Domesday is the oldest surviving public record in Britain. It documents the results of an extensive land survey commissioned by William I in 1085. It is the most comprehensive account of pre-industrial society, offering an unparalleled glimpse into the medieval world.
Exploring Domesday
Recognized as the earliest and most significant public record, Domesday provides a highly detailed account of land ownership, resources, and valuations in late 11th-century England. The survey's scale was immense, and its resulting record, the Domesday Book, remains an extraordinary historical achievement. No comparable document emerged in England until the national censuses of the 19th century.
The Discover Domesday exhibition delves into the purpose behind its creation and offers insights into how it can be interpreted. Visitors can explore the methods used to conduct the survey, the nature of the questions posed, the process of compiling the findings, and the remarkable preservation of this historical record for over nine centuries.
Historical Context
In 1066, William, Duke of Normandy, defeated the Anglo-Saxon King Harold II at the Battle of Hastings, securing his place as the ruler of England. Nearly two decades later, in 1085, the kingdom faced another looming threat—this time from Denmark. To fund the mercenary forces needed to defend his realm, William required a comprehensive understanding of the financial and military resources available to him.
During his Christmas court in 1085, William commissioned an extensive survey to assess the wealth and assets of England’s boroughs and manors. His primary objective was determining ownership, valuation, and the obligations owed to the Crown in taxes, rents, and military service. A concurrent reassessment of taxation, known as the geld, was carried out, with records still surviving for parts of the southwest. However, Domesday was far more than just a tax ledger. It also documented land tenure, linking estates to their respective manors and identifying the King’s principal tenants—those responsible for providing knights to serve in his army. This meticulous record allowed William to consolidate and maximize royal revenues while reinforcing the feudal obligations of his chief barons, who were vested in formalizing their post-1066 territorial gains.
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle confirms that William ordered this survey, referred to as the description, during his Christmas court in 1085. While most historians agree that he intended the findings to be compiled into the Domesday Book, some scholars suggest that his son and successor, William Rufus, initiated the book’s formal creation. Regardless of who finalized the process, the survey was a massive administrative undertaking, reflecting the full organizational power of Norman rule in England.
The Origins of the Name “Domesday”
The term Domesday is not found within the book itself. Its name is first recorded in a document about the Exchequer, written around 1176 (Dialogus de Scaccario). It explains that Domesday was a metaphor for the Day of Judgment. Just as the Last Judgment was believed to be final and unchangeable, so were the decisions recorded in the Domesday Book. By 1180, Domesday had become widely accepted, reflecting its role as an authoritative record of ancient landholdings. It was also called the Winchester Roll, the King’s Roll, and sometimes the Book of the Treasury during the medieval period.
The World of Domesday
The World of Domesday explores life in late 11th-century England through the extensive details recorded in the survey. Domesday provides a wealth of information about the landscape, detailing how different regions were used for ploughland, pasture, meadow, and woodland, offering insights into regional land-use variations. It also documents the people who held or worked the land and the social structures that defined their relationships. As noted by an Anglo-Saxon chronicler, no resource—whether ox, cow, or pig—was omitted from the survey. Over 20 years, Domesday also reveals how the English landscape evolved through efforts to consolidate and protect Norman rule.
Domesday Book
1. Purpose of This Guide
This guide provides an overview of accessing and interpreting the information recorded in the Domesday Book. An online Domesday exhibition is available for a broader understanding of Domesday and the historical context of late 11th-century England. Due to its historical significance and fragility, the original Domesday Book is rarely accessible. Instead, this guide directs researchers to high-quality printed and online facsimiles and translations.
2. Understanding Domesday Book
Domesday Book is a comprehensive survey and valuation of landed property in England, commissioned by William the Conqueror at the end of 1085 and conducted the following year. It details land ownership, usage, and changes since the Norman Conquest 1066. While it is an invaluable historical record, it is not a population census, as the individuals named are predominantly landholders. Written in Latin, reliable translations are available for more straightforward study.
The Domesday Book is generally not the best source for those researching Norman ancestry. Instead, reference materials such as A J Camp’s My Ancestors Came with the Conqueror (1990) and Katharine Rohan’s Domesday People: A Prosopography of Persons Occurring in English Documents 1066-1166 (1999) Vol. 1 may be more helpful. The Spotlight On: Domesday video also includes a brief introduction to Domesday.
3. Great Domesday, Little Domesday, and Areas Covered
The survey does not include London, Winchester, Northumberland, Durham, or much of northwestern England. Welsh regions are also primarily excluded, with only a few border areas documented.
Most of the survey's findings were compiled into Great Domesday, while Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex were recorded separately in Little Domesday, a smaller volume. Little Domesday is a surviving part of an earlier, more detailed draft based on the original survey returns.
4. Information Recorded in Domesday
The Domesday survey was conducted through sworn inquests held by commissioners in local courts. These inquests involved questioning local men using a standardized set of inquiries, repeated three times to reflect changes in landholding over time. The survey documented land ownership as it had been:
On the final day of Edward the Confessor’s reign (5 January 1066), abbreviated in Domesday as TRE (Tempore Regis Edwardi).
When the land was granted by William the Conqueror.
It was in 1086, the year the survey was taken.
The survey questions included:
What was the manor called?
Who held it during Edward the Confessor’s reign?
Who holds it now?
How many hides (a unit of land measurement) does it contain?
How much land has been added or removed?
What holdings did each freeman and sokeman possess?
How many plow teams are there?
What is the population breakdown of freemen, sokemen, villains, cottars, and enslaved people?
How much woodland, meadow, and pasture is there?
How many mills and fisheries exist?
What was the manor’s value in 1066 and 1086?
Not every entry contains all these details. For further clarification, a glossary of Domesday terms is available in the online Domesday exhibition.
5. Structure of the Original Domesday Book
Both Great Domesday and Little Domesday are organized by county. Within each county, entries are further arranged by landholder. A numbering system, written in red Roman numerals, marks the beginning of each landholder’s entry. Each county section begins with a table of contents, listing landholders alongside their assigned numbers, with the king always appearing first. However, there was no original index. Later editors have compiled comprehensive indexes in both online and printed editions, making it easier to locate specific entries.
It is important to note that modern place names often cover areas that, in the 11th century, belonged to multiple distinct manors. If different landowners held these manors, they may appear in separate Domesday entries. Likewise, if a single individual held multiple manors in other counties, their holdings would be recorded in more than one entry.
Mary Watson
