More information : TA 143018. Settlement remains of Cabourne shrunken Medieval village, formerly part of Cabourne lie at about 85m above OD on either side of a narrow steep-sided Wolds valley, running from W to E. St Nicholas's church, although heavily restored in 1872, contains some medieval masonry and a Norman font unearthed from below the floor during the restoration. It is situated at the W end of the village where a series of dry minor valleys combine to form the main valley. Its place-name underlines the settlement's early concern with the availability of reliable water, near the head of the valley.
Although the DB returns do not total precisely, supporting evidence from the Lindsey Survey in the early 12th century suggests that Cabourne formed a six-carucate fiscal unit in the 11th and 12th centuries. DB records no less than 7 holdings in the vill; by the early 13th century this had been reduced to two secular holdings, that for a time were both held by Gilbert de Turs (de Turribus): there may be a hint of the topographical significance of this division in a reference to the fee of Esthalle in Cabourne, held by Gilbert c.1200.(b)
In 1337 Richolda of Thornton let 'a mediety of the capital manor of Cabourne': later that century and in the first half of the 15th the manor of Cabourne was in the hands of the Tournays of Caenby And let for rent. But to balance this, a series of grants to local religious institutions perpetuated the fragmentation. The most important was Hugh de Baiocis's grant before 1185 of 13 bovates and 7 tofts to the Templars. Under their organisation this became the baillia or economic and administrative centre for their lands and properties in NE Lindsey that extended to Barton, Worlaby, Wootton, Limber, Stallingborough, Aylesby, Irby, Grimsby, Holton, Ravendale, Thorganby and Fulstow. Under the Hospitallers, their Cabourne estate was reduced to the status of member of Willoughton preceptory, its centre reckoned only as 'unum croftum, absque domo'; after the Dissolution it was 'a messuage and land' granted to John Bellowe and John Broxholme.(d)
The Gilbertine priory of Alvingham also had a grange at Cabourne from at least the early 13th century. In 1535 the priory's temporality in the vill was worth 13/4 and let; the same clear value was assigned to the former monastic possession in William Monson's hands in 1558, then detailed as '1 messuage, 1 toft, 40 acres of land, 20 of pasture and 100 of warren and heath'.(e) In addition, Gilbert de Turs gave the advowson of St Nicholas's church to the Augustinians of Wellow Abbey as part of their early endowment, and in the 14th century they held a manor at Cabourne, which is listed in 1372 among the dilapidations of the Abbey's property that here involved a reduction from 2 ploughs to 1.
About 1200 the same Gilbert gave the Dean and Chapter of Lincoln 2 tofts, a bovate of land and pasture for 180 sheep, 2 horses and 6 oxen, and common pasture for their own sheep to the canons of Thornton Abbey as part of their early endowment; Hugh de Baiocis gave Thornton a bovate, a messuage and common pasture in 1150- 1160, surrendered in 1546; and Newsham Abbey surrendered grazing for 200 sheep in Cabourne field, which derived from gifts and leases from Galfridus de Turs of the time of Richard I.(f) The latter items indicate the early importance of grazing at Cabourne, no doubt heightened by the monastic interest: in 1251 and 1262 the prior of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem in England granted in fee farm tofts, crofts, arable and meadow in
Cabourne, and common pasture of the vill for a total of 700 sheep, 16 oxen and 12 horses.(g) Part of Cabourne's pasture lay detached in the Smithfield area of North Kelsey parish in the sandy lowlands W of the chalk escarpment, as indicated by the DB entry for William de Percy's manor. From this situation, the Dissolution naturally again produced a multiplicity of secular ownership in which St Pols, Tyrwhitt's and Monsons had a share, but between the mid 18th and the beginning of the 19th century the Pelhams of Brocklesby, earls of Yarborough, had acquired practically the whole parish,
including patronage of the church, in part through their role in arrangements for meeting the debts of the Holles family, dukes of Newcastle, who had held the manor of Cabourne since the early 16th century. At the parliamentary enclosure of Cabourne, by act of 1811 and award of 1814, there were just two large farms within the village - the present Cabourne House and Church Farm - and a few cottages. Although the peak recorded population for Cabourne occurs at DB with a minimum of 39, already then two of the smaller holdings, both sokeland of manors in Rothwell and assessed at 3.5 bovates, were waste. The early 14th-century lists of 14 and 15 taxpayers represent barely more than half the average for the area - the impact presumably of gifts to religious institutions and early conversion to pasture. Relief of 100% in 1352 and exemption from the parish tax in 1428 with less than 10 households mark a further sharp decline: but reliefs in the 15th century were below 20% and declining, albeit in relation to the low base level: there were 9 and 10 taxpayers in 1524 and 1525; 7 persons were available for the Lindsey Musters in 1539, there were 6 taxpayers in 1542-3, 12 households in 1536, 42 communicants in 1603 and 53 in 1676. At the beginning of the 18th century these levels had doubled, and the modern period has seen a characteristic late 19th-century peak of population and latterly an improved ratio of buildings to people.(i)
A coherent chronological and morphological history for this settlement is made impossible by the complexity of the extant earthworks, the loss of upstanding detail in certain areas due to ploughing, and the position of the surviving farms and cottages.
Generally, the earthworks represent former close boundaries, low but well-defined banks and shallow ditches, associated with terrace and hollow-ways marking the old village streets and lanes. On the S and on part of the N side the closes run up to the lip of the valley; occasionally the sites of former buildings are identifiable. It is significant that on both sides of the valley ridge- and-furrow apparently underlies a number of properties. Substantial sections of the shrunken village must therefore represent later expansion or infilling of spaces between separate nuclei. The area around the church has particular claims as a location for the early settlement: since a number of valleys join here, it is topographically the most suitable site for settlement in the locality. Unfortunately this is the area where the earthworks are least well preserved. To the NE of the church a well which has not run dry in living memory (local information) may mark the site of the early village spring. NW and W of the well are low earthworks rendered indeterminate by levelling and ploughing in 1965. Prior to this, as shown on the RAF vertical air cover, they were associated with the sites of former rectangular buildings. Fieldwalking produced 13th to 15th-century pottery and slag.(j)
The construction of the Old Vicarage and the laying out of its gardens have removed any remains immediately W of the church. In the paddock SW of the Vicarage, fragmentary earthworks representing buildings and small plots are cut by a bank and ditch boundary feature that nevertheless lies within the limits of old enclosure mapped in 1814, which follow the field boundary and include the block of ridge-and-furrow to the N. Both this close and that NW of the church had the field-names Coney Close in 1814 and contained no buildings.(k) To the E of St Nicholas's the valley floor has been obscured by a former pond ('a'on plan, shown water-filled in 1814) and the erection of Cabourne House and Church Farm which have perhaps overlain early settlement. Another pond at 'b' cuts through earthworks that comprise tofts with foundations of stone buildings and boundaries that pick up the close divisions rising up the valley side. The pattern possibly continued westwards as it does to the E. Alternatively, the pond and farms may represent the infilling of a former green in front of the church with the well or spring at tne end. The closes N and NE of Cabourne House, at 'd' on plan, are much longer than those to the immediate E in area 'c', but are divided half-way up the slope by a way that continues through as the back boundary of 'c'. Both contain ridge-and-furrow. The earthworks at 'c' were levelled and ploughed in 1968 exposing the course of a road and close boundaries: of two clear occupation areas, one contained the chalk foundations of a building about 25 x 10m, the other sherds of Medieval gritty and glazed wares.(l)
A very well-defined block, 'e', joins 'c' at the E. Although different in consisting of a ladder of fairly broad closes, like paddocks or small fields, it too contains former arable. Whether all of its enclosures contained structures is uncertain but there were rectangular buildings in the westernmost. On the S side of the valley, the pattern of closes is confused by late additions such as the hedge boundary at 'f': it may consist of perhaps five large closes with later subdivisions. On the other hand, an abandoned section of the village may have had later properties superimposed on it whose boundaries did not coincide with the earlier pattern. At 'g' chalk rubble foundations mark the position of a farm complex set, like the Primitive Methodist Chapel to its W, on top of earlier arable within a broad close similar to those at 'e'. The former village street system also raises problems and reinforces the impression that the settlement remains are not all contemporary. An earlier road, bordering the SE side of 'e' and following the valley, merges with the modern road. As the later road veers to follow the valley bottom, a hollow-way appears W of 'g' and running up on to the S side of the valley, is traceable to area 'f'. Its relationship to the close boundaries is interesting: like the half-slope way on the N side, in some instances it seems to cut across them obliquely while in others it is crossed by them. Perhaps the hollow-way ('f'-'g') avoided the bottom to skirt a large former green, although the apparent lack of buildings on its S side argues against this and its origin may lie in a division between the front area of properties and appendant closes. Following the S lip of the valley and at right angles to the boundaries of the closes is a terrace-way, partly defined by a well-marked lynchet. At its W end it probably turned N by Glebe Farm to join the main road as that curved sharply southwards alongside the church, as shown on the 1814 map, thereby forming a side lane analogous to that which serves its counterpart along the N lip of the valley. On the N slope of the main valley a street part terraced and part hollowed, fronting an old headland, marks the N edge of block 'e' and gives access to the easternmost paddock. At 'h' it meets block 'c' and makes a double bend around its NE corner. At least one building in this block was built against the street. At 'i' the street meets block 'd' and, while appearing to cut straight across the closes here, which it may therefore post date, it also joins up with a terrace-way at their N ends. The form and situation of this is directly comparable with that on the opposite side of the valley. There must have been at least one earlier street in or near the lowest part of the valley to serve those closes which were truncated by the lanes described above.
The limit of old enclosure shown in the enclosure award map matches in significant detail the earthworks of the southern terraceway as it diverges from the field boundary and the right- angle bends of the northern terraceway, and encompasses the full extent of block 'c' and the closes around and E of White House Farm.
Despite the difficulties of interpretation, the settlement remains at Cabourne do seem to fall into distinct blocks, that are not necessarily all contemporary and may owe something to a process of infilling between several discrete nuclei, such perhaps as 'c' infilling between 'd' and 'e', or to phased later addition to the E end of a single settlement. At the same time, they may have a tenurial significance: what appears as a single farm plus paddocks that makes up block 'e' might easily be a monastic holding or grange, and the block of closes around White House Farm, separated it seems from the village remains, could be similar or even an eastern manor in named contrast with one near the church. (1-2)
The remains of the Medieval shrunken village and possible site of a grange were seen as earthworks and mapped from good quality air photographs as a part of RCHME: Lincolnshire NMP. The remains lie between TA 1472 0203 and TA 1379 0190. As previosly mentioned, some areas have now been levelled.
(Morph No. LI.242.13.1-11)
This description is based on data from the RCHME MORPH2 database.
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