THE DOMESDAY SURVEY 



overthrow of England. Northamptonshire and the shires near it were for many 

 winters the worse. 



It would seem to confirm the view I have advanced that a careful 

 study of the manorial valuations entered in Domesday reveals a general 

 recovery in values between 1066 and 1086. On the great fief of the 

 Count of Mortain they had risen from ^Tji lis. to £i2C) lbs. ; 

 on that of William Peverel, from £\j 12s. %d. to ^74 lbs. 8^. ; on 

 that of Hugh de Grentmesnil from ^18 1 3/. to £^t^o los. The in- 

 ference I draw from these figures is that the devastated manors had 

 gradually been stocked afresh. 



The above considerations invest with peculiar importance the 

 Domesday valuation of the county. If we examine first that of its neigh- 

 bours, we find that Mr. Pearson, who devoted special attention to the 

 subject, reckoned that, on the east, Bedfordshire showed, between 1066 

 and 1086, a decrease in values from ;(^i,474 lis, ^d.to £i,0()6 izs. 2d., 

 and Huntingdonshire a decrease from >C899 ^S^- 4^^- *° £'^^\ '^S^- 4^- 

 Buckinghamshire, on the other hand, shows an increase from £i,J^S 

 6s. 2d. to >(^i,8i3 7J. gd., and Oxfordshire a much larger one — £2,ySg 

 15J. ^d. to ^3,242 2J-. lid. Lastly, on the north, Leicestershire dis- 

 plays an amazing increase — >C49i 4-^- 4^- t° jCzS^ 3-f-^ For Northamp- 

 tonshire itself Mr. Pearson's figures are these : — 



This shows a substantial increase of over 30 per cent. But the 

 special feature of these figures is the great rise in the Church lands, 

 which had all but doubled their value. And this rise is the more 

 remarkable when reference to Domesday shows us that it is mainly due 

 to the startling changes in the values of the many manors held by 

 Peterborough Abbey. Now a still closer investigation reveals, I think, 

 the fact that this was not so much a rise as a sharp recovery in value. 

 Peterborough itself, for instance, which was worth only £1 in 1066, is 

 entered as worth jTio in 1086. Werrington, to its north, had risen from 

 j^i to £i\., and Clinton, on the road to Market Deeping, from £2 to 

 ^Tio. Two manors, Tinwell and Easton, facing one another on the 

 Welland, just above Stamford, had increased their value from i os. to 

 £j, and from 2s. to 30J. respectively. Warmington, one of its manors 

 lying to the north-west, had risen from ^s. to ;(^ii, other portions of 



* Pearson's England in the Middle Ages, I. 668. 

 261 



