The Enclosure Maps of England and Wales 1595–1918
A Cartographic Analysis and Electronic Catalogue

Provided the first comprehensive study of the enclosure mapping of England and Wales.

Roger J. P. Kain (Author), John Chapman (Author), Richard R. Oliver (Author)

9780521173230, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 3 March 2011

436 pages
24.6 x 18.9 x 2.2 cm, 0.78 kg

Review of the hardback: '… a very valuable source for enclosure maps of England and Wales extant in national and local archives …The book and database are a very rich source for researchers of parishes transformed by formal enclosure.' Jean Morrin, University of Winchester

This book offered the first comprehensive study of the enclosure mapping of England and Wales. Enclosure maps are fundamental sources of evidence in many types of historical inquiries. Although modern historians tend to view these large-scale maps essentially as sources of data on past economies and societies, this book argues that enclosure maps had a much more active role at the time they were compiled. Seen from this perspective of their contemporary society, enclosure maps are not simply antiquarian curiosities, cultural artefacts, or useful sources for historians but instruments of land reorganisation and control which both reflected and consolidated the power of those who commissioned them. The book is accompanied by a fully searchable, descriptive and analytical web catalogue of all parliamentary and non-parliamentary enclosure maps extant in public archives and libraries and offers an essential research tool for economic, social and local historians and for geographers, lawyers and planners.

1. The enclosure movement in England and Wales
2. County-by-county analysis of enclosure map characteristics
3. Enclosure maps of England and Wales
Appendix: Surveyors of enclosure maps
Contents of the www catalogue
Index of places in England and Wales with extant enclosure maps.

Subject Areas: Geography [RG], Economic history [KCZ], Historical geography [HBTP], Social & cultural history [HBTB], British & Irish history [HBJD1]