Tunstall in the Domesday Book (1086)
Tunstall is named in the Domesday Book, compiled by Norman commissioners in 1086, entered under the hundred of Amounderness in Yorkshire. The survey assessed Tunstall at 21 carucates of taxable land.
At the time of the survey, Tunstall supported a recorded population of 16 villagers, 3 smallholders, 2 freemanmen, working 6 ploughs between them.
Something went badly wrong here between the two surveys. Before 1066, Tunstall was worth 4 shillings; by 1086 that had dropped to 3 shillings – a fall of 25%. Most Yorkshire villages that lost value on this scale were swept up in the Harrying of the North – William’s scorched-earth campaign of 1069–70.
1 of 3 manors within Tunstall are recorded as waste in 1086, with the remainder still productive. This partial devastation suggests the settlement was caught in the path of the Harrying of the North but not entirely destroyed — or that recovery had begun in some holdings by the time of the survey.
The survey lists 3 manors at Tunstall 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 Tunstall (1086)
- Mills: 2 mills (valued at 1.05 shillings)
- Churches: 1
- Meadow: 20 None
- Woodland: 1.5 * 0.5 None
Other Settlements in Amounderness
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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