United States or Liberia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
"Data obsidione coram civitate Eboraci." This charter does not create a different title, but gives the lands as held by the former possessor. The monarch assumed the function of the fole-gemot, but the principle remained the feudee only became tenant for life.
Hence the oath of fealty was a personal obligation, and investiture was needful before the new feudee took possession. The state, as represented by the king or chieftain, while allowing the claim of the family, exercised its right to select the individual. All the lands were considered BENEFICIA, a word which now means a charge upon land, to compensate for duties rendered to the state.
Their estates were relieved of a most onerous charge, and the lands freed from the burden of supporting the army of the state. Henry VII. had thus a large fund to give away; the rent of the land granted in knights' service virtually consisted of two separate funds one part went to the feudee, as officer or commmandant, the other to the soldiery or vassals. The latter part belonged to the state.
Such an arrangement would have left the income of the feudee unimpaired, as it would only have applied the fund that had been paid to the men-at-arms to this purpose; and by creating out of that land a number of small estates held direct from the Crown, the misery that arose from the eviction and destruction of a most meritorious class, would have been avoided.
Word Of The Day