DOMESDAY SURVEY 



and an entry in a i 2th-century survey of the hundred of Thingoe, made for 

 Abbot Sampson of St. Edmundsbury,'' gives the name of the twelve leets of 

 Thingoe Hundred, with their constituent vills. The peculiar feature of 

 the Norfolk and Suffolk Domesday Surveys is the existence of a system of 

 supplementary assessment for the geld, based on these leet divisions. In many 

 of the East Anglian entries a new term occurs, ' the formula which prescribes 

 how much geld the landholders of the vill must pay " when the hundred 

 pays 20J.," "' and, coupled always, or nearly always,'* with this formula, the 

 measurements of the vill expressed in leagues and furlongs or quarentines 

 {quarentenae).^^ By setting this Domesday assessment of the geld over against 

 the vills of the Thingoe leets, as given in the 1 2th-century survey, Mr. Round 

 has shown that the hundred in this case was divided into twelve blocks of 

 equal assessment, each paying 20^. when the hundred paid ^i sterling to 

 the geld, and called leets}^ It is worth noting that ^od. is the Danish ora^ 

 at least in one of its forms, the twelfth part of a pound sterling, the eighth 

 part of a mark." This may point to a Scandinavian origin for the leet 

 system, which would be quite in keeping with the character of Suffolk, a 

 carucated county, which had formed part of ' Guthrum's Kingdom,' and was 

 settled as well as conquered by the Danes.'^ Following the clue offered by 

 the leet organization in Thingoe Hundred, it is possible to find much evidence 

 which implies the existence of an ordered system of assessment of the same 

 nature throughout the county. The total assessment of the twenty-four 

 hundreds at ^i a hundred would be £,1^. The actual assessment, as stated 

 in Domesday Book, is £^11 \\s. 5|^., distributed among the hundreds in the 

 following proportions : — 



Name of Hundred ^ t, d. Name of Hundred ^ i. d, 



• Thingoe 100^ Bishop's o 



• Thedwastre i o i^ Bradmere o 



• Risbridge i o i| Lothing O 



Lf^l^ford 109^ Half Hundreds 



■ Blackbourn 1 7 9t t 1 • 1 1 



.Wilford o IQ 8i Loth'"g^*"'^ ° 



. Carlford o IQ 7f " ^^'^J""^, ° 



Stow o 



Cosford o 



T oi88" Ipswich [100 ' head-pennies '] . ."o 



. Colneis 0186 Hundred and a Half 



■ Claydon 0184. Samford 164^ 



. Plomesgate 0175 r, u u j j 



- Bosmere 017 3 Double Hundred 



• Blything O 17 iij' Babergh i 13 i| 



■S'""g^°''' ° ''^ " Total . . . . 21 II 5l 



• Hartismere o • ' ^ 



" Gage, Suff. Hund. oflh'mgoe, Introd. xii ; Select Pleas in Manorial Courts (Selden Soc), Introd. p. Ixxiii^ 

 n. A ; Round, Feud. Engl. loi ; Chron. Joe. de Brakelonda (Camden Soc), 21. 



" Maitland, Dom. Bk. and Beyond, 431, n. I ; Dom. Bk. 382^; ' Stoches,' assessed at '4</. in gelto de 

 20 solidis,' 372; St. Edmund's Bury, ' et quandoin hundreto solvitur adgeltum unam libram, tunc inde exeunt 

 6od. ad victum monachorum.' 



" In one case [Dom. Bk. zb, ' Brumfort ' (Bramford)] the lineal measurements are given without the geld. 



^ Dom. Bk. 304, ' Edwardestuna. Habet hoc manerium sex quarentenas in longo et sex in lato et de 

 gelto 10^.' " Feud. Engl. 98 et seq. 



" It appears to have been variously worth i6d. and 2od. Liebermann, Gesetze der Angelsachsen : Glossary 

 'ora' ; cf. Chadwick, Anglo-Sax. Institutions; Index, 'ora' ; Dom. Bk. 312 ; Dunwich, 'forisfacti sunt de ii 

 oris' ; cf. Round, 'The Domesday Ora ' (Engl. Hist. Rev. xxiii, 283). For the whole question of the Suffolk 

 ' ora ' cf. below, p. 409. "* Round, Feud. Engl. Ti.-i~. 



" It is interesting to note that Ipswich half-hundred was almost exempt from geld, and that Bradmere was 

 practically assessed as a half-hundred. The ' head-pennies ' are not here included in the geld. Cf. below, p. 416. 



I 361 46 



