DOMESDAY SURVEY 



which Herdwick and Portlemouth respectively belong as outlands. Another 

 peculiarity is the small assessment laid on the Devonshire booklands. Not only 

 does the virgate take the place of the hide elsewhere/ so that manors are assessed 

 at I hide i virgate/ or 5 virgates, which would elsewhere be assessed at 5 hides, 

 but manors of unusual size are assessed at a single virgate, and ordinary 

 manors at a ferling, J ferling, or J ferling. Thus Chittlehampton with some 

 2,700 acres is assessed at i virgate ; Stoke Rivers with about 1,200 acres at 

 3 virgates ; Sampford Spiney with nearly 1,200 acres at half a hide ; 

 Dartington with over 1,400 acres at i virgate; Py worthy with roughly 

 1,500 acres at 3 virgates ; and among demesne manors of the crown North 

 Tawton with approximately 2,500 acres at J virgate ; South Molton with 

 close on 3,600 acres at 1} virgates ; Hemyock with just over 1,400 acres at 

 I virgate. On the other hand one or two exceptionally high assessments are 

 met with in the east of the county. Woodbury with about 3,200 acres is 

 assessed at 10 hides; Broad Clyst with some 3,000 acres at 9! hides; 

 Holcombe with something like 2,000 acres at 9 hides ; Standon with 

 apparently only 30 acres at i virgate ; an Otterland of about 40 acres at 

 I virgate ; and Clyst William with little more than 40 acres at half a hide. 



It is now generally admitted that whatever the hide may have originally 

 connoted as being the land of one family, yet as ordinarily used in the pages 

 of our record it denotes simply a unit of assessment. The hide is the unit 

 which paid 2 shillings towards the normal king's geld, the virgate is a 

 quarter of that unit, the ferling is a quarter of a quarter or one-sixteenth of 

 the unit.* What is more, there is no necessary connexion between area and 

 assessment, the assessments having been originally fixed by partitioning among 

 those liable to contribute an assessment levied on the hundred.* Once only 

 is the acre met with as a measure of assessment, having the value of one-thirtieth 

 of a virgate,' namely, at Sherwood [Haiserstona, fol. 182^), where the abbot of 

 Bucfast was assessed for li ferlings and 3 acres. On the rare occasions when hide 

 and virgate are not used to describe assessment the question arises, what 

 is the area they denote.? Thus in Ottery St. Mary (fol. 195) there are 

 stated to be ' 200 acres of meadow and 6 hides of pasture ' ; in Combe 

 Raleigh (fol. 348/^) there are '50 acres of wood(land) and i hide of 

 pasture'; in Smallridge (fol. 343), '31 acres of pasture and j hide of 

 wood(land).' Similarly in Lipson (fol. 222) there is ' i acre of meadow 

 and I virgate of pasture' ; in Little Cadbury (fol. 4151^), '4 acres of meadow 

 and 3 virgates of pasture'; in Doddiscombsleigh (fol. 4681^), 'i virgate 

 of wood (land) ' ; in Middle Washburton (fol. 396), ' i virgate of pasture ' ; 

 and in Lowly (fol. 468(^) there are ' 20 acres of pasture and i ferling of 

 coppice.' 



' In Trans. Devon Assoc, xxxiii, 60 1, it is shown that Ipplepen, assessed in Domesday at is| virgates, is 

 described in a charter of 956 as 15! hides of land {Cart. Sax. iii, 132). Eyton, Key to Domesday, Dorset, 14 ; 

 Round, Feudal England, 93. 



' For instance Lympstone, Blackborough Boty, Pirzwell, and at half that quantity Fenacre, Magnelege, 

 Church Putford. 



' For proof refer to Filleigh (fol. 300^), where the Exeter Book says it was assessed for 4 virgates, the 

 Exchequer for l hide ; to Riddlecombe (fol. 389), where 6 ferlings + z\ virgates are stated to make up 

 I hide ; to Church Putford (fol. 412), where | hide + \ virgate are equated with i virgate and i ferling + 

 I virgate and I ferling ; to Alverdiscott (fol. 212^), where 6 virgates = l| hides. 



* Maitland, Domesday and Beyond, 120, 206, 45 1; Trans. Devon Assoc, xxxiii, 573. 



' Round, Feudal England, 38. 



I 385 49 



