1900 E. C. SCOBELL — COMMON FIELDS AT UPTON 217 



fowl being offered every year to the departed by the Hving 

 members of the house." * 



The system, it may be noticed, is found to prevail in 

 India among savage races, and is fully developed in Ireland. 

 Such similar traits are shown that it may be fairly assumed 

 that this well-nigh universal system is one and the same 

 in general principle. 



In it we clearly trace the primitive conception of unity 

 of kin — a family brotherhood : a clan or family, not, as 

 now, the individual, being the unit. 



Whenever the system originated there can be no doubt 

 of its being general in England in the 14th century. ' The 

 vision concerning Piers the Plowman ' bears witness to 

 this. In the vision he sees 



"A faire filde ful of folke, fonde I there bytwene. 

 Of alle maner of men, the mene and the riche, 

 Worchyng and wandryng, as the worlde asketh. 

 Some putten hem to the plow, pleyed ful selde. 

 In settyng and in sowyng, swonken ful harde." 



Prol: 17 ff. 



This must have been an open field in which the villagers 

 worked one fine morning — not several fields with hedges 

 around. 



From the tithe map of Upton it would appear that 

 " Common Fields " were once more general than at the 

 time of the recent inclosure, for many fields w^ere divided 

 into the narrow strips, or lands, which are of such special 

 interest. 



These strips, which thus appear to have existed gener- 

 ally in this and other uninclosed parishes, were separated 

 from each other not by hedges but by lengths of un- 

 ploughed grass — called "balks" or " meers " (see PI. IX.) 

 — the Latin equivalent is salio, the French sillon, the 



* Gonime, 'Village Community,' p. 115. 



