Animal farm

An unusual horse curb bit, carved stonework, a huge quantity of 11th to 13th-century pottery and some high-status finds brought Time Team on a hunt for a Norman house or hunting lodge in this former royal forest.

But it wasn't long before the stone walls and foundations, which had originally been thought to support a two-storey building, began to look rather less impressive. Gradually, as the forensic trowels of the diggers went to work, the structure started to shrink in every direction.

Royal forests were fiercely protected by the Norman monarchy, however. So if it wasn't a hunting lodge, what was it and why were there buildings here at all? Could the Domesday Book hold a clue? According to the book, it seems that this area was home to an extraordinary number of pigs…

Time Trail

The royal forests of medieval England have given us some of the most evocative, and lasting, folk tales of any era. The stories of Robin Hood and his band of outlaws may not be entirely faithful to the reality in the Sherwood Forest of the time. But there can be little doubt that they are based on a strong element of truth – and that they accurately represent the deep hostility that was felt towards the king and his agents over the appropriation of these lands.

At their height, the royal forests accounted for three tenths of the total land surface of England. From the Forest of Northumberland in the north east to Dartmoor in the south west, William the Conqueror and his successors carved out huge chunks of land for their privileged use. The East Midlands, where Time Team carried out its Hanslope dig, included a particular concentration of forests, with an unbroken belt of them running south-westwards from the Wash to the Thames in Oxfordshire. The Hanslope site, near Milton Keynes, is towards the middle of this belt in the former royal forest of Salcey.

Very little archaeological evidence exists about life in the royal forests. Yet we do know that despite the severe restrictions imposed by forest law, large numbers of people depended on them for their living. The Hanslope site was interpreted by Time Team's experts as a likely centre of animal husbandry. A reference in the Domesday Book to the fact that there were 1,000 pigs kept in the vicinity added credence to the idea that this might have been a centre for pig farming.

If so, it is possible that one of the special courts set up to administer forest law would have had jurisdiction over the site. This was the 'swainmote', among whose jobs it was to regulate the grazing of pigs. The swainmote, which took its name from an Old English word meaning a meeting (mote or moot) of swineherds, predated the establishment of royal forests – and still exists today in the New Forest, Hampshire.

How much do you know about royal forests? Try our Time Trial quiz to find out.

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