Hugh
of Farndale
c
1260 to c 1330
The Medieval
Inhabitants of Farndale
FAR00021D
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1240s and 1250s (before Hugh was born)
Farndale was first cleared for agriculture from perhaps about 1220
(FAR00004A). So although we don’t know about Hugh’s parents, it might be
supposed that they were the hard grafters who first broke up the forest in the
dale and started farming. As Farndale was an extension of the existing estate
of Kirkbymoorside, Hugh’s grandparents and his ancestors before them, were
likely to have come from the land at the northern edge of the Vale of York,
perhaps in the ancient agricultural lands around Kirkdale. These lands were
part of the same landholdings and estate as Farndale.
1260
Given the age of his
son, Hugh might have been born in about 1260.
By 1276, at the time of the death of Joan Stuteville, about 545
acres of Farndale was under cultivation (see FAR00017). The bonded tenants paid a standard rent of 1s per acre. By that
time there were seven cottars in Farndale and further occupation at Duthenwayt, probably in the area of the Duffin Stone today,
up the western side of the dale. Hugh’s parents were likely to have been part of a community of
villeins, tilling the land, and paying high rents to the Stuteville landowners.
By 1282, on the
death of Joan’s son, Baldwin Wake, the cultivated acreage in Farndale had risen
to 768 acres in only six years (FAR000020). There were 90
bondmen by this time in Farndale. This must have represented a planned campaign
of settlement and activity in the dale must have been noisy and
constant at this time.
1285
Hugh’s
son Henry (FAR00028B) might have been born in about 1285.
1301
There
was no Hugh of Farndale recorded in Farndale in the 1301 Lay Subsidy (FAR00029),
but De Hugone de Redmyre (RED00001) paid tax of 2s 6d. However I
don’t think this was the same person as in the same 1310 record where Hugh’s
son Henry was described as Hugh of Farndale, De Hugone
de Redmyre also appeared as a transgressor, described
as ‘of Redmire’. It is possible that Hugh was not in
Farndale in 1301. There was for instance a De Hugone filio Willelmi who paid 17d tax
in Danby. A possible model might be that Hugh was born in a place like Danby,
the son of William and then moved to and settled in Farndale in the early fourteenth
century.
A number of local folk had taken draught
beasts into Pickering Forest in the reign of Edward III in 1310 or 1311, where
the draught animals were forbidden to wander. Some pasturages were reserved for
the use of the King where there was no right in common and here, cattle were agisted at a fixed price, to be paid to the bailiff.
These sums were collected by the agisters, of whom there were two in each ward,
men of substance it seems by their assessments in the Lay Subsidies.
Not the least of the profits derived from the
possession of a forest was that arising from the agistment of cattle in waste
grounds. (The Duchy of Lancaster Records, from
the North Riding Record Society, The Honour and Forest of Pickering,
Edited by Robert Bell Turton, Volume IV, 1897, page xxvii, North Riding Records
Yorks Volume III,
The Honour and Forest of Pickering, 1894, Edited Robert Bell Turton, page 61)
There was a lengthy list of those individuals from Farndale found by the
agisters in about 1310 with their cattle in the forests. Thomas
Wake, the Lord of Liddell, whose tenants they were, said the price had already
been paid and the tenants should be discharged of the matter. Amongst those fined were Henry (FAR00028B), son of Hugh of Farndale (FAR00021D) had 6 oxen, 2 bullocks and 2 beasts of
burden, worth 38s
There is a separate page about poaching in Pickering Forest.
1330
Perhaps Hugh died by about 1330.