(4): Interference with the pursuits of the poor.

If the rich suffered injury in their property, the poor suffered in a more pungent way: stern laws prevented them from supplying three of their primary needs; food, firewood, and building materials. On no account could they kill deer; while difficulties surrounded the taking of timber from the woods. It is true that even the Assize of Woodstock allowed them the privilege of “estovers” (that is of cutting firewood), but only under stringent rules. All waste was prohibited; and “waste” was a wide word covering, not merely wanton destruction, but all sales or gifts of logs; while nothing could be taken except at sight of the forester, whose consent would not be procured for nothing. This may be illustrated from a period sixty years later than John’s reign: Hugh of Stratford, who paid two and a half marks of yearly rent to the Warden for his post, recouped himself by taking “from the township of Denshanger for every virgate of land one quarter of wheat in return for their having paling for their corn and for collecting dead wood for their fuel in the demesne wood of the lord king; and from the same town he took from every house a goose and a hen in every year.” A sum might be taken for every load of sticks; the men of Somerset complained that “from the poor they take, from every man who carries wood upon his back, sixpence.” Dwellers within or near the forests were prohibited from keeping dogs, unless their value for other pursuits, as well as for hunting, was destroyed by the removal of three claws of the forefoot. Nor could they keep bows or arrows, so necessary for their protection amid the dangers that beset the inhabitants of lonely districts throughout the Middle Ages. No tanner or bleacher of hides could reside in forest districts, unless within a borough.