23. Speen, Berkshire: R.O. Mins. Accts., Gen. Ser., Bdle. 750, No. 22; Misc. Bks. Land Revenue, vol. 187, f. 97–101. At the earlier date the figures refer to the assized rents, at the later date to the rents of free tenants, customary tenants, and “firms.”
24. Schitlington, Bedfordshire: R.O. Mins. Accts., Gen. Ser., Bdle. 741, Nos. 16, 19, and 27. At the first date the figures refer to the assized rent, and include “Tallage of the vill £10.” At the second date they cover the same entries as at the first. At the last date they refer to the rent as it appears in the Rental. At this time there are certain additional entries, viz., “Firm of land £8, 5s. 0-1/4d., Firm of the manor £4, 15s. 4d., Increase of Rent [of a mill(?)] 13s. 4d., Increase of Rent of 1 messuage, 1 virgate with croft and meadow 13s. 7-1/2d." These I have omitted.
25. Cranfield, Bedfordshire: R.O. Mins. Accts., Gen. Ser., Bdle. 740, Nos. 18, and 25; Mins. Accts., Hen. VIII., No. 4. At the first two dates the figures include rents of free and native tenants and ferm of lands. At the last date the entry is “Rent of the vill, as by the rental, £72, 2s. 1-3/4d.”
26. Holywell, Huntingdonshire: R.O. Mins. Accts., Gen. Ser., Bdle. 877, No. 17, Bdle. 878, No. 1. At the first date the entries include rents assized, and certain miscellaneous items such as “Hewesilver," “Heringsilver,” “Brensilver”; at the later date “Rents assized of free and villein tenants £4, 19s. 8d., customary rent lately in works and in new rent £15, 6s. for 17 virgates paying 18s. each, £6, 15s., for 25 cotmen paying 9s. each, 6s. 8d. increment of rent.”
The suggestion that it might be of interest to try to discover how far rents were stationary over long periods came to me from reading the article by Maitland on “The History of a Cambridgeshire Manor" in E. H. R., vol. ix., where he points out that copyholders must have enjoyed a considerable unearned increment. The table of rents explained above is unsatisfactory, because of the difficulty of finding a basis for the comparison of payments at different periods. Thus at the earlier dates there are the tenants' works, and (occasionally) tallages to be considered; at the later the rent obtained from leasing the demense. The variety of the sources of manorial revenue makes it impossible to discover a common form to which the payments on all manors can be reduced. The ideal would be to take the villeins' payments and works in (say) the fourteenth century, and to compare them with the payments of the copyhold tenants in the sixteenth century. But since the commonest entry is simply “rents of assize,” which included the rents of freeholders as well as of customary tenants, this simple procedure is often impossible.
While the table given on pages 115–117 is certainly not what could be desired, I am inclined to think its inaccuracies do not lie in the direction of exaggerating the fixity of rents, but rather, if anything, in underestimating it, because (i) when a total rent is given for the fifteenth or sixteenth century, without further particulars, it probably often included the rent paid by the farmer of the demesne, which at the earlier period was non-existent, (ii) at the later period the total rent often included payments made for new encroachments in the waste. When this is evidently the case, as at Wootton, and the amount of the new payments is stated, I have omitted them, my object being to compare, when possible, the rents paid by customary tenants at different periods. But often it is not possible to make such an allowance, and therefore I am disposed to think that the figures for the later dates are more likely to be weighted with irrelevant items than are the figures for the earlier dates. This makes the comparatively slow increase in the rents of some manors all the more worthy of notice.
Table VIII ([p. 212])
1. Norfolk.
Massingham Priory (two farms, Hen. VIII., R.O. Rentals and Surveys, Gen. Ser., Portf. 24, No. 4, f. 46); Wymondham (Hen. VIII., R.O. Augm. Off., Misc. Bks. 408, f. 25); Marshams (Marham(?), Hen. VIII., Augm. Off., Misc. Bks. 408, f. 19); Thetford (Hen. VIII., Augm. Off., Misc. Bks. 408, f. 22); Bockenham (Hen. VIII., R.O. Augm. Off., Misc. Bks. 408, f. 9–10); Langley (Hen. VIII., R.O. Augm. Off., Misc. Bks. 399, f. 228–9); Walsingham (Hen. VIII., R.O. Augm. Off., Misc. Bks. 399, f. 201); Brisingham (31 Eliz., R.O. Misc. Bks. 220, f. 236); Farfield (31 Eliz., ibid.); Wighton (17 Eliz., R.O. Rentals and Surveys, Duchy of Lanc, Bdle. 7, No. 34); Peakhall (1575, Holkham MSS., Tittleshall Bks., No. 12); West Lexham (1575, Holkham MSS., West Lexham MSS., No. 87); Foxley (1568, Holkham MSS., Billingford and Bintry MSS., Bdle. No. 9); Sparham (1590, Holkham MSS., Sparham MSS., Bdle. No. 5); Billingford (between 1564 and 1606, Holkham MSS., Billingford and Bintry MSS., Bdle. No. 9); Fulmordeston (1614, Holkham MSS., Map No. 59).
2. Wiltshire.