Juliana de Aula (of Hall Place, Yateley)

living 1287

Juliana de Aula is listed as having the largest holding of land in Yateley in the Rental of the Priory of St Swithin at Winchester dated 1287. This Rental contains the returns, services and customs of the Manor of Crondal of which the Prior and monks were Lords of the Manor.

Juliana heads the list of those landholders in Yateley owing duties to the Lords of the Manor and lists all those duties which must be performed, many at specific times of the year.

Her principal landholding is stated as one hide of land containing 106 acres. There is only one other tenant holding one hide of land in the whole of Crondal Manor, and that was Robert de "Brambesshate". Bramshot was then also within the ecclesiastical chaplaincy of Yateley, and was near the present location of Junction 4A of the M3 motorway. The Crondal manor estate was the second largest owned by the Priory. In contemporary taxation returns, Yateley was taxed far higher than other villages of the manor. Juliana was thus very important, although technically only a 'villein.' In fact there were no freeholders of land in Yateley tithing until late in the 19th century.

Juliana‘s importance can be supported from her surname: 'Aula' can be translated from latin as 'church nave' or 'Court Baron.' Although Juliana is described as having 3 acres of encroachment 'before Yateley church' the meaning here is that she was permitted to hold her own Court Baron. In fact the books recording the courts baron of her successors in title in the 18th and 19th centuries still exist in the Hampshire Record Office. Notes for previous courts were found in the Wiltshire Record Office.

Manorial landholdings were regulated by two types of court; Courts Baron and Courts Leet. The Court Leet was the main court of the manorial system. It generally met twice a year and dealt with all matters pertaining to the manor including petty offences, highway and ditch repairs and breaking the Assize of Bread. The View of Frankpledge was almost always held at the Court Leet. A survival from Saxon days, the View of Frankpledge was essentially the main way that England was policed until the development of police forces in the last century. The Manor of Crondal held a Court Leet and View of Frankpledge regularly and the court rolls and court books exist, almost in complete succession, from 1281 until they were abolished by law in 1926. Even after this date the books were kept up-to-date with property transactions. The importance of this for the historial research of Yateley is that the Court Leet also dealt with the transfer of title of the tenants' land-holdings, by 'copy of court roll.' The mediaeval villeins were thus later termed 'copyholders.'

In later centuries the term villein‘ had given way to copyholder‘ since transfers of ownership of land were effected by writing out two copies of the land transaction and cutting them apart across a wavy line. Later confirmation that the bearer held the actual copy‘ of the court roll consisted of fitting them back together.

Juliana de Aula was one rank above the normal copyholder since she was permitted to hold a Court Baron. Although she was herself a tenant and therefore copyholder of the Prior and monks of St Swithins as Lords of the Manor of Crondal, she had sub-tenants of her own in halimote‘.

This word occurs in the Crondal Customary of 1567 as hallimot‘ referring to the land of each of Richard Allen‘s subtenents. This word is made up of two parts: hall‘ and moot‘. According to the Oxford Distionary guide to usage of the word ” in Anglo Saxon Moots may be discerned the first germs of popular government in England• 1885. Juliana‘s descendents were undoubtedly the Hall family still found in the 1567 Customary.

Originally the term Court Baron had applied to Courts held for freeholders rather than villeins or 'copyholders.' However in this case where a villein was holding her own court it appears that the name of Court Baron was used and retained down the centuries, maybe since only land tenure was dealt with. Yateley had its own common fields, run under the strip farming system, as well as the 'waste of the manor,' which we now call Yateley Common and Yateley Green. Certainly the Lord had a hayward in Yateley. It may be that the hallimot‘ court also regulated the management of the common field and the common rights‘ over the waste on behalf of the Lord of the Manor.

From the 1567 name le Haule Place‘ we can be sure that Juliana lived on the site of what is now Yateley Manor School. The name Yateley Manor is a Victorian affectation and the present house had its foundation about 1828. The previous house was always known by its 'customary' name of Hall Place. In the manorial 'customary' of 1567 we can read all the customary names of fields belonging to Richard Allen, Juliana's 16th century successor in title, and read the names of his hallimot/halimote/halymote- or sub-tenants.

It is interesting to speculate whether Hall Place, spelled 'le Haule Place' in the 1567 customary is derived from Juliana's latin surname meaning 'the Court Baron place' or is from the more obvious derivation of the Middle English word Halle meaning a large house which, from Richard Allen's will and inventory, we can certainly say it was. I would opt for Juliana's surname since I believe that any Anglo Saxon 'halla' hereabouts was in Hawley from which, I believe, it derived its name. One then has to grapple with the subtle distinction between Halimote and Court Baron. Perhaps the two types of court were held consecutively and the distinctions got blurred as they did at the View of Frankpledge for the whole manor.

We know very little about Juliana except her landholding and her customary duties. She may have been married and widowed since one of the 'customs' she owed the Lord was that she could not 'give her daughter in marriage without ransom.' However that may be just stated in the Rental as a 'custom' for completeness, without any daughter being in existance. She herself may thus have been the eldest daughter and heir of the previous tenant.

In the 1287 Rental there is mentioned a Warren de Aula holding a half hide of land in Aldershot. Warren may have been a close relative of Juliana, even her husband, but it is unlikely. It is more likely Warren was so named since he held a copyholding with subtenants in Aldershot, and was no relation to Juliana.

We can be reasonably sure that Juliana actually lived in Yateley at Hall Place since one of her duties was to "find 6 men for 2 days for harvest service at (Long) Sutton, and she shall personally superintend the reapers, and shall find one man from her own house and one man from any tenant of hers for one day for harvest service at Crondal."

The first two court rolls found by Baigent are translated from the Latin by him in the Crondal Records 1891. Although these rolls are dated 1281 and 1282, there is no mention of Juliana de Aula. There are however five other Julianas, perhaps named after one of the most important females in the district.

Written by P. J. Tipton, 6 March 1993