ORIGINS
The origin of the name of the village can be discerned from the record in the Domesday Survey of 1086 which read :
In Begesland Aschil had 6 carucates of land to the geld [to be taxed] where there could be three ploughs. Now Robert has 1 plough there and 7 villanes with 2 ploughs. There is a priest and a wooden church. *TRE 20s now 16s.
As Bega was an Anglo-Saxon personal name this is an indication that the village probably got its name in the 8th century and a sundial placed upside down in the church tower suggests that Begesland then came under Danish influence.
Its inscription can read from a cast that was taken at the end of the 19th century :
SVMARLEDAN.HVSCARL.ME.FECIT
Sumarledi was a Norse personal name meaning ‘summer voyager’ and Huscarl was also a personal name but as it could also refer to a free household villane there are two possible translations of the inscription.
The ‘housecarl of Sumarledi made me’ or ‘for Sumarledi, Huscarl made me’.
Whichever version is correct Sumarledi seems to have been a Scandinavian of considerable rank who is likely to have been present in the village during the 10th century.
*TRE was an abbreviation for the Latin Tempore Regis Edwardi to indicate the value of the land in King Edward’s time
As a carucate is usually reckoned to have been about 120 acres Aschil’s pre-conquest vill covered approximately 720 acres and as he also held 3 carucates at Scaltun [Scawton] and 6 at Morton [Murton] which were on each side of Begesland he held over 1,800 acres which were granted by William I to William Malet who was with the king when York surrendered in 1067 and was also granted 37 other vills at the Great Council of York held in 1069. The Robert recorded in Domesday was his son who took part in the unsuccessful rebellion of Robert Curthose against Henry I and lost his life and his land which Henry granted to one of his supporters Nigel d’Aubigny after the Battle of Tenchbrai in 1106.
Nigel married Maud de Laigle who had previously been married to Robert de Mowbray, Earl of Northumberland who was dispossessed and imprisoned for life after rebelling in 1095. Maud divorced de Mowbray in 1104 and was then divorced by d’Aubigny in 1118 on the grounds that she could not bear children after which he married Gundreda de Gournay and they had a son named Roger who when he came of age they gave the name of Mowbray which was the name of the first husband of the wife d’Aubigny divorced. The Norman estate of Montbray which had passed from Robert de Mowbray to Maud de Laigle was transferred to Nigel d’Aubigny after their marriage and inherited by his and Gundreda’s son Roger together with the land previously held by Robert Malet
