Knight-service
Encyclopedia
Knight-service was a form of Feudal land tenure
under which a knight
held a fief or estate of land termed a knight's fee
(fee being synonymous with fief) from an overlord conditional on him as tenant performing military service for his overlord.
and sword
, the most important factor in battle. It was long believed that knight-service was developed out of the liability, under the English system, of every five hides
of land to provide one soldier in war. It is now held that, on the contrary, it was a novel system in England when it was introduced after the Conquest by the Normans, who relied essentially on their mounted knights, while the English fought on foot. It existed in Normandy where a knight held a fiefs termed a fief du haubert, from the hauberk
or coat of mail (Latin: lorica) worn by knights. Allusion is made to this in the coronation charter of Henry I
(1100), which speaks of those holding by knight-service as "milites qui per loricam terras sues deserviunt."
The Conqueror divided the lay lands of England among his magnates in the form of "honours" or great blocks of land. These were subdivided by the magnates into smaller manors and yet smaller divisions or fiefs
just large enough to support one knight, termed knight's fee
s. The knight paid homage
to his overlord by taking a vow of loyalty and accepting the obligation to perform military service for his overlord.
The same system was adopted in Ireland
when that country was conquered under Henry II
. The magnate who had been enfeoffed by his sovereign for his honour of land could provide the knights required either by hiring them for pay or, more conveniently when wealth was mainly represented by land, by a process of subinfeudation
, analogous to that by which he himself had been enfeoffed. That is to say, he could assign to an under-tenant a certain portion of his fief to be held by direct military service or the service of providing a mercenary
knight. The land so held would then be described as consisting of one or more knight's fee
s, but the knight's-fee had not any fixed area, as different soils and climates required differing acreages to produce a given profit requisite to support a knight and his entourage. This process could be carried farther till there was a chain of mesne lord
s between the tenant-in-chief
and the actual occupier of the land. The liability for performance of the knight-service was however always carefully defined.
The primary obligation incumbent on every knight was service in the field, when called upon, for forty days a year, with specified armour and arms. There was, however, a standing dispute as to whether he could be called upon to perform this service outside the realm, nor was the question of his expenses free from difficulty. In addition to this primary duty he had, in numerous cases at least, to perform that of castle ward at his lords chief castle for a fixed number of days in the year. On certain baronies also was incumbent the duty of providing knights for the guard of royal castles, such as Windsor, Rockingham and Dover. Under the feudal system the tenant by knight-service had also the same pecuniary obligations to his lord as had his lord to the king. These consisted of:
The chief sources of information for the extent and development of knight-service are the returns (cartae) of the barons (i.e. the tenants-in-chief) in 1166, informing the king, at his request, of the names of their tenants by knight-service with the number of fees they held, supplemented by the payments for scutage
recorded on the pipe rolls
, by the later returns printed in the Book of Fees
, and by the still later ones collected in Feudal Aids.
In the returns made in 1166 some of the barons appear as having enfeoffed more and some less than the number of knights they had to find. In the latter case they described the balance as being chargeable on their demesne, that is, on the portion of their fief which remained in their own hands. These returns further prove that lands had already been granted for the service of a fraction of a knight, such service being in practice already commuted for a proportionate money payment; and they show that the total number of knights with which land held by military service was charged was not, as was formerly supposed, sixty thousand, but, probably, somewhere between five and six thousand. Similar returns were made for Normandy, and are valuable for the light they throw on its system of knightservice.
). By the time of Henry III
, as Bracton
states, the test of tenure was scutage; liability, however small, to scutage payment made the tenure military.
The disintegration of the system was carried farther in the latter half of the 13th century as a consequence of changes in warfare, which were increasing the importance of foot soldiers and making the service of a knight for forty days of less value to the king. The barons, instead of paying scutage, compounded for their service by the payment of lump sums, and, by a process which is still obscure, the nominal quotas of knight-service due from each had, by the time of Edward I
, been largely reduced. The knight's fee, however, remained a knight's fee, and the pecuniary incidents of military tenure, especially wardship, marriage, and fines on alienation, long continued to be a source of revenue to the crown. But at the Restoration (1660) tenure by knight-service was abolished by the Tenures Abolition Act 1660
, and with it these vexatious exactions were abolished.
, and the Liber Rubeus or Red Book of the Exchequer
(13th c.), edited by H. Hall for the Rolls Series
in 1896. The later returns are in the Book of Fees
and in the Record Office volumes of Feudal Aids, arranged under counties.
For the financial side of knight-service the early pipe rolls have been printed by the Record Commission and the Pipe Roll Society, and abstracts of later ones will be found in The Red Book of the Exchequer, which may be studied on the whole question; but the editors view must be received with caution and checked by JH Round's Studies on the Red Book of the Exchequer (for private circulation). The Baronia Anglica of Madox
may also be consulted.
The existing theory on knight-service was enunciated by Mr Round in English Historical Review, vi., vii, and reissued by him in his Feudal England (1895). It is accepted by Pollock and Maitland (History of English Law), who discuss the question at length; by Mr JF Baldwin in his Scutage and Knight-service in England (University of Chicago Press, 1897), a valuable monograph with bibliography; and by Petit-Dutaillis, in his Studies supplementary to Stubbs' Constitutional History (Manchester University Series, 1908).
Feudal land tenure
Under the English feudal system several different forms of land tenure existed, each effectively a contract with differing rights and duties attached thereto. Such tenures could be either free-hold, signifying that they were hereditable or perpetual, or non-free where the tenancy terminated on the...
under which a knight
Knight
A knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior....
held a fief or estate of land termed a knight's fee
Knight's fee
In feudal Anglo-Norman England and Ireland, a knight's fee was a measure of a unit of land deemed sufficient from which a knight could derive not only sustenance for himself and his esquires, but also the means to furnish himself and his equipage with horses and armour to fight for his overlord in...
(fee being synonymous with fief) from an overlord conditional on him as tenant performing military service for his overlord.
Early history
It is associated in its origin with that development in warfare which made the mailed horseman, armed with lanceLance
A Lance is a pole weapon or spear designed to be used by a mounted warrior. The lance is longer, stout and heavier than an infantry spear, and unsuited for throwing, or for rapid thrusting. Lances did not have tips designed to intentionally break off or bend, unlike many throwing weapons of the...
and sword
Sword
A sword is a bladed weapon used primarily for cutting or thrusting. The precise definition of the term varies with the historical epoch or the geographical region under consideration...
, the most important factor in battle. It was long believed that knight-service was developed out of the liability, under the English system, of every five hides
Hide (unit)
The hide was originally an amount of land sufficient to support a household, but later in Anglo-Saxon England became a unit used in assessing land for liability to "geld", or land tax. The geld would be collected at a stated rate per hide...
of land to provide one soldier in war. It is now held that, on the contrary, it was a novel system in England when it was introduced after the Conquest by the Normans, who relied essentially on their mounted knights, while the English fought on foot. It existed in Normandy where a knight held a fiefs termed a fief du haubert, from the hauberk
Hauberk
A hauberk is a shirt of chainmail. The term is usually used to describe a shirt reaching at least to mid-thigh and including sleeves. Haubergeon generally refers to a shorter variant with partial sleeves, but the terms are often used interchangeably.- History :The word hauberk is derived from the...
or coat of mail (Latin: lorica) worn by knights. Allusion is made to this in the coronation charter of Henry I
Henry I of England
Henry I was the fourth son of William I of England. He succeeded his elder brother William II as King of England in 1100 and defeated his eldest brother, Robert Curthose, to become Duke of Normandy in 1106...
(1100), which speaks of those holding by knight-service as "milites qui per loricam terras sues deserviunt."
The Conqueror divided the lay lands of England among his magnates in the form of "honours" or great blocks of land. These were subdivided by the magnates into smaller manors and yet smaller divisions or fiefs
Fiefs
Fiefs may refer to:* Fiefdom* Fiefs, a commune of the Pas-de-Calais département in northern France...
just large enough to support one knight, termed knight's fee
Knight's fee
In feudal Anglo-Norman England and Ireland, a knight's fee was a measure of a unit of land deemed sufficient from which a knight could derive not only sustenance for himself and his esquires, but also the means to furnish himself and his equipage with horses and armour to fight for his overlord in...
s. The knight paid homage
Homage
Homage is a show or demonstration of respect or dedication to someone or something, sometimes by simple declaration but often by some more oblique reference, artistic or poetic....
to his overlord by taking a vow of loyalty and accepting the obligation to perform military service for his overlord.
The same system was adopted in Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
when that country was conquered under Henry II
Henry II of England
Henry II ruled as King of England , Count of Anjou, Count of Maine, Duke of Normandy, Duke of Aquitaine, Duke of Gascony, Count of Nantes, Lord of Ireland and, at various times, controlled parts of Wales, Scotland and western France. Henry, the great-grandson of William the Conqueror, was the...
. The magnate who had been enfeoffed by his sovereign for his honour of land could provide the knights required either by hiring them for pay or, more conveniently when wealth was mainly represented by land, by a process of subinfeudation
Subinfeudation
In English law, subinfeudation is the practice by which tenants, holding land under the king or other superior lord, carved out new and distinct tenures in their turn by sub-letting or alienating a part of their lands....
, analogous to that by which he himself had been enfeoffed. That is to say, he could assign to an under-tenant a certain portion of his fief to be held by direct military service or the service of providing a mercenary
Mercenary
A mercenary, is a person who takes part in an armed conflict based on the promise of material compensation rather than having a direct interest in, or a legal obligation to, the conflict itself. A non-conscript professional member of a regular army is not considered to be a mercenary although he...
knight. The land so held would then be described as consisting of one or more knight's fee
Knight's fee
In feudal Anglo-Norman England and Ireland, a knight's fee was a measure of a unit of land deemed sufficient from which a knight could derive not only sustenance for himself and his esquires, but also the means to furnish himself and his equipage with horses and armour to fight for his overlord in...
s, but the knight's-fee had not any fixed area, as different soils and climates required differing acreages to produce a given profit requisite to support a knight and his entourage. This process could be carried farther till there was a chain of mesne lord
Mesne lord
A mesne lord was a lord in the feudal system who had vassals who held land from him, but who was himself the vassal of a higher lord. A mesne lord did not hold land directly of the king, that is to say he was not a tenant-in-chief. His subinfeudated estate was called a "mesne estate"...
s between the tenant-in-chief
Tenant-in-chief
In medieval and early modern European society the term tenant-in-chief, sometimes vassal-in-chief, denoted the nobles who held their lands as tenants directly from king or territorial prince to whom they did homage, as opposed to holding them from another nobleman or senior member of the clergy....
and the actual occupier of the land. The liability for performance of the knight-service was however always carefully defined.
The primary obligation incumbent on every knight was service in the field, when called upon, for forty days a year, with specified armour and arms. There was, however, a standing dispute as to whether he could be called upon to perform this service outside the realm, nor was the question of his expenses free from difficulty. In addition to this primary duty he had, in numerous cases at least, to perform that of castle ward at his lords chief castle for a fixed number of days in the year. On certain baronies also was incumbent the duty of providing knights for the guard of royal castles, such as Windsor, Rockingham and Dover. Under the feudal system the tenant by knight-service had also the same pecuniary obligations to his lord as had his lord to the king. These consisted of:
- relief, which he paid on succeeding to his lands;
- wardship, that is, the profits from his lands during a minority;
- marriage, that is, the right of giving in marriage, unless bought off, his heiress, his heir (if a minor) and his widow; and also of the three aids.
The chief sources of information for the extent and development of knight-service are the returns (cartae) of the barons (i.e. the tenants-in-chief) in 1166, informing the king, at his request, of the names of their tenants by knight-service with the number of fees they held, supplemented by the payments for scutage
Scutage
The form of taxation known as scutage, in the law of England under the feudal system, allowed a knight to "buy out" of the military service due to the Crown as a holder of a knight's fee held under the feudal land tenure of knight-service. Its name derived from shield...
recorded on the pipe rolls
Pipe Rolls
The Pipe rolls, sometimes called the Great rolls, are a collection of financial records maintained by the English Exchequer, or Treasury. The earliest date from the 12th century, and the series extends, mostly complete, from then until 1833. They form the oldest continuous series of records kept by...
, by the later returns printed in the Book of Fees
Book of Fees
The Book of Fees is the colloquial title of a modern edition, transcript, rearrangement and enhancement of the mediaeval Liber Feodorum , being a listing of feudal landholdings or "fees/fiefs", compiled in about 1302, but from earlier records, for the use of the English Exchequer...
, and by the still later ones collected in Feudal Aids.
In the returns made in 1166 some of the barons appear as having enfeoffed more and some less than the number of knights they had to find. In the latter case they described the balance as being chargeable on their demesne, that is, on the portion of their fief which remained in their own hands. These returns further prove that lands had already been granted for the service of a fraction of a knight, such service being in practice already commuted for a proportionate money payment; and they show that the total number of knights with which land held by military service was charged was not, as was formerly supposed, sixty thousand, but, probably, somewhere between five and six thousand. Similar returns were made for Normandy, and are valuable for the light they throw on its system of knightservice.
Denaturation
The principle of commuting for money the obligation of military service struck at the root of the whole system, and so complete was the change of conception that tenure by knightservice of a mesne lord becomes, first in fact and then in law, tenure by escuage (i.e. scutageScutage
The form of taxation known as scutage, in the law of England under the feudal system, allowed a knight to "buy out" of the military service due to the Crown as a holder of a knight's fee held under the feudal land tenure of knight-service. Its name derived from shield...
). By the time of Henry III
Henry III of England
Henry III was the son and successor of John as King of England, reigning for 56 years from 1216 until his death. His contemporaries knew him as Henry of Winchester. He was the first child king in England since the reign of Æthelred the Unready...
, as Bracton
Henry de Bracton
Henry of Bracton, also Henry de Bracton, also Henrici Bracton, or Henry Bratton also Henry Bretton was an English jurist....
states, the test of tenure was scutage; liability, however small, to scutage payment made the tenure military.
The disintegration of the system was carried farther in the latter half of the 13th century as a consequence of changes in warfare, which were increasing the importance of foot soldiers and making the service of a knight for forty days of less value to the king. The barons, instead of paying scutage, compounded for their service by the payment of lump sums, and, by a process which is still obscure, the nominal quotas of knight-service due from each had, by the time of Edward I
Edward I of England
Edward I , also known as Edward Longshanks and the Hammer of the Scots, was King of England from 1272 to 1307. The first son of Henry III, Edward was involved early in the political intrigues of his father's reign, which included an outright rebellion by the English barons...
, been largely reduced. The knight's fee, however, remained a knight's fee, and the pecuniary incidents of military tenure, especially wardship, marriage, and fines on alienation, long continued to be a source of revenue to the crown. But at the Restoration (1660) tenure by knight-service was abolished by the Tenures Abolition Act 1660
Tenures Abolition Act 1660
The Tenures Abolition Act 1660 was an Act of Parliament of the Parliament of England passed in 1660. The long title of the Act was An act for taking away the Court of Wards and liveries, and tenures in capite, and by knights-service, and purveyance, and for settling a revenue upon his Majesty in...
, and with it these vexatious exactions were abolished.
Sources and bibliography
The returns of 1166 are preserved in the Liber Niger (13th cent.), edited by HearneThomas Hearne
Thomas Hearne or Hearn , English antiquary, was born at Littlefield Green in the parish of White Waltham, Berkshire.-Life:...
, and the Liber Rubeus or Red Book of the Exchequer
Red Book of the Exchequer
The Red Book of the Exchequer is a 13th-century manuscript compilation of the records of the English Exchequer. Made of vellum, the book was compiled by a royal clerk who died in 1246...
(13th c.), edited by H. Hall for the Rolls Series
Rolls Series
The Rolls Series, official title The Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland during the Middle Ages, is a major collection of British and Irish historical materials and primary sources, published in the second half of the 19th century. Some 255 volumes, representing 99 separate...
in 1896. The later returns are in the Book of Fees
Book of Fees
The Book of Fees is the colloquial title of a modern edition, transcript, rearrangement and enhancement of the mediaeval Liber Feodorum , being a listing of feudal landholdings or "fees/fiefs", compiled in about 1302, but from earlier records, for the use of the English Exchequer...
and in the Record Office volumes of Feudal Aids, arranged under counties.
For the financial side of knight-service the early pipe rolls have been printed by the Record Commission and the Pipe Roll Society, and abstracts of later ones will be found in The Red Book of the Exchequer, which may be studied on the whole question; but the editors view must be received with caution and checked by JH Round's Studies on the Red Book of the Exchequer (for private circulation). The Baronia Anglica of Madox
Thomas Madox
Thomas Madox was a legal antiquary and historian, known for his publication and discussion of medieval records and charters; and in particular for his History of the Exchequer, tracing the administration and records of that branch of the state from the Norman Conquest to the time of Edward II...
may also be consulted.
The existing theory on knight-service was enunciated by Mr Round in English Historical Review, vi., vii, and reissued by him in his Feudal England (1895). It is accepted by Pollock and Maitland (History of English Law), who discuss the question at length; by Mr JF Baldwin in his Scutage and Knight-service in England (University of Chicago Press, 1897), a valuable monograph with bibliography; and by Petit-Dutaillis, in his Studies supplementary to Stubbs' Constitutional History (Manchester University Series, 1908).