How was the Domesday Book created?

"... made a survey of all England; of the lands in each of the counties; of the possessions of each of the magnates, their lands, their habitations, their men, both bond and free, living in huts or with their own houses or land; of ploughs, horses and other animals; of the services and payments due from each and every estate."
Robert, Bishop of Hereford, one of the ecclesiastics brought to England by King William.

The Domesday Book was written with a goose quill on parchment made out of sheepskin (known as vellum) that had been vigorously treated. Originally it was written in Latin, the language of medieval scholars.

In each district the Commissioners took evidence on oath and made use of a local "jury" to verify facts. In each shire they had to determine:

• The name of the place, who owned it before 1066 and who owned it after that date
• The size of the land held. Usually measured in hides, a hide was an area considered large enough to support one family. The measurement varied from 60 to 120 acres depending on the agricultural worth of the land
• The number of villagers, cottagers and slaves; how many freemen?
• How much of the land was woodland, meadowland and pasture
• The number of mills and fish ponds
• The number of plough teams working on the land, eight oxen usually equalled one team.
• What the value of the land was before 1066 and what it was after that date  

As well as the above information the Commissioners would also record any other information that they thought was useful, such as local customs or taxes. Only the chief landowner was named in the Domesday Survey, all other inhabitants were merely counted. There was also no necessity to name individual buildings or castles. Those that are mentioned are usually included for taxation or land value reasons.

The information was collected and collated at Winchester and copied up as a single volume by one writer. Norfolk, Essex and Suffolk were copied into a second volume and the surveys of several towns, including London, were not transcribed.

[Original author: Miranda Greene, 2002]