Medieval Staffordshire
The Anglo Saxons|||| | Norman Conquest|||| | Castles|||| | Manors||||
Towns|||| | Timeline|||| | Glossary|||| | Teaching Resources|||| | Site Map||||
Towns
During the early history of what is now Staffordshire there were no major towns although there were many smaller settlements in Staffordshire. For example, the sites at Wall and Penkridge were Roman settlements and that at Wall certainly seems to have influenced the siting of Lichfield. Tamworth was in the mid Saxon period an important royal settlement (King Offa built a palace there in the late 8th century) and it was a place of regional significance. Tutbury does not seem to come into existence until the castle was built there after the conquest. Stafford as a town does not seem to have existed prior to 913 but there are some indications of some settlement activity prior to this.
There are only three towns mentioned in Domesday - Stafford, Tamworth and Tutbury.
Tamworth
There is no entry for Tamworth, but some burgesses are, which shows us that it was a town even if it was not surveyed) which had both been fortified by Aethelflaed in 913 and Tutbury.
Tamworth, with the building of Offa’s palace was an important royal settlement from as early as the 8th century. This royal connection as well as the fact that the town lies further to the east than Stafford meant that it attracted the unwanted attention of the Danes who settled in the eastern half of England. During the late 9th century the Danes destroyed Tamworth, the town later re-emerged as a fortified town (along with Stafford) under Aethelflaed as part of a defensive system against the Viking threat. In 943 there was a Danish rebellion when many of the inhabitants of the towns were massacred. By 1086 and the Domesday survey we might expect to find Tamworth like Stafford, a smallish settlement though reasonably-sized with some signs of having suffered during the turbulent decades prior to the survey. However the problem is that the survey (for whatever reason) completely ignores Tamworth and it is only mentioned in passing.
Tutbury
Image : SV-XI-79. © Trustees of the William Salt Library. By kind permission.
The development of Tutbury is tied in with that of the castle. It looks very much as if the town was planned around the castle, either when it was first built by the Ferrers family or soon after. The Domesday survey tells us that there were “42 men in the borough round the castle living only from their trade”, showing how important the castle was in terms of trade and the economic development to the town.
Stafford
© Ben Cunliffe
Stafford was the main county town by 1086. It was a walled town that gave its name to the county (Staffordshire) and had a Norman castle (although by the time of the survey this was in ruins). The town had about 200 messuages with at least 50 of these. Many of the land holders in Stafford were important men, such as the King himself, the Bishop of Chester, Henry de Ferrers and others. The town did develop throughout the medieval period but there was no rapid expansion of wealth in either Stafford or the county generally.
St. Chad's church is the oldest building in Stafford. The main style of architecture is late Norman, probably between 1100 and 1180.
The common factor for the medieval development of all of these towns is a castle. The Norman castle in Stafford fell into disuse although this was replaced by the castle which still overlooks the town and although the town lost its castle it still retained many of the functions that came with the castle - law and order, a sheriff etc. Tamworth still has its Norman castle which was held by the end of the 11th century by Roger Marmion and it was this family that built up the castle. As we have seen, Tutbury was a town built and planned along side the fortification to serve the Norman castle.
Of course as time went by these boroughs grew bigger and more Staffordshire towns emerged as the medieval period progressed.
Lichfield
© Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent Archive Service
Lichfield was not one of the three boroughs mentioned in Domesday and although it played an important role within the church (as head of a large diocese) the settlement remained small, so small in fact that it lost the bishopric to Chester in 1075, of this period William of Malmesbury wrote of Lichfield that it was a “tiny village … in the midst of a wooded district”. The town did eventually emerge as a planned settlement, much as Tutbury had done but this time with a cathedral as the driving force not a castle.
Newcastle under Lyme
There is also a persuasive argument that Newcastle under Lyme was already a medieval town with castle of some local significance at the time of the Domesday survey. The castle here was built after that in Stafford, hence the name “New Castle” and it maybe that this “town” was over looked by the Domesday surveyors just as Tamworth was (though perhaps for different reasons).
Find out more about Medieval Leek||||
Back to Home page||||
-
-
-
-