Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/417

 1922 COMMUN1TAS VILLAE 409 a general settlement of disputes in which there were concessions on both sides. 1 The Estate Book also contains a charter of 1308, 2 by which Adam le Werrur of Harlestone grants to Thomas his son, inter alia, ' totam portionem bruerae cum ex consensu communitatis villae contigerit frussandae '. But the best example of corporate action in the book is the grant of a piece of land called ' Bell- ropes ' to the Rector ' per communitatem villae ', to provide ropes for the church bells. 3 The ' ceragium ' or threepenny due from each virgate in the village outside the demesne lands, to provide wax for the church, probably had its origin in a com- munal grant by the villagers. The second document printed here is a precept of 1360 from the Fermor-Hesketh collection at Easton Neston. 4 It is just fifty years earlier than the Harlestone indenture, and is a singularly clear example of corporate action in a village for a work of public utility. Professor Stenton has recently given some further examples of communal action in villages in the twelfth century, 5 notably in the communal endow- ment of the chapel of Hothorpe in Northamptonshire by the men of the village. These documents suggest that a view of village life founded entirely on manorial documents may be one-sided and therefore untrue. Documents concerned with estate management have survived in great numbers from the middle ages. Documents which show the men of the village recognizing their character as a community and acting together as such are comparatively rare, and have not yet been made the object of systematic research. They come for the most part from the later middle ages, and it is at least probable that as more of them are brought to light the village which describes itself as a communitas and acts with its common counsel for its common good will cease to appear as an exception. JOAN WAKE. HARLESTONE INDENTURE. (lOf x 8".) Presens indentura tripartita testatur quod cum villata de Herleston' & inhabitantes in eadem per non modicum tempus retroactum graue dampnum inprouisum atque penuriam sustulerant & tollerant in presenti pro eo quod diuersi campi terrarum arabilium ville predicte sub tali forma & cultura ibidem usitati annuatim coluntur. quod in quolibet tercio anno 1 Ibid. p. 131. For another example of exchange of common rights between a lord and the men of a village, see Maitland, Select Pleas in Manorial Courts (Selden Society), ii. 172. Ibid. p. 87. * Ibid. p. 43. Northampton, ii. 321. 5 Danelaw Charters, Ixi, Ixii, Ixiii, Ixx, Ixxi, Ixxvii ; nos. 142, 143, and 465.
 * G. Baker has printed a translation of this document, History of the County of