A General Introduction to Domesday Book (in 2 volumes) - Vol. 1

Personal

Notes

Subtitle: Accompanied by Indexes of the Tenants In Chief, and Under Tenants, at the Time of the Survey: As Well As of the Holders of Lands Mentioned in Domesday Anterior to the Formation of That Record: with An Abstract of the Population of England at the Close of the Reign of William the Conqueror, so far as the same is actually entered.

Domesday Book, the famous land and population census held during the time of Edward the Confessor (d. 1066) and William the Conqueror, is Britain's oldest public record and the true starting point of English genealogy. Ellis' work is designed to throw light upon the holdings of lands as well as instances of the hereditary descent of land from those who had possession in Saxon times. By far the greatest achievement of the work is the three indexes which comprise alphabetical lists of the names of all landowners and tenants, instancing the counties wherein they held land, the location of the original citation in Domesday Book, and details of their properties, marriages, and heirs. The first index contains over 1,500 names of landowners who held land from William the Conqueror; the second contains 5,000 names of persons entered in Domesday Book as holding lands in the time of Edward the Confessor and through later years anterior to the survey; and the third index includes over 3,000 listings of the under-tenants of land at the formation of the Domesday survey.