Book excerpt: This book, the final installment of a two-volume history of French lordship, examines the role of lordship in old regime society, the internal structures and administration of lordship - including the seigneurial dues, domain-farms, forests and common lands, and serfdom - and seigneurial justice. In addition, the book reviews the regional patterns of lordship, and concludes with an examination of lordship from 1770 to 1789, the years immediately preceding the French Revolution.