Pity Poor Rolland

Back on March 23, 2017 I posted – in installments – a paper I had written for the Richard III Society of Canada on English law in the time of that maligned King, who, for the record, even some of his greatest detractors admitted made good laws. Early on in that paper I had written about the feudal practice of holding lands by various kinds of service to one’s lord, some of these services being considered free, and some unfree:

"All of these kinds of tenure by service — knight service, scutage, serjeanty, socage — were considered free (as opposed to base) tenures, meaning that it was a freehold and you were a freeholder. What made these various kinds of tenure free? Key to the idea was that the services or money owed were certain. Even poor Rolland, a tenant in Suffolk who 'was obliged upon Christmas Day to make a leap, a whistle and a fart coram domino rege' was a freeholder, insofar as his rather embarrassing service was at least spelled out and rendered at a stated time. Outside of Christmas Day, his time and labour were his own.”

Rolland’s service was eventually commuted to a money payment.

I had come across the case of Rolland in A. W. B. Simpson’s An Introduction to the History of the Land Law, p. 6. What Simpson’s source was, I had no idea at that time. However, either Rolland’s peculiar service was not unique in Suffolk, or else the tenant’s name changed in various retellings, for I came across a very similar anecdote in William Camden’s Remains concerning Britain (1605), p. 144: “Baldwin le Pettour [‘the Farter’], who had his name and held his land in Suffolk, Per saltum, sufflum et pettum, sive bumbulum, for dancing, pout-puffing, and doing that before the King of England in Christmas holy days, which the word pet signifieth in French.”

Was Suffolk renowned among counties for producing top-notch royal flatulists, or were Rolland and Baldwin the same person? And if the same, which name is correct? (And one wonders whether in the original source of the tale there is not also some mild onomatopoetic punning intended on ‘Suffolk’ and ‘sufflum’?)

Not surprisingly, they are the same person; Camden simply seems to have misremembered the Christian name (though he got Rolland’s unfortunate surname right). And the source of the tale is an entry in the Liber Feodorum (“Book of Fees”), a 1302 compilation of Exchequer entries of tenants-in-chief of the King. The entry in question runs thus (p. 1174):

Seriantia que quondam fuit Rollandi le Pettour in Hemingeston in comitatu Suff', pro qua debuit facere die Natali Domini singulis annis coram domino rege unum saltum et sifflettum et unum bumbulum, que alienata fuit per particulas subscriptas.

“The following (lands), which formerly were held of Rolland the Farter in Hemingston in the county of Suffolk, for which he was obliged to perform every year on the birthday of our Lord before his master the king, one jump, one whistle, and one fart, were alienated in accordance with these specific requirements.”

This service was perhaps less humiliating than it might sound, since after all, he performed it by royal command of his Majesty the King, and it was well-remunerated: 30 acres of land. Cheap rent, when you consider it. And — wait for it, folks — I learned that Rolland even has his own Wikipedia page. So, an independent fortune that gave him freeman’s status, a modicum of fame down through the ages… which of us wouldn’t break wind on command for that? But alas, not all of us have been blessed with Rolland's peculiar talent.

Bibliography

CAMDEN, William. Remains concerning Britain. Thomas Moule (ed.). London: John Russell Smith, 1870.

LYTE, H. C. M. (ed.). Liber Feodorum. The Book of Fees, Commonly Called Testa de Nevill: Part 2, A.D. 1242-1293. London: His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1923.

SIMPSON, A. W. B. An Introduction to the History of the Land Law. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961.