After William became king, he reigned in tranquility for about 20 years. In fact his first son Robert was rebelling and was ready to attack Normandy while the king of Denmark and the court of Flanders were going to attack England.
So William, in order to get ready to face the situation, decided to have a clearer idea of his country situation and he ordered a survey. He sent in fact his men in all the different shires of England to get information about the people living there. The results of his survey were collected in a book called “Domesday book” (= the day of judgement).
In a moment of great danger he had decided to begin such a similar thing for different reasons:
- It gave a precise idea of the economic and social situation of the country he had conquered;
- It gave the possibility to judge people;
- It was a confirmation of the economic and political domination of the Normans;
- It was very well accepted by the barons because it confirmed and consolidated their titles;
- It was the first book of this kind and it also gave a lot of details about people used by historians and sociologists.
At the same time it showed that, before the arrival of the Normans, the country was very well organized and efficient and for this reason the Norman conquest had represented a source of suffering for the nobility as well as for the peasants.
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