common origin among the early tribes of Norway or adjacent parts of Scandinavia. It is unreasonable to suppose that a body of colonists, whether in ancient or modern time, would settle in any particular locality and afterwards proceed to invent their customs. We know how in the case of modern colonies the settlers take their laws and customs with them. So it must have been in regard to the customary law of rural primogeniture, with a reversion to the eldest daughter, among some of the early Anglian or Scandian colonists in the North of England. What the tribal names of these people were it is perhaps now impossible to discover.
As we stand on one of the higher mountains south of Keswick, a great part of the ancient lordship of Derwentwater is spread out before us. In this region, which still retains so many characteristics of its Norse settlers, traces are found, in the extensive districts of Castlerigg and Derwentwater, of this Norwegian custom of rural primogeniture, under which, in default of sons, the eldest daughter succeeds to the inheritance.[1] The same rule survives, or did within recent times, in other lordships in Cumberland, Westmoreland, the Isle of Man, at Kirkby Lonsdale, and in Weardale in the county of Durham. The evidence of Norwegian settlements on the north-western coasts of England is so widely spread that the custom no doubt formerly prevailed on many manors of these districts, where its traces are now lost. Something almost identical with it existed in the city of Carlisle under the name of cullery tenure. The cullery tenants of this city were seised of certain customary estates of inheritance, consisting of houses and shops, etc., which they held of the mayor, aldermen, and citizens as the lords of the city. They were admitted to these estates and paid a small annual quit-rent. On the death of a cullery tenant, in the absence of sons, his eldest daughter suc-
- ↑ Elton, C. I., ‘Law of Copyholds,’ p. 134.
