2. THE
TEXT
The text of the Nottinghamshire Domesday occupies some
fourteen folios of volume 1, the Exchequer Domesday.[1] A
further two half folios are devoted to the Roteland
wapentakes of Alstoe and Martinsley, which were administratively part of the county
in 1086, although later joined to the Northamptonshire hundred of Witchley to
form the county of Rutland.[2] The
account is divided into four unequal sections. The first deals with the
boroughs of Nottingham and Derby.[3] In
1086, and probably from a much earlier period, the two counties were closely
associated, sharing a sheriff and a common administration.[4] The
form of the description of the boroughs, and the relationship between them, is
discussed in detail in chapters 7 and 8. The second section can be broadly
characterised as an incomplete shire customal to which is appended what appears
to be a list of holders of liberties.[5] Its
function, however, may be either directly, or incidentally, to indicate the
predecessors of the Norman holders of land.[6] Third,
there is a list of tenants-in-chief who held land in the county in 1086, which
is by way of an index to the fourth section, the breves, that is, chapters, which form the bulk of the text.[7]
It is with this latter section, the description of the estates of
Nottinghamshire, that much of this study is concerned.
There
are thirty breves in all. The first,
as is customary in all county Domesdays, concerns the land of the king.
Somewhat anomalously, however, it is followed by an account of the estates of
those tenant-in-chief of comital rank - Count Alan of Brittany, Earl Hugh of
Chester and the Count of Mortain. It is more normal for the clerics to follow
the king, in strict order of precedence. In the Yorkshire account, for example,
the three earls occupy the fifth, sixth, and seventh positions, with Earl Hugh
at their head, behind the archbishop and canons of York, the bishop of Durham
and his men, and the abbot of (St. Mary's) York.[8] In
Nottinghamshire, however, the archbishop, the bishops of Lincoln and Bayeux,
and the abbot of Peterborough are relegated to a lower position. The
tenants-in-chief of the shire follow. Again, they appear in some sort of order
of precedence. The great barons of the realm usually occupy a high position in
all the counties in which they held land. But there are local variations which
reflect the regional importance of individual lords. In Nottinghamshire, for
example, the land of the clerics is immediately followed by that of Roger de
Bully, the greatest landholder in the county. In Yorkshire, however, he follows
Berengar de Tosny who is twenty-first in Nottinghamshire.[9] The
final breve is an account of the land
of the king's thanes, those Anglo-Scandinavians of modest rank who retained
title to, and tenure of, their lands after the Conquest.[10]
Each breve, with the exception of headings
and some place-names, is written in Carolingian miniscules.[11]
The pages are divided, by prickings and rulings, into two columns each of 44
lines. Generally speaking, an attempt was made to write each section at one
sitting. Breve no. 1, the land of the
king, may, however, be an exception. In common with the description of terra regis in other county Domesdays,
it shows signs of ad hoc and hasty
compilation. Thus, entry no. 1,24, the concatenated account of some seventeen
parcels of land, and the following entries which describe the same land in
greater detail, reveal a difference in hand from the preceding entry concerning
the manorial caput in Mansfield,
which may suggest that they were a postscriptal addition to a space which had
been intentionally left for the purpose. Such peculiarities, accompanied by
anomalous entries and non-standard information emanating from an early stage in
the enquiry or a different source,[12]
suggest that the return for the king's land was not always uniform with the
other breves. Indeed, it is not
unlikely that the data are derived from an initial survey of the king's income
and lands alone which the Exchequer Domesday scribe himself formulated in an
attempt to bring it into conformity with the rest of the text.[13]
Commonly, however, the scribe of the manuscript seems to be copying from an
already compiled exemplar. It is thus unlikely that there was any extensive
composition from diverse sources at this late stage.[14]
Emendations,
corrections, and additions were, nevertheless, subsequently made, indicating
that the scribe had access to a larger body of information, either an
unabbreviated exemplar or separate sources used for checking. It is of vital
importance to identify such changes for the stratigraphy of the text must
clearly be established before the breves
can be examined for traces of procedural activity and sources. Various devices
were employed when material was added to the text. The most obvious are
interlineation, usually, although not always, used for adding qualifying
detail, and addition to the side margin. The foot margin was also used, and
such additions can be detected by a line count if not by a difference in hand.
Land in Tithby, for example, is enrolled below the 44th line of DB i, f.288c,
and the entry is clearly postscriptal.[15]
Additions to the end of the breve are
more difficult to detect, but can often be identified from anomalous details of
procedure such as irregularities in wapentake sequence, that is, the common
order in which estates are described in every breve.[16] The
three final entries of William Peverel's breve,
for example, relate to land in the wapentakes of Bassetlaw and Broxtow. They
are preceded, however, by estates in Bingham which, in normal circumstances,
would have been enrolled after those in the other two wapentakes.[17]
The entries, then, would appear to be postscriptal and, indeed, in this
instance both the hand and diplomatic[18] of
the text indicate that they are later additions to the text. Finally, whole
entries are frequently squeezed into blank lines originally left for another
purpose, or appended to the last line of existing entries. Thus, in the
archbishop of York's breve, an estate
in Ranskill was postscriptally entered on a blank line between two textual
groups of manors,[19] and
in the king's breve, Fenton was
enrolled on the last line of a soke entry relating to Leverton.[20]
All the postscriptal material identified, with the exception of those
interlineations which are readily discernible in the manuscript and the Farley
edition, are listed in Appendix 1.[21]
Wapentake
rubrics are by no means general, and are only found regularly and correctly in breves nos 1, 6, 9, and 17. With only
one exception, all are written on single lines in large rustic letters within
the body of the text.[22] This
might suggest that such information was an integral component of each breve, that is, it was entered as the
text was written. The regularity of wapentake sequence found in almost every breve does indeed imply that the
geographical location of each estate was known to the Domesday scribe, or to a
scribe of some previous recension. But the information was clearly not thought
to be vital for no rubrics at all are found in twenty two of the breves, and there is evidence to suggest
that it was not always a current component of the text. In Lincolnshire, many,
if not most, rubrics are evidently later additions, even when written on a
blank line.[23]
In Count Alan's breve, for example,
wapentake and hundred rubrication is thorough, but the method of recording the
information is entirely dependent on the space available in a previously
drafted text.[24]
Thus, a rubric was interlined or written on the last line of the preceding entry
if space permitted, but was otherwise entered in the margin or a pre-existing
space within the text. Rubrication, then, was clearly an afterthought and not
originally considered germane to the purpose of the enquiry.
The
same is probably true of the Nottinghamshire folios. Spaces, which are by
definition current, often occur between the description of estates in different
wapentakes, but do not contain rubrics. Moreover, blank lines are sometimes
left in the text where no wapentake rubric can be intended. Berengar de Tosny,
for example, held three manors which were all situated in the wapentake of
Newark. The third, however, is separated from the other two by a one line
space.[25]
Any indication of the wapentake at this point would have been redundant for
such information is usually only noted for the first estate in each division of
the county. Indeed, the reason was apparently otherwise for, although the
estate was in Newark Wapentake, the works of the villeins (opus villanorum) belonged to Saxilby in Lincolnshire.[26]
Furthermore, spaces are almost certainly used in breve no. 5 to indicate different types of estate.[27]
It is therefore possible that gaps were left in the text for one purpose and
were only subsequently employed to record wapentakes. Other types of
rubrication - the identification of hundred and soke - are rare and are in all
cases clearly later additions to the text.[28]
In
circuit 6 the basic unit of textual organisation within the breve is the manerium which is here, somewhat loosely, translated as 'manor'.[29]
The caput, which is identified by the
presence of an aula or hall, is
described first, but the value assigned to it is that of the whole estate.[30]
There then follows an account of the manorial appurtenances in separate
entries, first the berewicks, then the land in soke. The form of the text,
however, does not necessarily reflect the social and economic structure of
estates for it is essentially a function of procedure. Thus, for example,
'intra-manorial' sokemen - those sokemen who are accounted for within the
manorial caput[31]-
seem to be of a similar status to those who are recorded in separate soke
entries. In the absence of any parallel passages in Domesday Book itself, no
direct comparison of the two classes can be made. But the fact is clear from an
examination of the description of the manor of Scotter (Lincs.) in a c.1125 survey of the estates of
Peterborough Abbey.[32] In
1086 there were 15 sokemen, 32 villeins, and 13 bordars in Scotter itself.
There was sokeland in Scotterthorpe, recorded in a separate entry, where there
were a further 8 sokemen and 4 villeins.[33] In c.1125 the two parcels of land were
described as a single estate. There were 29 sokemen, 24 full villeins, 2 half
villeins, and 10 bordars.[34]
Clearly, the 15 intra-manorial sokemen of 1086 cannot be represented by the two
half villeins of c.1125 - the latter
probably represent the 4 bordars in Scotterthorpe in 1086. It is apparent,
then, that there was only one class of sokemen representing both the intra- and
extra-manorial sokemen of 1086. The former are only intra-manorial by virtue of
proximity, and this is probably determined by the structure of local
government.[35]
In
the Nottinghamshire Domesday there are fewer berewicks and soke entries than in
Lincolnshire. As in Derbyshire, 'manors' predominate, accounting for 61% of all
entries, as opposed to 49% in the description of its more easterly neighbour.[36]
However, the same basic structure is found. William Peverel's manor of
Wollaton, for example, is enrolled in four consecutive paragraphs. The first
relates to the centre of the estate in Wollaton itself, and it is followed by a
berewick in Cossall and two parcels of sokeland in Bramcote and Sutton
(Passeys). The value of the whole estate, 100 shillings in 1066 and 60
shillings in 1086, is recorded in the first entry.[37]
There are, of course, as elsewhere, irregularities which arise from the
exigencies of procedural convenience. Thus, in Ralf son of Hubert's breve no. 13, Leofric's manor in Barton
(-in-Fabis) is separated from its berewick and soke in Clifton and the two
Chilwells by another manor in Barton.[38]
Geographical association may have prompted the enrolment of the second entry at
this point. But it is more likely that it was, in its own way, also a dependent
of Leofric's estate and was therefore entered as a manorial appurtenance.[39]
Soke entries which are widely separated in the text from the manorial caput, however, may betoken the absence
of a seigneurial return, that is, an account of each estate furnished by the
tenant-in-chief to aid the Domesday commissioners, or accidental omission.
Thus, soke of Bulwell in Watnall is separated from the manor by twenty entries,
but was presumably enrolled after two manors in the same vill because the
scribe did not have an account of the appurtenances of Bulwell before him. He
therefore proceeded on a geographical basis, whether from a geld list or oral
presentation.[40]
The soke of Wysall in (King's) Thorpe and Willoughby was apparently forgotten
and only subsequently added to the foot of the column with a sign to indicate
its proper position.[41]
Compound soke entries. in which a large number of parcels of land are described
together, are also found in the Nottinghamshire folios. As elsewhere in circuit
6, they are usually, although not exclusively, associated with large estates of
the terra regis[42]
and, characterised by a geld total for the whole area - individual assessments
are often later interlineations [43]-
they appear to take their form from the administration of the estate. Thus,
soke of the bishop of Lincoln's manor of Newark is described in three entries
which comprise one, seven, and nine separate parcels of land in three distinct
areas of the wapentake of Newark.[44] It
is likely, then, that the source for this type of entry is entirely different
from that of the more usual entries.[45]
Finally, manor and berewick are occasionally described in a single entry,
although the identification of inland is usually postscriptal.[46]
This device is the norm in the Roteland
and Derbyshire folios and is more a reflection of the structure of local
government than significant differences in the nature or management of estates.[47]
Within
the basic textual group of the manor, again in common with all the shires of
the circuit, there are distinctive forms. Various calligraphic devices and
diplomatic formulas are employed, in addition to, or instead of, the explicit
record of relationship, to distinguish the status of individual parcels of
land. The most obvious is the use of Lombardic capital letters - M for manerium, B for berewita, and S for soca [48]-
which are prefixed to almost all entries (figure 1). Exceptions, often later
additions to the text, may indicate uncertainty of status, if not simple
omission. Roger de Bully, for example, held an estate in Fenton with sake and
soke, but without a hall.[49] The
absence of a marginal M may reflect this apparent contradiction. By way of
contrast, it was merely omitted in the description of six manors at the end of
William Peverel's breve for they are
a later addition to the text.[50]
Generally, however, marginal letters are consistently used, as in the
Derbyshire, Huntingdonshire and Roteland
folios, and the usage is therefore contrasted with those of the Yorkshire and
Lincolnshire accounts in which various formulas were employed in turn.[51]
Less apparent, but a no less significant, differentiating device is the
treatment of initial letters and identifying place-names. All manorial entries
begin with a statement 'In x, y habuit z carucatas terre ad geldum' (figure 1). The description of Walter
de Aincurt's manor of Staunton, for example, begins 'M. In STANTUNE habuit Tori
x. bouatas terre ad geldum'.[52] The
initial I is square in form and shaded in red ink, and the place-name is written
in large rustic letters and rubricated. By way of contrast, B and S entries
usually begin 'In x, z carucate terre ad geldum'. Thus, soke
of the manor of Staunton in Alverton, Flawborough and Dallington commences with
the statement 'In Alureton et Flodberge et Dallintune vi. bouate terre ad
geldum'.[53]
The initial I is rustic in form and the place-name is in no way distinguish-ed
from the rest of the text. These conventions of letter form are clearly used
with purpose for initial I's are occasionally changed from one type to the
other.[54]
Deviations from the norm, then, are evidently significant and probably indicate
anomalies in status. Queen Edith, for example, held a manor in Oakham with five
berewicks, assessed at four carucates, and Leofnoth a second manor in the same
vill which was rated at one carucate.[55] Both
entries are manorial in form. The second, however, has a rustic initial I and a
note is appended to it recording that the whole manor, with the berewicks, was
three leagues in length and one league and eight furlongs in breadth.
Leofnoth's manor, then, was clearly considered to be part of Queen Edith's
estate, to which the berewicks belonged, and the form of the initial I seems to
indicate its inferior status as a dependent of the larger manor. Similar
examples, although less well-documented, can be found in the Nottinghamshire
folios.[56]
By way of contrast, William Peverel's berewick of Wollaton in Cossall appears
to have undergone an upward change in status for the place-name of the entry is
identical in form to that of a manorial counterpart.[57]
Figure 1: DB i,
f.287a,b, the land of William Peverel.
The
distinctive character of different types of entry is emphasised by the
information that they provide. Manorial entries record the TRE tenant and the
value of the estate in the time of King Edward and in 1086. Berewick and soke
entries, however, only record this information in special circumstances, and
then but rarely in the Nottinghamshire folios, for manorial appurtenances
usually belonged to the lord's hall.[58] In
forinsec soke entries - that is, a type of entry in which the land was held by
one tenant-in-chief, while its soke was enjoyed by another - the record of a
holder in 1066 identifies the soke lord. Thus, (Earl) Algar is recorded as the
lord of sokeland in Willoughby (in the Wolds), but he clearly only had its
soke, probably in (Upper) Broughton.[59] But
this convention is more common in Lincolnshire than Nottinghamshire where an
explicit statement of relationship is usually made. Walter de Aincurt, for
example, held sokeland in Fiskerton, Morton and Farnsfield, but the soke is
said to belong to the archbishop of York's manor of Southwell.[60]
In other contexts, the record of a TRE tenant of sokeland indicates some degree
of independence from the administrative machine of the manor. Soke of the royal
estate of Arnold in Gonalston, for example, was in some way the right of Ernwin
and four sokemen who are recorded as the tenants in 1066.[61]
A separate value for a parcel of sokeland, whether intentionally or
incidentally, performs much the same function. As conventional sums, the valet and valuit figures are clearly farms,[62] and
therefore imply a separate unit of management.[63]
Thus, twenty sokemen in Leverton in the soke of Oswaldbeck rendered 20
shillings in consuetudines and were
therefore probably otherwise free of manorial exactions.[64]
All
three types of entry, however, invariably contain a record of geld assessment,
and commonly of teamlands, teams in demesne, population and ploughs.[65]
Throughout the Nottinghamshire folios, the three main classes of peasant are
recorded in a standard order of sokemen, villeins, and bordars. Slaves, where
they appear, follow villeins or are relegated to the manorial stock. The amount
of land held by the intra-manorial sokeman, as measured by assessment to the
geld, is not universally recorded, but the information is found throughout the
county survey. These characteristics of the record of population, along with
the consistent use of marginal M, B, and S, are in marked contrast with the
usage of the first half of the Lincolnshire text. There, it would seem, the
Domesday scribe, or a predecessor, experimented with various devices to
indicate the separate status of sokemen and sokeland. In manorial entries,
peasants are listed in the order of villeins, bordars and sokemen, and the land
of sokemen, although sometimes recorded in terms of carucates or teams, is
usually not readily distinguishable from that of the villeins. The record of
soke exhibits similar fluidity of diplomatic and form. Sokemen are invariably
listed first, but marginal S is not used consistently until breve, no. 18 and various formulas are
used in its stead. It is only from breve
no. 24, f.355a, that all uncertainties are dispelled and the scribe adopts the
conventions that are found in the Nottinghamshire folios.[66]
The Yorkshire Domesday exhibits a similar fluidity of form which is never
satisfactorily resolved.[67] The
baldness of the Nottinghamshire text, then, is probably a result of its
compilation after the ad hoc
emergence of satisfactory formulas in the early stages of composition.[68]
Economic
assets, such as woodland, meadow, pasture, fisheries, and willow beds, occur in
most entries. Mills and churches, however, are found predominantly in manorial
entries. This pattern may reflect a seigneurial monopoly, especially in the
case of mills,[69]
but it is more likely to be a function of the selective processes of the
Domesday enquiry.[70]
The Roteland Domesday, although appended to
the Nottinghamshire account, forms a separate section in the text.[71]
The preamble to the description of the area, however, indicates that it was
integrated into the administration of the shire. The wapentakes of Martinsley
and Alstoe, of which it was composed, belonged to the sheriffdom of Nottingham,
and half of Alstoe gelded in Broxtow and half in Thurgarton.[72]
It can, then, be legitimately studied as part of the Nottinghamshire Domes-day.
Its interest and importance lies in two areas. First, it contains a record of
its liability to the geld in terms of twelve-carucate hundreds and is therefore
of great significance to an understanding of the carucation of Nottinghamshire.[73]
Second, and uniquely in the Exchequer Domesday, it is geographically arranged.[74]
As such, it provides an invaluable key to the procedure of the Nottinghamshire
Domesday and the structure of its local government machinery. In all other
respects, the form of the Roteland
text is the same as that of Nottinghamshire folios.
These,
then, are the basic characteristics of the text. In the following analysis of
the Nottinghamshire Domesday the importance of an understanding of the
structure and stratigraphy of each breve
will become apparent. It would be inappropriate, however, to discuss the form
of each section of the text in the detail required before the data can be used
with confidence. But the basic method is illustrated in figure 2. In each breve a record is made of all essential
details of every entry - entry number, wapentake number, status as indicated by
Domesday Book, TRE holders, TRW tenant - along with non-standard relationships
and anomalous forms and information. Duplication and postscriptal material are
carefully noted.
Figure 2: breve no. 10, the lands of William Peverel
NO |
WP |
STA |
VILL |
TRE TENANT |
TRW TENANT |
ANOMALOUS INFORMATION |
1 |
4 |
M |
Colwick |
Godric |
Waland |
Waland holds |
2. |
1 |
2M |
Sibthorpe |
Leofwin |
Robert |
|
3 |
4 |
M |
Gonalston, Milton |
Wulfsi cilt |
|
|
4 |
5 |
M |
Thrumpton |
Staplewin |
|
|
5 |
5 |
M |
Clifton |
Countess Gytha |
|
|
6 |
5 |
|
ibid. |
Ulfkell |
Ulfkell |
deleted; equivalent to 30,25 |
7 |
5 |
|
Barton |
|
|
addition to margin |
8 |
5 |
S |
Wilford |
|
|
|
9 |
5 |
S |
West Bridgeford |
|
|
|
10 |
5 |
S |
Normanton, Keyworth |
|
|
individual assessments interlined |
|
6 |
|
Willoughby, Stanton |
|
|
Willoughby equivalent to 30,25 |
11 |
6 |
S |
Costock |
|
|
|
12 |
5 |
|
Adbolton |
|
|
addition |
13 |
5 |
S |
Bassingfield |
|
|
|
14 |
5 |
S |
Gamston |
|
|
|
15 |
6 |
M |
Radford |
Aelfric |
Wulfnoth |
Wulfnoth holds 1 bov. thaneland |
16 |
6 |
4M |
Stapleford |
Wulfsi cilt |
[Robert] |
|
|
|
|
|
Staplewin |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Godwin |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Gladwin |
|
|
17 |
6 |
M |
Morton |
Bovi |
|
|
18 |
6 |
M |
Newbound |
Morcar |
|
|
19 |
6 |
S |
Lenton |
|
|
|
20 |
6 |
3M |
Linby |
3 brothers |
|
|
21 |
6 |
|
Papplewick |
|
|
5 bov. belong to this manor; addition |
|
|
|
|
|
|
to blank line? |
22 |
6 |
M |
Basford |
Alwin |
Saxfrid |
|
23 |
6 |
M |
ibid. |
Aswulf |
|
deleted; equivalent to 52 and 30,28; |
|
|
|
|
|
|
in custody of William Peverel |
24 |
6 |
M |
Lenton |
Wulfnoth |
Wulfnoth |
in custody of William Peverel |
25 |
6 |
M |
Toton |
Haldane |
Warner |
|
26 |
6 |
S |
Chilwell |
|
|
equivalent to 13,5 |
27 |
6 |
M |
Strelley |
Godric |
Godwin |
Godwin [the priest] has one plough |
|
|
|
|
|
|
from William Peverel |
28 |
6 |
M |
ibid. |
Brown |
Ambrose |
Ambrose holds from William |
29 |
6 |
M |
Greasley |
Wulfsi |
|
|
30 |
6 |
M |
ibid. |
Wulfsi |
waste |
Alric holds from William |
31 |
6 |
M |
Brinsley |
Brown |
Alric |
Alric has one plough under William |
32 |
6 |
M |
Eastwood |
Ulfketel |
waste |
William has charge; value TRE only |
33 |
6 |
M |
Newthorpe |
Grimkell |
waste |
equivalent to 62-3? |
34 |
6 |
3M |
Beeston |
Alfheah |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Alwin |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Ulfkell |
|
|
35 |
6 |
M |
Wollaton |
Wulfsi cilt |
Warner |
|
36 |
6 |
B |
Cossall |
|
|
place-name manorial in form |
37 |
6 |
S |
Bramcote |
|
waste |
|
38 |
6 |
S |
Sutton |
|
waste |
equivalent to 30,55 |
39 |
6 |
2M |
Bilborough |
Alric |
Ambrose |
|
|
|
|
|
Wulfsi Swein |
|
|
40 |
6 |
M |
Nuthall |
Haldane |
|
|
41 |
6 |
|
Broxtow |
|
|
|
42 |
6 |
S |
Watnall |
|
|
|
43 |
6 |
M |
Watnall |
Grimkell |
|
no value given |
44 |
6 |
M |
Watnall |
Siward |
|
no value given |
45 |
6 |
S |
ibid. |
Grim |
|
|
46 |
6 |
S |
ibid. |
Aelmer |
Jocelyn |
value, of 43-6?; soke of 66; Jocelyn |
|
|
|
|
|
Grimkell |
and Grimkell hold, 43-6? |
47 |
6 |
M |
Kimberley |
Azor |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Grimketel |
|
|
48 |
6 |
M |
ibid., [Awsworth] |
Alwin |
waste |
no value; 'William has charge' add. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
equivalent to 30,33? |
49 |
6 |
M |
Hucknall |
2 brothers |
|
|
50 |
6 |
S |
Hempshill |
|
|
soke of 66 and 43 or 44 |
51 |
6 |
2M |
Basford |
Alfheah |
Payne |
|
|
|
|
|
Algot |
[Saxfrid] |
|
52 |
6 |
|
ibid. |
Aswulf |
|
addition and equivalent to 23 and |
|
|
|
|
|
|
30,28 |
53 |
6 |
M |
Costock |
Fredegis |
Godwin |
Godwin has under William |
54 |
6 |
M |
Rempstone |
Fredegis |
|
|
55 |
7 |
2M |
Radcliffe |
Fredegis |
Fredegis |
Fredegis and Wulfgeat have under |
|
|
|
|
|
Wulfgeat |
William |
56 |
7 |
M |
Adbolton |
Godwin the |
|
|
|
|
|
|
priest |
|
|
57 |
7 |
M |
Tithby |
Wulfric |
Fredegis |
Fredegis has under William |
58 |
7 |
M |
Wiverton |
Wulfric |
|
|
59 |
7 |
M |
Langar |
Godric |
|
|
60 |
7 |
S |
Wiverton |
|
|
|
61 |
7 |
M |
Barnstone |
Godric |
|
each had a hall |
|
|
|
|
Azor |
|
|
62 |
6 |
M |
Newthorpe |
Grimkell |
waste |
no value; duplicated in 33? |
63 |
6 |
B |
ibid. |
|
waste |
berewick of 47 |
64 |
2 |
|
Manton |
Alwin |
|
addition; held for 2 manors |
|
|
|
|
Wulfgeat |
|
|
65 |
6 |
|
Selston |
Wulfmer |
|
addition; held for 3 manors |
|
|
|
|
Gladwin |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Wulfric |
|
|
66 |
6 |
|
Bulwell |
Godric |
|
addition; held for a manor |
NOTES 1. NO = number of entry; WP =
wapentake: 1. Newark, 2. Bassetlaw, 3. Lythe, 4. Thurgarton, 5. Rushcliffe,
6. Broxtow, 7. Bingham, and 8. Oswaldbeck; for the significance of the order,
see chapter 3; STA = status of land. |
[1] DB i, f.280a-293b. To facilitate the identification of individual
entries, reference will be made to Notts
DB which incorporates the Farley edition, but also numbers each entry.
References to the borough are prefixed by the letter B, and passages in the
body of the text are cited by breve
and entry numbers separated by a comma. Subsequent entries in the same chapter
follow a semi-colon and entries in other breves
a full-stop. Thus, Notts. DB, 5,4;7.
7,5 refers to entries number four and eight, the manors of Laneham and Sutton,
in breve number 5, the land of the
archbishop of York, and entry number five, the manor of Rolleston, in breve number seven, the land of the
bishop of Bayeux. The Phillimore editions of the Derbyshire, Yorkshire,
Huntingdonshire, Northamptonshire, and Rutland Domesdays have also been
employed, and the same conventions, prefixed by the relevant abbreviation, have
been adopted for all references. Lincs.
DB, has been used for Lincolnshire. Throughout, however, the author has
preferred his own translations, for the rendering of technical terms into
modern English in the Phillimore editions is confusing rather than
enlightening. However, the text has been quoted where the sense of a passage is
not clear, or a term used is of especial importance. Despite the use of easily
available editions, it has nevertheless proved necessary to consult the text
itself at all points, for the hand displays variations that could not be
faithfully reproduced in record type. With restricted access to the manuscript
itself, reference is therefore made to the currently (1986) available facsimile
edition of Domesday Book, published by the Ordnance Survey between 1861 and
1863. The photozincographic process employed provides a silhouette rather than
a true representation of light and shade, and consequently does not reveal
rulings or pen-strokes. Domesday Book
Rebound, PRO, London 1954, has been used for the general characteristics of
the text.
[2] DB i, f.293c-294a; Rutland DB,
notes; C. Phythian-Adams, 'Rutland Reconsidered', Mercian Studies, ed. A. Dornier, Leicester 1977, 63-84. Roteland will be used throughout to
refer to the area encompassed by the two Domesday wapentakes in order to
distinguish it from the county of Rutland which only came into existence in the
twelfth century.
[3] Notts. DB, B; Derbys. DB, B.
[4] D. Crook, 'The Establishment of the Derbyshire County Court, 1256', DAJ 103, (1983), 98-106; D. R. Roffe, The Derbyshire Domesday, Darley Dale
1986, 18.
[5] Notts. DB, S.
[6] See chapter 5.
[7] Notts. DB, L. Breves 1-30. The Nottinghamshire list of
tenants-in-chief is one of the few that actually tallies with the text itself.
Discrepancies are common in other counties. St. Mary of York, for example,
appears as a tenant-in-chief in the Yorkshire list, but there is no
corresponding breve in the text (Yorks. DB, L.). The indices copied into the
Exchequer text probably pre-date the compilation of Domesday and may emanate
from a very early stage in the enquiry.
[8] Yorks. DB, L.
[9] Notts. DB, L; VCH Notts. i, 216; Yorks. DB, L.
[10] It is claimed in VCH Notts.
i, 234, that the king's thanes held their lands on conditions of tenure very
similar to those which had prevailed generally over the county in the time of
King Edward. This is unlikely. It is clear that they were not of high status
after the Conquest, and their fees are almost all represented by modest
sergeancies in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. But they were clearly of a
higher status than many of the thanes who appear in the breves of the tenants-in-chief, for they held directly of the king
rather than of a local magnate. Whether the king's thanes held their estates by
book, or on less advantageous terms, is not apparent. See chapters 4 and 5.
[11] Domesday Book Rebound is a
basic source for any palaeographical investigation of the text, and the
evidence has recently been reviewed by A. R. Rumble, 'The Palaeography of the
Domesday Manuscripts', Domesday Book: a
Reassessment, ed. P. H. Sawyer, London 1985. But there has been little work
on the minutiae of entry formation and the relationship between layout and
sources.
[12] See, for example, Lincs. DB,
1/9, where details of the estate when received are given. This information is
required by the articles of the enquiry (see chapter 3), but is rarely given in
circuit 6 except in the account of terra
regis and the boroughs. The account of Nottingham provides a particularly
good example of the 'three period' approach, combined with a rather clumsy
attempt at compilation. See chapter 7.
[13] S. Harvey, 'Domesday Book and Anglo-Norman Governance', TRHS, 5th ser. 25, (1975), 178; R. W.
Finn, The Liber Exoniensis, London
1964, 40, 145. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle account of the genesis of the enquiry
(ASC, 161-2), draws a sharp
distinction between the survey of the lands of the king and of his men, and it
is thus possible that the reference to two surveys, one checking the findings
of the other, made by Bishop Robert of Hereford, obliquely alludes to separate
inquests with different aims (W. H. Stevenson, 'A Contemporary Description of
the Domesday Survey', EHR 22, (1907),
72-84). If, as seems likely (see chapter 3), the account of the royal estate
and soke of Roteland is taken
directly from the initial survey, the king would appear to have been primarily
concerned with the normal annual income of the crown which came from his
estates, soke dues, and geld, that is, in the words of the Anglo-Saxon
Chronicle, 'what dues he ought to have in twelve months from the shire'.
[14] MDB, 29 and passim.
[15] Notts. DB, 11,13.
[16] See chapter 3.
[17] Notts. DB, 10,64-6.
[18] In all three entries land is said to be held for so many manors (pro .ii. maneriis). This formula is rare
in the Nottinghamshire folios, but ubiquitous in the Yorkshire Domesday which
was probably one of the first counties to be compiled (Rumble, 'Palaeography',
36). Its use in William Peverel's breve
therefore suggests that the scribe was not following his normal practice. He
may have taken the phrase from an early recension, or merely reverted to the
non-standard form in a fit of absent-mindedness. For further discussion of the
significance of the formula, see chapter 5.
[19] See chapter 4.
[20] Notts. DB, 5,12. 1,33.
[21] Many subtle changes can often be seen in the hand, but it is usually
difficult to assign any great significance to them. Slight differences in the
alignment of margins, despite rulings, and variations in the size of the script
may merely attest to the scribe resuming his labours after a short ale or mead
break.
[22] Notts. DB, 30,39.
[23] D. R. Roffe, 'The Lincolnshire Hundred', Landscape History 3, (1981), 29.
[24] Lincs. DB, breve no. 12.
[25] Lincs. DB, 21/1-3.
[26] Lincs. DB, 18/1; L3/3,17.
Saxilby is not named in the Lincolnshire text, but it is clear from the Lindsey
Survey that the description of the vill is subsumed in the various entries
identified as Ingleby.
[27] See chapter 4. Blank lines are common in the Lincolnshire folios and
were apparently left with the intention of distinguishing different types of
estate (see Appendix 2). The most demonstrable example occurs in breve no. 68 which is entitled 'The land
of Sortebrand and other thanes'. It is divided into three distinct sections (Lincs. DB, 68/1-4; 68/5-15; 68/16-48).
The first two are separated by a one line space. The third begins at the top of
the next column, but is indicated by an enlarged initial capital I. The
division so defined corresponds to the original intention of the scribe of the
Exchequer text, or of some earlier version for, according to the list of
tenants-in-chief at the beginning of the description of the county, breve no. 68 was to be entirely devoted
to the land of Sortebrand. It was to be followed by no. 69, the land of
Chetelbern and others, which actually appears as the second section of no. 68,
and finally by no. 70, the land of the king's thanes, which is in fact the
third section of the same breve (Lincs. DB, p.14). There were three
entirely different fees, then, and the space between sections one and two was
clearly intended to distinguish them. The same convention was widely used in
the Lincolnshire Domesday, and the resulting blank lines were occasionally
employed to enroll postscriptal material such as wapentake rubrics.
[28] Notts. DB, 1,30. 18,6.
[29] With a root meaning of 'a residence', it was a nexus of tribute rather
than an integrated economic unit of lord's demesne and peasant holdings. The
term aula, 'hall', which is
occasionally used as a synonym in Domesday Book, is closer to the concept. The
articles of the enquiry recorded in the Inquisitio
Eliensis ask for the name of the manor (mansio)
in preference to that of the vill because it was through the institution that
seigneurial wealth was accumulated. See chapter 5.
[30] TMS, 31-2.
[31] Stenton, who first drew attention to the problem (TMS, 46-9), coined the term 'inter-manorial'. This is misleading
for the sokemen in question appear to be 'within' rather than 'between', and
therefore 'intra-manorial' has been preferred.
[32] Chronicon Petroburgense, ed.
T. Stapleton, London 1849, 157-83.
[33] Lincs. DB, 8/17, 18.
[34] Chronicon Petroburgense, 164.
[35] Roffe, 'The Lincolnshire Hundred', 31. Entry formation and its
relationship with the twelve-carucate hundred is discussed in chapter 3.
[36] Roffe, Derbyshire Domesday,
8-10. In the Yorkshire folios manorial entries also predominate on account of
the large number of small holdings in the king's breve which are described as manors. This type of estate has not
been studied, but is it possible that it is of a form that would be represented
in other counties as sokeland. Cf. Lincs.
DB, 51/3 where five sokemen appear to have held manors. Elsewhere in the
Yorkshire Domesday, there are as many berewick and sokeland entries as in
Lincolnshire.
[37] Notts. DB, 10,35-8.
[38] Notts. DB, 13,1-4.
[39] See chapter 4.
[40] Notts. DB, 10,46; 66.
[41] Notts. DB, 9,90; 91; 93. The
separate enrolment of manorial appurtenances may also reflect arrangements for
the exploitation of land which were not always coincident with the structure of
the manor as tributary nexus. See chapter 9.
[42] See, for example, Notts. DB,
1,24. The terra regis stood outside
of the network of twelve-carucate hundreds, the eleventh-century equivalent of
the vill, and entries were therefore not formulated by reference to the
institution. See chapters 3 and 6.
[43] See, for example, Notts. DB,
6,4.
[44] Notts. DB, 6,2-4.
[45] See chapter 3.
[46] Notts. DB, 5,1; 3; 4; 7.
[47] Rutland DB, R7; 17; 19; 20; Derbys. DB, passim; see chapter 3. In the Derbyshire folios entries encompass
such large areas of land that the names of individual nuclei, invariably called
berewicks although almost certainly parcels of sokeland, are named in
considerable detail to clarify the survey (D. R. Roffe, 'Introduction', Domesday Book: Derbyshire, ed. A.
Williams, forthcoming 1987). In only one case are manor and inland enrolled in
the same entry in the Lincolnshire folios (Lincs.
DB, 1/65), but, as in Yorkshire, berewick and soke are sometimes combined
(Roffe, 'Lincolnshire Hundred', 33).
[48] In the Huntingdonshire folios there are two instances of a marginal
Lombardic T, which probably stands for tainagium
or tainland, thanage or thaneland, a
tenure which is recorded in Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire, and Derbyshire (Hunts. DB, 19,9; 16; Notts. DB, 10,15; Yorks. DB, 1Y, 15; Derbys. DB,
6, 48), rather than terra, as
suggested by Stenton and C. Hart (VCH
Hunts i, 323-4; C. Hart, 'The Church of St. Mary of Huntingdon', Proceedings of the Cambridge Antiquarian
Society 59, (1966), 107n; see also R. W. Finn, An Introduction to Domesday Book, London 1963, 49n.). In TMS, 15-17, it is argued that the
Northern Danelaw references are mistakes for inland. But there were tenures in the North of a similar precarious
kind which were directly comparable to thanage. See chapters 4 and 5 for a
discussion of the status of the pre-Conquest holders of land in the
Nottinghamshire Domesday.
[49] Notts. DB, 9,113.
[50] Notts. DB, 10,64-6.
[51] In the Yorkshire Domesday the cumbersome pro manerio formula is initially employed instead of the marginal
M, but is soon replaced by x habuit unum
manerium. M, B, and S, although intermittently found before, are only used
with any consistency from breve no.
8. In Lincolnshire, M is found from the start, but a wide variety of phrases
were used to identify inland and soke. The scribe was clearly experimenting in
order to find the best expression, and it is often apparent that he was
attempting to capture subtle nuances of status. After f.355a, however, he
abandoned his uncertainty and adopted the conventions found in the
Nottinghamshire folios.
[52] Notts. DB, 11,2.
[53] Notts. DB, 11,3.
[54] Notts. DB, 13,2. 17,12. The
same characteristic is also found in Derbyshire and Lincolnshire.
[55] Rutland DB, R17; 18.
[56] Notts. DB, 6,11-12. 14,5-6.
13,2.
[57] Notts. DB, 10,36.
[58] TMS, 31-2.
[59] Notts. DB, 30,26. The soke
is, postscriptally, said to belong to Thorpe (-in-the-Glebe). The vill is only
recorded in two other contexts. In the first, it is a berewick of Broughton,
while in the second it is called 'the king's Thorpe' (Notts. DB, 1,60. 9,91). The whole settlement was evidently closely
related to Earl Algar's estate in Broughton.
[60] Notts. DB, 11,15-17. 5,1.
Forinsec soke in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire is normally duplicated in the breve of the soke lord. See Appendix 1.
[61] Notts. DB, 30,49. Many parcels
of sokeland were probably held by tenants who are not recorded in the text. It
is only the exceptional tenancies that are noted. See chapter 9.
[62] See chapter 5.
[63] TMS, 31-4.
[64] Notts. DB, 1,32.
[65] Waste usually, although not always, has a record of geld assess-ment
only; see chapter 6. Manorialisation of sokeland is discussed in chapter 9.
[66] Roffe, 'Lincolnshire Domesday', 31.
[67] Yorks. DB. There has been no
detailed study of the diplomatic of the text since The Domesday Geography of Northern England, eds H. C. Darby, I. S.
Maxwell, Cambridge 1962, 233-6, 456-94.
[68] See also Rumble, 'Palaeography', 36. By the same token, both Roteland and Derbyshire would appear to
be later compositions.
[69] Mill soke was an important manorial asset in some parts of the country
(TMS, 36-7).
[70] D. R. Roffe, 'Domesday Book and the Local Historian', The Nottinghamshire Historian 37,
(1986), 3-5; Roffe, Derbyshire Domesday,
19-20. See chapters 3 and 9.
[71] Rutland DB.
[72] Rutland DB, R1-3.
[73] See chapter 3.
[74] An incomplete list of landholders is appended to the index of
tenants-in-chief in the Nottinghamshire folios (Notts. DB, L), but the text was never seigneurially arranged,
although a half-hearted attempt was made to associate the lands of each
tenant-in-chief by identifying them with marginal Roman numerals (Rutland DB, R1; 9; 10 and notes).