DORSET GELD ROLLS 



From this last example it seems that Easter was the later of the two terms. Lady Day 

 seems to have been an alternative date for this term; in Cogdean hundred pro x et vii 

 hidis et dimidia reddiderunt homines Rogerii de Bello Monte c et v solidos post festum 

 sancte Marie. 



The collectors themselves were sometimes responsible for irregularities, either by 

 collecting geld in one hundred which should have been paid in another, or, as in 

 Gillingham hundred, failing to render money which they had received: quia iiii 

 congregatores huius pecunie non reddiderunt denarios quos receperunt dederunt vadimonium 

 in misericordia ad reddendos denarios et ad emendandum forisfacturam. In Uggescombe 

 hundred the collectors had received 245. quos recipere non deberent,^^ and moreover Hi 

 solidi et vi denarii inventi sunt indicis eorum super numerum. This same phrase occurs in 

 the account of Glochresdone hundred, where the four collectors had received 12^. for 

 land in another hundred, and in addition indicis eorum inventi sunt vi solidi super numerum 

 hidarum. This may simply mean that the collectors had received money when they 

 ought not to have done, for example from exempt land, but the references to the 

 number of hides suggest that the body which checked the collectors' returns had a 

 record of the geldable capacity of each hundred, perhaps derived from the accounts of 

 an earlier levy of geld. Such a record might explain the not infrequent disparity between 

 the number of hides said to be in a hundred and the details of the account. If the totals 

 given in the geld rolls were derived from an earlier collection of geld they might have 

 ceased to be accurate. 



The accounts of both Gillingham and Glochresdone hundreds refer to four collectors, 

 and four collectors are mentioned in the account of the Wiltshire hundred of Chippen- 

 ham.'^ In Wiltshire they are sometimes called congregatores, as in Dorset, and sometimes 

 collectores. In Somerset and Devon they are called fegadri and in Devon they seem to 

 have been entitled to i geld-free hide, or to the geld from i hide. They seem also to have 

 been called hundremanni in some Devon hundreds. In one of the hundreds of Cornwall 

 there is a reference to 4 hides which never paid geld secundum testimonium hundreman- 

 norum and it is possible that these were the Cornish geld collectors. Individual collectors 

 are mentioned twice, Celwi in Wiltshire and Ansger in Somerset." The Somerset rolls 

 mention a higher body to which the collectors were responsible, presumably the same 

 body as that which checked the accounts of the hundreds of Uggescombe and 

 Glochresdone. In Bedminster hundred (Som.) the fegadri had received the geld on i hide 

 which they had not paid in and for this vadiaverunt foris ante baronum regis. ^"^ Both the 

 Somerset and the Devon rolls mention the transportation of the geld to Winchester. In 

 Somerset illi qui portaverimt has [libras'\ Wintoniam received 40^. These Somerset 

 portatores geldi had received is. 3^. which the king did not have and non potuerunt 

 compotum reddere. Hos vadiaverunt sese reddituros legatis regis.^^ In Devon William 

 Hostius and Ralph de Pomario debebant geldum portare ad thesaurum regis Wintonie.^^ 

 The Dorset rolls give the total amount of money collected but do not mention the 

 transportation to Winchester. The three Wiltshire rolls show that two groups of 

 persons, one headed by a certain Walter and one by Bishop William, supervised the 

 collection of arrears, but some money was still outstanding. '^ 



It is still a matter of controversy whether the Geld Rolls date from 1084 or 1086, but 

 the view of most scholars is that they belong to 1084. In that year, according to the 

 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a heavy geld of ds. on the hide was levied and the Geld Rolls 



" This seems to have been the geld on 4 hides belonging " Ibid. ■•• Dom. Bk. (Rec. Com.), iv. 69 (f. 76b). 



to Abbotsbun,' Abbey, which should have paid geld in '^ Ibid. 489 (fF. 526b, 527). 



Whitchurch and Redhone hundreds. " Ibid. 65 (f. 71). 



" V.C.H. Wilts, ii. 170. ■' V.C.H. Wilis, ii. 171-2. 



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