70 Domesday and Feudal Statistics 



grauntz " escaped taxation as knights' fees. Com- 

 parison should be made with similar aids of 

 14 Hen. II., 29 Hen. III. and 38 Hen. III. where 



Change of volumes published at the common charge, discovers their 

 method editor's failure to understand his subject ; thus, in the co. of 

 in these Cornwall is but -| fee immediately held, and no capital socage 

 returns tenant of the Crown [whereas in 1346 (see p. 50) were 

 ( I 403)- some 165^ Knights' fees and of course numerous socagers 

 holding of lords of same] ; had the levy in 4 Hen. IV. been 

 per Knight's fee, the above would have owed to respond, as 

 they did in 31 Ed. I. and 20 Ed. III. on like occasions, being 

 then required to be answered de quolibet feodo militari (Rot. 

 Parl., i. 25), and de singulis feodis militum ("Feudal Aids," 

 A.D. 1346). No reader of course should be content to ta4ce 

 his views at second hand, when the originals can be con- 

 sulted, but regarding the vast accumulations of ancient 

 evidences printed during the I9th cent., a certain under- 

 standing of mediaeval usages might justly be expected from 

 any historical writer allowing himself to expound them. It 

 is quite clear that in the 1 2th and earlier part of the I3th 

 cent, a capital tenant was answerable as well for his fees held 

 in demesne, as for those held of him by others : it is equally 

 certain that in the I5th cent, the fees held by others of a 

 tenant in cap. were not esteemed to be by him held in chief 

 the returns of this aid (4 Hen. IV.) for 30 counties are 

 extant amongst the Exch. enrolments (the Book of Aids is 

 very incomplete as to same), and including socage total under 

 1,075, whereas from each Knight's fee (1346), with no socage 

 included, the collectors are burdened with ^11,663 173. y-Jd. 

 from 36 cos. (the rate 2 per fee), which would appear to 

 demonstrate that Jth of the total Knts' fees were then in 

 demesne. A tax of 205. on every 20 //. la. held in socage 

 indiscriminately would of course have produced a very con- 

 siderable sum, but it betrays a singular confusion of ideas to 

 consider the immediate socagers of the Crown as answering 

 to above : some or all capital tenants by serjeanty responded 

 to the 4 Hen. IV., but (I think) not so from Wards, Escheats, 

 or Honors, nor from Baronies (to the collectors at any rate). 

 At this date the Bp. of Ely held by the latter tenure for 



