A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND 
that it was ‘a certain service and not military service.’ At all events, 
over and above the defensive obligation inherent in it as a frontier tenure, 
its rank as a free service is obvious from the burdens of ward and 
marriage. It is scarcely possible to resist a smile when we read of North- 
umberland jurors delivering a verdict in 1295 that all the tenants-in- 
chief by cornage in the counties of Cumberland and Westmorland owed 
wardship (custodia) and marriage to the king, but whether a similar 
obligation rested on the tenants by cornage in Northumberland they were 
unable to say. We have already noticed that it was decided in 1238-9 
that the wardship of the land of Odard de Wigton, who held by cornage, 
belonged to the king.* But a plea of great local interest had come up 
for judgment at an earlier date. In 1223 William de Fortibus earl of 
Albemarle was summoned to answer to the king why he detained the 
moiety of Alice de Rumelly’s land belonging to the king by reason of 
his ward of the daughters and heirs of Richard de Lucy, who were heirs 
of the said land. ‘The earl pleaded that he held no land in Cumberland 
of the king by knight’s service, nor did his ancestors, but by cornage, 
and therefore the king should have no ward. Thomas de Muleton, the 
king’s prolocutor, said that the ‘ Boy of Egremunt’ was the king’s ward 
with his whole Honor, and died in ward ; after him, his three sisters, 
from whom all the lands descended, were in his ward and were given in 
marriage by the king, which the earl did not deny. It was decided by 
the court that the king should have the ward and the earl was amerced 
for unjust detention.* ‘The denial that these burdens were inherent in 
cornage was very rare. The declaration of the services due to the lord 
from the tenants of the barony of Liddel,on the death of Baldwin de Wake 
in 1282, may be taken as the usual report of a Cumberland jury on this 
tenure. The lands were held of the lord by cornage, and the freeholders 
of these lands paid yearly to the lord, instead of the said cornage, 56s. ; 
and that the lord should answer to the sheriff of Cumberland for the 
king’s use : and they should make suit to the lord’s court of Stubhill from 
three weeks to three weeks, and suit to the mills ; and they owed ward 
and relief, and aid to make the lord’s eldest son a knight and to marry 
his daughter.” It would be superfluous to adduce instances of cornage 
tenants paying fines for wardship and marriage, as the Pipe Rolls 
throughout the reign of king John contain many illustrations of these 
feudal exactions. William Briewere was a notorious trafficker® in 
heiresses in various parts of the kingdom, and traces of his work are not 
difficult to find in Cumberland. In 1202 he paid 500 marks’ for having 
one of the daughters of Hugh de Moreville with her whole inheritance 
1 Coram Rege Roll, Easter, 6 Edw. I. No. 37, m. 144, No. 38, m. 7 ; English Hist. Review, v. 631 ; 
Abbrev. Placit. p. 1946. 
2 Ing. p. m. 23 Edw. I. No. 43 ; Calend. Geneal. ii. 501. 
8 Bracton’s Notzbook, No. 1,270, ed. F. W. Maitland. 
4 Coram Rege Roll, 7, 8 Hen. III. No. 17, m. 12d; Bain, Calendar of Documents, i. 864. 
5 Ing. p. m. 10 Edw. I. No. 26; Bain, Calendar of Documents, ii. 65. 
6 Dugdale, Baronage, i. 700, 701. 
7 Pipe Roll, 4. John ; Rot. de Odjatis, 3 John, p. 184, Rec. Commission. 
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