Village Community
the means by which many scholars contend that great part of Europe must have been tlers took a tract of land, built their huts thereon, and laid out common fields, which they cultivated in common as one family. The land was divided out every few years into family lots, but the whole continued to be cultivated by the community subject to the established customs as interpreted in the village council by the sense of the village elders. This may still be seen in the villages of Russia, and even in some parts of England may still be traced the ancient boundaries of the great common field, divided lengthstill be traced the ancient boundaries of two others in different kinds of crop), and again crosswise into lots held by the two others in different kinds of crop), mark system, was started by Von Maurer in Germany, but mainly owes its cur- VILLAGE COMMUNITY rency to Sir Henry Maine, who in his the East and West" (1871) pointed out work entitled "Village Communities in the East and West" (1871) pointed out close parallels in the archaic land comtack upon the theory was made by F. tack upon the theory was made by F.
Seebohm, in his work "The English Village Community Examined" (1883; 4th ed. 1890), which labors to prove that the ancient village community was not originally free, but traces back to the Roman manorial system of a community in serfdom under a manor with its lord. theory a still more deadly blow by turn- Fustel de Coulanges dealt Von Maurer's ing against him the evidence of the Leges Barbarorum and early chartu- ing against him the evidence of the laries on which his argument mainly relied. He proves also that the Russian mir does not represent agrarian communism, the soil belonging not to it but to some one else, and the peasants merely tivating the land collectively. The primitive mark, the association of the mark itive mark, the association of the mark mon land (Gemeinland or Allmende) all the evidence for these he weighs and finds wanting, contending that the whole imposing structure of argument has standings, national communism having been confused with the common ownerbeen erected out of a series of misundership of the family, tenure in common communism with village commons. with ownership in common, agrarian ship of the family, tenure in common besides the example of Hitchin, from which Mr. Seebohm started working community in its most primitive form; back, he examines the cases of Aston village, in the parish of Bampton, Oxing back, he examines the cases of Aston modern institution, but one beginning mesbury, and others, his conclusion befar back in the history of human civiling that the village community is no ing that the village community is no which all peoples have passed. In the hill cultivation and settlement, of which many traces remain, he sees evidence of pre-Aryan influence analogous to similar customs surviving in India. The commany traces remain, he sees evidence of hill cultivation and settlement, of which inent feature, the village of serfs the customs surviving in India. The com- pre-Aryan influence analogous to similar ing their several homesteads and the lands around; small villages of serfs occupying cottage homes, massed together, and using the lands around ing their several homesteads and the Thus Mr. Seebohm's formula, defining the English institution as a manor with gether, and using the lands around them in intermixed or runrig occupation. a village community in serfdom under it, the English institution as a manor with Thus Mr. Seebohm's formula, defining VILLARD