A place in Essex 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, Smeetham was held by Rainer.
When William the Conqueror's commissioners surveyed Smeetham in 1086, they recorded a manor held by Rainer, who held from Count Eustace (of Boulogne). Before the Conquest, in the time of King Edward, it was held by free woman, one.
The settlement was assessed at 3 hides for tax. The record notes 3 plough teams at work (2 in the lord's demesne and 1 held by the villagers). The recorded population was 19 heads of household: 3 villagers, 14 smallholders and 2 slaves. These are heads of household, so the settlement's true population was several times larger. Its recorded resources included meadow (20 acres) and woodland (20 pigs). The manor was valued at 8 pounds in 1086, up from 7 pounds in 1066.
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 →
Smeetham was one of the settlements recorded in Essex in the 1086 survey. Essex in the Domesday survey →
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 15 strands of Smeetham'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 Smeetham.
221 recorded finds have been logged within about 5 miles of Smeetham, reported by members of the public and entered in the national record of archaeological finds. They span these periods:
The bedrock beneath Smeetham 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.