The last half century has seen many studies of the origin of the English village. As a cross-disciplinary enquiry this book integrates materials from geography, history, economic history, archaeology, place-name studies, anthropology and even church architecture. These provide varied foundations, but the underlying subject matter always engages with landscape studies. Beginning with a rigorous examination of evidence hidden within the surviving village and hamlet plans seen on eighteenth and nineteenth century maps, the first half of the book shows how these can be classified, mapped, analysed and then interpreted as important parts of former medieval landscapes. Many specific case-studies are built into the argument, all being drawn from the author's lifetime work on northern England, and accessible language is employed. From this base, the argument develops, with the objective of integrating landscape studies with the descriptive and analytical practices of history, and drawing these together by using the cartographic methods of historical geography. This foundation leads gently into deeper waters; to the landed estates in which all settlements developed and the farming and social systems of which they were a part; to the land holding arrangements that were integrated into the physical plans, providing methods of sharing out the agricultural resources of arable, meadow, woodland and common grazings; and finally to the social divisions present within a changing society. A wholly new theme is found in the argument that certain types of land tenure were associated with a class of officer, land agent or dreng , who in northern England was often linked with the provision of tenants for new villages. It is clear from the evidence amassed that the deliberate founding of new villages and the establishment of new plans on older sites was taking place in the centuries between about AD 900 and 1250. Finally, the study moves beyond the North of England to review the European roots of planned villages and hamlets, and concludes with a challenging hypothesis about their origin in the whole of England. This provides pointers towards future enquiry.

• Dedication
• Copyright Page
• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• Table of Figures
• List of Tables
• Abbreviations
• Preface
• CHAPTER ONE - The Nature of Rural Settlement
  • Questions of Terminology
  • Patterns and Forms–Some Definitions
  • Of Space and Place
  • Place and Shape–Village Plan Elements
  • National Contexts: Rural Settlement and Woodlands
  • Settlement and Woodland in Northern England
• CHAPTER TWO - Of Patterns and Forms–Settlement in Northern England
  • The North Yorkshire Moors–a Case Study
  • The Components of Settlement Patterns
  • Distribution Maps: Comparing and Contrasting
  • Village Plan Elements and Processes of Change
  • Settlement Sites
• CHAPTER THREE - Settlement Plans–Regular Forms
  • Simple Row Plans
  • The Regulated Village
• CHAPTER FOUR - Settlement Plans–Variations and Complexities
  • Cumbrian Villages and Hamlets
  • Yorkshire–Three Cases
  • Settlement Plans and Feudal Structures–Coxwoldshire, Yorkshire
  • Composite Row Plans and Towns
• CHAPTER FIVE - Interpreting the Morphological Record
  • Dating Village Plans
  • Historical Cartography
  • Archaeological Evidence
  • Antecedents and Antecedent Forms
  • Documents–Kirk Merrington and Middlestone
  • Morphology and Plan Elements–Wheldrake, Yorkshire
  • Graphical Analysis
  • Analytical Cartography
  • Review of Questions
• CHAPTER SIX - Estates and Small Shires–the Articulation of Local Settlement
  • The Organisation of Space
  • Early Land Grants in County Durham
  • Evidence and Questions
  • The Substance of the Small Shire
  • Rents and Renders Associated with Small Shires
  • The Nature of Aucklandshire
  • Aucklandshire Core Villages: Plan Morphology
• CHAPTER SEVEN - Village Plantation–Problems and Questions
  • Devastation and Medieval Settlement
  • Of Drengs and Village Plans
  • Drengs, Split Drengages, Firmars and Molmen
  • Conclusions
• CHAPTER EIGHT - Of Drengs and Plans
  • Settlement Sequences and Settlement Cycles
  • Settlement and Tenure: The Core Vills of Small Shires and Estates
  • The Peripheral Vills of the Bishopric Estates
  • Settlement Cycles in Durham
  • Conclusions in Durham
  • Beyond County Durham
  • Concluding Remarks
• CHAPTER NINE - Planned Villages in Europe and England
  • An Overview of European Settlement
  • Antecedents and Roots
  • A ‘Romanesque Society’?
  • The English Dimension
• CHAPTER TEN - Planned Villages in England–a National Perspective
  • Of Royal Demesne
  • The Genesis of Villages
  • Hamlet, Village and Burh
  • Vikings in the North of England
• Appendices
• APPENDIX II - The Structural Arrangement of Settlements in Boldon Book–Settlement Groupings.
• APPENDIX III Historic County Boundaries
• Bibliography
• INDEXES
• INDEX OF PERSONS
• GENERAL INDEX