Recorded only by dotted lines on an Ordnance Survey map, sometimes marked by half-forgotten mossy stones, parish boundaries are a fascinating part of our landscape heritage, often preserving the memory of events which happened many centuries ago.
Snaking across the countryside, following hedgerows, roads, footpaths, streams and rivers, or cutting across the landscape with no apparent reference to the lie of the land or to features of the human landscape, parish boundaries create a complex pattern and raise numerous questions.
Local historians, geographers and archaeologists now believe that many are of great antiquity and that the network of parish boundaries has been one of the most enduring elements in the landscape. The dotted lies on the maps are in some cases direct legacies from Anglo-Saxon times.
This book is conceived as a practical handbook: a guide to where to start a study of local territorial boundaries, what questions to ask and how to assess the significance of a particular boundary pattern in historical and archaeological terms. It provides for the first time an introduction to a subject which is attractive the attention of increasingly large numbers of local historians throughout Britain.
Contents:
List of Illustrations
1. Introduction
2. What is a Parish?
3. The Ancient Parish
4. Township and Tithing
5. How Old are Township Boundaries
6. Boundaries and Boundary Markers
7. Analysing the Boundary Pattern
8. Medieval Local Government: County, Hundred and Wapentake
9. Ecclesiastical Administration: Diocese and Deanery
10. Parish Boundaries in Scotland and Wales
11. Further Reading
Appendix: Place-Names Recording Boundaries
Index
