Note 161 — PART I TERRITORIAL STUDIES (continued 3)

(II) By an arbitrary payment of certain mysterious sums, which prove to be multiples of the unit 15s 3d. But there is no fixed proportion to be traced between the amount paid and the number of servitia due. Numerous instances are found of a single knight's fee being charged with a sum equivalent to five of these mysterious units. Magnates, again, are found paying apparently strange sums, which prove on dissection to represent 50, 100, 200 and even 300 of these units. The clue to the mystery is found in an entry on the Pipe-Roll of the following year (12 Henry II), which proves that this unit was the pecuniary equivalent of a serviens, and that the various payers had 'promised' the king so many servientes for the war in Wales.161 Such 'promises' were evidently offers, made independently of the actual service due from the 'promising' party. Following up this clue, we see that the Abbot of Abingdon must, like the Bishop of Hereford, have promised 100 'serjeants',162 that the Abbot of St Alban's must have done likewise,163 while the Bishop of London must have promised 150, in addition, be it noted, to paying a scutage of a marc on each knight's fee (20) of his servitium debitum.164 For the rolls of 1162 and 1163 prove that he had duly paid the scutage of the former year, and that this was a further payment. The varying form of these entries should be observed, for it was evidently quite immaterial to the clerks whether they wrote '5 serjeants' or their equivalent—76 shillings and 3 pence.165 Taking the pay of the serviens at 1d a day, the unit in question would represent six months' pay (for a year of 366 days).