THE BEASTS OF THE FOREST
Manwood’s _Treatise on the Forest Laws_, the first edition of which
appeared in 1598, has usually been accepted, without demur, as giving
indisputable details about the forests of England. Mr. Turner has,
however, rightly pointed out in his recent volume, _Select Pleas of the
Forest_, that Manwood, writing at the end of the Elizabethan period,
when forest law had for the most part decayed, is by no means altogether
reliable, particularly in those parts that treat of what constituted
beasts of the forest and beasts of the chase. In such particulars Manwood
seems to have relied on foreign rather than English treatises on hunting,
a fault in which he has been imitated by more than one modern writer, and
also to have confused methods of hunting with forest legislation.
Manwood declared that there were five beasts of the forest—the hart,
the hind, the hare, the wild boar, and the wolf; but this in reality
only makes four, for the hart and the hind are the male and female of
the red deer. He then made a second division, termed the beasts of the
chase, which included the buck and the doe (the male and female of the
fallow deer), the fox, the martin, and the roe. The law, however, made
no distinction of this kind between the red and fallow deer; both of
them were distinctly beasts of the forest, in any legal or customary
significance of that term.
The truth as to the English beasts of the forest, or king’s game, all of
which originally came under the head of venison, can only be ascertained
by a study of the eyre rolls and other original forest proceedings. It
then becomes clear that the forest beasts numbered four—the red deer, the
fallow deer, the roe, and the wild boar.
The hare has no business to be found in such a list, save in the single
warren of Somerton, within the bounds of the Somersetshire forest of
that name. In no other place is the hare known to have been preserved by
forest laws.
Again, the inclusion by Manwood of the wolf among the beasts of the
forest is absolutely without warrant.
As to beasts of the chase, a term without any legal significance, it may
be held to include, in addition to the deer, the wolf, the boar, the
hare, the fox, and other vermin, such as the wild cat, martin, badger,
otter, and even in some cases the squirrel. All that can be meant by this
term is, that these animals were chased and hunted, though after very
different fashions.
In charters of warren, a term already briefly discussed, the hare was the
principal beast. A decision of 1338 placed the roe among the beasts of
the warren; but it was not a decision of universal application. The fox,
and more especially the coney or rabbit, were also regarded as beasts of
the warren—that is noxious beasts which were hunted or killed, but not
preserved.
As to fowls of warren, they certainly could not be held to be noxious.
They included the pheasant, the partridge, and the woodcock, as well
as, in certain cases, such birds as the plover, and even the lark, the
capture of which was held to be a warren trespass. Mr. Turner considers
that it is probable that all birds, taken by snares or hawks within a
warren, were held to be fowls of the warren, and that their capture
constituted a legal trespass.
The one bird that has some claim to be considered a “fowl of the forest”
is the swan.
The RED DEER (_cervus elaphas_), the largest of the British deer, was the
chief beast of the forest, and remained so for a long period in all the
wilder districts, such as Dartmoor, Exmoor, the Peak Forest, Sherwood,
and the uplands of Pickering.
[Illustration: _PLATE IV_
RED DEER OF NEW FOREST (1791)]
The FALLOW DEER (_dama vulgaris_), introduced at an early date into
Britain, was more commonly sheltered in parks within forest bounds.
In a few cases both red and fallow deer were found in the same forest
outside parks; whilst other forests only sheltered one species. Thus
in Derbyshire, down to the time of their disafforestation in the
seventeenth century, only red deer were found in the Peak Forest, and
only fallow deer in Duffield Frith. In the fifteenth century, the fallow
deer were far the most numerous in the forests of Essex, Northampton,
Wiltshire, Hampshire, and Dorset; the proportions at later dates are
given in a subsequent section.
The different names applied to both these species at different ages of
their growth are not a little confusing, and vary somewhat from forest to
forest. The following table of terms, denoting the age and sex of the red
and fallow deer respectively, somewhat altered from a table given by Mr.
Turton in his account of Pickering forest, will be found useful:—
+---------------------------------------++-------------------------+
| RED DEER || FALLOW DEER |
+------+----------------+---------------++------------+------------+
| YEAR | HART | HIND || BUCK | DOE |
+------+----------------+---------------++------------+------------+
| 1st | calf | hind calf || fawn | fawn |
| |_vitulus cervi_ |_vitulus bisse_||_juvenculus_|_juvencula_ |
| | | || | |
| 2nd | brocket or | hyrsel or || pricket | tegg |
| | knobber | hearse ||_prikettus_ |_tegga_ |
| |_brokettus_ |_hyrsula_ or || | |
| | |_ursula_ || | |
| | | || | |
| 3rd | spayard | hind || sorrel | doe |
| |_spardus_ or |_bissa_ or ||_sourellus_ |_dama_ |
| |_sorellus cervi_|_cerva_ || | |
| | | || | |
| 4th | staggard | || soar, sore | |
| |_staggartus_ or | ||_sorus_ | |
| |_sourus cervi_ | || | |
| | | || | |
| 5th | stag | || buck | |
| |_staggus_ | ||_damus_ or | |
| | | ||_dama_ m. | |
| | | || | |
| 6th | hart | || great buck | |
| |_cervus_ | || | |
| | | || | |
| 7th | great hart | || | |
+------+----------------+---------------++------------+------------+
“Feton” (_feta_) is the term frequently used to signify a fawn, usually
of the red deer, in the earlier forest pleas and accounts. It occurs
several times in forest proceedings of the High Peak. The author of the
_Feudal History of Derbyshire_ makes the amusing mistake of reading it
_s_eton, and expends much learning on the derivation of such a term!
The term _raskall_ or _raskell_ occurs in various later forest accounts.
It usually means deer out of condition, fit neither to hunt nor kill; but
is occasionally used (as in Rutland accounts) to denote female deer.
“Murrain” was the generic term in mediæval England, for almost every
form of disease that affected cattle as well as deer. From the records
that are extant in various forest proceedings of the deaths of deer
from murrain, it is clear that sometimes this term was used to denote a
severe form of infectious illness that caused great ravages among the
herds; whilst at other times, when only two or three die in the year from
murrain, it would seem to be of the nature of some ordinary ailment. As a
rule, the foresters were expected to hang up on the trees of the forest
the carcases of those deer that had died of the murrain, and always to
keep a strict record of those that thus perished. On several occasions
there are instances of foresters being presented and fined, for skinning
and taking the hides of those that had died of disease.
At a later period, as in Duffield Frith, the foresters were ordered to
take the more sanitary course of burning the carcases. From a manuscript
book, dealing with the perambulations and pleas of Sherwood, in the
reigns of Henry III.-Edward III., it appears that the vast number of 350
head of deer (both red and fallow) had fallen victims to the murrain in
the year 1286.
The full records of the Pickering eyre of 1334 give details as to the
deer and murrain during each successive keepership since the last eyre
in 1280. During the keepership of Richard Skelton upwards of 500 died
of murrain. The murrain was severe in the forest of Rockingham during
the reigns of Henry VI., Edward IV., and Richard III., particularly
in certain years; 1,400 head of game died of disease during the whole
period. In the first five years of Henry VII. the deaths from murrain
amounted to 282. In the first year of Henry VII., 80 fallow deer died
of murrain in the Wiltshire forests of Melksham and Pewsham, namely, 27
bucks, 33 does, and 20 fawns; but in the second year of his reign the far
greater number of 340 perished, and in the third year 140. In 1489, and
again in 1493, an unusual number of both red and fallow deer were found
“dede of murrayn in Epping forest.” The most appalling case is that of
Clarendon forest, in 1470, when 2,209 died of murrain in the one year.
The ROE DEER were the most graceful and the smallest of British
_cervidæ_, a fully grown buck only standing twenty-six inches high
at the shoulder. It must have been quite common—at all events in the
south of England—in early days, as is proved by the scientific series
of explorations carried out by the late General Pitt-Rivers in the
Romano-British villages round Rushmore, Wilts. The roe or roebuck is
mentioned in forest proceedings under the interchangeable terms of
_capriolus_ or _cheverellus_, the latter being Latinised from the French
_chevreuil_. A roe killed in 1251 in Rockingham forest is entered, as
Mr. Turner points out, as _cheverellus_ in the forest inquisition,
and as _capriolus_ in the corresponding eyre roll. The writer of the
_Feudal History of Derbyshire_ has made nonsense of the various forest
presentments for the killing of roebucks in the Peak, by translating
_capriolus_ “wild-goat.” The killing of a wild-goat in this forest would
have been a work of merit, and certainly not deserving presentment.
In the full records of the Derbyshire eyre for the Peak of 1251, the
killing of a roebuck is presented, and at the next eyre, 1286, five such
cases are recorded. These Derbyshire instances help to clear up a matter
of some importance in the history of England’s forests. In the thirteenth
century there is no doubt that there were in general four, and only four,
beasts of the forest; these were the red deer, the fallow deer, the roe
deer, and the wild boar. In a charter of 1212, King John granted to the
monks of Lenton the tithe of all his venison taken in Derbyshire and
Nottinghamshire. The word “venison” (_venacio_) was applied in mediæval
days to the beasts of the forest, and is in this case defined as the red
deer, fallow deer, and wild boar. From this it has been supposed that
the roe was not considered as a beast of the forest in all counties.
Mr. Turner, in his valuable work on Forest Pleas, commenting on this,
says: “It is unfortunate that no documents still exist which relate to
the forests in Nottingham and Derby in the reign of Henry III. or his
predecessors,” and adds that a roe occurs in the Nottingham forest eyre
of 15 Edw. I., but that as this is a single case, the great rarity of the
roe in these counties may be inferred. The instances here adduced show
that this is a mistake.
At the eyre for Pickering forest, Yorks, in 1338, the question as to
whether the roe was a true beast of the forest arose, and the justices
in eyre referred the question to the court of King’s Bench, when it was
decided (contrary to previous decisions) that it was a beast of the
warren, for the curious reason that it put to flight other deer. It has
been supposed that from that date the roe ceased to be a beast of the
forest throughout England. But that decision was either not generally
known, or applied only to the peculiar case relative to the manor of
Seamer. In 1398 a case was presented at a swainmote held at Tideswell,
Derbyshire, of a venison trespasser killing a roebuck and a fallow doe.
As late as 7 Henry VII. a charge of taking a roe deer in a snare in
Clarendon forest was preferred against an offender, at the eyre held at
Salisbury.
There are many interesting particulars relative to the roe deer in the
records of Pickering forest. Edward II., in 1322, paid the large sum
of £5 for cord to make nets to catch roebuck. This expenditure on cord
would not be for the purpose of making small snares, but to aid in the
construction of a buckstall into which the deer would be driven. Henry,
Lord Percy, claimed, in 1338, to hunt and take fox, roe deer, cat, and
badger on his manor of Seamer, although within the forest. The jury found
that Lord Percy and all his ancestors had hunted and taken roe deer, but
that that animal was a beast of the forest, for which offence poachers
had been convicted and fined at the last eyre. The justices referred this
point to the judgment of King’s Bench, with the result already stated.
The few cases of venison trespass that are extant with regard to the
forest of Exmoor, prove that it possessed both red deer and roebuck.
Presentments for killing roe deer are also extant in the case of the
Forest of Dean and several others.
The WILD BOAR.—The wild boar is one of the oldest and most renowned
of the animals of the British forests. It appears on ancient British
coinage, on various works of art of the later Celtic period, on
Romano-British altars, and with frequency on Norman ecclesiastical
sculpture. The chroniclers tell us that boar-hunting was a favourite
sport of Henry I. Pickering forest had great repute for its wild boars
at the beginning of the thirteenth century. King John, in 1214, ordered
the constable of the castle on two occasions to render assistance to the
royal huntsman, who was coming with his hounds to kill wild boar in that
forest. The boars were to be sought in that part of the forest where the
king was wont to hunt them. The constable was to see that the meat was
well salted, and the heads soaked in wine and dispatched to the king.
In 1227, Henry dispatched his huntsman to Pickering to take twelve wild
swine for the royal use.
[Illustration: _PLATE V_
WILD BOARS
WILD BOAR HUNTING]
King John’s anxiety about the preservation of this beast of the forest
lasted to the end of his life. In September, 1216, he wrote to the
constable of St. Briavel ordering that the cattle were only to be
agisted on the fringes of Dean forest, and not in the forest itself, and
particularly not in those places frequented by the wild boars. In a list
of game taken for Edmund, Edward I.’s brother, in 1279, in Dean forest,
under letters patent, mention is made of one wild boar.
Thomas de Langley, master forester of Wychwood, Oxon., in 1217, received
the royal command to allow William de Brewere to take wild boars
(_porcos silvestres_) in that forest; and in 1223, the same forester was
instructed to take two wild boars and transfer them to the royal park of
Havering, which was part of Waltham forest.
There are several records of wild boar hunting in Clarendon and other
Wiltshire forests in the fourteenth century.
The boar or wild pig roamed through Cranborne Chase as late as the days
of Elizabeth. Hutchins cites two fifteenth-century cases noted in the
presentments of this chase. Robert Clare, in 33 Henry VI., was ordered
to be distrained for killing four wild pigs on Iwerne Hill. Thomas Robe,
vicar of Iwerne, was attached in the following year for killing four wild
pigs in Iwerne Wood with his bow and arrow.
As forests lessened in extent, the wild boar diminished in numbers;
but their survival in Lancashire, Durham, and Staffordshire, in the
sixteenth century, can be readily established. James I. hunted the boar
in Windsor forest in 1617. Charles II.’s reign is the latest time at
which this animal is known to have survived in England in a really wild
state.
The WOLF.—The abundance of wolves throughout England in pre-Norman
days is borne witness to by the Saxon name for January, namely, the
wolf-month. There was probably no part of England where the wolves had
surer or more prolonged retreats than amid the wilds of the Peak Forest
and its borders. The last places in this country where they tarried
were the Peak, the Lancashire forests of Blackburnshire and Bowland,
and the wolds of Yorkshire. It has been confidently asserted (Blaine’s
_Encyclopædia of Rural Sports_ [1858] p. 105) that entries of payment
for the destruction of wolves appear in the account books of certain
parishes of the East Riding, presumably of sixteenth or seventeenth
century date; but this on examination proves to be an error. They were
abundant in Dean forest in the time of Edward I., and tenures of land in
the forests of Rockingham and Sherwood, on the service of wolf-hunting,
were renewed in the fifteenth century. The best authorities (such as
Harting and Lydekker) consider that wolves did not die out in England
until the time of Henry VII., 1485-1509. The last wolf was killed in
Scotland in 1743. Packs of Irish wolves were not exterminated until 1710,
and the last solitary survivor was killed in 1770. Place and field names
afford remarkably abundant evidence of the considerable presence of
wolves in North Derbyshire. Woolow (formerly spelt Wolflow), Wolfhope,
and Wolfscote are well-known examples. Wolfscote Dale, though the term is
not often used, is still the map-name for the upper stretch of Dovedale,
and Wolfscote Grange and Wolfscote Hill are close to the forest border.
On the opposite side of the Dove, in Staffordshire, is the ridge termed
Wolfedge. The village boys of Hartington and Beresford Dale used to play
at wolves and wolf-hunting in the “forties” of last century, apparently
a traditionary game, as stated by the late Mr. Beresford Hope. Five
cases of wolf in the field-names of enclosures within the bounds of
the old forest have been found, whilst Wolfpit occurs as a boundary
of Priestcliffe Common, and Wolfstone of Chinley Common in enclosure
commissions, _temp._ Charles I.
[Illustration: _PLATE VI_
WOLF AND SHEEPFOLD
WILD GOATS]
A careful examination of forest and other records relative to Derbyshire
has brought to light various wolf references, most of which are now cited
for the first time. Among the evidences at St. Mary’s College, Spink
Hill, is a charter of Robert Ferrers, Earl of Derby (who died in 1139),
granting lands at Heage, which he held from the king on the service of
driving the wolves out of his lordship of Belper, within Duffield Chase,
which afterwards became a royal forest.
Two payments entered in the Pipe Rolls of Henry II. are highly
significant of the devastation then caused by Derbyshire wolves. In
1160-1, 25_s._ was paid to the forest wolf-hunters (_in lupariis_) as
an extra fee. In 1167-8, so great a value was set on the skill and
experience of the Peak wolf-trappers (_pedicatores_), that Henry II. paid
10_s._ for the travelling expenses of two of them to cross the seas to
take wolves in Normandy.
The accounts of Gervase de Bernake, bailiff of the Peak for 1255-6 are
of special value, as they contain some of the very few specific entries
that have yet been found among the stores of the Public Record Office
of damage done to stock by wolves. Mention is made therein of a colt
(_pullum masculum_) strangled by a wolf in Edale (_jugulat’ cum lupo
in Eydale_); and in another place, in a list of waifs that accrued to
the lord, there is reference to two sheep which were also strangled by
wolves. There is another thirteenth-century reference to Derbyshire
forest wolves which seems to have escaped the notice of county and
other writers. The Hundred Rolls of the beginning of Edward I.’s reign
record that Roger Savage was asked by what right he maintained dogs to
take foxes, hares, wild cats, and wolves, and replied that he was the
successor of William Walkelin, who had a royal grant to that effect.
At the pleas of the forest held at Derby in 1285, it was shown that a
bovate of land held by John le Wolfhunte and Thomas Foljambe, two of the
foresters-of-fee, was a serjeanty assigned for taking of wolves in Peak
Forest. On the jurors being asked what were the duties pertaining to that
service, the following was the highly interesting reply:—
“Each year, in March and September, they ought to go through
the midst of the forest to set traps to take the wolves in the
places where they had been found by the hounds; and if the
scent was not good because of the upturned earth, then they
should go at other times in the summer (as on St. Barnabas Day,
June 11th), when the wolves had whelps (_catulos_) to take and
destroy them, but at no other times; and they might take with
them a sworn servant to carry the traps (_ingenia_); they were
to carry a bill-hook and spear, and hunting-knife at their
belt, but neither bows nor arrows; and they were to have with
them an unlawed mastiff trained to the work. All this they were
to do at their own charges, but they had no other duties to
discharge in the forest.”
In the records of Cannock forest, Staffordshire, for 1281, there is an
entry of a wolf having killed a fat buck; the flesh was given to the
lepers of Freford.
The Fox was always held to be noxious in England, and no penalty was
attached to its destruction. Nevertheless, it was a breach of law to hunt
them within a royal forest, save by special licence; the obvious reasons
being that such hunting, if unrestricted, would disturb the king’s game,
and prove an irresistible temptation to poaching with not a few.
William Rufus licensed the abbot of Chertsey to hunt the fox in the
Surrey side of Windsor forest.
Richard I. and Henry III. granted licence to the abbot of Waltham to hunt
the fox in the Essex forest.
King John, in 1204, gave the abbot of St. Mary’s, York, liberty to hunt
the fox freely throughout all the royal forests of Yorkshire. The abbess
of Barking had like rights in the forest adjoining her house. It need
not be supposed that these religious superiors were expected by these
licences to hunt personally—though occasionally an irregular abbot might
thus indulge—the licence applied to their duly commissioned servants.
Licence was granted in 1279 to Adam Attewell, and those whom he took with
him, to take foxes throughout the forest of Salop, by traps and other
means, and to carry them away.
Everyone of England’s forests had one or more of the neighbouring
landowners holding charters authorising the pursuit of the fox with
hounds, save in the fence month; most of these charters dated from the
thirteenth and some from the twelfth century. In the large majority of
cases, the hunting of the hare was associated with that of the fox. The
burgesses of Nottingham had a chartered right to pursue the fox and hare
in Sherwood forest, and this right was held to warrant certain burgesses
keeping greyhounds at an eyre of 1538.
Thomas Bret, the vicar of Scalby, in Pickering forest, and four others,
were each fined 6_d._, in 1336, for making folds of small thorns—a vert
offence—in Scalby Hay to guard their sheep from the fox.
In Turbervile’s _Noble Art of Venerie or Hunting_ (1575), the hunting of
the fox and badger are described together. Both were hunted, or rather
drawn, by terriers. He remarks:—
“As touching foxes, I account small pastime of hunting of them,
especially within the ground; for as soone as they perceyve the
terryers, if they yearne hard and goe neare unto them, they
will bolte and come out streyghtwaies, unlesse it be when the
bitch hathe yong cubbes: then they will not forsake their yong
ones though they die for it.”
When the fox was hunted “above grounde,” after the earth had been
stopped, the hounds of the chase thus employed are described as
greyhounds, showing that the fox was usually coursed by sight, and not
followed by scent.
The HARE was the principal beast of the warren. The large majority of
chartered rights for the hunting of the fox within forests included the
hare. The forest pleas of Somerset, in 1287, show a most remarkable
exception as to the beasts of the forest in the case of the warren of
Somerton, within whose bound the king preserved the hare, and inquests
were actually held on those found dead.
At the eyre held at Rockingham in 1285, certain men were presented for
setting nets for hares in Brigstock park.
A curious entry in the Close Rolls of 1276 mentions that the keeper of
Bernwood forest was ordered to supply Sir Francis de Bononia (a famous
secretary of Edward I.), with several young bucks and does, and also four
live hares and six live rabbits, to be placed in the king’s garden at
Oxford.
At an eyre held at Sherborne in 1288, the jury protested against the
freemen of Cranborne Chase being deprived of their dogs, wherewith they
had a right to hunt the hare and the fox.
The Coucher Book of the Duchy of Lancaster contains a great variety of
presentments for hare hunting and hare taking, particularly in the
forest of Pickering, _temp._ Edward III. Robert Hampton, rector of
Middleton, presented at the eyre for keeping four greyhounds and hunting
hares at will, made no appearance and was outlawed. Matilda de Bruys was
presented as accustomed to hunt and catch hares; she appeared, was fined
5_s._, and found sureties for good behaviour. Peter de Manlay, jun., a
man of considerable position, was fined £1 for hare hunting, and Sir
Nicholas de Menill £1 6_s._ 8_d._ Others were fined for hare hunting, or
hare killing with bow and arrows, from 13_s._ 4_d._ to 1_s._ according
to their position. How such charges came before the eyre as contrary to
the forest assize, becomes clear from the nature of the charge in several
of the cases; the delinquents are described as catching hares in various
ways “to the terror of the deer.”
The WILD CAT was usually associated with the fox and hare in chartered
rights for forest hunting; we have found it thus included in forest
claims of Pickering, Windsor, Sussex, Cheshire, and Sherwood.
The wild cat is named by Turbervile, in 1575, as vermin which used to be
commonly hunted in England. At that time they were not hunted designedly,
but if a hound chanced to cross a wild cat he would hunt it as soon as
any chase—“and they make a noble trye for the time that they stand up.
At last, when they may no more, they will take a tre, and therein seek
to beguile the hounds. But if the hounds hold into them, and will not so
give it over, then they leap from one tree to another, and make great
shift for their lives, with no less pastime to the huntsmen.” The wild
cat is now extinct in England; it is supposed that the last one was shot
by Lord Ravensworth in 1833, at Eslington, Northumberland.
The MARTIN is mentioned in two or three of the forest hunting grants.
Thus, Richard Dove, chief forester of Mara and Moudrem, established,
at an eyre held at Chester in 1271, his claim to the hunting of foxes,
hares, cats, martins, and other vermin with hounds or greyhounds.
The BADGER is also included in certain grants for forest hunting. This
animal is expressly named in Henry III.’s grant in 1252 to Walter
Baskerville in the forests of Hereford, Gloucester, Oxford, and Essex;
in the 1253 grant to Roger Hardy, burgess of Scarborough, throughout the
whole forest of Pickering; in the 1253 grant to John of Lexington, in
Essex; in two other grants in parts of Pickering forest; and in the 1297
grant to Thomas Paynel, in the Sussex forest of Ashdown.
The OTTER obtains mention in a few forest proceedings and accounts. In
the Peak Forest there are three or four instances of presentments for
killing it with hounds; probably on the ground of disturbing the deer by
such an action. Edward IV. had a pack of otterhounds, which, like the
packs of harriers and buckhounds, was composed partly of running and
partly of scent hounds.
The SQUIRREL even was named in some of these licences. It was included in
the first-named grant of 1253 to John of Lexington; whilst the hunting
hare, fox, squirrel, and cat throughout Sherwood forest formed part of
the extensive privileges pertaining to Robert de Everingham, who was
removed from his office of hereditary keeper or chief forester in 1289.
The RABBIT or Coney has already been mentioned in connection with
warrens. The free chase and warren of Ashdown, Sussex, were held by
Edward I.’s mother; in 1283 proceedings were taken against various
persons for hunting and carrying of rabbits from her park at Mansfield. A
raid made on St. Leonards forest, in 1295, included rabbits amongst the
booty.
The office of parker of Blagden, in Cranborne Chase, carried with it “the
ferme of the cunnyes.”
The rabbit warrens within the forest of Clarendon were of exceptional
value, and are frequently mentioned in the accounts. In the time of
Edward III. they were the perquisite of the chief keeper. In 1495, £100
received from the “Fermour of the Conyes in Clarendon,” formed an item of
the revenue assigned for the king’s household. In the time of Charles I.
these warrens were worth upwards of £200 a year.
SWANS.—It was the duty of the chief minister of each ward of Duffield
Frith to secure the king’s swans, and all waif and stray swans on the
various rivers and streams within the forest limits. That there used to
be many swans on the Derwent, in Duffield forest, is proved by the name
Hopping Mill, or Hopping Weir, at Milford. Hopping, or upping, was the
term for the annual marking of the swans. Swainsley, on the margin of the
river near Hopping Mill, is a corruption of Swansley. In some forests,
such as Windsor and Clarendon, swan warding was an important part of
the forester’s duty. In the latter forest a large number of swans were
kept on the river. In Edward III. reign these royal birds were stolen on
several occasions. In June, 1327, the prior of Ivy Church and another
were commissioned to inquire and search for certain swans which were said
to have been conveyed to divers places on the Avon, between Salisbury and
Christchurch. Further commissions were issued to recover stolen swans in
1331 and in 1345; on the latter occasion the stolen birds were said to be
worth the great sum of £100.
EYRIES of hawks and falcons formed the subject of the second inquiry
named in the chapter of the Regard, drawn up in 1229. In the long list
of perquisites pertaining to the office of chief forester of Mara and
Moudrem, claimed at the 1271 eyre held at Chester, is the right to all
sparrow hawks, merlins, and hobbies.
Sir John de Meaux paid to the Earl of Lancaster for his woods of
Levisham, in Pickering forest, 2_s._ annual rent, and eyries of falcons,
merlins, and sparrow hawks. Thomas Wake, in his barony of Middleton, in
the same forest, claimed to have eyries of sparrow hawks and merlins in
his woods.
When the regarders assembled in Sherwood forest in 1309, the foresters
swore to lead the twelve knights to view, _inter alia_, the eyries of
hawks and falcons.
Falcons and falconers are named several times in the fourteenth century
in connection with Rockingham forest.
PARTRIDGES and PHEASANTS have been already named under warrens. In 1336
two offenders were fined for catching partridges in Pickering forest; the
one delinquent had to pay 3_s._ 4_d._, and the other 6_d._ The amounts
were in all probability settled in accordance with their social position.
Part of the privileges granted in the forest to the abbey of Chertsey,
by Henry II., was the liberty of taking pheasants. Among the offences
dealt with at the eyre held at Guildford in 1488, for the Surrey portion
of Windsor forest, was the fining of Ralph Bygley in the heavy sum of
100_s._ for being a common destroyer of pheasants and partridges, and
a taker of birds. Another offender at the same eyre was presented for
killing six pheasants with a hawk.
Pheasants are mentioned in a raid on St. Leonards forest, Sussex, in 1295.
HERONS.—There are several incidental notices of herons and heronries
among the forest proceedings. In the raid that was made in 1295 on the
forest, or rather the chase of St. Leonards, Sussex, herons formed part
of the booty that was unlawfully removed. In 1334 Sir Walter de London,
the king’s almoner, received the tithe of 157 herons that had been killed
in Pickering forest. Mention is also made of herons sent up to London,
out of Clarendon forest, for the king’s table, on several occasions in
the fourteenth century.
WOODCOCKS.—The accounts of Duffield forest for 1313-14 make mention,
under the ward of Hulland, of 4_s._ 6_d._ for “ix cokschutes.” A cockshut
was a large net suspended between two poles, employed to catch or shut in
woodcocks; it was used chiefly in the twilight. At the southern extremity
of this ward is a farm still known as Cockshut. The same place-name
survives on the sites of several of our old forests; and licences to
use cockshuts were granted at swainmotes in Derbyshire, Hampshire, and
Wiltshire. Reference to woodcocks will also be found under Galtres forest.
General licences for fowling in specific parts of a forest were sometimes
granted in the local courts. On several occasions bird fowlers were
attached at fourteenth and fifteenth century swainmotes in Duffield
Frith, Clarendon forest, etc.; and a few examples of presentments at
eyres for a like general offence are also extant. Thus, at Pickering,
in 1334, Henry the Fowler of Barugh, Adam the Fowler of Ayton, and two
others, were summoned and fined for catching birds in the forest by means
of nets, birdlime, and other devices. The general disturbance of the deer
would doubtless cause such action to be considered a breach of the assize
of the forest.
BEES and HONEY.—The fifth chapter of the Regard, issued in 1229, related
to the king’s right to the honey in the royal demesne woods of the
forests. At the Chester eyre of 1271, the hereditary chief forester of
Mara and Moudrem claimed all swarms of bees as part of his extensive
perquisites.
At an attachment court of the Lancashire forests of Quernmore and
Wyersdale, in 1299, several men were presented for taking a _byke_ or
nest of wild bees, and carrying the honey to the house of Ralph de Caton,
where it was found, and also for burning the oak tree containing the
comb; the tree was valued at 4_d._ and the honey at 6_d._
A long roll of amercements, imposed at an eyre for Sherwood forest, held
at Nottingham in 1334, includes a fine of 12_d._, in addition to 6_d._
the value of the honey, on two men, for carrying honey from out of the
forest.
Particular indictments of the Pickering eyre of 1335 included the taking,
by one Gilbert Ayton, of a gallon of honey and two pounds of wax out of
old tree trunks. Gilbert appeared by attorney, and said that, by the
great Charter of the Forest, it was provided that every freeman might
have the honey found in his own woods. The indictment itself stated that
he found the honey in his own woods of Hutton Bushell and Troutsdale, and
therefore he asked for judgment in his favour, and obtained it.
The fifteenth-century directions to the “collectors” of the different
wards of Duffield Frith instructed them to take for the king all bykes of
bees.
The ancient right of the Crown to forest honey may be traced in the claim
of the lords of the manor of Wanstead, Essex, in 1489, to the profits of
bees, honey, and wax in Wanstead wood. One of the items in the charge
at the Epping swainmote of later days was: “If any man do take out of
the hollow trees any honie, wax, or swarmes of bees within the forest,
yee shall do us to weet.” The lord of the manor of Minestead, in the New
Forest, claimed the honey in his woods as late as 1852.