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Skule 13

Name

Summary

Skule 13 was a small landowner with just 13 acres in south Norfolk, commended to the important Norfolk thegn Thorketil. For reasons unknown the house on his holding was removed by the king’s reeve some time after 1066.

Distribution map of property and lordships associated with this name in DB

List of property and lordships associated with this name in DB

Holder 1066

Shire	Phil. ref.	Vill	DB Spelling	Holder 1066	Lord 1066	Tenant-in-Chief 1086	1086 Subtenant	Fiscal Value	1066 Value	1086 Value	Conf.	Show on Map
Shire Norfolk	Phil. ref. 66,106	Vill Forncett	DB Spelling Scula	Holder 1066 Skule 'of Forncett'	Lord 1066 Thorkil	Tenant-in-Chief 1086 William, king	1086 Subtenant -	Fiscal Value 0.11	1066 Value 0.04	1086 Value 0.04	Confidence B	Map
Totals								Fiscal Value	1066 Value	1086 Value

Profile

One of the Norfolk holdings attributed to Skule appears from its small size and other circumstances to have belonged to a man other than the middling thegn Skule son of Leofweald (Skule 2). It comprised 13 acres at Forncett ‘over which Hermer’s antecessor had the commendation TRE’. The land was in the king’s hand in 1086. TRE it had included a house which the king’s reeve Osketil afterwards removed (transtulit), and for which action he had given a pledge when the matter was recorded in LDB among the Norfolk ‘annexations’. Whether the house was removed administratively from the holding and its revenue accounted at another place, or whether Osketil had the house physically dismantled and transported somewhere else, is not clear: the verb transfero could be used in a metaphorical sense as well as for literal removal.

The four other holdings in Domesday Forncett amounted to 147 fiscal acres (Norf. 9:98, 205, 223; 11:5); with Skule’s 13 acres they made a round 160 acres or 1⅓ carucates, showing that Skule’s land was additional to the other entries and not comprised within any of them.

Forncett lay 10 miles south-west of Norwich, between two of Skule 2’s manors, but this holding looks more like the tenement of a small free peasant. Its owner’s commendation to the antecessor of Hermer de Ferrers, who is identifiable in DB as Thorketil, is in any case unlikely to be compatible with Skule 2’s status as a king’s thegn.