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OF THE

UNIVERSITY

OF CALIFORNIA

INTRODUCTION.

EARLY FORMS OF MILITARY SERVICE.

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In order to discuss the development of some of the peculiar features of knight service in England, it is necessary to recall certain facts relating to the earlier forms of military service, a they existed under the Anglo-Saxon and under the Norman kings. It is not within the scope of this dissertation to present any new views upon the beginning of English feudalism, or the political relations of Norman to pre-Norman England. Of these trite questions it seems as though satisfactory solutions have been reached. That the Norman Conquest was "a catastrophe which determined the whole future of English Law;"' that in England "consecutive political history does, in a sense, begin with the Norman Conquest," in opposition to the older view that "it (the Norman Conquest) must be considered as an event rather than an overwhelming catastrophe," 3 appears to be pretty well established.

One of the most prevalent of all mediaeval institutions is that of the obligation of military service for land. It is an essential feature of feudalism, but it is not peculiar to feudal times or feudal countries alone. The idea is seen developed in the declining Roman Empire, when requisitions for soldiers were made by the government upon the landed proprietors; under Charles the Great, whatever may have been the theory of military duty, in practice it was made dependent on the possessors of land; 5 in England, from the time Hengest and Horsa promised 'Polluck and Maitland, Hist. Eng. Law, I, 57.

2 Round, Feud. Eng., 317.

3 Palgrave, Eng. and Nor., III, 596.

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"It is not with the coming of William that the history or the law of England began." Freeman, N. C., V, 55.

4 Coulange, La Gaule Romaine, 292.

5 Capit., 808.

to act in defense of Vortigern by virtue of their holding the land of Thanet, military duty for tenure is apparent in some form or other. The system naturally suggests itself and springs up spontaneously wherever the conditions are favorable. When, by reason of the demands for special training or expenditure on the part of those who comprise the fighting force of the country, the ordinary freemen can no longer be depended upon to form an adequate army, and when the nation has not a fiscal system capable of maintaining mercenary troops, the landed estates of the country are alone capable of furnishing a soldiery that will have the necessary equipment of horse and armor, to say nothing of skill at arms and military esprit.

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So, under the Anglo-Saxon system, the host which was originally the people in arms, came to depend for its strength upon the thegnhood. The thegn bore a twofold relation in the state. First, he was generally, though not necessarily, a landowner. Five hides are the traditional quantum since Alfred for a thegn to hold, yet one might be a thegn and hold less, or hold more and still not be a thegn." The presumption was that a thegn should have the means to maintain his rank on the usual scale, and that one possessing five hides of land was "of thegn-right worthy." Secondly as a soldier the thegn was of the character of the gesith, a purely personal follower and beneficiary of the king. That he was remotely a development from the early German comes of Tacitus is not unlikely.3 As early as the heptarchy period not only the kings, but other lords by gifts of land were providing for these antrustions, who, being bound by special oath to their lords, could be used more freely than the fyrd, which could be arrayed only in the defense of the kingdom, while the thegns could be mustered for any service. By reason of this personal connection with the king, the thegn-born acquired a quality of nobility after the third generation. In this capacity they resemble the knights of later time, and the documents some3 Freeman, N. C., I, 90.

Stubbs, C. H., I, 208.

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times use the words knight and thegn interchangeably. Thus cniht appears in the Codex Diplomaticus, and miles is used by Latin writers. These things, among others, led Palgrave to call the system of the Anglo-Saxons feudal. Thus :

"The feudal period of their government must be placed under Egbert, when we suddenly discover the application of feudal principles in ensuring and enforcing the imperial supremacy of the crown." "

"But the full establishment of feudality appears in the reign of Edgar." 3

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What is characteristic of true feudalism is not merely the relationship of letter and hirer of land, or that of lord and vassal alone, but the union of both of these.4 Of the twofold aspect of thegnhood, the thegn resembled the knight as a military follower of the king (or other lord), who owed personal service, at his own expense of equipment, and at his own expense during the campaign. Like the knight, the thegn on assuming his rank was ushered in with the honorable ceremony of girding with the sword and belt. The principle of commendation also was extended to the utmost before the Conquest. Every freeman must choose his lord, and the lordless man became a kind of outlaw. But in the aspect of a landholder the thegn was materially different from the knight. Among the Saxons there were none of the peculiar Roman forms of tenure, such as the precarium, emphyteusis, colonat. Being free from these Roman influences England developed its land system from its German foundation, and so proprietorship in land was far less complicated than in Gaul. All land, whether folk-land or bookland, was subject to the trinoda necessitas. Each hide was to furnish its man, and a thegn might be liable for five men or a single warrior five times as well equipped; though this principle was never carried out with strict regularity. In this way each "Hic Edwardi Regis armiger fuit, et ab illo cingulum militiae accepit." (Ord. Vit., 669. See also in Bede, miles.)

•Palgrave, Commonwealth, I, 586.

3 Ibid., 587.

Polluck and Maitland, His. Eng. Law, I, 44. 5 Gneist, Self gov., II.

"Freeman, N. C., I, 91.

7 Glasson, Droit Ang., I, 133.

8 Stubbs, C. H., I, 211.

9 Gneist, Self gov., 3.

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landowner performed service according to the amount of his land. Under the feudal régime this was very different. Land that had been allotted as knights' fees owed its given quota of service irrespective of its extent or value. Lands that were not specially designated as knights' fees did not furnish this kind of service. The holder of knights' fees or a portion of one furnished the particular service that this land called for, irrespective of his own status or whatever other kind of land he might hold. The Anglo-Saxon proprietor, on the other hand, performed service, not because of a piece of land, but for the amount of his land; not for land, but because he was a landholder. In the case of knights' fees, however they might be divided and cut up, they ever remained knights' fees; in the case of a five-hide estate supporting one equipped as a thegn, if it was broken up, the fragments would not be different from other small estates. It is no proof of a theory, but a significant fact, that the word beneficium by which tenure in Gaul was commonly known does not appear in the document of England for this epoch.

The tendency which is conspicuous at a later time among the knights is noticeable among the thegns-that of becoming more attached to their landed interests than to their military functions. The kings from the time of Canute had to depend for their immediate needs upon the Hus-carls. In the summer of 1066 Harold could not keep his regular levies together during the long time he had to wait for William, and the battle of Hastings was fought largely by Hus-carls.

Such was the uncertain but simple condition of military landtenure to the time that the Normans came in 1066. An important question then is, what ideas of tenure did William and his men bring with them? One is confronted with the lack of all distinct information of the jurisprudence of Normandy prior to the time of Philip Augustus. The most that is known is that Normandy became French rather than remained Scandinavian in character and language; that Roman influence is evident in the chartered towns; the Duke did homage to the King of France as suzerain and was a "peer" in a distinctly feudal state; the

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