Ancient Land Tenures.

The Land system of England in Anglo-Saxon times was complicated, inasmuch as there was not one and the same law for every plot of land. But it is important to note that private ownership, such as now exists page 127 amongst us, was entirely unknown. Of the four leading divisions of Landed property before the Conquest^*—

Folk Land was that belonging to no person or community, but to the nation as a whole. It is surmised to have been land remaining over after the invaders (or first settlement) had allotted sufficient plots to each of their freeman comrades. In shires exposed to invasion the Sovereign power occasionally granted such land to secure the aid of the holder, or to reward the military services of some other person.

Bocland (or Book-land) was that of later origin than the other two, and granted by a written instrument or book, as it was then called. At first such grants were only made to religious houses, or by the King, with consent of the Witan or Parliament; but it is clear they must have come from the stock of either Folk Land or Common Land, and the balance of evidence strongly tends to the former supposition.

With the advent of William the Norman came the change to military feudalism. Folk Land became the King's Land, and, along with such other soil as came by confiscations and forfeitures, was registered in the Domesday Book as Terra Regis. And with the disappearance of Folk Land there went Bocland, which had been made out of it. The religious houses, it is true, were not dispossessed by William, but their instruments of grant became void, and under the feudal regulations they received tenures of "Frankalmoigne" instead, that is to say, "free alms," or of "Divine Service," that is to say, "free masses for the grantor and his heirs." (See Section on "The State Church.")