Distraint of Knighthood and Military Obligation under Henry III

Abstract

ONE of the many questions relating to military service which require further investigation is that of distraint of knighthood.' Writs ordering distraint began in 19224 and were issued with increasing frequency until the period of baronial reform; after that, they continue to appear on the rolls at rather longer intervals. Many explanations of the purpose of the writs have been advanced. Stubbs, in a typically judicious survey, wrote that 'the distraint of knighthood was both in its origin and in its effects a link between the two branches of the national force.' He regarded it, however, as anti-feudal, an attempt to build up a nonfeudal military class.2 J. E. Morris, writing of the writs subsequent to 1278, which he thought were the earliest to be directed to all wealthy landholders, considered them definitely military in purpose.3 In his view, they constituted an extension of the Assize of Arms to a new class, with the object of creating a 'cavalry caste' on which Edward could draw for military purposes. He laid down the excellent principle that 'all military legislation comes primarily from military needs.' For Denholm-Young, too, the writs were issued in an attempt to overcome the shortage of knights, and he presumably believes that taking up knighthood meant 'becoming a heavily armed knight.'4 A contrary view is expressed by A. L. Poole. According to him, Henry III wished to increase the yield of feudal incidents; his 'chief object was financial.' A subsidiary purpose, according to Poole, was to increase the number of men available for judicial and administrative functions.' It is extremely difficult to believe that the measure was financial in original intention, even if it eventually became so. It will no doubt be necessary to leave the question open, in view of the complete lack of direct evidence as to the effectiveness of the writs, and their relationship to Henry's armies. It may be worthwhile, however, to conduct a more careful examination of the writs, mostly enrolled on the Close Rolls, than has hitherto been attempted, in an effort to establish the occasions on which the distraining measure was issued, and the purposes which it was intended to serve. In this article it is maintained, on the one hand, that the main occasions of distraint were the foreign undertakings of the crown; and on the other, that these undertakings help to explain the changes in the character of the writ, transforming it from an attempt to obtain at least a minimum personal response from the tenants-in-chief, to a demand that all land-holders of a certain value become knights without regard for tenure. In its first phase, the writ was feudal both in itself and in its effects; later, it may have been intended to strengthen the feudal host, but it did so by ignoring feudal barriers; and finally, it became one of the means by which a non-feudal army was built up. It was in foreign undertakings, and particularly in overseas expeditions, that the deficiencies of the feudal host were first and most persistently manifested. These deficiencies have usually been studied in terms of the reduction of the servicium debitum to a meager fraction of that revealed by the Carte Baronum of 1166.6 Miss Chew states that there grew up, in the thirteenth century, a distinc-