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Soke (legal)
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The term soke (/ˈsoʊk/; in Old English: soc, connected ultimately with secan, "to seek"), at the time of the Norman conquest of England, generally denoted "jurisdiction", but its vague usage makes it probably lack a single, precise definition.[1]
Anglo-Saxon origins
The phrase 'Sac and soc' was used in early English for the right to hold a court[2] (the primary meaning of 'soc' seems to have involved seeking; thus soka faldae was the duty of seeking the lord's court, just as secta ad molendinum was the duty of seeking the lord's mill).[1]
According to many scholars, such as Stenton and Finberg, "... the Danelaw was an especially ‘free’ area of Britain because the rank and file of the Danish armies, from whom sokemen were descended, had settled in the area and imported their own social system."[3]
Royal grants of sac and soc are seen by historians like Vinogradoff as opening the way for the replacement of national by local justice, through the creation of immunities or franchises:[4] as G. M. Trevelyan put it, “by grants of sac and soc private justice was encroaching on public justice”.[2] Other scholars have viewed the judicial powers represented by the Anglo-Saxon Soke as rather limited.[5] The standard grant of sac et soc, toll et team et infangthief represented the equivalent of the authority of the reeve at the hundred court,[6] impinging on royal justice, for instance, in the right to slay a thief caught red-handed (infangentheof).[7]
Sokemen
A sokeman belonged to a class of tenants, found chiefly in the eastern counties, especially the Danelaw, occupying an intermediate position between the free tenants and the bond tenants, in that they owned and paid taxes on their land themselves.[8] Forming between 30% and 50% of the countryside, they could buy and sell their land, but owed service to their lord's soke, court, or jurisdiction, [8] (though Adolphus Ballard argued that a sokeman was merely a man who rendered service from a sokeland, and was not necessarily under jurisdiction.).[1]
Sokemen remained an important rural element after the Conquest, buying and selling property, and providing their overlords with money rents and court attendance, rather than manorial labour.[9] According to the Ely Inquiry, the terms of remit for the Domesday Book specified determining for each manor “how many freemen; how many sokemen...and how much each freeman and sokeman had and has”.[10]
Later developments
After the Norman Conquest, doubt developed over the precise meaning of the word soke. In some versions of the much-used tract Interpretationes vocabulorum, "soke" is defined: aver fraunc court (Norman for ‘to have a free court’), and in others as interpellacio maioris audientiae, which glosses somewhat ambiguously as claim ajustis et requeste:[1] thus sometimes soke denoted the right to hold a court, especially when associated with sak or sake in the alliterative binomial expression sake and soke (soc and sac).
Sometimes only the right to receive the fines and forfeitures of the men over whom it was granted when they had been condemned in a court of competent jurisdiction. The Leges also speaks of pleas in socna, id est, in quaestione sua (‘pleas which are in his investigation’).
Ballard in the early twentieth century argued that the interpretation of the word "soke" as jurisdiction should be accepted only where it stands for the fuller phrase, "sake and soke", and that "soke" standing by itself denoted services. Certainly, many passages in the Domesday Book support this contention, but in other passages "soke" seems to serve merely as a short expression for "sake and soke".[1][11]
Territorial
The term soke, unlike sake, sometimes applied to the district over which the right of jurisdiction extended (compare Soke of Peterborough).[1] By the same usage, it could designate the ward of a town, as with Aldgate in the charters of Henry I.[12]
Legal terminology
The law term, socage, used of this tenure, arose by adding the French suffix -age to soc.[1]
See also
History of English land law
Soke used in place-names:
Portsoken, a district in the City of London
Soke of Peterborough, Cambridgeshire
Thorpe-le-Soken, Essex
Kirby-le-Soken, Essex
Walton-le-Soken, Essex
Liberty of the Soke, Winchester[13]
Socken
References
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Turner, George James (1911). "Soke". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. 25 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 353.
G. M. Trevelyan, History of England (London 1926) p. 92
Emma Day (2011), SOKEMEN AND FREEMEN IN LATE ANGLO-SAXON EAST ANGLIA IN COMPARATIVE CONTEXT. (PDF) p. 21, cam.ac.uk
J. B. Bury, The Cambridge Medieval History Vol III (Cambridge 1922)p. 466
S. Baxter ed., Early Medieval Studies in Memory of Patrick Wormald (2017)
A. G. Little ed, Essays in Medieval History Presented to Thomas Frederick Tout (Manchester 1925) p. 48
J. Hudson, The Oxford History of the Laws of England II (Oxford 2012) p. 291
G. O. Sayles, The Medieval Foundations of England (London 1966) p. 136
G. O. Sayles, The Medieval Foundations of England (London 1966) p. 243
Quoted in D. Douglas, William the Conqueror (London 1966) p. 349
Ballard, Adolphus (1906). The Domesday Inquest. London: Methuen & Company. p. 84.
A. G. Little ed, Essays in Medieval History Presented to Thomas Frederick Tout (Manchester 1925) p. 48
"Winchester: The soke | British History Online". www.british-history.ac.uk.
External links
The Story of Our Law for Little Children (A simple history of the word Socage)
Vinogradoff, Paul (1911). "Socage" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.).
########################################################################################
Depiction of socage on the royal demesne (miniature from the Queen Mary Psalter, c. 1310). British Library, London.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Socage (/ˈsɒkɪdʒ/)[1] was one of the feudal duties and hence land tenure forms in the feudal system. A farmer, for example, held the land in exchange for a clearly defined, fixed payment to be made at specified intervals to his feudal lord, who in turn had his own feudal obligations, to the farmer (principally those of protection) and to the Crown. In theory this might involve supplying the lord with produce but most usually it meant a straightforward payment of cash, i.e., rent.
It contrasted with other forms of tenure including serjeanty (the farmer paid no rent but had to perform some personal/official service on behalf of his lord, including in times of war) and frankalmoin (some form of religious service). For those higher in the feudal hierarchy, there was also knight-service (military service) as a condition of land tenure.
The English statute Quia Emptores of Edward I (1290) established that socage tenure passed from one generation to the next (or one nominee to the next such as newly appointed feoffees/trustees (to uses/trusts)) subject to inquisitions post mortem which would mean a one-off tax (a "feudal relief"). This contrasts with leases which could be for a person's lifetime or readily subject to forfeiture and rent increases. As feudalism declined, the prevalence of socage tenure increased until either it became the normal form of head tenure in the Kingdom of England (all types enabling grants underneath it of any leases or subleases, as today but also copyhold where lord of the manor). In 1660, the Statute of Tenures ended estates requiring the owner to provide (with the "incidents" of) military service and most freehold tenures (and other "estates of inheritance") were converted into "free and common socage".
The holder of a soc or socage tenure was referred to as a socager (Anglo-Norman) or socman (Anglo-Saxon, also spelt sochman, from the legal concept of a soke, from the verb 'to seek').[2] In German-speaking Europe, the broad equivalent was a Dienstmann.[dubious – discuss] The etymology of socage according to William Blackstone is the old Latin word for a plough.
See also
Soke (legal)
Quia Emptores (statute of), 1290 - also strengthened the devise/use of trusts, i.e. the holding of land or other assets for beneficiaries (equitable owners) other than the trustees (legal owners)
Computo (writ of production of accounts, commonly obtained at the end administration of such an estate by a guardian)
Corvée, physical work as a form of rent, largely abolished in England on the abolition of serfdom
History of English land law
References
Wells, John C. (1990). Longman pronunciation dictionary. Harlow, England: Longman. p. 658. ISBN 0-582-05383-8. entry "socage"
Partington, S W (1909), "2", The Danes in Lancashire and Yorkshire, retrieved 2012-05-15, "Tenants who owned such tenures were called 'sochmen', and the tenure itself was called 'socage'"
External links
Vinogradoff, Paul (1911). "Socage" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.).
Soccage in Lower Canada: An act to explain and amend the laws relating to lands holden in free and common soccage in the province of Lower Canada
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
The term soke (/ˈsoʊk/; in Old English: soc, connected ultimately with secan, "to seek"), at the time of the Norman conquest of England, generally denoted "jurisdiction", but its vague usage makes it probably lack a single, precise definition.[1]
Anglo-Saxon origins
The phrase 'Sac and soc' was used in early English for the right to hold a court[2] (the primary meaning of 'soc' seems to have involved seeking; thus soka faldae was the duty of seeking the lord's court, just as secta ad molendinum was the duty of seeking the lord's mill).[1]
According to many scholars, such as Stenton and Finberg, "... the Danelaw was an especially ‘free’ area of Britain because the rank and file of the Danish armies, from whom sokemen were descended, had settled in the area and imported their own social system."[3]
Royal grants of sac and soc are seen by historians like Vinogradoff as opening the way for the replacement of national by local justice, through the creation of immunities or franchises:[4] as G. M. Trevelyan put it, “by grants of sac and soc private justice was encroaching on public justice”.[2] Other scholars have viewed the judicial powers represented by the Anglo-Saxon Soke as rather limited.[5] The standard grant of sac et soc, toll et team et infangthief represented the equivalent of the authority of the reeve at the hundred court,[6] impinging on royal justice, for instance, in the right to slay a thief caught red-handed (infangentheof).[7]
Sokemen
A sokeman belonged to a class of tenants, found chiefly in the eastern counties, especially the Danelaw, occupying an intermediate position between the free tenants and the bond tenants, in that they owned and paid taxes on their land themselves.[8] Forming between 30% and 50% of the countryside, they could buy and sell their land, but owed service to their lord's soke, court, or jurisdiction, [8] (though Adolphus Ballard argued that a sokeman was merely a man who rendered service from a sokeland, and was not necessarily under jurisdiction.).[1]
Sokemen remained an important rural element after the Conquest, buying and selling property, and providing their overlords with money rents and court attendance, rather than manorial labour.[9] According to the Ely Inquiry, the terms of remit for the Domesday Book specified determining for each manor “how many freemen; how many sokemen...and how much each freeman and sokeman had and has”.[10]
Later developments
After the Norman Conquest, doubt developed over the precise meaning of the word soke. In some versions of the much-used tract Interpretationes vocabulorum, "soke" is defined: aver fraunc court (Norman for ‘to have a free court’), and in others as interpellacio maioris audientiae, which glosses somewhat ambiguously as claim ajustis et requeste:[1] thus sometimes soke denoted the right to hold a court, especially when associated with sak or sake in the alliterative binomial expression sake and soke (soc and sac).
Sometimes only the right to receive the fines and forfeitures of the men over whom it was granted when they had been condemned in a court of competent jurisdiction. The Leges also speaks of pleas in socna, id est, in quaestione sua (‘pleas which are in his investigation’).
Ballard in the early twentieth century argued that the interpretation of the word "soke" as jurisdiction should be accepted only where it stands for the fuller phrase, "sake and soke", and that "soke" standing by itself denoted services. Certainly, many passages in the Domesday Book support this contention, but in other passages "soke" seems to serve merely as a short expression for "sake and soke".[1][11]
Territorial
The term soke, unlike sake, sometimes applied to the district over which the right of jurisdiction extended (compare Soke of Peterborough).[1] By the same usage, it could designate the ward of a town, as with Aldgate in the charters of Henry I.[12]
Legal terminology
The law term, socage, used of this tenure, arose by adding the French suffix -age to soc.[1]
See also
History of English land law
Soke used in place-names:
Portsoken, a district in the City of London
Soke of Peterborough, Cambridgeshire
Thorpe-le-Soken, Essex
Kirby-le-Soken, Essex
Walton-le-Soken, Essex
Liberty of the Soke, Winchester[13]
Socken
References
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Turner, George James (1911). "Soke". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. 25 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 353.
G. M. Trevelyan, History of England (London 1926) p. 92
Emma Day (2011), SOKEMEN AND FREEMEN IN LATE ANGLO-SAXON EAST ANGLIA IN COMPARATIVE CONTEXT. (PDF) p. 21, cam.ac.uk
J. B. Bury, The Cambridge Medieval History Vol III (Cambridge 1922)p. 466
S. Baxter ed., Early Medieval Studies in Memory of Patrick Wormald (2017)
A. G. Little ed, Essays in Medieval History Presented to Thomas Frederick Tout (Manchester 1925) p. 48
J. Hudson, The Oxford History of the Laws of England II (Oxford 2012) p. 291
G. O. Sayles, The Medieval Foundations of England (London 1966) p. 136
G. O. Sayles, The Medieval Foundations of England (London 1966) p. 243
Quoted in D. Douglas, William the Conqueror (London 1966) p. 349
Ballard, Adolphus (1906). The Domesday Inquest. London: Methuen & Company. p. 84.
A. G. Little ed, Essays in Medieval History Presented to Thomas Frederick Tout (Manchester 1925) p. 48
"Winchester: The soke | British History Online". www.british-history.ac.uk.
External links
The Story of Our Law for Little Children (A simple history of the word Socage)
Vinogradoff, Paul (1911). "Socage" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.).
########################################################################################
Socage
Depiction of socage on the royal demesne (miniature from the Queen Mary Psalter, c. 1310). British Library, London.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Socage (/ˈsɒkɪdʒ/)[1] was one of the feudal duties and hence land tenure forms in the feudal system. A farmer, for example, held the land in exchange for a clearly defined, fixed payment to be made at specified intervals to his feudal lord, who in turn had his own feudal obligations, to the farmer (principally those of protection) and to the Crown. In theory this might involve supplying the lord with produce but most usually it meant a straightforward payment of cash, i.e., rent.
It contrasted with other forms of tenure including serjeanty (the farmer paid no rent but had to perform some personal/official service on behalf of his lord, including in times of war) and frankalmoin (some form of religious service). For those higher in the feudal hierarchy, there was also knight-service (military service) as a condition of land tenure.
The English statute Quia Emptores of Edward I (1290) established that socage tenure passed from one generation to the next (or one nominee to the next such as newly appointed feoffees/trustees (to uses/trusts)) subject to inquisitions post mortem which would mean a one-off tax (a "feudal relief"). This contrasts with leases which could be for a person's lifetime or readily subject to forfeiture and rent increases. As feudalism declined, the prevalence of socage tenure increased until either it became the normal form of head tenure in the Kingdom of England (all types enabling grants underneath it of any leases or subleases, as today but also copyhold where lord of the manor). In 1660, the Statute of Tenures ended estates requiring the owner to provide (with the "incidents" of) military service and most freehold tenures (and other "estates of inheritance") were converted into "free and common socage".
The holder of a soc or socage tenure was referred to as a socager (Anglo-Norman) or socman (Anglo-Saxon, also spelt sochman, from the legal concept of a soke, from the verb 'to seek').[2] In German-speaking Europe, the broad equivalent was a Dienstmann.[dubious – discuss] The etymology of socage according to William Blackstone is the old Latin word for a plough.
See also
Soke (legal)
Quia Emptores (statute of), 1290 - also strengthened the devise/use of trusts, i.e. the holding of land or other assets for beneficiaries (equitable owners) other than the trustees (legal owners)
Computo (writ of production of accounts, commonly obtained at the end administration of such an estate by a guardian)
Corvée, physical work as a form of rent, largely abolished in England on the abolition of serfdom
History of English land law
References
Wells, John C. (1990). Longman pronunciation dictionary. Harlow, England: Longman. p. 658. ISBN 0-582-05383-8. entry "socage"
Partington, S W (1909), "2", The Danes in Lancashire and Yorkshire, retrieved 2012-05-15, "Tenants who owned such tenures were called 'sochmen', and the tenure itself was called 'socage'"
External links
Vinogradoff, Paul (1911). "Socage" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.).
Soccage in Lower Canada: An act to explain and amend the laws relating to lands holden in free and common soccage in the province of Lower Canada