Page images
PDF
EPUB

tur, id est centum pro cxx." 133 The persistence, in Lincolnshire, of the long hundred is well shown in the Inquisitiones post mortem on Robert de Ros, 1311, among those printed by Mr. Vincent.134 We there read of "c. acre terre arrabilis per majorem centenam que valent per annum lx. S. prec' acre vj. den.," at Wyville and Hungerton (on the border of Leicestershire); while at Claxby and Normanby (in the north of the county) we have "cc. acras per minorem centenam et valent c. s. prec' acre vj. d." Again, at Gedney (in the south-east), we have "cc. acre terre arrabilis per majus centum et valent per annum xxiiij. li., prec' acre ij. s. et iiij. acre prati et valent per annum viij. li., prec' acre ij. s. Et cxiij. acre pasture per majus centum et valent per annum ix. li. xix. s. vi. d., prec' acre xviij. d." On the same property there were due "ccciiij. opera autumpnalia cum falcis, et valent xxxvj. s. viij. d., prec' operis j. den.," so that these also were reckoned by the long hundred.

Mr. Stevenson was not aware of this evidence, but admitted that as the Domesday passage refers to "such a Danish stronghold as Lincolnshire, it is not free from the suspicion of Danish influence." His own evidence from a 16th century rental 135 is subject to a similar criticism. For the general use, therefore, of the "long hundred" in England he is compelled to rely on the Dialogus de Scaccario and Howden's description of the new survey of 1198, the "hide or ploughland" being described in both cases as of a hundred acres, where the "hundred" must have meant 120. But I venture to think that the use of this reckoning for the ploughland, or archaic "hide," does not establish its general

133 Mr. Stevenson, perhaps, is rather too severe on Canon Taylor's Carucate" remarks in the New English Dictionary. Strictly, no doubt, the Canon was mistaken, with Mr. Pell, in reckoning 120 as 144, "by the English number"; but the evidence in his paper on "the plough and the ploughland" seems to establish a practice of counting by twelve instead of ten.

134 Genealogist, N. S., vi. 160–1.

135 Arch. Rev., iv. 322.

The "Long" Hundred of 120

71

employment. In Domesday, certainly, it is only at Lincoln that we find it actually recognised, houses being reckoned everywhere else on the usual system.

I think, therefore, that we may fairly hold the Anglicus numerus, or long hundred, to have specially prevailed in the "Danish" districts, which were also assessed, we shall find, in sums of six and twelve. But what was the boundary of this Danish district? It was not the border between Mercia and Wessex, for Mercia was itself divided between the "six" and the "five" systems.156 Of the two adjacent Mercian shires, for instance, of Leicester and Warwick (afterwards united under one sheriff), we find the latter decimal and the former duodecimal. The military service of Warwick and Leicester was arranged on the same method, yet Leicester sent twelve "burgesses" to the fyrd where Warwick sent ten. But, it may be urged, the two shires were divided by the Watling Street, the boundary (under the peace of Wedmore) of the Danelaw. Was then the Danelaw the district within which the systems prevailed? No, for the Danelaw, under this treaty, included all Cambridgeshire and other hidated districts. The answer, therefore, which I propound is this: The district in which men measured by carucates, and counted by twelves and sixes, was not the district which the Danes conquered, but the district which the Danes settled, the district of "the Five Boroughs."

13 On this point one may compare with profit "the making of the Danelaw" (858-878), by the late Mr. Green (Conquest of England, pp. 114-129), who had devoted to this subject much attention. He discusses the limits of Eastern Mercia, the district of the Five Boroughs, in the light of local nomenclature (ibid., pp. 121–2), and includes within it, on this ground, Northamptonshire, while observing that the country about Buckingham, which formed the southern border of the "Five Boroughs," has no "byes." My own evidence is wholly distinct from that of local nomenclature, and defines more sharply the district settled and reorganized by the Danes. The hidation of Northamptonshire is peculiar, a unit of four (reminding one of the Mercian shilling) coming into prominence. Still, it was not carucated, but retained its assessment in hides.

Dependent on these "Five Boroughs" were the four shires of Leicester, Derby, Nottingham, and Lincoln. For two of the Boroughs, Lincoln and Stamford, both belonged to this last shire, which was, indeed, the stronghold of the system.137 Between Stamford and Cambridge we have the same contrast as between Warwick and Leicester, for while Cambridge was divided into ten wards ("custodiæ "), Stamford was divided into six. Lincolnshire, as I have said, was the stronghold of the system, and it is in Lincoln itself that we find Domesday alluding eo nomine to the Anglicus numerus, the practice of counting 120

as 100.

Now in the peculiar district of which I am treating there occurs an important formula which covers Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, Derbyshire, and Notts. Domesday has nothing like it for the other parts of England. Here are the three passages in which we find it recorded:

[blocks in formation]

DERBY AND NOTTS. In Snotingehamscyre et in Derbiscyre pax regis manu vel sigillo data, si fuerit infracta, emendatur per xviii. hundrez, unumquidque hundret viii. libras. Hujus emendationis habet rex ii. partes, comes terciam. Id est xii. hundred emendant regi et vi. comiti -i. 280b.

For comparison with these three passages we may turn to

137 Stamford is assigned to Lincolnshire by Domesday, but is now in Rutland. The "Rutland" of Domesday (the northern portion of the county as at present constituted) was included, we shall find, in the carucated district by which it was surrounded on the north.

The "Danish" Districts

73

the charter of immunities confirmed to York Cathedral by Henry I., Stephen, and Henry II. We there read:-

Si quis enim quemlibet cujuscumque facinoris aut flagitii reum et convictum infra atrium ecclesiæ caperet et retineret, universali judicio vi. hundreth emendabit; si vero infra ecclesiam xii. hundreth; infra chorum xviii. . . In hundreth viii. libræ continentur.138

[ocr errors]

As there were twelve carucates in the "Hundred," so it paid twelve marcs, which, if we can trust the above explanation, themselves came to be termed a "Hundred." Moreover, the "Hundreds" themselves were grouped in multiples of six. So too the Yorkshire thegn who held six Manors or less paid three marcs to the sheriff; if he held more than six, twelve marcs to the king (Domesday, i. 298b).

[ocr errors]

It is a special feature of the "Danish" district that each territorial "Hundred" contained twelve "carucatæ terræ." This point is all-important. Just as a "Hundred" to an Anglo-Saxon suggested one hundred "hides," so to the Danes of this district it suggested twelve "carucates." Nay, to the men of Lincolnshire there could be no more question that twelve carucates made a Hundred" than there could be now, among ourselves, that twelve pence make a shilling. If we turn to the Lindsey Survey,139 a generation later than Domesday, we obtain proof to that effect. We find that Survey, in three instances, adding up all the estates of a tenant within a Wapentake, and giving us the result in "Hundreds " and 66 carucates." Here are the actual figures :—

138

Reg. Mag. Alb. at York, pars. ii. 1. Quoted by Canon Raine, in his edition of John of Hexham (who applies these formula to Hexham itself), p. 61.

15 Vide infra, p. 181, et sq.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

Now we must observe that these "Hundreds " are not districts with "a local habitation and a name "; they are merely sums of twelve carucates produced by compound addition. We further find, at the head of the survey of each Wapentake, a note that it is reckoned to contain so many "Hundreds," with the explanation, in some instances, that in each "Hundred" were xii. carucatæ terræ." 1) 143 But even here the real unit is shown to be "six carucates," for several Wapentakes contain an odd "half-hundred,” while in that of Horncastle this is actually entered as "six carucates."

Here are the nineteen Wapentakes, with the number of Hundreds assigned to each, and the number of "carucatæ terræ " that such Hundreds would imply :

140❝Suma iii. hundr' et vi. car. et vi. bov."

141 "Suma iiii. hundr' et x. car." (a wrong total).

142 Summa iii. hundr' et v. car. et iiii. bov."

143 See also on these Hundreds Mr. Stevenson's remarks in Eng. Hist. Rev., v. 96, which have appeared since I made these researches.

« PreviousContinue »