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Summary of Dominant Character

This zone is characterised by land enclosed by straight-sided walls or hedgerows laid out to a regular pattern. Roads within the field pattern are often straight and of a standard width (Hindle 1998) and the woodland is mostly plantation, either planned deliberately as part of the surveyed layout, or planted later within existing surveyed enclosure boundaries. Surveyed enclosure mostly dates to the 18th and 19th century but there are also more modern areas of straight sided enclosure which are included within the zone.

The majority of the zone consists of former moorlands on the higher land in the west of the district. This land was enclosed in the 18th and 19th century, often under the authority of a parliamentary award. Further east, much more of the land was already enclosed by the 18th century so the areas of surveyed enclosure are smaller and represent the enclosure of areas of isolated common land.

The process of enclosing areas of common moorland and communally farmed town fields had been occurring long before the 1700s (Hey 1986, 192). When carried out by the agreement of the local population this often led to the development of piecemeal, irregular enclosure patterns (see ‘Assarted Enclosure’ and ‘Strip Enclosure’ zones). By the 18th century the call by large landholders to enclose land was supported by acts of parliament; where owners of three quarters of the land agreed, an act could enforce their wishes upon the minority landholders (ibid, 193). This often meant that the poorest farmers fared badly. This division of land was the creation of a surveyor’s drawing board and led to a very regular field pattern.

Farmsteads within the zone generally align with the field systems indicating a contemporary or later date. This is supported by the fact that their plan form principally corresponds to the ‘courtyard’ plan type. Characterisation of farmstead types in Yorkshire has revealed that farms based around regular planned courtyards “were most commonly developed on arable-based farms established as a result of enclosure from the later 18th century” (Lake and Edwards 2006, 44).

The areas of modern enclosure within this zone date to the mid to late 20th century and are often the result of reinstatement of land to agricultural use after opencast coal or clay working or deep shaft coal mining. There are broad similarities between some of these areas and areas of ‘Surveyed Enclosure’ enclosed by parliamentary award. The main difference lies in the nature of the hedgerows dividing up the land. The hedges are less mature and contain few trees although there are sometimes small plantations along the edge of the fields. These were probably planted at the time of the mineral extraction to mask the works from nearby roads and houses. In places these modern enclosures are similar in character to the older irregular assarts but the dividing hedgerows tend to be less diverse in species and slightly more regular in form when compared to their ancient equivalents.

Relationships with Adjacent Character Zones

At its western limits the ‘Surveyed Enclosure’ zone stretches into the ‘Moorland’ zone along the river valleys. In most places there is a clear change between the improved farmland and the open moors but there are some fields that are reverting to moorland plant types.

Areas of ‘Surveyed Enclosure’ become more fragmented further east and intermingle with the ‘Strip Enclosure’ and ‘Piecemeal Enclosure’ zones where the land was often enclosed at an earlier date. There were further areas of surveyed enclosure in the east of the district but these have mostly been over built by the suburbs of Barnsley and smaller expanded industrial settlements.

Inherited Character

The areas of Parliamentary Enclosure within this zone represent a large-scale systematic programme of landscape design and change. This process involved dramatically altering the character of the area in social as well as physical terms, as the common resource of the heather moors was transformed into managed grasslands only accessible to their owners and tenants. The physical transformation of the land involved, for the most part, a complete change from what was already present. In some moorland areas the land was ploughed for the first time (Taylor 1975, 143) and where lime was added to the land this altered the plant species that could grow there.

Where Parliamentary Enclosure was on moorland and common there is generally little evidence of past landscapes. However, in the west of the zone, there are small areas of land reverting to moorland plant types after the abandonment of grazing.

Where isolated areas of common are enclosed by Parliamentary Award, such as Barugh Common west of Barnsley town, it is sometimes possible to make out the limits of the 19th century common. These are visible in sinuous or irregular boundaries at the edge of the area.

A small proportion of the surveyed enclosure within the district of Barnsley divided up areas of former open townfields. These were large medieval fields that surrounded a nucleated settlement and were divided into unhedged strips that were “individually owned but farmed in common” (ibid, 71). Parliamentary Enclosure in these areas has a more complex pattern of historic legibility compared with the former moorland. An example of this is seen in Hunshelf where there is a mixture of straight and curving boundary features, medieval farm buildings and sinuous roads. The pattern of older roads through the former townfield is also seen south of Kexbrough. In many cases former open field names are shown by Ordnance Survey mapping, although they are associated with a number of modern land parcels (Oliver 1993, 56).

At ‘Gunthwaite Park’ and ‘Tankersley Deer Park’ the picture is even more complex. Both of these sites developed as private parkland, Tankersley in the 14th and Gunthwaite later in the 15th century. These were two of a number of medieval deer parks in the district (see ‘Private Parkland’ zone), in their heyday in the 14th century it has been estimated that deer parks covered up to 2% of England (Rackham 1986, 123). These parks provided venison, grazing for cattle or sheep, timber and were a symbol of status for their owners.

By the 19th century both parks had fallen out of use. Both were turned over to farmland, although Tankersley was also exploited for the ironstone that is prevalent in the area (Jones 1995). Although not part of a Parliamentary Award, the date of the enclosure of these areas meant that regular straight fields were put in place. The former parkland is visible through surviving park boundary features and, at Gunthwaite, buildings associated with the medieval hall. Within the ‘Gunthwaite Park’ area there are also hints at the landscape prior to the park as the slight curving of some field boundaries suggest this may have been part of the Ingbirchworth townfield.

Figure 1: Tankersley Deer Park showing the former park boundary and the M1 cutting through 18th and 19th century regular surveyed enclosures.

Cities Revealed aerial photography © the GeoInformation Group, 2002

In contrast to the complex histories visible in the area of former parkland are ‘Kexbrough and Cawthorne Former Mineworks’, ‘Kexbrough Modern Enclosures’ and ‘Wombwell Main’. The Middle and Lower Coal Measures make up most of the geology in Barnsley. Within this area a number of coal seams run close to the surface and these became the focus for attention of the Directorate of Opencast Mining from the Second World War (Gray 1976, 41). Running through this bedrock there are also rich seams of clay that have been utilised for pottery and brick production over the years. Since the late 20th century these resources have been extracted on a larger scale in opencast pits. After the closure of areas of opencast clay or coal mining the land is reinstated with new field boundaries which tend to be regular and straight. However, around Cawthorne there are areas where new field boundaries have been reinstated along the same boundary lines that existed prior to mining giving the impression of an ancient landscape. The key difference is that these hedges tend to less diverse with few mature trees. Where reinstatement of the land has been successful there is often no clear sign of the opencast mining itself.

Later Characteristics

As with the moors to the west of this zone, there are a number of 19th and early 20th century reservoirs and associated waterworks filling the steeper valleys in the north west of the district. These will have served the urban population of Barnsley and district. Several of the reservoirs have taken on recreational functions as fishing lakes or places to watch birds. These activities have brought car parking and concrete paths to the sites. Taking advantage of these recreational uses and lying adjacent to Scout Dike Reservoir is the Scout Dike Outdoor Education Centre. This developed on a site that was used by the US army in the Second World War for amphibious training (Council for British Archaeology 2006, Non Anti Invasion Record: 1410)

Transportation routes have made significant impacts on the landscape of Barnsley. As the industries of Barnsley developed, large numbers of railway lines were laid across the landscape cutting across earlier field boundaries. Around ‘Wombwell Main’ the course of dismantled mineral railways are preserved in the landscape. Although the tracks have been removed the earth banks with their tree lined sides stay as clear reminders of former industrial landscape. In places these routes have become part of the regeneration of the landscape as a recreational amenity. This is seen at ‘Dunford Bridge’ where former railway lines are now part of a well developed cycle trail.

The railways of Barnsley have dramatically reduced in number since the late 20th century but the continuing affect of transport is seen in the construction of roads though the district. The M1 motorway cuts through part of this zone, as do other modern duel carriageways. Their dominant constructional materials are concrete, steel and massive earthen embankments, which generally sever earlier previously coherent landscape units. The gentle curves of the roads that allow traffic to turn at speed are in direct contrast with the straight lines within this zone.

Areas within this Zone

• ‘Dunford Bridge’
• ‘Enclosed Moors North of Penistone’
• ‘Reservoirs around Ingbirchworth’
• ‘Penistone East Enclosed Commons’
• ‘Langsett to Hunshelf Former Moors’
• ‘Gunthwaite Park’
• ‘Wombwell Surveyed Enclosures’
• ‘Lundwood Enclosures’
• ‘Staincross and Royston Commons’
• ‘Kexbrough and Cawthorne Former Mineworks’
• ‘Barugh Former Commons’
• ‘Kexbrough Modern Enclosures’
• Tankersley Deer Park’
• ‘Wombwell Main’

Bibliography

Bevan, W.

2003 The Upper Derwent: Long-term Landscape Archaeology in the Peak District. Thesis (PhD) [online]. University of Sheffield. Available from: http://ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/resources.html?bevan_phd_2005 [accessed 25/05/07].

Council for British Archaeology

2006 The Defence of Britain Database [online]. Available from: http://ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/resources.html?dob [accessed 20/02/08].

Gray, G.D.B.

1976 The South Yorkshire Coalfield. In: J. Benson and R.G. Neville (eds.), Studies in the Yorkshire Coal Industry. Manchester University Press, 31-44.

Hey, D.

1986 A Regional History of England: Yorkshire From AD 1000. London: Longman.

Hindle, P.

1998 Roads that ramble, and roads that run. British Archaeology, 31 [online]. Available from: http://www.britarch.ac.uk/ba/ba31/ba31feat.html [accessed 20/02/08].

Jones, M.

1995 Ironstone Mining at Tankersley in the Nineteenth Century for Elsecar and Milton Ironworks. In: B. Elliott (ed.), Aspects of Barnsley 3. Barnsley: Wharncliffe Publishing, 80-115.

Rackham, O.

1986 The History of the Countryside: The Classic History of Britain’s Landscape, Flora and Fauna. London: Orion Books.

Taylor, C.

1975 Fields in the English Landscape. London: J.M. Dent and Sons Ltd.

Lake, J. and Edwards, B.

2006 Historic Farmsteads. Preliminary Character Statement: Yorkshire and Humber Region. Cheltenham: University of Gloucester/ English Heritage/ Countryside Agency.

Oliver, R.

1993 Ordnance Survey Maps: a Concise Guide for Historians. London: Charles Close Society for the Study of Ordnance Survey Maps.