Although Mr Eyton also indulged in 'fanciful calculations', and committed the fatal error of combining facts and fancies, he was at least on the right track in discarding the notion that the Domesday hide denoted a fixed area, and in treating it as a term of assessment. At the same time, the acceptance of my theory that this assessment was not determined by the real value of the Manor or Vill, but was unconnected with it, would be, of course, destructive of all his calculations.
The five-hide unit which lies at the root of my theory is found ever to the front, turn where we will. In Oxon[122] we find entered in succession the Bishop of Lincoln's Manors 90, 60, 40, 50, 50 hides, while if we work through the southern extremity of the county (lying south of Ewelme), following the bend of the Thames, we find the assessments are as follows: Preston Crowmarsh, 5; Crowmarsh Gifford, 10; Newnham Murren, 10; Mongewell, 10; Ipsden, 5; North and South Stoke, 20¼; Checkenden, 5; Goring, 20; Gethampton, 6½; Whitchurch, 10; Mapledurham, 10; Caversham, 20; Dunsden, 20; Bolney (8) and Lashbrook (12) 20; Harpsden, 5; Rotherfield, 10; Badgemoor, 5; Bix 5. So too on the western border we have in succession Churchill, 20; Kingham, 10; Foxcote (1) and Tilbury (14), 15; Lyneham, 10; Fyfield, 5; Tainton, 10; Upton, 5; Burford (8) and Widford (2), 10; Westwell, 5.[123]
Berkshire undoubtedly offers a fruitful sphere of study. On the one hand, we have so large a proportion of Manors assessed at 5, 10, 15, 20 hides, and so forth as to strike the reader at once without special research; on the other, we find these archaic assessments reduced under the Conqueror in the most sweeping manner, and the old system thus effaced. Fortunately for us in this case its existence is recorded in the Domesday entries of the previous assessments. What is here, as elsewhere, wanted is a thorough local analysis of the hidage, Hundred by Hundred. For no county is such an analysis more urgently needed.
In Bucks the Primate's three Manors are of 40, 5, 30 hides, while nine Manors of Walter Giffard follow one another with these assessments: 20, 10, 10, 20, 3½, 10, 5, 5, 10; and in Gloucestershire we are met on every side by Manors of 5, 10, 15, 20 hides, and so on. In Surrey, the Primate's six Manors are assessed at 30, 20 80, 5, 20, 14 hides. As a proof that this feature is in no way of my own creation, I will take the Wiltshire Manors selected by Mr Pell for his tables. Seven out of the eleven selected by him are five-hide assessments, being 5, 10, 20, 40, 20, 5, 10. The marvel is that any one can have failed to observe the general occurrence of the fact.
In Middlesex the five-hide unit is peculiarly prominent. We have only to glance at the pages of Domesday to be struck by such assessments as Harrow (100 hides), Fulham (50 hides[124]), Isleworth (70 hides), Harmondsworth (30 hides), while on folios 129b-130, we have seven Manors in succession of which the assessments are 15, 35, 30, 30, 7½, 15, 10, representing 3, 7, 6, 6, 1½, 3, 2, multiples of the five-hide unit. But, here again, conspicuous as is this unit even in the case of Manors, its prevalence would be still more apparent, if we could reconstruct the Vills. Thus, for instance, in the Hundred of Spelthorne we find these assessments:
| Hides | Folio | |
|---|---|---|
| Staines | 19 | 128 |
| 'In Speletorne Hundred' | 1 | 128b |
| 'Hatone' | 1½ | 129 |
| Haneworde | 5 | 129 |
| 'Leleham' | 2 | 129 |
| 'Exeforde' | 1 | 129 |
| 'Bedefunt' | 2 | 129 |
| Felteham | 12 | 129 |
| Stanwelle | 15 | 130 |
| 'Bedefunde' | 10 | 130 |
| 'West Bedefunde' | 8 | 130 |
| 'Haitone' | 1⅚[125] | 130 |
| 'Leleham' | 8 | 130b |
| 'In Hundredo de Spelethorne' | ⅔[126] | 130b |
| 'Cerdentone' | 5 | 130b |
'Exeforde' is Ashford, which 'appears from a very early period till after the dissolution of the monasteries to have been an appendage of Stains'.[127] Thus we obtain an assessment of 20 hides for Staines cum Ashford. So too we have at once for Laleham an assessment of ten hides, while that of East and West Bedfont was, we see, twenty hides. The most striking case, however, is that of Hatton; for, if we add to its two named Manors the nameless estates in the above list, the four fit in like a puzzle, giving us an aggregate assessment of exactly five hides.
The hundred, therefore, was assessed thus:
| Hides | |
|---|---|
| Stains with Ashford | 20 |
| Stanwell | 15 |
| West Bedfont | 10 |
| East Bedfont | 10 |
| Laleham | 10 |
| Feltham | 12 |
| Hanworth | 5 |
| Charlton | 5 |
| Hatton, etc. | 5 |