ii6 THE DOMESDAY INQUEST 



by the sheriff. 1 Certain landowners in Kent furnished a 

 guard for the King for six days in Canterbury or Sandwich, 

 and were provided with food and drink by the King. Other 

 lands which lay in Wye furnished him a guard for three 

 days in those two towns. 2 At Hadam a sokeman holding 

 " de soca regis " with liberty of sale, paid 2d. a year to the 

 sheriff. 3 At Cirencester there was a free man holding two 

 hides, who rendered twenty shillingsworth of provisions to 

 the King ("2O/- in firma"), and throughout the whole of Eng- 

 land performed service for the sheriff. 4 At Luffenham and 

 Sculthorp the sokemen and the bordars worked for the King 

 as the reeve ordered them. 5 In the eastern counties fold- 

 soke ("soca faldae") is continually mentioned ; at Halgetun 

 (Norfolk) there were twelve men, of whom six were in fold- 

 soke and the other six were free. 6 A man who owed 

 fold-soke was obliged to fold his sheep on his lord's land, 

 so that the lord reaped the benefit of their manure. The 

 sokemen of St. Edmund's Abbey in Suffolk, who lived at 

 Flemingston, owed service (" servitium ") in Risby Lackford 

 and Hemegretham ; 7 and frequent mention is made of the 

 service due to the saint from his sokemen. Professor Mait- 

 land has called attention to the fact that 



" From a document which comes to us from the Abbey of Ely, 

 and which is slightly older than the Domesday Inquest, we learn 

 that certain of St. Etheldreda's sokemen in Suffolk had nothing to 

 do but to plough and thresh whenever the abbot required it of 

 them ; others had to plough and reap and weed, and to carry the 

 victuals of the monks to the minster, and to furnish horses whenever 

 called upon to do so. This seems to point rather to ' boon-days ' 

 than to continuous week-work, and we also observe that the soke- 

 men of the east, like the radmen of the west, had horses." 8 



The pre-Conquest sokemen at Hitchin rendered 40 a 



1 D. B., I. 189 b i. 2 Id., I. i a i. 3 Id., I. 133 b 2. 



4 Id., I. 162 b 2. 5 Id., I. 219 a 2. Id., II. 203 b. 



7 Id., II. 358. 8 D. B. andB., 77. 



