"The question about the hide," says Professor Maitland in _Domesday Book and Beyond_, "is 'pre-judicial' to all the great questions of early English history." The main argument employed by J. M. Kemble (_The Saxons in England_) in favour of the "small" hide is that the number of hides stated to have existed in the various parts of England gives an acreage far in excess of the total acreage of these parts, making due allowance for pasture and for woodland, an allowance necessary because the hide was only that part of the land which came under the plough, and each hide must have carried with it a certain amount of pasture. Two illustrations in support of Kemble's theory must suffice. Bede says the Isle of Wight contained 1200 hides. Now 1200 hides of 120 acres each gives a total acreage of 144,000 acres, while the total acreage of the island to-day is only 93,000 acres. Again a document called _The Tribal Hidage_ puts the number of hides in the whole of England at nearly a quarter of a million. This gives in acres a figure about equal to the total acreage of England at the present time, but it leaves no room for pasture and for the great proportion of land which was still woodland. On these grounds Kemble regarded the hide as containing 30 or 33, certainly not more than 40 acres, and thought that each acre contained about 4000 sq. yds., i.e. that it was roughly equal to the modern acre. Another argument brought forward is that 30 or 40 acres was enough land for the support of the average family, in other words that it was the _terra unius familiae_ of Bede. Another Domesday student, R. W. Eyton, puts down the hide at 48 acres.