ROYAL FORESTS 21 



neither Life nor Members for Killing our Deer." 

 The penalty instead was imprisonment for a year 

 and a day or a fine a big difference ! 



Edward I. carried on this policy of disafforesting 

 large areas of the Royal forests and lightening the 

 burdens of the Forest law. Of course, by " dis- 

 afforesting," as here used, I would not be under- 

 stood to mean that the forests in these areas were 

 cut down. They were far too extensive at that 

 period to have rendered this possible. The dis- 

 afforesting simply meant that the areas so treated 

 were no longer subject to the forest laws. The 

 policy was continued in subsequent reigns, until 

 with changing conditions of social life the forest 

 law gradually lost its importance, and finally dis- 

 appeared in the seventeenth century. 



One curious result of the high-handed action of 

 the Norman kings for which our generation should 

 be grateful, is that by the end of the eighteenth 

 century the only areas of the old forests of the 

 country left were the remnants of the Royal forests 

 of Dean, Windsor, the New Forest, Epping, etc. 

 For assuredly, but for the fact that these remained 

 Royal forests i.e. were not " disafforested " they 

 would have disappeared with the rest, as will be 

 described. 



It is of interest to note that the animals protected 

 in the Royal forests were, firstly, the Royal red deer 

 (the hart and the hind), the fallow deer (which may 

 have been introduced by the Romans), possibly the 

 roe deer, and the wild boar, next only in importance 

 to the red deer. The wolf was present, but probably 



