to Lord Lyttelton. In Dugdale's Baronage I find none of
this description in the first Norman reigns; for even that of Clare was
connected with the local earldom of Hertford.

[Sidenote: Question as to the nature of baronies.]

It is universally agreed that the only baronies known for two centuries
after the Conquest were incident to the tenure of land held immediately
from the crown. There are, however, material difficulties in the way of
rightly understanding their nature which ought not to be passed over,
because the consideration of baronial tenures will best develop the
formation of our parliamentary system. Two of our most eminent legal
antiquaries, Selden and Madox, have entertained different opinions as to
the characteristics and attributes of this tenure.

[Sidenote: Theory of Selden;]

According to the first, every tenant in chief by knight-service was an
honorary or parliamentary baron by reason of his tenure. All these were
summoned to the king's councils, and were peers of his court. Their
baronies, or honours, as they were frequently called, consisted of a
number of knight's fees; that is, of estates, from each of which the
feudal service of a knight was due; not fixed to thirteen fees and a
third, as has been erroneously conceived, but varying according to the
extent of the barony and the reservation of service at the time of its
creation. Were they more or fewer, however, their owner was equally a
baron, and summoned to serve the king in parliament with his advice and
judgment, as appears by many records and passages in history.

But about the latter end of John's reign, some only of the most eminent
tenants in chief were summoned by particular writs; the rest by one
general summons through the sheriffs of their several counties. This is
declared in the Great Charter of that prince, wherein he promises that,
whenever an aid or scutage shall be required, faciemus summoneri
archiepiscopos, episcopos, abbates, comites et majores barones regni
sigillatim per literas nostras. Et praeterea faciemus summoneri in
generali per vicecomites et ballivos nostros omnes alios qui in capite
tenent de nobis. Thus the barons are distinguished from other tenants in
chief, as if the former name were only applicable to a particular number
of the king's immediate vassals. But it is reasonable to think that,
before this charter was made, it had been settled by the law of some
other parliament, how these greater barons shoul