ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



The Domesday Survey of 1086 not only serves to show the ecclesiastical 

 configuration of the county in the eleventh century, but confirms the im- 

 pression of the wealth and importance already attained by the Church and the 

 monasteries at that time. It has been pointed out that the great and dominant 

 feature in the disposition of Dorset lands as there recorded is that more than 

 a third of the whole county was in ecclesiastical hands at the time the Survey 

 was taken, and that the patrimony of the church was greater than that of all 

 the barons and greater feudatories combined/' Among the seventy-six tenants 

 including the thegns, holding in chief of the king, are entered the names of 

 five bishops, eleven abbots, four abbesses, the community of Sherborne, the 

 chapter of Coutances, and four Saxon priests, whose lands are designated 

 under the title terra elemosinariorum Regis ; the abbot of Marmontier, a sub- 

 feudatory, is entered under the holding of the earl of Mortain. As regards 

 the estates of the various ecclesiastics, the bishop of Salisbury, besides the nine 

 manors assigned to the use of the monks of Sherborne,™ held by right of the 

 bishopric, the manors of Charminster, Alton Pancras, Up Cerne, Yetminster, 

 Beaminster, Netherbury, Chardstock, a carucate of land at Lyme, half an acre 

 at Bridport, two houses in Wareham, one in Dorchester, and other lands 

 obtained in exchange." Odo, bishop of Bayeux, half-brother of the Conqueror, 

 had as his sole Dorset estate the manor of Rampisham ; ^^ Geoffrey, bishop of 

 Coutances, who for his services at the time of the Conquest had been granted 

 large tracts of land in different counties, held the manor of Winterborne 

 Houghton;'" the bishop of Lisieux, Gilbert Maminot, had the manors of 

 Tarrant Keynston and Coombe Keynes, with a hide of land in Tarrant Pres- 

 ton ; ^* the small estate of Maurice, bishop of London, consisted of half a hide 

 of land in Odeham.''^ The eleven abbots holding in chief include the superiors 

 of Cranborne, Cerne, Milton, Abbotsbury, and Horton, all belonging to this 

 county ; the superiors of Glastonbury, Winchester, Athelney, and Tavistock 

 outside its borders ; and the Norman abbots of St. Stephen, Caen, and 

 St. Wandragesil or Fontanel. The four abbesses were the superiors of 

 Shaftesbury (Dorset), Wilton (Wiltshire), Holy Trinity Caen, and St. Mary 

 of Montevillers. The holding of the Dorset religious houses was briefly as 

 follows: — Cranborne held 2 carucates of land in Gillingham, the manors of 

 Boveridge and Up Wimborne, Lestesford, half a hide in Langford, and the 

 manor of Tarrant Monkton ; under the holding of the widow of Ralph Fitz 

 Grip, the Norman sheriff, it is recorded that Hugh gave to the church of 

 St. Mary of Cranborne half a hide of land in Orchard, ' and it is worth 

 20J.' ; ^^ Cerne held manors or estates at Cerne, Little Puddle, Radipole, 

 Bloxworth, Affpuddle, Poxwell, East Woodsford, Heffleton, ' Vergroh,' Little 



'^' R. D. Eyton, Key to Domesday Surz>. of Dorset, 156. Thus, supposing the whole territory of Dorset 

 to be divided into 265 parts, the iilng held nearly 36J such parts, the bishop of Salisbury followed with nearly 

 26, the abbess of Shaftesbury had more than i6i, the abbots of Cerne and Milton more than i 2 each, the abbot 

 of Abbotsbury more than i\ ; ibid. 



" These included the manors of Sherborne, Oborne, Thornford, Bradford, Over and Nether Compton, 

 Stalbridge, Weston, Corscombe, and Stoke Abbott. 



" Dom. Bk. (Rec. Com.), i, 75-7. From the enumeration of estates in the foundation charter of the 

 cathedral by Bishop Osmond in 1091 it is evident that many of the old endowments of the bishopric of 

 Salisbury had passed over into the possession of the church of Sarum ; Reg. of St. Osmund (Rolls Ser.), i, 198. 



" Dom. Bk. (Rec. Com.), i, 77. " Ibid. " Ibid. yjb. 



" Ibid. In the parish of Wimborne which it is conjectured he held in virtue of the deanery ; 

 R. D. Eyton, op. cit. 113, note 3. 



" Dom. Bk. (Rec. Com.), i, 84. 



