DOMESDAY SURVEY 



Feltwell and Northwold/ where Domesday tells us that St. Audrey had ' soke 

 and all custom,' we know from the Ely placitum ^ that the sokemen held 

 by uncertain services. They were to plough, reap, and thresh, carry the 

 corn of the abbey, and put away in barns whenever required. They were 

 also to find horses as they might be required, and to carry food to the 

 monastery. We hear that some of them were free, and could sell their land. 

 It does not seem that the ' freemen ' held by these services, though Domesday 

 is not quite explicit.^ On the other hand, we find consuetudo used in at least 

 one case * to imply profits of jurisdiction. 



The term ' freeman ' does not, as we shall see, always connote complete 

 independence. Besides the tie of commendation the freeman might be 

 bound to do suit to his lord's fold ^ or his lord's mill. The former tenure, 

 ' fold-soke,' is frequently mentioned in the Domesday account of East Anglia. 

 The manure of the sheep was doubtless valuable, and the obligation on the 

 tenant of driving his sheep to his lord's fold must have been a source of con- 

 siderable profit to the lord. The Domesday jurors seem not to have been 

 unanimous as to the compatibility of this service with 'freedom.' In Loddon 

 hundred the distinction is sharply drawn between six tenants in Hillington 

 who were in soca falde and six who were liberi ; * while in the neighbouring 

 hundreds of Humbleyard and Clavering those who hold by fold-soke and 

 commendation only are distinctly classed as freemen.'' ' Freedom ' is doubt- 

 less relative, and in Clackclose hundred the possibility of degrees of freedom 

 is clearly recognized.^ The possession of ' fold-soke ' did not of itself confer 

 any jurisdiction. Thus the tenants who owed fold-soke to Ely in Hoe were 

 sokemen of the king's manor of Mileham and presumably freemen of the 

 hundred of Launditch.' Fold-soke and commendation do however seem to 

 go together, and in Deepwade hundred we find both bound up with the lord's 

 right of pre-emption of his tenant's land. Thus tenants in Tibenham and 

 Fritton holding both before and after the Conquest of different lords were 

 alike under this obligation.^" In Walsham hundred we find an exceptional 

 state of things. Here jurisdiction followed fold-soke. Earl Algar had had 

 soke over his bordars and over the tenants who held by fold-soke ; the others 

 were freemen. Their soke belonged to the king and the earl, i.e. they owed 

 suit to the hundred-court." 



It will be noticed that the hundreds in which fold-soke is mentioned, 

 i.e. Clavering, Loddon, Humbleyard, Henstead, Deepwade, Walsham, Clack- 

 close, and Smethden, are not precisely the hundreds where Domesday places 

 the largest numbers of sheep, and it is possible that the coveted privilege of 

 a free-fold ^^ may have played some considerable part in the greater development 

 of sheep-farming in other parts of the county; but the actual distribution of 

 both items is so uncertain that we are not warranted in drawing any definite 

 conclusion. 



Besides praedial services and fold-soke, we read of another incident of 

 tenure which seems to be regarded as a diminutio capitis : it is a restriction of 



' Dom. Bk. f. 162. ^ Hamilton, Inq. Com. Cantab. 192. 



' Dom. Bk. fF. 162, ^l'ib. ■* Ibid. f. 252, Cum omni coiuuetud'me prctcr m. 



^ Maitland, Dom. Bk. and Beyond, pp. 76 sq. * Dom. Bk. f. 203/J. 



' Ibid. ff. 204, 204^, 208^, 230, 249^, 250. ' Ibid. lO^b, 230^, and cf. 273^. 



Mbid. f. 214. "• Ibid. fF. 2463, 260. " Ibid. 129^, 194^, 216. 



'■ Ellis, Int. to Domesday, \, 275, quotes several instances from Monasticon. 



31 



