Cwybr in the Domesday Book (1086)
The settlement of Cwybr is recorded in William I’s Domesday survey of 1086, entered under the hundred of Ati’s Cross in Cheshire. The survey assessed Cwybr at 1.5 carucates of taxable land.
At the time of the survey, Cwybr supported a recorded population of 23 villagers, 13 smallholders, 8 slaves, working 17 ploughs between them.
The survey records Cwybr’s value at 10.5 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.
The survey lists 2 manors at Cwybr under different lords. Splitting a single settlement between multiple tenants was common across the North – Saxon estates broken up and handed to William’s followers after 1066.
Resources Recorded at Cwybr (1086)
- Cattle: 34
- Pigs: 8
- Sheep: 106
- Meadow: 4 acres
- Woodland: 5 acres
Other Settlements in Ati’s Cross
The Meaning of the Name
The origin of the name Cwybr is not securely established from its modern form alone; like many settlement names in the North it likely combines an Old English or Old Norse personal name with a landscape term.
Remarkably, the name has changed little since 1086, when the Domesday scribes wrote it as Cwybr.
Nearby Domesday Settlements
Other places recorded in the 1086 survey within a few miles:
- Bryn - 1.0 km E
- Cwybr Bach - 1.0 km N
- Pentre - 1.4 km NE
- Llewerllyd - 2.0 km E
- Pen-Y-Gors - 2.0 km S
- Rhuddlan - 2.0 km S
Heritage Around Cwybr
Photographs of churches, listed buildings and monuments in the vicinity, contributed by volunteers to the Geograph project and reused here under a Creative Commons licence.
© David and Rachel Landin · Geograph · CC BY-SA 2.0
© Eirian Evans · Geograph · CC BY-SA 2.0
© Eirian Evans · Geograph · CC BY-SA 2.0
Images © their respective photographers, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 and reused here with attribution. Photographs depict listed buildings, churches and monuments near this settlement and may show neighbouring villages.
Data derived from the Open Domesday project (opendomesday.org), based on the Domesday Book dataset compiled by Professor J.J.N. Palmer and team. The Domesday Book (1086) is in the public domain.
Found an inaccuracy? [email protected]