The Highland Zone in Domesday Book

Abstract

Of all the many books written about Domesday, not one has explored its riches for a topographical study of eleventh-century England. This is part of the extraordinary neglect of historical topography to which O. G. S. Crawford drew attention in his Archaeology in the Field a few years ago;’ all the more odd because the very first book to be read in the nascent University of Oxford in the year 1184 — or the first book of which the title has come down to us — was the Topography of Ireland, read aloud to the assembled masters and scholars by Girald Cambrensis over the space of three whole days. As little time at Oxford has been devoted to the study of topography since then, one might suppose that Girald had effectively killed the subject by this solo performance.