Encountering the Environment: Rural Communities in England, 1086-1348
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Encountering the Environment: Rural Communities in England, 1086-1348 Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Leicester Susan Kilby Centre for English Local History University of Leicester October 2013 ii Abstract Susan Kilby, Encountering the Environment: Rural Communities in England, 1086-1348 Our current understanding of the medieval local environment is largely based on scholarly writings focusing on the policies towards the landscape pursued by the social elite. This presents us with some obvious problems if we want to understand local places through the eyes of the lower orders. But that is exactly what this study aims to do. By re-examining a variety of sources this research seeks to reconstruct the physical—and in some respects, metaphorical—environment of three contrasting English villages, using this as the basis for determining how peasants perceived their natural surroundings, and how this led to the development of the local economic strategies and social structures that can be pieced together from the records of the medieval manor. Since the emphasis here is largely on attitudes toward local environment, the intellectual approach moves beyond more traditional English historical spheres regarding the peasantry to consider mentalities. This has rarely been a consideration for historians concerned with English medieval peasants. Indeed, one might ask just how we can hope to uncover the thoughts of those who left little documentary evidence behind? Reconsidering the records that survive, it is clear that peasants left a great quantity of material waiting to be uncovered. Hidden within seigneurial documents can be found direct peasant testimony, notably their personal names, and those they bestowed upon the landscape. Through these documents— alongside the physical environment—we find further signposts indicating how they felt, thought about, and commemorated their local landscape. This study reveals that some peasants used the landscape to set themselves apart from their neighbours. It shows that, although uneducated in the formal sense, some nevertheless had a strong grasp of contemporary scientific thought. It outlines the means through which locally important folk stories were embedded within the landscape itself. And it sees beyond the officially endorsed local village landscape, with its authorized roads and footpaths, to reclaim the real environment inhabited and traversed by English people over 700 years ago. iii Acknowledgements Many people have helped to bring this thesis to fruition. I am immensely grateful to those with a local interest in each of three settlements that form the subject of this work: to Stephen Upex for his generosity in sharing his work on Elton and Castor; to Avril Lumley-Prior, William Burke and Brian Goode for passing on their knowledge of the Castor landscape; and to Robert Rolph in Lakenheath. I would also like to thank local farmer Robert Fray, who kindly let me walk across what was once molwellehil in Elton following a chance meeting as we were out walking in September 2010. I would also like to record the great debt I owe to Peter McClure (University of Hull), Philip Shaw (University of Leicester), David Parsons (University of Wales) and Paul Cullen (University of the West of England), each of whom from time-to-time has led me through the minefield of medieval language, and without whom my own efforts to interpret the minor names and bynames of Elton, Castor and Lakenheath would undoubtedly have been flawed. I also owe thanks to Elizabeth New (Aberystwyth University) for her help in considering the Castor seal impressions; to Stephen Mileson (University of Oxford) for commenting on elements of the thesis; and to both the Cadbury Research Library at the University of Birmingham and Jean Birrell for kindly allowing me to borrow a copy of their translations of the Lakenheath court rolls. I have received considerable assistance from those at the University of Leicester, including Charles Phythian-Adams, Matthew Tompkins, Andrew Hopper and Lucy Byrne. Particular thanks are offered to Christopher Dyer who has willingly volunteered advice and criticism throughout, despite having retired before I began; to Joanna Story for similarly providing guidance, support and encouragement; and most especially to Richard Jones, who has been an inspirational teacher, and whose unstinting generosity, patience, encouragement and occasional prodding has undoubtedly resulted in a far better piece of work than I thought myself capable of producing. iv Table of contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................ iii Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................... iv Table of contents .............................................................................................................. v List of figures ................................................................................................................... vii List of tables ...................................................................................................................... x List of appendices ........................................................................................................... xii Abbreviations ................................................................................................................. xiii Additional notes ............................................................................................................xviii Chapter One: Introduction................................................................................................ 1 Chapter Two: Understanding the rural environment: the seigneurial perspective ....... 39 Chapter Three: The unseen environment ...................................................................... 72 Chapter Four: Naming the landscape ........................................................................... 106 Chapter Five: Re-imagining the medieval environment ............................................... 138 Chapter Six: The hidden economy ................................................................................ 166 Chapter Seven: The practical landscape ....................................................................... 203 Chapter Eight: Ordering the landscape ........................................................................ 237 Chapter Nine: Conclusion ............................................................................................. 280 Appendices .................................................................................................................... 291 Appendix One ............................................................................................................... 292 Appendix Two ............................................................................................................... 300 Appendix Three ............................................................................................................. 310 Appendix Four ............................................................................................................... 314 Appendix Five ................................................................................................................ 360 Bibliography .................................................................................................................. 371 v vi List of figures All photographs were taken by the author, unless otherwise stated. 1.1 Elton (Hnt), Castor (Ntp) and Lakenheath (Sfk) 1.2 Elton (Hnt) 1.3 Farcet Fen (Hnt) 1.4 Ailsworth, Castor, Milton, Sutton and Upton (Ntp) 1.5 Castor and Ailsworth (Ntp), pre-c.1215 1.6 Lakenheath (Sfk) 1.7 Extract from the reeve’s account, Lakenheath, 1334-5 1.8 Microsoft Access database, Lakenheath: select tables 1.9 Sample data entry forms, Lakenheath 1.10 Sample query, Lakenheath: individuals associated with the warren 2.1 Lords and peasants in the manorial landscape 2.2 La Neyte (Mdx) in 1723, showing the Willow Walk and Eye Stream 2.3 Undley Causeway, Lakenheath (Sfk) 3.1 The Gere Family Tree, Lakenheath 1313-1328 3.2 Percentage of distinct personal names by category: Elton, Castor and Lakenheath 3.3 Unique environmental names as a percentage of total unique names: Elton, Castor and Lakenheath 3.4 Map of Boarstall (Buc), 1446 3.5 Lakenheath seal matrices, late medieval 3.6 The wax seal impression of Cecilia Paris, Castor, c. late thirteenth century 3.7 The wax seal impression of Ralph Aboveton, Castor, c. early fourteenth century 4.1 Boterflyemede, Elton, alongside the speculative locations of the medieval furlongs Bouhtwell and Herdwykbenelond vii 4.2 A hypothetical model of the chronology of naming at Castor and Elton 4.3 The percentage of personal names in field-names: Elton, Castor and Lakenheath 4.4 ‘Cultural’ qualifiers in field-names: Elton, Castor and Lakenheath 5.1 ‘Lady Conneyburrow’s Way’, Normangate Field, Castor 5.2 Ermine Street from the air, Normangate Field, Castor 5.3 The putative location of ‘Lady Conneyburrow’s Way’, Normangate Field, Castor 5.4 Roman roads in Castor and Ailsworth 5.5 The approximate site of denchemor, Castor 5.6 Wælwyrt in the Old English Herbarium 5.7 The warrior capital, St Kyneburgha, Castor, c.1100-1110 5.8 ‘St Kyneburgha’ and warriors, St Kyneburgha, Castor, c.1100-1110 5.9 ‘Danewort’ capital, St Kyneburgha, Castor, c.1100-1110 5.10