Etude on Comparative Source Studies: Example of Medieval English Manor

Abstract

The paper offers a number of problems connected with specificity and comparative characteristics of manorial records — surveys and court rolls of medieval England. Manorial surveys as a basic type of records include various data concerning lands, tenements, and rents of English peasants, entry fines, heriots, enclosures, different social types of peasantry, etc. A number of them have been thoroughly researched by Russian historians, while manorial court rolls haven’t been yet researched enough. Manorial court rolls if compared with manorial surveys, are sources of another type. They represent everyday life of English medieval peasantry, including its legal aspects as well as crucial role of manorial custom in the relations between peasants and manorial lords; order of manorial courts’ work and their types; crimes and punishments in the manors; borrowings from the system of Common law (e.g. the Jury), etc. Manorial court rolls have been substantially researched in England and in the USA by both historians and legal scholars. This article also deals with the problem of interpretation of numeric and legal “languages” of manorial records.