For over two centuries, the majority
of the land around Lyneham village has been used for agricultural
purposes. In 1937 the Air Ministry had intentions to acquire
the land for the expansion of the Air Force and use most of
the pasture and arable fields around Lyneham Court as an aircraft
storage depot. Much of the land was purchased and the face
of the landscape changed.
Even today there is still a significant proportion of the
land which is widely used for arable and dairy farming. The
majority of the land in the local area is classified as lower
quality agricultural land, predominantly at grade 3 and 4.
This is related to the underlying heavy clays. Areas of grade
5 are rare but are present on steeper ground.
There are isolated pockets of higher-grade land through
the area. These exist primarily on freer draining soils within
the clay landscape or on the tighter cornbrash, evident to
the west of the district.
The landscape within the Avon Valley exhibits a significantly
higher quality of agricultural land on the pockets of fertile,
freer draining ground. The Chalk plains to the south are also
of consistently higher quality at grade 2.
The landscape of the district exhibits mixed agricultural
practices to varying degrees. Arable practices dominate on
much of the higher grade, freer draining and more fertile
level land. Pastoral agriculture dominates on the poor grade,
wetter and steeper topography, the valley and scarp sides,
along watercourses and across much of the rolling heavy clay
landscape.
To the west, on the edge of the Cotswolds, the fields are
frequently bounded by limestone walls, many of which are in
need of repair. Away from the west, evidence of stone walls
soon disappear, replaced by hedges of mixed species and varied
management. Boundaries around more intensively farmed land
appear more degraded than those in the pastoral landscape.
The overall, picture across the district is of a patchwork
of mixed agricultural land.
Geology
Much of the landscape character of North Wiltshire
is dominated by underlying geology of the middle to late Jurassic
period, with elements of rock from the later Cretaceous period.
The age of the rock bed moves roughly from the older Middle
Jurassic to the west through the Upper Jurassic to the Lower
and Upper Cretaceous in the southeast. For a complete description
of the underlying land, its geology and composition click
here
Farming
At the time of the Domesday Survey the estate contained enough
land for 10 ploughs, and 71 hides were held in demesne, which
was land under feudalism kept by the lord for his own use
and occupation as distinguished from that granted to tenants.
Primarily nine farms served the agricultural land of the Lyneham
area, for more information on the farming of Lyneham click
here.
Lyneham Estate Valuation
In 1334 Lyneham paid the second highest contribution in Kingsbridge
hundred indicating there was some prosperity in the community.
The parish had 227 poll-tax payers, the highest amount in
the hundred. Five parishioners were selected to pay additional
taxes for the Royal Benevolence, owing to their affluence.
To find out the valuation figures of the Lyneham estate click
here. |
