A HISTORY OF NORFOLK Again, instead of the cotarii we invariably find bordarii, who are common throughout England and sometimes distinguished from the cotarii} Besides this we find a careful return of the quantity of stock on the demesne of each manor, and of the stock belonging to the dependent freemen and sokemen. Then we are told how much the manor is and was worth, and the value of the tenants holding under it, and last of all what it, or the vill in which it lies, measures, and how much it pays to the king's geld. We remark in the instructions quoted above that a double method is adopted for ascertaining these points. The commissioners do, indeed, seem to proceed hundred by hundred, but the first inquiry is made of the sheriff and of the lords and their Frenchmen. We may imagine if we will that the commissioners sat at Norwich, and took first of all the evidence of each tenant-in-chief and his men as to the lands which he claimed within the county, proceeding to verify their evidence, hundred by hundred and vill by vill, by the verdict of the juries. In view of the later practice of the justices in eyre, it seems unlikely that the commissioners held their inquiry in the chief town of each hundred. There are certain marginal notes in the Norfolk Domesday which seem to bear on this. Some of the later chapters or brevia' are marked with the letters /l ; n ; f. r; n.f. r. It may be fanciful to interpret these as indicating that the tenant-in-chief whose possessions are in question made, or did not make, a return to the commissioners, but we find very many cases where the claim of a tenant-in-chief is substantiated or challenged by the verdict of the hundred. We may return to the considera- tion of some of these cases, but as some sort of evidence of the existence of written returns we may quote from the invasioms the following case at Fersfield : — In Feruessella is a freeman with four acres who was commended to Alsi, and William Malet had him on the day on which he was alive and dead, and now Walter [of Caen] holds him of R[obert Malet]. But Robert Malet asserts that he knew nothing of it {contradicit se nescisse) until the day on which he was enrolled {inbreviatus).^ On the same page we find a freeman in Bradenham, formerly belonging to Earl Ralf, and afterwards ' Robert Blund [had him] at farm of the king, and Godric has him in the King's Treasury in his breve for zos.' * He is not to be found in the chapter on the king's lands among those farmed by Godric in S. Greenhoe hundred, so that this must refer either to a return made by ' Maitland, Dom. Bk. and Beyond, p. 38. ' Cf. Dom. Bk. fF. 176^, 2051^, 238, 276, 2771^, for this use o{ breve. ' Dom. Bk. f. 276^.
- Mr. Round points out that this use of breve is illustrated by two entries which are of special value as
relating to the same contested estate. They are as follows : — ' In Biskele i liber homo Ulketelli commend' et ' In Bichesle i liber homo Anslec commend' cum dim. liber sub eo de xvii ac. terrae . . . semper dim. dim. libero T.R.E. de xvii ac. semper dim. car. . . . car. . . . Hanc terram calumpniatur Godricus dapifer Istum servavit Rogerus Bigot in manu Regis sicut perhominem suum judicio vel bello, Radulfum scilicet, dicit et reddit censum in Hund' ; sed Hund' testatur quod tenuit ad feudum comitis R. et Hund' testatur quod Godricus dapifer tenuit sub rege ad feudum ad feudum R. Bigot, sed Godricus reclamat istam cum R. comitis antequam forisfaceret i anno, et post per ii medietate quae est in breve Regij. Hanc recepit annos ex dono Regis. Et contra homo Rogeri Bigot Godricus pro dim. carucata terrae ' (ff. 176-176^). contradicit judicio vel bello. Godricus reclamat istam cum medietate terrae quae est in breve Rogeri Bigot. Hanc recepit Godricus dapifer pro dim. carrucata terrae' (fF. 277^-278). The extract on the left is from the account of Roger Bigod's fief, and that on the right from the record of aggressions [' Invasiones']. Another reference to the breve is on fol. 238, 'est mensurata in brevi sancti Adeldredae.' The measurement referred to is that of the whole Ely manor, which is duly found on fol. 212^. 2
