Monument record MBC45265 - Medieval and/or post medieval ridge and furrow cultivation, Tingewick parish.

Clusters of medieval and/or post medieval ridge and furrow cultivation blocks, remnants of the former common open-field system, is visible on historic aerial photographs and remote sensing data as earthworks and was mapped as part of the North Buckinghamshire Aerial Investigation and Mapping project (EBC18304). Located in the SW corner of Tingewick parish and centred at SP 64424 32418, almost all of the ridge and furrow blocks are aligned roughly N-S, with just a few blocks aligned W-E. The ridge and furrow cultivation blocks are visible as earthworks or plough-levelled earthworks on aerial photographs taken in the 1940s, focussed within the (then) newly constructed RAF Finmere airfield. Aerial photographs taken in 2019 and recent remote sensing data indicate that about three quarters of the mapped earthwork blocks have been plough-levelled, whilst a small number have been reduced to cropmarks by intensive post-war agricultural practices. The linear earthwork furlong banks are part of a much more extensive system of land division boundaries that extends eastwards through Bedfordshire and beyond into Cambridgeshire. Whilst many of these features originate in the medieval period with the establishment of the common field cultivation system, some of the boundary banks may have earlier origins. They remain visible chiefly as extant, sinuous, parallel, plough-levelled earthwork sections on recent lidar remote sensing data (1-9).

Scattered blocks of medieval and/or post medieval ridge and furrow cultivation and furlong boundaries, remnants of the former common open-field system, is visible on historic aerial photographs and remote sensing data as earthworks and was mapped as part of the North Buckinghamshire Aerial Investigation and Mapping project (EBC18304). Located across the eastern half of Tingewick parish and centred at SP 66297 32883, almost all the ridge and furrow cultivation blocks are visible as extant earthworks on aerial photographs taken in the 1940s, but aerial photographs taken in 2019 and recent remote sensing data indicate that about two-thirds of the mapped blocks have since been plough-levelled due to changes to post-war agricultural regimes, with remaining blocks surviving as earthworks in fields around Tingewick village, Grovehill Farm and Tingewick Mill. The sections of linear earthwork furlong banks are part of a much more extensive system of land division boundaries that extends eastwards through Bedfordshire and beyond into Cambridgeshire. Whilst many of these features originate in the medieval period with the establishment of the common field cultivation system, some of the boundary banks may have earlier origins. They remain visible chiefly as extant, sinuous, parallel, plough-levelled earthwork sections on recent lidar remote sensing data (10-28).