Abstract
Lawless violence and the legal system were both props for gentry power, but ultimately the greatest foundation of gentry power was landholding. One of the most frequently stated characteristics of medieval society, or indeed of almost any pre-modern civilization, is that wealth derived primarily from land and in talking about elite society and about local power structures, one cannot avoid talking about land. Thus, the control and transfer of land are pervasive themes in this book, from the endowment of gentry within the honorial system, to legal and extra-legal battles over land, to inheritance and donations of land. This chapter