A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



between the different holdings in a ' vill.' It is somewhat remarkable 

 that this should be so, when we remember the solemn, if not immutable 

 character assigned to the Domesday record.' That the variation, how- 

 ever, existed is proved by this Survey's interesting reference, in two 

 distinct places, to ' the rolls of Winchester ' (its name for Domesday) as 

 containing a different assessment. But the Survey's evidence illustrates 

 also the assessment found in Domesday. For in Northamptonshire the 

 'small virgate ' of this 12th century survey is directly connected with 

 that reduction, that sweeping reduction of assessment, of which the 

 traces, as explained in the Domesday introduction, are found in that 

 record.'' In those Hundreds where the old assessment had been reduced 

 60 per cent. Domesday shows us a unit of 4 'hides' in the place of one of 

 10 'hides.' Thus each Domesday 'hide' was equal to 2| of the old 'hides,' 

 and each Domesday virgate {i.e. quarter of a 'hide') to 2\ of the old 

 virgates. What the Survey below did was to retain the new assessment 

 so far as the ' hides ' were concerned — indeed, the 4-hide unit is even 

 more conspicuous than in Domesday — but to revive the old virgates 

 under the name of ' small virgates,' the Domesday virgates being termed 

 'large' ones. The result, it will be found, was that the 'hide' had ten of 

 these 'small virgates'; and this must be carefully borne in mind, for the 

 ' virgates,' in Northamptonshire, of the Testa de Nevill are these ' small 

 virgates,' and not the virgates of Domesday. It is the more necessary that 

 this should be explained, as the historians of the county, it is quite clear, 

 did not understand this system or its close connexion with Domesday. 



Although they were acquainted with this Survey and used its evi- 

 dence, in some cases, for identifying holdings of which the locality was 

 not mentioned in Domesday, neither Bridges nor Baker made any attempt 

 to deal with the document as a whole, nor, indeed, has it ever been 

 published. Its value for tracing the devolution of fiefs and manors in 

 the county has, consequently, never been explained. Moreover, its 

 evidence was misunderstood, owing to the belief that it all belonged to 

 the reign of Henry II. Bridges, for instance, assuming this, was puzzled 

 (ii. 491) by its giving as lord of Barnack, not Gervase Paynell, who held 

 it under Henry II., but Fulc Paynell, his grandfather. Baker, similarly, 

 sought to identify, in the reign of Henry II,, the ' Odo Dapifer ' whom it 

 mentions, although this was no other than the Eudo Fitz Hubert of 

 Domesday, who enjoyed the favour of the Conqueror and his sons and 

 held the post of 'dapifer.'^ It is not easy to give the reader an idea of the 



' ' Hie liber ab indigenis Domesdei nuncupatur, id est, dies judicii per metaphoram ; sicut 

 enim districti et terribilis examinis illius novissimi sententia nulla tergiversationis arte valet 

 eludi, sic cum orta fuerit in regno contentio de his rebus quas illuc annotantur, cum ventum 

 fuerit ad librum, sententia ejus infatuari non potest vel impune declinari ' {Dia/ogus de 

 scaccario, II. 1 6). 



* See pp. 260-9 above. 



' The reader should also be cautioned that Bridges and Baker wrote before Mr. Hunter's 

 discovery that the earliest Pipe Roll belongs to the year 11 30, and not, as had been supposed, 

 to 1 1 40 (5 Stephen). The latter date is that which is invariably given by Baker, and it made 

 all the calculations based on it ten years wrong. 



358 



