Monument record MBC45355 - Ridge and furrow field systems in the parish of Thornton

Ridge and furrow field systems, with plough headlands, trackways, furlong boundaries and drainage ditches, of medieval and post medieval date are visible on historic aerial photographs and remote sensing data as extant earthworks, levelled earthworks and cropmarks and were mapped as part of the North Buckinghamshire Aerial Investigation and Mapping project (EBC18304). Located within the parish of Thornton and centred at SP 75910 35445. Earthworks of ridge and furrow field systems, with associated plough headlands, trackways, furlong boundaries and drainage ditches, covered most of the parish in the 1940s. Earthworks remain close to Blacksfield Farm, Thornton College and Thornton Hall (formerly Tyrrellcote Farm) and within Cowpen Wood and Great Wood. Modern landuse is majority arable. A former trackway can be seen continuing in to the parish of Beachampton to the north, visible on the Ordnance Surveyors’ Drawing of Stony Stratford (1814) continuing to Beachampton Hall. Areas where no ridge and furrow is visible as earthworks in the 1940s sometimes have later cropmarks of earlier occupation visible, in the form of enclosures and linear features, as has been found in other parishes within the project area. (1-25)