Post by Arthur on Dec 12, 2010 14:19:13 GMT -6
One of the institutions Arthur made was Manorialism. To defray the cost of building a nation, he assumed much of the already established infrastructure, financed and built by the departing Romans. Manoralism is characterized by the vesting of legal and economic power in a lord, supported economically from his own direct landholding and from the obligatory contributions of a legally subject part of the peasant population under his jurisdiction. These obligations can be payable in several ways, in labor, in food and board, or, on rare occasions, in coin.
Manorialism derives from traditional inherited divisions of the countryside, reassigned as local jurisdictions known as manors; each manor being subject to a lord, usually holding his position in return for undertakings offered to a higher lord. The lord held a manor court, governed by public law and local custom.
The word manor is to mean any home area or territory in which authority is held. Arthur authorized the acquisition of all manors and estates that the Roman nobles vacated.
The strips of individually-worked land in the open field system are immediately apparent. In this plan, the manor house is set slightly apart from the village, but equally often the village grew up around the forecourt of the manor, usually walled, while the manor lands stretched away outside. As concerns for privacy increased, manor houses are located a farther distance from the village.
Manors each consisted of up to three classes of land:
Additional sources of income for the lord include charges for use of his mill, bakery, or wine-press, or for the right to hunt or to let pigs feed in his woodland, as well as court revenues and single payments on each change of tenant. On the other side of the account, manorial administration involve significant expenses.
Dependent holdings are held nominally by arrangement of lord and tenant, but tenure became in practice almost universally hereditary, with a payment made to the lord on each succession of another member of the family. Villein land could not be abandoned, at least until demographic and economic circumstances make flight a viable proposition; nor can they be passed to a third party without the lord's permission, and the customary payment.
Though not free, villeins are by no means in the same position as slaves: they enjoy legal rights, subject to local custom, and have recourse to the law, subject to court charges which were an additional source of manorial income. Sub-letting of villein holdings are common, and labor on the demesne might be commuted into an additional money payment.
Manorialism derives from traditional inherited divisions of the countryside, reassigned as local jurisdictions known as manors; each manor being subject to a lord, usually holding his position in return for undertakings offered to a higher lord. The lord held a manor court, governed by public law and local custom.
The word manor is to mean any home area or territory in which authority is held. Arthur authorized the acquisition of all manors and estates that the Roman nobles vacated.
The strips of individually-worked land in the open field system are immediately apparent. In this plan, the manor house is set slightly apart from the village, but equally often the village grew up around the forecourt of the manor, usually walled, while the manor lands stretched away outside. As concerns for privacy increased, manor houses are located a farther distance from the village.
Manors each consisted of up to three classes of land:
1. Demesne, the part directly controlled by the lord and used for the benefit of his household and dependents;
2. Dependent (serf or villein) holdings carrying the obligation that the peasant household supply the lord with specified labor services or a part of its output (or cash in lieu thereof), subject to the custom attached to the holding;
3. Free peasant land, without such obligation but otherwise subject to manorial jurisdiction and custom, and owing money rent fixed at the time of the lease.
Additional sources of income for the lord include charges for use of his mill, bakery, or wine-press, or for the right to hunt or to let pigs feed in his woodland, as well as court revenues and single payments on each change of tenant. On the other side of the account, manorial administration involve significant expenses.
Dependent holdings are held nominally by arrangement of lord and tenant, but tenure became in practice almost universally hereditary, with a payment made to the lord on each succession of another member of the family. Villein land could not be abandoned, at least until demographic and economic circumstances make flight a viable proposition; nor can they be passed to a third party without the lord's permission, and the customary payment.
Though not free, villeins are by no means in the same position as slaves: they enjoy legal rights, subject to local custom, and have recourse to the law, subject to court charges which were an additional source of manorial income. Sub-letting of villein holdings are common, and labor on the demesne might be commuted into an additional money payment.