A HISTORY OF ESSEX disturbance were accompanied by such destruction. I have elsewhere dwelt on the importance attached by Geoffrey, Earl of Essex, under Stephen to immunity for his ' assarts ' and ' waste of the forest,' 1 and drawn attention to mention of such an ' assart ' at Ugley in a charter of the same reign. 2 Other references to assarts are found in early charters relating to Essex, and we know from three entries, under Herefordshire, in Domesday that clearings in the woodlands for the purpose of cultivation were already known as assarts (or essarts) in io86. 3 Judging from such evidence as we have both before and after the Conquest, we must assume that this loss of woodland represents that extension of the cultivated area (terra lucrabilis) that was always in progress. In addition to the coast marshes and the woodlands, ' pasture ' and ' marsh ' are occasionally mentioned inland. At Fairsted, for instance, in the heart of the county, we have mention of pasture worth fourpence (a year), and at Notley, adjoining it, of pasture worth sixpence (a year), while at Walthamstow eight shillings a year were received from the ' pasture,' at Waltham (Holy Cross) eighteen shillings, at Roydon two shillings, at Hallingbury 28 pence, and at Epping with Nasing 32 pence. At Witham the annual value of the pasture had risen from sixpence to fourteenpence. The ' pasture ' at Hatfield Broadoak is of interest for the curious payment received from it ; it rendered to the manor 9 wethers and the service of ploughing 41 acres. An entry, apparently unique, records that at Great Wigborough there was ' pasture for 100 sheep, rendering 16 pence (a year).' At Tiltey we have 20 acres of marsh ('maresc'), and at Greenstead on the Colne (adjoining Colchester), 24 acres ' of meadow and marsh.' At Little Parndon there were 45 ' what with meadow and marsh,' and at Great Canfield 48 ' of meadow what with meadow and marsh.' * A remarkable entry under Peldon speaks of ' 80 acres of arable land and 200 acres of marsh ' having been taken from its 5 hides. This must be a solitary mention of coast marsh as such, and appears to correspond with the few cases in which woodland, as we saw, was reckoned by hides and acres, and not by the number of swine for which it afforded feed. We have still to deal with the mills, the fisheries and the saltpans among the sources of profit to the holders of land. The multure or right of the lords to the grinding of all the wheat at their mill made its possession of some value, and it is interesting to find how often the watermills entered in Domesday can be identified at the present day. The most remarkable group of mills in Essex was at West Ham, on the Lea, where we read there were 8 mills and had been 9. At Leyton to its north, a mill, we are told, had been ' taken away ' (ablatus est), a phrase which needs explanation. At some places we find a mill where there had been none ; at others there was none, though there had ' Geoffrey de Mandevllle, pp. 376-8. * Essex Arch. Trans, [n.s.] viii. 328. 3 Domesday, i. 179^, 184^ ('essarz'), 1 80 ('exsarta silvae '). In the first of these the word 'essarz' is written over ' terrae project* de silva,' which implies the identity of the two. 4 ' Inter pratum et maresc ' is the formula used in both cases. 378
