A place in Hampshire 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, Shalfleet was held by Geoffrey.
When William the Conqueror's commissioners surveyed Shalfleet in 1086, they recorded a manor held by Geoffrey, Jocelyn son of Azur, Leofa of Shalfleet and Thorgisl. Before the Conquest, in the time of King Edward, it was held by Edric.
The settlement was assessed at 6 hides for tax. There was land for 14 ploughs, with 15 plough teams at work (5 in the lord's demesne and 10 held by the villagers). The recorded population was 40 heads of household: 18 villagers and 22 smallholders. These are heads of household, so the settlement's true population was several times larger. Its recorded resources included meadow (4 acres), woodland (20 swine render) and 1 mill. The manor was valued at 15 pounds in 1086, down from 20 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 →
Shalfleet was one of the settlements recorded in Hampshire in the 1086 survey. Hampshire in the Domesday survey →
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 15 strands of Shalfleet'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.
The bedrock beneath Shalfleet is Solent Group (Paleogene).
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.