Details

The monument is located between, and to the south of, St Helen's and Toulston
Hall Farm. It includes the earthwork remains of buildings and other features
of land use of the medieval settlement of Toulston. These are overlain by
later earthworks related to the original Toulston Hall and its associated
gardens. There is also one standing building within the area of the monument.
This is known as the smithy and is thought to be one of the ancillary
buildings belonging to Toulston Hall. An area of the medieval settlement, to
the south of Toulston Hall Farm, which has been disturbed by agriculture and
landscaping, is not included in the scheduling.
Toulston was recorded as Ogleston or Togleston in the Domesday Survey when it
was held by Nigel from Robert Count of Mortain. It lay in the Wapentake of
Barkston Ash and in 1332 the village was assessed to pay a total of 17
shillings lay subsidy, which rose to 18 shillings two years later. The lay
subsidy was a tax levied on wealthier residents of the village and was on
average 36 shillings per village within Barkston Ash in 1334. However, the
village appears to have suffered heavily from the Black Death as it was
granted 50 per cent relief from the lay subsidy in 1352, although this relief
was reduced to 13 per cent two years later. Toulston is recorded as having 28
poll tax payers (men and women over the age of 14) in 1377 and 30 in 1379. The
settlement of Toulston is thought to have been depopulated to make way for the
hall during the Tudor period, with the landscaped gardens dating to around
1600.
The settlement of Toulston was sited on a spring line formed by the junction
of a block of sand to the north west meeting the underlying clay. The main
street of the settlement followed the south side of this spring line running
south west to north east. This is now partially overlain by modern trackways
but can be seen as a slight hollow way to the north west of the smithy. Along
the south side of this hollow way there are the slight earthworks of a number
of buildings. In this area to the north west of the smithy there are two
square sunken areas about 10m across surrounded on all four sides by small
building platforms. These are the earthworks of fold yards surrounded by farm
buildings. To the south of these, running up the hill there are further
earthworks of boundaries between tofts which were the small enclosures
typically used for vegetable and herb gardening to the rear of the houses. The
western end of the village is marked by an earth bank. Further earthworks of
similar buildings, some with rubble stone footings, lie to the north of the
spring line between the two modern farms.
To the south east of the smithy there is a large building platform partly cut
into the rising ground to the south. This platform faces NNW and measures 75m
by 20m and was the site of Toulston Hall. Extending downhill from the centre
and both ends of the platform are three broad ramps or banks ending at another
bank that runs parallel to the building platform about 30m to the north. The
main building of Toulston Hall would have been smaller than the building
platform, but placed centrally. The banks are raised walkways designed to give
a view of the two square sunken areas outlined by the banks. These would have
been formal gardens.
Just to the west of these gardens is the still partly roofed smithy. This
building is square in plan and arranged on the same axis as the large building
platform. It is stone built, single storey and contains a large blacksmith's
hearth and the remains of a brick beehive oven. The building is reputed to
have been used by Parliamentarian forces before the Battle of Marston Moor.
On the spring line, overlooked by the large building platform there is a now
irregularly shaped pond. The western part of this garden feature related to
the original hall has been enlarged to form part of the garden of the modern
Toulston Hall Farm. Downstream and to the ENE of this pond there is a second,
better preserved pond. This is an ornamental canal, a typical feature of early
post medieval gardens, and is about 75m long with a rounded bay on its south
side. This water feature is overlooked from the south west from a line of
platforms which are the remains of further formal garden features. These
overlie and cut into earthworks of medieval ridge and furrow cultivation which
can be more clearly seen immediately to the east of the large building
platform.
Excluded from the scheduling are all modern fences, dry stone walling, and
telegraph poles, although the ground beneath these features is included.

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.

Source: Historic England

Reasons for Scheduling

Medieval rural settlements in England were marked by great regional diversity
in form, size and type, and the protection of their archaeological remains
needs to take these differences into account. To do this, England has been
divided into three broad Provinces on the basis of each area's distinctive
mixture of nucleated and dispersed settlements. These can be further divided
into sub-Provinces and local regions, possessing characteristics which have
gradually evolved during the last 1500 years or more.
This monument lies in the Humber-Tees sub-Province of the Central Province
which comprises a great fertile lowland, with many local variations caused by
slight differences in terrain, but generally dominated by market towns,
villages and hamlets. The dispersed farmsteads between these are mainly of
post-medieval date, created by movement out of the villages and onto newly
consolidated holdings following enclosure. Some, however, are more ancient
disposals, the result of manors, granges and other farmsteads being moved out
of villages in the Middle Ages; others have become isolated by the process of
village depopulation, which has had a substantial impact in the sub-Province.
The Vale of York local region is a rich agricultural lowland dominated by a
dense pattern of villages and hamlets founded in the Middle Ages, about one in
four of which have since been deserted. It contains low and very low densities
of dispersed settlements, some of which are isolated medieval moated manor
houses. The landscape was formerly dominated by communal townfields which were
mainly enclosed in the 18th century.

Medieval villages were organised agricultural communities, generally sited at
the centre of a parish or township, that shared resources such as arable land,
meadow and woodland. Village plans varied enormously, but where they survive
as earthworks, their most distinguishing features include roads and minor
tracks, platforms on which stood houses and other buildings such as barns,
enclosed crofts and paddocks. They frequently included the parish church
within their boundaries, and as part of the manorial system, most villages
included one or more manorial centres which may also survive as visible
remains as well as below ground deposits. In the central province of England,
villages were the most distinctive aspect of medieval life, and their
archaeological remains are one of the most important sources of understanding
about rural life in the five or more centuries following the Norman conquest.
Many early houses had gardens associated with them. The creation of gardens
has an early history in England, the earliest examples known being associated
with Roman villas. During the Anglo-Saxon and medieval periods, herb gardens
were planted; particularly in monasteries where the herbs were used for
medicinal purposes. However the major development in gardening took place in
the late medieval and early post-medieval periods when the idea of the garden
as a `pleasure ground' developed. Early gardens take a variety of forms. Some
involved significant water-management works to create elaborate water-gardens
which could include a series of ponds and even ornamental canal systems. At
other sites flower gardens were favoured, with planting in elaborately shaped
and often geometrically laid out beds. Planting arrangements were often
complemented with urns, statues and other garden furniture. Such sites were
often provided with raised walkways or prospect mounds to provide vantage
points from which the garden layout could be seen and fully appreciated.
Whilst gardens were probably a common accompaniment to high status houses of
the late medieval to early post-medieval period, continued occupation and
subsequent remodelling of gardens in response to changing fashions means that
early garden designs rarely survive undisturbed. Gardens provide a valuable
insight into contemporary aesthetics and views about how the landscape could
be modified to enhance the surroundings. Their design often mirrors elements
of the design of the associated house; particularly following the symmetry of
the buildings. In view of their rarity, great variety of form, and importance
for understanding high status houses and their occupants, all surviving
examples of an early date will be identified to be of national importance.
Toulston is a good example of the way that high status houses replaced
medieval villages, modifying and overlying their remains to form pleasure
gardens. The monument retains important information about a medieval village
and will include evidence of its layout and economy. The earthworks of the
hall with its surrounding gardens is also important and additional buried
remains will provide further evidence of the transition of land use from the
medieval settlement to the higher status country house.

Source: Historic England

Sources

Other
Record card, Yorkshire Archaeological Society, SE 44 SE 02, (1970)
Record card, Yorkshire Archaeological Society, SE 44 SE 04, (1970)

Source: Historic England