The King's Court Comes to Town
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Walter, the king's court is coming to town, and there are a number of real estate cases lined up for them to handle. They need someone on the bench who knows Yorkshire real estate. And that's you; no one knows Yorkshire real estate like you.
Heady stuff. Walter de Boynton was a self-made man. He had started with very little and managed to accumulate enough wealth during his lifetime to propel him into public service in the county of Yorkshire. Now, rubbing shoulders with the king's court. That would be something. The answer was easy -- sure. It will be great!
Walter did know Yorkshire real estate like no one else. He had been chief financial officer, or senechal, of St. Mary's Abbey, York for more than two decades, and real estate was what finances for the abbey was all about. He had been all over the county setting up and witnessing transactions [A Boynton Story: Witnessing for God]. He had seen it all.
The court arrived in York. Walter and his friend William de Percy [A Boynton Story: Boyntons and Percys--00] were commissioned to serve during the term in York. They heard the first case on July 25, 1206 and the sessions ran through September 23. It was not a strenuous pace: they met 25, 26, and 27 of July, the first and second of August, then took a break until September when they met 8 times. They heard twenty-seven cases, and all were about real estate.
Real estate? Why was the king's court busying itself with real estate transactions?
First, if you think single family dwelling unit when you read "real estate" you have the wrong conceptual box. In 1206 land and economy were virtually one. Land transactions were more like buying and selling corporations today than like today's housing market. They were the economy.
Second, when we buy and sell real estate we pay someone to do a title search to make sure the title is good, and we place the record of the transaction with the registrar of deeds who keeps the records for the county. In England in 1206 there were no county registrars of deeds and no one to do a title search so they had to invent other ways to accomplish a clean title and an official record of the transaction -- one invention was the parties in the exchange suing each other in the king's court.
The invention of the collusive suit was feasible because there were only a few thousand families in England who held land -- at the time. Very few people had to worry about land transactions, and it did not require a large bureaucracy to process the records of suits. Plus, there were other ways of handling land transactions. England was "papered over" with charters exchanged along with the exchange of land. That is the primary way we know about Walter; he was busy for several decades witnessing the exchange of land and putting his signature on the charters created. Charters is one of the principal ways we know about almost everyone in thirteenth century England other than the kings and his immediate family and friends. Charters and tax rolls [the pipe rolls], and the tax rolls are even less informative than the charters.
Instead of charters the court produced fines. They are called fines because each one begins with the phrase "Haec est finalis concordia." It is a finalis concordia -- hence, 'fine' which is derived from final. The only part of the fine that varies from one case to the next is the last part -- the first four parts are identical. It is the last part of the fine that is specific to the case -- hence, the foot of the fine. And "feet of fines" is what they publish: Pedes Finium Ebor. Regnante Johanne, A.D. MCXCIX-A.D. MCCXIV.
The foot of the fine may have varied with the specifics of each case, but it had a rather standard format
All you had to do was fill in slots and you had a foot of fine. All of the "persons" were named and their status -- plaintiff, tenant, husband -- was specified. You could also add the name of a person who acted for one of the parties, a proto-lawyer. Already -- by 1206 they had discovered the miracle of forms. The twenty-seven cases were published in Latin [Pedes Finium ... 1897]. Virginia Murphy, medieval scholar, translated them and the text of the feet of fines is available. [feet of fines]
Twenty-two of the twenty-seven cases were about dower. Public health practices were not terrific and medical care was even worse. One result was many widows and many widowers, but the economic status of widows and widowers was quite different. Widowers held the land. Widows were not heirs when their husbands died; children -- first male and then female -- were the heirs. That did not mean wives were tossed out on the street. They had their own stake in the family fortune -- the dower. In these cases they were working out their financial futures.
One possible future was re-marriage. Second and third marriages were quite common, and they were probably facilitated by the dower woman could bring to the family wealth. We know that three of the women bringing suits had re-married by the time of the suit because their new husbands were mentioned in the fine [fine 270 and 271 (same family), 276, 281 and 282 (same family)].
In at least five cases the woman was making arrangements with family. When the name of the woman's former husband and of the other party in the suit are the same it is highly likely that this was a family settlement. There are five cases with suits between persons with the same name [fine 266, 270, 277, 280, and 282]. In the three that involved an exchange of land, the land was to revert to the family members when the woman died.
Other than re-marriage, there seem to have been two strategies pursued. In all cases women had land as their dower. One strategy -- set up a stream of future income. Iveta made a deal with the prior and the nuns in Warter. They got her land. She got
Iveta one corrody, namely the bread and ale and pottage of one canon, to have for her entire life from the church of Warter. [fine 257]
That is what she got from the prior. From the nuns she got half a mark and a cow. Iveta was taken care of for life. One woman arranged for 10 shillings per year; another 20 shillings per year. Another, Helen, got a quarter of wheat every year.
Most of the cases involve cashing in the land. Ten of the women sold the dower for sums ranging from 20 shillings to 9 marks.
Five of the cases did not involve dower [259, 262, 263, 272, and 279]. Four were simple land for money exchanges. A more interesting case involved the exchange of the advowson of the church at Cowthorpe for 2 bezants [fine 279]. Two couples, Geoffrey and Alice de Coletorp and Geoffrey and Isabel de Werreby, had the advowson for the church at Cowthorpe. They were the patrons of the church. They got to present/choose the clergyman. They also got to build and maintain the building. And they kept the money coming into the church. In England's medieval intertwining of church and state the king had half the advowsons in the country. Lords of manors established churches and hence had the advowson for them. However, they often became gifts to monasteries as guarantee of one's immortal salvation [A Boynton Story: Witnessing for God]. And you could sell it, which is what happened here. The price was 2 bezants. Bezants are gold medallions. So the finances of the church was exchanged for gold.
In seven cases a person acted in court for one of the parties to the suit [fines, 257, 268, 270, 271, 275, 281 and 282]. They were not exactly lawyers; they were not exactly not lawyers [A Boynton Story: Before Lawyers]. William de Boynton, Walter's son, acted for the abbot of Meaux twice [fines 271, 275]. A son, a new husband, and one other acted for widows. And a canon of Warter acted for the prior.
The king's court is in session: Small stories of family and economy play themselves out in the courtroom. Iveta's future is secured, and the church becomes richer. That was how the church came to hold half of the land in England by the sixteenth century. A wife arranges for her dower to pass to the heirs of her husband and to guarantee her financial future, as well. Land is exchanged. Land is sold.
What did Walter do? He, along with the other justices, presided over the orderly movement of life and economy.
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Pedes Finium Ebor. Regnante Johanne, A.D. MCXCIX-A.D. MCCXIV, published by the Surtees Society, vol. 94, 1897.