Anglo-Saxon period; but for this purpose it becomes necessary to make a few remarks upon vassalage, as it actually existed amongst the AngloSaxons.

Like their German ancestors, they regarded it as superior to all other obligations in the man, and as equally binding upon the lord, except in the instance of his own superior being opposed to him, when the same principle which had bound the other applied to himself also.

Alfred, in his laws (c. 38, be gefeohte) says, "Eac we cwædath that man mot mid his hlaforde feohtan orwite, gif mon on thone hlaford feohte, swa mot se hlaford mid thy men feohtan. After thære ylcan wisan mot monfeohtan mid his geborenum moege gif him mon on woh ongefeohtath, butan with his hlaforde, and that we ne lyfath."

This interesting passage places in the clearest light not only the intimate connexion which existed between the English lord and his vassal, but also shews it to have been approved of and ratified by the highest authority of the law.

This relation between them was a voluntary compact, and contained conditions which it was the duty of each to fulfil. It was created by the oath of fealty and simple homage, called by the Anglo-Saxons the hyldath or holdath.

The oath of the man or vassal is given in Æthelstan's laws in the following words: "On thone Drihten, the thas haligdom is forehalig, ic wille beon N, hold and getriwe and eal lufian that he lufath and eal ascunian that he ascunath æfter Godes rihte, and æfter worold gerysnum and næfre willes ne gewealdes wordes ne geweorces owiht don thes the him lathre bith, with thæm the he me healde swa ic earnian wille and eal that laste that uncer formal was, tha ic to him gebeah and his willan geceas."

Vassalage was the same in all ranks of society, and, as lord, the eorl, ceorl or king, claimed over his man identical rights and privileges. It was also assumed by all grades, and an equal commended himself (or, Saxonicè, bowed himself) to an equal, and became his man.*

In the time of the Confessor, Eorl

* Alfred's Laws, c. 4. Be hlaford syrwe.

Swegen, son of the celebrated Godwin, with a view of conciliating his relative Eorl Beorn, offered "to swear unto him oaths, and be to him hold."+

The effect of vassalage in this country, as on the continent, was to give to the lord devoted and uncompromising followers, who had, with their own free will, separated themselves from the political community to identify themselves, in their feelings and interests, with the former.

It is therefore easily understood how the new kings and their successors would largely dispense amongst such deserving adherents the lands which were submitted, as we have seen, to their discretionary bounty; and thus, as the connexion between the princeps and comes was not severed, and the old German tenure of the public land was by necessity observed, the determinable occupation of the one, and the military service of the other were accumulated, and in the result the feudal system was developed.

The royal beneficiary and vassal in England was known by the appellation of king's thegn, to distinguish him from the medeme thegn, or ordinary gentleman. His military service was due to the king only, whom he regarded as his personal and immediate lord; and, being in this respect on an equality with the ealdorman, led his own men or tenants into the field, while the allodiaries were conducted by the ealdorman of the shire.

He was also released from the civil power of the latter, § and was amenable to the king alone. In all other respects also he enjoyed privileges beyond those of the medeme thegn; and the most important of these was the jurisdiction which he possessed over his own vassals and tenants, for, by a principle of Germanic law, the civil judicature generally accompanied the military power; and accordingly, in the case of the king's thegn, the two privileges were usually conjoined by the grant of a crown. We have thus

+ Ingram's Sax. Chron. p. 220, a.d. 1049. "Cwæth that be him athas swerigan wolde, and him hold beon."

Sax. Chron. A.D. 871, ad finem. The expressions used there imply the fact of the military independence of the king's thegn. § Wilkins's Laws, p. 118.

Cnut's Laws, de hereotis. "Cyninges

attempted to trace the origin of English benefices, and the prolongation of these estates to a period embracing the life of the grantee, and the question next arises whether in this country the perpetuation of the fief, (i. e. its hereditary transmissibility,) was ever established, and if such were the case when that event took place.

It should be observed, that, as this subject is not very clear in France, it is not surprizing that our own annals supply no direct evidence in regard to it; and much therefore must be left to presumptions, which are, however, sufficiently strong, I think, to shew that this final developement had taken place independently in England.

In regard to the evolution of feodality in France, the celebrated Augustin Thierry has some striking remarks, which have considerable bearing on the same question in its relation with this country.* He says,

"La tradition des assemblées de canton et des assemblées nationales, le système de garantie mutuelle, et d'associations de tous les hommes libres, durent par la force des choses tomber en desuetude. Cette portion des moeurs Germaniques alla déclinant de plus en plus, mais une autre portion de ces mêmes mœurs, l'habitude de vassalage, devint de plus en plus vivâce, and finit par se rendre dominante. Elle fut le seul lien social auquel dans l'anarchie des volontés et des interêts se rattachèrent ceux qui repoussaient avec dedain la citè Romaine et pour qui la citè Germanique n'était plus desormais qu'un rêve impossible à realiser. Cette societé à part que formaient au sein de chaque tribu Germaine les patrons et les vassaux, espèce d'état dans l'état, qui avait sa jurisdiction, sa police, ses usages particuliers, grandit ainsi rapidement en force et en importance."

It is evident, if M. Thierry has correctly enumerated all the causes which in France led to the establishment of the feudal system, that there would not be much probability of finding it in this country, even in the first stage of its progress, for it is well known that the several German institutions referred to by this historian continued to exist, notwithstanding all the frightful troubles of the nation thegn the his socne hæbbe." Montesq. liv. 30, ch. 18.

* Recits Merovingiens, vol. 1, c. 5, p. 288.

during the Danish invasions, and long survived the shock, not only of these events, but of others of a similar nature which followed them. Yet, as we have seen feodality in its incipient form existing here as a native institution, through no introduction or imitation of continental usages, other causes widely different from those which suggested themselves to M. Thierry must have operated to produce in England the complete and final developement of the system. It is not my purpose to inquire whether there has been any omission on the part of M. Thierry in regard to his own country, though I am inclined to believe such is the case; at least, that the causes which he has enumerated do not go to the institution but to the encouragement only of feudalism. But at all events, in respect to England, the change or developement of the benefices into perpetual fiefs is totally inexplicable unless other reasons are assigned, and these reasons are, I think, obvious and natural. The king who had known and loved the deceased vassal, continued (though by the eye of the law he was regarded to have re-granted) to the son the benefice of his father, and on his death the same course was again pursued, and the descent of the benefice being thus maintained in the channel of the same family, was gradually looked upon, and at length claimed, as an estate of inheritance, governed of course by its own peculiar rules. The witan, who connived at or sanctioned such a proceeding, either on the part of their sovereign or their fellow nobles, had, in so doing, motives of personal interest, however indirectly exercised; and the king only consulted his own influence and power in strengthening those of his adherents, especially at a price which was not derived from his private means or resources.

This developement may be traced historically in the appointments of the later ealdormen and eorls; for their offices proceeding from the same source as the fiefs underwent the same changes, and involved themselves by the same process.

The ealdordom of Mercia granted by Alfred the Great to Ethelred and Ethelflæd jointly was a feudal county, and so were all the hereditary eorldoms, which sprang up in the tenth century

in England. But, as in a former number I went fully into this part of the subject, I beg to refer the indulgent reader to the article there inserted, without trespassing on his patience by a repetition.

The beforegoing observations may account for the institution of feudalism, but they do not explain the extra. ordinary increase of fiefs, almost to the disappearance of the true allodium, which is discernible in the 11th century in England.

In France, Montesquieu has attributed the same circumstance to the fact of the large allodiaries voluntarily surrendering their estates, and receiving them back from their sovereign as hereditary benefices; their inducement to take this step being the greater honour and protection which attended the king's vassals.*

Similar privileges undoubtedly appertained to the king's thegnas in England, but no mention can be found of the English medeme thegn surrendering his bocland for the prospect of obtaining them; and other reasons therefore must be sought for to explain this increase of fiefs.

None 1 think so readily or so naturally present themselves as the immense escheats to the crown of bocland, occasioned by the destruction of the great families, which must have followed the hideous devastations of the Northmen in all parts of the country during the tenth century, and the seizures and confiscations made by the Danish sovereigns who sat on the English throne. There is no doubt that, at the commencement of the eleventh century, the infeudation which had been proceeding during the preceding century had then pervaded the major part of the English territory. In the first-mentioned century the word allodium had acquired the general meaning of a hereditary property, and as such was applied to fiefs; † and it is in this sense that we find it so extensively employed in the Domesday Book, to describe estates as they were held during the reign of the Confessor.

Such notices as the following occur continually in the Survey, "God

* L'Esprit des Lois, liv. 30, c. 2. + Hallam's History of the Middle Ages, vol. i. ch. 2, p. 103, in note.

winus comes tenuit de Rege E. sicut allodium.”‡

These words are inapplicable to the old Saxon allodial estate of bocland, which was not held of the king or any other superior, but they can only express the fief or perpetuated benefice, developed in the course of things out of the folcland. The events of the

reign of the Confessor compose a picture of feodality scarcely, if at all, differing from the political appearances of the continent. The excessive influence and power which that system, when full grown, was calculated to give to the eminent families by means of the sub-infeudations which theirown large benefices enabled them to make, is distinctly shown in the conduct and proceedings of Eorl Godwin and his sons, which would have been impracticable, unless through the aid of that system; and the overwhelming importance conferred by it was in that age so familiar to men's minds, that, when the great Eorl I have named was dispos sessed and outlawed, the nation wondered at his fall, not at his previous power and riches. "That" (says a contemporary historian) "wolde thyncan wundorlic ælcum men the on Engla lande wæs, gif ænig man ær tham sæde, thæt hit swa gewurthan sceolde."§

From the reign of the Confessor the transition was but short to the Conquest of the Norman. If therefore any change was effected by the latter in the principles on which the English soil was occupied, it must have been abrupt and violent, and would therefore leave behind it ample memorials of its occurrence. It has been usual to attribute to the Conqueror the parentage of the feudal tenure in this country; and this opinion is supported by the authority of Blackstone and De Lolme. The theory is attempted to be grounded on a circumstance recorded in the Saxon Chronicle, under the year 1085, in the following words, "Siththan he (i. e. William) ferde abutan, swa that he com to Lammæssan to Searebyrig, and thær him comon to his witan, and ealle tha land sittende men, the ahtes wæron,

Tom. i. fol. 22.

§ Sax. Chron. A.D. 1051.

ofer eall Engleland, wæron thæs maunes men, the hi wæron, and ealle hi bugon to him, and wæron his men, and him hold athas sworon, that hi wolden ongean ealle othre men him holde beon."

I will ask the reader, what is there in this passage, to intimate that at this epoch, nineteen years after the accession of William, the feudal system was for the first time introduced into England? If the English historian had intended to commemorate a revolution in the institutions of his country, such as the sudden and arbitrary introduction of a foreign novelty, by which the general allodial land of the kingdom was transformed into fiefs, would it not be amazing that he should use language so inadequate to represent his meaning? He could be clear and circumstantial when he recorded the Survey preceding the compilation of the Domesday; and other events of a similar degree of importance are also carefully told by him. If the construction put upon this fact by Blackstone and De Lolme were correct, we should look to find existing in our own times some solemn record of it, for such a measure could not have been done without the consent of all persons interested in such a proceeding, and must have left a legal memorial to attest the change of law, and to enforce its observance. But, though we have many copies even of the act of the Witenagemot which founded the ecclesiastical Courts, we have no trace of any enactment of that body connected with the present subject. The fact is, that the witan were specially convened by the Conqueror to take the oath of fealty The same thing had been done by Cnut, who, on his accession to the whole of the kingdom in 1016, had assembled the magnates, and obtained from them an oath of the like nature.*

The explanation of each circumstance is founded on the peculiar character of vassalage as it then existed. Homage and fealty were originally undistinguishable, no fealty being due where homage did not apply, and the immediate vassal only was

* Flor. Wig. A.D. 1016.

bound by this obligation. In the Saxon oath which has been quoted it will have been seen that no fealty was even reserved to the king.

"

It was not till later times that this reservation was made. The effect of this principle was practically seen in the reign of the Confessor. During the troubles of that period the followers of Godwin, Swegen, and Harold unhesitatingly embraced their cause, as that of their immediate lords, against the king. The Saxon historian says of these vassals, Ealle gearwe to wige ongean thone cyning." Their conduct was contrasted with that of the eorls, who were engaged in hostilities against their own lord, and felt all the feudal responsibility of the step. The same writer says, "hi (the eorls) trymedon hi fæstlice ongean, theah him lath wære, that hi ongean heora cynehlaford fundan sceoldon." This state of things compelled Edward to take securities of the thegnas of Harold, and afterwards, for his own safety, to require them all to be deli vered into his hands. As the same circumstances might occur in his own case, we should not be surprised that William took the precaution of administering to the landed proprietors of the country, whether his own or others' vassals, an oath of personal fidelity to himself as a guarantee for their support, and in order to obviate the mischiefs that might arise through the want of taking such an obligation from them; and this was all which he could do, or could propose to himself to be done.

In conclusion of this sketch, I will merely observe, that the same data being found in the institutions and customs of England before the Conquest, as those from which the continental system was undoubtedly derived, and there being no proof of the Normans having introduced that system, it must necessarily follow that feodality in England had a native origin and growth.

OPENING OF THE GREAT EASTLOW
BARROW, AT ROUGHAM, SUFFOLK.
MR. URBAN,

In the Gentleman's Magazine for Nov. 1843, p. 527, I communicated a few observations supplementary to the account of the exploration in the month of Sept. in that year, made by the Rev. Professor Henslow, of one of the four Roman tumuli extant at Rougham, near Bury St. Edmund's, on the estate of Philip Bennett, esq. At p. 190 of the same volume is a notice of an accidental discovery made, on the 7th of the previous month of July, of Roman sepulchral remains in another of these barrows, which led to the research above mentioned.

I mentioned that the Roman tumuli at Rougham were four in number, ranging near the side of a country road, on a line nearly north and south. That the northernmost, the loftiest of the range, was known as Eastlow hill; the next barrow, to the south, was accidentally opened in July 1843, as I have described; the third barrow was explored by Professor Henslow, with a very successful result, as has been seen by his report of the excavation; the fourth barrow, at some former, but, I believe, unascertained period, was nearly levelled with the adjacent natural surface of the soil.

The first, however, and loftiest of these ancient sepulchres remained still unexplored, except that a portion of its west side had been cut away on some occasion merely for agricultural purposes. This larger tumulus could not be less than one hundred feet in diameter, and twelve or fourteen feet in height.

When I was on the spot last autumn, I had reason to believe that I might my self have been permitted to explore this tumulus, but I could not then conveniently undertake the task, and I have awaited with some degree of curiosity the result of a research which I thought it highly probable might be made by the gentleman who, in the former instance, had proved himself so well qualified to direct it.

This renewed exploration of the Rougham sepulchres was made by the Rev. Mr. Henslow about 1st July last, and has produced a very interesting discovery. Had I been fortunate enough to be apprized of the day fixed for the excavation, I should have certainly been present as a spectator.

Mr. Henslow has recorded the particulars, some weeks since, in the Bury Post,*

and hints that they may be followed up at some future time by a lecture on the subject of ancient sepulchral deposits; I shall for the present, therefore, confine myself to a few general outlines of the discovery, and to one or two observations which the notes of the Professor have elicited.

Narrative of Professor Henslow.

On Thursday morning, the 4th of July last, the workmen were sufficiently advanced, after more than four days' constant labour, in exploring the large tumulus at Rougham, named Eastlow-hill, to raise our expectations that we should be able to expose an extensive deposit of Roman remains by the hour at which the public had been invited to attend. The discovery turned out to be something of a very different description from what I had anticipated. Instead of urns and vases, pateræ and simpula, lamps and lachrymatories, such as were found last year, the only contents of a large chamber of masonry, which I shall presently describe, proved to be a leaden coffin, inclosing a skeleton.

Perhaps it is my scanty experience in this sort of adventure that inclines me to fancy our antiquaries will feel more interested at this result than if we had met with a repetition of what the Bartlow Hills, the smaller tumuli at Rougham, and those of other places, have revealed to us concerning the more usual ceremonies adopted by the Romans in burying their dead. I am aware that Roman skeletons have been found before in leaden coffins; but the circumstance is rare; and I have no opportunity here of consulting the Archeologia, or other standard works on antiquities, to ascertain how far former discoveries may bear comparison with the present.

The object of peculiar interest to myself was the well-built chamber of masonry. My very slight acquaintance with antiquities must be my excuse, if I wrongly suppose this chamber to afford us, in England, a solitary existing example of the manner in which the Romans tiled their houses. I recollect having seen a rather rude sketch (in the second volume of the Archæologia) of a tiled roof, which, I believe, was of the same description as the one we have now found. It was discovered in a tumulus near York; and, if it has been preserved, it may be a second example of this sort. In that case, the

GENT. MAG. VOL. XXII.

3 B