10. NOTTINGHAMSHIRE
AND THE NORTH
Little is known about the history of
Nottinghamshire before the arrival of the Danes. The area of the later county
was a part of Mercia from the seventh century, and there is no evidence to
suggest that it ever had a distinct identity in the time of the Heptarchy.[2]
Nevertheless, the region was probably of some importance for it was situated on
the north-east frontier of the kingdom. Commanding access to the heart of the
Midlands from Northumbria, it was evidently a key strategic march in the
rivalry between Mercia and the northern kings, several decisive battles were
fought on or within the bounds of the later county.[3]
Within this context, it might be supposed that the kings of Mercia maintained a
tight grip upon the area. Many of the large sokes which are described in Domesday
Book must have been important royal estates at this time.[4] The
roots of the pronounced royal presence of the mid tenth century are probably to
be found in a concentration of interests by the Middle Saxon period.
There is no documentary evidence to
illustrate the role of any settlement in the vicinity of Nottingham in this
period, but the archaeological record suggests that it was an estate centre of
some importance. Extensive excavations in the last fifteen years in the area of
the English Borough have brought to light a complex sequence of enclosures,
defences and, in the later phases, a related intra-mural road system (figure
19). But, while the relative chronology of development is now well established,[5]
absolute dating has proved more elusive on account of the almost complete
absence of stratigraphy and lack of closely dateable artefacts. The earliest
Dark Age features on the site are the probably defensive ditches of an
enclosure to the east end of the mediaeval settlement towards Sneinton, commanding
a shallow valley which led down through the cliff and thence to the Trent. This
was succeeded by settlement on the south side of the English Borough, which may
have been bounded by a system of small ditches, and possibly extended over the
cliff - perhaps no more than a steep slope at this time - to the lower levels
at its foot. The present church of St Mary is situated within this area on the
northern side. The relationship is suggestive, but, as we have seen,[6]
no evidence has come to light to demonstrate a pre-Danish origin for this
church. Settlement here was superceded by the construction of the first phase
of the English Borough, demonstrably a plantation which was defended by a
substantial timber rampart some 25 feet wide, fronted by a large ditch. Despite
the difficulties of dating, it seems likely that it was within this
fortification that the Danish army was besieged in 868.[7] It is
perhaps less likely, however, that the system was the work of the invaders for
its overall scale at this date in Mercia is unparalleled and almost certainly
beyond the resources and needs of the Danes at this time. Considerable
organisation and wealth clearly lie behind its construction, and the kings of
Mercia were probably the only power in the area that could effect such a
massive project. The borough was probably built in response to a threat from
the North, and may have been a reaction to Viking attacks. The only record of
Danish incursions in the area before 868 was a raid in Lindsey in 841 and a
major battle in the North in 844 when the king of Northumbria was killed.[8]
But the chronicles for this period all have a southern bias, and their authors
were clearly uninformed, and probably uninterested, in events in the North. The
situation may have been a lot less stable than the sources suggest, and Mercia
may have taken appropriate steps to defend its borders. At any event, as we
have seen, the archaeological evidence indicates that this was not the first
settlement in the area. The existence of earlier defences, however modest,
imply that Nottingham was already an important royal estate centre.
There is abundant evidence to show
that the Danish settlement in the East Midlands was extensive at this period.
From 914 the Chronicle makes reference to Danes who owed allegiance to boroughs
from their lands in the surrounding countryside, and sometime between 901 and
911 Edward the Elder and Ealdorman Æthelred of Mercia were encouraging the
English to buy land from the colonists.[14] The
large number of Danish place-names in the area indicates the extent of Danish
control of estates, if not necessarily the numbers of settlers.[15] The
initial settlement was almost certainly confined to the seizure of large
estate centres, the sokes of the East Midlands. The resources of an area could
easily be tapped by control of the more important tributary nexi. Less certain
is the extent to which Danish clients and dependents were settled within these
estates in the late ninth century, but it was probably a protracted process.
The dominance of personal name elements in the Danish place-names of the region
suggests that an unprecedented degree of lordship developed in the hundred years
after the colonisation.[16] The
ordered division of sokes element by element, however, may imply that the
process was originated in a grant of dues in a central court. Only subsequently
was this arrangement fossilised in the tenure of land itself with the localisation
of interests. Whatever the chronology, it was evidently not a settlement of
completely independent Danish warriors or colonists. The preservation of the
overall form of sokes within the new estates, and their apparent tenurial unity
in 1066, suggests that the jarls who controlled the major estate centres
retained a residual interest in the land of their compatriots. Indeed, the
vestigial survival of certain dues, such as ecclesiastical tithes, over large
areas may be a direct survival of such lordship.[17] The
impact of Danish colonisation on the development of distinctive tenurial forms
in the East Midlands, then, has probably been exaggerated. The settlement
clearly accelerated the fragmentation of sokes, a process that was already
under way in the ninth century,
but did not
introduce any radically new
forms.[18]
Since Mercia had extended to the
Humber, it might be supposed that the region had been settled by the southern
army for Guthrum appears to have ruled the whole of the kingdom north of Watling
Street.[19]
Nevertheless, it seems likely that the initiative had come from the Danes of
York, or at least that the settlers in the East Midlands had very quickly come
under their hegemony. The Chronicle of Æthelweard records that in 894 the
Northumbrian Danes 'possessed' or 'ravaged (pandunt)
large tracts of land to the west of Stamford between the thickets of Kesteven
and the waters of the Welland'.[20] The
area referred to is what was later known as Rutland, and, although the precise
reading of the manuscript is now irrecoverable, it is clear that the Danes of
York had considerable influence in this area.[21]
Stenton suggested that South Lincolnshire had been annexed in the previous year
when Sigeferth piraticus had raided
the east coast,[22]
but recent research has shown that this annal refers to a raid on Wessex.[23]
There is, then, no reason to believe that the
connection with York
was of recent occurrence. Again,
in 909 Edward the Elder launched a raid into Lindsey in which the body of St
Oswald was taken and removed to Gloucester. The A version of the Chronicle,
while omitting any reference to the saint, describes the same operation as a
raid on the host in the North.[24]
Clearly Lindsey was part of Northumbria in the early tenth century. There is no
specific reference to Nottinghamshire at this time. But if Northumbrian Danes
held land as far south as the Welland, it is likely that they also controlled
the more northerly areas of Danish settlement. Indeed, the implicit reference
to Roteland may indicate that this
estate, an integral part of the county in the later tenth century, was already
attached to Nottingham at this time, within the political sphere of York.
Two chronicle references, then,
indicate that the centre of power in the Northern Danelaw in the ninth and
early tenth centuries was York. This suggests, by implication, that there were
no independent garrisons in the five boroughs. The evidence afforded by the
Anglo-Saxon Chronicles is not inconsistent with this conclusion. Until 913 it
only speaks of two armies, the hosts of Northumbria and East Anglia. But in
that year we first hear of separate forces attached to boroughs at Leicester
and Northampton.[25]
A garrison at Derby is noted in 917 and at Stamford in 918.[26]
The city of Lincoln does not appear in the sources until 942.[27]
The precise nature and function of settlement in Nottingham at this time cannot
be determined with any degree of precision. But no tenth-century garrison is
recorded until Edward
the Elder manned it with English and Danes in 918.[28]
There is no archaeological evidence to suggest that the interior of the English
Borough was occupied between 868 and 918.[29] This
is not to say that the town was necessarily deserted, as the possibility of
some modest settlement cannot be precluded. The defences, however, fell into
such decay that extensive repairs were necessary by 918.
Comparable evidence in the area of
the five boroughs is only available from Stamford. Unlike Nottingham, there was
great activity in the town for it was an industrial centre of some considerable
importance. There is archaeological evidence for extensive metal working and a
technically advanced pottery industry which marketed its wares throughout the
region.[30]
The original nucleus of the town was a royal manor in the vicinity of St
Peter's Church which was probably a Mercian settlement in origin. This had been
defended with a double-ditched enclosure with an internal palisade sometime in
the period 850+50 years. Since no more specific dating evidence came to
light, it has not proved possible to determine whether the system was Danish or
pre-Danish. There are parallels for both possibilities.[31]
It was, however, short-lived and was quickly back-filled.[32]
The main centre of Danish occupation in the late ninth or early tenth century
was further to the east on both sides of the High Street/St Paul's Street axis.
The whole area was given over to intensive industrial activity in its two
earliest phases. Nothing is known about the form of the settlement, but the
present grid defined by Broad Street, High Street and St Mary's Street appears
to be a planned development with defences which postdates this activity. Late
ninth- or early tenth-century occupational material was found under part of the
possible rampart excavated on St George's Street. The whole complex was
probably built before 918 for it is topographically earlier than the site of
Edward the Elder's Saxon borough south of the Welland. But, as a tertiary
feature of the site, it is unlikely to be more than a few years earlier.[33]
Like Nottingham, then, there is no evidence to suggest that Stamford was a
particularly important military centre until the early years of the tenth
century.
The emergence of burghal garrisons
in the East Midlands by 913 was probably not unconnected with a power vacuum in
the North. In 910 the Northumbrian army had been badly mauled by Edward at
Tettenhall in Staffordshire, and the death of many of its leaders - two kings,
two earls and some nine barons are named - evidently left the Danes of York in
confusion.[34]
It is this lack of leadership which probably provided the occasion for the
intervention of Ragnald, the Danish leader of Norwegian Vikings from the
Western Isles, into northern politics. He seems to have had a power base in
Northumbria by 914 when he fought the first battle of Corbridge, and he may
even have held York itself.[35]
Between then and 919, however, he was in Ireland, and the Danes of York were
apparently paralysed.[36] They
evidently took no active
part in the struggle against
Edward and do not appear on the political scene until Ragnald's imminent return
in 917-919. The Danish settlers of the East Midlands, then, may have been left
to their own devices. The decisive stimulus to defend settlements, however, was
probably the campaigns of reconquest of Danish England by Edward the Elder and
Æthelflaed. By 913 they had both consolidated their control of Wessex, and
south and west Mercia by extending the network of burhs established by King Alfred, and had launched their respective
offensives across Watling Street. For the first time, the heartland of the
Danish colonists was threatened.
The fortification and garrisoning of
the Danish boroughs was probably accompanied by the introduction of measures to
raise resources for their support. It is clear that those who were settled on
rural estates owed allegiance to a central stronghold. The Chronicle records,
for example, that in 917 all those who owed allegiance to Northampton as far
north as the Welland submitted to Edward the Elder.[37]
This indicates the garrison was not confined to the borough itself. As in
Wessex, the men settled within its territory probably had to contribute to the
burghal defence. There is no evidence to suggest, however, that there was a
formal and developed system like that of the Burghal Hidage.[38]
The carucation of the Northern Danelaw has usually been seen as a particularly
Danish characteristic, and it has often been argued that it had been introduced
by the early tenth century when evidence for burghal territories is first found.[39]
However, as we have seen, carucation is intimately related to the
concept of the territorial tithing, and this type of institution is not found
before the 960's. There are good reasons for supposing that it is an
essentially English innovation.[40] An
earlier assessment is a possibility. The teamland figures of the
Northamptonshire Domesday have been interpreted as such an assessment. It is
argued that the consistent ratio between the sums and the hidage of 1086
indicate that teamlands represent an early stage in the hidation of the shire
in the eight hundreds in the south-west of the county. A consistent
relationship is less apparent in the rest of the shire, but since teamland
figures are consistently larger and frequently duodecimally based, it has been
suggested that they represent a carucation which pre-dates the conquest of the
southern Danelaw by Edward the Elder and the subsequent hidation.[41]
No satisfactory charter evidence has been adduced to substantiate this
hypothesis,[42]
and, as it stands, it is untenable. Although the fact that two sums are
mathematically related suggests that one has been derived from the other, there
is not necessarily a great time span between them, and, moreover, there is, per se, no means of determining which
came first. Just because one is larger than the other does not imply that it is
ancient. Indeed, as we have seen,[43]
in Nottinghamshire the
teamland figures exceed the carucates to the geld, but seem to relate to
a reassessment of estates, albeit notional rather than measured, between 1066
and 1086. The teamland of Lincolnshire and Derbyshire has been similarly
interpreted,[44]
and indeed there is no reason to doubt that the same was true in
Northamptonshire. In a high proportion of entries, the teamland figures are
identical with the working teams employed in 1086, and are therefore clearly
related to current agricultural reality.[45] The
teamland figures of Domesday Book, then, afford no evidence to suggest that the
Danelaw was assessed for military service in the early tenth century. Indeed,
if boroughs were only garrisoned in or shortly before 913, a well-designed and
permanent system is probably unlikely. Thus, the ease with which the borough of
Huntingdon was abandoned by the Danes for Tempsford in 917 suggests no
established territorially based militia.[46] It
seems more likely that the relationship between the Danish borough and its
defenders was a personal one at this time.[47] It
is, then, sharply contrasted with the formal organisation of the Burghal Hidage.
Events in the North Midlands in
917-20 again brought the Danes of York into the politics of the area. Just
after Easter in 917 the armies from Leicester and Northampton and 'north from
there' broke the peace and rode out to Towcester and besieged the borough.[48]
The distinction drawn between Leicester and the armies of the North is marked,
and may suggest that, as in 913, the borough acted independently.
Alternatively, it may imply that Leicester occupied some pre-eminent position
in the East Midlands. For the Wessex chronicler the forces beyond were
undifferentiated. He may thus have understood them to have been subject to a
common authority. But the annal is more likely to indicate simple ignorance of
affairs in the North. The Towcester raid opened up military possibilities for
Æthelflaed. It may have been the participation of the army of Derby that
enabled her to so easily secure the borough and its territory in July.[49]
Her advance then gathered pace. In the following year she secured possession of
Leicester by peaceful means, 'and the majority of the Danish forces that owed
allegiance to it became her subjects'.[50] It
was at this point that the people of York had promised to accept her rule, but
she died before the treaty could be ratified.[51] The
development is at first mystifying for Æthelflaed was of no apparent threat to
York at this point. However, her campaign in the previous ten years had not
been solely directed against the Danelaw. The construction of boroughs in
Staffordshire at Sergeat,
Bridgenorth, Tamworth, and Stafford in 912 and 913, and in Cheshire at
Edisbury, Weadburh, and Runcorn in
914 and 915, was as much concerned with Norse penetration into north and west
Mercia from the Cumbria coast.[52] In
this, she shared a common concern with the Danes of York. Ragnald, who had
established his leadership of the Norse invaders, had probably seized York by
914.[53]
But, although he could claim a hereditary right to the throne of Northumbria as
a grandson of Ivarr, his Norse army was
probably not so welcome to the Danes of York.[54]
Thus, on his return in 919, he had to fight for the city.[55]
His absence in Ireland, then, may have been seen as an opportunity to
re-establish a purely Danish regime. It was evidently in this context that the
Northumbrians felt it was in their interest to reach an agreement with the Lady
of the Mercians in the face of a common threat.[56] The
timing of the treaty is significant. The 918 annal suggests that negotiations
had been taking place for some time, and it therefore seems likely that Æthelflaed's
peaceable possession of Leicester and 'most of the people who owed allegiance
to it' was a direct result. By implication, the Danes of Nottingham, and
possibly Lindsey, submitted at the same time. The settlers of the East Midlands
were no doubt as hostile to a Norse regime at York as anyone, but the
initiative for the settlement came from York, and it would therefore seem that
the northern Danes were still a force to be reckoned with south of the Humber.
The death of Æthelflaed left the
alliance in temporary abeyance. But the events of the next two years suggest
that, despite problems in Mercia, Edward the Elder adopted and vigorously
pursued his sister's nordpolitik. On
hearing of her death, he left Stamford, having secured the borough and its
territory, and dashed into Mercia. He took Tamworth and all Mercia which had
owed allegiance to Æthelflaed, and all the peoples of Wales submitted to him.[57]
The exact sequence of the events that followed is not clear, but it is evident
that Edward's succession to the kingdom was not as smooth as the Wessex
chronicler implies.[58]
According to the Mercian Register, Ælfwynn, the daughter of Æthelred of Mercia
and Æthelflaed, was deprived of all authority in Mercia and was taken into
Wessex.[59]
The date of the annal is 919, but originally it may have been a continuation of
the previous entry.[60]
There was clearly an anti-Wessex party in Mercia at this time, and Edward
evidently had trouble in controlling it. As late as 921 the men of Chester
rebelled against him.[61] It
is probably for precisely this reason that there are so few references to
Æthelflaed's achievements in the southern chronicles. Her role in the
reconquest of the north was minimised to discourage any Mercian based cult
which could have fuelled separatist feeling and threatened the annexation of
the kingdom.
Presumably after some sort of
settlement, Edward then proceeded to Nottingham. He occupied the borough and
had it repaired and garrisoned by English and Danes, and all the people settled
in Mercia, both Danes and English, submitted to him.[62]
His actions at this point would appear to depart from his normal practice. He
apparently demanded no special submission from the men who owed allegiance to
the borough, and, unlike at Stamford, Hertford, and Bedford, he failed to build
a fort south of the river to secure the main lines of communication.[63]
Moreover, the reference to a garrison of English and Danes is unique. The
circumstances, however, were somewhat different. His relations with the Danes
were apparently friendly, and it is likely that he was merely picking up the
strands of Æthelflaed's policy and actively attempting to effect her
objectives. His subsequent
activities are consistent
with this conclusion. His whereabouts in the next few months are not
made explicit in the sources, but he may have been consolidating Mercia if
Ælfwynn was not expelled until 919. In the late autumn of the same year,
however, he built boroughs at Thelwell and Manchester in Cheshire and
Lancashire.[64]
Like that of his sister, his concern seems to have been to contain the Norse on
the west coast. Within this context, then, it would appear that he had reached
an understanding with the Danes at Nottingham which left him free to
consolidate Mercia, if still insecure, and launch an offensive against the
common enemy. By implication, the Northumbrian Danes were a party to this
treaty. It is evident that Nottingham was within their sphere of influence, and
Edward cannot have felt confident of the security of his eastern flank without
their co-operation.
The events of the following two
years confirm this conclusion, for it was probably a political upheaval in York
which subsequently destabilised the area and forced Edward to take more
decisive action in Nottinghamshire. In 919 Ragnald took York and the loyalty of
the garrison in Nottingham became suspect.[65]
Edward therefore returned to the town in 920, and built a borough south of the
Trent, connecting the two forts by a bridge.[66] His
actions are in sharp contrasted with those of his first visit in 918, and it
would therefore seem that, with the change of regime in York, it had become
necessary to secure the borough and the river crossing. Subsequently, it was
used as an offensive springboard, for he advanced into Derbyshire and built a
borough in the vicinity of Bakewell, and the whole of the north submitted to him.[67]
It may have been in this campaign that a borough was also built to the north of
Nottingham, possibly in Blyth or Tickhill.[68]
Nottingham, then, probably remained in the sphere of York until 920.
The return of Edward to Nottingham
marked the end of York's hegemony, if not influence, over the town and county.
The effects of the conquest were probably considerable. As already noted, there
is no archaeological evidence to suggest extensive occupation in the English
Borough in the late ninth and early tenth centuries. Unlike Lincoln and
Stamford, the borough was evidently not an important industrial centre before
the Norman Conquest. There is, for example, no trace of locally produced
pottery before the mid to late tenth century, and there is little production
before the twelfth century.[69]
Certainly before 918 or 920, Nottingham did not possess the urban attributes
normally associated with the Danelaw borough. This characteristic may be
related to the subjection of the area to York, for the town can hardly have
been of central strategic importance to the Northumbrian Danes for their
hegemony was not threatened until the campaigns of reconquest of Edward and
Æthelflaed. Since Nottingham was not situated in a prosperous region, there
were thus probably few stimuli to urbanisation. After 920, however, it probably
assumed a regional importance which had been unprecedented since the Danish
colonisation. As an 'English' borough, it guarded the main routes into Mercia
and the south, the Trent, and
the Great North Road, from Northumbria. It was probably at this time,
then, that conscious attempts were made to urbanise the settlement so that it
could function effectively as a strategic forward position. The Anglo-Saxon
Chronicle certainly indicates that Edward instituted radical changes. In 918 he
was said to have 'occupied, repaired and garrisoned' (gebetan, gesettan....mannum) the borough.[70]
The terms gesettan and mannum are usually used of boroughs that
had been recently built by Edward, and
may therefore imply the establishment, or at least the re-organisation, of the
settlement.[71]
The archaeological evidence may support this conclusion. It was probably in the
early tenth century that the ditch was re-cut and the timber rampart replaced
by a dump bank; the land behind, inside the intra-mural road, was stripped for
bank building material, and properties were laid out from the road for the
first time.[72]
Urban life in the borough, then, may only have begun in the aftermath of the
English reconquest and was probably associated with the creation of a burghal
system.[73]
If Edward's subjection of the
borough, and the measures he took to settle and garrison it, had far-reaching
implications for the settlement, the fort he built south of the Trent was
probably of quite ephemeral importance. No trace of the settlement has been
found in mediaeval sources, and even the site cannot now be positively
identified. It is, however, most likely to have been situated close to the main
road from the south in West Bridgford..[74] The
failure of the institution to develop
is in marked contrast with similar boroughs in the Danelaw. The site of the
Edwardian borough at Stamford, for example, was a suburb of the Anglo-Scandinavian
town.[75]
But its survival is unlikely to be related to its burghal origins. It may have
had its own mint in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, but this was probably
more a function of the liberties of the Abbot of Peterborough, who held much of
the land, than of its status as a borough.[76] In
every other respect, it was an integral, although subordinate, part of the
borough of Stamford. Its development, then, may have owed less to its origins
than to its proximity to the ancient nucleus of the town. Such a development at
Nottingham was less likely because the new borough south of the Trent was
physically remote from the main settlement nucleus because of the width of the
Trent flood plain. Nevertheless, there was probably still a discernible relationship
between the site and the borough in the eleventh century. Wherever it was
situated, in 1066 it clearly lay within the estate of Clifton which encompassed
all of the land to the south and east of Nottingham.[77]
It has been tentatively suggested that this manor was held by Earl Tosti before
the Conquest and was attached to an important comital holding in Nottingham
itself. It was probably through the latter that thanes were organised for the
defence of the borough, and Clifton almost certainly played a key role in the
system. The whole organisation was evidently related to royal authority
- the king seems to have enjoyed
the two pennies of both estates.[78] It
is possible, then, that there was some considerable degree of continuity of
function from the period when the two boroughs were responsible for securing
the river and the river crossing.
Despite the submission of the new
regime at York in 920, there was no permanent political settlement in the
North. Ragnald probably felt it was expedient to recognise Edward's
overlordship at this time in order to consolidate his position in Northumbria,
but he can have in no way thought of it as permanent or constricting. The North
had not been incorporated into the kingdom of England. Northumbrian autonomy
had not been overthrown.[79]
Edward's authority in the East Midlands had more substance in reality.
Nottingham, Derby, Leicester, and Stamford had submitted and were garrisoned.
Nevertheless, the close ties with the North could not be so easily severed. The
region had been associated with Northumbria for the past 50 years. The ruling
class of the area shared a common racial identity with the Danes of York, and
probably thought of themselves as northerners. In fact, although the kings of
England enjoyed their sovereignty, the links with Northumbria, both political
and institutional, remained strong for the next 150 years. Indeed, political
discontent with central government was usually expressed in terms of alliance
with York. Control of the five boroughs, then, became a persistent theme in the
relations between north and south. The area was a Trojan Horse as far as the
security of Mercia and the Southern Danelaw was concerned. In 939 and 1013, the
support of the region allowed the northerners to rapidly penetrate into the
heart of England. It is not surprising, then,
that the crown
repeatedly took steps to effect
the separation of the area from the North and ensure its loyalty. This was the
cauldron within which the distinctive institutions of the East Midlands developed.
The first few years of West Saxon
hegemony over Nottinghamshire and the East Midlands are unfortunately obscure.
Nottingham, in common with Leicester, Derby, and Stamford, was a royal borough
for it had a mint which produced coins for Athelstan,[80]
and it may have been assigned a territory for its support at this time. As we
have seen, the pattern of tolls in the East Midlands hints at an organisation
of land that precedes the shiring of the region. There is no unequivocal
evidence to demonstrate that this was established in the reign of Edward the
Elder or Athelstan, but it is at this time that mention is first made of the
restriction of trade to boroughs and the monopoly in tolls that this
arrangement entailed.[81] In
that the distribution of theloneum
highlights the importance of centres like Bakewell and Blyth/ Tickhill,[82]
it is therefore not at all unlikely that toll banlieus indicate something of
the burghal territories of the region in the early tenth century. If so, it
would appear that Nottingham controlled almost the whole of the Trent Valley
and its upland hinterland from Bycarr's Dyke through to the River Dove in what
became south Derbyshire. This pattern emphasises its primary role in the
control of the main lines of communication between Mercia and the north [83]and
suggests that Derby already had a subordinate status. Indeed, although clearly
an important economic centre - its production of coin was second to none in
the East Midlands at this time[84]
- the settlement was probably never defended, and may have been a merchantile
suburb of Nottingham.[85]
Stamford and Leicester were probably
also assigned territories at this period. Later evidence suggests that the
former controlled Kesteven and Holland, while the latter may have held sway
over substantially the area of the later shire.[86] By
way of contrast, Lincoln probably experienced a different development. The city
does not appear in the sources until 942, and it may have remained part of
Northumbria until 927 when Athelstan annexed York, or even until the redemption
of the five boroughs by Edmund in 942.[87]
Vital evidence is provided by the coinage produced in the city. The St. Martin
pennies of Lincoln, which were struck in the 920s, were modelled upon the St.
Peter pennies issued at York from the early years of the tenth century, for
they bear the somewhat un-Christian sword motif of the Archbishop's mint. The
relationship between the two centres was evidently close for the dies used in
the later issues at York seem to have been cut in Lincoln.[88]
The St. Martin pennies suggest, then, that there was a close affinity between
Lincoln and Northumbria which had survived the upheavals of 918-20. Moreover,
since a mint at York was almost certainly controlled by King Sihtric at this
time, it seems likely that Lincoln was producing coins for the York regime and
was therefore part of Northumbria.[89] Its
authority was probably derived from the hegemony that York exercised over the
whole of the East Midlands in the early years of the tenth century. The
submission of Lincoln and Lindsey is not recorded in the sources, but they may
have pledged allegiance to Edward the Elder at the same time as Stamford or
Nottingham, and Sihtric may have recovered them after 921. However, in terms of
Edward's objectives in 918-20, the subjection of Lincoln was a low priority. As
virtually an island, it afforded few lines of communication between north and
south. Thus, once Nottingham was secured by negotiation, it was of little
importance, for the main theatre of activity was to the north and west. It is
possible, then, that Lindsey remained a part of Northumbria throughout. Indeed,
the persistent claims of the Archbishop of York to the diocese of Lindsey in
the tenth and eleventh centuries imply a long-established and uninterrupted interest
in the area.[90]
Whether the Archbishop of York
exercised ecclesiastical authority in Nottinghamshire between 920 and 942 is
not clear,[91]
but there is no evidence to suggest that Athelstan's political control was in
any way relaxed. In 927 Sihtric died, and Athelstan ousted Guthfrith and
annexed York.[92]
Despite attempts to consolidate his power base by winning over Archbishop
Wulfstan and other churchmen with extensive grants of land in 934,[93]
his hold on the North must have been precarious. His claim to sovereignty was
probably primarily based upon the submission of Northumbria in 920. However, he
probably saw the marriage of his sister to Sihtric in 926 as conferring an
equally important right. Mercia had been a precedent, for it had been annexed
by Edward on the basis of Æthelflaed's marriage to Æthelred.[94]
But neither eclipsed the hereditary rights of the house of Ivarr in the minds
of the Danes. Although opposed in 918, these rights now gave expression to
separatist feelings in the North. Between 939 and 954, the Danes of York, led
by Archbishop Wulfstan, manipulated successive kings in order to maintain their
autonomy.[95]
In 937 Olaf Guthfrithson crossed from Ireland, and, in alliance with the Welsh,
Scottish, and almost certainly the Northumbrians, attempted to win back his
patrimony. The role of Nottingham and the neighbouring boroughs in this
campaign is, as with almost every detail of the episode, unknown. But the
conspiracy collapsed after Olaf's crushing defeat at Brunanburh.[96] He
was more successful in 939, however. On the death of Athelstan, he returned to
Yorkshire and was immediately accepted by the Danes of York. Furthermore, the
East Midlands seem to have submitted to him with the minimum of opposition, for
it was not until he reached Northampton that Olaf encountered any resistance.
Failing to take the borough, he proceeded north-west to Tamworth and stormed
the town. He then retreated to Leicester where, besieged by Edmund, he reached
an agreement with the king through the mediation of the two archbishops. The
terms were advantageous to Olaf, and suggest that Edmund had no chance of
winning over the five boroughs at this time, even though the northern
army was besieged within the city. Edmund ceded the East Midlands and Olaf
became the king of Northumbria and the area of the five boroughs.[97]
The ease with which he overran the area suggests that the Danish settlers there
were more than sympathetic to his claims. As part of Northumbria before 920
they, like the men of York, may have felt that Olaf had a greater right to
their lordship than Edmund. In effect, they probably saw the conquest as the
reunification of a kingdom which had been usurped and divided by an alien power
some 20 years before.
In the following
two years the five boroughs were
clearly ruled from York for coins of Olaf were produced in Derby.[98]
In the event, this may have proved as irksome as the hegemony of Wessex, for in
942 Edmund won back the five boroughs, and the account in the Anglo-Saxon
Chronicle suggests that the area was hostile to the York regime which was
supported by a heathen Norse army:
In this
year King Edmund, lord of the English, protector of men, the beloved performer
of mighty deeds, overran Mercia, as bounded by Dore, Whitwell gate and the
broad stream, the River Humber; and five boroughs, Leicester and Lincoln,
Nottingham and likewise Stamford, and also Derby. The Danes were previously
subjected by force under the Norsemen, for a long time in bonds of captivity to
the heathens, until the defender of warriors, the son of Edward, King Edmund
redeemed them, to his glory.[99]
It would, of course,
be rash to accept this account at face value.[100] It
is inaccurate in suggesting that the five boroughs had been subjected to the
Norse for a long time since they had only been conquered some two years before.
It is a Wessex version of events which is clearly intended to glorify Edmund's
achievements. The same editorial considerations had suppressed all notice of
the events of 939-940 which are only recorded in the northern chronicles.
Nevertheless, if not pure propaganda, the annal may indicate that there were
tensions between the Danish settlers and the Norse garrisons in the boroughs.[101]
It is not until the expulsion of
Eric Bloodaxe in 954 that York itself was finally brought under the control of
the king of England.[102] But
the East Midlands were evidently subject to West Saxon rule from 942. In the
following 20 years the kings of England took decisive steps to consolidate
their authority in the area and effect a settlement of the North. Their
objectives were probably two-fold. Edward the Elder's conquest had failed to
break the bonds between the five boroughs and York, for they had reasserted
themselves in 940 to threaten the security of Mercia and the Southern Danelaw.
Thus, measures were necessary to first divorce the area from Northumbria and
then convert it into a march against the North. It was from this time that the
Five Boroughs assumed their distinctive identity as a confederacy and acquired
the character-istic institutions which were to survive for centuries.
The most immediate effect of the
reconquest must have been the garrisoning and refortification of the boroughs.
No archaeological evidence has come to light in Nottingham or the other major
boroughs. But Newark - the place-name means 'the new defences' [103]-
was probably fortified at this time. Little is known about the pre-Conquest history of the town. Excavations by Professor Barley in 1961
located a massive ditch, some 34 feet wide and 13 feet deep with a 16 foot
berm, which he interpreted as pre-Conquest, although there was no firm dating
evidence.[104]
A recent trial excavation on Slaughterhouse Lane has revealed a rampart up to
45 feet wide. Again, there was no firm dating evidence associated with the
feature itself, but it was cut by stratigraphically later features of eleventh
or twelfth century date. The rampart is thus clearly earlier.[105]
The size of these defences on the north side of the town contrast with much
smaller earthworks located by Malcolm Todd to the south and east in the 1970's.[106]
Despite the ambiguous nature of the archaeological evidence, there are
indications that Newark was an important settlement in the mid tenth century.
The existence of a royal mint in the town in the reign of Eadwy suggests that
the borough which is described in the Domesday Book account was already in
existence in the 950's,[107]
although the exact date of its foundation cannot yet be determined. But if not
in Eadwy's reign, the settlement evidently assumed unprecedented importance at
that time as a centre of royal authority. This is in itself eloquent witness to
the king's policies in the area. Situated on the Trent below Nottingham, Newark
can only have functioned as a forward position to defend the county town from
river- and road-borne incursions from Northumbria. This suggests that
Nottingham, and by implication the other boroughs of the area, were garrisoned
as a buffer against the North. Alongside the military initiative, steps were taken
to create a party and win support in the East Midlands. Edmund probably granted
key estates to placemen, possibly in many cases in advance of his campaign as
an incentive to active support and loyalty, and to local Danish leaders alike
to consolidate his position. A record of only one such transaction survives,
however. In 942 Edmund granted to Wulfsige Maur, a trusted ally of Mercian
descent, a large block of estates on either side of the Trent in Staffordshire
and Derbyshire which effectively controlled the upper Trent valley.[108]
But such measures, although effective in the short-term, did not eliminate the
more entrenched Northumbrian interests. Most important among these was probably
the influence of the church of York. Between 940 and 952 the eminence grise in the North had been
archbishop Wulfstan of York. A staunch advocate of Northumbrian autonomy, both
secular and ecclesiastical, he had manipulated successive rulers in York to
serve the best interests of northern independence.[109]
His capture and imprisonment by King Eadred in 952, however, provided the
opportunity for positive action against the power of the church in the North.[110]
One of the most immediate measures seems to have been the revival of the
diocese of Lindsey which had lapsed in the late ninth century under the
pressure of the Danish invasions.[111] Bishop
Leofwine, who first
appears in 953,
never specifically subscribes as bishop of Lindsey. However, he is said
in the episcopal lists to have united the dioceses of Lindsey and Dorchester.[112]
Since Osketel was bishop of Dorchester from 953 possibly until 971, Leofwine
must have been bishop of Lindsey during those years.[113]
The timing of the appointment is suggestive. It is clearly related to
Wulfstan's imprisonment and thus implies that he had exercised his authority as
primate in the area.
There is no contemporary evidence to
indicate the grounds on which Wulfstan might have claimed ecclesiastical
jurisdiction. In the eleventh century, his successors persistently claimed the diocese
on the grounds that Lindsey had been converted to Christianity by Paulinus who
was bishop of York.[114] But
the question was complicated by the conquest and reconquest of the kingdom of
Mercia and Northumbria in the seventh century. Chad, Bishop of Mercia included
it in the diocese of Lichfield. In 678, however, Northumbria again conquered
Lindsey, and subsequently Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, divided the see
of York and appointed Eadhead to the southern bishopric. But the latter was
forced to resign when Lindsey was recovered by Mercia. From this time, the area
remained a separate diocese until the late ninth century.[115]
Wulfstan was no doubt aware of this background, but recent practice probably
provided stronger arguments for him than antiquarian delvings in the archives.
The Danish invasion had left an ecclesiastical vacuum in the East Midlands, for the diocese of Lindsey
lapsed and the see of Leicester was moved to Dorchester-on-Thames. The
Archbishop of York, however, had survived the upheavals of the late ninth
century. The Danish conquest of Yorkshire had been rapid and complete and,
unlike the situation in the Southern Danelaw, the church was no threat to the
settlement. For its part, the Northumbrian church probably saw alliance with the
Danish regime as the best way of protecting its interests.[116]
A modus vivendi, then, was quickly
worked out in the North, and indeed the conversion of the heathens was well
advanced by the late ninth century.[117] It
was natural that the church of York extended its sphere of influence into the
East Midlands, an area which was already under the political hegemony of the
Danes of Northumbria, for it was the only competent ecclesiastical authority in
the region. Wulfstan's claims to Lindsey, then, were almost certainly based
upon 60 or 70 years of undisputed enjoyment of archiepiscopal jurisdiction.
The appointment of Leofwine was no
doubt intended to impose a control on that jurisdiction. But it probably did
not amount to a usurpation of the rights of the archbishopric. York
intermittently continued to exercise its authority in Lindsey in the tenth and
eleventh centuries, and its claims to the diocese were persistent and evidently
firmly based.[118]
They were not extinguished by an adverse papal bull in 1061, and William Rufus
only decided in favour of Robert Bloet in 1092 after receiving a massive gift
of 3,000 pounds from the bishop of Lincoln who had inherited the claim of
Dorchester after the removal of the see to Lincoln in c.1072. Nevertheless, Archbishop
Thomas of York was still compensated for the loss of
the diocese and the episcopal manors of Newark, Stow, and Louth by the gift of
the abbey of St. German, Selby and the church of St. Oswald, Gloucester [119]In
the light of the archbishopric's apparently strong claims to Lindsey,
Leofwine's status as bishop must be questioned. His subsequent translation to
Dorchester may suggest that he was a suffragan of that see.[120]
But the insistence in the episcopal lists that he united the two dioceses may
alternatively imply that Lindsey was not claimed by Dorchester until his tenure
of both sees after 971. It is possible, then, that he was originally appointed
to Lindsey as a suffragan of York to exercise episcopal authority during
Wulfstan's imprisonment on behalf of Eadred's party. Dorchester's subsequent
claims may therefore have been based upon a de
facto annexation of the diocese.
The resurrection of the diocese of
Lindsey, however, did not tackle the central problem. More radical measures
were needed to curb the independence of the church in the north. The submission
of York in 954 provided the occasion. Sometime between 954 and 956, Osketel
Bishop of Dorchester was appointed to the see of York. The circumstances
surrounding this translation, notably the fate of Archbishop Wulfstan, are
confused on account of contradictory statements in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
It is not clear whether Wulfstan regained York on his release in 954, exchanged
bishoprics with Osketel, or held one
or the other under Osketel's supervision.[121]
However, the latter was certainly Arch-bishop in 956 after Wulfstan's death,
and he appears to have held Dor-chester in plurality until his own death in
971.[122]
The arrangement was an important precedent which was adhered to until the mid
eleventh century. Osketel came from the Southern Danelaw and was of Danish
descent. He was thus probably acceptable to the Danes of York, but he was
untainted by their northern separatism. King Eadred clearly felt he could trust
him to represent the interests of the crown in the North. Succeeding kings
learnt the lesson and a northern cleric was never again preferred to York.
Moreover, all until Wulfstan II (1003-1023) held a southern see in plurality.
This not only relieved the poverty of the archiepiscopal see, but also ensured
loyalty to the kings of England for the archbishop was dependent upon the
goodwill of the crown for a large part of his income.[123]
The grant of land in Nottinghamshire at South-well by Eadwy in 956 and at
Sutton and Scrooby by Edgar in 958 may have been designed to fulfil a similar
function.[124]
However, in the light of the division of the kingdom between the two brothers
in 957, the endow-ments were probably an attempt to win the support of the
archbishop for their respective causes.[125]
Nottinghamshire was almost certainly a part of the diocese of York from this
date at the latest, for all of the rights of the archbishop in the county were
attached to Southwell Minster from an early period.[126]
But, like Lindsey, the area may have remained in the sphere of the metropolitan
see after 920 for there is no evidence to suggest that either Edward or
Athelstan introduced ecclesiastical reforms.[127]
The most far-reaching effect of the
West Saxon reconquest of the Northern Danelaw was the introduction of a
radically new system of local government which was designed to raise taxation,
co-ordinate a system of defence, and keep the peace. It was probably after what
proved to be the final submission of York that the first general system of
royal admin-istration was introduced into the region within the confederacy of
the Five Boroughs. The boroughs of Leicester, Nottingham, Derby, Lincoln, and
Stamford are first associated as a group in the annal for 942.[128]
As we have seen, this entry, which takes the literary form of a poem, was
intended to glorify the achievements of the house of Wessex and is clearly
propaganda. As such, it is almost certainly not a contemporary compilation. In
the earliest surviving manuscript, it was written sometime after 955.[129]
Moreover, its tone conveys the impression that it was written from the smug
security of hindsight. Thus, the boroughs
are said with an air of finality to have been redeemed. This phase would
surely have been inappropriate in 942 when there was still an autonomous regime
at York. It is highly unlikely, in fact, that the Five Boroughs constituted a
confederacy before or even at this date. Up until 918, the boroughs never
consistently acted in concert. Significantly, the only explicit notice of an
alliance was between Leicester and Northampton, which was never part of the
confederacy. After 920 there is less evidence, but it seems likely that Lincoln
was part of Northumbria until at least
927. The earliest
reference to a
confederacy occurs in Æthelred's Wantage Code which can probably
be dated to 997,[130] but
there are reasons to believe that the system was introduced some 30 years
before to co-ordinate a new system of local government.
As we have seen,[131]
in the eleventh century local government was intimately related to carucation.
The primary unit of administration was a twelve-carucate hundred which was
essentially a tithing. But it also assumed responsibility for all royal imposts
and exactions as well as the maintenance of law and order. It may also have had
a military role. It was in every sense a communal or public system for, while
every estate, with the exception of royal demesne, belonged to a hundred, it
was essentially independent of land tenure. In this respect, it differs from
earlier systems based upon the soke. The hundreds in their turn were grouped
together to form the equally communal institution of the wapentake. In
Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, there was a standard quota of seven hundreds
per wapentake. Suit was originally paid to it by all estates, regardless of
their liberties, for it was the machinery through which the king's inalienable
forfeitures were articulated. Like the hundred, the wapentake was a public
system, and seems to have been a function of carucation. Carucate, tithing, and
wapentake, then, constituted an integrated whole. As such, it is possible to
perceive that the system was a tenth-century institution for its elements are
found in the legislation of Edgar and Æthelred. Thus, the penalty that was
imposed on the hundred for breach of the peace is cited in a Northern Danelaw
context in the Wantage Code, while the wapentake is first found in Edgar's
fourth code (962-3) where it is linked
with a general system of
tithing. It seems likely, then, that the new system had been introduced by 963.
It was, moreover, closely related to
the Confederacy of the Five Boroughs. In 1066 breach of the king's peace was
amended by eighteen hundreds, each of which paid eight pounds, twelve to the
king, and six to the earl.[132] The
same penalty, and a very similar division of dues, applied to the organisation
of the Five Boroughs. The peace given by the ealdorman and the king's reeve in
the meeting of the confederacy was amended by twelve hundred, that given in the
court of the borough by six, and in the wapentake by one. In this case, the
hundred is a long hundred of sixteen-pence Danish oras, that is, 120×16d=1920d=8 pounds.[133]
The structure of local government is probably also an oblique reflection of the
principles expounded in the Wantage Code. The relative value ascribed to
different courts implies that a borough, that is proto-shire, court was in some
way worth, or was made up of, six wapentakes. This is a significant feature of
three of the counties of the region. There were six wapentakes in
Nottinghamshire (four whole + four half), and six in Derbyshire.[134]
There were a greater number in Lincolnshire, but patterns of six recur. There
were ten whole and two double, that is four half, wapentakes in Kesteven and
Holland.[135]
In the North Riding of Lindsey there were seven, including Bolingbroke and
Gartree which, although topographically in the South Riding, were accounted in
the North, and six each in the South and West Ridings.[136]
The operation of the tithings and wapentakes, then, seems to have been
prefigured in the regulations for the Five Boroughs. It seems clear that the
confederacy was but the superstructure of the system of local government based
upon carucation.
The Five Boroughs as an institution,
then, owed its existence to an initiative of the English crown. In the mid
tenth century successive kings took a great interest in the workings of local
administration throughout the kingdom. The Hundred Ordinance was promulgated in
the reign of Eadred, or possibly in the early years of Edgar, and was intended
to institute reforms and tighten up procedure in the apparatus of government in
southern England.[137]
Edgar's fourth code, in its provision of tithings and witness, legislated for
the whole country, both English and Danish.[138] The
institution of the Five Boroughs must be seen in this context. Closely related
to the territorial tithing, a new concept in royal administration, it was
itself clearly a royal institution and, indeed, the ealdorman and king's reeve
were appointed by the crown. Nevertheless, the confederacy had a Danish
identity. Its assembly was presumably attended by the settlers of the East
Midlands, and the proceedings were transacted according to such good laws as
they could best decide upon. Edgar had deliberately refrained from meddling
with Danish law, although this did not preclude the introduction of new
administration.[139]
This was of some importance for a distinctive organisation gave expression to a
legitimate sense of separate identity
and thereby also weakened the bonds that tied the East Midlands to Northumbria.
It is probable that this was the ultimate objective of the king in the
institution of the Five Boroughs. Yorkshire may have been carucated at the same
time as the East Midlands, and in this sense was incorporated into the realm.[140]
But it still posed the greatest threat to the security of the kingdom. The Five
Boroughs were thus a march and, as the fortification of Newark reveals, were so
considered. This function of the confederacy is probably reflected in the
differences in status of the constituent boroughs and variations in the
distribution of geld within the system. Although each borough had its own
administration and territories, two occupied a pre-eminent position. Stamford,
with its territory of Kesteven and Holland, was probably loosely appended to
Lincoln at this time. Its heavy assessment was probably intended to support the
more vunerable forward position which in its turn could control the Humber and
the east bank of the Trent.[141]
Derbyshire, Roteland, and possibly
Leicestershire, were attached to Nottingham in the same way. This borough above
all occupied a key strategic position, and it may well have operated as the
headquarters of the whole organisation.[142]
It is from this time that the
administrative geography of the Northern Danelaw was established. As we have
seen, various adjustments were probably made to the territories of the
constituent boroughs to form effective units which survived as
the shires of the mediaeval period.[143] The
wapentake as a distinct institution, and in many cases as discrete territories,
came into existence at this time and was destined to form an important element
in local government for the succeeding 900 years. The life of the hundred was
generally shorter. In the twelfth century, it gave way to the smaller and more
convenient vill throughout much of the Five Boroughs.[144]
It survived in the fenland of Holland, however, into the eighteenth century.[145]
In these respects the West Saxon reforms were an outstanding success. But in
its central objective, the new system was not always to prove effective. Its
superstructure, the confederacy, was the shortest lived, and probably the least
effective, feature of the new administration. The Five Boroughs as an
institution is not found after 1015: in the following year reference is first
made to the shires of Nottingham and Lincoln, and, if not an anachronistic
reference,[146]
it would seem that the functions of the regional organisation had had already
devolved upon individual boroughs to form the
administratively autonomous units
of Domesday Book.[147]
Probably the only vestiges of the Five Boroughs to emerge into the
post-Conquest period were the permanent annexation of the territory of Stamford
by Lincoln and the close association of Derbyshire with Nottinghamshire. The
demise of the confederacy was probably related to its failure to divorce the
East Midlands from the North, for from the early eleventh century, the region
increasingly sided with the northern Danes in times of conflict with central
government.
The loyalty of the men of the Five
Boroughs appears to have been in doubt by the late tenth century. Despite the
fact that the renewed Danish raids were concentrated in southern England, it is
suspicious that there was only one recorded incursion into the East Midlands between
979 and 1013. In 993 the Danish host sailed up the Humber and raided Lindsey
and south Yorkshire. The local levies, however, declined to fight.[148]
Some indication of tension between north and south is illustrated by the
re-emergence of the bishopric of Lindsey. Sigeforth subscribes as bishop
between 996 and 1004, and he may have been succeeded by Ælfstan who attested
two charters in 1009 and 1011.[149] As
with Leofwine in 953, it is possible that both owed allegiance to York for the
archbishops seem to have been active south of the Humber in the early eleventh
century. According to Florence of Worcester, the church of Stow St. Mary in the
West Riding of Lindsey was founded by Eadnoth of Dorchester (1006-1016), and in
1054 it was claimed that farm was only taken from the manor from the time of
Bishop Æthelric (1016-1034).[150]
However it is clear from a papal bull of 1061 that Archbishop Ælfric of York
(1023-51) had enjoyed jurisdiction over the diocese of Lindsey and the manors
of Stow and Newark during his episcopacy.[151]
From the available data, it is not possible to reconstruct the sequence of
events, but in the light of York's claims in the eleventh century, it may have
been making a serious attempt to annex the province.
Whatever the truth of the matter,
the claims and counterclaims are clearly evidence of tension between north and
south in the area. Discontent came out into the open in 1013. In that year King
Swein of Denmark encamped with an army at Gainsborough on the Trent, and almost
immediately Earl Uhtred and Northumbria, and Lindsey and the Five Boroughs
submitted to him. They were shortly joined by all the Danes north of Watling
Street.[152]
Once again the Northern Danelaw acted as a Trojan Horse, and Swein conquered
all before him. But it is likely that the rebellion in the North owed as much
to opposition to West Saxon rule as to kinship with the Danes. On Swein's death
in 1014, Cnut was elected as king. But Æthelred regained support, and the
Danish king was forced to abandon Lindsey. The northerners were left in the
lurch, and Lindsey was harried.[153]
Action, however, was probably not taken against the leaders of the northern
Danelaw until the following year. On the occasion of a great council meeting at
Oxford, Eadric Streona, ealdorman of Mercia, had Siferth and Morcar, 'chief
thanes' of the seven boroughs, murdered. The king then confiscated all their
estates and ordered Siferth's widow to be seized and taken to Malmesbury.[154]
Nothing is known about the circumstances surrounding the deed, but it is likely
that it was not unconnected with the rebellion in 1013.[155]
In the event, it solved no problems for it provided the occasion for Edmund
Ironside to rebel and join the northern party. He abducted Siferth's widow and
married her, and then went north into
the Five Borough and seized the lands
of the two thanes. He then levied forces in the North to fight Cnut.[156]
The opposition of the northerners to the invaders was at variance with their
attitude in 1013, and suggests that separatism was the real motivation for rebellion.
Thus, after Eadric defected to Cnut, both Edward and Uhtred harried the
ealdorman's lands in Shropshire and Herefordshire, rather than attacking the
Danes.[157]
in the meantime, Cnut harried the Danelaw, took York, and secured the
submission of the North.[158]
The reference to seven boroughs in
the 1013 annal is unique. The term evidently included Derby, Nottingham,
Lincoln, Leicester, and Stamford, for in the same year Edmund 'went from the
west, north to the Five Boroughs' and at once took possession of all the
estates of Siferth and Morcar [159]who
are elsewhere described as 'the chief thanes of the seven boroughs'.[160] In the light of Edmund's alliance with
Uhtred ealdorman of Northumbria, one of the additional boroughs can surely be
identified with York.[161] There
are several possibilities for the seventh. Torksey or Gainsborough in Lindsey
suggest themselves, although if the term 'Five Boroughs' was used in a
territorial sense, both identifications would be unlikely. The only other
borough in the north that was of a standing with York and the Five Boroughs was
Bamburgh which was held by Uhtred at this time.[162] The
phrase is probably no more than descriptive for there is no evidence for a
formal confederacy which encompassed the whole of the Northern Danelaw. Nevertheless,
it does indicate an identity of interest between the Five Boroughs and
Northumbria, and a single earldom cannot be ruled out at this time.
Evidence for the political status of
the East Midlands in the next 50 years is unfortunately slight. In 1065, it
seems that Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Lindsey, and possibly south
Lincolnshire were part of Tosti's earldom of Northumbria. His interests in
Notting-hamshire were considerable. He held comital manors in Nottingham,
Bothamsall, and possibly Clifton and Bingham, and it seems likely that many
other estates which were held by tenants in 1066 were attached to them.[163]
It was probably to these tenants that a writ of Edward the Confessor, addressed
to Tosti's thanes in Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire, was directed.[164]
The extent of his estates in Lincolnshire is less clear. He does not appear in
the Lincolnshire Domesday as a pre-Conquest holder of land, but he held Misson
in Nottinghamshire as soke of Kirton-in-Lindsey.[165] The
manor was held by Earl Edwin TRE, and was probably an important comital estate
for in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the administration of the whole of
the West Riding of Lindsey was attached to it.[166]
The Nottinghamshire commissioners, as elsewhere, evidently
employed earlier sources, and their account
of Misson thus shows that Tosti held Kirton before his expulsion from
the earldom in 1065. Whether he held other estates in the county cannot be
determined with certainty. Earl Morcar, however, his successor as earl of
Northumbria, was in possession of a large number of manors in 1066 throughout
Lincolnshire.[167]
Not all of these can have been comital. The estates which were granted to Drew
de Beurere, for example, had belonged to Ulf Topeson at about the time of the
Conquest.[168]
But Morcar's title to them - he is recorded in Domesday as the TRE lord - was
clearly different from that to Bourne, which he also held in 1066, for Drew had
no claim upon it.[169] It
would be presumptious to attempt to determine the status of his various manors,
however, for it was the cause of genuine perplexity in 1086. In the Clamores for Kesteven, it is recorded
that 'the claims which Drew de Beurere makes upon Morcar's lands they remit to
the king's decision'.[170] In
Torksey alone can we be reasonably certain that his interest was derived from
his office for he enjoyed the third penny of the borough.[171]
If Edwin was earl in Lincolnshire, he was probably so in succession to his
brother Morcar.
According to Domesday Book, Tosti
held no estates in
Derbyshire, although Earl Siward of Northumbria had held a manor in
Markeaton.[172]
But the events of 1065 suggest that it too was part of the earldom for the
shire participated in the rebellion against Tosti. In that year the
Northumbrians rose up against the earl, killed his housecarls, and elected
Morcar in his place.[173] The
rebels marched to Lincoln, and, reinforced by the men of the shires of
Nottingham, Derby, and Lincoln, they marched upon Northampton where they were
joined by Earl Edwin with the men of his earldom. The northerners despoiled the
county, which had been held by Tosti, before Edward the Confessor acceded to
their demands.[174]
According to the Abingdon Chronicle (C), Tosti's tyranny was responsible for
the uprising,[175]
but the immediate cause may have been an attempt to introduce novel taxation.[176]
Whatever the reason, the men of Derbyshire obviously felt equally aggrieved,
which suggests that, along with the shires of Nottingham and Lincoln, the
county had been part of Tosti's earldom.
As in 1013, it was the boundary of
the Five Boroughs which proved to be the decisive frontier between north and
south. It would be rash, however, to argue that the East Midlands had remained
in the sphere of York without interruption from the early eleventh century.
Despite the obscurity of the period, it seems likely that there was a
considerable amount of fluidity in the composition of the Midland earldoms
between 1016 and 1066. In 1017 the Five Boroughs may have been part of the
earldom of Mercia granted to Eadric,[177] but
by 1041, they were probably subject to Thored, 'earl of the Middle Angles', who
was succeeded by Beorn Estrithson, a scion of the house of Godwin, in 1045.[178]
After the latter's death in 1049, there is no explicit notice of an earl until
1065, but Leofric may have annexed the region to his earldom of Mercia at some
point. He certainly had lands and influence in Nottinghamshire and
Lincolnshire. Sometime before 1054, he and his wife Godgifu refounded the
monastery of Stow in Lincolnshire, endowed it with the manor of Newark in
Nottinghamshire, and confirmed the
possession of the community to Bishop Eadnoth of Dorchester.[179]
This was clearly a political move of some importance which was probably
intended to consolidate Mercian influence in the Trent valley. His son Ælfgar
held much of Holland, and Leofric his nephew controlled extensive estates in
Lincolnshire and Derbyshire as pluralist abbot of Burton-on-Trent, Coventry,
Crowland, and Thorney.[180] The
great Mercian families also had considerable interests in the region. Leofric
son of Leofwin and Leofnoth, for example, possessed innumerable manors in
Mercia and the Five Boroughs, many of which had descended from Wulfric Spot.[181]
By way of contrast, there were relatively few tenurial links between the East
Midlands and Yorkshire. Great landowners of the Danelaw like Ulf Fenisc and
Tochi son of Outi held manors in Yorkshire, but the bulk of their estates lay
south of the Humber.[182] Any
long established links
and formal ties between Northumbria and the Five Boroughs, then, seem
improbable. Tosti had also held Northamptonshire, Huntingdonshire, and
Bedfordshire as part of his northern earldom, but the association was not of
great antiquity.[183] In
the 1050s the fluidity of political groupings grew more marked as the house of
Godwin extended its power. Thus, the relationship between the shires of
Nottingham, Derby, Lincoln, and York may have been merely a function of an
opportunist move by Tosti to extend his power base in the east and the north,
probably after the exile or death of Ælfgar in c.1062.[184]
It was left to King William to secure the North. With the
breakdown of government through English officials, the Conqueror determined on
a policy of direct rule. A strategy of castle building was put into effect in
1068. Its objectives were twofold. First, to secure the major centres of
population in the East Midlands, second to hold the main lines of communication
with the North. Castles were built at Warwick and Nottingham. Then York was
secured by the construction of two castles in the city. On the return to the
south, further castles were built at Lincoln, Huntingdon, and Cambridge, and
almost certainly at Stamford.[185] The
North was by no means subdued. But the Five Boroughs were apparently firmly
held for they did not rise with the Northumbrians in the following year. The
East Midlands thus escaped the harrying of the North in 1069 which irrevocably
changed the face of Northumbrian society.[186]
[1] See below.
[2] C. R. Hart, 'The Tribal Hidage', Mercian
Studies, ed. A. Dornier, Leicester 1977, 49-52; pace VCH Notts. i, 317.
[3] ASE, 79; ASC, 23; P. H. Sawyer, From
Roman Britain to Anglo-Saxon England, London 1978, 21-32.
[4] M. W. Bishop, 'Multiple Estates in Late Anglo-Saxon Nottingham-shire', TTS 85, (1981), 37-47.
[5] C. S. B. Young, Discovering
Rescue Archaeology in Nottingham, Nottingham 1982. Publication of
individual excavations is forthcoming.
[6] See chapter 7.
[7] ASC, 45-6. According to
Æthelweard, the Danes built a fortificat-ion in 868 (The Chronicle of Æthelweard, ed. A. Campbell, London 1962, 36). If
based upon authentic record or memory, some modest enclosure like that built by
the Danish army at Repton in 873/4 is probably referred to (Current Archaeology 100, (1986), 142).
[8] ASC, 42.
[9] It will be argued that the Five Boroughs as a confederacy was not instituted until the late tenth century. In
the following, then, lower case 'five boroughs' will be used in a purely
geographical sense to denote the settlements of Lincoln, Leicester, Nottingham,
Derby, and Stamford, and their respective territories.
[10] ASC, 45-6.
[11] ASC, 46-8.
[12] ASC, 48.
[13] ASC, 48-50.
[14] ASC, 63-8; ECNE, 103-4.
[15] K. Cameron, 'Scandinavian Settlement in the Territory of the Five
Boroughs: the Place-Name Evidence', Place-Name
Evidence for the Anglo-Saxon Invasion and the Scandinavian Settlements, ed.
K. Cameron, Nottingham 1975, 115-38; G. Fellows-Jensen, Scandinavian Settlement Names in the East Midlands, Copenhagen
1978; P. H. Sawyer, The
Age of the
Vikings, 2nd ed., London 1971, 154-69.
[16] P. H. Sawyer, 'Some Sources for the History of Viking Northumbria', Viking Age York, ed. R. A. Hall, London
1978, 7.
[17] The church of the soke often had parochial rights over independent, but
interlocking, estates within its vicinity (D. R. Roffe, 'The Church of St
Oswald of Rand', forthcoming 1987). The coincidence of ecclesiastical structure
with such groups of estates suggests that the rights of the central church were
related to lordship.
[18] P. Stafford, The East Midlands in
the Early Middle Ages, Leicester 1985, 30-35, 117-121.
[19] ASE, 260-1.
[20] Æthelweard, 51.
[21] F. M. Stenton, 'Æthelweard's Account of the Last Years of King Alfred's
Reign', Preparatory to Anglo-Saxon
England, ed. D. M. Stenton, Oxford 1970, 8-13; S. Keynes, M. Lapidge, Alfred the Great, London 1983, 337. In
the latter, it is claimed that pandunt
can only be intransitive and therefore cannot take territoriam as an object. Praedantur
is therefore preferred. However, examples of its use as a transitive verb in
the classical period are given in W. Smith, J. Lockwood, Chambers Murray Latin English Dictionary, London 1933, 505. Most of
the only known manuscript of Æthelweard was destroyed in 1731, and the modern
edition is based upon the printed version of H. Savile in Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores post Bedam Praecipui, London 1596,
ff.472-83 (Æthelweard, xi).
[22] Stenton, 'Æthelweard's Account', 8-13.
[23] A. P. Smyth, Scandinavian York
and Dublin: the History and Archaeology of Two Related Viking Kingdoms i,
Dublin 1975, 33.
[24] ASC, 61.
[25] ASC, 62.
[26] ASC, 64, 66.
[27] ASC, 71.
[28] ASC, 67.
[29] C. S. B. Young, pers. comm.
[30] C. M. Mahany, D. R. Roffe, 'Stamford: the Development of an
Anglo-Scandinavian Borough', Anglo-Norman
Studies V: the Proceedings of the Battle Conference 1982, ed. R. A. Brown,
Woodbridge 1983, 199, 210-11; K. Kilmurry, The
Pottery Industry of Stamford, Lincs. c.
AD 850-1250, Oxford 1980.
[31] A small defensive 3œ acre enclosure of the Viking period has been
discovered at Repton and has been associated with the overwintering of the
Danish army in 873-4 (Current Archaeology
100, (1986), 140). The earliest defensive system in Nottingham is pre-Danish.
[32] Mahany, Roffe, 'Stamford', 201-6, 211.
[33] Mahany, Roffe, 'Stamford', 206-11; C. M. Mahany, Stamford Castle and Town, Stamford 1978, 8-11.
[34] ASC, 61-2; Smyth, Scandinavian York i, 75, 102.
[35] Smyth, Scandinavian York i,
75, 102.
[36] Smyth, Scandinavian York i,
108.
[37] ASC, 66.
[38] DBB, 577-81; ASE, 265.
[39] See, for example, C. R. Hart, The
Hidation of Northamptonshire, Leicester 1970, 24-8; C. R. Hart, 'The
Hidation of Huntingdonshire', Proceedings
of the Cambridge ). Antiquarian
Society 61, (1968), 55-6; C. Phythian-Adams, Continuity, Fields and Fission: the Making of a Midlands Parish, Leicester 1978, 20.
[40] See chapter 6.
[41] VCH Northants i, 263-9; Hart,
Hidation of Northants, 24-37.
[42] Hart, Hidation of Northants,
32-37. Copies are inadmissible since religious houses frequently changed
assessments to make their muniments consistent with later records, notably
Domesday Book. Of the two original charters cited, the assessment of Braunston
(S623) bears no relation to either the Domesday hidage or ploughland figures.
It is claimed, however, that the 30 hides of an estate in Badby in 944 (S495)
are represented by 30 teamlands in 1086. But the identification of the estate
in Domesday Book is dependent upon the unsupported identification of Chelverdescote in Fawsley Hundred with
Newnham in Edelweardesle.
[43] See chapter 6.
[44] Lincs. DB, xvii-xix; VCH Derbys i, 317-18.
[45] S. P. J. Harvey, 'Domesday Book
and Anglo-Norman Governance', TRHS, 5th ser. 15, (1975), 186-9.
[46] ASC, 65.
[47] C. S. Taylor, 'The Origins of the Mercian Shires', Gloucestershire Studies, ed. H. P. R. Finberg, Leicester 1957,
20-1.
[48] ASC, 64.
[49] ASC, 64-5.
[50] ASC, 66-7.
[51] ASC, 67.
[52] ASC, 62-4; F. T. Wainwright,
Scandinavian England, Chichester 1975, 317-24.
[53] Smyth, Scandinavian York i,
102-8.
[54] Smyth, Scandinavian York i,
79.
[55] Symeon of Durham, Historia Regum,
Symeonis Monachi Opera Omnia, ed. T. Arnold, London 1885, 93.
[56] Wainwright, Scandinavian England,
317-24.
[57] ASC, 66-7.
[58] Wainwright, Scandinavian England,
93, 323-4.
[59] ASC, 67.
[60] ASC, 67; Wainwright, Scandinavian England, 127-9.
[61] Wainwright, Scandinavian England,
324.
[62] ASC, 67.
[63] ASC, 62, 64, 66.
[64] ASC, 67.
[65] Symeon of Durham, Historia,
93.
[66] ASC, 67.
[67] ASC, 67-8; C. R. Hart, The North Derbyshire Archaeological Survey,
Chesterfield 1981, 118-22.
[68] See chapter 8.
[69] I am indebted to Vicky Naylor, Nottingham Museums, Field Archae-ology
Section, for information on the pottery industry in Nottingham in advance of
publication.
[70] ASC, 67; The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed. B. Thorpe, London 1861, 195.
[71] See, for example, the entries for Thelwell and Manchester (ibid., 196).
[72] C. S. B. Young, pers. comm.
[73] See below.
[74] Historic Towns: Maps and Plans of Towns and Cities in the British Isles
with Historical Commentaries from Earliest Times to 1800 i, ed. D. M. Lobel,
London 1969, Nottingham, 2. Mickleborough Hill between West Bridgford and
Ruddington has also been suggested as a site on the basis of the name which
connotes 'great borough' (VCH Notts. i, 291n). In the light of the remoteness
of the site from the Trent, this is
probably less likely.
[75] Mahany, Roffe, 'Stamford', 206-9.
[76] H. R. Loyn, 'Anglo-Saxon Stamford', The
Making of Stamford, ed. A. Rogers, Leicester 1965, 29; A. Rogers, 'Medieval
Stamford', ibid., 35.
[77] See chapter 7.
[78] Notts. DB, S5.
[79] Smyth, Scandinavian York i,
11.
[80] D. Hill, An Atlas of Anglo-Saxon
England, Oxford 1981, 131-2.
[81] F. E. Harmer, 'Chipping and Market: a Lexicographical Investigat-ion', The Cultures of North-West Europe (H. M.
Chadwick Memorial Studies), eds C. Fox, B. Dickens, Cambridge 1950, 342-9.
[82] See chapter 8.
[83] There is evidence that
the Great North
Road passed through Nottingham in both 934 and 1016
(S407, ASC, 94-5). Commanding the
lowest bridge on the Trent, the borough thus occupied a highly strategic
position.
[84] P. Stafford, The East Midlands in the Early Middle Ages, Leicester
1985, 45.
[85] D. R. Roffe, 'Introduction', Domesday
Book: Derbyshire, ed. A. Williams,
forthcoming 1987. The borough was always closely associated with Nottingham,
and a relationship similar to that between Winchester and Southampton, or more
locally, between Lincoln and Torksey, a suburbium
of Lincoln in 1086 (Lincs. DB,
p13/2-3), is suggested.
[86] Mahany, Roffe, 'Stamford', 213-4;
The Norman Conquest of Leicestershire and Rutland: a Regional Introduction to
Domesday Book, ed. C. Phythian-Adams, Leicester 1986, 9-11.
[87] ASC, 68, 71.
[88] T. Stewart, 'The St Martin's Coins at Lincoln', British Numismat-ics Journal 36, (1967), 49-54; A. P. Smyth, Scandinavian York and Dublin ii, Dublin
1979, 8-9.
[89] Smyth, Scandinavian York i,
106; ii, 9.
[90] See below.
[91] See below.
[92] ASC, 68.
[93] S407; ECNE, 117-8. The grant
of Amounderness to the archbishop was probably speculative, that is, he could
have it, if he fought for it.
[94] Smyth, Scandinavian York ii,
10.
[95] Smyth, Scandinavian York ii,
160.
[96] Smyth, Scandinavian York ii,
10; ASC, 69-70; Willelmi Malmesbiriensis Monachi De Gestis Regum Anglorum i, ed W.
Stubbs, London 1887, 151-2; ASE,
342-3.
[97] Smyth, Scandinavian York ii,
91-4; ASE, 57.
[98] Smyth, Scandinavian York ii,
95.
[99] ASC, 71.
[100] ASE, 358-9. Stenton has been
followed by many later writers.
[101] Smyth, Scandinavian York ii,
109.
[102] ASC, 73.
[103] PNN, 199.
[104] M. W. Barley, 'Excavation of the Borough Ditch, Slaughterhouse Lane,
Newark, 1961', TTS 65, (1961), 10-18.
[105] I am indebted to C. Drage of the Trent and Peak Archaeological Trust,
Brewhouse Yard, Nottingham, for information on his excavation in advance of
publication.
[106] M. Todd, 'Excavations on the Medieval Defences of Newark, 1972', TTS 78, (1974), 27-53.
[107] Hill, Atlas, 127-31; Notts. DB, 6,1. There were 56
burgesses in Newark in 1086 (Notts. DB, 6,1).
[108] S484, 1606; ECNE, 104-5; P.
H. Sawyer, 'The Charters of Burton Abbey and the Unification of England', Northern History 10, (1975), 34.
[109] Smyth, Scandinavian York ii,
160; D. Whitelock, 'The Dealings of the Kings of England with Northumbria in
the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries', The
Anglo-Saxons: Studies in some Aspects of their History and Culture presented to
Bruce Dickens, ed. P. Clemoes, London 1959, 72-3.
[110] ASC, 73.
[111] ECNE, 343. Dr. Hart asserts that the Alfred who witnesses three
diplomas in 934 was a bishop of Lindsey, but I can find no authority for this
statement. See M. A.
O'Donovan, 'An Interim
Revision of the Episcopal Dates for the Province of
Canterbury 850-950 Part I1', Anglo-Saxon
England 2, (1973), 95-6, who states that the bishopric lapsed between 878
and 953.
[112] Florence of Worcester, Chronicon
ex Chronicis i, ed. B. Thorpe, London 1848, 242; Radulfi de Diceto Opera Historica ii, ed. W. Stubbs, London 1876,
201.
[113] Whitelock, 'Dealing', 73-5.
[114] J. W. F. Hill, Medieval Lincoln,
Cambridge 1948, 65, 80-1.
[115] O'Donovan, 'Episcopal Dates', 95-6.
[116] Smyth, Scandinavian York i,
41.
[117] D. Whitelock, 'The Conversion of the Eastern Danelaw', Saga Book of the Viking Society 12,
(1945), 175.
[118] See below.
[119] The Registrum Antiquissimum of
the Cathedral Church of Lincoln i, ed. C. W. Foster, Lincoln 1931, 186-7,
11-12; Hill, Medieval Lincoln, 65.
The see of York held some 36 carucates of land in Lindsey in 1086. Although it
is not recorded as lord in 1066, it is possible that the tenants of the land
held from the archbishop before the Conquest (Lincs. Db, 2/1-28). Its endowment in the county, then, may have
been quite large.
[120] Whitelock, 'Dealings', 75.
[121] Whitelock, 'Dealings', 73.
[122] Whitelock, 'Dealings', 75.
[123] Whitelock, 'Dealings', 73-6.
[124] S659, 679; VCH Notts. ii, 38.
[125] G. T. Davies, 'The Anglo-Saxon Boundaries of Sutton and Scrooby,
Nottinghamshire', TTS 87, (1983), 13.
[126] Visitations and Memorials of
Southwell Minster, ed. A. F. Leach, London 1891, xxiii.
[127] Pace ECNE, 343.
[128] ASC, 71.
[129] ASC, xi.
[130] EHD i, 403; S. Keynes, The Diplomas of King Æthelred 'the Unready',
Cambridge 1980, 196-7.
[131] See chapter 6.
[132] Notts. DB, S1; Lincs. DB, p9/31-3; Yorks. DB, C38.
[133] EHD i, 403.
[134] See chapters 6 and 8.
[135] Lincs. DB, lxxiii.
Winnibriggs and Threo, and Boothby and Graffoe were grouped together in the
later Middle Ages (H. M. Cam, Liberties
and Communities in Medieval England, London 1963, 92.
[136] Lincs. DB, lxxiii; D. R.
Roffe, 'The Lincolnshire Hundred', Landscape
History 3, (1981), 34. Bradley
and Haverstoe in
the North Riding were grouped
together and may have been half wapentakes. There is no discernible standard
quota in Lincolnshire, although five wapentakes were assessed at seven
hundreds, or a multiple or fraction of that sum, while another four were within
six carucates of the same.
[137] EHD i, 393-4; H. R.
Loyn, The Governance of Anglo-Saxon England 500-1087, London 1984, 142.
[138] EHD i, 397-401.
[139] EHD i, 399.
[140] There has unfortunately been no systematic study of the carucation of
Yorkshire, but there is some evidence for a seven-hundred quota. Thus, 84
carucates of land were attached to the city of York (Yorks. DB, SN Y1). In the twelfth century, Twixt Tyne and Wear, and
Westmoreland and Copeland were each assessed at 504 carucates (VCH Yorks. ii, 139-41). A later carucation,
based upon similar principles, cannot therefore be ruled out.
[141] Mahany, Roffe, 'Stamford', 214-5.
[142] See chapter 8.
[143] See chapter 8.
[144] Roffe, 'Lincolnshire Hundred', 27, 36.
[145] Roffe, 'Lincolnshire Hundred', 27, 36. Its survival appears to be
directly related to the unmanorialised structure of society in the fenland. The
leet of East Anglia provides a direct parallel. Something of its organisation,
however, may have survived in the rather shadowy institution of the villa integra of the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries (B. A. Lees, 'The Statute of Winchester and the Villa Integra', EHR 41, (1926), 98-103). No relationship
has been perceived between those found in Nottinghamshire and the Domesday
administrative structure, but vestigially the unit had similar functions to the
twelve-carucate hundred. Its most important role as a tithing, however, had
passed to manorial lords with their assumption of view of frankpledge.
[146] An ealdorman of Lindsey is named in 1016 (ASC, 96), but this does not preclude the existence of Lincolnshire
as an administrative area, for as late as 1086 'Lindsey' and 'Lincolnshire'
seem to have been synonymous (F. M. Stenton, 'Lindsey and its Kings', Preparatory to Anglo-Saxon England, ed.
D. M. Stenton, Oxford 1970, 133). Lincoln was clearly the dominant party
(Mahany, Roffe, 'Stamford', 214).
[147] ASC, 94-5. Leicestershire
does not appear by name until Domesday, but it is likely that it too was
constituted as a shire by the reign of Cnut (Norman Conquest of Leicestershire, 10).
[148] ASC, 83.
[149] S878, 891, 899, 904, 922, 924.
[150] Chronicon i, 216; Cartulary of the Abbey of Eynsham i,
ed. H.
E. Salter, Oxford 1906, 28-30.
[151] Registrum Antiquissimum i,
186-8.
[152] ASC, 92-3.
[153] ASC, 93.
[154] ASC, 94.
[155] ASE, 388-9; P. Stafford, 'The
Reign of Æthelred II: a Study in the Limitations on Royal Policy and Action', Æthelred the Unready, ed. D. Hill,
Oxford 1978, 35-6.
[156] ASC, 94.
[157] ASC, 94. Eadric's power base
was in the West Midlands. See Chronicon
i, 158.
[158] ASC, 94-5.
[159] ASC, 94.
[160] ASC, 94.
[161] ASE, 388n.
[162] I would like to thank Tom Cain for this suggestion.
[163] Notts. DB, B2. 1,9; 65. 9,97.
[164] F. E. Harmer, Anglo-Saxon Writs,
Manchester 1952, no. 119.
[165] Notts. DB, 1,65.
[166] Lincs. DB, 1/38. In 1341, for
example, the sheriff of Lincoln held his tourn in Spital-in-the-Street
which was parcel of the
manor of Kirton (CPR 1340-1343, 137; CCR 1323-1327, 119). The earliest reference to the hospital,
formerly called Herwyk (CPL iv, 510), occurs in the late twelfth
century (Registrum Antiquissimum ii,
319-20), but the settlement is represented by sokeland of Kirton in Hemswell in
1086 (Lincs. DB, 1/41). The soke of
Kirton was of great extent, extending into the West Riding wapentakes of
Corringham, Aslacoe, and Manley, and
there is evidence to suggest that the church of Kirton had extensive
liberties throughout the area (D. R. Roffe, 'The Church of Stow St Mary,
Lincolnshire', in preparation).
[167] Lincs. DB, 1/1, 4-6, 26, 65;
2/37, 39; 3/31; 30/1, 22, 26, 28; 35/13; 42/1.
[168] Lincs. DB, 30/1, 22, 26, 28;
xlii.
[169] Lincs. DB, 42/1; 72/40.
[170] Lincs. DB, 72/50.
[171] Lincs. DB, p13/3.
[172] Derbys. DB, 4,1.
[173] There may also have been a spontaneous uprising in Lincoln (W. E.
Kapelle, The Norman Conquest of the North, London 1979, 99, 261).
[174] Kapelle, Norman Conquest,
98-100; ASC, 137-8.
[175] ASC, 138.
[176] Kapelle, Norman Conquest,
96-8.
[177] ASC, 97.
[178] E. A. Freeman, The Norman
Conquest ii, Oxford 1870, 557-8.
[179] Cartulary of Eynsham, 28-32.
[180] Lincs. DB, 1/28, 30, 34;
12/83-4; 14/96; C. R. Hart, 'Athelstan 'Half King' and his Family', Anglo-Saxon England 2, (1973), 138-43.
[181] P. H. Sawyer, The Charters of
Burton Abbey, Oxford 1979, xliii..
[182] Lincs. DB, xxx, xxxvii. Ulf
held land in Derbyshire, Nottingham-shire, Lincolnshire, Huntingdonshire,
Cambridgeshire, and possibly in Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire,
Buckinghamshire, and Oxfordshire. Tochi held in Northamptonshire,
Leicestershire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, and Lincolnshire (H. Ellis, A General Introduction to Domesday Book
ii, London 1833, 239, 251).
[183] Freeman, Norman Conquest ii,
559-60. Harold had held Huntingdonshire as part of the earldom of East Anglia
before 1053.
[184] The Life of King Edward the
Confessor, ed. F. Barlow, London 1962, 51.
[185] Mahany, Roffe, 'Stamford', 216.
[186] Kapelle, Norman Conquest,
117-9.