It struck me recently that there is a rather large gap in my knowledge of the chivalric class. Can anyone point me towards a source for (or provide an example of) the dimensions of a twelfth- or thirteenth-century aristocratic manor. I'm not particularly fussy about the socio-economic profile of the inhabitants, but I'd prefer to restrict this to Germany, France, and England.
English manors have the greatest extant sources on 'manors' of 12-13th c. Although I don't really do much English medieval history, I've had cause to dip into this book which should prove useful to you:
Most of it you can read on Google books. You'll notice the author very rapidly - like, page 1- problematizes the concept of the medieval manor for this period. Another one of these pesky historiographic conceptions which Maitland criticized over 100 years ago.
In France you'll find the generic 'château' which doesn't carry in the word a singular concept of feudal economy as the English manor does (ie stereotypical arrangement of villein, freeholders, demesne, local court, etc). And looking at châteaus in France from this period one is struck by the immense variety in design, 'fortified-ness' and placement - it's really hard to draw a singular architectural-ideological conclusion.