A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE and two of 2 each, which would not seem to fit a duodecimal system. Yet the Rutland evidence, thanks to Domesday's introductory note (fo. 293/^), enables us to see how such figures could be, and were, com- bined in twelves. In the Hundred of Corby, which bordered on Leicestershire, we may trace the same influence as in those of Nassaburgh and Willibrook. Blatherwick, for instance, had 6 ploughlands ; Carlton, 18 ; Corby, 9 ; Dingley, 9 ; Stoke Albany, 6 ; Wakerley, 6 ; and Weekley, 6. Nor should we forget that in that portion of Rutland which was then in Northamptonshire, North and South LufFenham together are assigned 24 ploughlands. Enough has now been said to prove that in the north- east of our county the ploughlands show traces of a reckoning as artificial as in its south-west, and that this arrangement was duodecimal in the former district and decimal in the latter. Tedious as may have seemed the process by which we reach this conclusion, the result is well worth it ; for we learn from these figures that the Danish element from the north must have established a strong footing in a good part of Northamptonshire, although, as the Domesday assessment shows, it was so far driven back that not only the whole county, but one of the Rut- land ' wapentakes ' — a name which implies a Danish district, — was eventually assessed in hides, like the counties to the south.* It is, how- ever, worth noting that a ' bovate ' (which was alien to the ' hide ' system) does occasionally appear, as if a stray survival. We may, there- fore, compare this evidence, afforded by the local assessments, with that derived from the county place-names, in its bearing on the character and limits of Scandinavian settlement within the borders of the shire. '^ The Hundred of Nassaburgh itself is said to derive its name, ' the Nass or Ness of Burgh', from its situation, stretching out in the form of a promontory between the Welland and the Nene ;' and within it we find such significant names as Northolm, Gunthorp, Worthorp, Dosthorp, and Southorp. It is, moreover, very remarkable that, in the Peterborough Survey, we find an entry (under Henry I.) that ' Gilbert owes 45 shil- lings from the two Hundreds " de Wapentach [sic) de Burch." ' * This was the double 'Hundred' of Nassaburgh. Thus, although described as a ' Hundred' in Domesday, the Scandinavian name here survived, just as in Rutland, to its north-west, ' Wiceslea ' — the Northamptonshire portion — is styled a ' Hundred ' three times,* and a ' Wapentake ' five ' It is possible that the even numbers of the hides in the local Hundreds, as shown in the Northamptonshire geld-roll, may be due to the comparatively late date of this assessment. ^ On the duodecimal system of the ' Danish ' districts see my Feudal England, pp. 69-82, 86-90, 196, 573. It is only right, however, to add that my theory of ' the six-carucate unit,' while it has not been challenged, has not been endorsed, so far as I know, by historians. As yet, therefore, it represents my own view alone. ^ Bridges' Northamptonshire, II. 483. This suggestion is confirmed by the fact that the adjacent (south-western) angle of Lincolnshire was called ' Nesse ' wapentake (D. B., fo. 376A).
- Chronicon Petroburgeme, p. 167.
- In one of these cases ' Wap ' is written in the margin.
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