Crossword clues for socage
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Socage \Soc"age\, n.[From Soc; cf. LL. socagium.] (O.Eng. Law) A tenure of lands and tenements by a certain or determinate service; a tenure distinct from chivalry or knight's service, in which the obligations were uncertain. The service must be certain, in order to be denominated socage, as to hold by fealty and twenty shillings rent. [Written also soccage.]
Note: Socage is of two kinds; free socage, where the
services are not only certain, but honorable; and
villein socage, where the services, though certain,
are of a baser nature.
--Blackstone.
Wiktionary
n. (context obsolete English) In the Middle Ages, a system whereby a tenant would pay a rent or do some agricultural work for the landlord.
WordNet
n. land tenure by agricultural service or payment of rent; not burdened with military service
Wikipedia
Socage was one of the feudal duties and hence land tenure forms in the feudal system. A farmer, for example, held the land in exchange for a clearly defined, fixed payment to be made at specified intervals to his feudal lord, who in turn had his own feudal obligations, to the farmer and to the Crown. In theory this might involve supplying the lord with produce but most usually it meant a straightforward payment of cash, i.e., rent.
In this respect it contrasted with other forms of tenure including serjeanty (the farmer paid no rent but had to perform some personal/official service on behalf of his lord, including in times of war) and frankalmoin (some form of religious service). For those higher in the feudal hierarchy, there was also knight-service (military service) as a condition of land tenure.
The English statute Quia Emptores of Edward I (1290) established that socage tenure passed automatically from one generation to the next (unlike leases). As feudalism declined, socage tenure increased until it became the normal form of tenure in the Kingdom of England. In 1660, the Statute of Tenures ended the remaining forms of military service and all freehold tenures were converted into socage.
The holder of a soc or socage tenure was referred to as a socager (Anglo-Norman) or socman (Anglo-Saxon, also spelt sochman). In German-speaking Europe, the broad equivalent was a Dienstmann.
Usage examples of "socage".
Above all, the owner of the soil could still hold his head high as the veritable Socman of Minstead--that is, as holding the land in free socage, with no feudal superior, and answerable to no man lower than the king.
It is curious that while in England the burgage-tenure was deemed a species of socage, to distinguish it from the military holdings, in Scotland it was strictly a military holding, by the service of watching and warding for the defence of the burgh.
But this does not hold good where the King is the lord of the common pasture, and several persons holding of him in socage have common, because in that case anyone having common may avow a good distress.
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.