virgate

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virgate
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Latin, virgata.

The virgate was a unit in the assessment system in most of the counties of Wessex and western Mercia, one quarter of a hide or 30 fiscal acres. J.H. Round long ago provided illustrations of the relationship of hides, virgates and acres, mainly from circuit 3 and especially from Cambridgeshire, where the Cambridge Inquisition provides totals for the hidage of each vill as well as each manor, giving greater confidence in the arithmetic involved.

Orwell provides a particularly clear example. The Cambridge Inquisition records that 'Orwell answers for 4 hides', the details being:

Manorial lord Hides Virgates Acres
Chatteris abbey 0 0 1/4 0
Earl Roger 1 1 1/3 0
Walter son of Aubrey 0 1 0
Robert Gernon 0 1 0
Sigar 0 1 1/3 0
Durand 0 3 1/3 0
Picot 0 3 1/4 5
Ralph Banks 0 0 1/3 0
Total 1 10 5/6 5

Exactly 4 hides if the equation 1 hide=4 virgates=120 acres holds true.

For more detail, see J.H. Round, Feudal England (1895).