cornage. It should be noted, moreover, 

 that with a few exceptions, which will be dealt with presently, this obligation 

 rested on the unfree only. In Boldon, in 1183, there is no doubt that 

 cornage is merely an incident of unfree tenure, a seignorial due, and, if 

 compared with others, not a very important one.* 



Now this due, and here is a point of importance, was not incumbent on 

 all the manors of the bishopric. Boldon Book deals with, roughly, about 

 141 vills ; of these, thirty are noted as rendering cornage and a milch cow, 

 and form, therefore, as we have already seen, a distinct type or class. Nine 

 more may be added because, although they pay no cornage, they render 

 either the milch cow or ' castleman ' (an incident distinct from cornage, but 



!For a more general discussion of the subject than can be undertaken here, see Littleton, Tenures, 156, 

 with Coke's comment ; Neto Natura Brevium, 8vo, London, 1652, p. 200 ; Hutchinson, Hiit.of Dur., i. 147, 

 lii. 1 13-1 14 ; Surtees, ibid. i. 252, iii. 152 ; Hodgson, Hist. ofNorthumb., i. pt. i. pp. 258-263 ; Greenwell, 

 in Boldon Bk. (Surtees Soc.), gloss, s. v. 'cornage,' and HatfieliTs Surv., p. 278 ; Secbohm, Engl. Village Community, 

 68-72 ; Crump, in Palgrave, Diet, of Political Economy, i. 426-427 ; Maitland, in Engl. Hist. Rev., v. 627, ft, 

 and Domesday Bk. and Beyond, 147 ; Vinogradoff, Villainage In England, 295 ; Hall, in Red Bk. of the Exch., 

 ii. pref. ccxxxvi.-ccl. ; Round, Commune of London, 278-288; Wilson, in V.C.H. Cumb., i. 295-335; 

 Lapsley, in Amer. Hist. Rev., ix. 670-695. 



* Flambard became Bishop of Durham in 1099 ; he was deprived in noo, restored in 1107, and died 

 in 1128 ; W. Stubbs, Reg. Sac. Angl. (2nd ed. Oxf., 1897), 41 ; Le Neve, Fasti Eccl. Angl., ed. by T. D. 

 Hardy (Oxf., 1854), iii. 282-283 ; J- H. Ramsay, Foundations of Engl. (Lond., 1898), ii. 256. 



1 Both charters are printed in Feodarium, 145 note ; cf. ibid. 149 note. 



*Dur. Halmote R. (Surtees Soc.), 12. 



1 Pipe Roll 31 Hen. I. (Rec. Com. 1833). A translation of the part of the record referring to Durham 

 may be read in Canon Greenwcll's edition of Boldon Bk. (Surtees Soc.), App. pp. i-iii. 



The bishop took from Boldon 55*. scot and 28/. 6d. averpenny, as against iji. cornage plus 6s., the 

 regular tariff of composition for the milch cow. 



i 273 35 



