ed. On festival days, Bible stories, legends, and lives
of saints were read or performed as miracle dramas. They learned
to avoid the devil, who was influential in lonely places like
forests and high mountains. At death, the corpse was washed,
shrouded, and put into a rectangular coffin with a cross on its
lid. Priests sang prayers amid burning incense for the deliverance
of the soul to God while interring the coffin into the ground. Men
who did not make a will risked the danger of an intestate and
unconfessed death. The personal property of a man dying intestate
now went to the church as a trust for the dead man's imperiled
soul instead of to the man's lord.

Unqualified persons entered holy orders thereby obtaining "benefit
of clergy", and then returned to secular employments retaining
this protection.

A villein could be forever set free from servitude by his lord as
in this example:

"To all the faithful of Christ to whom the present writing
shall come, Richard, by the divine permission, abbot of
Peterborough and of the Convent of the same place, eternal
greeting in the Lord: Let all know that we have manumitted
and liberated from all yoke of servitude William, the son of
Richard of Wythington, whom previously we have held as our
born bondman, with his whole progeny and all his chattels,
so that neither we nor our successors shall be able to
require or exact any right or claim in the said William, his
progeny, or his chattels. But the same William, with his
whole progeny and all his chattels, shall remain free and
quit and without disturbance, exaction, or any claim on the
part of us or our successors by reason of any servitude
forever.

We will, moreover, and concede that he and his heirs shall
hold the messuages, land, rents, and meadows in Wythington
which his ancestors held from us and our predecessors, by
giving and performing the fine which is called merchet for
giving his daughter in marriage, and tallage from year to
year according to our will, - that he shall have and hold
these for the future from us and our successors freely,
quietly, peacefully, and hereditarily, by paying to us and
our successors yearly 40s. sterling, at the four terms of
the year, namely: at St. John the Baptist's day 10s., at
Michaelmas 10s., at Christmas 10s., and at Easter 10s., for
all service, exaction, custom, and secular demand; saving to
us, nevertheless, attendance at our court of Castre every
three weeks, wardship,