When the Domesday survey was completed in 1086 there was no mention of Mountsorrel so probably it did not exist at that time. Perhaps because this narrow strip of land squashed between the hills and the flood plain, with little agricultural land to sustain a community, was a poor site for a settlement to establish itself .
But the manors of Rothley and Barrow did exist and the boundary between them went through the middle of what is now Mountsorrel, probably through Watling Street.
William the Conqueror gave Barrow to the earl of Chester, Hugh D’Avranches also known as Hugh Lupus, or Hugh the Fat. He retained Rothley and it remained a royal manor until it was transferred to the Templars. But during King Stephen’s reign it was effectively controlled by the earl of Leicester
Now this might have been a lousy spot for a village but on top of the hill there was a superb site for a Norman castle,and once the castle was built Mountsorrel started to develop at the base of the castle to provide services to the castle.Because the castle was more or less on the boundary of the two manors, Rothley and Barrow, and because there was only a narrow strip of land available for expansion, Mountsorrel spread in a linear fashion along land owned or controlled by both the earls of Chester and the earls of Leicester.
Consequently Mountsorrel was split in two; the South End, or Mountsorrel Superior, controlled by the Earls of Leicester and the North End,or Mountsorrel Inferior, belonging to the Earls of Chester, and it remained split for another 800 years, finally being united in 1884.