A wapentake is a term derived from the Old Norse vápnatak, the rough equivalent of an Anglo-Saxon hundred. The word denotes an administrative meeting place, typically a crossroads or a ford in a river. The origin of the word is not known. Folk etymology has it that voting would be denoted or conducted by the show of weapons, or alternately voting was done only by citizens, who were the only ones who could possess weapons, an idea perhaps suggested by references in The Germania of Tacitus or current practice in the Swiss canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden. According to other authorities weapons were not flourished at a Norse þing and "weapon taking" or vopnatak was the end of an assembly, when one was allowed to take weapons up again, providing another possible origin of the wapentake.
The Danelaw counties of Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire, Rutland and Lincolnshire were divided into wapentakes, just as most of the remainder of England was divided into hundreds.
In Yorkshire, a Norse wapentake usually replaced several Anglo-Saxon hundreds. This process was complete by 1086 in the North and West Ridings, but continued in the East Riding until the mid 12th century.
In some counties, such as Leicestershire, the wapentakes recorded at the time of Domesday Book evolved into hundreds later on. In others, such as Lincolnshire, the term remained in use. Although no longer part of local government, the structure of wapentakes is largely preserved in Rural Deaneries (see, for example Beltisloe or Loveden).
In most of England, the corresponding unit was the hundred, which was in principle, a grouping of a hundred households. Around a thousand years ago, it was important as a unit for gathering taxes and raising men for the 'citizen' army of the time, known as the Fyrd. The idea of the hundred goes back at least to the time of Tacitus but the version called the wapentake belongs to the Danish-influenced part of England. It therefore dates in that country, from the tenth or very early eleventh century.
White (1882), Directory for Lincolnshire, p. 94 described the wapentakes as "now of little practical value". Their potential functions had been taken over piecemeal by other units such as electoral districts, Poor-Law unions and so on.
The term ward was used in a similar manner in the four northern counties of Cumberland, Durham, Northumberland and Westmorland.
Lathes in Kent and rapes in Sussex consisted of several hundreds, and filled some roles usually associated with hundreds.
In Wales the hundred replaced traditional units such as the cantref (or cantred) or commote. Irish counties were divided into baronies.
Read more about this topic: Hundred (country Subdivision), England and Wales