Where these rustic services had not been commuted tbramoncy rent the tenure was called ' villein socage," as distingui-.hed from ' free and common socage.' * In Knightservice tenure, and iu the spiritual tenure of Francalmoigne or Free Alms, that is freedom from all earthly services [on which churches, abbeys, and cathedrals, in England held and still hold so many of their lands], and in all the military tenures the services were uncertain : from all other free tenants of lands a fixed amount of service, or rent, was due, and their tenures were included in the general name of socage '
It was a free tenure, the land a freehold, and the
<Litt. ch. 5, Sect, in, 85a; Reeve's Hist. M vol. ch. xxi. 49.t ; I. Francis Sullivan's Lectures on the Laws of England, 1.57 ; Christian's Blackstone, ii. 81, n 1 ; Sullivan's Mass. Land Titles, 34 ; Maine's Hist. Inst., 120 ; Stubbs' Cons. Hist., 549.
5 Maine's Hist. Inst'ns., 120.
<> Elton's Tenures of Kent, 29.
T A villein was an inhabitant of a villa, the ancient name of a farm, and in the earliest times was attached to it permanently. .\ud as many villas were included in a manor, it had often many villein's- These villeins gradually came to be allowed to hold parcels of land, on condition of manuring, or ploughing the lord's demesne lands, or on base or rustic services. Hence arose the tenure termed villein-socage.
* Elton's Law of Copyholds, 3, note b.