An Old English Home and Its Dependencies

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Baring-Gould Sabine. An Old English Home and Its Dependencies

CHAPTER I. Paternal Acres

CHAPTER II. The Manor House

CHAPTER III. The Domestic Hearth

CHAPTER IV. Old Furniture

CHAPTER V. Ceilings

CHAPTER VI. The Parish Church

CHAPTER VII. The Village Inn

CHAPTER VIII. The Manor Mill

CHAPTER IX. The Farmhouse

CHAPTER X. Cottages

CHAPTER XI. The Village Doctor

CHAPTER XII. Scapegraces

CHAPTER XIII. Hedges

CHAPTER XIV. Underground Rights

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As every circle has its centre, so had every manor its hall, the centre of its organization, the heart whence throbbed the vital force through the district, and to which it returned. The hall was not merely the place where the lord lived, for he did not always occupy it, but it was the gathering place of the courts leet and baron.

It is the fashion to hold that land was originally held in common, and that private proprietorship in land is an encroachment on the public rights.

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In the earliest period, in it he and his house-churls and family slept, as well as ate and worked. But the women had a separate apartment, which in time became the with-drawing room. Bedrooms, kitchens, parlours, were aftergrowths, as men sought more comfort or privacy, and these were grouped about the hall. Nevertheless, the custom of sleeping in the hall continued till Tudor times.

It is instructive to notice the difference between the residence of the feudal lord on the Continent and that occupied by him in England. In the former his place of abode is a castle, château, derived from castellum, schloss, from schliesen, a place into which the lord might lock himself in and from whence lock out all enemies. But the English terms – mansion, manor-house, hall, court, imply nothing military, give token of no exclusiveness, make no threat. The chronic warfare and petty disturbances that prevailed on the continent of Europe obliged the lords of the soil to perch their residences on inaccessible and barren rocks, whereas in England they are seated comfortably in valleys, in the midst of the richest land. In France, in Germany, in Italy, each feudal owner quarrelled with his neighbour, and made war on him when he listed. There was nothing of that kind in England. With the exception of the struggle between Stephen and Matilda, and the Wars of the Roses, we were spared serious internecine strife, and the hand of the king was strong enough to put down private feuds.

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