Mavourn moated site, with associated fishponds, enclosures and deserted settlement site

Overview

Heritage Category: Scheduled Monument

List Entry Number: 1010913

Date first listed: 19-Mar-1991

Location

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

National Grid Reference: TL 07136 57573

Summary

Legacy Record - This information may be included in the List Entry Details.

Reasons for Designation

This is an exceptionally fine example of a contemporary medieval settlement site complex in a rural landscape setting. Deserted medieval settlements originally functioned as places of residential, agricultural and industrial activity but many were abandoned in the 14th and 15th centuries following the Black Death and later epidemics. Sites of this type may consist of various components including the church, domestic dwellings, gardens, the village green, fishponds, hollow-ways and other boundary markers. Also associated with the village was the manor house, often surrounded by a moat, denoting the higher status of the lord of the manor. The Mavourn moated site is important in its own right as well as in its association with the adjacent medieval settlement. Around 6000 moated sites are known in England. They may exhibit a high diversity in their forms and sizes. As such they make up a significant class of medieval monument and are important for the understanding of the distribution of the wealth and status in the countryside. Many examples provide conditions favourable to the survival of organic remains. The Mavourn site provides a high diversity of features including the foundations of the original manor and ancillary buildings. Leats and ponds relating to the water management strategies linked to the function of the moat. The significance of the site is enhanced by its relationship with the medieval village.

History

Legacy Record - This information may be included in the List Entry Details.

Details

The monument includes the remains of a medieval moated enclosure, fishponds, occupation and cultivation earthworks. The moat has an outer ditch on the west side and external banks to the east. The outer edge of the moat measures some 95m. by 80m. including a partially water filled ditch which is about 9m. wide. The above ground remains of the post medieval farmhouse and farm buildings in the interior are excluded from the scheduling although the subsurface area is included as it is considered to preserve the remains of an earlier medieval building. Part of the latter can still be seen as a series of low earthworks east of the house. North of the moat are the remains of a number of fishponds connected by a series of supply and outflow channels. Also to the north are the earthworks of a deserted medieval settlement. The visible remains consist of a series of building platforms, garden plots, ditches and a hollow-way leading towards the moat. Between the fishponds and the moat are two square enclosures which may have been constructed for horticultural purposes.

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: 11526

Legacy System: RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Simco, A, 'Beds Archaeology' in The Moated Site .....at Mavourn Farm, Bolnhurst, (1986), 77-85
Simco, A, 'Beds Archaeology' in The Moated Site .....at Mavourn Farm, Bolnhurst, (1986)
Other
County Records Office, Various (County Records Office),
FN 1097, 1254, A87, Franklin, E, Inventory, (1633)
Title: Tithe map (1847) Source Date: 1847 Author: Publisher: Surveyor: MAT 7

Legal

This monument is scheduled under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 as amended as it appears to the Secretary of State to be of national importance. This entry is a copy, the original is held by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.