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A HISTORY OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE 



ditch. In these five instances whole villages were swept away, so that the 

 tenants, their families and labourers, must have entirely lost their means of 

 livelihood, and but little help could have come from the neighbouring villages, 

 which had suffered only in a less degree. Everywhere the evicted tenants 

 must have joined the bands of vagrants wandering over the country, that were 

 becoming an increasing difficulty and a problem to the government. 



With regard to the status of the inclosers, one fact is very striking in all 

 parts of the county. The ecclesiastical inclosers, whether lords of manors, 

 freeholders, or firmors, were responsible for an exceptionally small proportion 

 of the whole. The abbot of Notley inclosed 60 acres at Ashendon ; the 

 prior of Ravenstone, 48 acres at Ravenstone; the prior of Brad well, 300 acres in 

 Bradwell and Wolverton ; the abbot of Missenden, 80 acres at Great Missen- 

 den ; the prior of Snelshall, 20 acres at Mursley ; the abbot of Biddlesden, 

 40 acres at Thornborough ; the abbess of Elstow, 20 acres at Moulsoe ; 

 the abbot of Osney, 27 acres at Upton and 90 acres at Steeple Claydon ; and 

 the prebendary of Buckingham, 30 acres at Gawcott. The total amount of 

 land inclosed by ecclesiastics was only 715 acres, but it can to a great extent 

 be explained by the poverty and insignificance of most of the monasteries in 

 the county. Elsewhere it was the abbots of great monasteries who led the 

 inclosing movements, but when the ecclesiastical land was scattered in small 

 pieces of freehold in different manors, inclosure on a large scale was im- 

 possible. The lords of manors were responsible for the inclosures on their 

 lands held by firmors or copyholders, and therefore, if these are added, the 

 total inclosed by ecclesiastics is considerably raised, since the big inclosure at 

 Hogshaw was carried out on ecclesiastical land. Only one instance of 

 inclosure by a copyholder occurs throughout the county, and, curiously, it is 

 the only case in which the evidence was false. John Godewyn held i mes- 

 suage and 161 acres of land by copy of court roll of the prior of St. Frides- 

 wide's, Oxford, and 10 acres of freehold, both at Over Winchendon, and was 

 returned as having inclosed them for pasture. When his case was brought 

 on for trial it appeared that he had not inclosed the land at all, but had only 

 engrossed the two tenements. By far the greatest proportion of land was 

 inclosed by laymen of different kinds ; frequently it was done by the lords of 

 the manors themselves, who at this time seem still in many cases to have 

 farmed the demesne lands themselves ; twenty firmors, some of whom held 

 the site of the manor, or the chief messuage of the manor, form another large 

 class of inclosers, but ordinary freeholders formed the great majority. 



At Castle Thorpe the remarkable instance occurs of a large inclosure 

 being made on a manor in the hands of the king, and by order of a royal 

 official, in spite of the statutes passed by Parliament. The bailiff had 

 inclosed 100 acres by order of the bishop of Carlisle, supervisor of the 

 lands of King Henry VII, and had evicted eighty-eight inhabitants. 

 The effect of his inclosure was to render the common cultivation of other 

 tenements in the manor impossible, and the tenants had therefore to give 

 up their lands. 



The value of the land when inclosed was generally given in the return, 

 the average being 11*62^. per acre; the value on the large inclosures of 

 100 acres or more was considerably higher than that on the smaller inclosures, 

 the two averages being lyizef. and f)'%$d. respectively. 



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