Burgage: Difference between revisions

'''Burgage''' is a [[medieval land terms|medieval land term]] used in [[England and Wales]], [[Ireland]] and [[Scotland]], well established by the 13th century. A burgage was a town ("[[borough]]") rental property (to use modern terms), owned by a king or lord. The property ("burgage tenement") usually, and distinctly, consisted of a house on a long and narrow plot of land ([[Scots language|Scots]], ''toft''), with a narrow street frontage. Rental payment ("tenure") was usually in the form of money, but each "burgage tenure" arrangement was unique, and could include services. As populations grew, "burgage plots" could be split into smaller additional units. (Amalgamation was not so common, until the second half of the 19th century<ref>T. R. Slater, The Analysis of Burgage Patterns in Medieval Towns</ref>. Burgage tenures were usually money based, in contrast to rural tenures which were usually services based. In [[Anglo-Saxon England|Saxon times]] the rent was called a ''landgable'' or ''hawgable''.