Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 29.djvu/114

86 tried in vain to find any account of such an assembly at Nottingham as the deed implies. In Burke's Extinct Peeraye it is stated that the sixth Earl Ferrars, on the return of Richard I. to England, assisted at the siege of Nottingham, and sat with the rest of the peers in the great Council held at the Castle of Nottingham in the following March. This shows that parliaments were hold there, and we should infer that the deed was executed at a parliament, and, as the king is not mentioned as witnessing the deed, the inference is that he was not present. We believe Richard was not in England at any time during the last year of his reign.

The second deed, which probably was executed not long after the first, as the parties to it are the same, at lords a good illustration of the ancient tenure of lands by knight service. To make a tenure by that service a certain quantity of land was necessary, and this was called a knight's fee, and the first deed is an instance of the grant of such a fee; for Kedleston was to be held "per servitium unius militis." The tenure of knight service drew after it (amongst other things) Aids. Now aids were originally merely benevolences voluntarily given by the tenant to his lord in times of difficulty and distress ; but in course of time they grew into a matter of right. They were of three kinds — 1st, to ransom the lord, if taken prisoner; 2nd, to make the lord's eldest son a knight ; and 3rd, to marry the lord's eldest daughter by providing her a suitable portion. Now this deed shows that Earl Ferrars was entitled to an aid from Richard de Curzon to make his son a knight and to marry his eldest daughter, and that, in like manner, Richard de Curzon was entitled to a precisely similar aid from Thomas. These are clearly treated as matters of right arising from the tenure. But the deed farther shows that Thomas had previously furnished an aid to Richard when Richard was called upon to furnish an aid to the Earl. Now this was clearly a voluntary act on the part of Thomas ; for his tenure only bound him to furnish an aid to Richard to make his son a knight, and to marry his daughter, and in no way bound him so to do to the Earl. This deed, therefore, is an instance of aids rendered both as a matter of right and voluntarily.

The third deed, which is dated in 1313, also is well worthy of notice. A lord of a manor may lawfully enclose so much of the waste in the manor :ls he pleases for tillage or wood ground, provided he leave sufficient common for those who are entitled to it. This is called approvement, which is an old word, signifying improvement. And instead of enclosing the waste himself, the lord may grant so many acres of the waste as he thinks lit to another, and then the latter may enclose them. This deed recites a grant of forty acres of waste by Henry de Irton, Lord of Irton, to Wdliam de Irton, with the intention that William should endoser them. But if the lord, or his grantee, enclosed so much its to leave insufficient common in the residue, any commoner may break down the whole inclosure; and hence it is that this deed provides that, if any one having right of common prevents William de Irton from enclosing or keeping enclosed the land granted to him, Henry de Irton will be bound in a bond for fifty marks to William de Irton, in order to indemnify him against any such interruption.