203. General Capitulary to the Missi, 805.
M. G. LL. 4to, II, 1, no. 44.
16. Concerning the oppression of poor freemen: that they are not to be unjustly oppressed by more powerful persons on any pretext, and forced to sell or give up their property.
204. Capitulary of 811.
M. G. LL. 4to, II, 1, no. 73.
This and the preceding document illustrate the attempts of the great lords to round out their domains and increase the number of their dependent tenants by forcing poor free land-owners to give up their lands and become tenants.
2. Poor men complain that they are despoiled of their property, and they make this complaint equally against bishops and abbots and their agents, and against counts and their subordinates.
205. Capitulary of Worms, 829.
M. G. LL. 4to, II, 2, no. 193.
6. Freemen who have no lands of their own, but live on the land of a lord, are not to be received as witnesses, because they hold land of another; but they are to be accepted as compurgators, because they are free. Those who have land of their own, and yet live on the land of a lord, are not to be rejected as witnesses because they live on the land of a lord, but their testimony shall be accepted, because they have land of their own.