Norfolk Hundreds

White's History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Norfolk 1845

DISS HUNDRED

Is so called from its thriving market town, and is nearly a square district, about seven miles in length and breadth, bounded on the west by Guiltcross; on the north, by Depwade; on the east, by Earsham Hundred; and on the south by the river Waveney, which divides it from Suffolk.

It is a well wooded and fertile district, generally champaign, but rising in some places in gentle undulations, and having mostly a strong loamy soil, which is generally moist, owing to a substratum of impervious blue clay, lying at the depth of from one to two feet.

Diss and Earsham were anciently one Hundred, and they still form the Deanery of Redenhall, in the Archdeaconry of Norfolk. Diss Hundred holds its Petty Sessions at the town of Diss, on the first and last Mondays of every month; and Mr. John Muskett is clerk to the magistrates.

The following enumeration of its 16 parishes shews their population in 1841, the annual value of their lands and buildings, as assessed to the county rate in 1843, and their territorial extent.

	+===================================================+
	|                        |        | Annl. |         |
	|    PARISHES.           |   Pop. | Value |  Acres. |
	|                        |        |   £.  |         |
	+---------------------------------------------------+
	| Bressingham                647      3644     2287 |
	| Burston                    468      2456     1405 |
	| Dickleburgh-    }          747                    |
	|  with Langmere  }          109      3082     2055 |
	| Diss                      3205    10,700     3382 |
	| Fersfield                  295      1912     1313 |
	| Frenze +                    46         +        + |
	| Gissing                    498      2882     1907 |
	| Roydon                     586      2620     1217 |
	| Scole +                    685      2628     1454 |
	| Shelfanger                 445      2428     1637 |
	| Shimpling                  230      1232      670 |
	| Thelveton                  169      1482     1001 |
	| Thorpe Parva +              18         +        + |
	| Tivetshall St. Mgt         368      2766     1639 |
	| Tivetshall St. Mary        331      2100     1095 |
	| Winfarthing                696      4210     2566 |
	+---------------------------------------------------+
	|      TOTAL !              9543    44,142   23,628 |
	+===================================================+

[There is more information about individual parishes]

+ Frenze and Thorpe Parva are united with Scole, or Osmondiston, for the support of their poor; and their areas and annual value are included with Scole.

Bressingham, Fersfield, Roydon, Shelfanger, and Winfarthing, are in GUILTCROSS UNION, (see page 421, [this is in Guiltcross Hundred description]) and all the other parishes are in DEPWADE UNION. (See page 699. [this is in Depwade Hundred description])

! The population of Diss Hundred, in 1831, was 9300. Its annual value, as assessed to the property tax, was £37,473, in 1815, and £49,296 in 1842. It is in Long Stratton Police Division.

For more information see :-

General description and layout of Hundreds.
Other hundred descriptions from White's 1845.

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