Another cause of confusion in feudal land-measures is the money-estimation of land. Bishop Fleetwood (‘Chronicon,’ 1707) thought the acre was a marc-land of 160 pence and the rod a penny-land, denariatus terræ, so that the quarter-rod was a farthing-land. He was deceived by the coincidence of the 160 rods of the acre with the 160 pence, 13_s._ 4_d._, 8 ounces of silver, of the monetary marc, and he mistook the Farthingdale or Farendel, a quarter-acre or rood, for a quarter-rod. The acre was distinctly a penny-land, and the hide of 160 acres was a marc-land, paying 160 pence.
HIDE.—Ploughland, carucate, L. _carucata_, Fr. _caruée_. Normally 16 square furlongs = 160 acres, but sometimes 120 acres or less, varying according to the arable on it; and usually divided into 4 oxgangs, bovates or yardlands. In some parts the hide seems to have comprised several ploughlands and to have coincided with the knight’s fee (see Customs of Lancaster).
HUNDRED.—This division of a shire is supposed to have been originally one hundred hides; more probably it was a hundred knight’s fees.
These cognate terms have many developments of meaning, running almost parallel both in English and French. ‘Yard,’ the equivalent of A.S. gyrd, geard, and perhaps gæd (gad), is cognate to ‘Rod’ and to Fr. Verge. It may mean:
1. A rod from a tree; L. _virga_, Fr. _verge_.
2. A short measure of 4 to 6 spans; Fr. _verge_.
3. A pole of indefinite length, in various senses, naval, &c. Fr. _verge_, _vergue_.
4. A long measure of 9 to 24 feet = rod, pole, perch. In France the _perche_ may be from 9-1/2 feet (Burgundy) to 22 feet (French).
5. A measure of surface 9 to 24 feet square. Yard, Fr. _verge_.
6. A larger measure of surface 40 × 1 rod = a quarter-acre. Yard-land, rood, Fr. _vergée_.
7. A quarter of a still larger unit. Virgata, yard-land.
8. A holding of a rood when enclosed became a yard or garth, then a cultivated enclosure of any size: tree-yard (Du. _boom-gaard_), apple-garth, win-gaard (vineyard).[18]
Here the Fr. _verge_ parts company with ‘yard’; its place is taken by _cour_ (L. _curtiferum_) and G. _hof_.
9. Any enclosed land attached to a house: Palace-yard, Fr. _cour_. Farm-yard, Fr. _basse-cour_. Court-yard, G. _hof_. Court = farmyard in Somerset.