TOWNFIELDS, ROYDS AND SHAWS: THE MEDIEVAL LANDSCAPE OF A SOUTH PENNINE TOWNSHIP*

THOMAS JEFFREYS’S MAP of Yorkshire (1772) shows the ‘Dun River’ emerging from the high moors near the county boundary in the west.1 Only a few farmsteads were marked along the banks of the Don before it reached Thurlstone, six miles away, but their names — all of which are still in use — provide vital clues to the medieval origins of this Pennine landscape within the extensive parish of Penistone. Two prominent ridges, descending from the moors, converge on the village of Thurlstone and taper to a point that was once occupied by an ancient water-powered corn mill where the Don has forced its way through a narrow gap. Several of the farmsteads that shelter under the brow of the sunny side of the northern ridge bear medieval names, but fewer buildings stand on the northern side of the southern ridge, where Thurlstone’s common pastures stretched up to the skyline. The Upper Don valley was a remote area, rarely visited by outsiders. One who did, reported in 1822 that ‘the environs of Penistone have a dreary and barren appearance, especially to the Westward, where nothing presents itself but black and barren moors, covered chiefly with heath and ling . . . The climate, as well as the soil, is cold and unfavourable to vegetation’.2 Yet even at 1,100 feet above sea level, the most westerly hamlet of Carlecotes had its townfields where cereals (mainly oats) were grown, and in 1379 its leading inhabitant, William Rich, was a prosperous mercer who paid three times the basic rate of poll tax.3 Few families ventured far in search of better