Townland

       Four holdings (1holding = 64 legal acres) was to make an area called a townland. This recognized cluster of land would contain 256 legal acres. Now a "legal" acre of this day was not the same area as thought of in today's terms. Jenkins in his translation (pp.120-121) gives the legal acre to be measured:  

        "...a rod as long as the long yoke in the caller's hand, and as far as he reaches with it, with his arm stretched out, is the two limits, that is, the width of the legal acre; and thirty times the rod is its length".

       Now you know the long yoke as it was compared to the short yoke and, to the mid-yoke and to the armpit yoke. Of course you do...not! Say what! What kind of measurement was this all about? My analytical mindset wanted to know. Precision was paramount in the measurement of the acre starting with that middle peg and all.

        After digging around in a number of texts, it finally came to me that the legal acre of the day was not a physical measurement but, a recognized word for ownership.  The house that was fenced permanently, would become the personal property of the one who built the enclosed land (toft). The exact size and shape of the 4 acers belonging to each toft did not really matter as long as the general guidelines were followed. As the new proprietor, this land became your plant (origin of your family tree) and was given as the inheritance to your sons at your death. 

        Getting back to the 256 legal acres called the townland. It was the next step in land ownership from the holding discussed in the last post. My notes are shown to give that mental picture.

       A book by Palmer and Owen titled A History of Ancient Tenures In North Wales and The Marches [my ancestor's part of the world] gives the customary acre of Bromfield as "a hundred and three score perches to the acre and fowere and twenty foote to the to the pearch or pole." They conclude on p.8 "That is, it contained 10,240 square yards and was thus more than twice as large as the statute acre." [The English system of measurement.] On p. 9 the authors diagram examples of their research for the 10,240 sq. yds. but the shape of such acre could vary. (The book was published 1910.)

       Jenkins describes a long yoke as 12 English feet. (99.3-9n p. 259). He translates an acre is 1440 sq. yrds. (p. 303). He describes the concept that an acre equaled a day's ploughing (p303) and, that the "day" ended at noon (199.8-9n, p. 303). The patrimony in land it became.

P.S. The length of the acre was 30 times the width. (Jenkins p. 259).