Let us sum up the results obtained in this chapter.
1. The village communities contained in the manorial system are organised on a system of self-government which affords great help to the lord in many ways, but certainly limits his power materially, and reduces him to the position of a constitutional ruler.
2. The original court of the manor was one and the body of its suitors was one. The distinction between courts for free tenants and customary courts grows up very gradually in the fourteenth century, and later.
3. The steward was not the only judge of the halimot. The judgment came from the whole court, and its suitors, without distinction of class, were necessary judicial assessors.
4. The court of ancient demesne presents the same elements as the ordinary halimot, although it lays greater stress on the communal side of the organisation.
5. The conveyancing entries on the rolls do not prove the want of right on the part of the peasant holders. On the contrary, they go back to very early communal practice.
6. The rule which makes the existence of the manor dependent on the existence of free suitors is derived from the conception of the court as a court of free and lawful men, taking in villains and excluding slaves.
7. The manor by itself is the estate; the rural community and the jurisdiction of the soke are generally fused with it into one whole; but in some cases the two latter elements are seen emerging as independent growths from behind the manorial organisation.