Monument record MBC45328 - Medieval and/or post medieval ridge and furrow cultivation, Gawcott with Lenborough parish, Buckingham

Almost contiguous medieval and/or post medieval ridge and furrow cultivation, plough headland, ditch boundaries 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 within Gawcott and Lenborough, in the parish of Buckingham, and centred at SP 470392 231420, 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 three quarters of the mapped blocks have since been plough-levelled due to changes to post-war agricultural regimes, with remaining blocks surviving as earthworks in closes and fields between Gawcott village and Lenborough. 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. Ridge and furrow earthworks at the east end of the parish have mostly been removed by late 20th century land use ant there no clear earthworks visible on lidar visualisations. Most earthworks remain closest to the deserted settlement at Manor Farm and at Falcon Farm, east of the railway and close to the village of Padbury where earthworks also remain. (1-26).