See following...
David Meredith
Nottingham, ENG
Source: The Local Historian's Encyclopedia, by John Richardson. (ISBN 0 9503656
7 X)
Measurement of area and distance in Saxon and medieval times varied considerably
over the country and within any one region.
The Hide, for example, was an area which was assumed to support a peasant family
for a year and its size, therefore, depended on the quality of the soil.
Generally the main units of measurement bore the same relationship to each other
over England, but even so there were many excemptions. The normal relationship
was:
1 Hide, Carucate or Ploughland = 4 Virgates or Yardlands
1 Vigrate or Yardland = 2 Bovates or Oxgangs
1 Bovate or Oxgang = 10-20 acres
1 Acre = 4 Rods x 40 Rods
Acre: The Acre, was originally a stretch of land of no particular size or
nature, came to mean land which was cleared for cultivation or grazing. In open
field farming it was as large as a strip of land as could be ploughed by a yoke
of oxen in a day.
The Acre was standardised by Edward I at 40 Rods long x 4 Rods wide, or 4,840
sq, yds. Even so, for a long time, there were regional variations...
It was also a linear measure in some Midland counties of between 22 and 32 yds.
Tim,
My dictionary's historical definition of a Toft is "a homestead", & of
a
Bovate is "an oxgang". Unfortunately it fails to define "oxgang", but
assuming
Ox is a beast, it describes "ganging" as a Scottish noun meaning the range of
pasture allowed to cattle. So maybe they do not relate to modern measurements
at all but are referring just to the number of dwellings & land per head of
cattle therein.
Derek Miller