The Collaborative International Dictionary
Burgage \Burg"age\, n. [From Burg: cf. F. bourgage, LL.
burgagium.] (Eng. Law)
A tenure by which houses or lands are held of the king or
other lord of a borough or city; at a certain yearly rent, or
by services relating to trade or handicraft.
--Burrill.
Wiktionary
n. a medieval tenure in socage under which property in England and Scotland was held under the king or a lord of a town, and was maintained for a yearly rent or for rendering an inferior service (not knight's service) such as watching and warding.
Wikipedia
Burgage is a medieval land term used in England and Wales, Ireland and Scotland, well established by the 13th century. A burgage was a town (" borough") rental property (to use modern terms), owned by a king or lord. The property ("burgage tenement") usually, and distinctly, consisted of a house on a long and narrow plot of land ( Scots, toft), with a narrow street frontage. Rental payment ("tenure") was usually in the form of money, but each "burgage tenure" arrangement was unique, and could include services. As populations grew, "burgage plots" could be split into smaller additional units. (Amalgamation was not so common, until the second half of the 19th century.) Burgage tenures were usually money based, in contrast to rural tenures which were usually services based. In Saxon times the rent was called a landgable or hawgable.
Usage examples of "burgage".
If any one holds of us by fee-farm, by socage (feudal tenure of land involving payment of rent or other nonmilitary service to a supe-rior), or by burgage (tenure of land in a town on a yearly rent), and holds also land of another lord by knight’s service, we will not (by reason of that fee-farm, socage, or burgage) have the wardship of the heir, or of such land of his as is of the fief of that other.
If anyone holds of us by fee-farm, either by socage or by burage, or of any other land by knight’s service, we will not (by reason of that fee-farm, socage, or burgage), have the wardship of the heir, or of such land of his as if of the fief of that other.
Child, said Cadfael, sighing, until we get some sensible account of whats happened in Walter Aurifabers burgage tonight, I doubt if theres been murder done at all.
The goldsmiths burgage was situated on the street leading to the gateway of the castle, where the neck of land narrowed, so that the rear plots of the houses on either side the street ran down to the town wall, while the great rondel of Shrewsbury lay snug to the south-west in the loop of the Severn.
There were but two young men who habited within that burgage at night, and a man who had played and sung and tumbled a long evening away in their company had no difficulty in distinguishing between them.
I would take his word for it there was no disturbance, no prowling about that burgage during the night.
The journeyman, Iestyn, was working alone in the shop, repairing the broken clasp of a bracelet, when Hugh came to the Aurifaber burgage.
All Susannas movements were so, she did everything quickly, nothing in apparent haste, but now it did seem to Rannilts anxious ear that there was something of bridled desperation about the way she took those few sharp paces here and there, about her last housewifely survey in this burgage.
Cadfael walked through the flowering orchard, very uneasy in his mind after the nights alarms, and continued downstream until he stood somewhere opposite the gardens of the burgages along the approach to the castle.
The distance was not so great but Cadfael knew him, and knew, in consequence, at whose extended burgage he was looking.
Too many cobweb threads were tangling around the Aurifaber burgage, nothing that occurred there could any longer be taken as ordinary or happening by chance.
And all present, the alders, the crowfoot, the purple flower& Everything comes back, everything comes home, to that burgage.
All Susanna’s movements were so, she did everything quickly, nothing in apparent haste, but now it did seem to Rannilt’s anxious ear that there was something of bridled desperation about the way she took those few sharp paces here and there, about her last housewifely survey in this burgage.
And all present, the alders, the crowfoot, the purple flower… Everything comes back, everything comes home, to that burgage.
The burgage of the Vestier family occupied a prominent place at the head of the street called Maerdol, which led downhill to the western bridge.