The term manerium seems to have come in with the Conqueror[439], though other derivatives from the Latin verb manere, in particular mansa, mansio, mansiuncula had been freely employed by the scribes of the land-books. But these had as a rule been used as representatives of the English hide, and just for this reason they were incapable of expressing the notion that the Normans desired to express by the word manerium. In its origin that word is but one more name for a house. Throughout the Exeter Domesday the word mansio is used instead of the manerium of the Exchequer record, and even in the Exchequer record we may find these two terms used interchangeably:—‘Three free men belonged to this manerium; one of them had half a hide and could withdraw himself without the licence of the lord of the mansio[440].’ If we look for the vernacular term that was rendered by manerium, we are likely to find it in the English heal. Though this is not connected with the Latin aula, still these two words bearing a similar meaning meet and are fused in the aula, haula, halla of Domesday Book.
Manor and hall.
Now this term stands in the first instance for a house and can be exchanged with curia. You may say that there is meadow enough for the horses of the curia[441], and that there are three horses in the aula[442]; you may speak indifferently of a mill that serves the hall[443], or of the mill that grinds the corn of the court[444]. But further, you may say that in Stonham there are 50 acres of the demesne land of the hall in Creeting, or that in Thorney there are 24 acres which belong to the hall in Stonham[445], or that Roger de Rames has lands which once were in the hall of St Edmund[446], or that in the hall of Grantham there are three carucates of land[447], or that Guthmund’s sake and soke extended only over the demesne of his hall[448]. We feel that to such phrases as these we should do no great violence were we to substitute ‘manor’ for ‘hall.’ Other phrases serve to bring these two words very closely together. One and the same page tells us, first, that Hugh de Port holds as one manor what four brothers held as two manors, and then, that on another estate there is one hall though of old there were two halls[449]:—these two stories seem to have the same point. ‘Four brothers held this; there was only one hall there[450].’ ‘Two brothers held it and each had his hall; now it is as one manor[451].’ ‘In these two lands there is but one hall[452].’ ‘Then there were two halls; now it is in one manor[453].’ ‘Ten manors; ten thegns, each had his hall[454].’ ‘Ingelric set these men to his hall.... Ingelric added these men to his manor[455].’
Difference between manor and hall.
We do not contend that manerium and halla are precisely equivalent. Now and again we shall be told of a manerium sine halla[456] as of some exceptional phenomenon. The term manerium has contracted a shade of technical meaning; it refers, so we think, to a system of taxation, and thus it is being differentiated from the term hall. Suppose, for example, that a hall or manor has meant a house from which taxes are collected, and that some one removes that house, houses being very portable things[457]: ‘by construction of law,’ as we now say, there still may be a hall or manor on the old site; or we may take advantage of the new wealth of words and say that, though the hall has gone, the manor remains: to do this is neater than to say that there is a ‘constructive’ hall where no hall can be seen. Then again, manerium is proving itself to be the more elastic of the two terms. We may indeed speak of a considerable stretch of land as belonging to or even as ‘being in’ a certain hall, and this stretch may include not only land that the owner of the hall occupies and cultivates by himself or his servants, but also land and houses that are occupied by his villeins[458]: still we could hardly talk of the hall being a league long and a league wide or containing a square league. Of manerium, however, we may use even such phrases as those just mentioned[459]. For all this, we can think of no English word for which manerium can stand, save hall; tún, it is clear enough, was translated by villa, not by manerium
Size of the maneria.
If now we turn from words to look at the things which those words signify, we shall soon be convinced that to describe a typical manerium is an impossible feat, for on the one hand there are enormous maneria and on the other hand there are many holdings called maneria which are so small that we, with our reminiscences of the law of later days, can hardly bring ourselves to speak of them as manors. If we look in the world of sense for the essence of the manerium we shall find nothing that is common to all maneria save a piece of ground—very large it may be, or very small—held (in some sense or another) by a single person or by a group of co-tenants, for even upon a house we shall not be able to insist very strictly. After weary arithmetical labours we might indeed obtain an average manor; we might come to the conclusion that the average manor contained so many hides or acres, possibly that it included land occupied by so many sokemen, villeins, bordiers, serfs; but an average is not a type, and the uselessness of such calculations will soon become apparent.
A large manor.
We may begin by looking at a somewhat large manor. Let it be that of Staines in Middlesex, which is held by St Peter of Westminster[460]. It is rated at 19 hides but contains land for 24 plough-teams. To the demesne belong 11 hides and there are 13 teams there. The villeins have 11 teams. There are:—
3 villeins with a half-hide apiece.