The English paid large numbers of eels in rent, and the data here is broken down by century. Combined, the extant eel rents in the archives show the following:

Century(s) Number of Extant Rental Agreements Number of Eels Due
10th-11th 221 539,785
12th 49 60,052
13th 40 453,240
14th 32 33,997
15th-17th 13 13,179

It is important to note here that the division by century is somewhat arbitrary, and that the mapped eel-rents in a given century do not reflect all extant rents at the time. What are mapped here are places where eel-rents appear in the historical record in some capacity. But active eel-rents often go centuries between archival mentions; they most often only appear when they were created, when they were ended, or when there was a problem. Some rents only appear when they are cancelled; a lack of archival record does not indicate, by itself, that a rent did not exist or was inactive.

RIP, Interactive Map

I previously had an interactive map of all of the eels rents here, but sadly it is no longer supported. I’m looking into alternatives, to try to remake it on a different platform. Until then, I’m including images of the mapped rents by century:

10th – 11th Centuries:

12th Century:

14th Century:

15th – 17th Centuries:

Combined 10th – 17th Centuries: