Note 2 — HENRY S. SIMMONDS.
Reading edition
The Manor is thus described in Doomsday-book among the lands belonging to the Abbot of Westminster:—"St. Peter of Westminster holds Patricesy, Earl Harold held it; and it was then assessed at 72 hides: now at 18 hides. The arable land is—Three carucates are in demesne; and there are forty-five villians, and sixteen bordars with fourteen carucates, there are eight bond men: and seven mills at £42 9s. 8d. and a corn rent of the same amount, and eighty-two acres of meadow and a wood yielding fifty swine for pannage. There is in Southwark one bordar belonging to the Manor paying twelve pence. From the roll of Wendelesorde (Wandsworth) is received the sum of £6. A villian having ten swine pays to the Lord one; but if he has a smaller number, nothing. One knight holds four hides of this land and the money he pays is included in the preceding estimate. The entire Manor in the time of King Edward was valued at £80, afterwards at £30; and now at £75 9s. 8d.
"King William gave the Manor to St. Peter in exchange for Windsor. The Earl of Moreton holds one and a half hides of land, which in King Edward's time and afterwards belonged to this Manor. Gilbert the Priest holds three hides under the same circumstances. The Bishop of Lisieux had two hides of which the Church of Westminster was seized in the time of William and disseised by the Bishop of Bayeaux. The Abbot of Chertsey holds one hide which the Bailiff of this will, out of ill-will (to the Abbot of Westminster) detached from this Manor, and appropriated it to Chertsey."
Hide of land in the ancient laws of England was such a quantity of land as might be ploughed with one plough within the compass of a year, or as much as would maintain a family; some call it sixty, some eighty, and others one hundred acres. Villian, or Villein, in our ancient customs, denotes a man of Servile or base condition, viz, a bond-man or servant. (Fr. Vilain. L. Villanus, from Villa, a farm, a feudal tenant of the lowest class.)