The Great Events by Famous Historians [Volumes 1-14]

These words, "in fee, with right of inheritance," leave no doubt that the great vassals of the crown were absolute proprietors, and that all their subvassals had the same right of holding in perpetuity. The estate, however, reverted to the crown if the race of the original feoffee became extinct, and in cases, also, of felony and treason. When Alain of Bretagne, who commanded the rear of the army at the battle of Hastings, and who had received four hundred and forty-two manors, bowed before the King at Salisbury, at the great council in 1085, and swore to be true to him against all manner of men, he also brought with him his principal land-sittende men (land-owners), who also bowed before the King and became his men. They had previously taken the oath of fealty to Alain of Bretagne, and engaged to perform all the customs and services due to him for their lands and tenements. Alain, and his men, were proprietors, but with very unequal rights. Alain, by his tenure, was bound to provide for the King as many armed horsemen as the vast extent of his estates demanded. But all those whom he had enfeoffed, or made proprietors, upon his four hundred and forty-two manors, were each bound to contribute a proportionate number. When the free service of forty days was to be enforced, the great earl had only to send round to his vassals, and the men were at his command.

By this organization, which was universal throughout the kingdom, sixty thousand cavalry could, with little delay, be called into the field. Those who held by this military service had their allotments divided into so many knights' fees, and each knight's fee was to furnish one mounted and armed soldier. The great vassals retained a portion of their land as their demesnes, having tenants who paid rents and performed services not military. But, under any circumstances, the vassal of the crown was bound to perform his whole free service with men and horses and arms. It is perfectly clear that this wonderful organization rendered the whole system of government one great confederacy, in which the small proprietors, tenants, and villeins had not a chance of independence; and that their condition could only be ameliorated by those gradual changes which result from a long intercourse between the strong and the weak, in which power relaxes its severity and becomes protection.

In the ordinance in which the King commanded "free service" he also says, "we will that all the freemen of the kingdom possess their lands in peace, free from all tallage and unjust exaction." This, unhappily for the freemen, was little more than a theory under the Norman kings. There were various modes of making legal exaction the source of the grossest injustice. When the heir of an estate entered into possession he had to pay a "relief," or heriot, to the lord. This soon became a source of oppression in the crown; and enormous sums were exacted from the great vassals. The lord was not more sparing of his men. He had another mode of extortion. He demanded "aid" on many occasions, such as the marriage of his eldest daughter, or when he made his eldest son a knight. The estate of inheritance, which looks so generous and equitable an arrangement, was a perpetual grievance; for the possessor could neither transmit his property by will nor transfer it by sale. The heir, however remote in blood, was the only legitimate successor.