Sowerby under Cotcliffe in the Domesday Book (1086)
The 1086 Domesday survey records the settlement of Sowerby under Cotcliffe, entered under the hundred of Allerton in Yorkshire.
Other Settlements in Allerton
- Ainderby [Steeple]
- Appleton [Wiske]
- Arncliffe [Hall]
- Birkby
- Borrowby
- Brompton
- Cowesby
- Crosby [Grange]
- Dale [Town]
- Deighton
- Ellerbeck
- Foxton
- Girsby
- Hawnby
The Meaning of the Name
The name Sowerby under Cotcliffe is of Scandinavian origin. Its final element derives from the Old Norse word bý, 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’.
Names of this type are a fingerprint of Scandinavian settlement: they cluster across the old Danelaw, where Norse-speaking settlers renamed or founded villages from the late 9th century onward.
Remarkably, the name has changed little since 1086, when the Domesday scribes wrote it as Sowerby under Cotcliffe.
Listed Buildings Near Sowerby under Cotcliffe
Historic England records 3 listed buildings within about a mile of Sowerby under Cotcliffe. Listing protects structures of special architectural or historic interest, graded I (exceptional), II* (particularly important) and II.
Grade I
- Church of St Lawrence - 1.19 km
Grade II
- The Grange - 0.41 km
- Bank Top Farmhouse - 0.43 km
Scheduled Monuments Near Sowerby under Cotcliffe
Scheduled monuments are nationally important archaeological sites given legal protection. 1 lies within roughly a mile of Sowerby under Cotcliffe:
Sowerby under Cotcliffe Today
Today Sowerby under Cotcliffe lies within the administrative area of Hambleton, and the settlement recorded a population of 40 at the 2021 census. Nine and a half centuries separate that figure from the small rural community the Domesday survey recorded here in 1086.
Read more about modern Sowerby-under-Cotcliffe on Wikipedia .
Nearby Domesday Settlements
Other places recorded in the 1086 survey within a few miles:
- Kirby Sigston - 1.0 km N
- Landmoth - 1.4 km SE
- Winton - 3.0 km N
- Foxton - 3.2 km N
- Thimbleby - 3.6 km NE
- Newsham Grange - 3.6 km NW
Heritage Around Sowerby [under Cotcliffe]
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 Lally · Geograph · CC BY-SA 2.0
© Antony Dixon · Geograph · CC BY-SA 2.0
© Paul Buckingham · 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.
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