The mediaeval system of taxation based on the hidage, and many of the menial services exacted from the serf, were survivals of the Roman land-system. mentary Other arguments are advanced in favour of the Roman Docuorigin of the manor. There is documentary evidence, ex- evidence. tending back to the seventh and even sixth century, to show that Saxon estates of a manorial type existed in England for hundreds of years before the Norman Conquest1. Of these Anglo-Saxon documents the best known is the Rectitudines Singularum Personarum belonging to the eleventh century, which affords a general picture of serfdom that only lacks Norman terminology to make it complete. It is supplemented by other documents which describe two early English estates of a manorial character, Tidenham and Stoke. Lastly, the laws of Ine (seventh century) and of Ethelbert (sixth century) are interpreted in favour of a manorial structure of society. It follows, therefore, that almost immediately after the English Conquest the manor had become the prevailing type of estate, and must accordingly have been the original basis of the Saxon settlements. The intervening period is too short to allow of the alternative theory that England was covered with free village communities, which were gradually reduced to manorial subjection. Thus on the one hand the mediaeval manor traced its most characteristic features to the Roman villa, while on the other it was prevalent among the Anglo-Saxons very soon after their conquest of Britain. of the This conclusion is also reached by another line of argument Nature based upon the indivisible nature of the tenurial holdings. tenurial The universal feature of the mediaeval village community holdings. was the equality of the holdings, which almost everywhere conformed to a uniform standard3. From the earliest times the normal type of peasant holding was the yardland, or virgate, consisting of thirty acres scattered in strips over the open fields. These virgates were never divided among heirs, and for centuries had passed from father to son without 1 Seebohm, op. cit. 126-180. * F. Liebermann, Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen (1898), i. 444-453. 3 Infra, p. 33. The Teutonic school. Teutonic aspect of English history. ? losing their unity. But this equality in the tenements, which was maintained by the rule of undivided succession, could only have proceeded from their servile character. It was the distinctive mark of the free holding that it could be divided among heirs or otherwise alienated, and accordingly free tenants could at once be singled out by the irregu larity of their holdings. (Now if the great mass of peasants had once been free, the equality which characterized their holdings would speedily have disappeared, and certainly not have lasted for many centuries. Its uniformity and its permanence can only be accounted for by the supposition that the bulk of the holders of yardlands had at no time possessed that right of alienation, which their servitude alone could have denied to them. The system of indivisible holdings on the mediaeval manor is accordingly held to prove its servile origin, and this inference confirms the contention that the manor was a continuation of the villa) Another school of thought insist upon the Teutonic aspect of English history-though the importance of the Celtic element now receives wider recognition 1. They reject the doctrines of the manorial school, and regard the manor as a native growth which owed little or nothing to Roman influences. We have to consider, therefore, the grounds on which they deny the Roman origin of the manor, and the alternative hypothesis advanced in its stead. The Roman theory of the manor involves certain social implications which seem to destroy completely the validity of its premises. If the Saxon invaders adopted the Roman land-system and the manor was always the normal type of estate then the character of the English Conquest has been entirely misconceived, and we must suppose that the Roman occupation of Britain left permanent traces which deeply affected the subsequent development of the English nation.) (In place of the utter destruc tion of Roman civilization with which the Conquest is usually associated, it would follow that Roman organization, social and economic, continued to survive with few or no changes.) The Celtic population, instead of being exter 1 *minated or displaced, would have remained as the basis of the new civilization, and the Saxons could only have formed a comparatively small body which assumed the position vacated by the Romans. This implies that the foundations of English life, instead of being predominantly Teutonic, were mainly Roman and Celtic. The Saxon Conquest, it is maintained, did not destroy existing society, and the English state was built upon the ruins of the past 1. "The object of the races who broke up the Roman Empire", Pearson holds, "was not to settle in a desert, but to live at ease as an aristocracy of soldiers, drawing rent from a peaceful population of tenants". Most elaborate of all were the 'learned and ingenious' theories of Coote in his work on the Romans of Britain. The Anglo-Saxon invaders, he contended, did not make a tabula rasa of Britain 2; they were "sufficient only to provide masters for the conquered race, not colonizers "3, and the natives were spared to minister to their wants. All the institutions of early English society, the shire, the hundred, the tithing, the trinoda necessitas, the borough and the gilds, were traced to a Roman origin. These conclusions are the outcome of the Roman theory, but they are irreconcilable with the Teutonic colouring of English history and cannot therefore be accepted. (The English language, law and religion, and the names of English villages, seem decisive proof that the masses of the people were not of Celtic but of Teutonic blood.) Philologists appear to agree with the statement that our language contains " few Celtic and still fewer Latin words "5. "The tendency of modern scholarship", says a recent writer on philology, "is to decrease the number of Celtic words in English 1 C. H. Pearson, History of England (1867),i. 101, 103. That the invaders would step into the place of the Roman lords is also inferred by Seebohm, Village Community, 421; Ashley, Origin of Property, p. xxxii seq. 2 H. C. Coote, The Romans of Britain (1878), p. vi. • Ibid. 199. ♦ Ibid. 341 (hundred, etc.); 362 (borough); 397, 410 (gilds); 422 (native Christianity paved the way for the work of St. Augustine); 424 (A.-S. coinage was the old Roman money of Britain); 236, 376, 439 (the old Roman settlers dwell apart in cities); 262-264 (the Roman estate, or centuria, survives as the hide, or A.-S. family holding). * E. A. Freeman, The Norman Conquest (1870), i. 16. Contrast Pearson, op. cit. 102 and App. A; and Coote, op. cit. 36 seq. Roman on Britain. the number of Celtic words adopted into English before the twelfth century is less than a dozen, and several of these were probably imported from Ireland or the Continent". If the bulk of the nation had been other than Teutonic, it is impossible to believe that more numerous traces of their speech would not have been imprinted on our language; and their absence is "an objection which goes to the root of the whole matter "2. As to law, Stubbs declared that "the vestiges of Romano-British law which have filtered through local custom into the common law of England are infinitesimal". In religion the Saxons remained heathen for a century and a half, while their ultimate conversion was the work of missionaries from Rome. The names of our villages, we are also told, are so overwhelmingly English that a British name is almost as rare as a British word in our language "4. It is extremely improbable that a small group of settlers, planted in the midst of a Celtic village, would have been able to impose its own nomenclature upon the native population, when we bear in mind how stubbornly the inhabitants of a village cling to the old traditions and landmarks. All this makes it incredible that the Celts formed the most considerable element in the population 5. Moreover, Bede tells us that the homes of the Angles were left empty, and this indicates a migration of tribes and not of a mere handful of piratical chieftains 6. There is a wide divergence of opinion as to the extent of influence Roman influences on Britain and the nature of the English Conquest. Britain was ordered after the usual manner of Roman provinces, and appears to have attained some con 1 L. P. Smith, The English Language (1912), 50. Similarly, H. C. Wyld, The Historical Study of the Mother Tongue (1906), 238. 2 F. W. Maitland, Domesday Book and Beyond (1897), 222. 3 W. Stubbs, The Constitutional History of England (6th ed.), i. 67. 4 W. H. Stevenson in the English Hist. Review, iv. 358; these names must record an enormous displacement of the native population." Freeman did not hold, as is often supposed, the theory of complete extermination: Four Oxford Lectures (1888), 69, 74-75, 85. • Venerabilis Baedae Opera Historica (ed. C. Plummer, 1896), i. 31 ; c. 15. Chadwick (The Origin of the English Nation, 1907, p. 185) regards Bede's statement as an exaggeration, but seems to agree with the main contention. siderable degree of civilization. It was governed by Roman officials and planted with Roman settlers, who reproduced the familiar features of Roman life and culture. Roads were constructed, the most permanent fruit and abiding witness of the Roman occupation; improved methods of tillage were introduced, mineral wealth was exploited1, and the resources of the country were energetically developed. None the less Britain always remained the outpost of the Empire, valuable only for its strategical position and for its corn tribute. It was the last province to be acquired and the first to be abandoned; while its civilization was superficial and not deep-rooted. Gaul and Spain 2 were completely transformed by the thorough permeation of Roman influences; but in Britain Celtic life flowed on undisturbed. The arrangements of tribal society continued side by side with the large private estates of the Roman landowners, for the existence of a landed aristocracy was not incompatible with the continued survival of Celtic life in all its primitive aspects. In any case, the nature and extent of the villa system would seem to have been exaggerated. Roman villas, while numerous, were not sufficient to exclude other systems of land-holding. The view that Italy and the provinces were ruined by the development of large estates, latifundia perdidere Italiam, needs to be modified 4. Again the villa was not identical with the mediaeval manor 5, for the position of the colonus was not attended by the absolute renunciation of all legal pretensions and complete subjection to the lord which stamped the English serf. society. But, in any case, Roman civilization in Britain must have Disruption been largely swept away in the disruption of society that Roman followed the recall of the Roman legions. Internal factions and the raids of Picts and Scots and Saxons completely destroyed the fabric of Roman life, which had rested upon the 1 J. Ward, Roman Era in Britain (1911), 9. For Roman roads, ibid. c. 2, and map facing p. 280. T. Mommsen, The Provinces of the Roman Empire (ed. 1909), i. 67, 86. • Vinogradoff, Growth of the Manor, bk. i. c. ii. But Haverfield (Vict. County Hist. Norfolk, i. 281) holds that "the Britons generally adopted the Roman speech and civilization." ♦ Vinogradoff, Growth of the Manor, 67-68, and authorities cited, p. 106 (n. 59). 5 Ibid. 82. |