soke
/səʊk
/noun British historical
1A right of local jurisdiction.Maud, William the Conqueror's queen, held the town and soke as part of the king's demesne....
- In 1888 the soke of Peterborough, which retained special jurisdictions, was given its own county council, and in 1965 was merged with Huntingdonshire, before finding its way in 1972 into a substantially enlarged Cambridgeshire.
1.1A district under a particular jurisdiction; a minor administrative district.A royal estate served, in turn, as an administrative centre for a cantref, a territory including numerous townships, analogous to the English soke or primitive ‘shire’....
- For this reason the five hide units were combined in some regions into districts of 300 hides, which were called ship sokes.
- The private sokes of Stigand and Harold, however, gradually disappeared when cathedral, castle and Mancroft were raised on the sites of the sokes.
Origin
Late Old English, back-formation from obsolete soken 'habitual visiting of a place'.