Bilton appears in the Domesday Book of 1086, entered under the hundred of Ainsty in Yorkshire. The survey assessed Bilton at 3.5 carucates of taxable land.

At the time of the survey, Bilton supported a recorded population of 6 villagers, 11 smallholders, 3 slaves, working 6 ploughs between them.

The survey records Bilton’s value at 4 shillings in 1086. No pre-Conquest figure survives – not unusual in the North, where records were disrupted by the Harrying and by the patchy coverage of the survey.

Resources Recorded at Bilton (1086)

Mills: 1 mill (valued at 3d)
Sheep: 15
Meadow: 26 acres
Woodland: 6 acres

Other Settlements in Ainsty

The Meaning of the Name

The name Bilton is of Anglo-Saxon origin. Its final element derives from the Old English word tūn, a farmstead or village. The first element is most likely a personal name or an early descriptive term, now difficult to recover with certainty. Taken together the name probably meant something close to ‘a farmstead’.

Remarkably, the name has changed little since 1086, when the Domesday scribes wrote it as Bilton.

Listed Buildings Near Bilton

Historic England records 12 listed buildings within about a mile of Bilton. Listing protects structures of special architectural or historic interest, graded I (exceptional), II* (particularly important) and II.

Grade I