Exploring British Villages

Page 2 of 7

• 1. What is a Village?
• 2. The Medieval Village
• 3. Village Change in the Post-Medieval Period
• 4. Planned & Estate Villages
• 5. 'Industrial' Villages
• 6. Become a Village Detective
• 7. Find out more
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The Medieval Village

When we think of a British village we probably imagine a settlement of traditional cottages around a village green with a church and ancient manor house as backdrop. This common form of village has its roots in the medieval period when many villages started out as a cluster of agricultural dwellings.

Today farmsteads tend to be scattered about the landscape, but back in the medieval period those working on the land tended to live in small nucleated settlements (villages) and worked 'open-field' agriculture where land the wasn't enclosed. In fact, over much of Britain in the period up to 1800 it would have been unusual to have seen a farm or cottage outside of a settlement boundary.

By the time that the Domesday Book was written in 1086 most of the good agricultural land in Britain was already under cultivation, and England was a densely populated country. Two centuries later nucleated settlements were to be found over much of Britain, typically consisting of well-organised village settlements sitting within open fields.

Over lowland Britain on good soil you would typically find a settlement every couple of miles, and the communities would use the open agricultural land around where they lived. The average village would have its church, manor house, and cottage tenements all clustered together, and the open land around would usually be divided into thin strips. In some villages you can still see the remnants of medieval strip field systems around the periphery of the settlement. There would often be meadows, pasture and woodland held 'in common', and only the lord of the manor would have his own, private land or 'demesne'. In the medieval village virtually everyone would have earned their living on the territory, hence the community had to be relatively self sufficient.

'Green Villages' were a common village form, where houses clustered around a central green of common land. They are often the remnants of planned settlements introduced after the Norman Conquest in the 11th century. It is suggested that this arrangement allowed for easier defence, especially compared to the village form most common before the Normans, which was simple clusters of farms. However there is also evidence of 'village' greens in Anglo-Saxon settlements, and even at Romano-British sites.

The village green was soon got adopted as the main social space within a village, as well as its focal point alongside the church or chapel. Village greens often take a triangular form, usually reflecting the fact that the village was at the meeting of three roads. The continuing importance of the village green to modern day communities is reflected in the fact that this is usually where the war memorial is seen, as well as village notice boards, where local cricket matches are played, and where public benches are placed. The Open Spaces Society states that in 2005 there were about 3,650 registered greens in England and about 220 in Wales.

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