There are entries in the Domesday Book for manors and landholdings owned by the King, St Guthlac, Guy of Craon and Count Alan (there were disputes over land between Count Alan and the King). There were 'berewics' of manors in Fleet and Gedney. Holbeach was referred to as 'Holbech', 'Holeben', 'Holobech' and 'Holobec'. Domesday records a minimum population of seventy-one families and two manors. It also records a taxable value of £35 which indicates that this part of South Holland was wealthy. There was large scale reclamation of land in Holbeach around 1229-1236. Much of the early documentary history of Holbeach relates to the reclamation of fen and marsh and maintenance of the drainage systems. By 1241 the construction of dykes effectively drained the fens up to the Cambridgeshire border. Thomas de Multon, Lord of Holbeach, obtained a licence for a market and a fair in Holbeach about 1252 AD. This was later increased to two or more fairs. Three historians have mentioned guilds associated with Holbeach, which implies the presence of a guildhall. {1}{2}{3} The name Holbeach comes from the Old English, hol meaning hollow and Baec meaning back. Holbeach is on a raised site and a meaning 'the concave ridge' is topographically appropriate. {4}