Life in a Medieval Village - Frances Gies [75]
Once the suit was initiated, if the complainant did not carry it through, he and his pledge were fined. “From Ralph Hert and Isolda his wife and their pledge, namely Reginald Child, for their non-suit against Richard Reeve and John Abovebrook, six pence.”18 The defendant might wage his law, as John of Elton did “sufficiently” in 1294 against Emma Prudhomme, who had made accusations against him, and who was herself consequently fined.19 Or the case might be postponed. The delay might result in settlement, either through the defendant’s offering to pay a fine or through the two litigants reaching an out-ofcourt agreement. Such compacts were encouraged by the judicial device of the “love-day” (dies amoris), on which the parties to a dispute were directed to try to reconcile their differences.20 An out-of-court settlement, however, could not be allowed to become an out-of-pocket settlement for the lord. The parties still owed a fee, in this case recorded under the title of “license to agree”: “From John son of John of Elton for license to agree with John of Langetoft and Alice his wife sixpence.” “From Nicholas le Rous for license to agree with Henry Daysterre and Emma his wife four pence.”21 Part of the agreement was the determination of which of the two parties would pay the fine.
Yet the court was lenient toward the destitute, or realistic about the difficulty of getting blood out of turnips. “In mercy, but [fined] nothing because [he or she is] poor,” recurs many times in the records.
At least once a year, usually in late winter or spring, a form of manorial court known as the view (review) of frankpledge was held. A uniquely English institution, frankpledge antedates the Conquest.22 All the village’s male residents under the age of twelve belonged to units of ten or a dozen called frankpledges or tithings, each of which was collectively responsible for the behavior of its members, and whose interests it defended. If a man was accused by a neighbor, the members of his tithing were responsible for his appearance in court. At the head of each tithing was a leader called a chief pledge, an important man in the village: “It was commanded to Hugh Achard and his tithing at the last view to have [a certain man] at this court and he had him not. Therefore he and his tithing in mercy.”23
The tithing was not kinship-based, though in some ways it served the purpose of the old clan or supra-family group. Originally it was a cell in the royal administration, and its review in some places was still performed by the king’s sheriff (shire-reeve, chief officer of the shire), but usually the local lord had acquired frankpledge along with manorial justice. Carried out by the steward, the view of frankpledge assured the integrity of the village’s tithings, making certain that every boy turning twelve years of age and every male newcomer to the village acquired membership. By the end of the thirteenth century, the tithing system and personal pledging were showing signs of decadence as the royal courts developed more modern juridical techniques, such as prison and bail.24
In theory, and perhaps at one time in fact, there was some distinction in procedure and type of case between the regular hallmote and the view of frankpledge, but by the late thirteenth century it had virtually disappeared. The Court Baron’s list of offenses typically heard by the view of frankpledge—shedding of blood, rape, theft of grain or poultry, placing a dung-heap in the high street, building a fence on a neighbor’s land or on the king’s highway—are very much the same things heard in ordinary hallmotes.25 However, where the hallmote, usually held in the autumn, elected the reeve, beadle, and wardens of autumn, the view of frankpledge chose the village ale tasters.26
Killers, professional robbers, and other hardened felons, regular defendants in the royal courts, were rarely seen in the hallmote, which was nevertheless no stranger to violent crime. It was reported in several