The six-hynde class.
The mention of the six-hynde class in addition to the twelve-hynde and twy-hynde classes makes it a matter of importance to learn what manner of persons were included in the six-hynde class.
The Laws of King Alfred, as we have seen, generally mention the six-hyndeman with the other classes, but without giving any clue to an answer to the question to what social rank he belonged. In the Laws of Ine, however, a distinct clue is given, and it is one which accords with Continental usage and suggests a reason for the disappearance of the six-hyndeman from the later laws. He is mentioned again after King Alfred’s time only in the so-called Laws of Henry I.
The clauses relating to this subject are important enough to claim consideration in a separate section.
The gafol-gelda and the gebur.
One other important social distinction, or division of classes, appears already in the Laws of Ine, viz. that which existed between possessors of land and gafol-geldas and geburs who were, as we should say, tenants on the land of others. We shall have to return to the consideration of this distinction and to note the fact that it is in these Laws of Ine that the gebur appears as almost the equivalent of the gafol-gelda, while they afford incidental evidence also that the typical holding of the gafol-gelda (and thus of the gebur) was the ‘yardland’ or virgate of open-field husbandry.
The mention of the gafol-gelda and the gebur occurs in s. 6.
Gif hwa gefeohte on cyninges huse sie he scyldig ealles his ierfes ⁊ sie on cyninges dome hwæðer he lif age þe nage. Gif hwa on mynstre gefeohte hund twelftig scill. gebete. Gif hwa on ealdormonnes huse gefeohte oþþe on oðrer geþungenes witan lx scill. gebete he ⁊ oðer lx geselle to wite.