The English cultural landscape has evolved over centuries, retaining in
its multifarious patterning many aspects of the past which provide
evidence of a long and gradual development. This book discusses in
detail some aspects of life in medieval England still to be seen in the
landscape. The perspective of the air photograph conveys a fresh
understanding of the physical setting of medieval society, of the
interaction between communities and the land upon which they settled and
of the varying pattern of the social and economic fabric of the country.
Comparison of air photographs with early maps and records is
exceptionally informative, permitting analytical studies of town and
village plans, or providing clues to the discovery of quite unexpected
features. Many villages were established long before the Doomsday
survey: some have vanished or are now to be seen only as a roughness in
the ground or as marks in soil or crops. Others may remain as an ancient
nucleus of a town or city now surrounded by more recent building
development.