Frankalmoin

Or Frankalmoign. (Free Pity/Mercy or Free Alms, or Elemosina). Also known as "charitable tenure" or "tenure in free alms". This was a kind of  feudal land tenure in which an ecclesiastical body held land which was free of military service, such a knight's service or other secular duty. Jurisdiction of such land typically belonged to or lay with the ecclesiastical court.

Gifts to religious institutions in "free alms" we defined as gifts to God, then to the patron saint of the religious institution and finally those religious persons (persona ecclesiastical or parsons) serving God in the specific house.

"They which hold in frankalmoign are bound of right before God to make orisons, prayers and other Divine services for the soul of the grantor."

References

Benjamin Thompson (1 June 1994). "Free Alms Tenure". Anglo-Norman Studies XVI: Proceedings of the Battle Conference 1993. Boydell & Brewer Ltd. pp. 221–. ISBN 978-0-85115-366-7. 

A Systematic Arrangement of Lord Coke's First Institute of the Laws of England: 1. London : S.Brooke, 1818. Chapter VIII: Of Tenure in Frankalmoign. 1818. pp. 349–.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankalmoin

Maitland and Pollock
The History of English Law Before the Time of Edward I. The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.. pp. 240–. ISBN 978-1-886363-22-9.

Frankalmoin and Jurisdictional Immunity: Maitland RevisitedAudrey W. Douglas

Speculum
Vol. 53, No. 1 (Jan., 1978), pp. 26-48
Published by: Medieval Academy of America
Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2855605

Extract

...
Thereafter Maitland confined himself to consideration of the history of Utrum, an assize that determined 'utrum tenementum sit   pertinens ad elemosinam   sive   ad   feudum   laicum'.  In his view "while it was at first a preliminary action to decide jurisdictional competence, it later became a proprietary one, available as the "parson's writ of right" only to parochial rectors. Thus. he explained. not only did the nature of the action change but its scope was narrowed to a particular class of parsons and tenements. These changes, which he placed between the ages of Glanvill and Bracton, inflicted on the church courts "a severe defeat" (p. 248). The assize was denied to bishops and heads of religious communities, who, though they held properties in elemosina,  were considered to have recourse to other remedies in the royal court; (pp. 248-49). The restriction placed upon the operation of the assize was aided by royal writs of prohibition that sought to prevent suits touching feudum laicum from being determined before church courts. Eventual]y, the contrast to 'lay fee' is no longer (as in the: Constitutions of Clarendon) elemosina,  but consecrated soil. the sites of churches and monasteries and their churchyards. lo which, according to Bracton. may be added "lands given to churches at the time of their dedication" (pp. 250-51).

...
This broad range of evidence allows us not only to develop the general hypothesis that under English land law elemosina was a species of privileged tenement, rather than of tenure, but also to perceive the roots of its judicial immunity in the precepts of canon law. Furthermore, while we must agree with Maitland that the assize Utrum is crucial to lhe study of elemosina, a closer look at the circumstances in which early litigants came to the assize compels us to rewrite the details of its early history.  With the full realization that no new set of items can here adequately explain all the problems that the topic holds, nevertheless with the evidence at hand we may attempt a viable and broadly based revision of the established view of the role of elemosina in English ecclesiastical land tenure.

Const. Clar. c. 9 provides a useful starting point for the present discussion. The majoritv of the sixteen constitutions issued in 1164 dealt with specific in the particular spiritual quality of its service, and a  class of property termed elemosina,  to which a jurisdictional privilege was attached. Such a distinction in fact, facilitates an altogether different approach to the questions raised by Maitland. For instance. it opens up the possibility that the line between tenure in elemosina and all other tenures did not necessarily coincide with that between elemosina and feudum laicum. Indeed the evidence examined below indicates that elemosina was a very restricted class of ecclesiastical property, even  in the twelfth century, and that by far the greater part of the church's lands, whatever their tenure, constituted feudum laicum.

...

This broad range of evidence allows us not only to develop the general hypothesis that under English land law elemosina was a species of privileged tenement. rather than of tenure, but also to perceive the roots of its judicial immunity in the precepts of canon law.

...

Sir William Blackstone; James Stewart; William Blackstone Collection (Library of Congress) (1839). The rights of persons, according to the text of Blackstone: incorporating the alterations down to the present time. Edmund Spettigue. pp. 150–.

William Mudford (1834). "By What Rights Do Bishops Sit In Parliament". The Canterbury Magazine. Office of the Kentish Observer. pp. 64–.


Sir Edward Coke; Sir Thomas Littleton; Francis Hargrave; Charles Butler, Sir Matthew Hale, Heneage Finch Nottingham (Earl of), Thomas Day (1812). The first part of the institutes of the laws of England, or, A commentary upon Littleton: not the name of the author only, but of the law itself. Johnson and Warner, and Samuel R. Fisher, Jr.. pp. 133–.
 Book 2 Chapter 6 On Frankalmoigne

Sir Edward Coke; Sir Thomas Littleton; Francis Hargrave; Sir Matthew Hale, Heneage Finch Nottingham (Earl of) (1853). The first part of the institutes of the laws of England, or, A commentary upon Littleton: not the name of the author only, but of the law itself. R.H. Small. pp. 135–.

Extract from
Thomas Edlyne Tomlins (1820). The Law-dictionary: Explaining the Rise, Progress and Present State of the British Law: Defining and Interpreting the Terms Or Words of Art, and Comrising Also Copious Information on the Subjects of Trade and Government. Payne. pp. 2–.