Little Domesday as one volume, open to Norfolk
©TopFoto.co.uk/Public Record Office
After his successful invasion of England in 1066, William the Conqueror wanted to learn more about the country he now ruled. And more importantly, he wanted to know how much tax he could raise from it.
In 1085, he commissioned a survey of England to provide records of landholders, their tenants, the amount of land they owned, and how many people occupied the land. Incredibly, the information was gathered in only a year by fewer than 28 people, and was recorded by hand in two huge books (Great Domesday and Little Domesday).
This massive project contained details of no fewer than 13,418 settlements. Almost all the places described still exist, even if some of them have changed their names.
Biography
We tell the astonishing story of how the Domesday work was undertaken, and look at a rival 20th-century project that was nearly lost forever
Features
How come William the Conqueror ended up ruling us anyway? Find out here. We decipher a sample of the text, dip a toe into the politics of census-taking, and recall what other legacies the Norman invasion bequeathed us
