A HISTORY OF HEREFORDSHIRE to save the cost of cartage, and possibly toUs/^^ by obtaining money locally for the wood, sending it to Droitwich, and buying wood with it there.'^^ There are several other entries in our county referring to salt from Droitwich ; "*" the king's manor of Marden had nine seams (summas) of salt from the salt- works there or 9^/. (in lieu thereof) ; '** on the bishop's lands are four manors- of which one owned a salt-pan at Droitwich, another a salt-pan there ' ren- dering 16 mitts,' and the others severally shares of salt-pans ; ' Walintone' also^ was entitled to ' 16 mitts of salt at Droitwich for 30 pence.' In spite of all these uses, the woodland, which in some parts had extended^ was in others being already stubbed up for cultivation. In Herefordshire alone, apparently, are essarts mentioned in Domesday, and at Marcle they are actually defined as lands reclaimed from wood.^^^ Fifty-eight acres had been thus reclaimed there, while at Leominster the essarts were bringing in js. d}^^ At Weobley a whole plough-land had been cleared,^" and at Fern- hill the ' essarz ' brought in s. bd. So much for the rural districts, compared with which, at the time of the Survey, the towns were of small importance. We are helped to pass to the urban from the agricultural element on the one hand by the rural work performed by the burgesses of Hereford, on the other by a few entries of burgesses who belonged to manors. In the lengthy and most important section relating to the 'city' of Here- ford we read that every whole messuage within the city wall owed, with other dues, thre:e days' reaping in August at Marden, and one day's hay- making " where the sheriff would. With this we may compare the case of the thirteen burgesses of Droitwich who owed reaping service to a Worcester- shire manor of Osbern Fitz Richard in August and March.^'" It will be necessary to examine closely the cases of Hereford burgesses- connected with country manors as having in my opinion a very important bearing on what is known as ' the garrison theory ' of the borough. That theory was first applied to English boroughs by Professor Maitland,^^ and though it does not seem to have gained much acceptance, Mr. Ballard has strenuously upheld it.^ His conclusions are that the evidence of Domesday Book supports Professor Maitland's ' garrison theory ' with a sh'ght modification, and proves that many of the rural magnates performed their duty of fortifying the boroughs by keeping houses in those boroughs and burgesses in those houses, and that too, not only in the nevi^er Midland boroughs, such as Oxford, Buckingham, Tamworth,, Warwick, and Stafford, but in those also that were inhabited in Roman times.^ I must still maintain that the burgesses mentioned in connection with the villages resided in the boroughs . . . and that their residence in the boroughs was owing to their liability for the repair of the walls.^'* "' For these tolls on the salt-carts see the entries of customs at the Cheshire salt-works in Domesday. "^ This would fit in with the suggestion (p. 292 above) that the payment by the Leominster villeins ' ad sal ' was a commutation of service, if they had previously to cart the wood. ^" Such entries were misunderstood by Ellis {Introd. to Dom.), who imagined them to relate to salt-works at the respective places. "' This seems to give us the value of the horse-load. '" ' Essarz ' is written over ' terre projccte de silva.'
- ' De exsartis silvae exeunt xvii sol. et iiii den.'
^^' ' Terra ad i carucam de essarz.' It is not quite clear whether the words ' redd xi sol. et ix den.' which follow refer to the ' Essarz ' alone. It is not clear why this was the royal manor selected. '^ ' Ad fenum congregandum.' Fol. 176^. ™ Dom. Bk. and Beyond, 179-92, especially 189-91. ' The Dom. Boroughs (1904), 1 1-35. The Dom. Inquest (1906), 176-8. The Dom. Boroughs, 35. ^" The Dom. Inquest, 177-8. 296 228 230 232
