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Leofgifu 32

Name

Summary

Leofgifu 25 was as one of 27 minor tenants on an estate of Bury St Edmunds Abbey at Huntefelde in 1086.

Profile

Leofgifu 25 was a widow who occurs in FBB (f.143; p.43) as Leueue uidua and as one of 27 minor tenants on an estate of Bury St Edmunds Abbey at Huntefelde in 1086, perhaps to be identified with its two estates at Whatfield recorded in DB (see Leofcild 10) and about 15½ miles to the south-east of the abbey.  The DB entries record a total of 28 free men (3 under the abbey’s subtenant) on the estates in 1086 but do not give their names.  FBB records Leofgifu 25 as holding 10 acres rendering 10d, placing her in about the middle range of free peasants there with regard to size of holding.  She was one of four or five women holding land at Huntefelde in 1086.  The only other instance of the name Leofgifu in the FBB lists (f.135; p.25), and also described as a widow, was on the abbey’s estate at Great Barton, just to the north-east of Bury, where she held 4 acres rendering 4d.  Given the context and proximity of the two holdings it is probable that both were held by Leofgifu 25.

Bibliography

FBB: ‘The Feudal Book of Baldwin, abbot of Bury St. Edmunds, 1065–1098, contained in the Black Book of the abbey, MS. Mm. iv. 19, fols. 124–43b. (Cambridge University Library)’, in Feudal Documents from the Abbey of Bury St. Edmunds, ed. D. C. Douglas, British Academy Records of the Social and Economic History of England and Wales, 8 (London: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 1932), 1–44