Leigh Shaw-Taylor

Common land was once very widespread, before being swept away by a process known as enclosure (discussed further below). In 1500, perhaps 50 percent of England and Wales was common land. There is a popular conception that this common land could be used by everyone, or at least by the whole village community. But as we will see, this is a highly misleading perspective. 

What was common land?  

Today we are familiar with a system where only the owner of land or the owner’s tenant has any right to use that land. Common land was different. In essence, this was land over which multiple individuals had what were termed ‘common rights’. But what were common rights? Common rights refer to rights for multiple individuals to use land they did not own or rent for specified purposes, most importantly grazing animals. It is important to realise that, contra popular perception, not everyone had common rights.

T. K. Atkinson, Sheep on a Common. Hackney Museum, Chalmers Bequest.

There were three main types of common land. First there was the common or the waste. Second there was common arable, and thirdly and rather less widespread there was common meadow. 

The common or waste was permanent grazing land, often grassland but also heathland, fen, and moorland. Technically the freehold of the common belonged to the Lord of the Manor, but anyone with common rights could pasture animals on the common. Sometimes there were rights to gather fuel, especially peat or gorse where these were available. Although greatly reduced in extent, many commons survive today and are generally open access land on which anyone can go for a walk or a run – commons make up around three percent of English land today. 

Alfred James Munnings, Crostwick Common, Norfolk. Norfolk Museums Service.

The common arable refers to fields where crops were grown, typically wheat, barley, oats, or rye. Individuals owned land in the common fields in multiple long thin strips often scattered over a wide area. The strips were cultivated privately, and only the owners or the owners’ tenants had the right to cultivate these strips. However, after the harvest, any one with common rights to pasture animals could put their livestock in the common field to graze on the stubble and weeds. Common rights could also be exercised when one of the common fields was being left fallow for the year. 

The third type of land was common meadow, usually land liable to flood. This was permanent grassland in which individuals owned their own plots for growing grass to make hay. After the hay harvest, those with common rights could graze their animals on the meadow. 

There were broadly two ways to hold common rights. First, those who held land in the common fields would have common rights. Second, some houses, usually termed common right cottages, were deemed to come with common rights. 

A surviving common right house at Willingham, Cambridgeshire. Author’s photo.

Regulation

Common land required communal regulation. For one thing, if the commoners’ animals were to be pastured in the common fields after the harvest, it was necessary to agree what crops would be grown so that they would all be harvested before the commons were opened to common grazing. Also, the total number of animals had to be controlled to prevent over-grazing.  

Communal regulation was usually undertaken by the manor court. The manor court drew up village by-laws which specified how common land was to be used. Amongst other things, these by-laws specified how many animals the holders of common rights could put on the commons, the common meadow, and in the common fields.  

In the medieval period the custom on many manors was that a commoner could pasture as many animals as s/he could feed over the winter from their own holdings. This practice was known as ‘levancy and couchancy’. This meant that larger farmers had rights to put larger numbers of animals on the common land. Over time, levancy and couchancy tended to give way to precise numerical stints. For instance, cottage common rights were most commonly for two cows and perhaps 6-10 sheep. For the holders of land in the common fields, the size of the stint was proportional to size of the holding. For instance, one cow might be allowed for every 30 acres held in the open fields.  

Charles Collins II, Cattle and a Dog on the Common. Dorking Museum & Heritage Centre.

Who had common rights?

It has often been assumed that either nearly everyone had common rights or, more specifically, that nearly all labourers, the poorest members of the village community, did. This supposition was never adequately tested until work at Campop by Leigh Shaw-Taylor investigated who did and who did not have common rights, with a particular focus on agricultural labourers.

This was done by creating a database of the owners of common field land and common-right cottages, identifying the owners’ tenants and identifying the occupations of both owners and tenants for a number of settlements in the south-east Midlands. The particular focus of the study was on the extent to which labourers had common rights. 

At Weston Turville in Buckinghamshire in 1798, there were 53 commonable dwellings. The common rights were for two cows, a bullock and six sheep. Whilst labourers made up 64 percent of adult males, labourers only owned 2-3 percent of the commonable dwellings, and made up 13-18 percent of the tenants of common right cottages. Only one labourer was identified as holding land, but this was a mere quarter of an acre and was not common arable, so came with no stint on the commons. So, some labourers did have access to the common, but over 80 percent of labouring households had no access to common-right cottages.

Farm Labourer Carrying a Flail, late 18th century. The Royal Agricultural University Collection.

Most of the common right cottages were owned either by farmers or by landowners. Many of those owned by landlords were rented to farmers, many of whom held multiple common right cottages. Farmers held the tenancies of 69 percent of the common right dwellings, with some farmers holding two, three, or even five cottages.  

Other case studies produced similar results, leading to the broad conclusion that at the end of the 18th century, 85 percent of agricultural labourers had no access to common land. Of course, it is possible that more labourers enjoyed common rights at earlier dates, but there is no positive evidence to suggest this. Village craftsmen and traders were more likely to have common right cottages than labourers, but here too it was a minority. 

Enclosure

Common fields, common pasture, and common meadow were swept away by a process termed enclosure. At enclosure, common rights were abolished and land was reallocated. Enclosure took place by different processes at different times, but in the 18th and 19th centuries most enclosure was enabled by an Act of parliament, and such enclosures are termed ‘parliamentary enclosure’.  

Under parliamentary enclosure, the owners of common field land and common rights were compensated with new allotments of land free of common right. It has often been assumed that parliamentary enclosure was devastating for the rural poor because they lost access to the commons. This was true for some, but if most of the poor did not have common rights before parliamentary enclosure, they didn’t lose anything at enclosure. 

Further reading

• Shaw-Taylor, L., ‘The Management of Common Land in the Lowlands of Southern England, circa 1500 to circa 1850’, in M. De Moor, L. Shaw-Taylor, and P. Warde (eds.), The Management of Common Land in North West Europe (Turnhout, 2002), pp. 59–86. Link to chapter 
• Shaw-Taylor, L., ‘Labourers, Cows, Common Rights and Parliamentary Enclosure: The Evidence of Contemporary Comment c.1760–1810’, Past and Present 171 (2001), 95–126. Link to article 
• Winchester, A. J. L., ‘Upland commons in Northern England’, in M. De Moor, L. Shaw-Taylor, and P. Warde (eds.), The Management of Common Land in North West Europe (Turnhout, 2002), pp. 33-57. Link to chapter. 

Tags: common land, common rights, enclosure, English peasants

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