The Ten Towns of Coquetdale

The second piece of evidence, the obligation of ten townships in Coquetdale and the Ingram valley, outside the Redesdale Liberty, to serve in defence of Harbottle, is most clearly expressed in the 1604 Border Survey:

(The ten towns in Coquetdale) by their ancient custome owe their service to Harbotle in Rydsdale to be comaunded by the Capten there to serve in feild on horse or on foote in the Princes affaires for the defence of the Border lands  (1604 Survey, 116).

The theory that the customary service of the ten Coquetdale townships represented a relic of some Anglian, defensive arrangement is not of itself implausible. Moreover the existence of a similar mid eleventh-century, fortified estate centre at Prudhoe has been suggested on the basis of excavation (Keen 1982, 175-7; but cf. Higham & Barker 1992, 49, 284-9).

However the evidence from earlier documents presents a rather different picture from those of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In the inquisition post mortem for Robert de Umfraville, taken in 1325, the tenants holding all or part of the manors of Clennell, Biddlestone and Burradon were each listed as having to to pay sums for the guard of the castle of Alnwick, not Harbottle, as part of their dues (Cal IPM vi, no.607; see Selected Sources and Surveys no.3). This was repeated as a simple total - '30s for the ward of the castle of Alnewike' - when the inquest into Robert's holdings at death was retaken in 1331 (Cal IPM vii, no.390; Selected Sources and Surveys no.4).

This suggests that the manorial tenants of the ten townships retained some military obligations to the Alnwick barony up until at least the early 14th century. Furthermore none of the 13th and 14th century inquisitions specify that the tenants of the ten townships had to perform castle guard at Harbottle.