English Land Laic. 
339 = 73 
)mplicated by the introduction of a number of intermediate 
rds, and the way was prepared for the ultimate simplification 
' the whole feudal system by the enactment in the seventeenth Military 
!ntury, which has been already mentioned. By that statute the tenures 
ilitary tenures, which had by that time become almost unen- 
arable to the independent agriculturists and yeomen of the 
)untry, were swept away with all their burdens and liabilities ; 
id, except in the case of copyhold tenancies, the tenure known 
free socage became the general law of the land. The term 
cage, derived from the Saxon word " Soc " signifying a liberty 
privilege,* was used to denote any tenure of land in which 
e services to be rendered were certain and definite in their 
iture ; and although there was also a variety known as " villein 
cage " or " privileged villeinage," the services belonging to this 
uure were, generally speaking, such as a freeman could render 
ithout degradation. By the middle of the seventeenth century 
ese services had in most cases resolved themselves into the 
lyment of mere fealty and homage, which is the sole con- 
tion upon which, at the present day, the great bulk of English 
ad is held of the Crown. When land is held in freehold from 
termediate lords, there are still instances to be found where a 
stomary rent is due ; but, practically speaking, there is at the 
esent time for the great bulk of the soil of England some 
solute owner, either in actual or potential existence, who owes 
thing in respect of his tenure but the fealty of a subject to his 
vereign. What is meant by saying that in some cases such an 
ner has only a potential existence, will be better understood 
len we have explained the manner in which the rights of land- 
ners are frequently limited to the duration of their own lives. 
It is frequently asserted that the right of primogeniture, which Priraogeuiture. 
i ve the lands of the father to his eldest son, was always an 
liential part of the English common law, but the statement is 
i erroneous one. The ancient English common law of in- GavelkinJ. 
Iritance was the law of gavelkind, by which the land of the 
1 her descended in equal shares to his sons, who could alienate 
Socage is often said to be derived from the Saxon word for a plough, and to 
< lote an agricultural tenure, which imposed upon the tenant the duty of 
I ivating his lord's land. There is, no doubt, a Saxon word to which the term 
I ht etymologically be traced, but the root which is in reality its origin is a 
1 foctly distinct one, and bears the meaning given to it in the text. Nothing is 
I 1' clear than that such agricultural services were ''base" in their nature, 
' >rmed only by the serfs or villeins of the lord of the demesne ; and a little 
i'leration will show that a tenure depending on siich conditions could never 
become, either by common law or by Btatute, the ordinary holding of English 
men, or indeed have been ever applicable, except in isolated cases, to those 
' held directly from the Crown. (See Kerr's ' Blackstone,' p. C7, n.) The 
tiaken etymology referred to has been used by some writers to support a theory 
[iB the groundwork of English tenure generally was based upon the needs of 
Bculture. 
