THE TWO- AND THREE-FIELD SYSTEM 3 I 



of them, should be added to the list. The Glastonbury manor of 

 Ashbury was in Berkshire, and of this we have a survey similar 

 in date and character to that of Kington, described above. ^ The 

 upland parts of these seven counties form a compact area in the 

 southwest, characterized by high, bleak down-land not favorable 

 to a developed type of agriculture. Hence in this region the two- 

 field system lingered, little changed, at least until the seventeenth 

 century. We shall see that it was, as might be expected, the 

 prevalent type there at an early date. 



There were two outlying areas in which at the end of the six- 

 teenth century it was possible to find two-field townships as un- 

 changed as in the Cotswold counties. One such township was 

 Wellow, in the Isle of Wight. Here, in a Jacobean survey, the 

 customary holdings divided their arable with great consistency 

 and considerable equality between an East field and a West field.^ 

 Such surveys from the Isle of Wight are, however, so infrequent 

 that a two-field system can hardly be said to have retained much 

 hold upon the island in the days of James I. 



It was different with the other outlying area, the so-called wolds 

 of Lincolnshire, where two-field townships were as strongly in- 

 trenched as in the Cotswolds or the Wiltshire downs. The Jaco- 

 bean surveys of Humberston and Alvingham have been chosen 

 for illustration. Both townships had an East field and a West 

 field, and both divided the tenants' arable with marked precision 

 between the two. There was considerable common meadow at 

 Humberston, at Alvingham rather more enclosed pasture. In all 

 respects the townships were of the strictly two-field type. 



To show how often the three-field system is apparent in 

 Tudor and Jacobean surveys a longer list of counties than the 

 one just given is required. Among the counties where it 

 rivalled the two-field system were some in which the Cotswold 

 highlands gave place here and there to more fertile areas. Such 

 was Oxfordshire, which has already furnished us the survey of 

 Handborough. Such was Warwickshire throughout most of the 

 valley of the Avon. Such too were the three counties of the south- 



^ Harl. MS. 3961, ff. 11 7-133. The fields were East and West. 

 2 Cf. Appendix I, below, p. 440. 



