Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 5.djvu/36

24 Dartmore, have been immemorially made to be holden by copy of court roll, by the name of landbote; and such grants continued to be so made until the latter part of the last century. In a computus of this manor, anno 18 Henry VII., under the head "novus redditus," we have this entry:—

"De 3d de novo redditu 2 acrarum terræ moræ de forestâ domini, sic dimissæ Laurentio Hanneworth, tenend' nomine Laundebote secundum consuetudinem forestæ, ut patet in rotulo curiæ, 9 Hen. VI."

It appears from presentments made by the homage of Lidford manor, that the tenants claimed, as of right, to have such new grants made to them on every occasion of death or alienation, in addition to their old customary tenements. As a right, such a claim is of course untenable in point of law, but the practice certainly was to make such grants, and we are therefore enabled to infer, with some confidence, that the landbotes mentioned in the Sidmouth rental, and in the above grant of the villenage at Ashburton, were in their origin small new takes of manorial waste or demesne, granted to existing customary tenants.

I suspect, but am unable at present to adduce any proof of the fact, that the small tenements called Landeake, which occur in the rental of Plympton Priory, 9 Hen. IV., (Harl. MSS. No. 4765-6,) under the manor of Nyweton Sancti Cirici (Newton St. Cyres), are of the same nature as landbote tenements.