Braunton Field is noteworthy in that it shows that however the primitive village community of West Wales may have differed from that of Wessex, it must have had certain characteristics in common with it, by which open arable fields of intermixed occupation were created in the neighbourhood of villages. Braunton cannot have been from the beginning an isolated example. The process of enclosure by the method Marshall describes went on around and outside these ancient tilled open fields.

Another interesting fact is revealed by the study of the twenty-five inch Ordnance map for Braunton. Braunton Field has been much reduced in area; one can easily see that the adjoining lands were once part of the open field, for the hedges in the lands are so placed as to form a continuation of the spider-web lines of the “launchers” within the field. The average size of the enclosed fields outside the Great Field is indeed a little greater than of the separate lands within it, but there is an imperceptible gradation, beginning with the smallest “lands” in the Great Field which are nearest the village, on through those more remote, the nearer enclosed fields, and then the more remote of them. Enclosure has been effected by simply enclosing the strips of arable land in the open field as they are. The fact that no common rights existed over the Field, supposing this always to have been the case, would have made such enclosure almost a matter of indifference to the other occupiers; and the motive, no doubt, would be the desire to lay the strip down in pasture. The whole field is known to the villagers as “the tillage land.”

The Welsh Border.

The enclosure history of the counties along the Welsh border is somewhat similar to that of Devonshire. It took place early, partly in consequence of the predominance of pasture over arable, and partly under the influence of a custom of temporarily enclosing the waste and common pasture, similar to that in Devon and Cornwall.

The percentages of area of these counties enclosed by Acts for enclosure of common field arable are respectively:

	Per cent.
Cheshire	0·5
Hereford	3·6
Monmouth	0·4
Shropshire	0·3
Staffordshire	2·8

The Board of Agriculture reporter’s statements on the common fields surviving in 1793 are that in Cheshire there was not so much as 1,000 acres (Wedge, “Agriculture of Cheshire,” p. 9); in Staffordshire little more than 1,000 acres (Pitt, “Agriculture of Staffordshire,” p. 85); that Shropshire “does not contain much common field land” (J. Bishton, “Agriculture of Shropshire,” p. 8); but that in Hereford some of the best lands of the county are common fields (Clark, “Agriculture of Hereford,” p. 69). Of Hereford, William Marshall gives a fuller account. “Herefordshire is an inclosed county. Some few remnants of common fields are seen in what is called the upper part of the county; but in general it appears to have been inclosed from the forest state; crooked fences and winding narrow lanes” (p. 224).

Celia Fiennes found from Nantwich to Chester “much Enclosures” (p. 147), but from Salford to Northwich, “I went a very pleasant roade, much in the downs, mostly campion ground, some few Enclosures”; Herefordshire, “a country of Gardens and Orchards, with apple and pear trees thick in the hedgerows” (p. 33); Staffordshire, “well wooded and full of Enclosures, Good Rich Ground, extremely differing from Derbyshire” (p. 89). This was her first impression, confirmed later. “Harteshill is so high that from the top of it you see near 20 miles round, and shows all the county which in this part of Staffordshire is full of woods and jnclosures and good lands, except the Knackwood” (p. 137). From “Nedwoodforest” ... “you have a fine prospect of the country, enclosed good lands” (p. 139). Also beyond Stafford towards Cheshire was mostly enclosures (p. 144), and from Stafford to Wolverhampton the journey was through lanes (p. 194).

Walter Blyth includes Staffordshire and Shropshire as part of “the Woodlands, who before Enclosure, were wont to be relieved by the Fieldon, with corn of all sorts. And now grown as gallant Corne countries as be in England” (“The English Improver,” 1649, p. 40).

Evidence of early enclosure is supplied by Leland. About White Castle, which I take to be Bishop’s Castle, in south-west Shropshire, “the Countrys is Champion” (Vol. IV. fol. 176 b), but from Hereford to Leominster was enclosed ground (176 b and 177 a), thence towards Ludlow “by goodly corne Ground, part by enclosed” (178 b), Bridgenorth to Kidderminster “most by enclosed Ground” (182 b), to Bewdly was by “a fayre downe,” but all the way thence to Milton (4 miles), Hertlebury (2 miles), Salopbrook (5 miles), Worcester (3 miles), Wick (6 miles) and Bromsgrove (4 miles), each stage is said to be by enclosed ground (fols. 183 b–186 a).

As for Monmouthshire, “The soyle of al Venteland” (Gwent, the country between the Wye and Usk) “is of dark reddish Yerth ful of slaty stones, and other greater of the same colour. The country is also sumwhat mountaynous and well replenished with Woodes, also fertile of Corne; but men there study more to Pastures, the which be wel inclosed” (Vol. V., fol. 5), and “Erchenfeld is full of Enclosures very (fruteful) of Corne and Wood” (fol. 9). Round Shrewsbury there is “ground plentiful of Corne, wood and pasture” (Vol. V., fol. 80), at Whitchurch “meately fruteful sandy ground” (fol. 81), and sandy ground on to Northwich (ibid.).

Nowhere else in these counties is either “enclosure” or “champaine” specified.

The evidence as to the existence of a custom of temporary enclosure of the waste, is supplied by Robert Plot’s book on “Staffordshire,” published in 1686: “For the heathy land of this County, it is seldom enclosed; but when they intend it for tillage, which is never for above five years neither, and then it is throwne open to the Commons again” (p. 343). “Their gouty, moorisch, peaty, cold black land, they husbande also much after the same manner as they doe the heathy lands in the Moore Lands” (p. 345).

Another passage brings into juxtaposition the more recent enclosures from forest or moor for the sake of tillage, and the ancient arable common fields. “Others again have placed the origin of mildewing in making small inclosures, corn not being so lyable to this evil in the common open fields” (p. 351).

It is reasonable to suppose that the custom found in Staffordshire and in Devon and Cornwall also prevailed in other counties, particularly in those along the Welsh border. It is some confirmation that Eden about a hundred years later found a similar custom still surviving in Sutton Coldfield, in Warwickshire, but near the Staffordshire boundary.

“The poor here, besides the right of commonage, have this peculiar privilege, that every house-keeper may take in one acre of common, and plough it four years: and the fifth year he must sow it with clover and lay it to the common again; after which he may take another acre, and work it in the like manner. By this method, about 400 acres of common are kept constantly in tillage” (“State of the Poor,” Vol. III., p. 749, written probably in 1795).

The enclosure history of these five counties may be summed up in the statement that it probably proceeded very similarly to enclosure in Devonshire, but at a somewhat later date; and that enclosure was later towards the north. Monmouth, we see, was “full of enclosures” before 1540; Shropshire “partly enclosed” with some “champion”; but though Leland passed through Cheshire, he does not mention enclosures, and Celia Fiennes found the North of Cheshire mostly open as late as about 1697. In Hereford and Staffordshire there was a large proportion of ancient arable land, and complete enclosure was consequently longer delayed, leaving an appreciable area to be enclosed by Acts of Parliament.

Strathclyde.

Lancashire had no common field enclosed by Act of Parliament. It is possible that its partial autonomy as a Palatine County may account for this; but it must be noticed that the Acts of enclosure for Lancashire for enclosing commonable waste, are numerous right through the period of Enclosure Acts. Nor, though Lancashire was an early enclosed county, can we explain the absence of Enclosure Acts by the assumption that the enclosure of tilled land was completed by the beginning of the eighteenth century, for some common field persisted to the end of that century.

John Holt, the Board of Agriculture reporter, tells us: “There are but few open, or common fields, at this time remaining; the inconvenience attending which, while they were in that state, have caused great exertions to accomplish a division, in order that every individual might cultivate his own lands, according to his own method; and that the lots of a few acres, in many places divided into small portions, and again separated at different distances, might be brought together into one point” (“Agriculture of Lancashire,” p. 49). It would appear from this that the open fields of Lancashire, like Braunton Great Field, though unenclosed, and intermixed, and subject to some common rule for cultivation, were not subject to common rights. Any owner, therefore, who by exchanges or by buying and selling, could get his lands together in a convenient plot, might enclose without trespassing on his neighbours’ rights.

From Holt’s statement we find that enclosure was nearly, but not quite, complete by 1793. It was certainly far advanced a hundred years earlier. Celia Fiennes rode from Prescot to Wigan, “seven long miles mostly through lanes” (p. 153); from Gascoyne to Lancaster, “mostly all along lanes being an enclosed country” (p. 157). From Blackstone Edge the view was of “a fruitfull valley full of jnclosures” (p. 186). From Rochdale to Manchester, “the grounds were all enclosed with quicksetts” (p. 187).

Similarly Leland: “Manchester to Morle I passid by enclosid Grounde partely pasturable, partely fruteful of corn” (Vol. V., fol. 83). “The Ground bytwixt Morle and Preston enclosid for Pasture and Cornes.... Likewyse is the soile bytwixt Preston and Garstan; but alway the moste parte of Enclosures be for Pasturages” (fol. 84).

Cumberland and Westmoreland were later enclosed than Lancashire; and some few remnants of open arable field were dealt with by Acts. At Bolton, in Westmoreland, “certain open or common fields called Broad Ing Bartle and Star Ing” of 22 acres, at Soulby 90 acres of open field, and at Barton 130 acres, were enclosed by Acts mainly passed for the sake of enclosing waste; and at Kirkby, in Kendal, “a common open field” of 105 acres was enclosed. There were five Acts in Cumberland enclosing open fields; but only two say precisely how much. At Torpenton, 20 acres of field and 700 acres of waste was enclosed; at Greystoke, 240 acres of field and 3260 acres of waste.

But the enclosure of open-field arable was proceeding very steadily through the eighteenth century; and a clear account of the process is furnished us by two keen observers.

Eden gives an account of the condition of the arable land in seven Cumberland parishes, written either in December, 1794, or January, 1795.

“Gilcrux. About 400 acres of common field have been enclosed within the last fifty years” (“State of the Poor,” Vol. II., p. 76).

“Hesket. No more than 200 acres have been enclosed within the last fifty years. A large part appears to have had its hedges planted a little before that period” (Ibid., p. 81).

“Ainstable. Area 5,120 acres of which 3,480 are common.[106] About 400 acres have been enclosed in the common fields within the last fifty years.... The average rent of land is about 18s. per acre; but it is observable that here and in most parts of Cumberland, an extensive common right[107] is attached to most arable land” (p. 46).

“Croglin. The average rent of open fields is 9s. 6d. the acre, of inclosures, 15s. or 16s. About 100 acres of common-field land have been enclosed within the last fifty years; but a great part of the arable land still remains in narrow, crooked dales, or ranes, as they are called” (p. 67).

“Castle Carrock. The greatest part of this parish remains in dales, or doles as they are called; which are strips of cultivated land belonging to different proprietors, separated from each other by ridges of grass land; about 100 acres may have been enclosed in the last fifty years” (p. 65).

“Cumrew. The land is cultivated in the old Cumberland manner; the grass ridges in the fields are from twenty to thirty feet wide; and some of them are 1000 feet in length. Grazing cattle often injure the crops” (p. 68).

“Warwick. Almost the whole of the cultivated land (1126 acres) has been enclosed within the last fifty years. It formerly, although divided, lay in long strips, or narrow dales, separated from each other by ranes, or narrow ridges of land, which are left unploughed. In this manner a great deal, and perhaps the whole, of the cultivated lands in Cumberland, was anciently disposed” (p. 92).

The other observer is the poet Wordsworth. In his book on the scenery of the lake district, he quotes from West’s “Antiquities of Furness” to show that in the troubled times between the union of the Crowns of England and Scotland, holdings were let to groups of four tenants, each group dividing its tenement into four equal parts. “These divisions were not properly distinguished; the land remained mixed; each tenant had a share through all the arable and meadow land, and common of pasture over all the wastes.... The land being mixed and the several tenants united in equipping the plough, the absence of the fourth man” (who was called out for military service) “was no prejudice to the cultivation of his land, which was committed to the care of three.” In High Furness, “The Abbots of Furness enfranchised these pastoral vassals, and permitted them to enclose quillets to their houses, for which they paid encroachment rent.”

Wordsworth then proceeds with the tale of enclosure: “The enclosures, formed by the tenantry, are for a long time confined to the homesteads, and the arable and meadow land of the fields is possessed in common fields; the several portions being marked out by stones, bushes, or trees; while portions, where the custom has survived, to this day are called dales, from the word deylen, to distribute; but while the valley was thus lying open, enclosures seem to have taken place upon the sides of the mountains; because the land there was not intermixed, and was of little comparative value; and therefore small opposition would be made to its being appropriated by those to whose habitations it was contiguous. Hence the singular appearance which the sides of many of these mountains exhibit, intersected, as they are, almost to the summit with stone walls.... There” (in the meadows and lower grounds), “where the increasing value of land, and the inconvenience suffered from intermixed plots of ground in common field, had induced each inhabitant to enclose his own, they were compelled to make fences of alders, willows, and other trees ... but these last partitions do not seem to have been general till long past the pacification of the Borders, by the union of the two crowns” (Fourth Edition, p. 23).

The date of the enclosure of the intermixed arable and meadow land is thus fixed within certain broad limits. It did not begin till “long past the pacification of the Borders, by the union of the two crowns.” It took some time to effect the pacification of the Borders, even after the accession of James I. made it possible; “long past” that event is a vague date, but may very well bring us at least as late as the date when the enclosure of the common fields of Durham is supposed to have begun, “soon after the Restoration.” It is certain, further, from Eden’s information, that enclosure was going on steadily right through the second half of the eighteenth century, but by no means complete in 1795. The high prices of the war period would have greatly stimulated the movement, for it is obvious that if rents were thereby doubled both for open and enclosed land, the gross profit of enclosing would also be doubled; the net gain probably more than doubled. When Wordsworth wrote, the open fields were apparently still fairly numerous, but they had become a mere survival.

The date of the enclosure of this district is, however, the least interesting of the inferences to be drawn.

We find that up to the union of the Crowns, cultivation was carried on by a system very closely resembling the “run-rig” of the Hebrides. Groups of four tenants combined together, and yoked their horses to a common plough, and equally divided the holding between them, each tenant having his equal share in all parts of the holding. We next find that on the decay of this co-aration, for a long period, varying in duration in different parishes, holdings remained intermixed, but it seems clear that as in the one surviving Devonshire open field, and probably as in Lancashire, common rights were not exercised over the arable fields; though it might happen that besides the “ranes,” the grassy balks between the strips of arable land, there might be considerable stretches of grass amidst the arable field which was used for a common pasture. Lastly, we find that open, intermixed arable land and meadows, having this history, passes into a state of enclosure where increase of population, agricultural progress, and the increasing value of land make enclosure sufficiently profitable, by a gradual, piecemeal process, without the need for Act of Parliament, or reference to a Commission, or any combined resolution on the part of the lord and tenants of a manor.

It is because the process was late in Cumberland and Westmoreland and because it happened to interest three authors, West, Wordsworth, and Eden, who were not agriculturists, that the record of it for these two counties is available. All the indications suggest that Northumberland and Durham underwent a similar evolution; and all the preceding information with regard to the enclosure of Wales and much of the land immediately on the Welsh border, and of West Somerset, Devon and Cornwall, harmonises with the hypothesis that in those districts also the process was fundamentally the same, though with local differences, due to a very much earlier pacification.

---