Monument record 0588900000 - NW OF MOUNT PLEASANT FARM

Plan Form - SQUARE
SOILMARKS OF A SQUARE BANK & DITCH ON A/P'S.FEATURE SHOWN AS A COPPICE ON MAP OF THE CLAYDONS C1860. NOT AN ANTIQUITY(BI1).FEATURE ALSO SHOWN AS TREES ON OS 1:2500,1879(BI2)

A post-medieval square ditch and banked enclosure is visible on historic aerial photographs as earthworks and was mapped as part of the North Buckinghamshire Aerial Investigation and Mapping project (EBC18304). Located in a field between Rookery farm, Mount Pleasant Farm and Windmill Farm and centred at SP 71863 27121, a square earthwork bank between 3 to 5.5 metres wide encloses an internal area about 23 metres square. Exterior to the bank is a narrow ditch 1 to 1.5 metres wide. These features are site on a field of medieval ridge and furrow cultivation earthworks. The 1880 1st edition OS map records a C-shaped coppice of trees that appears to be planted on the bank earthwork, with no trees on the E facing side. Whether the earthworks pre-existed the coppice or were created for the purpose of tree planting is unclear. Recorded as still standing on the 1923 3rd Edition OS map, the trees had been cleared by 1946 and the earthwork is clearly visible. On aerial photographs taken in 2019 and recent remote sensing data, the earthworks are not visible, having been levelled by post-war agricultural regimes (3-6).