Alnham : Outlying Farmsteads And Settlements
In addition to the main nucleated village complex, the sites of several outlying settlements have been identified within the bounds of Alnham township, beside the Rowhope Burn, at Het Hill and at Leafield Edge, along with a number of individual, isolated farmsteads on the Spartley Burn and the Shank Burn. With the exception of those identified beside the Spartley Burn, these farmsteads or hamlets were all situated along tributaries of the Breamish, which provided substantial additional resources for the medieval community of Alnham.
Alnhamsheles and Alnham Moor (cf. Dixon 1985, II, 32-5): The scattered complex of steadings and garths on either side of the Rowhope Burn has been identified with the settlement of Alnhamsheles (cf. Dixon 1985, II, 32-3), which figures in several medieval documents and for a time seems to have acquired the status of a separate township itself. The earliest document to mention it, the Inquisition Post Mortem of John de Vesci in 1265, refers to the ‘Seles of Alnham Moor’ as part of the manor of Alnham (Cal IPM; PRO C145/29/38) and this is repeated in another Vesci inquisition in 1289 (Dixon 1985, II, 32), suggesting that the settlement originated as a cluster of seasonally-occupied cottages (shielings or ‘shiels’) used by the villagers while ‘summering’ their livestock in the Breamish catchment.
It was certainly established as a permanent community by 1314/5, when the Inquisition of Henry de Percy reveals there were eleven tenants at Alnhamsheles who paid £6 rent in time of peace (PRO C134/41/1). However it is not documented in any later Percy IPMs suggesting its life as a distinct township may have been relatively short. The farm of the Moor was worth £10 per annum in time of peace in the mid 15th century (Bean 1958, 30), but in 1472 it was let for only £4 because it had been devastated and its buildings destroyed (‘edifca . . . ad terram corruuntur’, cf. Percy Bailiff’s Rolls, 83). The same annual valuation is recorded in Clarkson’s Survey of the Percy estate in 1566/7 in respect of the demesne lands of ‘Alnham Moor’ leased by John Horsley. On this basis Dixon argues the village was abandoned by the mid 16th century.
A firm correlation between Alnhamsheles and the remains beside the Rowhope Burn, upstream of Alnham Moor Farm, is demonstrated by Norton ‘s map which inserts the caption ‘Here stode the Towne’ at this point. John Bell’s survey of the Alnham Moor enclosed lands in December 1809 (Aln Cas O XI 9) notes the ‘ruins of a village’ in the same area, which it labels ‘Boutlands’, and shows the outline of the field system. The remains visible today comprise perhaps up to twenty steadings with attendant garths, though not all the dwellings need have been occupied contemporaneously or been of equivalent status or function (planned by Dixon 1985, II, 34). Ten are clearly more sizeable than the remainder (Dixon 1985, II, 33). The village is surrounded by broad ridge and furrow ploughlands.
In the late medieval period, settlement in this area appears to have been concentrated into a single farmstead further downstream at Alnham Moor Farm. Thus Norton’s map of 1619 shows only a single building messuage in this part of the township, and this was clearly situated on the north side of the Shank Burn (the ‘Eu-erdeane burne’) roughly where the modern farm of Alnham Moor stands.
The farm is depicted at the centre of a large parcel of desmesne infields, listed by Mayson’s survey of 1615 as comprising 229 acres. Only two other buildings are shown in the northern part of the township. One, located slightly further south east at Cobden or ‘Coppeden’, clearly represents another farmstead, although it is illustrated in a less prominent fashion than Alnham Moor, and is attached to another 20-acre parcel of demesne land, ‘Coppeden alias Cobdon Leas’.
Several other tracts of enclosed demesne lie adjacent to Cobdon Leas, including ‘Cobdon Hawgh’ (i.e. Haugh), Barresse (together comprising over 129 acres) and Todlaw (6 acres). A third much smaller building, labelled ‘S[.] Sheild’, is shown c. 600m to the south east of the Cobdon messuage, at the south end of a 14 acre enclosure of freehold ground, ‘Cobdon Head’, held by Thomas Collingwood. The depiction of this building is much smaller and less elaborate than any of the other messuages shown on the map, lacking their stylised elements such the red (pantile?) roofs, suggesting that it was no more than a seasonally occupied cottage, as is also implied by the ‘shield’ name.
With the return of peaceful conditions in the 17th century, permanent settlement may have expanded once more along the Breamish. Three rows of cottages, situated on both the north and south sides of the Shank Burn, are marked on a Percy estate map of 1726 (Aln Cas O XI 3) and these can still be traced on the ground.
Other settlements attributed to the post-medieval period in the south catchment of the Breamish included the foundations of a longhouse with adjacent ridge and furrow at NT 96321584 on the north side of Meggrim’s Knowe, whilst an intriguing group of rectangular stone buildings has been surveyed by Tim Gates and Stuart Ainsworth at Tod Stones on the north bank of the Spartley Burn. A sub-circular stone structure at the west end of the largest of the buildings could be a kiln, raising the possibility that this might represent an illicit whiskey still of the kind known locally in the 18th century.
Barresses and Leafield: Two other settlements which have been identified on the ground, represented sizeable sites on the evidence of the extant remains. Thus the foundations of as many as thirteen steadings, surrounded by broad ridge and furrow, have been traced running up the slope of Het Hill in an irregular string. This area, located opposite Alnham Moor, is labelled ‘Barresse’ on the 1619 map, ‘The Barresses’ or similar on a succession of 18th-early-19th century plans. John Bell’s 1809 survey of Alnham Moor (Aln Cas O XI 9) notes the ‘ruins of several houses’at this point and depicts the outlines of abandoned field enclosures.
At Leafield Edge three distinct groups of earthworks, comprising the foundations of perhaps ten or more rectangular buildings with associated paddocks or garths, were recorded by Gates and Ainsworth. The settlement was located on the western edge of a unified block of broad ridge ploughing, which corresponds remarkably closely to the 115 acre parcel of demesne labelled ‘Alnham Moore Lea feilde’, shown on the 1619 map on either side of Leafield Burn. However, neither Leafield Edge nor the Barresses / Het Hill is marked as a settlement or even as a farmstead on that map suggesting they had already been abandoned by the early 17th century.
Freehold lands: Similarly extensive areas of broad ridge and furrow can be still traced through aerial photographs and ground observation at Hartlaw field on the north side of township’s Northfield, where Norton’s map marks a substantial building messuage similar to Alnham Moor, and at Aldersfield and Bromley to the west of Hazeltonrig. These too correspond to late-16th and early 17th century demesne parcels or freeholds, comprising 94, 39 and 53 acres respectively (cf. Dixon 1985, II, 25). All these outlying areas of broad ridging, including Leafield and Alnham Moor mentioned above, have been plotted out by Dixon (1985, I, based on RAF 1948 CPE Scot 319).
This arable cultivation had apparently ceased by beginning of the 17th century, if not earlier, since the demesne parcels and freeholdings all figure as pasture closes in Mayson’s Survey (1615) and Norton’s associated ‘plat’. The tenurial history of certain of these freehold lands, notably Cobden Head and Aldersfield, which was earlier known as Farnylees or Farneley, can be traced through a series of deeds and related documents, including two newly discovered by Tim Gates during the research for this Atlas.
