William’s love of hunting that he imported the very concept of ‘the Forest’ into England – the word occurs for the first time in an English context in the Domesday Book. We tend to think of forests as heavily wooded areas, but originally the term could be applied to land of any sort. It probably derived from the Latin word foris, meaning ‘outside’, for the Forest’s defining aspect was that it was a jurisdiction apart: an expanse of land reserved for the king’s own recreation, with its own rigorously enforced law.