DOMESDAY SURVEY 



within the rape.' This points to the importance of Lewes as a market 

 town at this early date, and is also a grim reminder of the status of serfs. 



The remaining customs refer to the payment of fines of ']s. \d!^ 

 for bloodshed, 8j. \d. (i.e. loo^/.) for prison breaking, and the same for 

 rape or adultery ; in the case of the last-named offence, the criminous 

 man, or rather his fine, belonged to the king and the woman to the arch- 

 bishop.^ There was also a payment of 20J. due from each moneyer, ' cum 

 moneta renovatur ' — that is to say, when new dies were issued by the 

 central authorities. Of all these occasional issues, or perquisites as they 

 would be termed at a later date, two-thirds went to the king and the 

 remainder (the well-known third penny so closely connected with 

 earldoms) to the earl. Of the total fixed rents and issues which in King 

 Edward's time amounted to ^^26, the king had received half, and the 

 earl, to whom William de Warenne succeeded, the other half The 

 value had risen in 1086 to >C34' with an additional .ii2j. ' de nova 

 moneta,' which would seem to be the new farm paid for the mint, either 

 by private moneyers or possibly by the burgesses. 



Details of the fixed issues are not given in the case of Lewes, 

 though we are told that in King Edward's time the i 27 burgesses used 

 to pay ^6 \s. \\d. for burgage rents {de gahlo) and market dues (de 

 theloned). These two items recur in connection with Pevensey, where 

 twenty-four burgesses had formerly paid 14^. bd. in burgage rents, 20J. 

 market dues, 35J. harbour dues, and 75J. T^d. for the use of the 

 common pasture. As the burgesses at Pevensey had increased to the 

 number of sixty in 1086, the first two of these items had risen respec- 

 tively to 39J. and £^\. Here also there was a mint paying 20J., but it had 

 been newly set up since the Conquest, unlike the ancient mint of Lewes,' 

 or those of Hastings, Steyning, and Chichester, all of which are passed 

 over unnoticed by the survey. 



At Arundel again we have a glimpse of ancient customs, for we 

 are told that in the time of King Edward ' Castle Arundel ' used to 

 pay 40J. from a mill ' et de tribus conviviis xx solidos et de uno 

 pasticio XX solidos.' The ' convivium ' appears to be the obligation of 

 providing food and lodging for the lord of the manor once, or in this 

 case three times, in the year ; it continued as an incident of feudal 

 tenure in some parts as late at least as the thirteenth century, for in 

 1202 William of Billinghurst held half a hide of land from Henry 

 Tregoze by service of the tenth part of a knight's fee and the render of 

 ' unum convivium per annum ad summonicionem suam.'* The 

 ' pasticium ' seems to have been a custom of similar nature, but 



• Probably a scribal error for %$. \d. 



' The appearance of the archbishop instead of the Bishop of Chichester (or rather Selsey) was pro- 

 bably due to the propinquity of his great manor and peculiar of South Mailing, though it is just possible 

 that these customs may carry us back as far as the early part of the eighth century, when there was no 

 bishop's seat in the county. 



3 The early importance of Lewes is shown by the decree of Ethelstan, about 930, establishing two 

 mints in the borough. 



* Cah Feet of F. (Suss. Rec. Soc), No. 79. 



