The History: From 1086 to Modern Day
Every landscape carries the marks of those who came before us. Beneath today's crops and footpaths lie centuries of stories, from the ancient woodland and medieval farming to changing field boundaries and the people whose lives have been shaped by this place. Understanding the history of the field reveals that it has never stood still; it's been quietly evolving for hundreds of years, and its past continues to shape the landscape we see today.
The Past in the Present
The hedgerows, old oaks and woodland margins that survive around this field today are far more than just features of a modern landscape. They offer a glimpse of a much older story, one shaped by historical woodland management, medieval parkland, farming and the generations of people who worked this land.
By following the clues preserved in historical documents, field names, old maps and other published articles, we can begin to piece together how this seemingly ordinary corner of Knebworth has changed over the centuries. Some connections are well documented; others remain possibilities, inviting us to look a little more closely at the landscape we see today.
Pre-1845: From Ancient Forest to Lord's Deer Park
The Domesday Village & The First Shift (1086-1300's)
The documented story of this landscape begins with William the Conqueror's Domesday Book of 1086. The survey reveals that 11th century Knebworth, then named Chenepeworde, was a busy and economically vital community centred around a major agricultural manor. Domesday records 33 heads of households living in the village (comprising 24 villagers, 4 smallholders and 5 slaves). For the 11th century, this was classed as a large and thriving settlement.
The text logs a heavy commitment to arable farming, noting that there was enough active crop land to keep 8 plough teams (each pulled by a team of eight oxen) working the heavy Hertfordshire clay.
Crucially for our field's history, Domesday records that Knebworth possessed woodland capable of sustaining 1000 pigs. The Normans didn't measure forest by counting trees or calculating area, they measured it by pannage - how many pigs could forage on the fallen autumn acorns and beech mast. In modern terms, a woodland dense enough to feed 1000 pigs could well have spanned roughly 1000-1500 acres of forest.
Originally, this entire medieval settlement cluster, its church and the original manor house sat closely together as a single hub, however in the 1300's this layout was permanently disrupted. In order to establish the medieval Old Park (likely to be the estate's original deer park). The Lord of the Manor cleared the immediate surroundings, forcing the settlement to move away from the house and church. It's possible that the displaced community relocated down to the edge of the park boundaries, establishing the new settlement line we know today as Park Lane. While this original 14th century park sat just north of my modern day focus area, its creation permanently reshaped the geography of Knebworth.
Based on Anne Rowe's book, "Medieval Parks of Hertfordshire", It's likely that the medieval Old Park was transformed into a very large rabbit warren in the mid 15th century. Then, along with the medieval Little Park which was created to the immediate south of Knebworth House and its walled gardens sometime prior to 1481, was later absorbed into the mid 17th century New Park.
Sources: Medieval Parks of Hertfordshire, Anne Rowe. Open Domesday by Anna Powell-Smith. Stevenage Borough Council, Settlement in the Stevenage area in the Mediaeval period.
Park Wood, one of the surviving woodland areas that may preserve a connection with Knebworth's much earlier wooded landscape.
Late 1300's - Early 1400's, The Medieval Wildwood & The Birth of The New Park
The Assarting of the Wildwood.
South of Park Lane, the earlier landscape is rather more difficult to reconstruct. The Domesday record tells us that the woodland was an important part of medieval Knebworth, while later manorial accounts reveal an estate in which timber, grazing and parkland management all played significant roles.
I have often wondered whether Park Wood and New Wood might preserve fragments of a much larger wooded landscape, gradually cleared and reorganised as the medieval parks developed. It is an intriguing possibility, although the precise extent of the earlier woodland remains uncertain.
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1401-1402 - Workers constructed a bridge at "Newparkponde".
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1402-1403 - One acre of wood was sold in the New Park.
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1410-1411 - 900 faggots (a bundle of small branches, brushwood or twigs used to start or feed a fire) were made in the New Park and sold.
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1412-1413 - trees were felled.
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1412 - 120 perches (approximately 600 metres) of new hedge was made and 40 perches of hedge repaired.
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1483-1484 - Broken branches were sold from 8 virgates (approximately 240 acres).
Sources: Medieval Parks of Hertfordshire, Anne Rowe.
New Wood, another modern day remnant of Knebworth's historic woodland?
1400's - 1641, The Great Park Era.
Life, Labour and the First Farmers.
This is perhaps one of the most critical chapters in the history of "A Knebworth Field".
While the original medieval New Park was born out of the old southern forest, I believe it to be located very much around the land immediately south of Park Lane, extending towards the centre where the first water management systems were created alongside the grazing lawns. For a period of around 80 years, both the New Park and the Great Park feature independently within the manorial accounts. It's my hypothesis that during this 80 year period, the Great Park referred to the wider area of land whilst the New Park referred to the original areas carved out for deer management. As stated in my "About" section, I'm not a historian so I'm ready to hear and certainly welcome any alternative suggestions on this.
The surviving accounts for the Great Park and potentially the earlier New Park, provide fascinating clues about the management of land that may have included the area explored in this project. Although the precise boundaries of these medieval parks remain uncertain, the records reveal a landscape shaped by woodland management, livestock, fencing and the work of generations of estate labourers.
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1402-1403 - (Timber Management): Heavy forestry work was constant. Accounts record the felling of 8 massive oaks and a beech tree being felled, specifically for the purpose of creating a bridge in the New Park. Also recorded are the commercial sales of several parcels of wood.
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1481-1482 - (Income From the Park): Accounts compiled during this time show that agistment of animals (charging outsiders to graze their livestock on the park grass) was 32s 4d. Income from the sale of loppes (branches, side shoots and smaller boughs of a standing tree) specifically from 13 hornbeams amounted to 4s 12d.
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1481-1482 - (Securing the Boundary): The manorial accounts record that during this period, 19s 2d was paid to two men to construct 115 poles (approximately 578 metres) of new fencing. To deter poachers and predators they were paid 6s 11d for setting sharp wooden spikes (le berdynge) into 83 poles (approximately 417 metres) of the fence. 16d was paid for the carriage of four heavy wagon loads of wooden stakes to complete the job. Also in this period, a payment of 27s 5d was recorded to maintain the park pale (the grand boundary ditch and bank).
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1511 (The Lord's Stables): By 1511, the use of the park was beginning to shift away from deer and the Great Park was officially reserved for the use of the lord's horses.
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1541-1542 (Pigs and Pasture): This period shows that the landscape was once again heavily utilised for livestock with manorial accounts logging significant income from both livestock grazing (agistment) and the charging for pigs to feed on autumn acorns (pannage).
1561, The First Stirrings of Change.
The most fascinating shift occurs in 1561. For the first time we see possible evidence of the very first stirrings of the Great Park being sub-divided and rented out.
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A tenant paid 13s 4d for a tenement called Le Parkgate and the agistment of two cows and a horse in the Great Park.
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A tenant paid 6s 6d for a tenement called Naylers and the agistment of one cow in the Great Park.
This shows that the park may have been losing its status as a private hunting ground and was instead, perhaps transitioning into tenant farming plots. Could it be that the grand plan to replace this old area with a brand new ornamental park closer to Knebworth House was already forming in the minds of the Lytton family nearly a century before it happened.
1641, The Decommissioning.
The final decommissioning of the Great Park came in 1641 when Sir William Lytton completed a brand new, fashionable "New Park" wrapping tightly around Knebworth House. With the family's deer and ornamental landscaping moved north, the Great park became completely redundant in its present form. Its status as a park was changed forever and the landscape was permanently broken up into the network of agricultural tenant farms, small holdings and cottage gardens that established the footprint of the arable field that I photograph so extensively today.
Sources: Medieval Parks of Hertfordshire, Anne Rowe.
View across the historic "Great Park" lands from north to south. August 2026.
The 1845 Tithe Apportionment: A Snapshot in Time
The 1845 Tithe Apportionment records serve as a vital, legally binding census of the Victorian landscape. Historically, tithes were a medieval tax requiring parishioners to give one-tenth of their agricultural produce directly to support the local church. By the 1830's, paying this tax in actual crops, livestock or wool had become very messy and inefficient. To solve this, the government passed the Tithe Commutation Act of 1836, which ordered every parish in the country to be meticulously mapped and assessed so these traditional payments could be converted into a fixed, annual cash rent. This bureaucratic shift resulted in an exceptionally valuable, historical snapshot of land ownership, occupation, field names and recorded land use.
For "A Knebworth Field", the 1845 Tithe records show that all of the 37 land parcels that fell across the field and woodlands were owned by one of three people - Sir E. G. Earl Lytton-Bulyer (Lord of the Manor), Reverend Charles Buchanan Pearson (Rector of Church of St. Mary and St. Thomas, Knebworth) and John Thompson a 57 year old locally born farmer. The names of these individual parcels of land act as layers of historical DNA, providing clues as to when and why each pocket of land was carved out of the old landscape.
The map below is a visual representation of the 1845 Tithe Apportionment map, showing the numbered field parcels. In the next section we will look at each section to see what it can tell us.
The Ancient Woodland Parcels
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Parcel 254. Park Wood. (Woodland) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
A large and possibly direct remnant of the original medieval wildwood. The name was solidified when the woodland became enclosed within the medieval park pale.
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Parcel 237. Park of New Wood. (Woodland) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
The name marks the exact boundary of the estate's original 15th-century New Park expansion and preserves the 400 year old memory of the moment this specific pocket of ancient forest was newly enclosed by a physical park ditch and bank.
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Parcel 230. Copse Wood. (Woodland) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
Derived from the old French word couper (to cut), a "copse" or "coppice" means a managed wood where trees were cut down to ground level on a seven to twenty year cycle. This name tells us that this specific pocket was likely used to produce a continuous supply of young, flexible rods and poles, possibly for weaving medieval hurdles and fences, or the production of charcoal.
The Medieval Hunting Glade Parcels
In historical landscape terms, a "Lawn" (originally Laund) was an open, grassy clearing surrounded by dense woods. Pockets such as these were often intentionally created and maintained inside a deer park to provide grazing and a clear line of sight for hunting parties. By 1845, these open glades had been ploughed up into arable crop fields but their names are beautifully evocative of their previous likely use.
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Parcel 243. First Lawn. (Arable) Owned by the Lytton estate and tenanted by Thomas Franklin.
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Parcel 239. Middle Lawn. (Arable) Owned by the Lytton estate and tenanted by Thomas Franklin.
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Parcel 238. Further Lawn. (Arable) Owned by the Lytton estate and tenanted by Thomas Franklin.
Thomas Franklin was a 33 year old locally born farmer who lived at Knebworth Lodge Farm with his wife Mary and their children Thomas, Ellen and Phillip.
The above sequential "Lawn" names probably remain entirely as they were named when the Great Park was still in existence, following the linear progression of the original open deer pasture as it stretched south from Park Lane into New Wood.
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Parcel 244. Pond and Brow in Lawn. (Woodland) Owned by the Lytton estate and tenanted by Thomas Franklin.
Tenanted by the same Thomas Franklin as the "Lawns" above, the Pond and Brow in Lawn was a singular, small, distinct land pocket, carved out of the First Lawn. This feature could still be seen on maps as late as 1946 and appeared to be a slight crest in the landscape which sloped down towards a pond - could this feature have been a water source, carved out historically for the park's deer?
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Parcel 240. The Lawn Spring. (Woodland) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 241. the Lawn Spring. (Woodland) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
In Hertfordshire and the wider Home Counties, the word "spring" when appended to a woodland name doesn't just mean a source of water. Technically it's an ancient forestry term for a "spring wood", a managed woodland explicitly enclosed to promote the growth of new coppice shoots. When estate men coppiced trees like ash, hazel or hornbeam, they had to legally protect the stumps from deer, cattle or rabbits which would eat the tender new shoots. Banks and ditches would be built so that the wood could spring back up securely. It's likely that the reason for two springs side by side would have been to allow for a rotation system. A typical system would involve woodmen cutting down one parcel whilst the adjacent parcel was left standing to mature. By the time the new growth had been harvested from the cut parcel, perhaps a decade later, the other parcel would have sprung up ready for coppicing.
The Park Close Divisions
The word "Close" explicitly means an enclosed, fenced-off field. When the Great Park was decommissioned in 1641, it was sliced into smaller farming plots. These pockets were leased out to specific tenant families, who attached their own names to the newly formed boundaries. Due to the early naming of these closes, the family names stuck, even though the original tenants may long since have moved on.
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Parcel 220. Webster's Park Close. (Arable) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 221. Ginn's Park Close. (Arable) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 222. Wheeler's Park Close. (Arable) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
The repeated use of "Park Close" may preserve a memory of the land's former association with parkland, while names such as Webster, Ginn and Wheeler suggest connections with individuals or families who once held or worked these fields.
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Parcel 223. Mardell's First Park Close. (Pasture) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 224. Mardell's Second Park Close. (Pasture) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 235. Mardell's Further Park Close. (Arable) Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
Named after the local Mardell family, these are further examples of first generation post-park tenant field names. The addition of "First," "Second," and "Further" to the names of the fields is beautifully descriptive of their location as they move further from the main accessway and down to New Wood in the south.
The Church Lands: A Medieval Island Enclave?
Among the fields recorded in the 1845 Tithe Apportionment are five adjoining parcels belonging to the Rector rather than the Lytton Estate. Their separate ownership raises an interesting question about the earlier history of this small group of fields.
Could these have formed part of a much older holding of church land, perhaps predating some of the surrounding parkland? If so, their boundaries might preserve a different chapter in the landscape's history. For now, however, the tithe records establish their nineteenth century ownership rather than a date at which that ownership began.
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Parcel 225. Three Acres. (Arable) Owned by Reverend Charles Buchanan Pearson & tenanted by George Balls.
A purely mathematical and utilitarian name. When the church lands were squared off and reorganised in the 1700's, old landscape names were often stripped away in favour of exact, practical measurements to help the Rector calculate crop yields and rents.
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Parcel 226. Home Close. (Arable) Owned by Reverend Charles Buchanan Pearson & tenanted by George Balls.
A universal name for the primary enclosed field sitting closest to the owner/tenants farmhouse or place of management, traditionally used for keeping domestic livestock close at hand, although in the 1840's we see that its use is arable.
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Parcel 227. Seven Acres and Half. (Arable) Owned by Reverend Charles Buchanan Pearson & tenanted by George Balls.
This is also an example of purely utilitarian naming determined by the size of the land rather than any local or traditional names.
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Parcel 228. Brow in Half. (Woodland) Owned by Reverend Charles Buchanan Pearson & tenanted by George Balls.
This parcel of land directly adjoins Copse Wood and it's described as woodland. A brow is a slope or incline, which suggests that this parcel of land contains a small, sloping woodland. Had this area been flat, it's likely that the half acre woodland section wood have been cleared and incorporated into an eight acre field rather than the "Seven Acres and Half" that we see above.
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Parcel 229. Eight Acres. (Arable) Owned by Reverend Charles Buchanan Pearson & tenanted by George Balls.
Another example of purely utilitarian naming.
George Balls, listed as the tenant of all of the above parcels, was a locally born farmer living in the Bell Plash (Bedwell Parish) area of Stevenage, along with his wife and four children.
Independent Freeholds and Village Edge
This group of land parcels mark the transition where the deep agricultural countryside met the social edge of Knebworth village life, showing how land was carved out for local trade, residents and nature.
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Parcel 148. Garden. (Arable) Owned & occupied by John Thompson.
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Parcel 153. Meadow. (Pasture) Owned & occupied by John Thompson.
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Parcel 155. Meadow. (Pasture) Owned & occupied by John Thompson.
John Thompson was a locally born farmer born in 1788. At the time of the Tithe Apportionment he was living in Knebworth with his wife Elizabeth and their dress-making daughter, Mary. John's ownership of the Tithe parcels mentioned above represents a rare case of non-Lytton freehold land on the edge of the estate, likely used for intensive domestic food production and private grazing.
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Parcel 151, Meadow by Almshouse (Pasture). Owned by the Lytton estate & tenanted by Mary Sherrington.
The Almshouses were erected by Mrs. Elizabeth Barbara Bulwer-Lytton in 1836, following her inheritance of the land in 1810. They were originally built to provide five tenements for "old and deserving people of the parish".
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Parcel 152. Lytton Arms Pub Gardens. (Pasture). Owned by the Lytton estate & tenanted by Mary Sherrington.
The original Lytton Arms Public House was built some time between 1836 and 1841 and served as a public house until 1887 when the building was retired and became Inn Cottage. The new Lytton Arms pub building that we see today was built in 1887.
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Parcel 154. Meadow. (Pasture). Owned by the Lytton estate & tenanted by Mary Sherrington.
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Parcel 236. Nightingale Close (Pasture). Owned by the Lytton estate & tenanted by Mary Sherrington.
Possibly named after its local wildlife habitat? Nightingale Close suggests an area that historically housed a thick, undisturbed hedgerow margin or scrubland where nightingales would have nested and sang. Due to this close's position bordering New Wood, this wouldn't be surprising.
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Parcel 149. Three Acres. (Arable). Owned by the Lytton estate & tenanted by Mary Sherrington.
At the time of the 1841 census, Mary Sherrington was a 60 year old widowed publican, living with her daughter Mary Ann and son Frederick, presumably at the then newly built Lytton Arms Public House. She likely made use of her pasture and arable holdings to provide feed for travellers horses, space for livestock trade and space to grow barley for brewing or crops to feed the inn's guests. By the time of the 1851 census, Mary is still living at the Lytton Arms but she's now a retired publican and her son-in-law, Thomas Skelton is listed as the head of the household and a publican and grocer. Mary's daughter Mary Ann (now married to Thomas) and her son Frederick, a gardener are still living with her.
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Parcel 231. Cottage and Garden. (Cottage and garden). Owned by the Lytton Estate & tenanted by Matthew Lumbis.
With no land use explicitly given for this entry in the records, it's likely that this is the residence and garden of Matthew Lumbis and that the garden will have been used, even if not entirely, for the production of some food crops for his family. At the time of the 1851 census, Matthew is a Wood Man and lives at Copse Corner in Knebworth and in fact on the later 1881 Ordnance Map, we can see this cottage explicitly related to as Copse Corner. The cottage and garden parcel that Matthew was tenanting in 1845 was located in the Lumbas Close tithe parcel (below), right next door to Copse Wood.
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Parcel 232. Lumbas Close. (Arable). Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
Due to the remarkably close match between the names Lumbas Close and Matthew Lumbis, I think it's possible that this particular close may have been named after an early tenant family from which Matthew Lumbis is part. Another link between Matthew Lumbis and Lumbas Close is that Lumbas Close was situated between Copse Wood and New Wood. Is it too much of a stretch to consider that Matthew Lumbis came from a generation of woodmen who initially tenanted and cleared that particular section of the woodland?
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Parcel 242. Green Lane. (Pasture). Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
Recorded as pasture in 1845 and may have served as an access route for woodland and agricultural activities.
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Parcel 147. Cooks Field. (Arable). Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 146. Nup End Common. (Arable). Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 233. Four Acres. (Arable). Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 234. Beech Tree Field. (Arable). Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
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Parcel 150. The Leg. (Pasture). Owned & occupied by the Lytton estate.
The above parcels are unremarkable in the naming, ownership or occupation. They represent practical field naming using the shape of the land (The Leg), a distinct tree marker (Beech Tree Field), an exact size (Four Acres), or an individual worker (Cook's Field).
Sources: The Genealogist, 1845 Tithe Apportionment.
View Across What Would Have Been Four Acres & Lumbas Close, From North To South.
1845-1939; The Woodland Boundaries
Between the landmark 1845 Tithe Apportionment and the mid-twentieth century, map records provide our best evidence into the structural shifts that affected the woodland areas of "A Knebworth Field." The most aggressive changes took place prior to 1939; thereafter, the ancient treelines largely stabilised into the footprint we recognise today. By tracing the sequential Ordnance Survey records, we can observe exactly how a centuries old tapestry of managed timber areas gradually receded to accommodate both agricultural efficiency and country estates.
1867, Anomaly and Legacy of "Sallow Wood."
The Great Britain Ordnance Survey Map of 1867 confirms that the historic woodland pockets of Copse Wood, New Wood, Park Wood, Brow-in-Half and the Lawn Springs remained fully intact. Although this particular map doesn't provide a great deal of detail, it introduces a fascinating nomenclature anomaly, labelling at least a portion of New Wood as "Sallow Wood."
Sallow is the traditional, historical name for goat willow (Salix caprea) and grey willow (Salix cinerea). While archival records before and after 1867 remain stubbornly silent around references to this name, the field itself continues to provide living proof of the map's accuracy.
During my walks in July 2026, I noticed an abundance of young goat willow growing along the grassy margin beside New Wood. I couldn't help wondering whether this might offer a small echo of the landscape once known as Sallow Wood. Of course, willow readily colonises suitable ground, so its presence today cannot establish a direct connection with the nineteenth century woodland. Nevertheless, the coincidence between the old name and the plants now growing here is one I find particularly intriguing.
1881, The Great Clearance.
By the time the 1881 Ordnance Survey was published, the woodland landscape had been radically changed, with Copse Wood, Brow-in-half and The Lawn Springs no longer shown on the map. Whilst I have no documentary evidence to explain the motive behind this restructuring, it's very likely that these smaller pockets of woodland were systematically removed to maximise the acreage of the adjacent arable fields. Perhaps strangely, during the same period, half of what was once Nightingale Close was allowed to revert back to woodland.
1897, The First Domestic Footprint.
The period between 1881 and the 1897 Ordnance Survey sees New Wood unchanged. The section of Nightingale Close that was previously incorporated into the woodland is still "rewilding". This period however, marks the beginning of a fundamental shift in Park Wood, as we see the first signs of domestic clearance. Along the north-eastern edge of Park Wood, the 1897 map captures the presence of Wood Cottage within a cleared section of woodland, then simply marked "Wood est".
1910, Lloyd George Domesday, the Edwardian Shift and the 1910 Park Wood Elite.
As the nineteenth century drew to a close, the woodland landscape of Park Wood began a radical transformation as the Lytton estate began carving out highly desirable residential plots within the woodland. What had once been an area of commercial timber management became an exclusive high-society enclave. By 1910, the newly laid foundations of four distinct properties permanently rewrote the DNA of this ancient acreage: Parkwood, Wood Cottage (prev Wood est.), Talbragar and Homewood.
The precise details of who owned, leased and lived within this new Edwardian enclave are preserved thanks to a remarkable piece of legislative history. Passed under the Finance (1909-10) Act 1910, Chancellor David Lloyd George introduced a new revolutionary tax on the incremental value of land. To implement it, the government launched a huge nationwide valuation project commonly known as the "Lloyd George Domesday Survey". Between 1910 and 1915, valuation officers visited every single plot of land in the country, meticulously recording ownership, tenancy, boundaries and rental values, cross referenced with detailed maps. For historians, these records provide a highly accurate snapshot of Edwardian society. Because clerks regularly updated these records over the subsequent years, they reveal the hidden human stories behind the estate walls, tracking how ownership passed through elite families and identifying the prominent figures who sought refuge within the boundaries of Park Wood.
Homewood: The most architecturally significant addition to the landscape was Homewood, positioned at the southern end of the Park Wood. Commissioned at the turn of the century, the house was explicitly designed by the legendary architect Sir Edwin Lutyens. Lutyens, who was married to Lady Emily Lytton, designed the property as a dower house for his mother-in-law, the Dowager Countess of Lytton. Completed around 1901, the building was described as a "virtuoso display by an expert in three-dimensional form." The Domesday records show that in 1910, whilst the Dowager Countess resided comfortably at Homewood, ownership of the property lay with the Earl of Lytton. The track that I call "Green Lane" after its naming in the 1845 Tithe records, today carries the name Dowagers Lane.
The surrounding properties were occupied by industrial and imperial elites whose vast households completely reordered the local domestic economy.
Parkwood (John James Patterson): Occupied the largest footprint of the non-aristocratic parcels. Patterson brought industrial and merchant wealth into Park Wood. His property was so imposing it adopted the name of the wood itself. Patterson's huge fortune, later valued at over £114,000 at probate, allowed him to maintain a grand household managed by a live in cook, a lady's maid and upper and under housemaids. In 1910, records show that the Parkwood estate consisted of a house, stable, garden and piece of woodland. Patterson had acquired a 90 year leasehold on the property, the freehold of which remained with the Lytton estate.
Talbragar (Rupert St. John Hughes): Securing his leasehold on the property from the Lytton estate in 1906, Hughes represented the globalised nature of Edwardian Elite society. The son of a wealthy commercial tycoon from Adelaide, Australia, Hughes named his residence Talbragar, potentially after a famous New South Wales gold mining district. Backed by Australian pastoral and corporate investments, Hughes lived as a traditional country gentleman, using his Knebworth base to network with top-tier British imperial circles. In 1910, the Talbragar estate consisted of the house, stables, garden and woodland.
Wood Cottage (The temporary sanctuary of Howard Carter?): Positioned alongside these grand estates is Wood Cottage, the first of the domestic properties built within Park Wood. By 1910, it was held via a leasehold by Lady Helen Mabel temple-Gore-Langton (the Countess Temple of Stowe), recorded under family trustees as Helen Maude Adams. At this time, the property is listed as house, stables, buildings and land. The cottage was initially utilised by her son-in-law, Major William Maurice Copland du Quesne Caillard - a decorated cavalry officer whose name elegantly combined the lineages of the prominent Caillard and Copland families. By 1918, as Word war I slowed global on-site archaeological efforts, the cottage was let out to one Howard Carter.
This discovery is particularly intriguing given the social and family connections linking the Knebworth estate with the wider circle of Lord Carnarvon, who famously financed the excavations that led to the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922.
Could the Howard Carter recorded at Wood Cottage have been the celebrated Egyptologist himself?
The possibility is certainly worth exploring. The surviving property records establish an association with someone of that name, while the wider family connections provide an interesting context in which to consider his identity. However, without further documentary evidence directly linking the tenant to the Egyptologist, I cannot yet regard the identification as confirmed.
As the inter war period progressed, the elite micro colony began to shift. The original Edwardian pioneers moved on and by 1939, Talbragar had lost its original Australian gold mining name and had been formally renamed Park Lodge.
When looking across the field today, the hedgerows and tree lines don't just reflect natural agricultural cycles and centuries of agricultural management. they carry the structural footprints of a brief, brilliant window when international industrialists, imperial pioneers, pioneering architects and possibly the world's most famous Egyptologist all shared and enjoyed the very same landscape.
July 2026. Extensive new, young "sallow" growth on the wide grassy margin between the arable field and New Wood.
Egyptologist Howard Carter (left) and an Egyptian reis (foreman) carefully brush away ancient, dried ritual resins to clean Tutankhamun's innermost solid gold coffin, still nested inside the base of the middle coffin. Photograph by Harry Burton, October 29-30, 1925. Harry Burton's Tutankhamun Tomb Photographs Archive, The Griffith Institute, University of Oxford. (burton photographic negative no. 0770). Public Domain.
With the final interwar realignments of 1939, the historical narrative of the woodland boundaries largely draws to a close, as these ancient treelines stabilised into the footprint we see today.
The singular modern exception to this architectural freeze is The Roundhouse, an award winning residential masterpiece constructed within the northern end of Park Wood. This striking eco-conscious dwelling was uniquely built on the circular footprint of a redundant, 14 meter wide, Edwardian water reservoir. Climbing three stories upward around a massive tree-like central pillar, the property is highly celebrated for its off-grid self-sufficiency. the structure features a conical rainwater harvesting roof, rooftop solar arrays and high performance thermally broken Crittall windows. Reflecting a true "full circle" link to its surrounding landscape, the façade of the building was crafted using the crushed concrete of the original reservoir lid, while its extensive oak, ash and larch timbers were sourced less than a mile away on the neighbouring Knebworth House estate.
1845-1972. Field Boundaries: A Changing Tapestry
To look across the singular, wide expanse of "A Knebworth Field" today is to look at a landscape completely scrubbed of its historic divisions. In 1845, the Tithe Apportionment recorded this area not as a single field but as an intricate patchwork of 28 individual parcels of land, each carrying its own distinct character, tenancy and name. The journey from this complex mosaic, down to the modern singular field is a story of agricultural optimisation, which can be traced step by step through the shifting lines on late-Victorian to late 20th century maps.
1881, The First Consolidations.
Because the map of 1867 lacks enough detail to track precise agricultural boundaries, the 1881 Ordnance Survey map provides our first definitive look at how the post Tithe landscape began to merge. By this point, the initial casualties of efficiency were the historic fences and ancient hedgerows that had stood for generations. The map reveals a series of significant unions across the acreage.
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The Lawn Complex: Middle Lawn and Further Lawn were formally unified, their dividing boundary completely uprooted. At the same time, the two pockets of woodland known as Lawn Springs vanished from the record, their timber cleared and soil absorbed into a newly expanded First lawn and the adjacent Websters Park Close.
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The Park Closes: Boundary lines were completely erased between Websters Park Close and and Ginns Park Close, forging them into a single, larger arable unit. Meanwhile, though the margins of Mardells First Park Close and Second park Close remained unaltered, Mardells further Park Close surrendered its identity, merging into a much larger footprint which included Beech Tree Field.
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Woodland Assimilation: As noted in the changing woodland records, the clearance of Copse Wood allowed its former acreage to be claimed by the plough, divided between and absorbed into Cooks Field and Mary Shillington's Meadow. Nightingale Close was in part lost to agriculture however with its southern end being absorbed into New Wood.
Through these combined losses of three distinct woodland pockets and the removal of internal bouondaries, the twenty eight original parcels of the 1845 Tithe map had now been whittled down to 21.
The 1881 Ordnance Survey edition, which was the first to introduce such a high level of specific detail, also provides us with a snapshot in time as to the ancient, veteran or simply prominent trees that lined the field boundaries. Some of these marked trees are likely to be the magnificent, deep rooted remnants of the ancient woods that had been cleared in some cases centuries prior. Because the Ordnance Survey permanently abandoned the labour intensive practise of charting individual boundary trees after this era, the 1881 map remains a solitary historical window into the true wooded character of the old Victorian hedge lines.
1897, The Turn of the Century.
The publication of the 1897 Ordnance Survey map proved that the momentum toward a consolidated landscape was accelerating, reducing the total parcel count to 20.
During this decade, The Leg was systematically joined with Three Acres, a plot historically tenanted by Mary Shillington. More evocative still is the sudden structural absence at Copse Corner. The house and garden which in the mid-nineteenth century had been tenanted by Matthew Lumbis, completely disappeared from the map. In their place, only a few faint lines remain, suggesting that while the living quarters were gone, a tangible mark remained on the earth - perhaps the crumbling foundation stones of a family cottage or the low, forgotten boundary of an old garden wall.
All evidence of trees along individual field margins has now been erased, not necessarily through physical uprooting but due to the Ordnance Survey's decision to no longer mark these living, historical remnants.
1922, Domestic and Civic Footprints.
By 1922, the general landscape and layout of the fields remained remarkably consistent with the 1897 boundaries. It appears that the sweeping modernisation characterising the first twenty years of the twentieth century was largely concentrated within the residential developments of Park Wood, leaving the central agricultural lines untouched. However, infrastructure quickly followed architecture, leaving distinct geometric stamps on the field margins.
The most notable changes include an infrastructure expansion likely built to support the local housing boom: a massive 14 meter wide concrete and steel water reservoir appeared at the north-eastern corner of what was once First Lawn.
The map also documents further changes, this time along the northern boundary of Home Close. A new structure formed a distinct rectangular enclosure within the top eastern corner of the close, close to the nineteenth century schoolhouse. While the school itself had become redundant in 1912 when children were transferred down the hill to the new London Road facility , this mapped anomaly I think captured the physical footprint of the old school playground which has been described to me by local residents who have memories of the area. In later decades, as horse drawn transport vanished from Park Lane, this solid, open playground clearing naturally evolved to meet the demands of the modern combustion engine, functioning today as a residents car park.
Finally, the 1922 map records a temporary structural anomaly in the north-western corner of "A Knebworth Field", showing two divided closes spanned by an intersecting feature. Because this structure vanished from all subsequent map editions, it represents (I think), a temporary field gate enclosure. Situated close to Park Lane with Manor Farm positioned just opposite, this layout would have served as a vital agricultural pinch point, the primary funnelling boundary for managing livestock, heavy horse team and early farm machinery entering the wider arable landscape.
1939, Encroachment and Allotments.
The publication of the 1939 Ordnance Survey map, the final cartographic record before the onset of the Second World War, captured a landscape adjusting to social expansion along its northern fringe. In 1922 a row of workers cottages had sprung up just north of our area of interest, adjacent to the track that navigates the northern boundaries of the fields. In 1922, these cottages had no visible rear gardens, however by 1939, a neat row of rear garden plots had encroached into the northernmost fields, reducing their arable acreage. Likely to meet the needs of these same cottages, the land that was once Mardells First Park Close was bisected to create two parcels, the southern one now being shown as allotment gardens.
1946-1960, Post War Stagnation.
Following the residential encroachment captured in 1939, the landscape entered a prolonged period of structural freeze. The Ordnance Survey maps of 1946, 1950 and 1960, along with contemporary aerial photography from 1950, record no changes to the internal field boundaries. During the years spanning the Second World War and immediate post war recovery, major infrastructure overhauls of the working fields seemed simply not to be a priority. Agricultural attention was focused entirely on maximising crop yields within the existing framework of the land, leaving the network of Victorian fences and divisions completely untouched for over two decades.
The 1950 Ordnance Survey aerial map does provide us with our next snapshot as to the state of the hedgerows and boundaries at the time. In comparison to the beautiful hand drawn maps of the 1881 survey which recorded many notable trees along the field boundaries, the 1950 tree count appears much reduced.
1972, The Great Consolidation.
By 1972, the decades long stagnation ended with a massive, unprecedented shift across the arable landscape. A series of aggressive consolidations had systematically torn down the old boundaries, compressing the remaining twenty parcels down to just eleven:
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The Northern Amalgamation: Across the entire northern expanse, an immense agricultural sweep was forged. First Lawn, Websters Park Close, Ginns Close, Wheelers Park Close, Mardells First park Close (including the wartime allotment gardens), Mardells Second park Close and the northern section of Mardells Further Park Close were all unified into a single, massive arable plot.
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The Western Union: The historic boundaries that defined Eight Acres, Seven Acres and Half, Three Acres, and half of Home Close were completely uprooted combining them into a single western block.
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The Southern Consolidation: At the southern end of the fields, a similar unification took place. Middle Lawn, Further Lawn, the southern tip of Mardells Further Park Close, Beech Tree Field and Four Acres were entirely consolidated. Alongside them, the lands historically known as Nup End Common, The Leg and Mary Shillington's Three Acres and Garden were formally joined.
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The Final Holdouts: By 1972, only a handful of the old Tithe plots retained their independent boundaries. These included of course Park Wood and New Wood, and a number of small pockets along the very western boundary. Other than that, just Lumbis Close, the historically amalgamated Cooks Field and Copse Wood, the remaining half of Home Close and the small historic meadow to its immediate west were the only survivors of the clearance.
Source: oldmapsonline.co.uk
Source: The National Library of Scotland
Source: National Library of Scotland
Source: oldmapsonline.co.uk
Unlocking The 1960's Agricultural Boom and the Expanding Fields.
Why did this huge change to our landscape take place within this timeframe?
The sudden collapse of the field boundaries between 1960 and 1972 was likely driven by a national radical, government backed transformation in British industrial farming. Several crucial factors caused this specific layout shift:
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The Rise of Heavy Mechanisation: The 1960's saw the widespread adoption of massive, heavy diesel tractors and wide-span combine harvesters. These machines required large, uninterrupted expanses of land to operate efficiently. Small, irregularly shaped Victorian plots forced operators to waste significant time and fuel with slowing down, turning and manoeuvring. Uprooting the internal hedges turned tight corners into long, continuous, efficient machine runs.
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The Agricultural Act and Hedgerow Subsidies: Although unthinkable today, the British government actively funded the destruction of the landscape during this era. Under the Agriculture Act of 1947 and subsequent 1957/1967 expansions, the Ministry of Agriculture offered substantial financial grants to farmers specifically to remove hedgerows, clear ditches and merge fields. The political goal was absolute self-sufficiency in grain production and ancient boundaries were viewed as barriers to national efficiency.
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The Transition Away from Mixed Farming: Historically across the UK, smaller fields like Mardells and The Lawns were kept separate from each other because they served different purposes in a traditional mixed farming rotation, where some fields held livestock and others grew arable crops. By the late 1960's, farming became highly specialised and livestock numbers began to reduce, thus rendering thick, livestock proof hedges and holding pens completely redundant. Across the UK, entire acreage was converted to specialised, continuous arable crop production, clearing the way for the vast, open field layouts we see today.
Sources: The Genealogist, 1910 Lloyd Domesday. National Library Of Scotland. Old Maps Online.
A Modern day Tractor Cultivating The Now Wide Expanse Of "A Knebworth Field".
1970's to Modern Day. The Machinery of Efficiency and the Rise of the Ecological Shield
The Great Arable Shift.
During the second half of the twentieth century, British agriculture underwent considerable change. Increasing mechanisation, changing agricutural policies and the government backed drive for greater food efficiency encouraged the creation of larger, more easily worked fields.
The maps suggest that this wider transformation was reflected in the landscape south of Park Lane, where many of the smaller historic divisions gradually disappeared. Exactly how these changes were experienced and managed by local farmers working this particular land remains something I'd love to know more about. If anyone reading this has historical agricultural links to this land or memories of the changing landscape, I'd love to hear from you.
The Changing Status of Hedgerows and Margins.
By the late 1990's, the "production at all cost" mentality of the post war boom began to reverse. Decades of intensive cultivation had resulted in widespread hedgerow degradation and soil compaction. The introduction of the Hedgerows Regulations 1997 halted physical boundary removals in some cases but the most dramatic visual changes to our UK arable landscapes occurred following the UK's exit from the European Union, which replaced old CAP payments with the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) and Countryside Stewardship schemes.
Rather than paying farmers for how much food they produce, modern frameworks pay for environmental outcomes. This likely explains the wildflower buffer strip which dominates the eastern edge of the field today.
Modern contracting outfits explicitly layout these uncultivated buffers to establish flower rich grass margins or herbal leys. Instead of prioritising food production on every square inch, large sections of arable fields are intentionally repurposed as an ecological safety net. Rather than rotating this nitrogen fixing crop across the whole field, it's kept permanently in place along the perimeter to act as an underground sponge, trapping fertiliser run off, providing a long term home for pest eating insects and allowing deep taproots to break up heavy compaction caused by turning machinery.
Wildflowers Growing Along the Margins of the Arable Field
Understanding the Landscape Today: A Visual Conclusion
What we see when we stand in "A Knebworth Field" today isn't a random collection of greenery but a living map written by centuries of human ambition, survival and technology. The vast, open skyline and the ancient woodland pockets are the result of a timeline stretching back to the Domesday Book of 1086 and beyond, tracking through centuries of feudal estate management by the Lytton family and culminating in the highly automated contract farming of the 21st century.
The arable field is sculpted for maximum modern food production, while the uncultivated borders and woodland represent our latest chapter - a conscious return to balance.
To truly appreciate how this historical push and pull manifests on the ground throughout the year, visit my Arable Field page to see the lifecycle of the modern harvest and the Hedgerows and Margins page to discover how these vital biological corridors change and adapt throughout the seasons.
If you have any stories to share regarding "A Knebworth Field" throughout history, or indeed any photographs that you feel may be of interest - please do get in touch.