THE HUNDRED OF SPELHOE
Containing the parishes of Abington; Great Billing; Little Billing; Boughton; Kingsthorpe; Moulton And Moulton Park; Overston; Pitsford; Spratton With Little Creaton; Weston Favella (fn. 1)
Map of the Hundred
The meeting-place of the hundred, from which it derived its name,
which means 'the hill of speech', was a field on high ground in the north
of Weston Favell parish. (fn. 2) In the Domesday survey the parishes of
Abington, the Billings, Boughton, Moulton, Pitsford, Spratton, and
Weston are all entered under Spelhoe, though, owing to imperfect rubrication,
several of these occur also under the heading of
other hundreds. In the 12th-century survey
Spelhoe includes all these parishes and also that
of Overstone, which is not mentioned in 1086,
being probably at that date part of Sywell. (fn. 3) Kingsthorpe, with outliers in Moulton and Weston, is
entered in both surveys (fn. 4) under the hundred of
'Mallesle', or Mawesley, of which all the other
parishes had been absorbed into the Hundred of
Orlingbury (q.v.) by the middle of the 13 th century. This is the more remarkable as from an early
date the Hundred of Spelhoe was appurtenant to
the royal manor of Kingsthorpe and the men of that
vill claimed to hold it at farm from the Crown ever since the reign of John.
Their right was confirmed by Henry III in 1224 (fn. 5) and its history is identical with
that of Kingsthorpe (q.v.) up to the reign of Charles II, after which date all
rights connected with it seem to have fallen into abeyance. There appears to
have been some doubt in the reign of Edward II as to whether the hundred was
included in the farm of the county of Northants., but an inquiry made in 1319
showed that it had always so belonged. (fn. 6) In 1365 the men of Kingsthorpe complained that whereas they used to have the Hundred of Spelhoe, worth £10,
Walter Parles (sheriff in 1359) and later sheriffs had taken the hundred and only
paid them 4 marks yearly for it. (fn. 7) By letters patent dated 1519 the men of
Kingsthorpe were granted the manor of Kingsthorpe with all its members to
hold from the Crown for 40 years at a rent of £50, and on the strength of these
letters they claimed in 1545 to hold the hundred also. (fn. 8) In 1638 another grant
was made in similar terms but, as there was no separate mention of the hundred,
the Parliamentary surveyors in 1651 left the matter for further consideration. (fn. 9)
The hundred was returned in 1246 as worth £8, (fn. 10) but by 1253 the farm had
been raised to 20 marks, (fn. 11) at which figure it was still standing in 1275. (fn. 12) It was
stated at the survey later in 1651 that the rent called certainty money, paid by
the freeholders of the hundred, amounted to £7 os. 8d., while the profits of the
court leet held half-yearly and of the three-weeks court and the royalties in
hunting, hawking, fishing, fowling, &c. were worth one year with another £4.
The waifs, strays, deodands, goods of felons and fugitives, &c. belonged to the
lord of the hundred if the bailiff seized them first, but if the bailiff of the lord
of a manor within the hundred, with a leet belonging, should obtain them first,
then that lord was to receive the profits. (fn. 13)