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19. Pigs, Poultry and Gardens.

Tithes "for the mills, besides warren, apples, fowls, eggs, pigges, chicken, as in other places" wrote the Revd Edward Brouncker in 1619 [c25/10 f2v].

All the farm's best products went to the market, wheat, malt, butter, cheese, poultry, eggs, young calves and some lambs, leaving behind a store pig, soft cheeses, vegetables and fruit with the lesser corn for bread. Therefore pigs were an essential part of the household economy. Only a few appear to have had sows so we have to presume the rest bought in their stores. Eighteen households had bacon hanging in flitches and over a third of the sites have stores, hogs, pigs or swine. The vicar's pig tithe books must be missing for only the odd reference that had escaped to another folio remain, but why did the vicar note in 1617 that John Densey of Bourton had "a pig sold him 12d" [c25/4 f18]? Easier to understand that Gybbs [25] who had four store hoggs worth £1-13-4d in May 1629 and seven flitches in the kitchen sent a pig to the vicar, who duly entered it into the poultry book: "Thos Gibbs a pygg" [c25/6 3v]. In 1616 Robert Mansell the miller has to give up two pigs, or pay their value of 2s-6d [c25/3 f4v].

Several had salting "troes" in the house for the pigs carcase must be salted down in a strong trough. Outside the pigs whey or barley grains needed a very heavy pig "throe." Many escape a mention so perhaps a trough was built into a yard wall of the hog houses? Robins [26] had "4 hogg troes," Richard Hanwell [34] was mentioned as having "hogg troves" and Pratts [24] owned "two hogge troves ijs." Widow Kynd's [31] were worth 2s-6d.

Nuberry [8] had their pigs in an enclosure to the north of the house. In May 1578 there were eight live hogs and nine young stores as well as 10s worth of "bacon in the Roffe" of the kitchen. Years later Woodrose at the same farm still had eight hogs, one pig and one sow. It was again May and inside Martha had four flitches worth 13s-4d. Robins [26] hung his in the cheese chamber, but French's [4] were still in the kitchen chimney (27s), either in a special smoke cupboard, or open to the wood smoke from the fire. Having preserved his flitches Solomon Howse [9] kept them in the chamber over the hall with the cheese, butter and apples.

It was only possible to feed a quantity of hogs if there was enough whey from the cheese or butter making to help fatten them up. Poorer husbandmen would save most of the whey for the family to drink, as their malt went as part of the rent. The rest of the barley could not be used for ale as it was required to make barley bread lightened with a little wheat flour. Their pigs therefore had less whey and fattening brewing grains than a farmer with more land. Most households had pigs at some stage and twentythree had them when they died. Their widows continued to rear them having seen to them when their husbands were alive. If a craftsman had some land with a cow or two, then he could afford to feed a pig. Palmers [59] having a small herd kept swine. There was always a problem of containing them in an Open Common Field situation. Youngsters taking them out to forage had to be careful they did not get into a neighbour's close, orchard, or the vicar's churchyard (p448).

There were seventeen inventories in which other stock were kept, but the pig was absent and twentyone who had no stock whatsoever. Occasionally a pig appears in a will: "My Eldest sowe" was left to John Truss [33] by his father in 1614.

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Pigs recorded in Inventories.

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Poultry.

" My [tithe] eggs sold in anno/ 1613 in all was But xxijs id ob" [c25/7 f5v].

The price of eggs has been used to measure the standard of living in a market area. Their value was known to closely follow the rise and fall of prices. Unfortunately Thomas Holloway fails to give us the number of tithe eggs he sent to the market.

The vicar's small tithes from poultry were, the Reverend Edward Brouncker wrote, the same "as in other places." However not many parishes left detailed evidence of sixteenth century small tithes. One reference was discovered on Gower. Apparently anyone keeping poultry must give two eggs for every cock, drake or turkey cock and one egg for every hen, duck or turkey hen, on Good Friday. The vicar's poultry tithes at Cropredy were due on New Years day (March the 25th) and the eggs at Easter. The quantities owed are vague even when a hen was given in lieu of eggs. Thomas wrote down who had given them to him on folios kept for his own information [c25/6]. The poultry tithe record includes households who no longer kept poultry when they died. Unfortunately ten households who left no inventory were also missing from the tithe book including Hall [6] who must have had poultry. Lucas [2] was one of those who did not pay a poultry tithe and they had a flock not a feather mattress. They may have been one of the few who never had hens. A third of the town had kept poultry right up to their death. It looks as though nearly all households were able to keep some hens, but these were given up in prolonged illness, or passed on to younger members of the household.

Poultry were found in far more inventories than other stock and three had only poultry. They sold eggs, raised chickens to sell at point of lay, or replaced their own. Pullets were sold as already laying, cocks were reared to sell for breeding, or for eating and the excess number of male chicks as capons for the table. The end fate for the good and bad layers was a useful addition to the pot. No feather went to waste (p647). For all those households who had hens they became an important item for the women to take to market. The fact that the vicar had from Cropredy alone seventyeight hens, two chickens, four pullets, fortyseven capons, thirtyseven cocks and five geese, often in lieu of eggs from 1611 to 1619, means that there were a great many cockerels announcing the dawn and hens broadcasting the laying of an egg, in this seventeenth century town. In 1615 his total from Cropredy, Bourton and Wardington came to a hundred and seven birds and in 1617 he had a hundred and eighteen. In 1619 Thomas wrote "for henes sold xxxvijs." How many hung in the vicarage nether house to feed his household [c25/6 fols.7v,9v & 12]?

In 1625 two hens and one cock were valued at 1s -4d. In 1628 two hens were worth 10d and in 1634 six hens and one cock were equal to 3s, making a hen worth 5d and a cock 6d.

The Nuberrys [8] used to breed turkeys. From Wardington a John Nuberry gave two capons in 1612 and then a turkey for three years running. These were not the large American turkeys, but the smaller guinea fowl from Turkey. By 1628 Nicholas Woodrose [8] left a turkey cock and hen worth 2s-6d. John Cross [51] at the upper mill had five turkeys worth 7s-6d in 1614. A valuable bird.

Ducks could use the moat and Nuberrys [8] had fourteen "duxes" and a drake. They also had two geese, a gander and thirteen goslings worth 5s-4d. Apart from their valuable quills to use as pens, painting brushes and flight feathers for arrows, geese were able with tarred feet to be driven to a local market, or up to London. The second of the three inventories mentioning geese was Johan Robins [26] who had one cock, three hens and two geese in 1579.

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The last was Redes [32] who had three geese one cock and eight hens worth 3s-4d in 1577. Until quite recently geese were still raised in special pens under the scullery work surface, for free roaming geese would find what they considered a safe place, but often fell prey to the fox. Tanner [39] is the only one to provide a tithe goose. He gave five between 1611 and 1617, one of which was a "fat gose." None appear in his inventory.

Poultry recorded in Inventories and Tithe Book.

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Geese made excellent guard dogs setting up a fearful noise at the approach of strangers. They also appreciated a pond. Redes had one in the yard and Tanner had one in his close on the corner of their lane with Creampot. Gybbs and Robins had the parish Hobb's pool between them on the High Street and Nuberry's geese and ducks could use the moat. Hentlowes [35] and Hall [6] who each had a nearby pond fail to record geese.

Hen houses escape a mention if there were no moveable objects stored in them. Geese and turkeys would require quite large boxes within a hen house to keep them comfortable, when all the poultry were shut up at night. In one of the two hen houses recorded weaver Watt's [27] was large enough to store his ladder. Up at Bourton Thomas Smyth had "under they henn roaste A stone sesterne" [MS. Will Pec.51/1/2]. If the valuable water cistern (13s-4d) had not been kept under the hen roost it would not have been mentioned. Few people would store anything in an occupied poultry house which meant the appraisers ignored them. Kynds, Redes and Watts [31,32,34] down Creampot all had hen pens. Rede's had theirs in the hall. Presumably ready to go outside when in use. Only a few would raise chickens in the house, unless foxes were about.

An unusual item appears in the poultry tithe book: Isaac Rychardson sent a dozen of larks [c25/6 f12], which reminds us that many birds were considered an essential addition to the diet, especially after a poor harvest.

Ale and Wine: Tithes or Presents?

A few records of ale, wine and "sacke" were entered into the Poultry book. James Bostocke [41] gave the vicar a bottle of wine and in 1615 he took round a bottle of "sacke" [c25/6 f4v & f6]. Thomas Densey, the blacksmith of the later Brasen Nose Inn site [13] also sent a bottle of wine in 1612 [f3v] and Elizabeth Bostocke who was working for Wyatt's [13] sent a pot of ale. This surely indicates they were paying a tithe on ale and wine they sold? Or was it in lieu of some other tithe, by arrangement with the vicar? Young Woodrose [8] contributed a bottle of sack in 1615. Mr Palmer gave him "a bottell of clarett wyne" in 1619 [f12] which would be used as communion wine. Presumably these last two were not tithes on sales for not all would have a licence to sell? Edward Bodinton (a man unknown to Wardington or Cropredy registers) presented a bottle of muscadet in 1619 [f12].

Rabbits.

Rabbits were called conys in the sixteenth and seventeenth century. They had become part of the wealthier man's diet. Thomas Holloway had at least two suppliers in Cropredy. Robins [26] in 1612 gave two and his neighbour across the High Street James Bostocke [41] gave the vicar a pair in 1613, with the bottle of wine, and two years later another cony. Wardington sent thirteen, but only two came from Bourton. What was the rabbit population at that time? Were these from a warren, or descendants of escapees? Rabbits had already become a nuisance in some areas though they were still more than half a day's wage for a craftsman being worth 7d around 1600.

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Doves.

In 1509 the B manor's dove house [8] was mentioned in a lease [BNC: Hurst 88]. A hundred years later Woodrose [8] had a "little dovecote" built of stone and covered with "slat and tyle." Tiles were seldom recorded in Cropredy and these must have been specially obtained being essential to the construction of this particular building, or were they left over from the south wing (p515). No doves were given to the vicar from the two manor farms, but in 1615 Woodrose paid the vicar a shilling tithe for the dovehouse (p234) which meant the expected profits were around 10s a year [c25/3 f1v]. Part of the value lay in the rich manures which were highly prized, but their other uses came from the constant supply of food for the table, produced largely at the expense of the other tenants' crops.

The little dove house of one bay was on the north side of the cattle yard , probably at the west end. It was next to the malt house and kiln and backing onto Dovehouse [Pigeon] Close (p512). The dovehouse may always have been next to the malthouse for later the close behind was called the Malthouse Close. There are no other records of pigeons for only manor farms could have a dovecote. The position of the A manor's dovehouse has been lost.

Bees.

Few hives appear in the inventories and honey being perishable is not mentioned. A honey tithe should have been paid at Christmas, but no record remains. The Holloways [21] would be bound to have their own hives to obtain honey for sweetening. It was necessary when preserving fruit in conserves and making jam for the winter. Their cook would also want some to preserve the hams. Elizabeth would need it to help make up her household medicines and if her hands were roughened by work, honey would be used in a cream to soften them. Wounds were covered with a linen cloth dipped in soft warm wax or lanolin. Her young maids must have a beeswax polish to keep the furniture shining and if any liquids were required to stand for months they must be securely stoppered up with the help of some wax. Fenny [43], her neighbour, might add some beeswax to harden his candles. Down Hello [58] the saddlers required the wax to waterproof their leather and so did the Church Street [45, 46 & 49] leather workers making the ploughman's boots and hedger's gloves, unless they used mutton fat. Those who were able kept a hive. Their bees had the Cherwell meadows below as well as the town orchards, trees and flowers around each close, all within a mile radius.

In 1559 John Sherman of Little Bourton had eight hives of bees to give to his children. One each to John and Katherine, and two to William, Jullian and Besse [183 250v 151r]. In 1597 part of a hive belonging to widow Hurst who lived in Round Bottom [52] was recorded. Empty hives were also assessed at Woodroses [8]. At least three more are mentioned in Bourton inventories. John Cleredge had six "stocks" [hives] in 1609 and he leaves them to his two sons along with all the horses and cows [PCC 114]. Robert Moles left four in 1610 which were worth 15s and the three at Thomas Smyth's in 1611 (who did not have a son to inherit them) had a value of 20s . At Monkeytree House [36] in 1703 a Thomas Batchelor, shepherd, left an acorn hive [MSS. Wills Pec. 41/1/21, 51/1/2, 33/4/55].

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Skep hives made of straw could be easily moved. When the colony grew too large they would swarm and hopefully be caught and moved to a spare hive, so increasing the stock. To collect the honey the hives chosen might have to be destroyed unless the beekeeper could devise a way of saving the colony. They were not as easy to control as the modern ones and some say they were more subject to disease. Nevertheless skep hives were produced and used for centuries very efficiently and the honey the bees provided was part of the diet. It could be that the whole family took charge of these important colonies, as few die owning bee hives having already passed them on before they died. The making of new hives may have been a task on an autumn evening for the poorer family, otherwise they could be purchased from a skep-maker. All the tools would be home produced from bones or wood. The needle being made from the drum stick of a goose and later a turkey. Part of a cow horn was used to make a ring to ensure each coil of straw was of the same thickness.

The vicar could claim his tenth from the sale of a hive and did so when Thomas Atkins sold one in 1614. The vicar received 2s-4d [c25/4 f2]. This meant the hive was worth 15s-4d, but Robert Lord's [1a] certainly was not. He sold one in 1614 for 5s and the vicar claimed 6d . In 1617 Robert Mansell sold "4 hyves" for 34s and the vicar was paid a tithe of 3s-4d [c25/3 fols.1 &7]. After taking on an occupied hive the new "owner" would find a way of doing their former bee-keeper a service. Some sales must have been for a new empty hive or more than one. The Mansells of Slat mill and the Lord family who were fulling at Cropredy Lower mill, both had ideal places to keep bees amongst the old meadows. Did someone in their families make and sell skeps, which led to the payment of a tithe?

In 1631 Robins [26] died leaving eight stocks of bees and someone had had to go out and tell the bees of his death. The daughter took over the farm and so the bees had to be passed to a son-in-law and not quietly to a son. They were worth £2-5s which shows the value of this useful side line. Robins' appraisers include the bees which makes them a little more than Robert Lord's new empty hives. Did Robins keep them in his orchard facing east, or in the wall of one of his buildings? Most hives needed some sort of protection and apart from a hackle, rather like a tall Welsh hat made of straw and fastened over the skep, the best shelter was specially built with a stand for the hive having three sides and a roof, but open to the front. Or else special boles, like alcoves in the wall just big enough to take a hive. Apart from the necessity of keeping the bees cool in summer they needed to be warm in winter and always dry. To keep bees and obtain honey needed the skill and experience passed on from generation to generation.

The earliest skeps could have been made of woven willow or hazel, but straw or rush hives were also made. It depended on the type of farming. Rye straw was popular in the north and areas like Cropredy where it was still grown, but wheat straw may have taken over as more was planted. In wetter areas the field rush would be gathered in the summer and used successfully. Bees prefer to live in a sphere shaped hive which allows them the maximum amount of warmth. In 1609 the Reverend Charles Butler recommended a seventeen inch high hive with a middle diameter of fifteen and thirteen inches at the skirt. To find the inside volume it was said to be large enough when able to hold three pecks of grain. The top would collapse with the combined weight of bees and combs, so a cop (a round piece of wood about one inch thick) with a central hole into which the top end of a willow or hazel rod split into four could be fixed. The bottom four ends had to reach down the hive to the third or fourth coil from the base and there they were sharpened and made to pierce the sides, but forming a tension that would keep the cop in position to support the weight and prevent the top of the hive collapsing inwards.

The coils of straw or rushes were bound tightly with brambles gathered at the end of autumn and prepared by stripping and then splitting and after soaking stropped to tender them with a strong piece of wood. The pith had first been scraped out.

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The skeps were covered by hackles of straw to protect them from the weather. The straw had woven bands to form a skirt and once over the skep a gart, or band, was placed to help hold the hackles and provide something to anchor the guy ropes to. Charles Butler wrote that it needed to be removed "now and then" to "meet with mice, moths, spiders, earwigs etc" to see what damage the mice had made and to air the hive "on a warm and windy day after much wet." Damp hives were dangerous to the bees' health. The hazel, willow, straw and reed hives had to be daubed to make them waterproof. In 1609 Butler gave his recipe for doing this. "Cow cloome tempered with gravelly dust, or sand, [lime] or ashes." The best was "neats" dung [from any working animal] for this was "good against the gnawing of mice. With this cloome close up the skirts and brackes of your hives that there be no way into them." G.Markham adds that a cross-bar was put in the hive and that "the mortar be at least 3 in thick close to the stone [as it rested in the alcove] so that the least air may not come in." "Cloome" or cloam from the stable was also used to make good strong floors. [Butler Charles The Feminine Monarchie 1609 and Markham G. The Nature Ordering and Preserving of Bees 1614 and Alston Frank Skeps 1987].

Gardens.

"The widow car/ter [of Claydon?] payd for tythe of her garden & orchard/" 2s-11d a quarter. "Wilscot hath cottengers & they payd my predessor/ Apples & there fruites of there gardens"Revd Brouncker [c25/10 f2].

 

"In March and in April from morning till night

In sowing and seeding good huswives delight.

To have her a garden, or other like spot,

To trim up the house and to furnish the pot" Tusser.

A husbandman with a wide close had plenty of room for his yards and garden. Those on narrower sites might have them behind and to one side as Watts [34] did.

A backyard could be the kitchen garden laid out in a formal square of four triangular plots with paths between. Herbs and shrubs such as lavender, hyssop, thrift, germander and box were useful to the household and could double up as rough surfaces to spread out the drying linen. Some had a woodyard leading to the orchard where certain stock could graze. A large vegetable garden might have to be beyond the rickyard, cattle yards and orchard, but the most convenient place was near the house. The three farms in Church Lane were denied space and must use what they had less freely. The vicar did have the churchyard and close opposite to use for grazing and this may have left room for some vegetables behind the house. Some had walls dividing the yards with thatched tops to preserve the stone, or double hedges.

In such gardens as Gorstelow's of Prescote manor the formal garden included part of the surrounding moat and was enclosed by a good stone wall. Inside were groves and walks presumed to have been there since Prescote was some kind of religious house. Here Richard Gorstelow used to walk in the privacy of the garden to help his agitation brought on by trying to keep the peace with his second wife [Gorstelow W. Charls Stuart and Oliver Cromwel United . 1655].

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Sabins who followed Normans into their Church Street cottage [48] were known as gardeners and there may have been work for them at Prescote. The estate was owned by the Danvers of Chelsea who had laid out a London (and Prescote?) garden in the Italian style by the end of the sixteenth century, though Walter Gorstelow's believed their garden layout came from the distant past. Even so the walks, groves and vegetable garden all required gardeners who must have lived in Cropredy.

Only the Woodroses [8] have a surviving tithe record for their garden, but as the rest of the husbandmen's tithe book has been lost it does not mean they had no gardens. While ploughed land owed a tithe to the rector (or in Cropredy's case the lay impropriator), the gardens which would usually be tilled by a spade owed tithe to the vicar, even if some of it could be ploughed [Tate W.E. p138]. Robert Woodrose the father and Nicholas the son each had their own plot inside the moat as well as their orchard. Nicholas paid the smallest tithe of fourpence and Robert who had the larger plot a shilling. By 1617 Nicholas's was increased to 8d. Just before November 1619 the vicar's records stop. He had not received the garden tithes, although the rest had come in. Perhaps the custom was to wait and see how their harvest was first and the payment was then due on St. Thomas's day [c25/3 fols.1v,3,4v,6 & 8].

The gardens would be producing onions, leeks, cabbage, kidney beans, parsnips, carrots (towards the end of our period), beetroots (a fairly new vegetable), cucumbers, lettuce and radishes as well as the essential herbs needed for cooking. To feed the large Holloway household Elizabeth would need help in the garden. In April 1613 Thomas Elderson [38] was in the vicarage doing the garden or some carpentry out there [c25/7 f5v]. It was not a cheap means of gaining food for in 1656 one and a half pounds of best onion seed cost 5s [P.R.O. S.P.46/100 fol 242F]. Once a garden was started then seeds must be collected and exchanged with other gardeners [Vegetables and herbs from Henry Lyte's Niewe Herball 1578 and John Parkinson's Paradisi in Sole 1629].

Herb gardens were necessary for the making of potions and medicines. Herbs were for salads, meat cooking and hanging up in the house. Tusser listed herbs all suitable for strewing amongst the rushes on the hall floor. Basil, baulm, camomile, costmary, cowslip and paggles, daisies of all sorts, sweet fennel, germander, hysop, lavender, lavender spike, lavender cotten, marjaram, mint, mandeline, pennyroyal, roses of all sorts, red mints, sage, tansy, violets and winter savory [Tusser: Points of Good Husbandry 1557]. Others add rosemary, saffron and thyme and probably many more which were then grown locally. There were books available for the minority. One was William Bulliein's Bulwark of Defence against all sickness printed in 1562. Later on Culpepper's books helped for the first time to take the mystery out of the medical world. He set about translating the latin texts, so that at last readers with no knowledge of latin could learn about the various properties of the plants and the cures they could effect.

Many cottage gardens were seen by foreign visitors to be a riot of colour. They might have the popular pinks, carnations, sweet williams, hollyhocks, cowslips, marigolds, daffodils, poppies, snapdragon, lily of the valley, paeonies and pansies to fill up the corners, and for those with the best scents they would beg a "strip" from a neighbours plants. Useful plants such as violets and roses were needed for strewing, scent and cooking. Rose water was sprinkled over floors and furniture as well as faces, hair and hands. Anything to keep at bay evil smells thought to bring illness.

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Orchards played an essential part in the diet by producing apples and wardens [cooking pears]. The vicar received tithes from the orchards which he recorded in the poultry book. Thomas Gorstelow [12] sent up apples to the vicarage in 1617, as well as a hen. Widow Whyte [46] twice gives the vicar produce from her orchard whose trees still remained, or had been replaced, down the years until two hundred years later Mary Smith mentions apples stored in the attic which was once widow Whytes [46] house. Approximate sites of old orchards are given on site plans in Part 4.

The millers [51] had an orchard in the close behind. At the top of Church Street the Bostockes [41] and Suttons [42] had orchards and across the High Street Gybbs [25] and Robins [26] both had part of their close planted with apple trees. Cooking apples were still there before 1914 and part of that ground is now under Orchard View. Eldersons [38] could also rely upon apples to see them through the winter which were taken up to the cockloft, as his neighbour the Huxeley's [36] would be doing. Growing pear trees up the gable end, or on the front and rear elevations surely started after the rebuilding in stone. Huxeley had at least two if not four pear trees growing against the house and barn. He had room to plant an orchard to the north of the cart entrance tucked into the bend on Creampot Lane. The Carters of Round Bottom [57] had a small orchard, but Bokingham's [55] on the opposite side of the Lane had room for a much larger one. Down the Long Causeway Gorstelows [12], Howse [9], Woodrose [8] and Lucas [2] are amongst those who were mentioned in Holloway's books. The Hall's [6] and their neighbours had room and necessity to grow them as well, but did not pay a tithe on the few remaining years of the book. Solomon Howse [9] had apples in 1641, while Kendall the thatcher in 1596 had three stryke of apples and one of the Palmers in 1602 had 5s-4d worth of apples.

On the 4th of May 1637 Dr Brouncker was still living away from Cropredy and had allowed Mrs Chauncy the grazing of the churchyard and "I have given her the orcharde/ [with] the fruits for this summer" [c25/4 f31]. Where exactly was Holloway's orchard?

Planting and growing hops along a hedgerow spread rapidly from 1556 to the end of the sixteenth century. Before 1556 they were imported.

Summary.

Cropredy's husbandmen had made a fresh agreement in the 1570's and balanced their crops and stock as well as possible. The fixed amount they could sow and the quota of stock per yardland would have made any variations near impossible in this mixed farming community, unless they found extra land to lease. Although flock sizes did vary in other neighbouring parishes, cattle seldom could. None could go into intensive beef rearing with just a third of their land down to grass. Only the two manor farms brought their stock up to twelve or sixteen, simply because they usually had the most yardlands. Large flocks of sheep we found mostly under shepherds, but others like the vicar, did speculate in sheep even in an Open Common Field situation, though nothing like the large flocks to be found in more pastoral regions, or on enclosed manors. The corn and stock in their personal estate was found quite naturally to rise with each yardland taken on and only Truss the shepherd had a high stock percentage of 77% and a low 5% of corn. In 13, the Trust and Borrowing chapter, there is a chart giving the totals of thirteen inventories to show the percentages of stock, corn and household possessions in Cropredy (p189).

In some parishes with good arable, but away from convenient markets the balance between stock and corn varied enormously from Cropredy. They grew just enough for their household and perhaps to pay the rent and tithe. If we once again compare with south Gower (for their records were in English and not Welsh) it was found they kept more cattle and sheep, but although their cheese and quality of wool were in the same class as Cropredy the value of their stock was much lower. David Beynon lived in the next parish to Rhossili.

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Although we do not know the quality of the stock set against each other it would seem that if David Beynon had Banbury and Warwick markets close at hand he might have had an estate worth almost £50 more than he died with [Emery F.V. "West Glamorgan farming circa 1580-1620." The National Library of Wales Journal p392 ff for David Beynon's stock].

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