One manor per knight? A knightly class?

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Tompkins, M.L.

One manor per knight? A knightly class?

Legg inn av Tompkins, M.L. » 17 jan 2006 12:51:01

Gentlemen,

May I inject a note of historical reality into this debate?

Like the curate's egg, many of the postings have been good in parts.
Douglas Richardson is right: there was indeed a knightly class, though
only in the first two or three centuries after the Conquest (by the late
medieval period the knights were little more than the uppermost layer of
the gentry), and not precisely in the sense in which he used the phrase.
Leo van de Pas is also right - a knight could hold less than three
manors, indeed could be landless - but again only in the centuries
immediately after the Conquest (by the late medieval and early modern
periods knighthood was becoming associated with the ownership of quite
considerable landed wealth and very few knights would have had as few as
just three manors).

The problem is that the word knight has been used with different
meanings at different times in the past (and at the same time in
different contexts, as Alan Brooks so rightly pointed out). To try and
bring out the changing significance of the word in connection with
landholding I'll look at it in three periods - the 12th, 14th and 16th
centuries.

A. 12th century. In the century or so after the Conquest knight (in
Latin 'miles') meant little more than a mounted and armoured soldier.
However the horse and armour were expensive, so the term implied a
certain social standing, and a certain amount of wealth was required to
support a knight. At that time landownership was just about the only
form of wealth available, and the Normans often measured land in
'knight's fees' - the amount of land required to support a knight. Many
manors constituted a single knight's fee - so to this extent Douglas
Richardson is wrong.

Also, there were many landless knights, who served for pay and the hope
of one day being granted a knight's fee. Tenants-in-chief and senior
sub-tenants held honours consisting of many manors, and were obliged to
supply their lord with a knight for every knight's fee they held. They
had the choice of procuring these knights by sub-granting their manors
to knights in return for military service, or keeping all their manors
in their own possesion and using the income to hire household knights.

So in this period what we would later call the gentry consisted largely
of knights. They certainly formed a knightly class, and one often sees
this term used in academic history books. This knightly class was
roughly the equivalent of what were called the gentry in the modern
period, though that term is quite anachronistic in the 12th or 13th
centuries (as Tim Powys-Lybbe has pointed out).

So to that extent the statement by Mr Tyernan that sparked this whole
debate off (that Hubert de Burgh belonged to a Norfolk gentry family) is
anachronistic, though I think his meaning was clear - that de Burgh
belonged to the knightly class, but not to its upper echelons.
Ironically Douglas Richardson's comment on that - that de Burgh came
from the knightly class, not the gentry - was correct, though not in the
way that he intended. However I did find the thrust of Mr Richardson's
argument, that de Burgh's associations (to various earls and bishops, I
think it was) point to him as coming from the upper echelons of that
knightly class, persuasive.

B. 14th century. During the 13th century the social standing of the
knights began to rise, and the epithet began to be associated with a
certain degree of landed wealth (indeed at various times, and for
various purposes, financial qualifications for knighthood were imposed -
as Chris Phillips mentioned). By the 14th century many of the smaller
landowners, who two centuries earlier would have been called a knight,
could no longer claim this status. A new word had to be developed to
describe them, and that word was esquire (in Latin armiger - there were
also other terms, such as valet [Latin valettus], man at arms - but
esquire was the one which stuck).

C. 16th century. By this time the social standing of the knights has
risen still further, so that they are now just the upper crust of the
untitled landowning classes. However the changes in terminology that
created the esquires in the 13th century have continued, and the term
esquire has risen in social status and now describes only the next
uppermost layer of the landowners. A new term has had to be invented
for the rest of that class, and that term is gentleman. The word is
never seen before the late 14th century (though its origins clearly lie
in the earlier word 'gentle'), but it comes more and more into use
during the 15th century, and by the 16th century is firmly established
with its modern meaning. The gentry have arrived.

Disclaimers and qualifications: The above is of course an over-
simplification of complex changes which occurred over a long period (and
the boundaries between knights and esquires, and later between them and
the gentry, were never clearly defined - there was always blurring at
the edges). Also, I'm conscious that I haven't provided any evidence
for what I have asserted, nor any authorities - there just isn't time,
and I don't have the books immediately to hand. However from memory I
can direct anyone who would like to look further into these matters to
Maurice Keen's excellent new book 'The Emergence of the English
Gentleman' (Tempus, Stroud, 2002), which will direct you to all the
previous literature on the subject. A lot of the most recent work has
been done by Peter Coss, published in a series of articles whose details
I don't have to hand, though if anyone wants them I can dig them up.
Nigel Saul and Christine Carpenter (and others) have also written on the
subject.

Regards,

Matt Tompkins

Leo

Re: One manor per knight? A knightly class?

Legg inn av Leo » 17 jan 2006 13:43:02

It already has been said that we shouldn't use the term _gentry_ for the
medieval times, personally I don't mind as there doesn't seem to be a proper
term for that group/class of people.

You maintain that Richardson is right there was a knightly class-----knights
were extracted from all kinds of families. Sons of kings, Dukes and Earls
were knighted. Did they therefor belong to the knightly class? I do not
think so.

To be a knight was a kind of exception in a family, knighthood was bestowed
on a person, never mind which family he came from or how many manors he
owned _before_ knighthood.
After knighthood, in whatever century, land was available to allow him to
keep up his responsibilities.

I don't think it is semantics, with gentry a class of people is implied,
with knight individuals are implied. You may have an army of knights but you
would not find women or children amongst them, therefor I disagree that
there was a knightly class. With gentry,. you can belong to such a family_
without_ yourself owning land. To belong to the knightly class you _must_
have been knighted and women and children usually were not knighted.

Richardson's problem is that he makes grand statements and cannot cope if
people disagree with him. Saying "my remark was just a generalisation" is
beyond him, he'd rather sneer and carp at people, showing how clever his is,
well he thinks he is.

Best wishes
Leo van de Pas
Canberra, Australia

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tompkins, M.L." <mllt1@leicester.ac.uk>
To: <GEN-MEDIEVAL-L@rootsweb.com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2006 10:49 PM
Subject: One manor per knight? A knightly class?


Gentlemen,

May I inject a note of historical reality into this debate?

Like the curate's egg, many of the postings have been good in parts.
Douglas Richardson is right: there was indeed a knightly class, though
only in the first two or three centuries after the Conquest (by the late
medieval period the knights were little more than the uppermost layer of
the gentry), and not precisely in the sense in which he used the phrase.
Leo van de Pas is also right - a knight could hold less than three
manors, indeed could be landless - but again only in the centuries
immediately after the Conquest (by the late medieval and early modern
periods knighthood was becoming associated with the ownership of quite
considerable landed wealth and very few knights would have had as few as
just three manors).

The problem is that the word knight has been used with different
meanings at different times in the past (and at the same time in
different contexts, as Alan Brooks so rightly pointed out). To try and
bring out the changing significance of the word in connection with
landholding I'll look at it in three periods - the 12th, 14th and 16th
centuries.

A. 12th century. In the century or so after the Conquest knight (in
Latin 'miles') meant little more than a mounted and armoured soldier.
However the horse and armour were expensive, so the term implied a
certain social standing, and a certain amount of wealth was required to
support a knight. At that time landownership was just about the only
form of wealth available, and the Normans often measured land in
'knight's fees' - the amount of land required to support a knight. Many
manors constituted a single knight's fee - so to this extent Douglas
Richardson is wrong.

Also, there were many landless knights, who served for pay and the hope
of one day being granted a knight's fee. Tenants-in-chief and senior
sub-tenants held honours consisting of many manors, and were obliged to
supply their lord with a knight for every knight's fee they held. They
had the choice of procuring these knights by sub-granting their manors
to knights in return for military service, or keeping all their manors
in their own possesion and using the income to hire household knights.

So in this period what we would later call the gentry consisted largely
of knights. They certainly formed a knightly class, and one often sees
this term used in academic history books. This knightly class was
roughly the equivalent of what were called the gentry in the modern
period, though that term is quite anachronistic in the 12th or 13th
centuries (as Tim Powys-Lybbe has pointed out).

So to that extent the statement by Mr Tyernan that sparked this whole
debate off (that Hubert de Burgh belonged to a Norfolk gentry family) is
anachronistic, though I think his meaning was clear - that de Burgh
belonged to the knightly class, but not to its upper echelons.
Ironically Douglas Richardson's comment on that - that de Burgh came
from the knightly class, not the gentry - was correct, though not in the
way that he intended. However I did find the thrust of Mr Richardson's
argument, that de Burgh's associations (to various earls and bishops, I
think it was) point to him as coming from the upper echelons of that
knightly class, persuasive.

B. 14th century. During the 13th century the social standing of the
knights began to rise, and the epithet began to be associated with a
certain degree of landed wealth (indeed at various times, and for
various purposes, financial qualifications for knighthood were imposed -
as Chris Phillips mentioned). By the 14th century many of the smaller
landowners, who two centuries earlier would have been called a knight,
could no longer claim this status. A new word had to be developed to
describe them, and that word was esquire (in Latin armiger - there were
also other terms, such as valet [Latin valettus], man at arms - but
esquire was the one which stuck).

C. 16th century. By this time the social standing of the knights has
risen still further, so that they are now just the upper crust of the
untitled landowning classes. However the changes in terminology that
created the esquires in the 13th century have continued, and the term
esquire has risen in social status and now describes only the next
uppermost layer of the landowners. A new term has had to be invented
for the rest of that class, and that term is gentleman. The word is
never seen before the late 14th century (though its origins clearly lie
in the earlier word 'gentle'), but it comes more and more into use
during the 15th century, and by the 16th century is firmly established
with its modern meaning. The gentry have arrived.

Disclaimers and qualifications: The above is of course an over-
simplification of complex changes which occurred over a long period (and
the boundaries between knights and esquires, and later between them and
the gentry, were never clearly defined - there was always blurring at
the edges). Also, I'm conscious that I haven't provided any evidence
for what I have asserted, nor any authorities - there just isn't time,
and I don't have the books immediately to hand. However from memory I
can direct anyone who would like to look further into these matters to
Maurice Keen's excellent new book 'The Emergence of the English
Gentleman' (Tempus, Stroud, 2002), which will direct you to all the
previous literature on the subject. A lot of the most recent work has
been done by Peter Coss, published in a series of articles whose details
I don't have to hand, though if anyone wants them I can dig them up.
Nigel Saul and Christine Carpenter (and others) have also written on the
subject.

Regards,

Matt Tompkins




Douglas Richardson

Re: One manor per knight? A knightly class?

Legg inn av Douglas Richardson » 17 jan 2006 19:02:39

"Leo" wrote:
Richardson's problem is that he makes grand statements and cannot cope if
people disagree with him.

I'm coping very well, thank you.

Best always, Douglas Richardson, Salt Lake City, Utah

Website: http://www.royalancestry.net

Best wishes
Leo van de Pas
Canberra, Australia

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tompkins, M.L." <mllt1@leicester.ac.uk
To: <GEN-MEDIEVAL-L@rootsweb.com
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2006 10:49 PM
Subject: One manor per knight? A knightly class?


Gentlemen,

May I inject a note of historical reality into this debate?

Like the curate's egg, many of the postings have been good in parts.
Douglas Richardson is right: there was indeed a knightly class, though
only in the first two or three centuries after the Conquest (by the late
medieval period the knights were little more than the uppermost layer of
the gentry), and not precisely in the sense in which he used the phrase.
Leo van de Pas is also right - a knight could hold less than three
manors, indeed could be landless - but again only in the centuries
immediately after the Conquest (by the late medieval and early modern
periods knighthood was becoming associated with the ownership of quite
considerable landed wealth and very few knights would have had as few as
just three manors).

The problem is that the word knight has been used with different
meanings at different times in the past (and at the same time in
different contexts, as Alan Brooks so rightly pointed out). To try and
bring out the changing significance of the word in connection with
landholding I'll look at it in three periods - the 12th, 14th and 16th
centuries.

A. 12th century. In the century or so after the Conquest knight (in
Latin 'miles') meant little more than a mounted and armoured soldier.
However the horse and armour were expensive, so the term implied a
certain social standing, and a certain amount of wealth was required to
support a knight. At that time landownership was just about the only
form of wealth available, and the Normans often measured land in
'knight's fees' - the amount of land required to support a knight. Many
manors constituted a single knight's fee - so to this extent Douglas
Richardson is wrong.

Also, there were many landless knights, who served for pay and the hope
of one day being granted a knight's fee. Tenants-in-chief and senior
sub-tenants held honours consisting of many manors, and were obliged to
supply their lord with a knight for every knight's fee they held. They
had the choice of procuring these knights by sub-granting their manors
to knights in return for military service, or keeping all their manors
in their own possesion and using the income to hire household knights.

So in this period what we would later call the gentry consisted largely
of knights. They certainly formed a knightly class, and one often sees
this term used in academic history books. This knightly class was
roughly the equivalent of what were called the gentry in the modern
period, though that term is quite anachronistic in the 12th or 13th
centuries (as Tim Powys-Lybbe has pointed out).

So to that extent the statement by Mr Tyernan that sparked this whole
debate off (that Hubert de Burgh belonged to a Norfolk gentry family) is
anachronistic, though I think his meaning was clear - that de Burgh
belonged to the knightly class, but not to its upper echelons.
Ironically Douglas Richardson's comment on that - that de Burgh came
from the knightly class, not the gentry - was correct, though not in the
way that he intended. However I did find the thrust of Mr Richardson's
argument, that de Burgh's associations (to various earls and bishops, I
think it was) point to him as coming from the upper echelons of that
knightly class, persuasive.

B. 14th century. During the 13th century the social standing of the
knights began to rise, and the epithet began to be associated with a
certain degree of landed wealth (indeed at various times, and for
various purposes, financial qualifications for knighthood were imposed -
as Chris Phillips mentioned). By the 14th century many of the smaller
landowners, who two centuries earlier would have been called a knight,
could no longer claim this status. A new word had to be developed to
describe them, and that word was esquire (in Latin armiger - there were
also other terms, such as valet [Latin valettus], man at arms - but
esquire was the one which stuck).

C. 16th century. By this time the social standing of the knights has
risen still further, so that they are now just the upper crust of the
untitled landowning classes. However the changes in terminology that
created the esquires in the 13th century have continued, and the term
esquire has risen in social status and now describes only the next
uppermost layer of the landowners. A new term has had to be invented
for the rest of that class, and that term is gentleman. The word is
never seen before the late 14th century (though its origins clearly lie
in the earlier word 'gentle'), but it comes more and more into use
during the 15th century, and by the 16th century is firmly established
with its modern meaning. The gentry have arrived.

Disclaimers and qualifications: The above is of course an over-
simplification of complex changes which occurred over a long period (and
the boundaries between knights and esquires, and later between them and
the gentry, were never clearly defined - there was always blurring at
the edges). Also, I'm conscious that I haven't provided any evidence
for what I have asserted, nor any authorities - there just isn't time,
and I don't have the books immediately to hand. However from memory I
can direct anyone who would like to look further into these matters to
Maurice Keen's excellent new book 'The Emergence of the English
Gentleman' (Tempus, Stroud, 2002), which will direct you to all the
previous literature on the subject. A lot of the most recent work has
been done by Peter Coss, published in a series of articles whose details
I don't have to hand, though if anyone wants them I can dig them up.
Nigel Saul and Christine Carpenter (and others) have also written on the
subject.

Regards,

Matt Tompkins




Douglas Richardson

Re: One manor per knight? A knightly class?

Legg inn av Douglas Richardson » 17 jan 2006 19:10:35

Dear Mr. Tompkins ~

Thank you for your good post. Much appreciated.

You provided a very comprehensive explanation of a rather complex
topic.

Best always, Douglas Richardson, Salt Lake City, Utah

Website: http://www.royalancestry.net


"Tompkins, M.L." wrote:
Gentlemen,

May I inject a note of historical reality into this debate?

Like the curate's egg, many of the postings have been good in parts.
Douglas Richardson is right: there was indeed a knightly class, though
only in the first two or three centuries after the Conquest (by the late
medieval period the knights were little more than the uppermost layer of
the gentry), and not precisely in the sense in which he used the phrase.
Leo van de Pas is also right - a knight could hold less than three
manors, indeed could be landless - but again only in the centuries
immediately after the Conquest (by the late medieval and early modern
periods knighthood was becoming associated with the ownership of quite
considerable landed wealth and very few knights would have had as few as
just three manors).

The problem is that the word knight has been used with different
meanings at different times in the past (and at the same time in
different contexts, as Alan Brooks so rightly pointed out). To try and
bring out the changing significance of the word in connection with
landholding I'll look at it in three periods - the 12th, 14th and 16th
centuries.

A. 12th century. In the century or so after the Conquest knight (in
Latin 'miles') meant little more than a mounted and armoured soldier.
However the horse and armour were expensive, so the term implied a
certain social standing, and a certain amount of wealth was required to
support a knight. At that time landownership was just about the only
form of wealth available, and the Normans often measured land in
'knight's fees' - the amount of land required to support a knight. Many
manors constituted a single knight's fee - so to this extent Douglas
Richardson is wrong.

Also, there were many landless knights, who served for pay and the hope
of one day being granted a knight's fee. Tenants-in-chief and senior
sub-tenants held honours consisting of many manors, and were obliged to
supply their lord with a knight for every knight's fee they held. They
had the choice of procuring these knights by sub-granting their manors
to knights in return for military service, or keeping all their manors
in their own possesion and using the income to hire household knights.

So in this period what we would later call the gentry consisted largely
of knights. They certainly formed a knightly class, and one often sees
this term used in academic history books. This knightly class was
roughly the equivalent of what were called the gentry in the modern
period, though that term is quite anachronistic in the 12th or 13th
centuries (as Tim Powys-Lybbe has pointed out).

So to that extent the statement by Mr Tyernan that sparked this whole
debate off (that Hubert de Burgh belonged to a Norfolk gentry family) is
anachronistic, though I think his meaning was clear - that de Burgh
belonged to the knightly class, but not to its upper echelons.
Ironically Douglas Richardson's comment on that - that de Burgh came
from the knightly class, not the gentry - was correct, though not in the
way that he intended. However I did find the thrust of Mr Richardson's
argument, that de Burgh's associations (to various earls and bishops, I
think it was) point to him as coming from the upper echelons of that
knightly class, persuasive.

B. 14th century. During the 13th century the social standing of the
knights began to rise, and the epithet began to be associated with a
certain degree of landed wealth (indeed at various times, and for
various purposes, financial qualifications for knighthood were imposed -
as Chris Phillips mentioned). By the 14th century many of the smaller
landowners, who two centuries earlier would have been called a knight,
could no longer claim this status. A new word had to be developed to
describe them, and that word was esquire (in Latin armiger - there were
also other terms, such as valet [Latin valettus], man at arms - but
esquire was the one which stuck).

C. 16th century. By this time the social standing of the knights has
risen still further, so that they are now just the upper crust of the
untitled landowning classes. However the changes in terminology that
created the esquires in the 13th century have continued, and the term
esquire has risen in social status and now describes only the next
uppermost layer of the landowners. A new term has had to be invented
for the rest of that class, and that term is gentleman. The word is
never seen before the late 14th century (though its origins clearly lie
in the earlier word 'gentle'), but it comes more and more into use
during the 15th century, and by the 16th century is firmly established
with its modern meaning. The gentry have arrived.

Disclaimers and qualifications: The above is of course an over-
simplification of complex changes which occurred over a long period (and
the boundaries between knights and esquires, and later between them and
the gentry, were never clearly defined - there was always blurring at
the edges). Also, I'm conscious that I haven't provided any evidence
for what I have asserted, nor any authorities - there just isn't time,
and I don't have the books immediately to hand. However from memory I
can direct anyone who would like to look further into these matters to
Maurice Keen's excellent new book 'The Emergence of the English
Gentleman' (Tempus, Stroud, 2002), which will direct you to all the
previous literature on the subject. A lot of the most recent work has
been done by Peter Coss, published in a series of articles whose details
I don't have to hand, though if anyone wants them I can dig them up.
Nigel Saul and Christine Carpenter (and others) have also written on the
subject.

Regards,

Matt Tompkins

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