146 SERVILE BURDENS
Royal, where both heriot and mortuary were exacted with the
utmost rigour. The customal runs:
When any one of them [the bondmen] clieth, the lord shall have all
the pigs of the deceased, all his goats, all his mares at grass, and his
horse also, if he had one for his personal use (,vz hahuerit domesticum\
all his bees, all his bacon-pigs (hacones intcgra$\ all his cloth of wool
and flax, and whatever can be found of gold and silver. The lord shall
also have all his brass pots or pot, if he have one, because at their
death the lord ought to have all things of metal. Abbot John
granted them in full court that these metal goods should be divided
equally between the lord and the wife on the death of every one of
them, but on condition that they should buy themselves brass pots.
Also the lord shall have the best ox for a "hercghett" and holy
church another. The lord shall choose the best ox by his bailiffs,
before the "hereghett" be given to the church.1
The customal then goes on to discuss how the rest of the pro-
perty is to be divided between the lord and the family, and it is
clear that the widow and her children are left to begin anew with
something over half their possessions taken from them.
One or two more examples will emphasise the severity with
which this exaction weighed on the poor. The Bishop of
Rochester as lord of the manor of Hedenham was entitled to his
serf's best chattel, and if he had but one horse, the customal de-
clared that it ought to be sold, and thirty pence given to the
lord and the balance to the widow!2 Or again, in 1345, at Bar-
chester, the lord claimed an ox worth 8$. and a cow worth 5$. as
a heriot. It was found that after this the widow could not take
her husband's holding on account of her poverty, and the reeve
was ordered to take the land and house into the hands of the
lord.3
Not all lords were so merciless. On the Ely manor of Mel-
bourne if the serf had no beast then no heriot was claimed, and
1 Vale Royal, 118. Dr Coulton (Med. Village* 175) writes: **J have not
met with any lay manor in England or France on which the death-dues even
approach these in severity*"
* Cust, Roff. ii. Thirty pence, or thirty-two pence, seems to have been
reckoned as a suitable sum in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. See
e.g. Blount, Tenures, 383; Comb. Antiq, Soc. Proc. xxvn, 164; Ramsey Cart.
i, 416; Page, Crowland, 116; Wore. Priory Reg. xlii, etc. Cf, Cust. Rents > 89
and references given there,
* W. Kennett, Paroch. Antiq. II, 85.