>Can anyone clear up for me the distinction between a 'common arable > >field' and 'an open arable field'? Were both divided into strips? It's >in connection with 17th and 18th century enclosure. > There is no difference, Leigh. They both meant large unenclosed fields divided into many long, narrow strips (bundles of strips running parallel to each other being often grouped into furlongs). Each farmer would have a number of strips scattered all through the various furlongs and fields. The strips would have originally been about a pole wide (ie about 16.5 or 18 feet wide) and a furlong long, thus about a quarter of an acre in area, but over the centuries many of them would have been combined with adjacent strips to make wider strips of half an acre or an acre or even more. In the Midland zone of England (a broad belt which actually stretched from Northumberland south and then southwestwards across the Midlands to Dorset) all the arable land of a village would typically be divided into just two or three such open fields. In other regions open fields would also be found but they would usually be smaller and not comprise the entire arable land in the village, some of which would be divided into the small hedged/walled fields we now find everywhere. Open/common fields were associated with a communal form of farming, in which everyone owning strips in the same furlong, or even in the same field, had to plant the same crop, and when there was no crop growing everyone had the right to graze their livestock over the entire field. Every year a different part of the parish's arable land, usually a complete open/common field, would be left fallow (ie nothing would be planted) to give the soil a chance to recover its fertility and to provide year-round grazing. They were called open fields because there were no hedges or walls or fences between the strips, and were also called common fields because everyone had the right of common pasture over everyone else's strips. Back in the 1960s some historians tried to see a distinction between common fields, which (they believed) were subject to the system of common farming and fallowing and pasturing I have just described, and open fields, which (they believed) were just areas of unfenced strip fields which were not farmed in common and in which each farmer could plant what he wanted, when he wanted, and over which no one else had pasture rights. This latter system has been shown to have been extremely rare, if it ever existed anywhere, and it is now generally accepted that the phrases 'open field' and 'common field' were entirely interchangeable. Matt Tompkins Blaston, Leics

Hi Matt Could you please tell me how meadow land fitted into the three field system? Was this enclosed in order to keep cattle and sheep out before hay was made and gathered into sheaves which would eventually be stored. As the great tithes generally consisted of sheaves of corn and and hay, presumably meadow land was managed in some way. An open unenclosed field would not have been practical. Do you think the nursery rhyme of "Little Boy Blue" would have been making reference to ways of dealing with the problem of keeping cattle in the "right" places in this system? Audrey ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tompkins, M.L." <mllt1@leicester.ac.uk> To: <OLD-ENGLISH-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Friday, August 06, 2004 1:02 PM Subject: RE: [OEL] Common vs Open > >Can anyone clear up for me the distinction between a 'common arable > >field' and 'an open arable field'? Were both divided into strips? It's >in connection with 17th and 18th century enclosure. > > > > There is no difference, Leigh. They both meant large unenclosed fields divided into many long, narrow strips (bundles of strips running parallel to each other being often grouped into furlongs). Each farmer would have a number of strips scattered all through the various furlongs and fields. The strips would have originally been about a pole wide (ie about 16.5 or 18 feet wide) and a furlong long, thus about a quarter of an acre in area, but over the centuries many of them would have been combined with adjacent strips to make wider strips of half an acre or an acre or even more. > > In the Midland zone of England (a broad belt which actually stretched from Northumberland south and then southwestwards across the Midlands to Dorset) all the arable land of a village would typically be divided into just two or three such open fields. In other regions open fields would also be found but they would usually be smaller and not comprise the entire arable land in the village, some of which would be divided into the small hedged/walled fields we now find everywhere. > > Open/common fields were associated with a communal form of farming, in which everyone owning strips in the same furlong, or even in the same field, had to plant the same crop, and when there was no crop growing everyone had the right to graze their livestock over the entire field. Every year a different part of the parish's arable land, usually a complete open/common field, would be left fallow (ie nothing would be planted) to give the soil a chance to recover its fertility and to provide year-round grazing. > > They were called open fields because there were no hedges or walls or fences between the strips, and were also called common fields because everyone had the right of common pasture over everyone else's strips. > > Back in the 1960s some historians tried to see a distinction between common fields, which (they believed) were subject to the system of common farming and fallowing and pasturing I have just described, and open fields, which (they believed) were just areas of unfenced strip fields which were not farmed in common and in which each farmer could plant what he wanted, when he wanted, and over which no one else had pasture rights. This latter system has been shown to have been extremely rare, if it ever existed anywhere, and it is now generally accepted that the phrases 'open field' and 'common field' were entirely interchangeable. > > Matt Tompkins > Blaston, Leics > > > ==== OLD-ENGLISH Mailing List ==== > OLD-ENGLISH Web Page > http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~oel/ >

NIcely detailed description. I would recommend anyone passing along the A1 to divert to visit Laxton, Nottinghamshire: the last surviving open-field strip-farming village left in England. (You can watch an explanatory film and buy a nice mug to commemorate your visit in the small information centre opposite the decent village pub.) SANDRA LOVEGROVE Researching LOVEGROVEs in all places and at all times. Please do visit the LOVEGROVE Information Centre on http://www.lovegrove.org.uk ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tompkins, M.L." <mllt1@leicester.ac.uk> To: <OLD-ENGLISH-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: 06 August 2004 13:02 Subject: RE: [OEL] Common vs Open > >Can anyone clear up for me the distinction between a 'common arable > >field' and 'an open arable field'? Were both divided into strips? It's >in connection with 17th and 18th century enclosure. > > > > There is no difference, Leigh. They both meant large unenclosed fields divided into many long, narrow strips (bundles of strips running parallel to each other being often grouped into furlongs). Each farmer would have a number of strips scattered all through the various furlongs and fields. The strips would have originally been about a pole wide (ie about 16.5 or 18 feet wide) and a furlong long, thus about a quarter of an acre in area, but over the centuries many of them would have been combined with adjacent strips to make wider strips of half an acre or an acre or even more. > > In the Midland zone of England (a broad belt which actually stretched from Northumberland south and then southwestwards across the Midlands to Dorset) all the arable land of a village would typically be divided into just two or three such open fields. In other regions open fields would also be found but they would usually be smaller and not comprise the entire arable land in the village, some of which would be divided into the small hedged/walled fields we now find everywhere. > > Open/common fields were associated with a communal form of farming, in which everyone owning strips in the same furlong, or even in the same field, had to plant the same crop, and when there was no crop growing everyone had the right to graze their livestock over the entire field. Every year a different part of the parish's arable land, usually a complete open/common field, would be left fallow (ie nothing would be planted) to give the soil a chance to recover its fertility and to provide year-round grazing. > > They were called open fields because there were no hedges or walls or fences between the strips, and were also called common fields because everyone had the right of common pasture over everyone else's strips. > > Back in the 1960s some historians tried to see a distinction between common fields, which (they believed) were subject to the system of common farming and fallowing and pasturing I have just described, and open fields, which (they believed) were just areas of unfenced strip fields which were not farmed in common and in which each farmer could plant what he wanted, when he wanted, and over which no one else had pasture rights. This latter system has been shown to have been extremely rare, if it ever existed anywhere, and it is now generally accepted that the phrases 'open field' and 'common field' were entirely interchangeable. > > Matt Tompkins > Blaston, Leics > > ______________________________