A place in Dorset with a history you can trace through the records: its entry in the 1086 Domesday Book, the archaeological finds and scheduled monuments around it, and the nearest Roman sites and battlefields. Everything below is drawn from the historical record.
In 1086, Lulworth was held by King William.
When William the Conqueror's commissioners surveyed Lulworth in 1086, they recorded 4 manors held by King William, Count Robert of Mortain and Aiulf the chamberlain. Before the Conquest, in the time of King Edward, the land was held by King Edward, Alsi, 538150 and Alfred the sheriff.
The settlement was assessed at 14.25 hides for tax. There was land for 32.5 ploughs, with 26 plough teams at work (9 in the lord's demesne and 17 held by the villagers). The recorded population was 90 heads of household: 33 villagers, 44 smallholders, 1 cottager and 12 slaves. These are heads of household, so the settlement's true population was several times larger. Its recorded resources included meadow (80 acres), woodland (3 * 3 leagues) and 4 mills. The manors were valued at 59.5 pounds in 1086.
The Domesday Book was the great survey of England ordered by William the Conqueror in 1085 and completed in 1086, the oldest surviving public record in the country. How the survey worked →
Lulworth was one of the settlements recorded in Dorset in the 1086 survey. Dorset in the Domesday survey →
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 15 strands of Lulworth's history, each drawn from the record and mapped to the exact spot:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
Nationally registered historic battlefields within 25 miles of Lulworth.
126 recorded finds have been logged within about 5 miles of Lulworth, reported by members of the public and entered in the national record of archaeological finds. They span these periods:
The bedrock beneath Lulworth is White Chalk Subgroup (Maastrichtian).
Aubrey's full report for this location includes every Domesday manor, the complete record of medieval lordship, archaeological context, and the story of how this settlement evolved from 1086 to the present day.