(carrucate), in our ancient laws and history, denotes a plough-land, or as much arable ground as can be tilled in a year with one plough.

In Doomsday Inquisition the arable land is estimated in carrucates, the pasture in hides, and the meadow in acres. Skene makes the carrucata the same with hilda, or hilda terre; Littleton the same with soc.

The measure of a carrucate appears to have differed in respect of place as well as of time. In the reign of Richard I. it was estimated at sixty acres, and at one period of the same reign at a hundred acres; in the time of Edward I. it was rated at a hundred and eighty acres; and in the twenty-third of Edward III. a carrucate of land in Burcester contained a hundred and twelve acres, and in Middleton a hundred and fifty acres.

By a statute of William III. of charging persons to repair the highways, a plough-land is rated at fifty pounds per annum, and may contain houses, mills, wood, pasture, &c.