division of the land such as the Danes had made in the ninth century.
But to the people who had recognized William it was but just that the
chance should be given them of retaining what was their own.
Accordingly, when the lands of all those who had fought for Harold were
confiscated, those who were willing to acknowledge William were allowed
to redeem theirs, either paying money at once or giving hostages for the
payment. That under this redemption lay the idea of a new title to the
lands redeemed may be regarded as questionable. The feudal lawyer might
take one view, and the plundered proprietor another. But if charters of
confirmation or regrant were generally issued on the occasion to those
who were willing to redeem, there can be no doubt that, as soon as the
feudal law gained general acceptance, these would be regarded as
conveying a feudal title. What to the English might be a mere payment of
_fyrdwite_, or composition for a recognized offence, might to the
Normans seem equivalent to forfeiture and restoration.

But however this was, the process of confiscation and redistribution of
lands under the new title began from the moment of the coronation. The
next few years, occupied in the reduction of Western and Northern
England, added largely to the stock of divisible estates. The tyranny of
Odo of Bayeux and William Fitzosbern, which provoked attempts at
rebellion in 1067; the stand made by the house of Godwin in Devonshire
in 1068; the attempts of Mercia and Northumbria to shake off the Normans
in 1069 and 1070; the last struggle for independence in 1071, in which
Edwin and Morcar finally fell; the conspiracy of the Norman earls in
1074, in consequence of which Waltheof perished--all tended to the same
result.

After each effort the royal hand was laid on more heavily; more and more
land changed owners, and with the change of owners the title changed.