Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/335

 1922 SCUTAGE UNDER EDWARD I 327 The preliminary arrangements were in strict accordance with precedent. On 16 February 1279 the treasurer and barons of the exchequer were ordered to cause to be levied the scutage for the army of Wales of the fifth year, at the rate of 40s. the fee, from fees held of the king in chief, or of the lands of minors in the king's wardship, or of escheats, honours in hand, and royal purchases. 1 To these instructions was added the definite proviso that the levy should be made ' secundum quod huiusmodi scutagium pro aliis exercitibus Wallie in casu consimili levari consuevit '. On the same day writs were issued to the sheriffs throughout England, entrusting to them, as usual, the super- vision of the actual work of collection, and ordering them to respond for the proceeds at the exchequer in July 1279. 2 The scutage accounts, which appear in the Pipe Roll of the seventh year, 3 furnish the first clear evidence of a departure from the precedents of the reign of Henry III. As is implied by the heading ' Scutagium Wallie, scuto assesso ad xls. sicut continetur in rotulo xlii regis Henrici ', the particulars of the fees were derived almost exclusively from the records of the previous levy ; but the lists of 1279, instead of being subdivided, on the usual plan, into tenants owing scutage and tenants quit per breve Regis, were drawn up as if for an aid, and made no allowance either for the performance of service or the payment of fines. The amount of scutage paid was extremely small. A few Crown vassals who had contrived to evade the summons of two years earlier, together with a certain number of tenants of wardships and escheats, paid and were entered on the roll as quit. 4 The majority of the tenants in chief considered that they had already fulfilled their duty towards the Crown by furnishing either soldiers or money in 1277, and consequently paid nothing Nevertheless, the sums entered against them were not written off, but con- tinued to be charged to their account in the rolls of subsequent years. Dr. J. E. Morris ascribes this undoubted breach of feudal custom simply to the carelessness of the tenants in chief in omitting to gain quittance or to prove their services to the sheriffs. In his view the conditions of service and of commuta- tion remained as they had been in the days of Henry III. 5 The evidence of the records, however, clearly disproves this theory, and strongly favours the conclusion that the continued demands for 1 Exch. Mem. Roll, Lord Treas. Rem., no. 52, Comm. Easter, m. 4 ; Cal. of Close Rolls, 1272-9, p. 522. 2 Cal. of Fine Rolls, 1272-1307, pp. 108-9 ; Exch. Mem. Roll, Lord Treas. Rem., no. 52, Comm. Easter, m. 4. 3 Pipe Roll, no. 123. the tenants of the honour of Totnes in Devon. 5 Morris, p. 42.
 * e.g. the abbot of. Tavistock ; the sub-tenants of the Fitzalan lands in Shropshire ;