Until well into the 18^th century, water and wind were the only sources of mechanical power. In medieval waterwheels the flow of water was regulated by sluice gates. A paddlewheel of elm wood turned in the water and drove the millstone via an axle and a system of interlocking cogwheels.

In England waterwheels were used from the Roman times onward. The Domesday survey records that of the 9,250 manors mentioned, 3,463 had 5,624 mills. During the Middle Ages, watermills were used for grain-grinding, drainage and fulling.

Fulling is part of the cloth manufacturing process. Originally wool was cleaned and felted in water by treading, but with the invention of the fulling mill at the beginning of the 12^th century, mechanical beaters did the work. Cloth became England’s chief source of wealth in the Middle Ages and many small rural industries employing carders (men who combed the wool), staplers (people who graded and sold the wool), spinners and weavers sprang up alongside these watermills.

Most mills mentioned in the Domesday Book, however, were corn mills, used for grinding grain into flour for bread. The tenants of the manor were forced to use the mill attached to their manor and were obliged to give the miller a 10% cut. The lord also got a cut. Many millers in the Middle Ages had a bad reputation for taking advantage of customers and cheating them. In the book, The Canterbury Tales, which was written in the Middle Ages, the writer Chaucer pokes fun at the miller in the Reeve’s Tale.

There were many watermills in medieval Herefordshire. The best source for the early period is the Domesday Book. It tells us that Harold Godwinson, for example, had had a watermill attached to his manor in Much Marcle and one with an eel pond at Burghill. If the water driving the wheel was too shallow or too slow, a millpond had to be made by damming the stream just above the mill. That is why you often find ponds mentioned alongside mills in the Domesday Book. William son of Norman, for example, held a mill in Broadward and a fishery of 500 eels, an important fish in the medieval diet.

The first known mill in Herefordshire was at Wellington dated by dendrochronology to 696 AD. By the time of the Domesday Survey of 1086 there were at least 116 mills. This includes 16 in and around the important manor of Leominster. In addition there were probably several more unrecorded mills in the town of Hereford.

The Domesday Book is a good written source for finding out about watermills. The actual remains of a watermill excavated by archaeologists are another good source. There is evidence for at least 6 medieval watermills in the county. Altogether 348 mills are listed in the SMR dating from the medieval period to the 20^th century. However a complete survey has not been carried out and there were probably far more than this. Many of these are listed on the SMR and you could search the database to find them.

Questions:

• 1.What types of energy resources did the medieval farmer have?
• 2.What were water mills used for in the Middle Ages?
• 3.What type of product made many wealthy in England?
• 4.Name a famous book written in the Middle Ages.
• 5.What primary sources could you use to find out about how many watermills there were in Herefordshire in the early Middle Ages?
• 6.What could you do if wanted to build a watermill and your brook was too shallow?
• 7.What is the method of dating wood called?
• 8.Do you like eating eel?

(Sources: Domesday Book, Herefordshire, gen.ed. John Morris, 1983. Historical Britain, Eric S.Wood, 1995. Exploring Villages, Joscelyne Finberg, 1958. The English Village, Richard Muir, 1980.)

Note: The Castle Mills, Hereford by John Eisel, Transactions of the Woolhope Naturalists' Field Club, 2000, pp.58-68 is now available.

A good source for the study of windmills in Herefordshire is: Muriel Tonkin, "Windmills in Herefordshire", A Herefordshire Miscellany, ed. D.Whitehead and J.Eisel, 2000.

TFM