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A54688 Ligeancia lugens, or, Loyaltie lamenting the many great mischiefs and inconveniences which will fatally and inevitably follow the taking away of the royal pourveyances and tenures in capite and by knight-service, which being ancient and long before the conquest were not then, or are now, any slavery, publick or general grievence with some expedients humbly offered for the prevention thereof / by Fabian Philipps. Philipps, Fabian, 1601-1690. 1661 (1661) Wing P2010; ESTC R7943 37,109 71

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of England at their Coronations Indamage the King in his other R●galities as in the Cinque Ports finding fifty ships upon occasion of Warr and many reservations of Honor and profit upon Tenures in Capite Knight Service and Socage in Capite which if revived and well looked after would almost raise an Army and furnish a great part of the Provisions thereof The King upon occasion of Warr shall never be able to erect his Standard but will be left to hire and provide an Army out of the Rascal●ity faithless unobliged rude deboisht necessitous and common sort of people If a Warr should break forth before a Rent-day or Excise money can be gathered will never want misfortunes and distresses and the King thereby failing of an Assistance at Land may loose also the help of his Navy at Sea May have his Money and his Rents seised as his late Majesties Magazines and Rents were in the beginning of the late Warrs Can have no manner of assurance in a Sedition or Commotion of the people that men will for a small pay adventure their lives and limbs for many times no better a reward then the lamentable comforts of an Hospital and the small charities and allowance usually bestowed upon maimed Souldie●s Destroy the hopes of the Bishops ever sitting again in the House of Peers as a third Estate or if restored to those their just rights so weaken the ground and foundation of that most antient Constitution as they may again be in danger to be divested of them which the inconveniences of prescriptions interrupted and Customs altered may perswade us to take heed of Disable the King and his Successors from recovering Forreign Rights succouring Allyes and making an Offensive or diversive Warr. Shake or dislocate if not take away that great Fundamental Law and Ancient Constitution of the Baronage and Peerage of England and their Rights of Sitting in the House of Peers in Parliament who sit there as Tenants in Capite and per Baroniam and are summoned thither in fide homagio in the faith and homage by which they are obliged which Proviso's not always arriving to their ends or intentions or a Saving of the Rights of Peerage of Sitting in the House of Peers in Parliament will not be able to insure or give them a certainty to be left in as good a condition as they were before Disfranchise the Counties Palatine of Lancaster Chester Durham and the Isle of Ely which relate unto Palaces of Kings not Plows and are no where in the Christian world to be found holden by any other Tenure then in Capite Make our Nobility and Gentry to hold their lands by no better Tenures then the Roturiers or Paysants of France do theirs and in Socage which as Sir Henry Spelman saith Ignobilibus rusticis competit nullo feudali privilegio ornatum feudi nomen sub recenti seculo perperam abusu rerum auspicatum belongs only to rusticks and ignoble men and being not intituled to any feudal priviledge hath of late times improperly and by abuse gained the name of Fee Loosen the foundation of such ancient Earldoms and Baronies as have been said to consist of a certain number of Knights Fees holden of them Hazard the avitas consuetudines ancient Rights and Customs belonging to Tenants in Capite and by Knight-Service Take away or lessen as to the future the fame and honour of the Nobility and Gentry of the English Nation which in feats of Chivalrie not Socagerie extended as far as the Roman Eagles ever flew and had no other bounds then the utmost parts of the earth Render them in Tenure and that which at first made them by their virtue and imployment Superiors in degree aswell as in their Lands and Revenues to the common sort of people to be in that particular but as their equals Will not be consistent with the honour of England to have Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service retained in Ireland and Scotland and not in England and to lessen the honour and strength of the English Nobility and Gentry in England by reducing their mesne Tenures into free and common Socage whilst the better and more Noble Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service shall be enjoyed in those inferior and dependent Kingdoms Or if taken away in Ireland and reduced into free and common Socage will in all probability meet with as many inconveniences as the like may do in England and lose the Kings of England that Service which by reason of the Tenures in Capite was always in a readiness and made use of by their Progenitors upon all occasions of War and necessity as well in England as Ireland And if the like shall be done in Scotland where the people too much accustomed to infidelity and a Rhodomontading where they are not resisted are best if not only to be Governed by their dependencies upon their Superiors and Benefactors and holding their Lands by Military and Knight-Service as that Kingdome it self doth in Capite of England as it was stoutly asserted by our King EDWARD the First and His Baronage of England there will happen such a dissolution or distemper of that body politique as will exceed all or any imagination before hand and the inferior sort of people will by such an alteration of their Tenures be like hunger bitten Bears let loose to as bad if not a worse kind of levelling then our Phanaticks would not long ago have cut out for the three Kingdoms of England Scotland and Ireland now happily conjoyned under their rightful King and Soveraign Will greatly derogate from the honour of the English Nation and make them who excelled in their Laws and Constitutions all or most of the Nations and Kingdoms of the Christian world and had more of right reason in them to be as a reproach to other Nations and seperated from the use of those ancient and Regal Rights Customs Powers and Regalities which all Monarchies in Christendom do use and will be as inconsistent with the honour of England as it would be to have their Kings in a complaisance of a troublesome and unquiet part of the people not to be Crowned nor Annointed not to use a Scepter or have a sword born before Them not to make Knights or not to do it in the ancient and usual manner which the Kings of other Nations and Kingdoms have ever done and enjoyed or to have the Earls of England as if they were only Comites Parochiales Governors of Villages mentioned by Goldastus or Dijck Graven or men of small honour in Holland appointed to look to their Sea-banks not to wear their Circulos Aureos Coronets of Gold Will not accord well with the Rules of Justice to take away Knights Fees or Tenures by Knight-Service from the mesne Lords without a fitting Recompence But break the Publique Faith and Contracts of those that hold of the King or them The recompence of 150000 l. per Annum will not be adequate to the loss
Principal Flower of the Crown which being not used to be made-up or grow out of Grievances Cannot be disparaged by those clamours and crys which have more then needed been made concerning the Earl of Downes concealed Wardship and the inconveniences arising thereby which did not the tenth part of that prejudice to his Revenue and Estate which his prodigality and other Extravagancies afterwards brought upon it and might how soever have been prevented if his mother in law or any other of his friends upon the several Requests of the Master of the Court of Wards and the Officers of that Court would have petitioned and compounded for his Wardship and not have made those many Traverses and Denyals in those many Suits of Law and pursuits which were afterwards made to compell them to it Nor will that or any other which are pretended grievances be ever equal or come up to those farr exceeding real and certain grievances which too many of the Fathers in law of England into whose hands and custody most of the Wardships or Guardianships are endeavored to be more then formerly put will if those Tenures shall be taken away bring upon fatherless children and will in a short time do more harm to the childrens Estates of the first husband then ever yet happened by Wardships to the King and mesne Lords Which the case of one that twelve years ago had the Revenue of an Infant amounting unto above 700l. per Annum charged with no more then 1000 l. debt and a great personal Estate committed to his Trust hath to this day paid none or a very small part of it but keeps the Rents and profits allowing a small exhibition to the Infant to his own advantage Of another that hath sold and wasted Woods and Timber of a Minors to the value of Ten Thousand pounds sterling And many more sad deplorable Experiments which abundantly induce to believe as well as lament them are not to be found in those well-ordered easie way of the Grants and Dispositions of Wardships which happened by Tenures in Capite by Knight-Service Which may appear to be the better established upon greater grounds of Law right Reason Justice and Equity when as many of the Lords of Manors and Copy-hold Estates who do now enjoy by those Tenures many Rights Seignories and commands with view of Frank-pledge Deodands Felons Goods Wrecks Goods of Out-lawed persons and retorna Brevium granted and imparted to their Ancestors by the bounty and favor of his Majesties Royal Progenitors who did not think it to be a grievance to have Abby or religious Lands which were freely given or cheaply granted to them held in Capite and by Knight-Service though there were at the same time a Tenth of the then true yearly value reserved would not upon the pretence and clamours of some Copy-holders concerning Fines incertain and the rigours and high demands put upon them by some Lords of Manors who have 5 or 600 Copy-holders in some Manors belonging unto them and can ask 13 s. 4 d. per Acre for some Lands and 10 s. per Acre for others to permit them to take their Estates hereafter at a reasonable Fine certain and whether poor or rich indebted or not indebted and charged with children or not will seise their Herriots and take as much as they can get upon the admissions of the Heir or the out cries against the many costly and vexatious Suits which have tired Westminster-Hall and some Parliaments concerning Fines incertain be well contented That their power of rating and taking Fines should be restrained or that they should be ordered upon the admittances of their Copy-hold Tenants by Act of Parliament to permit their Tenants without such Fines as they usually take to surrender and alien two parts in three for the advancement of their Wives payment of debts or preferment of Children as the Kings of England and mesne Lords have limited themselves or should be tyed upon the death of every Tenant and admission of his Heir as King James was pleased to limit him and his Heirs and Successors That upon consideration of Circumstances which may happen in assessing Fines either by reason of the broken Estate of the deceased want of provision for his wife his great charge of children unprovided for infirmity or tenderness of the Heir incertainty of the Title or greatness of Incumberances upon the Lands there shall be as those or any other the bike Considerations shall offer themselvs used that good discretion and conscience which shall be fit in mitigating or abating Fines or Rents to the relief of such necessities Or to release and quit all their Royalties in their Manors nor would think it a good bargain to have no Compensation or Recompence at all for them or no more then after the rate of what might Communibus Annis one year with another be made of them or that they could with justice and equity lay the burdens and payments of the Copy-holders upon the Free-holders and Cotagers Which if they do not now take to be reasonable in their own cases may certainly give every man to understand how little reason there will be to take away the dependencies and benefits by Tenures in Capite and Knight-Service holden of the King and mesne Lords Or to abridge the King of that harmeless power never before denyed to any of his Ancestors to create Tenures in Capite and by Knight service or in grand Serjeanty for the defence and honour of the Kingdom upon new Grants of Lands or Favours especially when ●s His Majesty that now is did by His Declaration of the thirtieth of November last concerning the establishing and quieting the Government in the Kingdom of Ireland which hath been since very much liked and approved by the Parliament of that Nation insert a Saving of the Tenures of the Mesne Lords and ordained Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service upon the Lands which shall be set out to the Souldiery for their Arrears Or that Tenures in Capite not by Knight-Service with all petit Serjeanties which as Sir Edward Coke saith is a Tenure as of the Crown that is as he is King and the Profits and Reservations upon them which if well gathered would make some addition to the Royal Revenue should by the pattern of Olivers so called Act of Parliament be taken away when there are no Wardships incident thereunto and that aid to make the Kings eldest Son a Knight or marry his eldest Daughter should be taken away in the Capite and Knight-Service Tenures and left to remain in the former Socage Tenures or how little it will be for the good of the people if the intended Act of Parliament shall order the Tenures in Capite by Socage to pay double their former quit Rents or other Rents or Incidents belonging thereunto or to pay for a Relief double their petit Serjeanties or other Duties reserved When as Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service
LIGEANCIA LUGENS OR LOYALTIE LAMENTING The many great Mischiefs and Inconveniencies which will fatally and inevitably follow the taking away of the Royal Pourveyances and Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service which being ancient and long before the CONQUEST were not then or are now any Slavery Publick or General Grievance With some Expedients humbly offered for the prevention thereof By Fabian Philipps LONDON Printed by J. M. for Andrew Crook and are to be sold at his Shop at the Green-Dragon in St Paul's Church-yard 1661. Ligeancia Lugens OR Loyaltie Lamenting The many great mischiefs and Inconveniences which will fatally and inevitably follow the taking away of Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service which being Antient and long before the Conquest were not then or are now any Slavery Publique or General Grievance THe King will upon occasion of Warr want the obligations and service of his Nobility and Gentry which hold in Capite Their Homage which is the Seminary and Root of the Oath of Allegiance The Education of the Heirs of persons disaffected which hold in Capite when they shall be in ward or minority His Tenants will be the more enabled to alienate their Lands to his Enemies or such as are disaffected which common persons in their Leases one to another do usually prevent and prohibit Provision for maintenance education and portions for younger Children care of payment of Debts preservation of the Wards estate Woods and Evidences will be neglected Finding of Offices after the death of the Ancestors extents of Mannors and Lands a light to Titles and Discents of Lands and recovery and making out of Deeds and Evidences laid aside Genealogies and Pedigrees darkened and Descents not at all to be proved Contention concerning the rights of Guardianship encreased and multiplyed The Mothers of Fatherless Children in their minority made the Guardians permitted to sacrifice the children of the first husband to the spoil and interest of a Father in Law and his second Children Or make them to be a prey to the kindred of the Mothers side who will neither be so kinde or carefull as those of the Fathers Or to Trustees Executors or Administrators who are too many of them dayly experimented to be false to their Trusts and may be as bad in their Guardianships There will not be so good a means as formerly for the preservation of the Wards Estate from false or forged Wills fraudulent Conveyances and other Incumbrances Nor for preventing of the Heires of Tenants in Capite to be disinherited by Heirs by second Ven●ers forged Conveyances or Wills frewardness of an aged Father or cunning of a Stepmother In Socage and that ignoble or Plow-Tenure there will not be that ready defence for the Kingdom as in Capite and by Knight-Service All the Antient Baronies which are annexed to antient Earldomes and Baronies and the newly created Baronies being by Law and the signification of the words a Complexum of honorary possessions belonging to Earls and Barons aswell as of the honour and title residing in their persons cannot now be properly called Baronies and he that was a Baron before will in a strict interpretation of the Feudal Laws from whence they had their beginning be no more nor no better then a Soke-man Alter and disparage the fundamental and ancient constitution of Peerage by making them to hold in Socage which no Baronies in the Christian World ever did or can be found to do The antient Earls and Barons who hold as Tenants in Capite and per Baroniam as the Earl of Arundell who holdeth by the Service of Eighty four Knights Fees and the Earl of Oxford by thirty many others may be greatly prejudiced The Nobility and Gentry of England will by the taking away of their mesne Tenures by Knight-Service be disabled to serve their Prince as formerly or bring any men into the Field The Subjection and Rights of the Bishop of the Isle of Man who holdeth immediately of the Earl of Derby will be taken away The profits of the Kings Annum Diem Vastum will be lost or greatly disturbed and his and the Nobilities and Gentries Escheates which as to a third part of that which is holden in Capite or Knight Service could not before have been conveyed away will be in no better condition Our Original Magna Charta which is holden in Capite and all the Confirmations of the English Liberties Franchises of the City of London and many other Cities and Boroughs which before 9 H. 3. did use to send Burgesses to Parliament will be enervated Destroy or weaken the antient Charters of the City of London for what except their Court of Wards or Orphans concerns their Customs and Husting Courts Put into fresh disputes the question of Precedency betwixt England and Spain which belongeth to England in regard it holdeth of none but God and hath Scotland Ireland and the Isle of Man holding in Capite of it Not well agree with the honour of England and the Monarchy and Superiority thereof to have the Isles of Garnesey and Jersey which are a part of Normandie to hold of the King by Feif roturier or the Principality of Wales and the Isles of Wight and Man to hold in Socage Damnifie all the Nobility and Gentry in their mesne Tenures in which they have a propriety which our Magna Charta and a greater then that twice written by the finger of God himself do without a crime forfeiting it or a just consideration or recompence for it which a relaxation of their own Tenures and Services will not amount unto forbid to be taken away Prejudice the Families of Cornwall Hilton and Venables who are called Barons as holding per Baroniam though not sitting in Parliament Bring a dis-repute upon the Esquires and Gentry of England whose original was from Tenures by Knight-Service Take away a great part of the root and foundation of the Equestris Ordo which was derived out of Tenures in Capite Blast and enervate the degree of Baronets Take away the cause of the eminent degree of Banneretts Make our heretofore famous Nation in Feats of Arms and Chivalrie to be but as an Agreste genus hominum or a race of Rusticks like the Arcadians Take away or weaken all the Mannors and Court Barons in England which were derived or had their original from Tenures in Capite Turn Tenures in Capite which from the Duty of Homage and acknowledgment of Soveraignty were so called into a Tenure which by only acknowledging a Fealty for particular Lands which they hold is but à Latere and no more then what one man holding by a Lease for years is by Law bound to do to another Release the aid of the Maritime Counties and Ports in case of Warr and Invasion Extinguish the Duties which every Hundred upon the Sea Coasts do owe in that which which was called the Petty Watches Discharge the Mises or Payments which in Wales and Cheshire are due to the Kings
Justice or Chancery are never mitigated or brought lower then two years present and improved value and where the Fines are certain do in many places pay as much or more in some places where they pay less pay after the rate of five pence per Acre and in other eight pence per Acre or higher as the custome varies and pay Herriots not only upon the death of the last Tenant but upon Surrenders and in some places the Widdows having no Free Bench as they call it or Estate in the Lands after their Husbands and where they have that or Dower which is seldom in other places do forfeit if they marry again or in some places if they commit fornication or adultery in their Widdow-hood and if the Lords of Mannors put the Tenants out of their Copyhold Estates upon a forfeiture they have by Law no remedy but to petition to them can have no Writ of Right-close to command their Lords to do them right without delay according to the custome of the Mannor no Writ of False Judgment at the Common Law given in the Lords Court but must sue to the Lord by Petition nor can sue any Writ of Monstraverunt to command their Lords not to require of them other Customs or Services then they ought must grinde at the Lords Mill and bake at his common Oven and not speak irreverently of them Or those kinde of Tenures of Lands in Cumberland Northumberland Westmerland and the North parts of England which pay a thirty peny Fine at every alienation and a twenty peny Fine upon the death of an Ancestor or of their Lord according to the rate of the small yearly rents of their Lands which were at the first freely given for service in Warr and to repell the Scottish Incursions now much insisted upon and called Tenant-Right Or Lease-holders which are racked or pay Fines and a Rent as much as any will give for them under harsh and strict Covenants conditions forfeitures Nomine Poenae's without a standing Army Assessments and a Troop of Horse as was done in Olivers time to scout in every County to awe terrifie abuse and sometimes rob the Inhabitants Or the now so much desired Tenure of free and common Socage many of which are under the payment of a Tenth every year of the value as they were first granted by Fealty only for all services with a standing Army or Assessments though farr lesser as it is hoped instead of Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service will be more desirable and prove a greater freedom then either the old Socage Tenure which in Kent they did sometimes willingly exchange to hold the same Lands by Knight-Service or the Copy-holders or Northern Tenant-rightmen or the free and common Socage by Fealtie only and no other Services None of which have or can justly claim as the Tenants in Capite and by Knight-Service do those antient and honourable Rights Immunities and Priviledges which justly belong unto them nor their Court Barons and Court Leetes with the priviledges of basse Justice doing Justice to their Tenants for small Debts under Forty shillings correcting and overseeing the Assize of Bread and Beer Weights and Measures corrupt Victuals punishment of breach of the Peace swearing Constables making By-lawes power of administring the Oath of Allegiance Inquiries concerning Victuallers Artificers Workmen Laborers and excess of prizes of Wines c. Inquiries after Seditions Treasons c. and presenting and certifying them or any other thing that might disturb the Peace and Welfare of their King and Country and by keeping the lesser Wheels in order did contribute much to that of the greater and every one as litle and subordinate Reguli and petty Princes enjoying under their Kings and Soveraignes that which to this day as well as antiently have been called Royalties which being but pencil'd and drawn out of Regal favours and permission are in Fide Homagio deduced from those Tenures For all which free Gifts Emoluments Immunities and Priviledges they had no other Burdens or Duties incumbent upon Tenures in Capite and Knight-Service THen to go to Warr well arrayed and furnished with the King or his Lieutenant General which every Subject if he had not Lands freely given him is in duty bound to do or his mesne Lord when Warrs should happen which in a common course of Accidents may be but once or not at all in his life time and then not to tarry with him above forty dayes or less according to their proportion of Fee or Lands holden at their own charge which is a greater favor then to go along with him all the time of his Warrs and for all the time that they remain afterwards in the Camp to be at the Kings charge and to have Escuage assessed by Parliament of their own Tenants if they shall refuse to go also in person Their respit of Homage was without personall attendance discharged once in four Terms or a years space for smaller Fees proportionable to the yearly value of their Lands then three shillings four pence per Ann. which they that held a Knights Fee yearly paid to their mesne Lords for respite of suit of Court Their releif when they dyed leaving their Heirs at full age was for a whole Knights Fee but Cs. lesse most commonly then a Herriot or the price of their best Horse or beast if they had holden in Socage and when they were in Ward paid nothing for it for a Barony 100 marks and an Earldom 100l. of a Marquis 200 Marks and a Duke 200 l. The Primer seisin which though due by Law was never paid untill 4º or 5º Car. primi was like the Clergies first-Fruits according to a small moderate value a years profit if in possession and a Moyety in Reversion and so small a casualtie or revenue as in the 16th year of the Raign of his late Majestie they did but amount unto 3086 l. 9 s. 8 d. ob half farthing And the charge to the Officers of a general Livery being like to an admittance of a Tenant in a Copy-hold estate but a great deal cheaper where the Lands were under value and found but at 5l. per Ann. which most commonly was the highest rate of finding or valuation of it when it was 100l. per Annum or something more with all the Fees and requisites thereunto did not exceed 10l. and the Fine for a Livery where there was a Wardship half a years profit after a small value and so little as in 16 Car. the accompt for Liveriess was but 1316 l. 12 s. 4 d. ob farthing And where a Special Livery under the Great Seal of England was sued out with a Pardon for Alienations Intrusions c. did not with the Lord Chancellors Master of the Rolls and Master of the Wards and all other Fees included make the charge amount to more then 15 l. or 20 l. Where a Livery was not sued out as