11 - Exchanges

Summary

Exchanges of real property between freeholders fall into three main groups: those made between lord and tenant, those made between independent freeholders, that is, neither being the lord of the other, and those made in pursuance of an obligation to comply with the terms of a warranty. Expressed motives for bringing about exchanges of the first two groups ranged from mere convenience to such specific purposes as the wish to evict lay tenants in order to found or endow religious houses, the wish to consolidate holdings in common fields, or to enclose common fields, the wish to bring tenanted land back into demesne so as to be able to build on it or turn it into a park. In the majority of charters no motive was stated. In the first group may be included exchanges made between the founders or other benefactors of religious houses, or their successors, and the religious houses themselves. It seems that, in the first flush of enthusiasm, such benefactors sometimes gave away property which they, or their successors, later wanted to have back for some reason or another, and the only respectable way to get it back was to give something else in exchange. There are early royal examples of such transactions. Sometimes a grantor changed his mind more than once. Exchanges were not always initiated by grantors or their heirs: the prior of St Bees, for instance, persuaded a benefactor to exchange some common field strips, which he had formerly given to the house, for an equivalent acreage of demesne land.