Help with a term for working in the fields 1608

[goldie61]

Does anybody know what this word is for work to be done in the fields?

It is from a Rent roll from 1608

5th line down of the part starting ‘Hugh Meare the father’.
He has a moytie of one one days ‘mathe’?
of meadowing.

It’s also repeated - 4 lines from the end:

And for one other moytie of a
dayes mathe in the same meadow....’

Thanks for any enlightenment!

[Rosinish]

Although there are many brilliant people who can read the script, I think it would be an idea to state where this was as old words can differ in different regions/countries?

Annie

[Vance Mead]

The Middle English Dictionary has this definition:

(a) math ale, money paid to tenants at the end of haymaking, ?money for ale to celebrate the end; math mede [OE mǣž-mēd], math silver, ?pay for hay-making, ?

So, hay-making, maybe from mow, mowing, moweth.

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/middle-english-dictionary/dictionary

[horselydown86]

See Bookbox's post on this thread:

https://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=803795.0

It's related to what Vance has posted, but in effect it's more likely to mean an area rather than an activity.

[goldie61]

Thanks everybody for your replies.

I think Bookbox hit in on the head in his reply you linked to HD.

Oxford English Dictionary
day’s math, n.
An area of land that can be mown by one person in a day, often taken as approximating to an acre; a day's mowing; (more loosely) a small portion of land

Brilliant. 

[bbart]

I'm glad this thread came up, as every now and then I have run into an old news item for farms for sale, and couldn't understand the math bit!

As an example, I have attached a snip of a sale in 1817, so much later than your will, but the term looks to still be in use in # 7, 9, and 10.  Fascinating stuff!

[Skoosh]

As in the aftermath when the poor were allowed to clear what was left after the crop was gathered!

Skoosh.

[goldie61]

As in the aftermath when the poor were allowed to clear what was left after the crop was gathered!

Skoosh.

Wow! 

[goldie61]

I'm glad this thread came up, as every now and then I have run into an old news item for farms for sale, and couldn't understand the math bit!

As an example, I have attached a snip of a sale in 1817, so much later than your will, but the term looks to still be in use in # 7, 9, and 10.  Fascinating stuff!

Interesting stuff bbart.
Isn't it weird how a word that nearly everybody would have known the meaning of - certainly if you go back to the rural landscape of the 1500 and 1600s, and even in your example in the 1800s, just disappears out of usage.
Fascinating stuff.