I read that a ceorl is a free peasant, similar to a yeoman in medieval England, who owned approximately 120 acres of land as his hide. This seems to be an enourmous figure though – for just one household I would have thought 12 acres to to excessive, let alone 120. Can anyone clarify the amount of land that an Anglo-Saxon ceorl might expect to own?
I'm curious as to where you found the figure that a Freeman was someone who owned a whole hide of land. Certainly some must have done, but at Domesday, the average land tenure of the Freeman class appears to be essentially the same as that of the average villein or 'villager' at a virgate of land (Hadley, 2000), a quarter of a Hide. The Hide was principally a productive unit rather than a discrete geographical measure, but was roughly equal to 120 acres, meaning the average Freeman household held about some 30 acres.