io THE DOMESDAY INQUEST 



numbers of households in the villages are inserted in our 

 record ; whether their heads held land or no, they were at all 

 events liable to compulsory military service in case of invasion. 

 Possibly the Assize of Arms of Henry II. was nothing more 

 than a reduction to writing of customs that had been observed 

 for centuries. 



Yet a further reason for the undertaking of a task of this 

 magnitude has been suggested that the Conqueror, now that 

 he was fully established in his kingdom, wished to know 

 whether his gifts had reached their destined recipients ; had 

 any magnate encroached on his less powerful neighbours ? 

 Were there any English who had retained possession of their 

 lands without his consent ? Mr. Freeman, indeed, regards 

 this as the chief object of the inquiry, but later authorities 

 are against him. We shall see later that one of the questions 

 propounded by the Domesday Commissioners for Cambridge- 

 shire was whether anything had been taken from or added to 

 the property then under consideration, and that to answer this 

 question they inquired into encroachments, and reported the 

 names of those who were in wrongful possession of any lands ; 

 but these inquiries have a very material bearing on the correct 

 valuation of any property. It is obvious that if I hide had 

 been taken away from a property that was assessed at 5 

 hides, it should in fairness pay only 80 per cent, of the 

 geld it formerly paid; and, conversely, if the owner of an 

 estate assessed at io hides had added to it I hide belong- 

 ing to another property, that its assessment should be increased 

 io per cent. 



Professor Vinogradoff contends that " beside the collection 

 of the geld, one of the purposes of the inquest was to provide 

 the King with exact clues as to the personal nexus of the 

 various tenements." 1 And in support of this contention he 

 refers to the great labour which was expended in arranging 

 the statistics relating to each property under the name of the 

 1 G. M., 292. 



