A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND 
animals kept by the Crown tenant. Times and places had produced 
variations of the name, but the thing itself remained the same. 
That the noutgeld of Cumberland was at one time paid in cattle, 
as the name and its substitutes indicate, we have direct as well as inferen- 
tial proof. If that be the case, it bespeaks a primitive mode of 
discharging territorial obligations perhaps more archaic than we should 
be willing to allow. It has been pointed out as a feature of Domesday 
that many of the services, which in the time of Edward the Confessor 
had been yielded in kind, were changed for a money payment under the 
Conqueror.’ The custom of paying the noutgeld in cattle lingered on 
in Cumberland to the middle of the twelfth century. Of this direct 
evidence is obtainable in the Register of the Priory of St. Bees.” There 
we have two charters to the monks, by which William (I.) earl of 
Albemarle granted for the souls of his ancestors and of the ancestors of 
his wife Cecilia daughter of William Fitz Duncan six cows out of his 
noutegeld in Coupland in each year when he received his noutegeld in 
that barony, the payment in kind as between lord and tenant having sur- 
vived for a longer period than the corresponding service due from the 
lord to the Crown. If we credit a story recorded by the anonymous 
1 Ellis, General Introduction to Domesday Book, i. 267, 268. 
2 Harleian MS. 434, L.i. 9. As these charters appear to be unique upon this point, we are giving 
them in full. 
fo, 17a 
(1) ‘Carta Willelmi Comitis Albemarlie de vi. vaccis de Nowtegeld in Coupland. Willimus Comes 
Albemarlie, Archiepiscopo Eborascensi et Capitulo et omnibus matricis ecclesie filiis salutem. 
Noverit paternitas vestra me dedisse et concessisse Deo et sancte Marie et sancte Bege in 
Copelandia et omnibus, vi. vaccas in perpetuam elemosinam reddendas anno omni quo 
meum Noutegeld debuerit fieri. Hanc autem donacionem feci pro animabus omnium ante- 
cessorum meorum et antecessorum uxoris mee Cecilie. ‘Testibus Petro de ffalchenb’, Rad. 
de Aw’i, Henrico foliot, W. de Belnag*, Heng. de Meneriis, Gilbert. [4/22k], Willelmo 
camerario, et multis aliis apud Bincheham.’ 
fo, 18a 
(2) ‘Carta W. Comitis Albemarlie de vj. vaccis. Willelmus Comes Albemarlie omnibus hominibus 
suis tam futuris quam presentibus salutem. Sciatis quod dedi et presenti carta confirmavi 
Deo et sancte Marie et sancte Bege et monachis de sancta Bega vj. vaccas de meo Nautegild 
de Copuland uno quoque anno quando accipio Nautegild in Copuland, et volo et firmiter 
precipio ut illud sine impedimento habeant pro salute anime mee et uxoris mee et heredum 
meorum et pro animabus omnium amicorum et antecessorum meorum. ‘Testibus hiis 
Helias [sic] de Mundeuilla, Magistro Rogerio, Willelmo camerario, et multis aliis.’ 
That the monks of St. Bees attached special importance to these charters is manifest from the mar- 
ginal note—‘habetur sub cera’—placed before each of them. According to Benedict Abbas (i. 243, ed. 
Stubbs), William earl of Albemarle died in 1179, but the Chronicle of Thornton (Monasticon, vi. 326) 
says it was in 1180. Several interesting facts about the rendering of the geld in cattle and its commuta- 
tion to a money payment will be found in Durham documents. In the ‘ Boldon Buke’ the payment of 
cows (vaccas de metride) is often mentioned in connection with cornage (pp. 4, 5, 6, 8, ef passim, Surtees 
Society). The well-known charter of Henry I. to the monks of Durham contains what has been 
designated ‘a classical passage ’ for the elucidation of this aspect of cornage. The king granted, among 
other things, ‘cornagium de Bortona quod Unspac tenet, scilicit, de unoquoque animali, 2d.’ a passage 
which shows that the custom of payment in kind was passing away (Feodarium Prioratus Dunelm. p. 145, 
Surtees Society). The agreement between Geoffrey abbot of St. Albans (1119-46) and Gospatric 
son of earl Gospatric, in connection with the church of Tynemouth, shows the transition even more 
clearly. Gospatric undertook to pay to the abbey twenty shillings ; if money (xummi) were wanting, 
payment in oxen was at Gospatric’s option, one ox to count as three shillings (Hist. Dunelm. Scriptores 
Tres. App. p. lv. Surtees Society). Those who are interested in cornage should not overlook the brilliant 
chapter by Mr. J. H. Round on ‘Castle-ward and Cornage’ in the Commune of London and other 
Studies (1899), pp. 278-88, in which we have the clear thinking and accurate definition so charac- 
teristic of that writer. 
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