The lord had to manage his estates by the help of a powerful ministerial class, but there was not much love lost between employers and administrators, and often the latent antagonism between them broke out into open feuds. If it is always difficult to organise a serviceable administration, the task becomes especially arduous in a time of undeveloped means of communication and of weak state control. It was exceedingly difficult to audit accounts and to remove bad stewards. The strength and self-government of the village group appeared, from this point of view, as a most welcome help on the side of the owner.(1*) He had practically to surrender his arbitrary power over the peasant population and their land, he had to conform to fixed rules as to civil usage, manorial claims and distribution of territory; but the common standards established by custom did not only hamper his freedom of disposition, they created a basis on which he could take his stand above and against his stewards.
He had precise arrangements to go by in his supervision of his ministers, and there was something more than his own interest and energy to keep guard over the maintenance of these forms: the village communities were sure to fight for them from beneath. The facilities for joint action and accumulation of strength derived from communal self-government vouched indirectly for the preservation of the chief capital invested by the lord in the land: it was difficult for the steward to destroy the economic stays of the villainage.
There are many occasions when the help rendered by the village communities to the lord may be perceived directly. I need hardly mention the fact that the surveys, which form the chief material of our study, were compiled in substance by sworn inquests, the members of which were considered as the chief representatives of the community, and had to give witness to its lore. The great monastic and exchequer surveys do not give any insight into the mode of selection of the jurors: it may he guessed with some probability that they were appointed for the special purpose, and chosen by the whole court of the manor. In some cases the ordinary jurors of the court, or chief pledges, may have been called upon to serve on the inquest. There is another point which it is impossible to decide quite conclusively, namely, whether questions about which there was some doubt or the jurors disagreed were referred to the whole body of the court. But, although we do not hear of such instances in our great surveys, it is surely an important. indication that the extant court-rolls constantly speak of the whole court deciding questions when the verdict of ordinary jurors seemed insufficient. And such reserved cases were by no means restricted to points of law; very often they concerned facts of the same nature as those enrolled in the surveys.(2*)On a parallel with the stewards and servants appointed by the lord, although in subordination to them, appear officers elected by the village. As we have seen, the manorial beadle was matched by the communal reeve, and a like contrast is sometimes found on the lower degrees.(3*) In exceptional cases the lord nominates the reeve, although he still remains the chief representative of village interests and the chief collector of services. But in the normal course the office was elective, and curious intermediate forms may be found. For instance, the village selects the messarius (hayward), and the lord may appoint him reeve.(4*) This is a point, again, which shows most clearly the intimate connexion between the interests of the lord and those of the village. The peasants become guarantors for the reeve whom they chose. A formula which comes from Gloucester Abbey requires, that only such persons be chosen as have proved their capacity to serve by a good conduct of their own affairs: all shortcomings and defects are to be made good ultimately by the rural community that elected the officer, and no excuses are to be accepted unless in cases of exceptional hardship.(5*) The economic tracts of the thirteenth century state the same principle in even a more explicit manner.
From the manorial point of view the whole village is responsible for the collection of duties. There are payments expressly imposed on the whole. Such is the case with the yearly auxilium or donum. The partition of these between the householders is naturally effected in a meeting of the villagers.(6*) Most services are laid on the virgaters separately. But they are all held answerable for the regularity and completeness with which every single member of the community performs his duties. As to free holdings, it is sometimes noticed especially to what extent they are subjected to the general arrangement: whether they participate with the rest in payments, and whether the tenants have to work in the same way as the villains.(7*) Very often the documents point out that such and such a person ought to take part in certain obligations but has been exempted or fraudulently exempts himself, and that the village community has to bear a relative increase of its burdens.(8*) A Glastonbury formula orders the steward to make inquiries about people who have been freed from the performance of their services in such a way that their responsibility has been thrown on the village.(9*)But it would be very wrong to assume that the rural community could act only in the interest of the lord. Its solidarity is recognised in matters which do not concern him, or even which call forth an opposition between him and the peasantry.
