A HISTORY OF WORCESTERSHIRE 



above (pp. 250-251), and it was there suggested that they were some- 

 times here indistinguishable from the free tenants, who are usually 

 termed ' liberi homines,' but in two instances, it should be observed, 

 ' franci homines.'^ From these there is a sharp drop to the village group 

 and its officers. Ellis allowed but one ' bedellus ' and seven ' prepositi ' 

 to Worcestershire ; but these figures have to be doubled when we include 

 the manors on fo. 180^.^ For then the bydel and the gerefa of Old 

 English days are found to have respectively, in all, five and eleven repre- 

 sentatives.^ The village smith, an important functionary, seems to be 

 mentioned eight times, and the miller occasionally. Here, as elsewhere, 

 the villeins {yillani) vfCVQ the backbone of the rural community. Ellis 

 reckoned their number at 1,520, but I make it, adding those on fo. 180^, 

 to be 1,666. In a somewhat inferior position to them were the class 

 known as bordars (bordarii), whom I similarly make, by adding those 

 omitted by Ellis, to have numbered 1,821, not 1,728, 



The ' bovarii ' are a class deserving of attention, for their occur- 

 rence in Domesday seems to be restricted to a group of adjacent coun- 

 ties: — Worcestershire, Herefordshire, Shropshire, Cheshire, and South 

 Lancashire, the same district (with the exception of Gloucestershire) 

 as that in which occur the ' Radchenistres ' and ' Radmans.' On the 

 Evesham Abbey manor of Ombersley we find it the duty of the ' bovarii ' 

 to have charge of the oxen, to plough, and to guard any thieves.* At 

 Wickhamford, each of the four ' virge bovariorum ' sent two men ' ad 

 carucam.'^ At Hampton (by Evesham), we learn definitely that each of 

 the ' virge bovariorum ' found ' two men for the lord's plough,' that is 

 the plough on the lord's demesne.* At Blackwell (in Tredington), a 

 manor held by the monks of Worcester, the ' bovarii ' similarly held half 

 virgates, and had charge of the Prior's ploughs, and of such prisoners as 

 there were.' These ' bovarii ' appear to have escaped the notice of Domes- 

 day commentators,* but an entry in the Glastonbury Inquisition (1189) 

 tells us that ' Peter the bovarius . . . has charge of the lord's oxen, and 

 goes with (ad) the plough.' * ' Bovarii ' also occur in a district even fur- 

 ther from that in which we find them in Domesday ; for the Peterborough 



* At the end of Pershore Abbey's lands we read of ' unaquaque hida ubi francus homo 

 manet' (fo. 175^) ; and at the end of those of Westminster Abbey we read of the ' placita 

 francorum hominum' under the Confessor (fo. 175). 



^ See p. 239 above, 



^ For the gerefa and the byde/, see Andrews' Old English Manor, pp. 130-143. 



* ' Quatuor sunt virge bovarionmi. Isti custodiunt boves, et arant per v dies . . . 

 Preter hoc isti debent custodire latrones si fuerint in curia' (Harl. MS. 3,763, fo. jSd). 



6 Ibid. fo. 72. 



^ ' Per totum annum virga debet invenire duos homines ad carucam domini et autump- 

 no ii homines ad ebdomada et ad Wedhoc,' etc. [Ibid. fo. 79). 



' ' sunt ibi iiij bovatae terrae, scilicet duae virgatae, quarum tenentes tenebunt et fugabimt 

 et custodient carrucas Prioris . . . Bovarii, si non custodient carrucas, et cotarii debent 

 custodire prisones ' (Hale, pp. 66a, 66b). 



^ They are not mentioned in the Indexes to Ellis' Introduction to Domesday, Maitland's 

 Domesday Book and Beyond, or Seebohm's English Village Community. 



^ ' Petrus bovarius . . . custodit boves domini et vadit ad aratrum,' 

 274 



