sochemanni 213 villani 1902 bordarii 1428 cotarii 736 servi 548
But we also learn that the Cambridgeshire of the Confessor's day had contained at the very least 900 instead of 200 sokemen[226]. This is an enormous and a significant change. Let us look at a single village. In Meldreth there is a manor; it is now a manor of the most ordinary kind; it is rated at 3 hides and 1 virgate, but contains 5 team-lands; in demesne are half a hide and one team, and 15 _bordarii_ and 3 _cotarii_ have 4 teams, and there is one _servus_. But before the Conquest this land was held by 15 sokemen; 10 of them were under the soke of the Abbey of Ely and held 2 hides and half a virgate; the other 5 held 1 hide and half a virgate and were the men of Earl Ælfgar[227]. What has become of these fifteen sokemen? They are now represented by fifteen bordiers and five cottiers; and the demesne land of the manor is a new thing. The sokemen have fallen, and their fall has brought with it the consolidation of manorial husbandry and seignorial power. At Orwell Earl Roger has now a small estate; a third of it is in demesne, while the residue is held by 2 villeins and 3 bordiers, and there is a serf there. This land had belonged to six sokemen, and those six had been under no less than five different lords; two belonged to Edith the Fair, one to Archbishop Stigand, one to Robert Wimarc's son, one to the king, and one to Earl Ælfgar[228]. Displacements such as this we may see in village after village. No one can read the survey of Cambridgeshire without seeing that the freer sorts of the peasantry have been thrust out, or rather thrust down.