To mention one instance suggested by our previous inquiry, we have noticed how the extension of Frankish rule in Gaul from the Loire to the Garonne increased the difficulties of maintaining two laws as to land. Strangers under Roman law, as in the ‘de migrantibus,’ one by one were settling among Franks holding alods or family holdings of terra Salica. Extended conquests reversed the process, and in conquered provinces immigrants living under Salic law became strangers amongst vicini living under Roman, Burgundian, or Wisigothic law.
The family holdings of terra Salica must have now become the exception and not the rule. This becomes evident in the provisions made for the army.
In the Capitulare of A.D. 803,[128] de exercitu promovendo, it was ordered that every free man (‘liber homo’) who, de proprio suo or as a benefice, had four mansi vestiti, that is mansi occupied by tenants, should equip himself and attend ‘in hostem.’ And those not having so many mansi were to club together so that for every four mansi a soldier should be found. The possession of mansi had apparently become sufficiently general to be taken as the typical form of landholding.
In A.D. 807[129] special arrangements were made for the case of the recently conquered Frisians and Saxons.
If help should be needed in Spain, every five of the Saxons were to equip a sixth. If the need arose nearer home, every two were to prepare a third. Or if the need arose still closer at hand, all were to come. Of the Frisians, counts and vassals and those who held benefices, all were to come, and of those who were poorer every six were to equip a seventh. There is no mention of mansi in the case of the Saxons and Frisians.
The Capitulare of A.D. 803 seems to show that in the longer settled districts of the Empire the possession of so many mansi, de proprio suo, was the prevalent form of landownership. So that, although the lex Salica remained still in force, the number of Franks living under it seems by this time to have borne a very small proportion to those living under Roman and other laws.
Family holdings under the Lex Salica were, however, probably not quite extinct. In the ‘Capitula generalia’ of A.D. 825[130] was inserted the following clause providing specially for family holdings, which may possibly have been holdings of terra Salica, though it is not so directly stated.
De fratribus namque qui simul in paterna seu materna hereditate communiter vivunt, nolentes substantiam illorum dividere, hac occasione, ut unus tantum eorum in hostem vadat, volumus ut si solus est vadat: si autem duo sunt similiter: si tres fuerint unus remaneat: et si ultra tres numerus fratrum creverit, unus semper propter domesticam curam adque rerum communium excolentiam remaneat. Si vero inter eos aliqua orta fuerit contentio, quis eorum expeditionum facere debeat, prohibemus ut nemo illorum remaneat. In ætate quoque illorum lex propria servetur. Similiter et in nepotibus eorum hæc conditio teneatur.
Concerning brothers who together live in common in the paternal or maternal inheritance, unwilling to divide their substance, when occasion comes that one of them only should go in hostem, we will that if there be one only he should go, and if there be two the same: if there be three let one remain; and if the number of brothers grows to more than three, let one always remain on account of domestic care and to attend to their common concerns. But if among them any contention shall have arisen which of them ought to go on the expedition we prohibit that any one of them shall remain. During their lives also let the lex propria be preserved. In the same way let this condition be kept to even among their grandsons.