202 ENGLISH FIELD SYSTEMS 



one-tenth of it was brought from grass into tillage each year, the 

 remaining tenths being similarly treated in succeeding years. It 

 is possible, however, that the infield may have met with tripartite 

 division, since a three-course rotation of crops was usual there. 

 Yet no advantage could have been gained by the marking out of 

 three compact areas. All crops were spring grains and no fur- 

 longs lay fallow; rights of summer pasturage, the main pretext for 

 the tripartite division of EngHsh midland fields, were non-exist- 

 ent. Nothing would have been sacrificed if the furlongs which in 

 any year were devoted to barley had not been contiguous. Nor 

 do the documents divide Scottish infields by hard and inflexible 

 boundaries into three equal compact areas; the parcels of a hold- 

 ing are not, for example, assigned to East field. North field, and 

 South field. Absence of division by fields thus becomes a con- 

 comitant of runrig and one of its distinguishing marks. It will 

 prove important when the question of Celtic influence in England 

 arises. Terriers from counties where such influence is suspected 

 should, if the suspicion be correct, show no grouping of their 

 parcels by fields. 



Before the subject of Celtic field arrangements is dismissed, it 

 should be pointed out that the subdivision of arable in the manner 

 of runrig was not, at any one time or place, an essential charac- 

 teristic of the system. If the explanation of the origin of runrig 

 above given be correct, such subdivision was rather an accident. 

 Farms, townships, -townlands, which are found divided in the 

 eighteenth century may well have been undivided a few genera- 

 tions earlier. Landlords may at times, on the expiration of leases, 

 have taken certain townships in hand and reconsolidated holdings ; 

 in the recompacted areas subdivision may once more have been 

 permitted and the cycle again have run its course. Regarding 

 Celtic countries, then, no sweeping statement can be made as 

 to the precise aspect of the townships at any particular time. 

 Some of them may have been entirely in the hands of one or two 

 tenants, with no runrig manifest; others may have been much 

 subdivided. 



The latter sort would in turn have assumed different aspects in 

 so far as arable or pasture predominated. If the township were 



