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Anglo-Saxon England and the Anglo-Norman Kingdom, c1053–1106

The end of the English aristocracy

  • 3 things to know
  • Paper 2

Overview

Recall questions on the scale of dispossession, the honour and why estates were scattered, the frontier earldoms, and the fate of the English language.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Your recallNot started
Key term

How concentrated was landholding by 1086?

Who and when

Why did William scatter estates across shires?

Key term

Which new earldoms were created, and why?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    What happened to the English landholding class after the conquest?

    Model answer

    It was largely dispossessed and replaced by a Norman aristocracy.

  2. 2

    What language became dominant among the new ruling elite, displacing Old English at court?

    Model answer

    Norman French.

  3. 3

    What happened to English landholders after 1066?

    Model answer

    They were almost entirely dispossessed. By 1086 only a handful of English tenants-in-chief remained, and perhaps five per cent of land was held by Englishmen.

  4. 4

    How concentrated was landholding by 1086?

    Model answer

    Extremely: about 190 lay tenants-in-chief held most of the land, and roughly half of it was in the hands of a dozen of William's closest companions.

  5. 5

    What was an honour?

    Model answer

    The complex of estates held by a tenant-in-chief, often scattered across many shires, with its own court and its own quota of knights.

  6. 6

    Why did William scatter estates across shires?

    Model answer

    Partly because land fell in piecemeal as English holders were dispossessed, and partly because dispersal made it harder for a magnate to build a compact regional power base.

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