THE DOMESDAY SURVEY 



Apart from the main Domesday classes at which we have glanced 

 above, we have a miscellaneous group comprising the swineherds 

 (fo. i8oi^), with the ' rustici porcarii ' at Oldberrow, the cowherd at 

 Bushley, the foresters, of whom we have already heard, and the dairymaid 

 {daia), who is found at Bushley and Queenhill. The very irregular 

 mention of such classes as these suggests the need for caution in accepting 

 the number given/ Indeed the omissions must be so serious that it 

 would be a futile task to estimate the population of the county on the 

 basis of the Domesday figures. Droitwich, probably, had many salt- 

 workers, though only three or four are mentioned, and the eight 

 burgesses, which is all that Ellis allows to Worcester, is a total obviously 

 absurd. The swine, again, must have needed herds in more than the 

 two or three places where we find them mentioned, and the ' newly- 

 planted vineyard ' at Hampton by Evesham must have had its vineyard 

 man.^ 



On agricultural services, the information in Domesday requires to 

 be largely supplemented by the surveys of the monks of Worcester's 

 manors in Archdeacon Hale's Registrum, and those of the Evesham 

 manors in the cartularies of that abbey. There is an interesting entry 

 in Domesday (fo. 1761^) of burgesses of Droitwich owing reaping service 

 at Wichbold ; and although on the Westminster Abbey manors there is 

 mention of some substantial landholders being required to mow for a day 

 yearly in the meadows of their lord, it must be remembered that the 

 labour was due from the land, not from its holder himself. Even villeins 

 could find substitutes, for at Blackwell, in Tredington, the villeins as a 

 body could send six men to mow, at Worcester, the meadow of their 

 lord the Prior.^ 



In discussing the affairs of the local monasteries and their disputes 

 with the new settlers and with one another, we have seen something of 

 the questions raised concerning the title to land. Worcestershire affords 

 numerous illustrations of the risk incurred by leasing church lands to 

 laymen, as was usual, for three lives. Of this practice bishop Oswald 

 had set a dangerous example, and we gather from Heming's Cartulary 

 that another bishop, Brihtheah, had done his best to follow it. It is to 

 this practice that we owe the curious record of a nuncupative will 

 found in the Worcestershire Domesday (fo. 177), the predecessor in 

 possession of William Fitz Ansculf being there alleged to have thus 

 obtained a church manor, and to have exhorted his friends, on his death- 

 bed, to see that the church regained it after his widow's death. Another 

 curious story, which may have escaped notice, is that which accounts 



^ The surveys, for instance, of Hanley Castle, on fos. 163^, i8oi, do not tally in details ; 

 and the '6 swineherds' of the latter entry are wholly omitted in the former. The I2th cen- 

 tury survey also of the Evesham manors in Cott. MS. Vesp. B. XXIV., strongly suggests 

 the omission of many villagers in Domesday. 



^ The population also must have been increased by the inmates and dependants of the 

 monasteries. A good idea of the officers and servants in the pay of a monastery may be 

 formed from a list of those of the monks of Worcester in Hale's Registrum (pp. 119-20). 



3 Hale, p. 65*. 



279 



