252 EVERYDAY LIFE
unmarried and chaste. It was considered to be a sign of villein
tenure that the whole of the tenement went to the widow, rather
than only a third or a half as would be the case in a free holding,
or if the property were held at a fixed money rent.1
Such was the general practice, but it is worth noting a few
examples of the ways in which men sought to protect themselves
against vagaries of their lord or the uncertainty of local custom.
At times, for instance, men would make a fictitious surrender of
their holding during their lifetime, and would receive it back
again, after payment of a fine, with the express provision, enrolled
in the court, that son or daughter were to succeed.2 Or again,
a man obtained leave to make over half his holding to his wife,
to last for the term of her life,3 thus making sure that she would
be provided for in any circumstance. A long series of customs,
said to date from 1343, show us in detail the arrangements on
the manors of the Abbess of Shaftesbury; and, in their compli-
cated ingenuity, they are evidence of the many possibilities that
were available there, and probably on many other manors.4 The
jus wduae was well enough established throughout England to be
regarded as a right on which the widow could reckon, and with
which she could make bargains or demise at her convenience.
The widow who found herself left with her husband's holding
was not ipso facto in an enviable position. Everything depended
on the circumstances. If she had a large holding, and no able-
bodied sons to cultivate it and to render her necessary obligations
on the lord's demesne, she at once found herself in difEculties.
The lord could not countenance his land being allowed to de-
teriorate through lack of cultivation, nor could he do without the
work she (or her deputies) were liable to perform on his own
lands. Consequently, if the widow was unable to carry out these
liabilities, she was forced to surrender her holding or to make
arrangements (with the lord's sanction) for the proper per-
formance of her duties. If she surrendered them outright she
1 Pollock and Maitland, op. cit. n, 418-26. References to the widow's
right will be found widespread; e.g. E.H.R. April 1928, 219; Durham
Halmote Rolls, 9, 18, 85; Buff. Inst. Arch. II, 232; Som. Arch. Soc. XXX, 77;
Selden Soc. iv, 121, etc.
* Page, Camb. Hist. Soc. in, 127; cf. Crowland Estates, 109 ff.
* Hales Rolls, 108.
4 Wilts Arch. Mag. v, 7ff.; cf. XLI, 174.