DURING the late Saxon period Frome was of great administrative and economic importance.
It was head of the largest and wealthiest hundred in Somerset, serving a vast hinterland of settlements in forest and marginal land: the agricultural statistics in the Domesday Survey imply that by the defeat of the Saxon kings, considerable forest clearance had taken place.
There was already a substantial market and possibly a mint, as coins with the letters FRO which may be from the town are known. There must have been a settlement of some size around the church and market; the location and extent of this remains largely unknown as once a pleasant habitable spot has been chosen, people will stay there demolishing the old and building anew up to the present day.
The lower parts of the Saxon and medieval settlement would have been subject to periodic flooding and still were until very recently. In the post-medieval period, there was an elaborate system of channels and sluices controlling the water supply and drainage of the town, the so called ‘secret tunnels’, but there is insufficient information to show any thing earlier. Having defeated King Harold and conquered Britain, William of Normandy needed a comprehensive survey of his new lands which was compiled by 1086.
Local historian, Michael McGarvie explains, “For all practical purposes it looks as if by the time of the Domesday Book the parish of St John the Baptist had already acquired those boundaries which it was to retain basically until after 1840. It was shaped like a somewhat battered and indented lozenge, except on the east where Rodden, itself a Domesday manor, plunged into its very heart surrounded on three sides by Frome. Frome parish stretched from Orchardleigh in the north, already in existence in 1086, to come down to an apex below Gare Hill in the south. On the east it was contained by the Wiltshire border and on the west by the ancient manors of Marston, Nunney, Whatley and Elm. St John’s is one of the few churches to be mentioned in Domesday book by name.”
The Domesday Book entry for Frome reads, “The king holds Frome. King Edward held it. It never paid geld, nor is it known to how many hides are there. (a hide was between 60 and 180 acres). There is land for 50 ploughs. In demesne (domain) there are three ploughs and six coliberts, (freed slaves) and there are 31villeins (tenants) and 36 bordars (craftsmen, shepherds, labourers) with 40 ploughs. There are 24 swine and 93 sheep. There are three mills paying 25 shillings and a market paying 46 shillings and 8 pence there are 30 acres of meadow and 50 acres of pasture. Woodland, one league in length and the same in breath it pays £54.05 at 20 pence to the ounce. Of this manor the church of St John holds 8 ploughlands.”
The commissioners listed 109 heads of household in Frome indicating a population of 400-500 and the overall impression is of a sizeable village for the time but without the prestige and royal connection that it once had although still an important trade centre. Much of the ancient forest had been cleared since Aldhelm’s time (c.685) and it seems most probable that the lands extended from St. John’s down to the river. The entry concerning church lands states that, ‘Reinbald holds the church of St. John’. He was a priest but much more than that, a favourite of Edward the Confessor, and may have held the office of chancellor becoming a very rich man. Amazingly for such fractious times he survived the transition to Norman rule and retained his money and privilege under William who it can be assumed valued his counsel.
The years after the conquest suffer from a lack of records and material remains and there is a sizable gap in our story. When Reinbald died at an unknown date, his vast estates passed to the Crown and in 1133 Henry I founded Cirencester Abbey and endowed it with all Reinbald’s former lands making the Abbott ruler of Frome.
Report by Mick Davis.
