A HISTORY OF NORFOLK Smeeth,^ A glance at the ordnance map reveals the extreme complication of the south-western corner of Frecbridge hundred, and suggests that at least two parcellings out of reclaimed land must have been made. This classic instance is not, however, so interesting as a similar tract between the rivers Yare and Waveney, which is split up between the six parishes of Langley, Chedgrave, Toft Monks, Stockton, Loddon, and Raveningham, half of which belong to Clavering hundred, and half to that of Loddon. The correspond- ing tract north of the Yare, known as The Marsh, is similarly divided between the hundreds of Walsham and Blofield. We are not, therefore, entitled to assume that the sheep enumerated in the account of any manor actually fed in the immediate neighbourhood of the village which now bears the name of the manor. If we make a rough map of the county, marking each manor where more than loo sheep are recorded, we find, as might be expected, that much of the sheep-farming went on in the western portion of the county in the marshes of Freebridge and Clackclose hundreds. We find sheep along the course of the Little Ouse, near Thetford, and also in the tract extend- ing along the valleys of the Yare and Waveney, and in the northern hundreds of Smethden, Brothercross, Gallow, and North Greenhoe. It is probably safe to assume that these last were pastured on the salt marshes which stretch from Blakeney to Titchwell along the north coast, just as Bishop William's loo sheep in Hindringham (f. 192) seem to have been pastured in Wells and Warham. In most cases we are left to infer the existence of these pastures from the numbers of the stock, so it may not be out of place to enumerate the few instances in which the ' pastura ovium ' is mentioned. In Clavering hundred Haddiscoe has pasture for forty sheep and for fifty more," Wheatacre for 200,^ Heckingham has ' marsh ' for sixty sheep,* while in Raveningham ' one freeman, Ketel Friedai,' has seven acres and I marsh. ^ In Freebridge hundred there is a pasture at Upwell, or Outwell, measuring five furlongs by four." In Clackclose hundred there is a marsh at Marham, whereof 'nescitur mensura.'^ In North Greenhoe hundred there is pasture for 200 sheep at Wells next the sea,* and finally there are sixteen acres of marsh in Norwich hundred.' The part of the county in which sheep seem least numerous may be found by drawing a line from Cromer to East Dereham, and another line from East Dereham to Harleston or Diss. For about five miles on each side of these lines, which form an angle at East Dereham, sheep may be said to be comparatively scarce. Norfolk is, on the whole, a flat county, but a good deal of the higher ground lies within the tract just described. This ground was probably fairly well wooded in 1086. We can infer this with tolerable certainty from the distribution of pigs in Domesday Book. As in the case of the sheep we must allow for a good deal of intercommoning at all events between manors, but when we find groups of villages lying near together and supporting more than a hundred swine each, we may safely conclude that they lay in a well-wooded district. Wood is often expressed in terms of pigs, as at Whinburgh,^° but in a few cases measurements are given. Thus ' Maitland, Dom. Bk. and Beyond, 365 n. * Dom. Bk. fF. 182, 190. ' Ibid. f. 250. Mbid. f. 205. ' 'Ibid. fF. 135^, 273/5. ' Ibid. f. 22ii. • Ibid. f. 212^. Mbid. f. 271. " Ibid. f. 2343. " Ibid. f. 2073. 24
