An oxgang or bovate (; ; ; ) is an old land measurement formerly used in Scotland and England as early as the 16th century sometimes referred to as an oxgait.[Cf. the Scottish acre.]
An oxgang is also known as a bovate, from bovāta, a of the word, derived from the Latin , meaning "ox, bullock or cow". Oxen, through the Scottish Gaelic word damh or dabh, also provided the root of the land measurement 'daugh'.
Skene in Celtic Scotland says:
- "in the eastern district there is a uniform system of land denomination consisting of 'daugh', 'ploughgates' and 'oxgangs', each 'dabhach' consisting of four 'ploughgates' and each 'ploughgate' containing eight 'oxgangs'.
- "As soon as we cross the great chain of mountains the separating the North Sea from the Atlantic Ocean, we find a different system equally uniform. The 'ploughgates' and 'oxgangs' disappear, and in their place we find 'dabhachs' and ''. The portion of land termed a 'dabhach' is here also called a 'tirung' or 'ounceland', and each 'dabhach' contains 20 pennylands."
In Scotland, oxgang occurs in Oxgangs, a southern suburb of Edinburgh, and in Oxgang, an area of the town of Kirkintilloch.
Usage in England
In England, the oxgang was a unit typically used in the area conquered by the
Vikings which became the
Danelaw, for example in the
Domesday Book, where it is found as a bovata, or 'bovate'. The oxgang represented the amount of land which could be ploughed using one ox in a single annual season. As land was normally ploughed by a team of eight oxen, an oxgang was thus one eighth the size of a ploughland or
carucate. Although these areas were not fixed in size and varied from one village to another, an oxgang averaged , and a ploughland or carucate .
[http://www.battle1066.com/g209.shtml Retrieved 2007-12-12; E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898 Retrieved 2007-12-12; http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~heckington/Church___Records/Records/Domesday_Heckington/domesday_heckington.html Retrieved 2007-12-12] However, in the rest of England a parallel system was used, from which the Danelaw system of carucates and bovates seen in the Domesday Book was derived.
[See for example Roffe, D., 'The Origins Of Derbyshire', in Derbyshire Archaeological Journal 106, 1986, especially pp. 102, 110-1.] There, the
virgate represented land which could be ploughed by a pair of oxen, and so amounted to two oxgangs or bovates, and was a quarter of a hide, the hide and the carucate being effectively synonymous.
[The true picture is however vastly more complex: see e.g. Stenton, F.M., 'Introduction', in Foster, C.W. & Longley, T. (eds.), The Lincolnshire Domesday and the Lindsey Survey, Lincoln Record Society, XIX, 1924, especially pp. ix-xix.]
A peasant occupying or working an oxgang or bovate might be known as a "bovater" or "oxganger".
See also
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Obsolete Scottish units of measurement
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In the East of Scotland:
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Rood
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Scottish acre = 4 roods
-
Oxgang ( Damh-imir) = the area an ox could plough in a single annual season (around 20 acres)
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Ploughgate ( ?) = 8 oxgangs
-
Davoch ( Dabhach) = 4 ploughgates
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In the West of Scotland:
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Pennyland ( Peighinn) = basic unit also broken into halfpennyland and farthingland.
-
Groatland - ( Còta bàn) = ie 4 pennies;
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Quarterland ( Ceathramh) = 8 pennylands (quarter of a mark);
-
Ounceland ( Tir-unga) = 4 quarterlands (32 pennies);
-
Markland ( Marg-fhearann) = 8 Ouncelands (varied);
((Dabhach) with corrections and additions)
External links
