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Our 2023 programme: 23 Feb: '1926' - our speaker is our Chairman, Martyn Lockwood. 23 Mar: Annual General Meeting. 27 Apr: 'John Ray' - Jennifer Rowland. 25 May: Napoleonic Invasion Plans - Neil Wiffen. 22 Jun: 'Jersey under the Jackboot: the occupation of Jersey during WW2' - Patrick Griggs. 27 Jul: 'The Life and Times of William Byrd (c1540-1623): A Local History' - Andrew Smith. 26 Oct: 'The Prison at Hill Hall' - Anne Padfield. 23 Nov: Pre-Christmas meeting. Talk to be confirmed. Admission: Members £1, Non-members £5 Annual Membership: £15 (Family: £30)

Saturday 17 May 2014

Essex Field Names (1): Introduction

Essex Field-Names
Collected and arranged by William Chapman Waller, M.A., F.S.A.
An extract from the Transactions of the Essex Archaeological Society, ‘new series’ Volume 5 (1895)

Part I: The Hundred of Ongar, and the Half Hundreds of Harlow aand Waltham [Extracts cover High Country Parishes only]

Short and disconnected lists of field-names appear from time to time in various publications, but, as far as I know, no attempt has hitherto [to 1895] been made to collect and arrange systematically those which are found to occur over the whole area of any particular county.  A passing reference made some years ago (by whom and where, I have forgotten,) to “the valuable lists of names contained in the Tithe Commutation Awards,” stuck, as such phrases will, in my mind, and it occurred to me that I would some day try to collect those parishes comprised in the Hundred of Ongar.  My first intention was to make a pilgrimage to each parish and there to inspect its particular Award.  But further consideration led me to abandon this plan as not only tedious but impracticable.  Later on, acting in concert with Council of the Society, I approached the Board of Agriculture, in whose custody the sealed copies of various Awards are deposited.  At first certain obstacles, which appeared almost insurmountable, stood in the way of my obtaining the facilities necessary for the execution of the work contemplated.  But at length, thanks to the cordial interest which the Right Hon. Herbert Gardner, one of our Vice-Presidents, manifested in a project approved of by our Council, and the courteous kindness of certain permanent officials of the Board over which he presides, all difficulties were got over, and the first instalment of Essex field-names now finds its place in the Society’s Transactions.

A few words explanatory of the scheme adopted are, perhaps, desirable.  The first proceeding was to go through the Draft Awards of the forty-one parishes contained in the Hundreds chosen, copying out all the field-names other than those absolutely common-place – such, for instance, as Broadfield, Longfield, Tenacres, and a few others, which occur by the score.  The names excerpted, to which the Tithe Map numerals were added, are in books which will ultimately be added to the MSS Collections of the Society.  Each name was next re-copied on to a slip, with the addition of a number corresponding to that assigned to be parish which it was found to occur.  Duplicates having been eliminated, the slips were arranged alphabetically, in which order they are now printed.  By way of pendant to this explanation I must add a word of thanks to my friend, Miss E M Allen, of Girton College, for the help she very kindly contributed towards the somewhat tedious process of re-copying and sorting.

It would be out of place to attempt, here and now, to say much as to the names of which the list is composed.  They exhibit a remarkable variety, the same name in precisely the same form rarely occurring more than once over whole area under review.  And it must also be added that the variations, in some few cases, appear to be due to the idiosyncracies of the original draughtsman or copyist, or of the person who informed him, rather to essential differences in the names themselves.  The explanation of sundry inaccuracies is probably to be found in the fact that the Awards, which were for the most part drawn up about half a century ago, were done in haste, and many names seem to have been misunderstood, misspelt, and mangled, while others were insufficiently authenticated. To give an instance or two: - the field which figures as ‘Peerless’ [Loughton] should indubitably appear as ‘Spare Leaze’, while ‘Luscious Mead’ [also Loughton] is really Lusher’s or Lushen’s mead; the various ‘Readings’ [e.g. Little Hallingbury, Matching], ‘Reddings’ [Stapleford Abbots, Great Hallingbury, Epping], etc., of which ‘redene’ is the earlier form.

Of all the names not immediately explicable three stand out as occurring more commonly than the rest: they are Small Gains [e.g. Navestock, Abbess Roding, Bobbingworth, High Ongar, Moreton], Rainbow Field [e.g. High Laver, Little Laver, Stondon Massey, Harlow, Hatfield Broad Oak], and Perry Field [e.g. Stanford Rivers, Stapleford Tawney, Fyfield, Magdalen Laver, Theydon Garnon]. Now ‘small’ is a word rarely found as part of a field-name: the comparison is usually expressed by ‘little’ and ‘great’. But in the case of ‘Gains’, the latter affixes occur once and once only, though ‘Gains’ itself never occurs without some qualifying word.  Perry Field may or may not be the equivalent of the modern Peartree Field [e.g. Theydon Mount, Bobbingworth, Magdalen Laver, Latton, Great Parndon].  But perige or peru is the Anglo-Saxon for pear-tree, and in one case I have come on a ‘Piryfield’ in a late 13th century charter relating to a parish in which later on two Perry Fields are found. … Rainbow Field [e.g. Navestock, Norton Mandeville, Abbess Roding, Beauchamp Roding, Stondon Massey] I hand over to the conjectures of the ingenious, with the remark that Rainbow, like Perry, also occurs as a surname.

Although many ‘Hop Gardens’ [e.g. Shelley, North Weald, Moreton, High Laver, Epping] remain to bear witness to the time when each vill drank its own brew, ‘Flex’ [Norton Mandeville] has in three instances only survived to recall the Statute passed in Henry the Eighth’s time, which rendered obligatory the cultivation of a certain amount of hemp or flax in each parish.


A momentary glance at an Ordnance Survey Map will serve to shew that the Commutation Awards by no means include all the place-names of the parish; and many which are nowhere recorded in print, are yet enshrined in old documents, or, in some instances, still live on the lips of peasant-folk, preserved through the centuries by oral tradition.  … Comment and criticism will of necessity by more advantageously applied when, if ever, the lists for the whole county are completed.  [W C Waller completed and published the work over nine parts from ‘old series’ Volume 5 to 9].

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