Page:VCH Essex 1.djvu/429

 THE DOMESDAY SURVEY to hold their land freely, and were only commended to the abbot of Ely ' (fo. 25). In all these cases the line is clearly drawn between a man's personal ' commendation ' of himself, for security, to a lord and the giving to that lord of rights over his land. In Essex, as in other counties, we find great importance attached to the power of the former holder to ' give," ' assign,' or ' sell ' his land, or to betake himself elsewhere l without having to obtain leave. At Hanningfield (fo. 25) 14 hides were held by 22 free men, 'who could withdraw themselves (recedere) without the leave of the lord of that manor ' (ipsius mansionis) ; at Sutton (fo. 96) there belonged to the manor a free man, holding half a hide, ' who could withdraw himself (abire) without the leave of the lord of that manor.' It is probable that the complication of tenures which had grown up under the English system was almost as obscure to the newcomers as it is to ourselves ; but if they set themselves to cut the knot, if their rough and ready methods led to the infliction of much hardship upon those small holders whose tenure was affected for the worse, or who even lost their lands, yet the classes below them, it might be thought, would remain much as they were ; the organization of the peasantry would not be affected by the change. This assumption, however, would be wrong. Professor Mail- land has selected Essex as a county in which the Conquest had a marked effect on the figures of the peasant classes. Let us look, for example, at the changes that take place in some Essex villages during the twenty years that precede the Domesday Inquest. The following table shows them : * Villeins Bordars Serfs Lord's Men's teams teams Theydon (Mount) T.R.E. [1066]. . 5 3 4 2 4 T.R.W. [1086]. . i 17 o 3 3 These are but specimens of the obscure little revolutions that are being accom- plished in the Essex villages. In general there has been a marked increase in the number of bordarii at the expense of the villeins on the one part and the serfs on the other, and this, whatever else it may represent, must tell us of a redistribution, of tenements, perhaps of a process that substitutes the half-virgate for the virgate as the average holding of an Essex peasant. The jar of conquest has made such revolutions easy.* The notable increase of the * bordars ' at the cost of the classes above and below them is a constantly recurring feature throughout the Essex survey, and one to which, as the Professor observes, I was the first to call attention. At the same time it has to be observed that this process was by no means uniform ; there are cases not only of the three classes remaining unchanged in their numbers, but even of the serfs exhibiting, not a decrease, but an increase. The learned Professor writes thus : On manor after manor the number of villeins and bordiers, if of them we make one class, has increased, while the number of servi has fallen. We take 100 entries 1 On the equivalence of these phrases see Feudal England, pp. ' I only give the first out of five in Professor Maitland's table. 359
 * Domesday Book and Beyond, p. 363.