Buck Park deerpound

Reasons for Designation

Deer parks were areas of land, usually enclosed, set aside and equipped for the management and hunting of deer and other animals. They were generally located in open countryside on marginal land or adjacent to a manor house, castle or palace. They varied in size between 3ha and 1600ha and usually comprised a combination of woodland and grassland which provided a mixture of cover and grazing for deer. Parks could contain a number of features, including hunting lodges (often moated), a park-keeper's house, rabbit warrens, fishponds and enclosures for game, and were usually surrounded by a park pale, a massive fenced or hedged bank often with an internal ditch. Some parks were superimposed on existing fieldscapes and their laying-out may have involved the demolition of occupied farms and villages. Occasionally a park may contain the well preserved remains of this earlier landscape. Although a small number of parks may have been established in the Anglo-Saxon period, it was the Norman aristocracy's taste for hunting that led to the majority being constructed. The peak period for the laying-out of parks, between AD 1200 and 1350, coincided with a time of considerable prosperity amongst the nobility. From the 15th century onwards few parks were constructed and by the end of the 17th century the deer park in its original form had largely disappeared. The original number of deer parks nationally is unknown but probably exceeded 3000. Many of these survive today, although often altered to a greater or lesser degree. They were established in virtually every county in England, but are most numerous in the West Midlands and Home Counties. Deer parks were a long-lived and widespread monument type. Today they serve to illustrate an important aspect of the activities of medieval nobility and still exert a powerful influence on the pattern of the modern countryside. Those deer parks which survive well, are well-documented, and contain within their boundaries significant well-preserved evidence of earlier landscapes, are normally identified as nationally important.

Despite some later stone robbing which has reduced the height of the enclosure walls, Buck Park deerpound survives well and retains a virtually complete circuit of walls. It is a rare example in Cumbria of a surviving stone-walled deerpound and retains considerable stretches of original medieval fabric and architectural features in the walls. Additionally, evidence of deer park management activities will be preserved within the compound.

Details

The monument is Buck Park deerpound. It is located immediately east of the junction of Tonguerigg Gill and Sleddale Beck and includes a stone-walled enclosure of about 1.3ha divided into two unequal halves by a cross-wall. The walls stand to a maximum height of about 3.6m and in places are topped with coping stones. The average width is 0.75m, although the cross-wall swells out at its northern end to about 1.2m. The external entrance was located at the north-eastern corner of the eastern half but is now blocked. A gateway through the cross-wall is located next to the north wall and measures 4m wide. The jambs of the gate are well built and iron brackets for gates still survive 2.5m above ground level, although these are likely to be post-medieval in date. In the north wall, immediately east of the gate, is a culvert spanned by a dry stone arch. A small sheepfold has been constructed adjacent to the south wall of the western enclosure utilising stones from the deerpound enclosure wall. The deerpound was associated with Shap Abbey and the abbot was given licence to impark from 1366 onwards.

MAP EXTRACT The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract. It includes a 2 metre boundary around the archaeological features, considered to be essential for the monument's support and preservation.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

22494

Legacy System:

RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Cantor, L, Arch Gazetteer in Medieval Parks of England: A Gazetteer, (1983), 80
Thompson, B L, Trans Cumb and West Antiq and Arch Soc. New Ser. in A Deer Park in Wet Sleddale, Vol. XXXIV, (1934), 43-4

Other
SMR No. 2902, Cumbria SMR, Deerpound Near Tonguerigg Gill, (1985)

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