Re: Merks and perches
- From: Stanmapstone@xxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 25 Sep 2005 14:20:36 +0000 (UTC)
In a message dated 24/09/2005 21:21:03 GMT Daylight Time,
andrew@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
<Having 'in my time' worked on very light sandy soils and also on very
<heavy clay soils the area of ground, by what ever measurement system
<used, that could have been worked by either a single labourer or a span
<of oxen in a day would vary up to nearly one hundred per cent. Was there
<a 'standard' or average weight of soil, say a Middlesex loam?
<Had land enclosure started at this time? If village
<land was still being cultivated by the 'ridge and furrow' method such
<calculations would hardly be relevant.
The Domesday Book, 1086, measured estates in Virgates and Hides, which
varied according to the richness of the soil. At the time of Domesday the hide was
not just a unit of measurement, it was a unit for purposes of taxation. A
Hide was enough to support a peasant family, and was a unit of productivity or
extent. An attempt was made to standardise the hide at 120 acres, but hides
were of widely differing extents in different areas. The size shrank on
fertile land, and expanded in poor, upland, locations.
At the heart of the feudal system was the principle that only the head of
state could own land outright. The dukes and barons and the King's
tenants-in-chief technically held their land ‘of’ the crown in exchange for the dues or
service they paid. So long as land was held in exchange for services, the
number of people it could feed to provide those services was more important than
its exact area.
However in 1538 the idea of land as private property can be said to have
taken hold, and accurate measurement became important when the greatest
real-estate sale in England's history occurred after Henry VIII dissolved the
monasteries. Almost half a million acres was suddenly put on sale for cash. From now
on land was not valued in the number of people it supported but depended on
money changing hands.
In a 1538 book Sir Richard Benese described, for the first time in English,
how to calculate the area of a field or an entire estate. He said that ‘The
distances are to be carefully measured with a rod or pole, precisely 16½ feet
long’
Prominent among the purchasers of the Church property were land-hungry
owners, like the Duke of Northumberland, and Sir Robert Southwell and the Winthrop
family in Norfolk, who had been enclosing common land.
Regards Stan Mapstone
www.mapstone.org
.
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