of its church to
Westminster Abbey which originated the present connection between the
two--a connection which has now, therefore, behind it nearly nine
hundred years of continuity.

In the few hurried months before Hastings the last of the great
Anglo-Saxon meetings in the town was summoned. It was held at the end
of October, 1065, and was that in which Harold's policy was agreed to.
Within twelve months Harold himself was dead, and a victorious
invading army was marching upon Wallingford.

In all this record it is clear that Oxford held a continually growing
place in the life of England, and especially as a stronghold of
whoever might be governing England. What battle was fought there, if
any, or how the Normans got it, we do not know, but it is presumed
that it suffered in the fighting because the number and value of its
houses is given in the subsequent Survey as having fallen very largely
indeed.

It is always well, whenever one comes across the Domesday Survey in
history, to remember that the whole record is very imperfectly
understood. We do not know quite what was being measured: we do not
know, for instance, in the case of a town like Oxford, whether all the
inhabited houses were counted; or whether only those who by custom
gave taxes were counted; nor can we be certain of the meaning of the
word _vastus_, save that it has some connection either with
destruction or dilapidation, or lack of occupation, or, possibly, even
remission of taxation. But the theory of a sack is not without
foundation, for we know that in the case of York (which was certainly
sacked by Tostig in 1065 and then again by William in 1068) what is
probably a destruction of a similar kind, though a rather greater one,
is expressed in similar words.

Whether, however, the number given in the town list of the Conqueror
is or is not due to the destruction wrought by the Conquest we must be
very careful not to estimate the population of that time upon the
basis to-day such a list would afford. The figures of Domesday stand
for a much larger population than most historians have hitherto been
inclined to grant, as may be shown by considerations to which I shall
only allude here, as I shall have to repeat them more fully upon a
later page when I speak of urban life upon the Thames. The nomadic
element in the life of the early Middle Ages; the smallness of the
space allotted for sleeping; the large amount of time spent out of
doors; the great