combe, Croham, Coombe, Selsdon, Woodside, and Shirley; from each of which a Constable is annually appointed at the General Court for the manor of Croydon ; within which, at the time of the enclosure of Norwood and the Commons, claims were made and allowed for the undernamed places as manors: Croydon, by the Archbishop of Canterbury. Rectory, Robert Harris, Esq. Norbury, Richard Carew, Esq. Haling, William Parker Hammond, Esq. Croham, The Warden and poor Brothers and Sisters of the Hospital of the Holy Trinity. Bencham, alias White Horse, John Cator, Esq. Having submitted to the reader this General account of Croydon and its neighbourhood, we shall now proceed to its history both ancient and modern. which they paid an acknowledgment; or else were in a more servile condition, as being sub dominis Regis vel aliorum entirely under the power of the King or other Lords. See Brady on Boroughs, p. 627. CHAP. II. Antiquity of Croydon. WE must not attempt to discover the origin of Croydon; History has not revealed it, and we must therefore be content with such portions of antiquity as she has imparted to us. In our detail of ancient matter relative to Croydon, we shall in the first instance rely upon the authority of Domesday Book, the most indisputable record of Topography existing in the British Dominions*. We extract then, for * It may not be improper here to remark that at the time of the Roman invasion the people inhabiting the county of Surrey, in which Croydon is situated, and also the county of Sussex, were called Regni, and according to Ptolemy, PHINOI, Surrey, or Suth-rey as it was afterwards called by the Saxons, derives its name from Sud, in Saxon South, and Rea, River, on account of its lying on the south side of the River. After the Norman conquest the estates of the English were indiscriminately seized by William, and divided among those favourites and chieftains who had followed him to victory. The ferocious conqueror, however, constituted himself the chief proprietor of all the possessions so granted, and compelled every man to do homage to him for the Fee which he was permitted to C our present purpose, all that this venerable repository affords. hold. In order to obtain accurate information respecting the lands he had parcelled out among his warriors, he commenced in the year 1080 a survey of the whole kingdom, which nothing less than the labour of six years could complete. The commissioners whom he appointed for the execution of this work, took an account of the extent of each district, of the particular lands which the district contained, their respective proprietors, tenures, value; and of the different qualities of land, whether meadow, pasture, wood, or arable: all these different entries were established upon the verdicts of Juries. Thus whilst William procured an exact account of all the landed estates in the kingdom, he raised for posterity an inestimable monument of antiquity. Concerning this elaborate performance, Ingulphus, who was secretary to the conqueror, writes thus: King William for the taxing of his whole land, tooke this order in all England, there was not an hide of land but he knew the value thereof and the possessor also, neither meire nor place their was, but it was valued in the king's role, the rents and profits, the possession and possessor, were made manifest & knowne into the king, according to the fidelitie of taxors, which being chosen out of every countrey taxed or seized their owne territories, or made their own rent role, This role is called the role of Winton, and of the Englishmen for the generalitie thereof, containing wholie all the tenements of ye whole land, it is named Domesday. Such a role and very like, did King Alfred once set forth, in which he taxed all the lande of Englande by Shires, Hundreds, and Tythings. And this role, as is before noted, was called the role of Winton, because it was laide in Winchester to be kept, which Cittie was the head of the West Saxon kingdome, com TERRA ARCHIEPI CANTUAR, In Whaletone* Hundred. In Demesne Archbishop Lanfranc holds Cro ming unto him by inheritance: at that time among all the particular kingdomes of England most noble and famous. In this role of Winchester, so most of all called, because it was made after the example of the other, were taxed, and set downe the Earldomes, Hundreds, Tythings, Woods, Parks, and all Farms, in every territory or precinct, how many carucates of lande, how many plough landes, and acres, what pastures and fennes, or marishes, what tenements and tenants were contained. Respecting the name of this celebrated record, the following account is given in Stow's Chronicle: the Booke of Bermondsey saith, this Booke was laid up in the King's Treasury which was in the Church of Winchester, or Westminster, in a place called Domus Dei, or God's House, and so ye name of ye booke, therefore called Domus Dei; and since shortly, Domesday. This survey, kept in the exchequer, and written in a legible hand, consists of two volumes, one in large folio, the other in quarto, and may be consulted upon paying a fee of 6s. 8d.; for a transcript a charge is made of 4d. a line. Domesday has lately been published for the use of the House of Parliament, and the public Libraries, in a type cast for the purpose. Upon the survey some lines were written, in the quaint language of his time, by Robert, a Poet of Gloucester, We do not give them, (and indeed they are not worth the reader's attention) lest we should swell this note to an immoderate length. Concerning this Poet, Robert, some account may be found in Dugdale's Traveller. * This hundred of Croydon was antiently called the hundred 1 indene, which, in the time of King Edward the Confessor was rated at 80 Hides*; now for 16 Hides and one Virgatet. Of the arable land there is twenty Carrucates. In Demesne there are 4 Carrucates and 68 of Wallington, which is now a small hamlet in the parish of Beddington, at a little distance from Carshalton towards the East. In Domesday it is always written Waleton. In some parts of Surrey the hundred is denominated from the same place that it was anciently, but the place having changed its name, the hundred goes by that new name. Salmon's Antiquities of Surrey. *A hide of Land in the time of Edward the Confessor was 120 acres; but land was not measured in England till about the year 1008, when the realm became tributary to the Danes, and for the more equal laying on of the tax the country was measured, and the money levied pr. Hide and all paid Danegeld accordingly. Domesday. † A virgate was 40 acres, but was different in some places. A carrucate (derived from the latin word carruca, a little cart) was as much land as could be tilled with one plough and the beasts belonging thereto in one year, having meadow pasture and houses for householders and cattle belonging. Domesday. |