3o8 THE ROAD TO FREEDOM
to leave the manor were granted at the Manor Court, and en-
rolled in the Court Rolls; first, in order that no question might
arise as to the legality of the serf's absence, and secondly to
impress on his fellows that there was a right and a wrong way of
doing these things.1
Nevertheless, despite all the efforts on the part of the manorial
authorities to check the exodus, men constantly fled from the
manor. So long as they were unnecessary to the manorial
economy, their lords may have relinquished them, more or less
reluctantly, at any rate feeling they were not worth the expense
and bother of fetching back. At the same time it was a more
serious matter when one who held land and a cot took to his
heels cum omni sequela sua. Then the manorial machinery was
put in motion against him: he was proclaimed as a fugitive in the
court and ordered to return, and any goods left behind were
sequestrated. But, despite all the steward's admonitions to the
homage, when once a man's name appeared as a wanderer it was
seldom removed by his return. At meeting after meeting the
court orders his return "as many times before", his neighbours
are ordered to produce him at the next court, but the years
pass by, and he does not return, until after some ten or twelve
years hope finally dies, and these useless commands to the
peasants are allowed to lapse.2 The ineffectiveness of these
courts, especially after the Black Death, is well shown on the
manors of the monks of Eynsham. To take one example:
At a court held on 30 April 1382, it was presented that several natim
had withdrawn from [the manor]; and an order is made in one case
to the father, in other cases to the homage as a whole, to see that the
culprits are brought'back. Similar presentments are made at every
Court down to 1462; but from 1469 onwards the matter is not men-
tioned. Although injunctions were always given to the next of kin, or
the homage, to bring back those who had escaped, and sometimes a
fine of 6s. Bd. or even 20$. was threatened, yet nothing was done either
by the lord, or the homage; the fines were not inflicted, nor were the
nativi produced. At the court held in 1437 when it was presented that
1 These licences are everywhere to be seen in Court Rolls. See e.g. Hales
Rolls, 58, 361, 485; Selden Soc. II, 24; Tooting Bee, 239; Winton Pipe, 17;
Kettering Compotus, 13; Levett, op. tit. 29, 135; V.C.H* Berks, I, 187;
Durham Hahnote Rolls, xvn, 185, etc.
8 See Econ. Documents (Tawney), 73; Hales Rolls, n6, 117, 501; Durham
Halmote Rolls, 21.