Enclosures

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In English economic history, enclosure (or inclosure) was the name given to the process by which land which had previously been considered commons -- with rights of access and use by all, was fenced (enclosed) and deeded or entitled to a single private owner, who was to enjoy the possession and fruits of the land at the exclusion of all others. This conversion from public to private lands was accompanied by force, resistance, and bloodshed.

The enclosure movement was a keystone in the beginning of the notion of private property, corporations, and intellectual property law.

There were two main waves of enclosure. Enclosures during the Tudor period largely resulted in conversion of land use from arable to pasture – usually sheep farming. These enclosures were often undertaken unilaterally by the landowner. Later, "parliamentary" enclosures (in the 18th and 19th centuries) saw strips in the open fields consolidated into more compact units surrounded by hedges. Tudor enclosures were often accompanied by a loss of grazing rights and could result in the destruction of whole villages.

Parliamentary enclosures usually provided villagers with some compensation for the loss of grazing rights, although the land received for common rights may not have been sufficient.

Introduction

There were two main processes of enclosure in England. One was the division of large open fields into privately controlled plots of land, usually hedged and known at the time as "severals". This land was already owned, but under a concept of ownership that gave the owners rights to the crops, but also meant that other people might have rights to partial use of that land. For example, villagers might have the right to graze their animals on the stubble in the open fields after the harvest was taken, or in a hay meadow after the haying. This land was private, but subject to certain public rights, usually known as "common rights". Before enclosure, a farmer might own or rent several strips in an open field. Medieval manors usually had two to three large open fields, so that crops could be rotated. In the process of enclosure, the large fields were divided and communal access restricted. Most open-field manors in England were enclosed in this manner, with the notable exception of Laxton, Nottinghamshire and parts of the Isle of Axholme in North Lincolnshire.

The second process of enclosure was the division and privatization of common fens and marshes, moors and other "wastes" (in the original sense of "uninhabited places"). These enclosures turned common land into owned land, whereas field enclosures only segregated land that was already owned.

Read more at Wikipedia.org