A HISTORY OF NORFOLK 



Again, instead of the cotarii we invariably find bordarii, who are 

 common throughout England and sometimes distinguished from the cotarii} 

 Besides this we find a careful return of the quantity of stock on the demesne 

 of each manor, and of the stock belonging to the dependent freemen and 

 sokemen. Then we are told how much the manor is and was worth, and 

 the value of the tenants holding under it, and last of all what it, or the vill 

 in which it lies, measures, and how much it pays to the king's geld. 



We remark in the instructions quoted above that a double method is 

 adopted for ascertaining these points. The commissioners do, indeed, seem 

 to proceed hundred by hundred, but the first inquiry is made of the sheriff 

 and of the lords and their Frenchmen. We may imagine if we will that 

 the commissioners sat at Norwich, and took first of all the evidence of each 

 tenant-in-chief and his men as to the lands which he claimed within the 

 county, proceeding to verify their evidence, hundred by hundred and vill by 

 vill, by the verdict of the juries. In view of the later practice of the justices in 

 eyre, it seems unlikely that the commissioners held their inquiry in the chief 

 town of each hundred. There are certain marginal notes in the Norfolk 

 Domesday which seem to bear on this. Some of the later chapters or 

 brevia' are marked with the letters /l ; n ; f. r; n.f. r. It may be fanciful to 

 interpret these as indicating that the tenant-in-chief whose possessions are in 

 question made, or did not make, a return to the commissioners, but we find 

 very many cases where the claim of a tenant-in-chief is substantiated or 

 challenged by the verdict of the hundred. We may return to the considera- 

 tion of some of these cases, but as some sort of evidence of the existence of 

 written returns we may quote from the invasioms the following case at 

 Fersfield : — 



In Feruessella is a freeman with four acres who was commended to Alsi, and William 

 Malet had him on the day on which he was alive and dead, and now Walter [of Caen] 

 holds him of R[obert Malet]. But Robert Malet asserts that he knew nothing of it 

 {contradicit se nescisse) until the day on which he was enrolled {inbreviatus).^ 



On the same page we find a freeman in Bradenham, formerly belonging 

 to Earl Ralf, and afterwards ' Robert Blund [had him] at farm of the king, 

 and Godric has him in the King's Treasury in his breve for zos.' * He is not 

 to be found in the chapter on the king's lands among those farmed by Godric 

 in S. Greenhoe hundred, so that this must refer either to a return made by 



' Maitland, Dom. Bk. and Beyond, p. 38. 



' Cf. Dom. Bk. fF. 176^, 2051^, 238, 276, 2771^, for this use o{ breve. ' Dom. Bk. f. 276^. 



* Mr. Round points out that this use of breve is illustrated by two entries which are of special value as 

 relating to the same contested estate. They are as follows : — 



' In Biskele i liber homo Ulketelli commend' et ' In Bichesle i liber homo Anslec commend' cum 



dim. liber sub eo de xvii ac. terrae . . . semper dim. dim. libero T.R.E. de xvii ac. semper dim. car. . . . 

 car. . . . Hanc terram calumpniatur Godricus dapifer Istum servavit Rogerus Bigot in manu Regis sicut 

 perhominem suum judicio vel bello, Radulfum scilicet, dicit et reddit censum in Hund' ; sed Hund' testatur 

 quod tenuit ad feudum comitis R. et Hund' testatur quod Godricus dapifer tenuit sub rege ad feudum 

 ad feudum R. Bigot, sed Godricus reclamat istam cum R. comitis antequam forisfaceret i anno, et post per ii 

 medietate quae est in breve Regij. Hanc recepit annos ex dono Regis. Et contra homo Rogeri Bigot 

 Godricus pro dim. carucata terrae ' (ff. 176-176^). contradicit judicio vel bello. Godricus reclamat istam 



cum medietate terrae quae est in breve Rogeri Bigot. 



Hanc recepit Godricus dapifer pro dim. carrucata 



terrae' (fF. 277^-278). 



The extract on the left is from the account of Roger Bigod's fief, and that on the right from the record 

 of aggressions [' Invasiones']. Another reference to the breve is on fol. 238, 'est mensurata in brevi sancti 

 Adeldredae.' The measurement referred to is that of the whole Ely manor, which is duly found on fol. 212^. 



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