Enclosure


Enclosure or inclosure is a term, used in English landownership, that refers to the appropriation of "waste" or "common land", enclosing it, and by doing so depriving commoners of their traditional rights of access and usage. Agreements to enclose land could be either through a formal or informal process. The process could normally be accomplished in three ways. First there was the creation of "closes", taken out of larger common fields by their owners. Secondly, there was enclosure by proprietors, owners who acted together, usually small farmers or squires, leading to the enclosure of whole parishes. Finally there were enclosures by acts of Parliament.
The stated justification for enclosure was to improve the efficiency of agriculture. However, there were a range of motives, one example being that the value of the land enclosed would be substantially increased. There were social consequences to the policy, with many protests at the removal of rights from the common people. Enclosure riots are seen by historians as 'the pre-eminent form' of social protest from the 1530s to 1640s.

History

After William I invaded and conquered England in 1066, he distributed its land amongst 180 barons, who held it as his tenants in chief, establishing a feudal system. However, he promised the English people that he would keep the laws of Edward the Confessor. Thus commoners were still able to exercise their ancient customary rights. The original contract bound the people who occupied the land to provide some form of service. This later evolved into a financial agreement that avoided or replaced the service.
Following the introduction of the feudal system, there was an increase in the economic growth and urban expansion of the country. In the 13th century, successful lords did very well financially, while the peasants faced with ever increasing costs did not, and their landholding dwindled. After outbreaks of the Black Death in the middle of the 14th century however, there was a major decline in population and crop yields. The decline in population left the surviving farm workers in great demand. Landowners faced the choice of raising wages to compete for workers or letting their lands go unused. Wages for labourers rose and translated into inflation across the economy. The ensuing difficulties in hiring labour has been seen as causing the abandonment of land and the demise of the feudal system, although some historians have suggested that the effects of the Black Death may have only sped up an already on-going process.
From as early as the 12th century agricultural land had been enclosed. However, the history of enclosure in England is different from region to region. Parts of south-east England retained the pre-Roman Celtic field system of farming in small enclosed fields. Similarly in much of west and north-west England, fields were either never open, or were enclosed early. The primary area of field management, known as the "open field system," was in the lowland areas of England in a broad band from Yorkshire and Lincolnshire diagonally across England to the south, taking in parts of Norfolk and Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, large areas of the Midlands, and most of south central England.

Definitions

Enclosure
  • Was the removal of common rights that people held over farm lands and parish commons.
  • It was the re-allocation of scattered strips of land into large new fields that were enclosed either by hedges, walls or fences.
  • The newly created enclosed fields were reserved for the sole use of individual owners or their tenants.
Inclosure
  • Inclosure is the spelling used in laws and statutes.
Villagers
There were essentially two broad categories of enclosure, these were 'formal' or 'informal' agreements. Formal enclosure was achieved either through act of Parliament, or, from 1836 onwards, by a written agreement signed by all parties involved. The written record would usually include a map.
With informal agreements there was either minimal or no written record other than occasionally a map of the agreement. The most straightforward informal enclosure was through 'unity of possession'. Under this, if an individual managed to acquire all the disparate strips of land in an area and consolidate them in one whole piece, for example a manor, then any communal rights would cease to exist, since there was no one to exercise them.

Open-field system

Before the enclosures in England, "common land" was under the control of the manorial lord. The usual manor consisted of two elements, the peasant tenantry and the lord's holding, known as the demesne farm. The land the lord held was for his benefit and was farmed by his own direct employees or by hired labour. The tenant farmers had to pay rent. This could either be cash, labour or produce. Tenants had certain rights such as pasture, pannage, or estovers that could be held by neighbouring properties, or in gross by all manorial tenants. "Waste" land was often very narrow areas, typically less than wide, in awkward locations, but also could be bare rock, it was not officially used by anyone, and so was often "farmed" by landless peasants.
The remaining land was organised into a large number of narrow strips, each tenant possessing several disparate strips throughout the manor, as would the manorial lord. The open-field system was administered by manorial courts, which exercised some collective control.
The land in a manor under this system would consist of:
  • Two or three very large common fields
  • Several very large common hay meadows
  • Closes.
  • In some cases, a park.
  • Common waste.
What might now be termed a single field would have been divided under this system among the lord and his tenants; poorer peasants were allowed to live on the strips owned by the lord in return for cultivating his land. The open-field system was probably a development of the earlier Celtic field system, which it replaced. The open-field system used a three-field crop rotation system. Barley, oats, or legumes would be planted in one field in spring, wheat or rye in the second field in the autumn. There was no such thing as artificial fertilizer in mediaeval England, so the continual use of arable land for crops would exhaust the fertility of the soil. The open-field system solved that problem. It did this by allowing the third field, of the arable land, to be uncultivated each year and use that "fallow" field for grazing animals, on the stubble of the old crop. The manure the animals produced in the fallow field would help restore its fertility. The following year, the fields for planting and fallow would be rotated.
The very nature of the three field rotation system imposed a discipline on lord and tenants in their management of the arable land. Every one had the freedom to do what they liked with their own land but had to follow the rhythms of the rotation system. The land-holding tenants had livestock, including sheep, pigs, cattle, horses, oxen, and poultry, and after harvest, the fields became 'common' so they could graze animals on that land. There are still examples of villages that use the open-field system, one example being Laxton, Nottinghamshire.

The end of the open-field system

Seeking better financial returns, landowners looked for more efficient farming techniques. They saw enclosure as a way to improve efficiency, however it was not simply the fencing of existing holdings; there was also a fundamental change in agricultural practice. One of the most important innovations was the development of the Norfolk four-course system, which greatly increased crop and livestock yields by improving soil fertility and reducing fallow periods. Wheat was grown in the first year, turnips in the second, followed by barley, with clover and ryegrass in the third. The clover and ryegrass were grazed or cut for feed in the fourth year. The turnips were used for feeding cattle and sheep in the winter. The practice of growing a series of dissimilar types of crops in the same area in sequential seasons helped to restore plant nutrients and reduce the build-up of pathogens and pests. The system also improves soil structure and fertility by alternating deep-rooted and shallow-rooted plants. For example, turnips can recover nutrients from deep under the soil. Planting crops such as turnips and clover was not realistic under the open field system because the unrestricted access to the field meant that other villagers' livestock would graze on the turnips. Another important feature of the Norfolk system was that it used labour at times when demand was not at peak levels.
From as early as the 12th century, some open fields in Britain were being enclosed into individually owned fields. After the Statute of Merton in 1235 manorial lords were able to reorganize strips of land such that they were brought together in one contiguous block.
Copyholders had a "customary tenancy" on their piece of land that was legally enforceable. The problem was that a "copyhold tenancy" was only valid for the holder's life. The heir would not have the right to inheritance although usually by custom, in exchange for a fee, the heir could have the copyhold transferred. To remove their customary rights, the landlords converted the copyhold into a leasehold tenancy. Leasehold removed the customary rights but the advantage to the tenant was that the land could be inherited.

There was a significant rise in enclosure during the Tudor period. Enclosure was quite often undertaken unilaterally by the landowner, sometimes illegally. The widespread eviction of people from their lands resulted in the collapse of the open field system in those areas. The deprivations of the displaced workers has been seen by historians as a cause of subsequent social unrest.