THE DOMESDAY SURVEY overthrow of England. Northamptonshire and the shires near it were for many winters the worse. It would seem to confirm the view I have advanced that a careful study of the manorial valuations entered in Domesday reveals a general recovery in values between 1066 and 1086. On the great fief of the Count of Mortain they had risen from ^Tji lis. to £i2C) lbs. ; on that of William Peverel, from £j 12s. %d. to ^74 lbs. 8^. ; on that of Hugh de Grentmesnil from ^18 1 3/. to £^t^o los. The in- ference I draw from these figures is that the devastated manors had gradually been stocked afresh. The above considerations invest with peculiar importance the Domesday valuation of the county. If we examine first that of its neigh- bours, we find that Mr. Pearson, who devoted special attention to the subject, reckoned that, on the east, Bedfordshire showed, between 1066 and 1086, a decrease in values from ;(^i,474 lis, ^d.to £i,0()6 izs. 2d., and Huntingdonshire a decrease from >C899 ^S^- 4^^- *° £'^^ '^S^- 4^- Buckinghamshire, on the other hand, shows an increase from £i,J^S 6s. 2d. to >(^i,8i3 7J. gd., and Oxfordshire a much larger one — £2,ySg 15J. ^d. to ^3,242 2J-. lid. Lastly, on the north, Leicestershire dis- plays an amazing increase — >C49i 4-^- 4^- t° jCzS^ 3-f-^ For Northamp- tonshire itself Mr. Pearson's figures are these : — 1066 1086 King's land Church lands Tenants in chief £ - 581 16 149 6 676 d. I 4 II 616 12 296 12 929 15 d. 8 2 7 1407 3 4 1843 ° 6 This shows a substantial increase of over 30 per cent. But the special feature of these figures is the great rise in the Church lands, which had all but doubled their value. And this rise is the more remarkable when reference to Domesday shows us that it is mainly due to the startling changes in the values of the many manors held by Peterborough Abbey. Now a still closer investigation reveals, I think, the fact that this was not so much a rise as a sharp recovery in value. Peterborough itself, for instance, which was worth only £1 in 1066, is entered as worth jTio in 1086. Werrington, to its north, had risen from j^i to £i., and Clinton, on the road to Market Deeping, from £2 to ^Tio. Two manors, Tinwell and Easton, facing one another on the Welland, just above Stamford, had increased their value from i os. to £j, and from 2s. to 30J. respectively. Warmington, one of its manors lying to the north-west, had risen from ^s. to ;(^ii, other portions of
- Pearson's England in the Middle Ages, I. 668.
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