In the year 1085, King William I who had ruled England for almost twenty years after his victory at the Battle of Hastings, was holding a meeting his officials and the bishops. According to the words of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, "the king had great thought, and very deep conversation with his council about this land; how it was occupied, or with which men. Then sent he his men over all England into each shire; commissioning them to find out "How many hundreds of hides were in the shire, what land the king himself had, and what livestock upon the land; or, what dues he ought to have by the year from the shire." Also he commissioned them to record in writing, "How much land his archbishops had, and his bishops, and his abbots, and his earls;" and though I tell at too great length, "What or how much, each man had, who was an occupier of land in England, either in land or in livestock, and how much money it were worth." He had it investigated so very narrowly that there, was not one single hide, nor a yard of land, not even an ox, not one cow, not one pig was there left, that was not set down in his record."
The record the chronicle spoke of is the Domesday Book, a great survey carried out by the officials of the Norman king, which allowed him to understand which land and resources he owned, and what was owed to him by other landowners and people. Two volumes were produced, providing over 832 folios of information that is astonishingly comprehensive for its time.
In parts of it you do learn about the landowners and the lands in England, where they explain what property was being held, down to the number of oxen and pigs one had. You also learn about over thirteen thousand places, including castles, markets, monasteries and towns. Some portions of the work are more detailed than others, and some places, like London and sections of northern England are not included in the records.
Still, for any historian of medieval England, the Domesday Book is an invaluable resource, which can be used to study the economics and social history of the period, how the royal government operated, and understand how various nobles built up their fortunes. For many places in England, the Domesday Book is the first mention of their existence, a starting point for their history.
Printed editions and translations of the work are widely available, as well as countless books and articles studying various aspects of the records. A new online database of the Domesday Book has just been launched by The Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England project, which will allow even better access to this medieval masterpiece.
