THE INCIDENCE OF THE GELD 253 



Devon (100 : 495) and Cornwall (100 : 766) ; but for this an 

 explanation has already been suggested that the hide repre- 

 sented the settlement of the conquering Saxon, and that 

 at the Saxon conquest numbers of Britons were spared 

 whose lands were omitted from the hidage of these counties. 

 A similar explanation will account for the under-assessment 

 of Somerset (100 : 125), Gloucester (100 : 161), Worcester 

 (100 : 159), and Shropshire (100 : 141). 



Mr. Round has approached the subject of over- and under- 

 assessment from a different standpoint. 1 He has calculated 

 the sums paid by the various counties for Danegeld in 1 1 30, 

 and compared these sums with the number of square miles 

 contained in these counties, and finds that there is a compact 

 block of counties in the centre of the island Berks., Wilts., 

 Oxon., and Bucks. of which every square mile paid approxi- 

 mately two-sevenths of a pound. To the north and west of 

 this block is a band of five counties Leicester, Warwick, 

 Worcester, Gloucester, and Somerset paying approximately 

 one-seventh of a pound a square mile ; and, similarly, the four 

 eastern counties Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, and Cambridge- 

 paid about one-seventh of a pound for every square mile. 

 Every square mile in Middlesex paid two-sevenths and in 

 Sussex one-seventh of a pound ; but Kent paid only one- 

 fifteenth, Nottingham and Derby only one-seventeenth, and 

 Devon and Stafford only one twenty-seventh of a pound per 

 square mile. For our purpose, it is sufficient to note that 

 of the twenty counties mentioned ten paid one-seventh of a 

 pound per square mile. If this be considered the normal 

 assessment, some counties were over-assessed, while others, 

 and these especially the last-conquered shires, were under- 

 assessed. " Kent, which had so steadily maintained first its 

 own independence, and then its local institutions, had suc- 

 ceeded in preserving an assessment that its neighbours had 

 cause to envy." 2 



1 F. E. t 94, etc. 2 Id., 95- 



