[2] The exact boundaries of this historic district are unknown, but it is thought to have covered the parishes of Sheffield, Ecclesfield, and Bradfield—an area roughly equivalent to those parts of the present-day borough of the City of Sheffield that lie to the west of the rivers Don and Sheaf that are within the boundaries of the ancient county of Yorkshire (later descriptions also include Brightside and the parish of Handsworth).
[10] Local historian T. Walter Hall (in 1931),[11] following Sidney Addy (1893),[12] suggested that the district's original settlement was at Hallam Head, above the River Rivelin, and that it had been destroyed during the Harrying of the North.
As evidence, he noted that the location lies by the ancient Long Causeway route and that the name of the neighbouring Burnt Stones Common referenced its destruction.
The geographic centre coincides with the junction of Tom Lane and Carsick Hill Road; two ancient byways found mentioned in medieval charters from the 13th century.
[1] The simple fact that the village of Hallam and Waltheof's aula had been destroyed and no longer existed, and that the taxable value of the manors in the area had been significantly devalued by the time of the Domesday Survey would contradict Hay's position.
He took part in a failed uprising to support the 1069 invasion by Sweyn II of Denmark and Edgar Ætheling (including an attack on York), but then once again submitted to William and was married to Judith of Lens, the King's niece.
[17] The territorial division of Hallamshire survived into the 19th century as a liberty, recorded in 1822 as including the parishes of Sheffield,[18] Treeton,[19] Whiston,[20] Rotherham,[21] Handsworth,[22] and Ecclesfield,[23] and with the Duke of Norfolk as Chief Bailiff.
Suburbs and villages within this area include Bradfield, Broomhill, Crookes, Fulwood, Hillsborough, Loxley, Stannington, Strines, and Walkley.
A 1637 survey by John Harrison of the estates in or near Sheffield belonging to the Earl of Arundel states that a place called little Haggas croft in Loxley Firth contained "the foundacion of a house or cottage where Robin Hood was born".
[27] Antiquarian Joseph Hunter—writing in 1819—reaffirmed this local tradition, stating that Loxley Chase has "the fairest pretensions to be the Locksley of our old ballads, where was born that redoubtable hero Robin Hood.