PART 1

A collection of documents in a parish chest enabled some research into a north Oxfordshire town. The result is this book which looks at the parish, people and properties in Cropredy from 1570 to 1640. Their married vicar, the Reverend Thomas Holloway left many folios which reveal that Cropredy was the mother church of a wider ecclesiastical parish. The older residents and new tenants were equally under the influence of the church and all had to pay tithes to the vicar. Every resident must attend Saint Mary's church which was the town centre for worship, education and news.

Easter Oblations.

1. The Thomas Holloway Documents.

A fine collection of accounts survived amongst other documents in Saint Mary's parish chest in the small north Oxfordshire town of Cropredy. The very tiresome script belonging to the Reverend Thomas Holloway spread over many valuable folios from 1587 to 1619: lists of Easter oblations, gifts of poultry, sheep and kyne tithes, cottagers commons and most important of all Thomas's farm accounts from land leased with his sons. All are remnants and mostly from the latter end of his time as guardian of the souls in the larger Ecclesiastical parish of Cropredy. This collection of parishes included the two Bourtons, Williamscote-in-Cropredy and Prescote who worshipped at the mother church of Saint Mary's, as well as Mollington and Claydon who had their own churches with ministers put there at Thomas's expense and the large parish of Wardington, Coton and Williamscote-in-Wardington which required another curate for their church.

The next vicar only added a list of offerings for 1624 and "remembrances taken out of my/ predesessors bookes" which he took from the Holloways folios [c25/10 f2]. The Reverend Edward Brouncker having decided to reside in Ladbroke, Warwickshire, required samples of Cropredy's records to guide him in his collection of tithes. One of the saved years was 1614 a particularly appropriate one for Edward to keep beside him for it represented a year of average harvests in the previous decade. Many of his parishioners soon felt he paid scant attention to their requirements by putting in non-preaching curates.

In spite of all the surviving records, few, apart from the Brasenose College properties, gave any clues as to which dwelling the families were connected with. The College mid- seventeenth century tenancy agreements had required the tenant to make a terrier which was a useful description of their leased land and buildings. Nearly all the people mentioned in the records had been involved in the rebuilding of their houses in stone, or spent their childhood in the new houses described in the wills and inventories, but until the vicar's Easter Oblations lists had been closely examined it was not possible to know if they were going to solve this major obstacle of putting families to sites. Holloway's very rare documents had been moved from the parish chest to the Bodleian library [Now with Oxfordshire Archives]. A visit was arranged and the ordered box arrived at the desk. It was very disappointing to be told the folios were too fragile to be handled, or photocopied, and it was suggested that funds be raised to have all the vicar's accounts repaired. Only then could we go ahead with a transcription. Some of the lists were covered by a rare document belonging to the Prerogative Court of the Archbishop of Canterbury and had a note to say the "Bottom corner eaten by rodents otherwise quite good condition. We do not recommend removing cover. To repair £18." By 1983 the bill was more, it came to £30 for that document alone, so that it was entirely due to everyone's generosity that the repairs were begun. Meanwhile it was decided to do a family reconstitution for every household from the registers and wills to help with the eventual transcription. The excitement only began when it was realised the amount of information these lists were going to unlock, so it is only fair to begin by introducing you to one of the delicate manuscripts.

Mrs Judith Segal, at that time the expert on restoration at the Bodleian Library, agreed to restore them, and afterwardscame to explain how the intricate work had been done. They were "dry cleaned, washed, deacidified, resized and repaired with Japanese paper and wheat starch paste." The rare 1611 cover which could not be removed was "relaxed and repaired with new parchment and toned with water colorer and pasted with wheat starch paste." Finally the documents were to be placed in a protective box. Only then could a photographic copy be made by Mrs Segal for the purpose of studying the lists and accounts. The documents themselves are a very rare survival from the past and will now last into the future.

Inside the 1611 cover the folios measure 12 inches by three and three quarter inches [30 x 9.5 cms].This was the first to arrive and was labelled MS. dd par Cropredy c25/7. There were 25 folios bound together [50 pages]. The rest of the Holloway documents were repaired and photocopied as funds were raised. A list of the documents is given on page 721.

Transcribing the first page began very slowly and has since needed to be corrected. It all proved far more difficult than anticipated, but one thing was soon apparent as the folios became clearer, the vicar had been very keen and methodical. The households were given in order beginning at the south end of the town and working up the Long Causeway house by house. All those properties belonging to the Brasenose College, which had already been identified, helped to prove that Holloway's lists made a yearly census from 1613 to 1619.

Cropredy Town

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries parishioners referred to Cropredy and a few of the surrounding villages as towns. The Reverend Harrison writing in 1577 refers to "uplandish towns." A township was made up of all those inhabiting a particular parish. In Cropredy like any other parish there were those who made their living entirely from the town lands as well as those who practised a craft. They had a Cross, but no charter to hold a market as Banbury did [Harrison W. Description of Britain ].

Those who dwelled in Cropredy during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries created a new town with their stone and thatched buildings. Wonderfully comfortable places and yet they were not without pressures for only one of their married children could take over their lease and the majority had to leave. Why did they not take on the twenty or so town properties vacated as families died out? Who allowed strangers to come in? How large was their town in those days and why did it never expand when the population began to rise in the early seventeenth century? Can we find out who lived in the town so long ago and how they earned their living? Could we learn about the organisation of their lives at work, at home, in church?

The search begins very naturally with the Reverend Thomas Holloway whose numerous folios made the following pages possible. The Queen had the patronage of the living and could put in any minister recommended to her. The parishioners must accept whoever was chosen. In 1573 they not only had to accept a young man, but possibly for the very first time one who was married. A resident vicar with a family and staff would mean a diligent tithe collector for he not only had to support them, but educate any boys up to university to become clergymen.

Another influence on the lives of the parishioners was the fact that as his patron was the Queen he could not afford to ignore her bishop's instructions. Archbishop Grindal who supported preaching was suspended by the Queen and any progress towards independent sermons vanished. Queen Elizabeth preferred homilies to sermons, considering three or four preachers sufficient for each county. Thomas Holloway must have obeyed the heirarchy even if he excelled at using bible quotes which could be taken in two ways. Somehow he kept his licence and preached for at least fourty six years. Thomas as vicar gave weekly sermons at Cropredy and quarterly ones in the other three churches in which he put curates to conduct the rest of the services.

Edward Brouncker who followed him as vicar was a great disappointment to the town for although they had to pay him a tenth of all their produce they had no say in who should be their vicar and could not force him to live in the town. The Sunday sermon for most people must have become the highlight of the week. Clergy were relied upon for information and education. The church was governed by the bishops directly from the Crown and as more of the bishops took up important administrative posts so church and politics became inseparable. To wish for reform of the clergy was almost to utter treason. One year the townsmen paid for their own preacher, a local man, for Brouncker had put in non- preaching curates, but once again the heirarchy were successfully suppressing preachers, still preferring catechisms and homilies. The people's preacher had to go and the town was furious. After the death of Thomas Holloway in 1619 sermons and records from a vicar severely diminish.

The church and parish records together with the collecting of small tithes in the Holloway folios were absolutely necessary to the period this book attempts to cover. They dominate and influence the use of the information, because like Brouncker we have only "Mr Holloway's books which I have by me," to help study their Open Common Field agriculture. Any enclosed, or manor farm land [8 & 50] seems to have had tithes collected and written down separately, so the calculations he made underestimate the total acreage. To complicate matters the land was measured then in yardlands, but not all yardlands have the same number of acres even in one parish (p295). Of course Thomas did not write with the same end in view demanded here, so like all such documents they have their limitations. On the other hand several facts revealed in his folios give them great value. Apart from Thomas's mentions of early enclosures, his seeding quantities and sales of corn, the folios will be constantly used as they form the backbone to the rest of the book.

Cropredy and the Ecclesiastical Parish.

Cropredy was important enough to be the centre of the eleven chapelries and hamlets north of Banbury, squeezed into the tip of Oxfordshire.Each civil parish was responsible for their own Open Common Field or Enclosed land and the population who depended upon it. The vicar was responsible for the souls of all eleven civil parishes which together formed the larger Cropredy ecclesiastical parish. The people from this ancient parish owed small tithes to the vicar of Cropredy and the large or rectorial tithes to a lay impropriator (p34). The majority of their wills were proved at the Peculiar Church Court held in Saint Mary's church Cropredy (p26).

The eleven civil parishes had for their outer boundary the county hedges of Northamptonshire on the northeast and Warwickshire on the northwest. The broad base of the area lay below Bourton and Wardington to the south [Fig.1.2]. Mollington was partly in Oxon, but mostly in Warwickshire which accounts for its apparently small acreage. Mollington was also in the Bloxham Hundred whereas the rest were in the Banbury Hundred.

At the top of the triangle lay Claydon. The twelfth, but extra-parochial, parish of Clattercote was a narrow belt of land lying between Claydon and Cropredy. From west to east lay Mollington, Cropredy and Upper Prescote and Prescote. To the south of Cropredy lay Great and Little Bourton. Below and to the east of the Prescotes lies the chapelry made up of Wardington, Upper Wardington, Williamscote and Coton.

Prescote and Clattercote were already enclosed. Williamscote-in-Cropredy (once part of Wardington) was enclosed during the second half of the sixteenth century.

The Ecclesiastical Parish of Cropredy.

The approximate size of the parishes in Oxfordshire were:

The townsmen used the yardland rather than the acre to describe the quantity of land (an average yardland on the B manor was equal to 32 acres p295). The vicars refer to Bourton as sixty yardlands and odd quarters [c25/10 f4], which in Bourton did not include the five yardlands for the manor, whose tenant paid a tithe of 16s-8d for half a year. The rest were also paying 3s-6d a yardland twice a year -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paying:

Thomas under estimates Wardington yardlands, for Brouncker wrote that he received of "Wardington for 107 yardlands £35" [c25/10 f1]. Holloway had only the following, which misses out Williamscote. Had the rodents eaten the top off his 1614 lists, for they were very short of the smallholders tithes?

The explanation for the discrepancies may lie in Thomas's method of putting payments for Cropredy tenants of the Open Common Field, in one document and enclosed land in another. A separate section was also reserved for the two manor farms, their mills and cottager's commons. This means that Cropredy's 56.5 yardlands appear as only 45 yardlands and three quarters. The annual total Thomas received came to £15-5s [c25/10 f2v]. The parishioners paying him 6s-8d for every yardland,on topof their other small tithes. As Walter Calcott had taken his manor of Williamscote-in-Cropredy out of the Wardington common fields his tithes were also entered separately. Whether the land was open or enclosed it was still measured by the yardland and payed tithes at the same rate.

An average yardland in Cropredy had 32 acres 1 rood, a third of which must lie fallow [Part 3]. In 1614 Cropredy had twenty three husbandmen leasing land. This had increased to twenty seven by 1670 and the middle range of holdings dropped from two yardlands to one and a half yardlands. At the same time one tenant had six, making it more difficult for those at the bottom end of the farming ladder to rise higher than half a yardland:

The number of tenants who were trying to manage on smaller and smaller amounts of land increased in Wardington between 1614 and 1670, until twenty out of fiftynine had half a yardland (around 16 acres) or even less. One smallholding had only four acres.

Although these surrounding parishes may seem to have nothing to do with Cropredy people they are in fact of the utmost importance. No township was entirely independent. Any changes to customs or enclosure in surrounding parishes would be commented upon by their interested neighbours and especially if relatives were involved. The vicar was able to flourish with such a large rural population, all paying him their small tithes, but it was the lot of his chapelries that they had to put up with a curate living on a low wage and after 1619 Cropredy was in the same position.

Enclosure of whole parishes was frowned upon and yet piecemeal enclosure was generally more widespread than first thought. They managed it by bargaining within the parish as tenants in common, for the purpose of increasing their leyland. Clattercote and Prescote both next to Cropredy were totally enclosed at an earlier date, but by the landlord for an entirely different reason. These enclosures drove out the smaller tenants and the consequences of this were there for all to see. It left a lordship like Prescote with almost no-one in the parish except a manor house and farm with their servants.

Had they managed to come to some agreement to prevent this occuring in Cropredy? No one would dream of rebuilding in stone if their tenancy was under such a threat. Cropredy had easy access to roads leading to the market towns and could be more profitable to a landlord by developing the trade and thereby ensuring an increased rental.

Cropredy had been divided into two manors. Each with a manor farm, but no resident landlord. To distinguish between them, but only for the purpose of this book, the original manor will be referred to as the "A manor." This had the bailiff's farm (p613) in Church Street [50] (now Red Lion Street) and was owned in 1572 by widow Lee of Clattercote and her nephew William Watson. The smaller "B manor" belonged to the Principal and Scholars of the Brasenose College Oxford whose manor farmhouse [8] was on the Long Causeway (p511).

Highways and Lanes.

Cropredy had the old Royal Way from Brackley to Warwick passing through which was a busy highway connecting two trade routes while Prescote was tucked away behind Cropredy and although it certainly had Lanes, none were quite as busy as the Royal Way. Clattercote was also dependent on one inter parish Lane rather than a busy highway. Williamscote-in-Cropredy the latest enclosure on the other hand actually welcomed the Drove Road close by, but even so the enclosed land was purposely kept away from the verge of Banbury Lane and their boundary with the Royal Way already had an ancient mound and hedge (Fig.10.1 p136). In Oxfordshire Cropredy was the most important town north of Banbury and well supplied by roads.

The area had several major routes which used the higher land, so that through the Ecclesiastical parish passed two very old ridgeway tracks converging on Banbury to the south. The road from Coventry via Southam entered Oxfordshire just north of Mollington, coming south along the wide flat ridge of land five hundred feet above sea level. It passed through the South Field of Cropredy into Bourton and on down Hardwick Hill to Banbury. This broad ridge fell away sharply to the west into the Warmington valley. To the east towards the town of Cropredy it sloped gently down through well drained arable strips to the wetter clay of the valley floor.

There the valuable flood meadows followed the south flowing river Cherwell.

The second ridge to the east of the river took the Banbury Lane via Wardington and Williamscote down hill to Banbury. Joining these two routes was the meandering Royal Way from the direction of Brackley, coming westwards down Williamscote hill, over the bridge beside the old ford into Cropredy, and up the Green to the Cross. It left the town between the North and South Fieldscrossing over the Oxhay pasture to reach the Mollington fields. This Royal Way then passed over the Broadway and on through Mollington to eventually reach the Banbury to Warwick highway.

The next main crossing over the river Cherwell was at Banbury four miles to the south, so Cropredy's ford was of some importance to the positioning of the town established since at least the formation of the Open Common Fields.

There are a sprinkling of Cropredy records left by people who used the roads. After the A manor's landlord moved to Derbyshire from Clattercote he had to constantly send messages to his bailiff in Cropredy about the repairs and collection of rents. On one occasion when the landlord of the A manor left Derbyshire for London via Cropredy he ran up a bill on the return journey of £5- 2s which included corn and hay for the horses, his meat and drink £1-5s and the servants 5s, not forgetting the horses shoes 2s-8d [Loose paper in Additional MSS 71960: 1702]. When his tenants wanted a will proved at the Prerogative Court of Canterbury they must journey to London to do so. One of the chosen routes was via Banbury, "Alesbury.../ Windover.../" and "Uxbridge". Woodrose's and Wilmers [8] had connections with London and so did the French and Hall [6] families. It would take them at least two to three days to travel to London and stay in lodgings there, before returning. They would find it a very expensive business, though a more private way to prove their wills and conduct their affairs. For those without land in other areas the local Peculiar Court of Cropredy was the usual place for people of the eleven surrounding hamlets and towns to prove their wills, but always in the presence of the town and neighbouring population, keen to hear all the details.

The parish roads helped the tenants to move from the farm to the land and it was up to the town to maintain them. The major ways took them from the town to all the markets around, and must have been passable for them in all but the worst seasons. Without a reasonable passage they would not have been able to pay their rents from the sale of produce. The wives also walked their cheese, butter and eggs to Banbury. Cropredy's nearest sheep, cattle and horse market was also at Banbury four miles away. The vicar used Southam ten miles to the north, Warwick seventeen to the west for selling stock and corn and Daventry fourteen miles away to purchase seed corn (p309).

Roads entering a great many English Greens arrived at the corners which would be gated. A convenience that any mover of stock would appreciate. Sheep will not leave by a central gate, but will happily follow the leader into a corner one, especially as at Cropredy there is a slight rise up from the river towards the west end. Two routes leave the upper edge, one for the Oxhay pasture and the North Field, the other for the Hayway, by the Cross, passing through the South Field to reach the western meads. The North Field route left along Backside, the rear way into the farms sited along the western edge of the town above the Green. The second northern Lane to leave the Green gave them their front entrance. This became known latterly as the High Street. It continued on to become Creampot Lane. Originally there may have been no farms on the north side of Creampot as it curved round to become the back lane for the A Manor Farm. To avoid the long trail up the High Street for these farms, not to mention the mess their stock would make, a way was cut through to Backside and called New Street Lane (p170). One other route left the north side of the Green at the river end. This was Round Bottom which kept just above the meadow line and skirted round below the churchyard to reach the manor house [50] and upper mill in Church Street. Also below the church was a passage called Hello leading down to Round Bottom. On either side were a few buildings which appear to have been built in the last quarter of the sixteenth century.

The Long Causeway coming northwards from Bourton arrived at the middle of Cropredy's Green. The Green merged into the Bridge Causeway going eastwards down to the river Cherwell. There was only one Causeway leaving the Green southwards because the land was low lying and the meadow came further westwards. Yet there was still one way the farmers could avoid trailing across the Green to reach their farms on the Long Causeway. From the Cross there was a field way southwards towards Bourton to meet the Bottom Way, otherwise called Small Way, or Belser. This track came down from the South Field to the Long Causeway opposite the Brasenose Manor Farm entrance [8].

The Two Manors.

Cropredy had no freeholders to buy out the smaller copyholders, which happened in many other parishes. Craftsmen were very much encouraged with small amounts of land attached to their cottages (this was several years before the 1589 Act in which four acres should be allocated to new cottages). Trade and farming mixed and prospered without too much interference from above. There were very few yeomen, most were husbandmen and artisans who had improved their income during the fixed rents of the sixteenth century. The only way the landlord could increase his revenues was to charge higher entry fines. The College leased out their landfor thirty years to customary tenants and to the copyholders they usually allowed three lives to be entered on the court roll.

After 1578 the Brasenose College Oxford took advantage of an Act of Parliament in 18 Elizabeth 1 (1575-6) which allowed colleges to demand a third of their tenant's rent in wheat or malt barley (p339). By doing this the B manor estate had a better share of the profits than the landlord of the A manor still on fixed rents. Possibly the B manor tenants felt they were being unfairly penalized when their neighbours were putting by more savings whenever the price of corn rose. It was a fact that the two main college farms were redeveloped in stages and not totally rebuilt as some on the A manor were. They must have watched while specially cut stone was used in the fine ashlar elevations on a few of the other manor's farms. The rest including the craftsmen and cottagers having theirs in the less expensive rubble stone on both estates.

The College manor leased to their tenants fixed parcels of land scattered about the North and South Fields always attached to each farm site. The A manor did likewise, but they had some extra parcels of demesne land which were often let separately in half yardland lots, to various parishioners on both manors. This complicated an other wise fairly straightforward pattern of land holding, by changing the tenants of some parcels from year to year. These lots were let to any who could afford the extra entry fine and rent. Yet not one family managed to take an unfair share of the extra land permanently. Each homestead seemed to grow and diminish according to their needs. This was possible when all families were at a different part of their twenty nine year generation cycle (p57). Some leased a farm site for several generations, and then the name changes. On closer examination the farm may have passed to a married daughter, in the absence of a son. With this security of tenure in the second half of the sixteenth century the family could plan ahead on low rents to put by enough to rebuild, or substantially alter the property. What was the situation in Cropredy regarding sites available for new buildings in the 1570's?

The Two Manors.

Many farmsteads must have merged for the number of households in the 1560's had dropped below the sixtytwo noted in 1548. Once two had joined they were unlikely to be given up again by a resident tenant and this may have led to the shortage of building land within the town. New sites had to be squeezed out of meadow land, the Green, or the A manor's home close. It may be that some of these lesser sites had been abandoned in the late 1550's, and now due to a period when burials rose over births, there was room for newcomers. We shall see that when some small parcels of land were taken from the north and south part of the Oxhay common, they were allocated to certain house sites and let to craftsmen as smallholdings.

Artisans being not wholly dependent on harvest and stock to pay the rent, might increase their wealth faster than husbandmen. Even so both could afford to build in Cropredy. When did they begin? Apparently building in stone had begun by the 1570's. After 1594 due to difficult harvests, famines and a steeper rise in the cost of living the building programme slowed down. However it is almost certain that by then a great many of the sixty households were already in stone under a thatched roof. In the early seventeenth century the masons still continued to work, but not on any new sites (except at Shotswell's [1a]), the alterations being confined to extensions and improvements to existing dwellings.

Cropredy's climate and soil conditions which produced the mixed farming was another important factor influencing the type of dwellings required and those past Cropredians who played a large part in the creation of their town deserve to be brought to our notice. Walter Rose, the carpenter, understood for he says "no-one of reflective mind can possibly separate the old-world cottage from the lives once lived in it... to whom we owe so much" [ Rose W. Good Neighbours Cambridge Univ. Press p9].

What type of houses did they replace? Most would be timber framed houses, with hazel and daub infilling. The roof material was always a thatch of straw. There had long been a shortage of timber, in north Oxfordshire, for the parishes lacked woods and had only small spinneys. Leland passing from Southam to Banbury in 1538 noted that all the land "be champaine, noe wood, but exceeding good pasture and corne" [Smith L.C. Itinerary 1538].

The landlord provided the timber for repairs allocating it in rotation once he had felled some trees on the estate. The tenants had to plant yearly six or nine young trees, either oaks, ash or elm along the boundaries and hedgerows, the majority being around the town closes. Extra timber being carted in from woods further away, where they regularly produced underwood and some long timber for other parishes.

Cropredy may have produced some underwood by coppicing oak and hazel in small areas. Osiers were also grown and pollarded along the Cherwell and in special osier beds to cater for the thatching spars and hurdles. From the 1540's the price of bringing in timber and underwood rose alarmingly, as much as 75% has been given [Bowden P.J. "Agricultural prices, farm Profits, and Rents" in Ag.H.E.W. 1V, p.605]. If the buildings were constantly kept in a watertight condition, then the situation may not have become impossible, but when in the 1550's there was a sudden drop in population and consequent fall in tenants, the materials now required after a long period of neglected repairs to the old timber buildings may have become prohibitive. Since they acquired their estate in 1524 the College buildings seem not to have suffered as tenants were quickly replaced. The bailiff tenanting the demesne farm on the A manor [50] may also have kept the Church Street cottages [44,46-9] belonging to his farm in reasonable repair, but the manor as a whole had suffered as it changed hands.

The whole of the A manor had been surrendered by the Bishop of Lincoln, and by 1547 belonged to the Crown. After changing hands it was sold to Thomas Lee in 1560, who was leasing the three hundred and forty acres of Clattercote Parish, now part of Christ Church College. It is possible that Lee could have started the new buildings beginning with the demesne farmhouse [50] and Howse [28], or carried on with a scheme already started, but he did not complete his plans. Thomas Lee died in April 1572 having left Clattercote and the manor of Cropredy to his widow Mary and she was to pay yearly to his nephew William Watson the sum of £32-9s-10d out of the rents. He was the son of Thomas Lee's late sister Ann Watson. William at the time was only nineteen years and twentytwo days old. How did they decide to increase their revenues? William had to defer to his aunt Mary who had rashly entered the manor of Cropredy without first getting a licence to do so, which was to cost her a fine of £5 in 1582 [Pat Rolls p13 m36 1582].

In those past ten years they had between them kept in motion an improvement scheme, a third of which appears to be under William's control for when he married Anne in 1589 this third was held, presumably in trust for her, by John Mardon and Arthur Coldwell [50]. William continues with the rest until 1596 [Pat Rolls p1 m2] when he and his wife Anne took out a licence to transfer ownership of two thirds of the manor to Humphrey Lee Esq and Richard Wood.

Widow Mary Lee had already married Richard Corbet who bought the reversion of the manor from Watson. After Mary died, her husband Richard Corbet married a Judith who had twice been widowed and he settled Cropredy and the Clattercote Priory on his new wife. Richard died in 1606 and his widow moved to Clattercote and lived in the Priory. Judith Corbet made two wills (one in 1618, the second in 1631) leaving the Cropredy manor to her son Henry Boothby by a previous marriage. By 1619 Lady Corbet had moved to Mollington with her son and daughter [c25/8 f 12 (ult)v], but by 1634 Lady Corbet was at Langley, Derbyshire [S.S.& F. Box 107 Bundle c. O.A].

Around 1572 discussions must have commencedwith the Brasenose College to organise the parish land in a more profitable way and allow the tenants to update the buildings by using stone rather than timber. Some areas in England had stone available, but timber and wood being plentiful they delayed using stone until a lot later, and many preferred timber buildings which had stood the centuries as well as any stone ones. In Cropredy it is possible the chronic shortage of timber and underwood and the number of properties in need of repair caused the change in the traditional ways of building their homes, rather than timber buildings falling from favour. Increasing the amount of timber on the front elevation was one method of boosting the occupiers status, but could stone do the same? The gentry were rebuilding using fine cut stone. The influence of new houses being built all around the area by wealthy yeomen and lesser gentlemen, such as Williamscote House, would be watched with interest. At Banbury market no doubt they would hear of others being built all along the limestone belt from Dorset up through the Cotswolds to the north east.

Some of the brown stone came from the marlstone beds of the middle lias quarried at Hornton. This they knew from the church, could stand the weather for centuries. Cropredy tenants were nearer to the quarries than to parishes like Silverstone with timber to sell, and as carting was at their expense this clearly affected costs. Roofing material presented few problems, just the nuisance of repeated renewals of homegrown long rye straw, or the shorter wheat.

When tenants rebuilt the dwellings on their ancient sites, they could only do so in a peaceful economic climate and the landlords permission. In the 1570's Cropredy had enclosed estates on two sides (Clattercote to the north, Prescote and a section of Williams-cote-in-Cropredy to the east), so that many must have feared for their farms when the landlord began to have discussions about the future of the parish. The Reverend Thomas Holloway, with his glebe land scattered in the whole ecclesiastical parish was going to want to preserve the labour intensive Open Common Field system of Cropredy and build himself a suitable house near the church. Thomas as a married clergymen would be keen to guard every one of his tithes and rights.

Tenants had been benefitting from increased wool prices. Corn had been even more profitable for twentyfive years, though from 1573 to 1583 wool again exceeded corn. While the tenants pocket improved some landlords outgoings increased beyond their inputs and they could do nothing about raising their incomes on fixed rentals without changing the system.

The new landlord must decide on the best way to increase the income from his estate, but how would it fit in with the College? Many tenants had died in the 1550's leaving widows and young sons to carry on through several change of owners. If the estate was to pull through and become prosperous again then the properties had to be rebuilt and a whole new management scheme undertaken. The town had three good assets: access roads, a river with mills and good arable land.

There were three options open to them. To exchange land and enclose the whole parish, reduce the number of tenants and charge increased rents for the convenience of enclosed farms. This would drive away the industrious craftsmen. Or they could farm it themselves with the help of shepherds and gain everyone's disapproval (including the College). This had happened close by at Wormleighton. The third way was to work with the College and reorganise the agriculture, adjusting the balance between the arable and the leyland through the Manor Courts, and to increase the number of craftsmen, by attracting them into the parish. There was no shortage of applicants at a time when the population had recovered from the mid century epidemics and was now rising. Some landlords were dividing the land and making more farms, not less, benefitting from the demand. The number of properties could not increase above sixty, but now, some of the cottages were allocated leyland from the demesne part of the common, though most were still well under four acres. It was important to keep a workforce of craftsmen, for too few meant they could not get the harvest home, but too many for the land to feed would soon erode the balance.

The A. Manor appears to have put the third policy into action, but who actually paid for the mammoth venture? There are no bills showing the cost per bay of stone building for Cropredy. Costs were rising fast and this may have advanced the programme. Approximate costs locally came to around £10 per bay. Huxeley's [36] house and barn had six bays within a seventy by twenty feet outer shell. Was £60 too small, or too large an estimate of the costs when they arrived in the 1570's? As shepherds they would think of this as equal to a hundred and eighty good ewes. Help was required before undertaking such a huge investment which was initially for only three lives, though many decendants were able to enter more lives by paying an entry fine. What we still cannot be certain of is how much the owners contributed.

What evidence is there to show which houses were involved? Nearly all households on the vicar's Easter lists can be allocated to a plot in Cropredy. From other evidence just a few, such as the four cottages in Church Street [46-49] remained as timber buildings for well over a hundred years. In 1613 there were once again about sixty households. In Edward VI's time there had been sixtytwo houselings (p718) [1548 Chantry certificate]. In the 1550's the numbers of tenants had fallen, but the rebuilding in stone encouraged the town to reach a maximum of sixty.

Two indicators of changes taking place were the increase in new surnames into the town and the planting of hedges in the parish.

Movement of Tenants.

There were few surnames coming through from the early sixteenth century, so it is not surprising to find that the largest proportion of householders living in Cropredy in the 1570's were incomers who took advantage of the reorganisation of land and buildings.

In 1614 out of twentyone farms (not including the vicar) thirteen had ancestors of the same name mentioned in early deeds and the 1552 Survey of the A manor. By 1640 only seven of these surnames remained though two more would return when the stepfather died. Four other farms went to son-in-laws, nephew or cousin with a different surname.

A few names which had a long innings were Howse who spread to three farms, then left before 1700. Wyatts came as trade in 1605 and by 1663 had the tenancy of four good farms. Toms stayed to the end of the nineteenth century. Most died in Cropredy, but three husbandmen left in 1614.

Smythe and Palmer the millers were there before 1570. Hill the bakers were also early residents. In Church Street the two copyholders Bryan [47] and Cox [49] were tenants in 1540, but their neighbour's surname, Norman [48], goes back only to 1585. There was a large influx over sixteen years so Cropredy must have had a lot to offer as most came in to set up a business. Not all these newcomers had new sites, some took over vacant ones. What they did have in common (except for Whytes and Normans) was an early stone house and the fact that they came into the town over a very short period of time (1574-1590), encouraged to settle and build by the landlord offering them small parcels of land. Craftsmen who took up leases and arrived between 1574 and 1590 may have done so attracted by the chance of a good stone building? Their known trades are added from wills:

The husbandmen had a third of the properties and the trade and cottage labourers the rest. The landlord of the A manor kept the craftsmens "new" properties as a separate part of the estate records and they are found in a deed of 1681 [M.S.ch Oxon 4950] (Ch.29).

More names came in over the next fifty years:

Labourers names between 1593 and 1640:

The constant changes in the thirtysix households connected with agriculture by trade or work is understandable when the cottage went with the work. It was also inevitable that over seventy years many would not have a son to inherit. Several copyholders entered a daughter who then married bringing a new surname to the town. On the farms the two manor sites had strangers taking over the lease. The husbandmen were the ones who kept a hold on the property for the longest periods, except for the Church Lane timber dwellings. Only the Adkins family were able to hold on like the Toms for centuries and we have no idea how they managed to do so. Certainly few survive for a hundred years, or for more than three or four generations. Perhaps the most stable population was over the early part of our period, the time when many were setting up a business and rebuilding in stone.

The Reorganization.

Several changes had to be made. One way was to reallocate some of the demesne pasture. This is looked at in the description of land in Part 3. Another was to alter the stocking quotas and again this has been dealt with alongside the description of land and stock. A third was to reduce the costs of moving and controlling stock by planting hedges along the Lanes. This could be coupled with protection of meads by drainage ditches and more hedges. All these took place.

A hedge survey helped to confirm the planting of hedges and this is looked at first, being more recent than Thomas Holloway's folios. Part 3 and 4 will try and prove that the major changes on the two estates from the rebuilding of the houses, stock reduction to the planting of hedges nearly all took place in the last quarter of the sixteenth century.

Planting Hedges.

Hedgerows were mainly used to keep stock and crops apart, but were also used to help combat a shortage of firewood. Those who could afford to helped solve the problem by changing from wood to coal, but this required a flue. The urgent need for coal fires was recognised by building at least one chimney in every new stone dwelling. Even though the old open hearths only burnt wood which burned at a slower rate than a fire drawn up a chimney, there was not enough hedging and topping to cater for sixty households.

In the early 1980's a hedge survey using the Hooper system of counting shrubs in thirty yard sections was made over Cropredy, Prescote and Williamscote-in-Cropredy [Hooper M. D. Hedges 1974]. The additional effort to record the whole hedge corner to corner was taken in every field, because so many were in danger of removal. It became evident that there were four distinct types of hedges. These became known in Cropredy as:

In Thomas Hennell's book it was discovered that Canon Marcon of Edgefield Rectory, Norfolk had recognised in the early 1930's that there were two kinds of hedges. Old ones with many species were generally winding while new all thorn ones were straight. The exception being those new ones that were parallel to older road hedges [Hennell T. Change on the Farm 1934 Cambridge Univ. Press]. Cropredy's have been taken a little further, but did not advance as Trevor Hussey has into species profiles ["Hedgerow History." The Local Hist. Vol.17 No.6 p327-342].

Cropredy's Middle hedges planted around four hundred years ago were found in four definite places. Firstly those on either side of the wide roads. The Oxhay road across the cow pasture had only straight hedges due to a lack of arable ridge and furrows in its pasture land. Elsewhere the roads had one hedge which would follow the curve of the ridge and furrow and the second hedge ran parallel to it, even if behind that hedge the arable strip lands butted up to the road. These middle hedges had ditches dug out on the road side of the hedge. The hedged roads helped the drover taking cattle and sheep to and from the market. The local shepherds and herdsmen were able to drive stock to the common, leyland or fallow with the minimum of damage to headlands and crops.

Late Encroachment onto the Oxhay Road.

It was interesting to find later alterations to Middle hedges for example on the Oxhay road to Mollington. This was altered when encroachments were made on the south side two hundred years later. Anker's brickyard close, Brickhill, was enlarged by grubbing up the Middle hedge and including the verge by replanting alongside the road with a Late Post Enclosure hedge (A-B). The ditch was piped under the encroachment (Fig.D1.4 ). Other alterations took place on Moorstone Way to Claydon. This has Early and Middle hedges from the town to the parish boundary with Clattercote, except where the Anker's again altered their boundary on Warkworth hill by planting a Late hedge around Lime Kiln Ground. It was also found that no parish had used the ridgeway to define a long boundary. These old routeways had a habit of widening in rainy seasons, but husbandmen with strips alongside wanted to keep drovers from trespassing on their crops and so Middle hedges were planted all along the Broadway at last defining the width of the highway. There are some records, included in the bundles of College terriers, of verges being encroached and the Middle hedge being removed. One in 1791 from Smedley's [Station House?] southwards to the later osier bed on the Sowburge, gave the College tenant an extra half acre in Sow Croft. A Late hedge replaced the original one.

Secondly, Middle hedges were planted at the top of the meadows alongside the ditches. This kept stock out, or in, as required, saving damage and herdsmen. At West Meadow the new permanent hedges also divided the mead into areas or closes, which meant the cattle did not graze the aftermath all at once (Fig.14.5 p204). These replaced the need for the temporary hurdles once used to contain stock. This was still done on the arable with sheep to manure the fallow land, but was obviously a time consuming task.

The Third area of hedging was round the leyland plots, especially in the concentrated north east corner of the parish (p200). If the hedges were planted over former arable they might run across the ridge and furrows. In the South Field there are to-day three fields Marsh furlong, Bretch and Long Marsh which have Middle hedges over former ridged up lands. One of the improvements in that area was to move the Sow burge tributary coming down from the Goggs. It was given a new straight bed on the south side of the Long Marsh Furlong [Dairy Ground] and planted with a sixteenth century hedge (Fig.D 1.5 ). The ley areas in Honeypleck between Bretch and the Oxhay Road (p223) acquired Middle hedges which were later used by the Vicar when it became his Glebe farm in 1775. By allocating him this area he was saved the considerable expense of hedging his parcel of land (Fig.14.6 p206).

Re-organisation of Land in the South Field.

The Fourth Middle type hedges were the most important ones as far as the house survey was concerned. Part of the Oxhay common in the South Field had at some time been taken off in "Pieces." Two of these plots went to two farms built on the communal Green [15 & 16], possible proof of their "new" arrival. These became known as Toms and Hunts Pieces, from the farmers who leased them. A third Piece used for the sexton's acre was in Little Church Piece, otherwise known as "Read's Piece" when the Redes were the parish clerks. They also had half a sydling in Church Piece to the north of a block of strips let to the Brasenose manor farm [8]. The sydling was a piece of leyland running alongside the arable and used for access and grazing (p206).

They had begun to structurally improve the Open Common Field farming by planting hedges, bringing down the number of stock allowed and setting aside greensward areas (ch. 15) to improve the herbage. All this not only to increase their cows production, but to make better provision for their horse teams, uncatered for in the days when oxen were the main source of power. Horses required better hay from enclosed leyland and more grazing land. In return they ploughed more land in a day than oxen, though at a higher cost. Once the land improvements had been put into effect the tenants would wish to carry on and improve their own accommodation.

What was the background to their town? Would it influence their rebuilding at all?

Was Cropredy built to a plan?

In pasture areas the houses were dispersed over the whole parish. Open Common Field farming used the land differently. The buildings kept to as tight an area as possible. Once they had decided upon the maximum number of households the land could support did they then plan the layout of the town? Or could it just have grown and when would they have limited that growth? Rebuilding on old sites abandoned in the 1550's still did not bring the number up to sixty and new sites had to be fitted in.

It can be said that villages evolved naturally over a long period of time, but there is a theory that some estates made a firm structural plan, relating the closes to the landsharing. The house sites do appear to be carefully thought out, but no relationship to a rotation of strips matching the placing of the farms to each other has so far been found in the terriers (though these only came in long after the Open Common Field system was set up).

The A manor rent roll divided the homesteads to the west of the town into three groups (Fig. 1.3p11) and they rotate through their properties, from one, two and three groups repeated from south to north and then down Creampot Lane, but ignoring the B. manor sites. The B. manor was split off from the A manor when the land belonged to the Bishop of Lincoln. The ones which do not relate to the rent roll division are the two on the Green [15 & 16] and the three in Church Lane [21, 23 & 24], but these were fairly allocated between the three groups. It is very doubtful that this was left over from the distant past, or is of any significance, for it could simply be the A manor's means of dividing up the manor so that a wife had a third and a son two thirds. The division of the farms for widows could only have come about after the bishop finally surrendered Cropredy for obviously on the death of a bishop his successor took over the entire estate. In which case the divisions had nothing to do with the original layout of the town.

Creampot Lane is split between the two landlords. Two wide ones [31, 32] and two narrow [34, 35]. This must have occured after the original manor was divided in two giving the manor  a quarter of the bishop of Lincoln's estate  in  Cropredy. There are other sites which ignore the groups. Below the Green there are two thin closes stretching westwards. One to each manor [13, 14]. Both could be later additions. To the south of them, all on the A manor estate, were two older farm sites [9, 12] behind two cottages [10, 11] encroaching on the verge, Below these came Springfield Farm [6] on the B manor and over the Long Causeway the College Manor farm [8]. Just two other sites lay on the west side, one of which belonged to the Rector [5] and French's farm [4]. Lastly on the east side an encroachment onto the B manor meadows of Devotion's [3] farmstead with Lucas's [2] copyhold cottage.

They built their homes above the highest flood level, between the meadow and arable. There were several advantages of living near the river. Two mills were built close to the town and the stock could be watered easily night and morning, below the Green. The roads crossed this Green and the mother church for the area was built above it. They were fortunate in their water supply. Many wells after being sunk were found suitable for drinking. The town had one pond in the High Street and perhaps another on the present 1881 Chapel site previously used by a wheelwright.

The next task was to look at the sites themselves. Was the position of the farms important? Which lanes were the farmers or craftsmen most likely to live in?

Villages were often built around a Green or along a highway. Cropredy had a Green, but it seemed more of a wide edge to the Royal Way running through the parish (after crossing the Cherwell ford), than a definite area set aside in the original plan. Cropredy's Green actually interrupted the plan of the town, rather than forming a centre piece. To the north and south of it, on the western side of the main Lanes, the farms had been laid out in an orderly fashion, totally ignoring the Green between the upper and lower sections of the town.

The two manor farmsteads were completely independent of the Green, preferring to stand near their meadows, and in the case of the larger A manor estate, near the upper mill. These were sited on the eastern side of the town, one above the Green and one below. Craftsmen's copyhold properties, needing less access to the arable land and with little choice anyway, were built in the centre of the town.

The Green was a large space below the church, stretching from the Town Cross fence on the west down to the river Cherwell on the east. It was not surrounded by property facing into the open pasture area. Nor was it used as a market, so the Cross was either a medieval preaching cross, or a place for travellers to express their thanks for a safe crossing through the floods in medieval times. The parishioners had required the Green at Cropredy to be kept open as a common pasture, alongside the important route through the parish, but as soon as there was pressure for more dwelling sites they began to nibble away at the Green from below the church and Church Lane.

The whole town was apparently conveniently set out with the majority of the farmcloses running east to west. It may be that originally the sites were of a standard size. The depth and the width making up an acre. There were three types. The three narrow ones of about 80 feet in width, six about a 100 feet wide and five about 120 feet wide. The two between the Green and Newstreet Lane had just over an acre each with a paddock between them because Hobb's Pool took up the High Street frontage. A strip once running east from the High Street towards the church, was 120 feet wide and divided into three, whose front boundaries each measured 100 feet on the north side of Church Lane. Toms and Hunts on the Green had a frontage of around 120 feet each.

In this town just over half of the houses faced east-west. The causeway, street or lane serving their house to a large extent governing the position of the property. Why did the rest decide to face southwards? Not all the western line of farms were rebuilt in stone to face east at the edge of their crofts. Howse [28] faced north and Lyllee [29] faced south at the north end of the town and French's [4] at the southern end was built with the gable end to the road on a narrow 80 foot close (p487). Each must have had a reason.

The farms in Creampot Lane appear to have originally been built right back on the edge of the wide A manor farm track, with their rear walls onto the headings of arable land. Any home close for [32 and 33] had to be attached to their farmstead upon the old verge. This in effect gave them odd sideways plots in marked contrast to the conventional long closes on Cropredy's western side. When these two rebuilt in stone I believe they took the opportunity to come forward to the edge of the by now sunken lane. The first three sites [31 to 33] faced south on wide sites, but the bottom two [34, 35] must still face across their narrow sites. The last close in the lane [35] being right against their meadow hedge (ch. 36) .

Three craftsmen on the College estate had cottages facing either north onto Church Lane [18-20], or southwards onto their gardens. They were opposite the three south facing A manor farms [21, 23, 24]. The Church Street cottages facing south may have housed the staff for the A. manor house [50] and farm. The present Chapel Green provided homes for four craftsmen [40-43] in their stone cottages. Huxeley's [36], Breeden's and Elderson's [37, 38] faced west, and Tanner's [39] which faced south were all built as craftsmen's smallholdings, taken from the edge of the A manor's demesne close.

Cropredy may differ from the rest of the country for the town had very few one cell cottages, and none to actually retire to. They were all family dwellings. The population went on increasing, but only a handful of cottages were fined at the court for encroaching onto the Green in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century. The next major upheaval came with the reorganisation following the 1775 Enclosure Award. Between 1570 and 1640 the land could feed only sixty households. Children who would be unable to take up a lease with a tenement must leave, but not all do so as early as fourteen. The records give us rare insights into who resided in the town from 1613 to 1624, other years have unfortunately been lost. The pattern of movement amongst the families and staff was surely following the local custom throughout our chosen period. The new stone houses had more space inside and sharing was tolerable up to a point, as long as the daughter-in-law could cope. If not then the widowed mother might have to "bitake herself to some friends whome shee please," as suggested by Thomas French [4] in 1631/2 .

Part 1 finishes with the most important person without whom none of this could have been put together, the Reverend Thomas Holloway. He industriously produced some of the finest documents with the sole intent of bringing in his revenues. In Part 2 the people who lived in this period, the husbandmen, craftsmen and servants dominate the pages, with their families, their inheritance customs and belongings revealed in the wills and their children's education or lack of it. Part 3 will deal with the Open Common Fields and the use of the land by the townsmen. Coming back to the houses in Part 4 it was discovered that Church Street had a row of early timber cottages preserved under a later stone facade, and Cropredy rebuilt a type of longhouse adapted to late sixteenth century requirements. The craftsmens cottages with some land are followed in the text by cottages connected to a farmstead. The farms are taken in town order in their own chapters while Part 5 deals with their apparel and possessions found in the inventories.

A mass of local detail has been added for those who wish to follow the unusual or commonplace in these various properties. Many factors brought out in the study are those which contributed to Cropredy's unique growth. A neighbouring parish would present a completely different set of results, though the archive material, the buildings, the soil and climate might be similar. It is the mixing of the ingredients which produced the unique environment and it is this essential Cropredy which we want to display, for this whole exercise is striving to explore, and hopefully to encourage the reader to continue to find more evidence and better solutions, especially those who live in one of the original sixty properties.

No apologies need be made for transcribing the documents using the original spelling, for during this period words had not settled down and it was quite permissible for the scribe to write as he spoke. These are not transcribed in order to amuse us, but to hear the English language as spoken in this small community. Several words escape translation and there is plenty of room for a further exhaustive search of the difficult scripts.

The new stone buildings reduced the amount of heat once lost in a poor dwelling, and saved time and money previously wasted in constant repairs. Goods would also keep longer in a dryer building. Then if the number of births did not rise too high, too quickly over burials, and the emigration of surplus individuals went on, those left might slowly begin to prosper after the initial expense of rebuilding.

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