A place in Norfolk 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, Merton was held by Ralph Baynard.
When William the Conqueror's commissioners surveyed Merton in 1086, they recorded a manor held by Ralph Baynard. Before the Conquest, in the time of King Edward, it was held by Aelgyth (widow of Thorsten).
The settlement was assessed at 5.25 hides for tax. The record notes 9 plough teams at work (3 in the lord's demesne and 6 held by the villagers). The recorded population was 36 heads of household: 6 villagers, 1 smallholder and 29 freemen. These are heads of household, so the settlement's true population was several times larger. Its recorded resources included meadow (36 acres) and woodland (240 pigs).
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 →
Merton was one of the settlements recorded in Norfolk in the 1086 survey. Norfolk in the Domesday survey →
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 15 strands of Merton'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.
171 recorded finds have been logged within about 5 miles of Merton, reported by members of the public and entered in the national record of archaeological finds. They span these periods:
The bedrock beneath Merton 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.