A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



record and its contribution to the social and economic history of the county 

 has already been dealt with in another article, and it is unnecessary to repeat 

 here what has already been written in the first volume as to the conditions 

 of Lancashire during the Norman period. 



From the Pipe Rolls ' we get glimpses of Lancashire as it may have 

 appeared a hundred years after the Norman Conquest, by which time the 

 honour had become practically coterminous with the present limits of the 

 county, and included the Furness estate of Michael Le Fleming. Judging 

 from the general aspect of the county as presented in the first ten rolls of the 

 reign of Henry II (i 161-75)," the main feature of the intervening century 

 must have been that of slow but sure economic recovery, the result of an 

 effective, and, as times went then, almost revolutionary struggle against the 

 hitherto prevailing dominance of the 'forest,' a large part of the county 

 being within the metes of the forest. 



Fines, farms, fees, and forests are still as in the Domesday records the 

 main topics dealt with, but with a difference. Among the first entries is a 

 payment of jC66 iSj. 4^., assessed on the whole county as a fine for various 

 ' negligences, purprestures and trespasses ' within the forest of Lancaster.* 

 This assessment was followed next year, and for many years in succession, by 

 a payment of 200 marks for a postponement of the forest regard in the 

 county,' though in the interval betweeen the fifteenth and twenty-first year 

 further fines were imposed to the extent of £()t, 1 3J. ^d. for inclosures and 

 assarts made within the prohibited area.' Fines continued to be imposed 

 or payments for postponement of the regard continued to be made through- 

 out the remainder of the reign.' The crown, always alert to profit by fresh 

 sources of revenue, found all over the county timber was being felled, clear- 

 ings known as 'assarts' or 'riddings'^' were being made, and the land thus 

 reclaimed was being laid down in corn and pasture. 



The fact that the forest came up to the towns was dangerously tempting 

 and greatly favoured the free pasturing of sheep, swine, and oxen in its desir- 

 able glades and coverts. Many fines were for the erection of cattle sheds, 

 huts for the herdsmen, or for hunting lodges.* The larger landholders and 

 the clergy were the chief offenders, though the fines of the latter were often 

 excub^cd by the king's pious clemency.' The comparative stability of 

 Angevin rule had favoured the foundation of the greater number of Lanca- 

 shire monasteries. The establishment of great religious houses, such as the 



•Farrer, Lanes. Pipe R. ' Mag. Rot. Pip. 8 Hen. II (1161-2), R. 8, m. 12 ; ibid. R. 21, m. 2. 



* Mag. Rot. Pip. 15 Hen. II (l 168-9), ^- '5> ™- ' ^ "^^ The reader will scarcely need to be reminded 

 that this sum, as of course all other sums mentioned in the rolls, would have to be multiplied by at least 

 twenty to represent its modern equivalent. The rolls have been printed for Lancashire up to the end of 

 King John's reign ; Farrer, Lanes. Pipe R. 



' Mag. Rot. Pip. 16 Hen. II, R. 16, m. 6 </. 



• Ibid. 21 Hen. II (i 172-3), R. 21, m. 2. 'De Placitis Alani de Nevill.' 



' Cf. ibid. 24 Hen. II (1177-8), R. 24, m. 31/. Among those fiT\tA pro foresta are Humphrey, clericus, 

 Albert Bussel's brother-in-law, the archdeacon of Chester, the dean of Manchester, the parson of Prescot, 

 the parson of North Meols, the dean of Kirkham, Elias son of Lessi, Geoffrey de Longton, Richard de 

 Pierpont, Siward de Sundish, Roger the Butler (of Warton in Amounderness), John son of ThursUn and 

 Matthew son of William. 



'^ Locally described as 'riddings,' and in north-east Lancashire as ' royds,' the 'rode land' of the village 

 communitv as distinct from the 'oxgang land' or ancient arable land of the early fiscal system of the county. 



' Cf. Mag. Rot. Pip. 32 Hen. II (1185-6), R. 32, m. 10, \od. 'Harold of Lancaster' is fined for 

 making ' cowplaces ' in the forest. Ibid. 33 Hen. II (R. 33, m. 2), ' Stephanus de Waleton r.c. de xlf. pro 

 •• logia " facta in foresta.' • Farrer, Lams. Pipe R. passim. 



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