[280] If the demesne land were let out in farm the customary ploughing and other services of the villeins would no longer be needed and if only a portion of it were so farmed the number of villein services required would be proportionately less. This, as well as the increasing employment of hired labour on the demesne during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, accounts for the item “Sale of Works” which appears in the Romsey account for 1412. Liveing, Records of Romsey Abbey, p. 194. From another point of view the number of rent-payers was increased by the fact that both free and unfree tenants could rent pieces of the demesne. As to the farming of the demesne, note however the conclusion to which Miss Jacka comes from a study of the Valor and the Dissolution Surveys now in the Augmentation Office: “The question ‘to what extent did the nuns in 1535 farm their demesnes?’ cannot be confidently answered on the evidence of any of the records before us. Apart from the fact that in many cases there is no statement at all, the word ‘firma’ or ‘farm’ is used so ambiguously that even where it occurs it is impossible to be certain that a lease existed.... There are, of course, unmistakeable cases in which the demesnes were farmed: Tarrant Keynes kept in hand the demesnes of 3 manors and farmed that of 7; Shaftesbury occupied the demesne of one manor and farmed that of 18 (Valor Eccles. I, pp. 265, 276). But in none of the few cases in which the whole of the demesne is described as yielding a ‘firma,’ should we be justified, in view of the several uses of the word, in asserting that it had the definite character of a lease. That is to say, whatever may be our suspicions, the evidence before us does not warrant the assertion that in a single case did the nuns farm the whole of their demesnes; and this conclusion is an unexpected and remarkable one, for we might well expect them to be among the first land holders who seized this method of simplifying their manorial economy.” Jacka, op. cit. f. 47.
[281] In the account roll of Dame Christian Bassett, Prioress of Delapré (St Albans) for 2-4 Hen. VII, the “rente fermys” range between £7 from Robert Pegge for the farm of the whole manor of Pray, to 2s. received from Richard Franklin “for the ferme of vj acres of londe in Bacheworth”; one John Shon pays 6s. 8d. “for the ferme of certeyne londs in Bacheworth and ij tenements in Seint Mighell strete with a lyme kylne”; Richard Ordeway pays 10s. for rent farm of “an hous wtin the Pray” and Robert Pegge 8s. for rent farm of “an hous and a stable wtin Praygate.” Dugdale, Mon. III, pp. 358-9. In this account her assize rents amount to £2. 11s. 2d. within the town of St Albans and her rents farm to £4. 13s. 2d.; while outside the town the rents of assize amount to £2. 5s. 0d. and the rents farm to £11. 19s. 8d., while four items amounting to £1. 19s. 11d. are doubtful, but probably represent farms. That is to say very nearly three quarters of the lands and houses belonging to Delapré were farmed out, and if we except payments from the town of St Albans, which were probably house-rents, over four-fifths of its possessions were in farm. Similarly in the account roll of Margaret Ratclyff, Prioress of Swaffham, for 22 Ed. IV. the rents are classified as Redditus Assise (£6. 0s. 4d. in all), Firma Terrae (£13. 0s. 3½d. in all) and Firma Molendini, the farm of a mill (£3. 14s. 4d.). Ib. IV, p. 459.
[282] References to money paid in fees to rent-collectors, or in gratuities to men who had brought rents up to the house often occur in account rolls, e.g. in the Catesby roll for 1414-15, “Also in expenses of collecting rents wheresoever to be collected ... xixs. Also paid to divers receivers of rent for the time viijs. viijd.” Baker, Hist. of Northants. I, p. 280. In the Delapré account of 2-4 Hen. IV, “Item paid to a man that brought money from Cambryg for a rewarde viijd. Item for dyvers men yt brought in their rent at dyvers tymes xxs. ijd.” Dugdale, Mon. III, p. 359. In the St Radegund’s Cambridge account of 1449-51, “In the expenses of Thomas Key (xvijd. ob.) at Abyngton, Litlyngton, Whaddon, Crawden, Bumpsted and Cambridge for the business of the lady (prioress) and for levying rent ... and in the stipend of Thomas Key collecting rents in Cambridge and the district this year xiiis. iiijd.” Gray, Priory of St Radegund, Cambridge, pp. 173-4.
[283] Gray, op. cit. pp. 148, 164.
[284] See for a translation of the whole charter, Aungier, Hist. of Syon, pp. 60-67. The original is given ib. pp. 411-8.
[285] See the valuation of Syon Monastery, A.D. 1534, translated from the Valor Ecclesiasticus, ib. pp. 439-450. At Romsey in 1412 the perquisites of courts brought in a total of £14 out of an annual income of £404. 6s. 0½d., made up of the rents and farms, sale of works, sale of farm produce and perquisites of courts on six manors. Liveing, Records of Romsey Abbey, p. 194.
[286] V.C.H. Hants. II, p. 135.
[287] V.C.H. Norfolk, II, p. 370. So apparently had the Prioress of Carrow. Rye, Carrow Abbey, p. 21.
[288] See p. [70] above. Compare the Catesby roll for 1414-15. “And in the expenses of the steward at the court this year and at other times vis. viiid.” Baker, Hist. and Antiq. of Northants. I, p. 280.
[289] V.C.H. Essex, II, p. 118.