Ancient and Archaeology听 permalink
Anglo Saxon woodland.
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Message 1.听
Posted by englishvote (U5473482) on Tuesday, 4th September 2007
I have a question about just how heavily wooded England was before the Norman conquest.
It has always been my understanding that lowland Britain was basically one huge forest until the bronze age and then gradually humans cleared the trees until we have the present situation.
But I recently read an article that states that Anglo Saxon England was not much more forested than present day England, at something like 10% woodland. In fact it had been that way since Roman times and probably before. Most of the forest had gone before the Iron age.
Apparently only after the Norman conquest were large tracks of England turned into 鈥渇orests鈥, for the breading and hunting of deer. The forests created were not necessarily all woodland, but areas legally set aside for deer hunting.
Is this so? Or just some wild fantasy and was England a heavily wooded area up until the industrial revolution. -
Message 2
Posted by ungodfather (U2173708) on Tuesday, 4th September 2007
You're right that England (not the UK NB) was basically cleared of trees by the Iron Age, bar a few dense remaining tracts such as the Weald and the Forest of Dean. These are all on the worst agricultural land for obvious reasons.
The lowest point of all (~4% woodland cover) is in about the mid 1600s. However there was a lot of deforestation dating from the neolithic (esp on what is now Downland and heathland), and even in the case of heathland from the mesolithic, so actually clearance is very significant even earlier than the bronze age you suggest.
There's a bit of a recovery in the Dark Ages and again post Black Death but generally the picture is a steep decline in woodland from the Neolithic, resulting in almost complete clearance before the Romans get here, then yet further slow decline (with a few wobbles as noted) until the 1600s. There's then a very slow recovery from the 1600s that gathers pace rapidly from the 1950s and continues to this day.
For Ireland and Scotland deforestation isn't near complete until much later, say 1800s for both. Not sure about Wales, I'd guess somewhere in between.
Siunce WW2 woodland cover has been rising because of plantations of exotic conifers and, from the mid 50s onwards, the natural spread of secondary woodland over once open Common land (esp old heaths) and Downland with the end of low intensity grazing in those areas.
Oliver Rackham's "A History of the British Countryside" is a good general reference, although ideas about the structure and function of truly natural forests has moved on a bit since he wrote it, esp in that many suspect he has underestimated the influence of early hunter gatherers and importantly wild animals; eg wild cattle and beavers.
Heathland is a case in point; with mesolithic hunter gatherers starting to burn it for game drives so early after the end of the ice age, it may never have been that densely forested at all.
As an aside, this is the first interglacial when the UK hasn't had elephants. mesolithic people seem to have fulfilled a similar ecological function; a UK without humans but with elephants would probably be much more of a savanna than dense woodland anyway. It's hard to tell what a truly "natural" landscape would be in Europe, there are just to many ways we've been influencing things, ever since Cro Magnon type people started hunting Mammoths. -
Message 3
Posted by englishvote (U5473482) on Tuesday, 4th September 2007
Thanks ungodfather for that informative reply.
My understanding of the situation has changed radically, I had a preconceived notion that England was still very much forested until the start of the industrial revolution.
I think the picture of a heavily wooded countryside in ancient and medieval times is very common, and even widely accepted.
Stories of vast forests, the abode of robbers and even of Robin Hood and the safe haven of Sherwood.
Also I seem to remember school history lessons about the forests only being cut down to build Nelsons navy, before that England was apparently covered in huge forests. And O level history texts telling of how the forests were decimated by charcoal burners to provide fuel for the early Iron works.
But of course schools have moved on since my day, and so it appears has our understanding of the human impact on our environment.
We have leant so much more about how great an impact early humans made to these islands, and just how what we consider to be natural is very much influenced by mankind.
As another question, have we any idea of the impact humans had on Britain before the last ice age, during the previous interglacial period. Or has the evidence simple been erased? -
Message 4
Posted by Flying_Arf-RIP_scrum_V_MB (U1505179) on Friday, 7th September 2007
When the ironworks were moved to Wales it was due the the plentifull supply of water & forestry, it was only after the valleys had been denuded of trees that the use of coke instead of charcoal was developed
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Message 5
Posted by stanilic (U2347429) on Sunday, 9th September 2007
Be careful not to confuse `woodland' with `forest' as `forest' also includes open space.
Furthermore there is `ancient woodland' and `woodland'. I don't think there is any `ancient woodland' left.
I think a thorough reading of Oliver Rackham, as reommended, will help enormously with this topic. -
Message 6
Posted by ungodfather (U2173708) on Thursday, 13th September 2007
There's a lot of ancient woodland left. Ancient woodland is defined as land that has been continuously wooded since the 1600s - because that was a low point, and pragmatically because that was when meaningful maps were invented. NB that it doesn't mean that the woodland has never been managed - it has all been managed to some extent - but simply that it has never been, say, a field.
I suspect you mean either virgin forest - in which case you're right, there's no virgin forest left in W Europe (merely wiping out the wild cattle and wild horses, let alone the boar and beaver, does for fully virgin status, and that's before anyone gets out an axe).
Or maybe you mean primary forest - land that has been continuously wooded not just since 1600 but since the end of the Ice Age. If so you'd be wrong - there are quite a few areas where various ecological and soil indicators lead one to believe that they are probably primary.
Returning to ancient woodland, there's an Ancient Woodland Inventory for most English counties, used amongst other things to protect them from development (or at least to try to!!). It should be available via your library or County Council. The %age cover varies from <1% in say Cambridgeshire up to, IIRC, about 9% in West Sussex. (9% ancient woodland cover is a lot! - that's 9% of the whole county, not 9% of the woods). -
Message 7
Posted by ungodfather (U2173708) on Thursday, 13th September 2007
Human influences before the last Ice Age were minimal - at that stage we'd be talking H neanderthalis (actually that's during the last glaciation)and I think heidlebergensis if you mean Boxgrove and Swanscombe type people living in a warm period. At that time Homo seems to have had minimal detectable influence on the landscape - maybe some very selective impacts on particular species (in S Africa early humans have a noticeable impact on the average size of tortoises for instance, as they ate all the big ones) but nothing more.
Neanderthals were perhaps bad news for cave bears because of habitat competition, but it took "Man the Wise" to really mess up the ecosystem!
And on a completely different topic...
The old Nelson's Navy taking all the good trees is a myth. So too is the charcoal issue - in fact woods survived best in places like the Forest of Dean and the Sussex and Kentish Weald where the charcoal industry was most important - probably they survived in part precisely because the industry was important, far more important than a few more miseable acres of poor grazing land. British broadleaves (other than beech) coppice, or regrow from the stump, when felled, so managing woods for small roundwood is infinitely sustainable. Coke from coal replaced charcoal because it was cheaper and available in huge quantities, not because we ran out of timber to make charcoal from.
Felling for tar and charcoal did have a big impact on later Scottish and Scandinavian forest clearance however - conifers don't coppice, fell them and they die. These areas also lacked the legal framework that protected English forests, so livestock often followed the felling and ate whatever regeneration from seed that there was.
It's actually very hard to completely kill a broadleaved tree; anyone who's tried to clear scrub off old grassland can attest to this. Even hard grazing often isn't enough. To do a proper job you usually have to grub it out, or use pigs to grub for you. -
Message 8
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Thursday, 13th September 2007
Thanks ungodfather, really informative posts. As an archaeometallurgy enthusiast your comments on charcoal from coppiced woodland were especially interesting.
Best wishes,
TP -
Message 9
Posted by fascinating (U1944795) on Friday, 14th September 2007
ungodfather, can you name one or two areas where there is primary forest, ie forest that has been there since the ice age?
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Message 10
Posted by ungodfather (U2173708) on Saturday, 15th September 2007
Off the top of my head..
The Mens and Ebernoe Common in West Sussex (both SSSI/SACs and Sussex Wildlife Trust nature reserves I used to manage), you can get details from the SWT website, both are open access and well worth a visit (take a compass as it's very easy to get gloriously lost, esp at Ebernoe, and both sites have lots of unmarked paths).
Bits of both the Forest of Dean and the New Forest
Most of the remaining Caledonian Pine Forest like the Black Wood of Rannoch.
A lot of the Ghyll woodlands of E Sussex and south west Kent
Let me know where you live (roughly) and I'll see if I can make some more local suggestions - no guarantees though, my detailed knowledge is mostly of southern England.
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Message 11
Posted by englishvote (U5473482) on Tuesday, 18th September 2007
Some very informative posts, they bring up so many more questions I shall have to get some books on the subject.
I am amazed how the facts differ from what is generally perceived. The impact of humans on their environment with just the aid of simple tools over a relatively short time span is far beyond what I assumed or for that matter what I was taught at school.
If I can just ask, can anybody recommend a book that covers the subject in simple terms that even I may understand? -
Message 12
Posted by stalteriisok (U3212540) on Saturday, 22nd September 2007
hi ungodfather
re Nelsons fleet -
"HMS Victory was built from the wood of over 5,000 oaks and the entire fleet of 27 ships contained around 50,000 oaks, representing roughly two million years of tree growth. Although oak was the back bone of the ships, over 20 species were involved, all with a unique place on board: from fir masts to pine booms, hazel gunpowder barrels to ash tillers. "
we had at that time about 200 warships - what were they built from ??? were only the ships of the line oak ??
sad tale - there was an ancient woodland on the channel tunnel site - monday it was there (i have a photo) - wednesday it was a bonfire
st
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Message 13
Posted by Alaric the Goth (U1826823) on Tuesday, 25th September 2007
Oliver Rackham鈥檚 鈥楬istory of the Countryside is indeed the key to understanding all this. He does reckon that woodland was largely cleared in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, and that what the Romans saw when they conquered was a landscape with small woods here and there, mostly managed by coppicing, the main purpose of which was to provide wood as fuel, though in some localities it supported iron-smelting with charcoal.
Rackham makes the very important point that the word 鈥榝orest鈥 was brought over here by the Normans, and meant 鈥榓 place of deer鈥 i.e. where deer (and some other 鈥榖easts of the chase鈥) were protected by forest law so that Norman Dukes, Bishops, other nobles and the King himself could enjoy the sport of hunting them. So we have Forests that were mainly moorland, like the Forest of Bowland, or the Forest of Rossendale. We have (mainly) wooded Forests like the New Forest (a patchwork of land types including woodland) and Forest of Dean. And we also have mainly heathland forests, like Sherwood Forest, which had no more woodland in the supposed time of Robin Hood than agricultural parts of the East Midlands not designated as 鈥榝orest鈥!
Only in recent centuries do we have 鈥榝orest鈥 meaning 鈥榩lace of trees鈥 (and largely used of plantations of conifers).
Ireland, by the way, lost more of its native woodland than England. The lack of an iron industry of any size may have contributed, and the relatively dense population (before the 19th century Famine and subsequent emigration). Very little 鈥榓ncient woodland鈥 is left there (e.g. the Killarney Oakwoods), or in Scotland either. Most lowland Scottish semi-natural or natural woodland would be oak-hazel wood. The native conifer, Scots pine, was found mainly in the Highlands, along with birch. Only the very north was treeless, but the spread of moorland is likely to have had a climatic as well as human cause. -
Message 14
Posted by Mick_mac (U2874010) on Tuesday, 25th September 2007
Ireland, by the way, lost more of its native woodland than England. The lack of an iron industry of any size may have contributed, and the relatively dense population (before the 19th century Famine and subsequent emigration). Very little 鈥榓ncient woodland鈥 is left there (e.g. the Killarney Oakwoods),..听
From the 16th century onwards Ireland native woodlands were decimated to feed Britain's need for timber and wood. Irish forests were routinely used to supply the iron industry in the 17thn and 18th centuries. There is a famous Irish poem of the period lamenting the loss of our forests:
Cad a dh茅anaimid feasta gan adhmaid?
T谩 deireadh 谩r coillte ar l谩r.
[What now shall we do without timber
Everywhere our forests are gone!]
In the 18th century the British navy had a timber depot in Kinsale, Co Cork, that organised the export of timber from confiscated estates. In addition, we supplied the British market for barrel staves, barrels and other cooperage. There are hundreds of families in the south-west nick-named Coopers after this trade.
The Houses of Parliament were roofed using Irish oak from Cratloe in Co Clare. -
Message 15
Posted by RyanO (U8918008) on Tuesday, 25th September 2007
鈥榳e had at that time about 200 warships - what were they built from ???鈥
In Ireland there were extensive forests until the late 16th C. This was the last period of English attempts at conquest and the forest was the refuge of raparees, tories and 鈥榳ood kern (ceithern = lightly armed soldier)鈥.
Needless to say the above were the opponents of the conquest and this shows the degree of tree cover to some extent.
Anyway the English attempts at colonisation went hand-in-hand with deforestation and the timber was the raw materiel for the ships of the Royal navy etc -
Message 16
Posted by Alaric the Goth (U1826823) on Wednesday, 26th September 2007
I don鈥檛 think it鈥檚 correct that Ireland was extensively wooded till the 16th century. As I recall, it鈥檚 not what Rackham, the expert on these things, says. I will look at 鈥楬istory of the Countryside鈥 again and check.
And if all these Irish trees were felled for timber to build British warships, etc. why did they not grow back from the stumps, for that is what broadleaved deciduous trees, such as oak, do if you cut them down? -
Message 17
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Wednesday, 26th September 2007
I don鈥檛 think it鈥檚 correct that Ireland was extensively wooded till the 16th century
听
And you would be right. Clearance accelerated from the 16th century on, but the real clearance had already been done long before. Study of ancient pollen deposits show that the race to deforest good agricultural land as far back as the Neolitich period had already stripped such remote areas as Achill Island of their trees. It can be assumed that Neolithic communities expanded from the better lands outwards, indicating that the great fertile plains on the island had already by then been turned over to agriculture. This is borne out by separate studies conducted in the Boyne Valley, which indicate that this region had missed the bulk of its trees by as early as 3,000 BC.
To put the English contribution to things into perspective, Rockham points out that Ireland, in terms of woodland coverage in the year 1600, had only one third that of England. -
Message 18
Posted by RyanO (U8918008) on Wednesday, 26th September 2007
'To put the English contribution to things into perspective, Rockham points out that Ireland, in terms of woodland coverage in the year 1600, had only one third that of England.'
So were the forests cleared during the period immediatly prior to 1600 when reduction of the Gaelic lordships reached its zenith? -
Message 19
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Wednesday, 26th September 2007
No, not if you mean compared to what happened afterwards. Both the late Gaelic landlords and their replacements from Norman intrusion onwards were working with a remnant of what once was. The Gaelic Irish didn't go in much for copsing, but they did attempt a form of tree husbandry by making some species exempt from felling, a piecemeal form of "legislation" that had little effect, primarily because constantly shifting political regimes made it difficult to enforce. When the land changed hands and became available for exploitation by Norman and English owners later little or no regard was paid to these old strictures, and Irish grievances against the English from this time does indeed list their 'indiscriminate' deforestation. However it is also true that the same landlords were in fact contributing to forestation by the same token, and many of Ireland's most treasured forests today actually date from this period and later.
But neither today's coverage, nor that which prevailed in the late Gaelic period are anything like that which had existed before the late Neolithic. If you're going to point an accusing finger at anyone for having a good go at removing every last tree from Ireland and converting it to arable land, rock and bog you need to go pre-Celtic, I'm afraid. -
Message 20
Posted by englishvote (U5473482) on Wednesday, 26th September 2007
Interesting stuff.
If Neolithic man had such a large impact in Lowland Britain and Ireland then did they have the same impact in continental Europe and elsewhere?
Surely Germany was very heavily wooded in the first century AD and even up until modern times and it must have had nearly the same population density as the British Isles. -
Message 21
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Thursday, 27th September 2007
Recent theory has it that Germany in Neolithic times followed a pattern of development that was rather unique in that the networks of societies for which traces remain show evidence that there was no steady progression towards the cultivation of arable land, but rather a swing back and forth over millennia between foraging and farming as predominant means of providing substenance. This is not true on the great estuaral plains, where farming took hold and remained, and there as you would expect the pollen analysis shows a marked absence of trees in comparison to the higher land and the land furthest from the navigable river stretches. By the iron age, in other words, German (and central European) landscape had come to resemble that which the Romans recorded - highly advanced arable land usage sitting cheek by jowl with nomadic herding on great expanses of land cleared of high density woodland. These areas themselves however were adjacent to (and sometimes penned in by) equally huge tracts of land that had preserved their ancient woodlands, since the land they covered was of an agricultural standard inferior to that which was now available in quantities sufficient to support the indigenous population.
Or to put it bluntly - they were as good at chopping down trees as any other Neolithic people, but just didn't have to denude the whole landscape to get enough good bits to live off. -
Message 22
Posted by Alaric the Goth (U1826823) on Friday, 28th September 2007
Mick_mac wrote: 鈥業n addition, we supplied the British market for barrel staves, barrels and other cooperage. There are hundreds of families in the south-west nick-named Coopers after this trade.鈥
Rackham points out that only a particularly high-quality wood can be used to make barrels, and that only a few trees in a wood would be suitable, so a whole wood couldn鈥檛 disappear due to barrel-making.
He also points out that it was just those parts of Ireland with the largest concentrations of ironworks that had the greatest survival of woodland, e.g. the west of Co. Waterford was still relatively well-wooded in 1840, and had not lost much in the previous 200 years. The iron industry in Ireland as well as Britain knew to manage its fuel supply.
He does acknowledge that the 17th and 18th centuries were particularly destructive of Irish woods, but says that this is due to rapid population growth (he mentions a four-fold increase) which meant all sorts of land including some very 鈥榤arginal鈥 bits, e.g. derries in loughs, was turned into agricultural land. -
Message 23
Posted by englishvote (U5473482) on Friday, 28th September 2007
Thanks Nordmann, I am starting to get a much better picture of events but it does all bring up more questions as I find out more.
It would appear that stone age man was responsible for deforesting the majority of Europe to provide farming and pasture land. And contrary to mine and many others misconception it was not the growth of industry that was responsible for the demise of woodland areas.
Even my notion that the impact on woodland areas within the British isles was more pronounced because of the fact that we are islands of limited useable land seems also to be off the mark. -
Message 24
Posted by mickeymay (U3600416) on Saturday, 29th September 2007
Iron age, was that pre roman? If so they were moaning about too much dense woodland (romans of course), old ceasar partly quit it on that basis.
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Message 25
Posted by cleopatraii (U9624147) on Sunday, 30th September 2007
Hi all!
I'm a member But I amn't a new member!Well,I'm cleopatraii from Egypt,I'm 16 years old .I'm here to improve my english and do speaking practise.My real name is samar
Love
Samar -
Message 26
Posted by Mick_mac (U2874010) on Sunday, 30th September 2007
Substantial native woodlands survived in Ireland into the 17th century, especially in Gaelicised areas outside the Pale where agricultural activity was primarily pastoral in character.
The south-east coast had an extensive export trade from Arklow and Wexford in oak for shipbuilding. So did the southern Munster ports of Bantry, Kinsale and Cork. Timber was shipped out as planking and staves for export. Staves were also being sent to Spain in large quantities. English and Dutch ships plying the wine trade routinely collected cargoes of staves from southern Irish ports because they were refused wine cargoes in Spain if they did not first offload fresh staves. At Irish ports staves fetched 拢6 per 1000, four times their production costs. The early growth in the town of Killarney was based upon trade in timber from the surviving forests of the south-west. Stave production was concentrated around south Cork and the valleys of the rivers Slaney in the south-east and Bann in the north.
In the 1670s the account books of the Bristol merchant James Twyford show, for example, that after Irish tallow, hides and wool his largest trading commodity was Irish timber, mainly in the form of barrel staves.
Bristol merchant records are also full of references to the trade in Irish goshawks and the skins of Irish wolf, squirrel and marten, all of which originated from woodland habitats in Ireland and were traded through that port. Ireland鈥檚 last recorded wolf was killed in 1754. Many English writers allude, not always flatteringly, to the forests of Ireland in the late 17th century, particularly in Ulster and Munster. During the Ulster plantation the forests of the north were reserved by law for building purposes only. -
Message 27
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Sunday, 30th September 2007
This still does not in any way corroborate a claim that the English were responsible in the main for Ireland's progression from a predominately wooded landscape to forestry levels commensurate with today's. It does however clearly illustrate the pattern of exploitation of woodland that saw Ireland's remaining woodland in the 16th century decimated (ie. reduced by a tenth) within 200 years during a period when Irish timber was - in terms of labour cost, availability, and ease of extraction - a more viable resource than its English counterpart.
Your use of the term 'substantial' in your opening sentence Mick_mac deserves a little qualification on your part therefore. While no one would deny that - compared to at any point after 1700, for example - so much of the woodland being newly exploited was indeed native, unmanaged forestry, it would be foolish indeed if the term was being used to imply that the island still retained anything like that woodland cover which had pertained up to the Bronze Age.
While this might seem almost a trifling point to many, I would contend that it is anything but, especially in light of some people's inclination to blame the English for all Ireland's ills, and in their rush to do so (as exemplified further up in this thread) misrepresent data in order to make one thing look like another, altogether worse, thing. That the English (as landlords, customers and legislators) exploited Irish woodland commercially to a huge extent in the period you mention is a fact. That it is this that accounts for the greatest deforestation of the island ever is an unsupportable claim (and risible when compared to the great land clearances conducted through to the late Bronze Age / early Iron Age). And that it fails to include the bald fact that silviculture such as it existed right up to the foundation of the Free State was conducted in the main by English managers of landed estates (the descendants of the Gael saw trees as obstructions to effective farming - as many still do) simply amplifies the distortion. If this distortion is accidental on your part, then I request your forgiveness in having had the affrontery to correct it. If it wasn't, then I am simply glad to have done so. -
Message 28
Posted by mickeymay (U3600416) on Monday, 1st October 2007
you could start with amn't, I'm not, would be better suited
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Message 29
Posted by Mick_mac (U2874010) on Tuesday, 2nd October 2007
Sorry to further hijack this thread but 鈥
Nordmann,
I am replying to your accusation that my last post
鈥 still does not in any way corroborate a claim that the English were responsible in the main for Ireland's progression from a predominately wooded landscape to forestry levels commensurate with today's.听
I made no such claim. I said that 鈥榝rom the 16th century onwards Ireland鈥檚 native woodland was decimated to feed Britain鈥檚 need for timber and wood鈥. You seem to be in agreement with me about this as you say that my post:
鈥oes however clearly illustrate the pattern of exploitation of woodland that saw Ireland's remaining woodland in the 16th century decimated (ie. reduced by a tenth) within 200 years鈥hat the English (as landlords, customers and legislators) exploited Irish woodland commercially to a huge extent in the period you mention is a fact. 听
The argument about the extent of that woodland is a separate issue about which I made no comment whatever other than to say that 鈥榮ubstantial native woodlands survived in Ireland into the 17th century, especially in Gaelicised areas outside the Pale where agricultural activity was primarily pastoral in character鈥.
As I said, my comments related to the surviving native forest, whatever its extent. You take issue with my use of the word 鈥榮ubstantial鈥. By 鈥榮ubstantial native woodland鈥 I meant woodland within the Gaelicised areas of Ireland, and south-west Ireland in particular where I have specialist knowledge. You said:
..it would be foolish indeed if the term was being used to imply that the island still retained anything like that woodland cover which had pertained up to the Bronze Age.听
Indeed it would, but then, I repeat, I made no comment in this regard. In fact, there are two arguments here: one about the extent of the cover that remained into the early modern period, and another about what subsequently happened to it. I was referring to the latter. I do not suffer from what you describe as the 鈥榠nclination to blame the English for all Ireland鈥檚 ills鈥 and I think if there was any distortion it was more inferred than implied. -
Message 30
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Tuesday, 2nd October 2007
Apologies Mick_mac if it sounded like I was attributing the statement about Perfidious Albion (as in "it's all down to P.A., every damn thing" kind of attitude) to yourself. I believe it was RyanO's comment earlier that patently implied the Irish transformation from an island on which you could once swing Tarzan-like in the trees from Clare to Dublin to a single copse surrounded by cow-rearing land and rock is England's doing.
With regard to what the English DID do to the trees I would tentatively suggest that the Irish beef at the time was not so much with the trees they selected for the purpose (though several poets and commentators of the day did express their dismay in those terms) but with the fact that a profit was being turned at the expense of the Irish from which the Irish would not benefit. As you know yourself none of the grievances expressed when taken alone amount to much compared to the underlying grievance shared by the bulk of the island's inhabitants - that of having been reduced to slavedom on their own turf by a foreign power. If removing vegetation in Ireland would have rid the Irish of English dominion, sufficient numbers of patriots would have been out with their axes, scythes and weedkiller to reduce the island to an extension of the Sahara overnight. -
Message 31
Posted by Alaric the Goth (U1826823) on Wednesday, 3rd October 2007
鈥楢n extension of the Sahara overnight?鈥 I don鈥檛 think that an Ireland cleared of trees and shrubs would be a desert! I think that quite an amount of bogginess is a lot more likely, as clearing the woodland would not change the rainfall the island gets!
I would contend still that the 17th/18th century destruction of Irish woodlands had relatively little to do with English commercial exploitation and a lot to do with an increased need for agricultural land in Ireland itself.
It still remains the case that if you cut down most native tree species in Britain or Ireland it does not kill the tree, and regrowth occurs. Cut down a whole Irish wood for barrel-staves (as I said in my post above, it is extremely unlikely that whole woods were ever felled for that purpose) and it regrows, unless you dig out or poison the stumps (in which case, it鈥檚 goodbye to any more barrel-staves). And I pointed out also that the Irish iron industry, just like its English counterpart, helped more woodland to survive in areas where that industry thrived, compared to mainly 鈥榓gricultural鈥 areas with no such industry. -
Message 32
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Wednesday, 3rd October 2007
Good to see the Gothic sense of irony alive and kicking still.
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Message 33
Posted by Mick_mac (U2874010) on Wednesday, 3rd October 2007
No problem, Nordmann.
I appreciate your response and was greatly amused by your image of Irish patriots hacking and cutting all round them for Ireland.
No time to elaborate now but will later if I get the chance. -
Message 34
Posted by RyanO (U8918008) on Sunday, 7th October 2007
鈥業 would contend still that the 17th/18th century destruction of Irish woodlands had relatively little to do with English commercial exploitation and a lot to do with an increased need for agricultural land in Ireland itself.鈥
In some ways the two went hand in hand AtG. You have to remember that there were laws inhibiting the native Irish from doing very much and the colonisation process meant that the best land was taken by those who were subservient to Englands needs.
Most of the agricultural land in the 17th/18th Cs was taken by the Protestant Anglo-Irish aristocracy, with the natives as tenants or serfs. If the natives wished to become free of this system they took to the鈥oods/forests, to hide and issue forth to 鈥榯ax鈥 the landlords etc. Very much your Robin Hood type affair.
Hence you can see the continuing 鈥榠nterest鈥 in the notion of where and why the trees went. Colonisation demanded the reduction of whatever forests where there in order to rob the Raparees and 鈥榳ood kern鈥 of cover and to increase the usable/exploitable land for the colonisers鈥 -
Message 35
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Sunday, 7th October 2007
If the natives wished to become free of this system they took to the鈥oods/forests, to hide and issue forth to 鈥榯ax鈥 the landlords etc. Very much your Robin Hood type affair.
听
Sources please. And numbers. How many "natives" are we talking about here and how much forest cover did they need? Which forests are we talking about (with sources again, please). -
Message 36
Posted by Alaric the Goth (U1826823) on Monday, 8th October 2007
Since there is now an Irish woodland thread on 'History Hub' thanks to Mick_mac, it might be a good idea to get this thread back on topic. I live in West Yorkshire, and we have a lot of 鈥-ley鈥 placenames hereabouts, which denote that the towns/villages concerned started in woodland clearings made by Anglo-Saxons. As this part (鈥楨lmet鈥) was the last 鈥楥eltic鈥 kingdom East of the Pennines, presumably the clearings were made after the 620s takeover of the area by Northumbria (well Deira to be precise). What other areas of Britain would you suggest, going mainly on placename evidence, were unusually well-wooded at quite a late date?
-
Message 37
Posted by RyanO (U8918008) on Monday, 8th October 2007
: 鈥楽ources please鈥
'I believe鈥︹ - where is your source for that?
鈥榶ou could once swing Tarzan-like in the trees鈥 -and that?
鈥業 would tentatively suggest鈥 鈥 sources and numbers, times, skin colour etc etc
You seem to have a great love of sources when it comes to others but you blather on regardless. All the posters here engage in argument heavily based on their opinions, IMHO鈥 -
Message 38
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Monday, 8th October 2007
Ah, so you were speaking tongue in cheek then. Like I was (emmm, self evidently) since even I know that there is no record of a Lord Greystoke ever having visited Ireland, let alone traversed the island via convenient vines hanging from the dense arboreal foliage.
Source: Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc.
P.O. Box 570277
Tarzana, CA 91357-0277 -
Message 39
Posted by ungodfather (U2173708) on Tuesday, 9th October 2007
I've been away for a bit - I'd recommend Rackham as a good place to start, as have others, for further reading.
Have a look at at recent books by Kirby and Vera (google for details) for an up to date view of the ecological debate about what the original Wildwood looked like and what role large wild herbivores played in it. A bit technical but perfectly accessible to the interested layman - both expensive so get them from the library.
Lots of interesting stuff re Ireland, thanks all.
Someone (sorry, can't recall who) asked about coppice regrowth and why it evidently didn't happen (to a sufficient extent to retain the forest, anyway) in Ireland.
My guess is that there was heavy follow-on grazing/browsing after felling. From 1600 onwards, and esp in the first half of the 19th Century, the crofts of Ireland (and indeed large parts of rural Scotland) were deperately overpopulated such that the people could just about get by in good years but were in dire straights in bad ones. In such circumstances every cottager would aspire to have a cow or a goat that could be grazed wherever he could get away with it. It's not hard to see how livestock would prevent coppicing in such circumstances. Just a guess on my part but it seems likely.
I suggest we leave the debate as to why the Irish (and scots) were so impoverished to a politics board.
Incidentally pigs are still the method of choice for unscrupulous Landowners wishing to clear protected woodland; intensive pigs kill trees and esp coppice quite effectively but since no axe or chainsaw is involved most of the protective legislation doesn't apply. -
Message 40
Posted by RyanO (U8918008) on Wednesday, 10th October 2007
鈥楩rom 1600 onwards, and esp in the first half of the 19th Century, the crofts of Ireland (and indeed large parts of rural Scotland) were desperately overpopulated鈥
Strange. Define 鈥榦verpopulated鈥 in terms of the 17-18th Cs? Was Scotland ever overpopulated? The populations of Ireland and Scotland were always smaller than England: how come England didn鈥檛 starve?
Could it be that the political machinery in London ensured that England was developed in a progressive manner while in the other countries policies were employed which retarded normal development? Could be鈥
鈥業 suggest we leave the debate as to why the Irish (and scots) were so impoverished to a politics board鈥
You wish鈥 -
Message 41
Posted by an ex-nordmann - it has ceased to exist (U3472955) on Wednesday, 10th October 2007
Overpopulation is when the population exceeds the ability of available resources to sustain it. One of the first and most noticeable effects is famine since the closer a society comes to depend on a level of supply growing proportionate to the size in humans of that society, the more vulnerable it is to fluctuations or interruptions in that supply. England right up to the early 19th century was as prone to famine as any other European country, and more prone than most. The great famines of 1002-1005, 1315-17, 1586 (which gave rise to the Poor Law) and 1623-24 were almost replicated by others that erupted on a large scale but normally in more limited geographical areas. Areas of poor land with high populations were naturally the most vulnerable. The area of northern England, an area of roughly the same size and demographic distribution of population as Ireland for example, fared atrociously, with famines comparable in effect to the scenes made infamous worldwide during the great famine in Ireland, and often with a domino effect that spread nationwide rapidly. These occurred in 1066, 1235 (that affected large cities too - 20,000 alone died in London), 1294, 1390, 1555, 1591, 1690, 1740-41 (as had Ireland at the same time for the same reasons), 1800, and 1816-17.
So, RyanO, the answer to your question about the English developing England in a progressive manner (whatever that really means) is irrelevant. If it did, it didn't render the most vulnerable sectors immune to starvation when the food supply, for whatever reason, was disrupted. And nor did its Poor Law, as can be seen above, do much to aid those afflicted either. As regards your question "How come England didn't starve?", well, it did - and frequently enough to show that even a country which had tried before most others to circumvent and alleviate its own citizens risk of general starvation could do little once the domino effect kicked in. By the mid nineteenth century England had at last managed to organise its agricultural output and Poor Law application in such a way that famine became less likely, but in areas of overdependency on one crop (Ireland being the most glaring example) these measures proved useless. Besides Ireland local famine continued to afflict northern England (Cumberland and Westmorland faring rather badly) right in to the 20th century when two of Cumberland's wards were the last local authorities on record to apply for famine relief at the time of the coal strike.
Your point that England retarded Irish progress agriculturally (I think that's what you mean) is moot. Agriculture, like much else, developed in tandem with English practise for several centuries. It would be fairer to say that the impediment imposed by England was that Ireland's success agriculturally reaped little dividend for the bulk of its indigenous population thanks to a succession of embargos and later, the blatant use of Ireland as a staple provider for the English market. That is where the political axe is to grind, but not by asserting that the "English didn't starve". Historically, between the 11th and the 20th centuries, they starved more frequently and with alarming mortality rates that were often on a par with Ireland's at the height of its greatest famine. -
Message 42
Posted by ungodfather (U2173708) on Thursday, 11th October 2007
I have little to add to Nordmann's excellent summary of the situation in England, except to note that some of the famines, notably 1816, were caused by "volcanic winters" - just because we haven't had a really big eruption since then it would be foolish to assume we won't ever have one again. 1816 was "the year without a summer" following an eruption of Hekla in Iceland, the same volcano that caused the catastropic collapse of early bronze age society.
Scotland also came up - anyone who's travelled in the Hebrides, esp Lewis, can see the affect of overpopulation. Every last scrap of land that could be cultivated was cultivated; hankerchief fields hanging over Atlantic cliffs, even outlying windblasted islands like Rona. The landscape is littered with "lazy beds" that can never have offered anything beyond subsistance living. The infamous clearances weren't the main cause of emigration from many parts of Scotland, it was simply people looking for a better life.
It is perhaps worth noting, since this discussion has political undertones, that even the clearances were largely the result of Scottish landowners' decisions, not imported English ones. Greed beats nationalism every time. However the impact of the potato famine showed that even with a benevolent landlord the poorest crofters lived in a knife edge; they could emigrate to a city or to the New World but starvation was inevitable sooner or later if they continued to try to feed their growing families from such tiny scraps of poor land.
With a modern morality it is certainly true that the richer parts of society could and should have done a lot more to provide famine relief in England, Ireland, Wales, and Scotland, and some landlords did indeed save their people from starvation. But without emigration such charity would only have postponed the inevitable - there was no internet or tourism etc to generate rural income outside of farming in those days. -
Message 43
Posted by stanilic (U2347429) on Friday, 12th October 2007
The point about living on the margins in The Hebrides was the seasonal raiding of sea birds nests by the natives and a common diet of cooked gull.
From a culinary point of view I am quite relieved that my ancestors chose to leave for London although the Mile End slums were not much of an improvement. -
Message 44
Posted by Flying_Arf-RIP_scrum_V_MB (U1505179) on Friday, 12th October 2007
Swapping Gull for feral pidgeon wouldn't be much of an improvement.
-
Message 45
Posted by Haesten (U4770256) on Tuesday, 16th October 2007
What other areas of Britain would you suggest, going mainly on placename evidence, were unusually well-wooded at quite a late date?
听
Epping forest covered much of Essex in Anglo-Saxon England, plenty of Leighs and leys along the Estuary. Henry VIII was still using the Honour of Raleigh for example, his hunting lodge still survives.
Epping was also the largest forest in Anglo-Saxon England and the oak was of good quality. Oak can grow to maturity in as little as 100 years in sandy soil but is poor quality, in the clay soil found along the Estuary it takes 300 years -
Message 46
Posted by Alaric the Goth (U1826823) on Wednesday, 17th October 2007
But Epping Forest was not designated as 'forest' till the Normans and, as I keep pointing out, their use of 'forest' in no way automatically indicates the area concerned was wooded. I believe that Epping was in fact well-wooded, much more so than e.g. Sherwood Forest, but I would doubt that Essex was particulatry well-wooded outside it as it is generally low-lying land which has always been good for growing crops or rearing livestock.
-
Message 47
Posted by Alaric the Goth (U1826823) on Wednesday, 17th October 2007
This paper by Oliver Rackham is very informative. He says that 鈥榯he most characteristic element in Essex place-names is 鈥揻eld,鈥︹檛his appears to mean an open place in sight of woodland鈥ames referring to clearings in woodland (-ley., -hurst,- ridding) are widely scattered but are few in comparison to Derbyshire or the Weald.鈥
On late Roman Essex he says: 鈥楢lready we can see dimly an arrangement of tracts of farmland separated by irregular tracts of wood and wood-pasture鈥hose last survivor in one piece is Epping Forest.鈥 Of Epping he says 鈥榠t was divided into plains and tree-covered areas鈥.
He says that the Saxons 鈥榗arved out 鈥搇ey settlements in the wooded ribbons.鈥 -
Message 48
Posted by Haesten (U4770256) on Wednesday, 17th October 2007
Epping stretched right down the Estuary and up to Colchester, I think you will find many more names connected to woodland, Brentwood, Galleywood, Woodham Ferrers etc, Benfleet, is derived from the Old English 鈥淏eamfleote鈥 wood and water for example.
Also the oak forest was very important for rearing pigs, Domesday; Chelmsford 鈥渢here is woodland for 400 pigs鈥, Ongar, 鈥渢here is woodland for 700 pigs鈥, just about every entry has woodland for pigs. -
Message 49
Posted by stanilic (U2347429) on Wednesday, 17th October 2007
Epping is an `-ingas' name describing the people who live on the upland `yppe' (Cameron).
This could mean that this tribe were dominant in the area. Don't know how the Rodingas would feel about that but such matters can be managed. -
Message 50
Posted by Haesten (U4770256) on Wednesday, 17th October 2007
Ippying, Ipping, Eppinghethe and Eppingthorpe,.but the forest was known to the Anglo-Saxons as Waltham forest.
Hundred of Waltham
鈥淗oly Cross held Epping then as now 鈥 there is woodland for 50 pigs.鈥
Waltham Abbey (Holy Cross) was founded by Tovi a staller of Cnut, it was held by Harold pre conquest
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