258 THE DOMESDAY INQUEST 



distance of about 2 miles, while from the Cherwell to the 

 eastern boundary is about I mile. The Domesday measure- 

 ments of the wood are I league by half a league, or 12 fur- 

 longs by 6. The map, too, would lead us to look in the 

 same direction for the pasture of 3 furlongs in length by 2 in 

 breadth. The old Cow Pasture was of approximately the 

 same dimensions till 1806. 



The meadow of 30 acres can be identified with more cer- 

 tainty ; for to the east of the bridge, on both banks of the Ray, 

 the map shows about 30 acres of meadow, known as the 

 Holme Common, which have never been ploughed. All the 

 other grass-land in the parish shows, by its ridges and furrows, 

 that at some time or other it has been under the plough. 

 The mill still stands where its predecessor stood in the eleventh 

 century, and is driven by a cut from the Cherwell. But the 

 omission of any mention of a church is no proof that there 

 was then no church in the village. Oxfordshire churches are 

 generally omitted, and it should be remembered that there 

 are traces of Norman work in the existing church. 



Our identification of the wood and the pasture with the 

 southern portion of the vill compels us to find all the land 

 which was then under the plough in that part of the parish 

 which lies to the north of the Ray, an area of about 1000 acres. 

 This was cultivated by six teams in 1086 ; but fifteen teams 

 were employed in the time of King Edward. The reason 

 for this decrease is to be found in the raid of the Northum- 

 brians to Oxford during the summer of 1065. Wherever 

 they went they lived on the fat of the land, little caring that 

 they destroyed the cattle of the villagers, and by so doing 

 they reduced the area of the land under cultivation. Possibly, 

 too, some of these fifteen teams were employed in the southern 

 part of the vill, and after the raid this land had been allowed 

 to go out of cultivation, and had relapsed into a state of scrub 

 and bush. 



At the last census the population of Islip was about 550. 



