184 MANORIAL ADMINISTRATION
The Hundred Rolls tell us that at Chalgrove, in Oxfordshire, the
yardland-holder who had sons old enough to earn a living
brought them up to the hall with him at Michaelmas, and there
selected one to serve the lord for a year at the usual wages.1
The peasants on the Gloucester and other manors were evidently
liable to be impressed for service, and we find that the lord could
even move them about from one manor to another if he found
he could employ them more profitably by so doing.2 The men
who were thus chosen were probably from the humbler ranks of
the peasants: "the poor cottars who obtain their living by the
work of their hands", as the Inquisitio Nonarum calls them.3
They were, in general, lodged in curia, that is, in the buildings
forming part of what would now be called the "home-farm".4
Their quarters were much the same as those they found in their
own homes, and otherwise they were comparatively well off; for,
unlike their fellows, they were not entirely dependent on the
seasons for their prosperity. They had payments both in money
and in kind. They were given a regular money wage,5 and if they
held any land, their rent was reduced on this.6 Further, they
were entitled to allowances of corn and other farm produce,7 and
during the busy harvest season they shared in the generous
rations which were provided at the manor house for the lord's
officials at this time.8
At Martham (Norfolk) in 1272, for example, we find them
consuming quantities of beef (both from the home stock, and
from that purchased in Norwich) and washing it down with beer,
brewed on the manor from malt there provided. Bread, both of
wheat and of rye, plenty of peas-pottage, herrings, cod, cheeses
1 Rot. Hund. ii, 768.
2 Glouc. Cart, m; Univ. Lib. Camb. MS. Kk. i. i. f. 2216.
3 Inquts. Nonamm, 14, and see V.C.H. Berks, n, 175; Dorset, n, 223;
Beds, II, 82,
4 Davenport, op. cit. 24 n. 3. "There is frequent mention of the domus
famulorum (cf. E.H.R. xx, 482) which was situated near the camera servientis;
and as a maid was kept to prepare pottage for the jfamz/#, it seems probable that
the ploughmen, carters.. .were unmarried men, resident in the court." But
see Rogers, Prices, I, 286-9.
B Min. Ace. 958/19; Kettering Compotus, 33.
* Levett, op. cit. 20; Min. Ace. 958/19; Crondal Records, 62.
7 Min. Ace. 751/18,21; 843/31; 859/23,918/17,998/25; Kettering Compotus,
47, 53, 57> 65, 67, 69, etc. See above, p. 88.
8 Min. Ace. 918/3; Kettering Compotus, 33; Rogers, Prices, II, 622, 623.