Ælfhild 13

Ælfhild the abbot’s mother, fl. 1066
Female
DWP
4 of 5

Name

Ælfhild
Ælfhild 12
Ælfhild 14

Summary

Ælfhild 13 was a thegn and the mother of Abbot Æthelnoth (Æthelnoth 46) of Glastonbury.  She held two estates in Somerset TRE (the largest of which belonged to Glastonbury abbey) that were assessed for a total of 8¾ hides and valued at £5 10s.

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
Somerset 37,8 Lovington - Ælfhild the abbot's mother - Serlo de Burcy Lambert 'of Blagdon' 1.00 1.00 0.83 C Map
Somerset 8,24 Westcombe Alfhilla Ælfhild the abbot's mother Æthelnoth, abbot of Glastonbury Thurstan, abbot of Glastonbury Azelin 'of Harptree' 7.75 1.00 4.50 A Map
Totals

Profile

Ælhild 13’s TRE estate at Westcombe was a part of Glastonbury abbey’s large manor of Batcombe.  Her possession of it has been seen as part of an alienation of Glastonbury’s property under abbots Æthelweard 49 and Æthelnoth 46; yet her tenure did not allow the land to be separated from the church, which may mitigate this view of these abbots (Kelly forthcoming).  

Ælfhild is described as mater abbatis in the Exon entry (167b1) relating to Westcombe and the abbot in question is clearly Æthelnoth 46, who was abbot of Glastonbury from 1053x1059 until his deposition in 1078.  Given that her son will have been more than thirty years old when he became abbot, then Ælfhild 13 would have been in at least her sixties by the time of the Conquest and was almost certainly a widow by that time.

The 7¾ hides at Westcombe would have put Ælfhild 13 on a par with many local thegns and so it is reasonable to consider the possibility that she held other of the TRE estates attributed to women called Ælfhild in Domesday Book, particularly since candidates for senior religious posts would tend to come from the social élite and the name Ælfhild was not a common one.  

The most obvious such estate is that at Lovington, which lay only 7½ miles away from Westcombe and where Exon (453a2, 521a3) tells us that a four-hide manor held TRE by Almær had been merged with two one-hide manors held in parage by Sigeric and a woman called Ælfhild, the whole then passing to Serlo de Burcy, the 1086 tenant-in-chief.  All three TRE holders were described as thegns in DB; and the fact that Exon (453a2) describes all three as holding their lands in parage, and (521a3) that Sigeric and Ælfhild also held their two hides in parage before these were added to Almær’s manor, implies that these were lands shared between heirs and therefore that the three thegns were related.  To have a woman of thegnly status and with the uncommon name Ælfhild holding a TRE estate only a few miles away from that held by Ælfhild 13 seems to be pushing coincidence too far.  Furthermore, another of the TRE estates held by Almær was as a tenant of Glastonbury Abbey, providing an indirect link between his relative Ælfhild and the abbey.  

Drawing these threads together, it seems probable that the Ælfhild who held a small TRE manor in Lovington was the same as the Ælfhild who was the abbot’s mother.  If so, then the manor at Lovington will presumably have been a private estate of Ælfhild 13 that represented some or all of her share of the family’s lands.

It is, however, highly unlikely that Ælfhild 13 can be associated with either the estate of Ælfhild 12 in north-east Devon or that of Ælfhild 16 in north-west Wiltshire.  Both of these estates were very small and lay 48 and 22 miles respectively from Ælfhild 13’s Somerset estates, which for the estate of Ælfhild 12 at least seems too far removed for such a tiny holding to have formed an outlying part of a larger estate.  Furthermore, both Ælfhild 12 and Ælfhild 16 were holding their estates in 1086 and Ælfhild 16’s estate had been held by her husband TRE, and none of these facts sit well with what little we know or can surmise about Ælfhild 13, who was almost certainly a widow by the time of the Conquest and who would have been in at least her eighties by 1086.

Rather more difficult to judge is whether Ælfhild 13 is the same person as Ælfhild 15, who was the TRE holder of a three-hide estate at Charfield in Gloucestershire, some 34 miles from Westcombe.  Given the size of the estates involved, these do not seem too distant from each other to have been held by the same person.  Where they differ, however, is that Ælfhild 13’s private estate at Lovington had passed to Serlo de Burcy by 1086 whereas that of Ælfhild 15 had passed to Joscelin Breton (although it is worth noting that neither successor held land in both shires).  Furthermore, the presence of Ælfhild 16 at Hartham, only 15 miles from Charfield and 22 miles from Westcombe, shows that the name Ælfhild was not sufficiently uncommon locally to form the basis of an identification without supporting evidence.  For this reason, therefore, the difference in successors just tips the balance of probability in favour of Ælfhild 13 and Ælfhild 15 being different people.

Bibliography


forthcoming