A short history of the Manor of Eton cum Stockdale and Colenorton.

In 1204 there were only daughters to inherit the manor, Christiana and Gunnora de Windsor, and within two years it was officially recorded that their husbands had paid livery for their wives' halves of the divided manor.  For a few decades the connection between the two manors and the Castle was broken; but when the heir was a minor, according to custom, he was made a ward of court and his lands administered by the Crown, through the Castle. Then in the middle of the fourteenth century the manor which had been inherited by Christiana a century and a half earlier was exchanged by Edward III for land and privileges in Berkshire. For the next six centuries the manor, now the Royal Manor of Eton, was to remain with the Crown and be administered for much of that time as part of the honour and jurisdiction of Windsor Castle.

The inheritance by the daughters of Walter de Windsor had divided the original manor into two smaller manors, but not many decades were to pass before Christiana's son had granted part of his area of Eton, together with that of Cippenham, to Prince Richard, the younger son of King John, thus creating a third manor stretching into Eton. Almost certainly the tenants of this manor had to attend the manor courts at Cippenham. In the fourteenth century it was acquired by the de Moleyns family of Stoke Poges. Sir John de Moleyns already owned land in Eton, part of which was granted to Burnham Abbey in 1339. The remainder seems to have been transferred to the Crown in 1447 and was then granted to Eton College. This appears to have been a fourth manor in Eton and known simply as 'Moleyn's fee' or 'Brigstreef’. The Royal Manor of Eton at this date had the name 'Church fee' since the right of advowson was held by the lord, or 'Bordeux's fee' after the previous lord of the manor. (See chart).

The part of Eton and Eton Wick which had been attached to Cippenham Manor and then Stoke Poges continued to be administered by the lord of that manor, and courts were held at least as late as the mid sixteenth century.

It is more difficult to understand how the other manor, the half originally inherited by Gunnora and known for many years as the Manor of Huntercombe, came in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to take on the names Colenorton and Stockdales. Colenorton was first mentioned in connection with the manor in 1526 after the manor had passed into the hands of the Crispe family through marriage. It may be that it represented land of John Crispe rather than his wife Margaret, who had inherited the Eton Manor.  Certainly even a century later when Andrew Windsor was lord of the manor the court for the Colenorton portion was held a day later than the Manor of Eton with Stockdales. Where the manor house stood is unknown, though there was one; the demesne land included seventy four acres of arable and pasture spread over the parish, and a house at Eton Wick.

The name Stockdales was first used in 1610 and again appears to have been a separate estate, but when John Penn bought the Eton Manor in 1793 the three were amalgamated; in future the name Eton cum Stockdales and Colenorton was applied to the whole property. This is the name by which it is still officially known.  The last Court Baron was held in 1948 soon after the Provost and Fellows of Eton College became the Lords of the Manor. The College had already bought the Royal estates in Eton and so after some seven centuries the various manors were once more reunited.

                   

Whether they were king, baron, knight or plain Mr or Miss, none of the lords or ladies of the manor even lived in the parish, let alone Eton Wick, with the sole exception of the Provosts and Fellows of Eton College, who held the Royal Manor for a short period in late medieval times and again this century when the two manors were once more united under one lord. But how much did it   matter to the people of the village who was the lord of the manor and where he lived? There is no simple answer, but it could have mattered a good deal, for the lord of the manor was often a considerable landowner and in the early centuries the manor was the main unit of local government. The affairs of the manor were conducted through the manor courts, the Court Baron and the Court Leet. Through these courts the village officials were appointed, dues exacted, misdemeanours punished and the regulations governing the use of the common fields and commons enforced. These courts were presided over by the lord's right-hand man, or steward, and the lot of the villagers would depend upon his character and that of the Lord of the Manor himself.

Only a few of the records of these courts of the Eton manors have survived, parchment rolls written in Latin of the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries and printed leaflets from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The full title of the court often incorporated the phrase, 'View of Frankpledge', which refers to the medieval system of grouping households into tithings (originally ten families). Each tithing was responsible for the good behaviour of its members and represented by one or more tithingmen at the court when cases of lawbreaking were considered.

Those who were liable for punishment were said to be 'in mercy' and were frequently fined, the money being kept by the lord of the manor.

Read the rest of this article here.  

 This is an extract from The Story of a Village: Eton Wick 1217 to 1977 by Judith Hunter.

Eton Wick Newsletter - Our Village August 2009

Manor, Lammas And Commons

In 1950 an Eton College master wrote an article for a village magazine stating that ten years earlier The Eton Urban Planning Officer asked two local men to mark a local map with all the land that they deemed to be lammas land. The men were Mr. H. Bunce a dairy farmer, and Mr. G. Gosling an Eton road sweeper. Apparently, the authorities had no map of this great institution that had existed here for over 1,000 years. 

I trust the men were knowledgeable and unbiased, but the point I am making is that my lack of sure facts puts me in good company. I have long believed that there is no confident authority on this subject. We have one certainly in that the green open spaces around Eton Wick are entirely due to the vigilance of many earlier generations and owe little to present day apathy. If you doubt me. please walk along the rail viaduct, adjacent to the Great Common and observe all the rubbish in the stream and the odd fridge, stove etc., dumped on the common. This could not have happened in the yesteryears because clearing the ditches was just one of the responsibilities shared by all users of the commons. 

Manor - The fact of being in a Manor: of having commons and lammas rights, are indicative of Eton's Anglo-Saxon origins. It was customary for Monarchs to reward for a special service, military; political; or perhaps even as bribery, some areas of his kingdom. The recipient became the Thegn (Thane) now known as Lord of the Manor. Locally we read that Edward the Confessor was living in a Saxon Palace at Old Windsor: (at that time there was no 'New' Windsor) In 1050 AD: he gave the Manor of Eton to his wife, Queen Edith. In 1075 the Queen died and the Manor went back to the Crown. A little later William the Conqueror granted the Manor of Eton to a 'Walter, son of other' in recognition of Walter being a Warden of the Forest and the Governor of the newly erected Castle Keep. The Castle's beginning dates to that time. Briefly. for nearly 1,000 years, the Manor has been handed down, divided and changing its name, is now the 'Manor of Eton cum Stockdales and Colenorton; which since 1941 has had Eton College as the Lord of that Manor. At the time of the Conqueror's Doomsday Book (1086) Eton Wick, as part of Eton. had Hedgerley and Wexham in the Eton Manor. 

Certainly there was no overcrowding; the Doomsday census of 1086 recorded only twenty-three families and four serfs in the entire holding. We can only guess at the accuracy of that census. Successive Lords were also the Governor/Constable of Windsor Castle. In 1204 there was no male heir to the Manor so it was divided between two sisters, each now having a separate Manor. In due course one of these was divided yet again, each, of course, having a separate title. It would be too complicated to try and cover all the changes in a short article, but it is sufficient to observe the more noteworthy. In the late 16. century a reference is made to a Manor of Colenorton. A few years later (1700) to a Manor of Eton cum Stockdales and later again to the Manor of Eton cum Stockdale and Colenorton. These dates do not necessarily reflect the starting dates of the respective changes. A Lord of the Manor may hold a. of Manors and yet not live In, or visit them. He is served by Stewards who administer the estate and the Courts Leet (meetings). 

The Stewards have a 'Bailiff and in the case of lammas, a 'Hayward'. Both are elected at the Court Leet. The Bailiff being in direct control and applications of the affairs of the Commons and Lammas, and the Hayward, being responsible for the seasonal grazing of lammas lands and the legitimacy of the grazing animals, ensuring only those belonging to local owners and not exceeding the 'stint' (allowance) of those owners. At an Eton Court Leet held after WW2 (1948) it is recorded the Deputy Steward (Mr A. L. Carter) held the meeting. Eight local adults were appointed jurors (Committee), the Eton vicar was appointed foreman. Mr Arthur (Bob) Bond as Bailiff and Mr John Pass the Hayward. Most were farmers, including two of the wives. We will leave Manors and look at the Commons and Lammas.

Commons and Lammas - Commons are areas for the restricted use of local people. They are throughout the country but not necessarily only for grazing, as is the case in Eton. Since the 18th century many commons have been enclosed (fenced or hedged) and many have been broken up and shared to the 'favoured'. Not so in Eton which, against the Lord of the Manors wish, petitioned Parliament in 1826 to reject the Enclosure Act being enforced. There was much rejoicing locally. Much earlier, open land had been set aside in Eton/Eton Wick as The Great and the Little Common on which authorised locals could graze their allowance of oxen, cattle, horses, sheep and pigs: but not geese. Throughout the years there have been changes and perhaps for two centuries oxen and sheep have not grazed the commons and latterly neither has dairy cows. The commons season is from May 1st until February 28th. The trees and fencing along Common Road give a wrong impression of the area of Great Common which reaches from the bollards close to Bell Lane and along the village to Eton's Common Lane. It also extends across the stream. behind the Greyhound, along to Common Road and again across that road as far as the stream again. These two smaller areas, bisected by Common Road, have the stream on one side and a wire cum hedge along the north side. Little Common is at the extreme north end of Common Road.

In those distant years any person settling in the Manor would be given a 'strip' (Butt) of land and common grazing rights. He would be told what to grow on his strip. There were narrow grass paths between the many strips of land, known as baulks, which strip holders were obliged to maintain. It was said a strip was equal to what a man could hand plough in a day: the many strips were unfenced. Crops were restricted to that which could be harvested by July 31st after which date the land was 'in lammas' and regardless of ownership was open to all those with a grazing stint (allowance) to use. The lammas lands were closed to general use on October 31st. In practice, until alter WW2, cows etc were fumed on the commons as from May 1st and after August 1st the Hayward exercised the right to take the beasts over the 'strips' and lammas lands (until October 31st) to graze. Over the years the 'strips' have all but vanished, being combined with and, in most cases, absorbed into the farms.

Eton and Eton Wick Recreation Grounds are among the numerous lammas lands. They were purchased with compensation for loss of lammas rights when the rail viaduct was built (mid 19th century). Today it is the practice for lammas rights to be switched from desirable sites to another of equal size not already an established lammas area. Even the Village Hall stands on former lammas land. which was apparently freed of lammas by unanimous approval. We could go on but space rules otherwise. 

The allowance to graze was restricted to the old village/town residents and was, at the beginning of the 20th century, restricted to one sheep for each acre of land held; one cattle or horse for every five acres and no cottager or freeholder to tum out more than two hogs or pigs; there was also an allowance of one cow for an odd three acres. Pigs had to be nose-ringed to prevent snouts damage to the turf. As holdings at the homes became smaller, many cottagers gave up their entitlements to graze. 

Older villagers will remember the mad stampede of homes every May 1st at 6pm. Mothers kept their children safely behind their garden fences until the horses had calmed down from their wild gallop of freedom after a winter of being stabled at the end of every day's work. Those horses were all work animals of either farmers or local traders. Very few have a right to graze on the commons and other places today. In 1965 it became necessary to register your rights and because so few used the commons at that time. they did not take up their option. It is several years since the seven or eight dairy herds of Eton Wick farms that regularly grazed the commons have gone. Fortunately, Mr Cooley still uses the common for bullocks. Without all the cows and horses lammas has become just a legend; there is of course no Hayward now. 

Mr Bill Cooley is now the Bailiff to Eton College 'The Lord of the Manor'. I believe Lord Carrington is the Steward. The Great Common is still used for a November 5th bonfire, which probably dates back to the Guy Fawkes era. In my childhood of late 1920's — 30's there was also a second bonfire close to the Jubilee Oak. The common was home to the Eton Wick Cricket Club between 1889 — 1922 when it moved to Saddocks Farm. In 1878 a steam fair was held on the common and about that time also a Political Rally. 

I understand the original football club of the late 19th century also used the common, but this may have been Dorney Common. This Is a very condensed résumé of Manors, Commons and Lammas. written to the best of my knowledge. Of any errors I offer my apology and I thank Mr Cooley for kindly checking this article and for correcting me on the grazing conditions now prevailing. 

Frank Bond

Click here to read Our Village August 2009.

This article was originally published in the Eton Wick Newsletter - Our Village as is republished with the kind permission of the Eton Wick Village Hall Committee. Click here to go to the Collection page.

Hayward, Cattle Pound and Common Lands

The Hayward, the Cattle Pound and the Common Lands

The hayward grazed the cattle over Lammas lands from the commons, the Slads, Eton Wick Recreation Ground, South Field and back home. The milking herds have virtually all gone, and with them the hayward, but the name lives on in Haywards Mead housing development.

Mr 'Hammer' Stannett, for many years the Lammas Hayward.

The Cattle Pound

Close to the road on the outskirts of Eton is a small brick enclosure - the Pound which was once used to impound cattle and sheep which had strayed from the field and the commons, or which belonged to people who did not have common rights.

The present pound (pictured here) was built in the 19th century, but there were several earlier ones.

The Pound was owned by the Manor of Eton cum Stockdales and Colenorton, which managed the common lands of Eton and Eton Wick and drew up the rules for their use. Eton College became Lord of the Manor in 1940 and in 1948 it held the last Court Leet and Court Baron, when the rules were ratified and a Bailiff and Hayward were elected.

The Hayward was responsible for placing strayed or unauthorised animals in the Pound; owners had to pay a fine before the animals were collected. In the early years of the twentieth century the fine was 6d (6 pennies) per beast for the Hayward, and 10 shillings per beast to the Lord of the Manor.

The plaque on the Pound gate reads:

"The Pound at Folly Bridge for unauthorised cattle from the Great Common in the Manor of Eton cum Stockdales and Colenorton. Restored 1996."

The Commons

There are two commons in the manor - Eton Great Common, which stretches from Eton Wick to Eton, and the Little Common to the north of the village. Commons were permanent pasture where animals belonging to those with common rights were allowed to graze from 1st May to 12th August each year, in the charge of the Hayward. For horses, cows, sheep and children May Day was an exciting day in Eton Wick!

Each commoner could graze his stint - an allotted number of animals based on the area he farmed. One beast was also allowed for every farmstead, house and cottage. The commoner must own the animals and mark them clearly.

Lammas Land

The name "Lammas" comes down from Saxon times. The name originally referred to the "loaf mass", a special religious feast which celebrated the first fruits of the harvest. Lammas Day used to be 1st August, but after the reform of the calendar in 1752 it moved to 12th August. In Eton and Eton Wick the Lammas lands were the large common fields - arable and meadow - which were subject to common pasture rights. This meant that after haymaking and the corn harvest, the cattle, sheep and horses belonging to the commoners (that is those with common rights) were allowed to graze those fields until 31st October.

Lammas rights might well have been a hindrance to the introduction of new crops, such as turnips and potatoes, but in the early 18th century the Eton Court Baron changed the rules to allow the farmers to grow a limited amount of turnip for winter feed for cattle. In earlier times there had been as many as eight farms with livestock in the parish, but there is now only one.

Down the centuries the commons and Lammas lands have had a great influence on the development of the parish. Thanks to them, much of the land has been kept free from buildings. Otherwise the river bank might now be covered with bungalows, and Eton and Eton Wick might have become joined into one large residential district. Instead, the commons and Lammas lands were registered under the Commons Registration Act of 1965.

For more about the Common lands of Eton and Eton Wick, see "The struggle to keep the common land".

The Story of a Village - A Changing Community

In past centuries the village expanded several times, but never quite so overwhelmingly as in the post war period. In 1931 the population was just over a thousand, it had risen to 1,640 by 1951, to 2,505 ten years later and now must be nearly three thousand.

With the influx of so many people into the village its inhabitants could no longer feel that each family was related to most others in the Wick. Probably this had never been strictly true; but by marriage and by recognising second cousins and the like, most families had indeed been related. The character of the village was changing in other ways. No longer was the College the most important source of income and employment for the majority of families, and less and less did College people take an interest and control of village affairs. The old gulf between gentry, epitomised in the Wick by College masters, and villagers gradually disappeared. Today new residents may be unaware of the old ties between Eton and Eton Wick. When Mr Vaughan died in 1940 his place as unofficial squire was taken by Bob Bond. Their backgrounds were very different, but both men were intensely interested in the village. It was Bob Bond who was reappointed bailiff at the 1948 Manor Court; he was instrumental in restarting the Boy Scouts after the war, he helped organise gymkhanas, dances and the annual Scout Fete ( which took the place of the old Horticultural Show). He also became the first president of the PTA.

The horse had virtually disappeared from the agricultural scene; though not entirely for George Pagett set up as a smallholder soon after the war and continued to use horses until the 1970s. The car and the lorry replaced the horse and cart, and garages became a necessity. Mr Sibley opened his filling station in 1958 and Ellis Motors were established in Victoria Road. People travelled more and taking holidays became the normal and not the exceptional way of life. Whereas in pre-war days people walked, cycled or used the bus to go to school, work or shopping, the use of the car became more and more the accepted practice. This transport revolution has brought in its wake other changes, such as the loss of the old road which ran from Haywards Mead to Meadow Lane in Eton and which is now only a bridle path. The Windsor Bridge has been closed to vehicle traffic and bus services have been cut, accentuating the hardship of those without a car. The roads are all macadamized and edged with pavements, and there is a profusion of street furniture road signs, electric streetlamps, bus shelters, pillar boxes, telephone kiosks and seats. Most of these have been provided by the statutory authorities, but the seat by Albert Place was the gift of the Women's Institute and the one in the churchyard in memory of Bob Bond.

Soon after the war, in line with national educational changes, Eton Wick School became a primary school, catering for both boys and girls from the ages of five to eleven; while older children were expected to attend secondary schools outside the village. However, it was still a church school, though the diocese was now responsible only for the fabric of the building and not the salaries of the teaching staff or the education of the children. To cater for the needs of the growing population the school was enlarged in 1953 and again in the sixties, but on that occasion the cost was such that a change of management became inevitable and the school was taken over by the County Council. In 1973 national policy brought about another change and the school became the combined infants and middle school with children being required to stay an extra year. But, though its title, appearance and teaching methods have changed over the years, because now almost all 'the children from Eton Wick are taught there, it has become even more the village school than in the years before the war when the older boys attended Porny School.

In spite of the addition of twelve new shops since the war there are now proportionately fewer shops per head than before the war. Several of the older shops have indeed closed and there is only one, Sibley's, in the area of New Town. The village has lost its priest-in-charge and Rev Christopher Johnson is now the only Church of England clergyman serving the parish of Eton, a sharp contrast to the situation a hundred years ago, when the parish was desperately trying to afford to employ two curates to assist the Vicar. Instead the village now has three churches, the Roman Catholic St Gilbert's having been built at the same time as Haywards Mead. The Village Hall stands close by and is still used for a baby clinic and library, but the role of the Hall has substantially diminished.  No longer is there a Village Hall Club; the Management Committee is concerned only with the maintenance of the building and the hiring of Its rooms. It has been overshadowed by its offshoot, the Football and Social Club, whose club rooms stand just behind the Hall. Some organizations still meet in the Hall, but others now use the rival establishment, and the whole of the ground floor is let to the County Council. Even the Village Fete, first organized by the Management Committee in 1962 and then the Youth Club, has now been taken over by the Football and Social Club, and since the mid-sixties it has been known as the Wicko Carnival.  The loss to the village of Wheatbutts Field when it was sold by the College brought about the end of the Scout Fete.

The list of changes seems inexhaustible, but it must suffice to mention only a few more and perhaps it is fitting that these should concentrate on the part of the parish first known as 'le Wyk'. The streams are now much shallower, the ponds filled in and the westernmost part of the common has recently been landscaped. Trees have  always been part of the village landscape, but unfortunately several beautiful elms had to be cut down in the 1950s. Hedges and trees have been grubbed up and in the last few years more elms have been lost through disease so that the area around Little Common has a rather open, desolated look.  It has been one more step in the succession of changes that has taken place since the first cluster of buildings established a wick in a clearing in the woods of Eton. Thankfully Eton Wick is still a village which will continue to evolve and, it is hoped, will remain surrounded and protected by commons and lammas lands.

This is an extract from The Story of a Village: Eton Wick 1217 to 1977 by Judith Hunter.

This is the final part of the serialisation of The Story of a Village - Eton Wick - 1217 - 1977. The Eton Wick History Group is most grateful for the kind permission of Judith Hunter's husband to publish her book on its website.

The village and community has continued to change and evolve since Judith completed her history more than 40 years ago and some of this change is reflected in The Eton Wick Newsletter - Our Village and the Photographic History of Eton Wick and Eton.

The Story of a Village - World War Two and After

With the war came other changes and new kinds of hardship - air raids, the blackout, rationing, gas masks and men away fighting. Women were drafted into factory work and homes and family life adjusted as evacuees from London were made welcome. The Village Hall was used as a school room for the evacuated children and equipped for use as a First Aid Post and Rest Centre. The Minute Books of the Institute tell of whist drives and dances organised as part of the war effort, especially during ‘Wings for Victory Week’ in 1942 and 'Salute the Soldier' Week the following year. Occasionally the Hall was used for billeting soldiers and, as in every other town and village, uniforms became part of the pattern of life. A gun site was established on Dorney Common close to Eton Wick and the noise shattered many a night's sleep. Eton Wick was lucky, however; a few bombs did fall on the village, but did very little damage, and the explosion which set a field alight seemed quite spectacular at the time. Men on active service were not so lucky; twelve lost their lives as the War Memorial at the church bears witness.

The story of Eton Wick during the war is not much different from that of any English village, but the 1940s mark a watershed in the history of Eton Wick. Change has always been taking place, albeit at times almost imperceptibly; but at this time the changes were to be great and far-reaching. Within a decade of the end of the war the long straggling rural village with its close-knit community had disappeared; its place taken by a larger dormitory village, top heavy with council houses.

The first new houses built were twelve 'prefabs' on part of Bell's Field. They were meant to be temporary, but instead provided good if not beautiful homes for more than twenty years. They were built towards the end of the war, and the first post war houses completed the development of the Bell's Field Site; the pale pink colour of the bricks is a constant reminder of the shortage of good facing-bricks at this time. A year or so later Tilston Field (north of the Eton Wick Road) was bought from Eton College for the first housing estate in the village itself. Great care was taken over the design of the housing and roads; trees, shrub borders and a small recreation ground were included to improve the amenities of the estate. Five fine police houses were built fronting the main road, and the Council were proud enough of the scheme to enter the completed half of the estate for the Ministry of Health Housing Medal in 1951. In the following year Prince Philip officially opened the estate at a small informal ceremony. Meux's Field was also bought by the Council and here were laid out Princes Close and a shopping parade, making altogether over two hundred houses and seven shops.

The main road from Moores Lane to Dorney Common was considerably widened and a shrub border planted in front of the estate and, as if to mark the change in appearance, its name was changed from Tilston Lane to Eton Wick Road. There was a zest for rebuilding and not only in bricks and mortar. Many of the clubs which had sunk into the doldrums during the war were revived and new ones founded. The first of these was probably the Youth Club which was started in 1946, followed by the Over Sixties Club in 1947 and a few years later the Parent Teacher Association, the Unity Players and the Young Wives. The Village Hall was still the centre of much of the social life of the Wick and great efforts were made to put it on a sound footing after the war. In 1950 it was redecorated by voluntary help, electricity was installed and in the following year it was enlarged by the addition of a covered forecourt. Two issues of a magazine called ' Our Village ' were published by the Institute as it was still sometimes called, and for several years from 1950 a Village Hall Week was held in the early part of the year. Village football became so popular that a Minors' Club was formed. When this proved very successful a second team of young men too old to stay in the minors' team had to be started. Eventually the club was renamed the Eton Wick Athletic Club and there was even more cause for 'Up the Wick' to be heard each Saturday.

The village was still growing; in the mid- and late 1950s private housing completed the redevelopment of the Wick west of Bell Lane with the laying out of Cornwall Close, Queens Road, Tilstone Close and the northern extension of Bell Lane. There was very little other building land available; the confirmation of the rules and regulations of the commons and lammas lands at the Manor Court held in College Hall at Eton in 1948 made it impossible to use these lands. Instead a compromise was agreed; lammas rights were not extinguished but transferred from land needed for redevelopment to parts of Bell Farm, which had been freed from rights when it became a sewage farm. In this way part of South Field was used to build Hayward's Mead estate early in the 1960s, and part of Sheepcote Field for the flats next to the school some years later. These were both council schemes, but the latter was part of a redevelopment plan for the village which included the demolition of the 'prefabs' and neighbouring houses in Alma Road and replacing them by Bell's Field Court and a row of shops. Castle View Terrace in Sheepcote Road and some of the Clifton Cottages were also pulled down to make way for the dark bricks of the private 'Georgian' style houses, while Sheepcote Road itself was given a new curving line. A few years earlier the Victorian houses of Albert Place and Victoria Terrace had been demolished and new houses and flats built in their place. A few houses have been built behind Bell Farm and the old people's flats of Clifton Lodge now star on the site of Hardings Cottages. Finally - and surely it must be finally for there is now almost no land left that can be built upon without infringing the common rights - Bunces Close has been built on land freed from lammas rights when South View was planned soon after the First World War. 

This is an extract from The Story of a Village: Eton Wick 1217 to 1977 by Judith Hunter.