Читать книгу History of the Origin of Representative Government in Europe - Guizot François - Страница 126

At this period, we meet with three kinds of landed property: 1st. Allodial lands; 2nd. Beneficiary lands; and 3rd. Tributary lands.

1st. Of allodial lands or Allods.—These were lands possessed in absolute right, which the proprietor held from no one, on account of which he owed nothing to any superior, and of which he had full liberty to dispose. The lands taken or received as booty by the Franks, at the time of the conquest of Gaul, or in their subsequent conquests, were originally allodial. At a later period it was said that a man held an allodium, only from God and his sword. Hugh Capet said that he held the crown of France in this manner, because he had received it from no one. Such tenures were mementos of conquest.

The word alode itself indicates that the first allods were lands, which fell to the conquerors either by lot or division; loos, lot; allotted, allotment; whence also came the French word, loterie. Among the Burgundians, Visigoths, Lombards, and others, we find positive traces of this division of the lands allotted to the conquerors. They took possession of two-thirds of the land, that is, not of the whole extent of the country, but of the land in any locality, where a barbarian of any importance took up his residence. The lands which thus fell to the barbarians, were called Sortes Burgundionum, Gothorum, and so on. We do not find among the Franks positive traces of such a division of the land; but we know, nevertheless, that they divided their booty by lot.

The word alode, then, was probably applied at first only to the lands taken by the victors in virtue of their conquests. Another proof of this is that allodial property, properly so called, was long distinguished from the lands held also in absolute right, and entailing no acknowledgment of a superior, but which had been acquired by purchase or in any other way. A distinction was also made among allodial lands, of salic land, which could be inherited only by males. This was probably the original allod, the land acquired at the time of the conquest, and which thereupon became the primitive and principal establishment of the head of the family. Terra salica is the terra aviatica of the Ripuarian Franks, the terra sortis titulo adquisita of the Burgundians, the hæreditas of the Saxons, and the terra paterna of the formulas of Marculf.