local. [In Anglo-Latin wista, wysta; ? a use of OE. wist provision, sustenance, applied orig. to an area that provided sustenance for a community of a certain size.] A Sussex land measure of area, the extent of which has been variously computed (see quots. and J. Tout in Engl. Hist. Rev., XVIII. 705 ff.).
c. 1180. Chron. Monast. de Bello (1846), 11. Octo itaque virgatæ unam hidam faciunt. Wista vero quatuor virgatis constat. Ibid., 17. Dividitur igitur leuga per wistas, quæ aliis in locis virgatæ vocantur. Ibid., 19. In Petlee est una wista in dominio…. Ista enim quadraginta viii. acris constat.
c. 1300. in Custumals Battle Abbey (Camden), 26. Radulphus Bedellus tenet j wistam. Idem tenet j magnam wistam. Ibid. (c. 1312), 100. Virgata seu wysta est sextadecima pars unius feodi militis. Quatuor virgatæ seu wystæ faciunt unam hydam.
c. 1650. in Sussex Archæol. Collect. (1853), VI. 236. I doo allowe tithe free, to my Parishioners, for euery Wist of land that they till, one oxe pasture upon the lease.
1799. Book of Surveys of D. of Dorset’s lands in Sussex (MS), under ‘Lullington,’ Upon this Tenant Down the D. of Dorset has a right to stock for two Wists & a half of land sixty sheep for each Wist.
1853. Sussex Archæol. Collect., VI. 236. A ‘wist’ in Berwick, according to … the Rev. John Hawes, was ordinarily 16 acres; but he afterwards found that in some of the farms it was 13 acres. In Saxon times the wist was 4 virgates or 60 acres.
1892. Vinogradoff, Villainage in Eng., 255.
