The Tithe Surveys of England and Wales

by Roger J.P. Kain, Hugh C. Prince

The rural landscape of England and Wales in the mid-nineteenth century is minutely depicted in the large-scale plans and schedules drawn for the Tithe Commissioners. Among other features shown on the maps are field boundaries and rights of way, whilst the accompanying schedules record the names of owners and occupiers, field names, land use and area. The amount of detailed information they provide, together with their uniformity, place the surveys as the most complete record of the agrarian landscape at any period. This book describes the nature of tithe payments, the Tithe Commutation Act of 1836 and the survey of over 11,000 parishes. The uses made of the surveys for reconstructing early field systems, for tracing land use and understanding farming practices, are systematically considered, The abstraction, computer processing and mapping of vast quantities of data are discussed.

343 pages, Hardcover

First published January 24, 1985

Reviews

[Kate Parr · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was half awesome and half kill-me-now. the awesome first half talked about the history of tithes, why they were commuted, how things used to be and how commutation made it better. it is interesting enough that I started making notes! It covers the survey itself, down to details about how the maps were produced, the rules governing their inclusion into the sacred 'First Class Maps'collection, and a lot of social commentary that was by-the-way interesting, such as the modus, which basically meant you could agree not to pay the tithe if you did something else nice for the vicar, like cook him a hot meal once a fortnight!

The kill-me-now second half does a survey of all the ways tithe information has been used, how useful it was etc. This was not helpful to me and as such deathly dull. i waded through it but felt pretty bitter by the end.

if you have an interest in this field i think it is THE work to read, but perhaps go in prepared to drift off after chapter 4.