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Cafla 2

Name

Summary

Cafla 2 was a small landowner on the Somerset part of Exmoor with an estate of ½ virgate worth just 12d. TRE. He survived the Conquest and held his land as a subtenant in 1086.

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 Somerset	Phil. ref. 21,61	Vill Bagley	DB Spelling Caflo	Holder 1066 Cafla 'of Exmoor'	Lord 1066 -	Tenant-in-Chief 1086 Roger de Courseulles	1086 Subtenant Cafla	Fiscal Value 0.13	1066 Value 0.05	1086 Value 0.17	Confidence A	Map
Totals								Fiscal Value	1066 Value	1086 Value

Subtenant in 1086

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 Somerset	Phil. ref. 21,61	Vill Bagley	DB Spelling Caflo	Holder 1066 Cafla 'of Exmoor'	Lord 1066 -	Tenant-in-Chief 1086 Roger de Courseulles	1086 Subtenant Cafla	Fiscal Value 0.13	1066 Value 0.05	1086 Value 0.17	Confidence A	Map
Totals								Fiscal Value	1066 Value	1086 Value

Profile

The name Cafla occurs only once in DB, holding a small estate at Bagley, high on Exmoor. Bagley stood at almost 1,200 ft above sea level on the northern slopes of Dunkery Beacon, in an area where there are extensive remains of late Iron Age farming and settlement. Although in such an agriculturally marginal location, Bagley was evidently occupied continuously until the farm was abandoned in the nineteenth century (Riley and Wilson-North 2001: 73–4).

Caflo survived the Conquest and in 1086 held his ½ virgate at Bagley from Roger de Courseulles. He was then farming with 1 plough (GDB) or ½ plough (Exon) and had 50 acres of pasture, 12 acres of woodland, and 2 bordars with another ½ plough. The increase in value from 12d. in 1066 to 40d. in 1086 suggests that Cafla’s new Norman lord was squeezing him hard.

The idea that the owner of this remote and marginal small farm had a name of Scandinavian origin cannot be ruled out entirely, but it ill accords with what else we know about the spread of Danish landowners into Wessex under Cnut.

Bibliography

Riley and Wilson-North 2001: Hazel Riley and Robert Wilson-North, The Field Archaeology of Exmoor (Swindon: English Heritage, 2001)