Oxgang

{{Short description|Old English and Scottish land area}} {{For|the suburb of Edinburgh|Oxgangs}} {{Anthropic_Farm_Units}} An '''oxgang''' or '''bovate''' ({{langx|ang|oxangang}}; {{langx|da|oxgang}}; {{langx|gd|damh-imir}}; {{langx|la-x-medieval|bovāta}}) is an old land measurement formerly used in Scotland and England as early as the 16th century sometimes referred to as an oxgait.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Lectures on Scotch Legal Antiquities|last=Innes|first=Cosmo|year=1872|pages=283}}</ref> It averaged around 20 English acres (eight hectares), but was based on land fertility and cultivation, and so could be as little as {{convert|15|acre|ha|round=0.5|abbr=off}}.<ref>Cf. the Scottish acre.</ref>

An oxgang is also known as a ''bovate'', from ''bovāta'', a Medieval Latinisation of the word, derived from the Latin ''bōs'', 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 'dabhachs', '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 Grampian Mountains] separating the eastern from the western waters, we find a different system equally uniform. The 'ploughgates' and 'oxgangs' disappear, and in their place we find 'dabhachs' and 'pennylands'. 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 {{lang|la|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 {{convert|15|acre|ha|0|abbr=off}}, and a ploughland or carucate {{convert|100|-|120|acre|ha}}.<ref>http://www.battle1066.com/g209.shtml Retrieved 2007-12-12; [http://www.bartleby.com/81/12614.html 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</ref> 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.<ref>See for example Roffe, D., 'The Origins Of Derbyshire', in ''Derbyshire Archaeological Journal'' 106, 1986, especially pp. 102, 110-1.{{Doi|10.5284/1066480}}</ref> 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.<ref>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.</ref>

A peasant occupying or working an oxgang or bovate might be known as a "{{lang|enm|bovater}}" or "{{lang|enm|oxganger}}".

==See also== * Obsolete Scottish units of measurement ** In the East of Scotland: *** Rood *** Scottish acre = 4 roods *** Oxgang (''Damh-imir'') = the area an ox could plough in a single annual season (around 20 acres) *** Ploughgate (''?'') = 8 oxgangs *** Daugh (''Dabhach'') = 4 ploughgates ** In the West of Scotland: *** Pennyland (''Peighinn'') = basic unit also broken into halfpennyland and farthingland. *** Groatland - (''Còta bàn'') = ie 4 pennies; *** Quarterland (''Ceathramh'') = 8 pennylands (quarter of a mark); *** Ounceland (''Tir-unga'') = 4 quarterlands (32 pennies); *** Markland (''Marg-fhearann'') = 8 Ouncelands (varied);

==References== {{Reflist}} {{Dwelly}} ((Dabhach) with corrections and additions)

== External links == * Oxgang: Wiktionary * Carucate: Wiktionary * Wapentake: Wiktionary

Category:Obsolete Scottish units of measurement Category:Obsolete English units of measurement Category:Units of area Category:Early modern history of Scotland Category:Early modern history of England