Monument record 301 - Medieval Village and Field System Remains Immediately East of Haycroft

<1> Ordnance Survey, 1870-1982, Ordnance Survey Archaeological Record Card, Waggott T P 1980 SJ55NE7 (Index). SCH2487.

Several channels, tracks, enclosures and low mounds, with associated ridge and furrow adjacent to a possible village envelope, adjoining Haycroft Farm on two sides, which are visible on aerial photographs (see 4). May represent the movement of or shrinkage of Spurstow Village.

<2> Williams SR, 1979, Aerial Archaeology in Cheshire, p.57 (Article in Monograph). SCH3094.

<3> Higham N J, Medieval Settlement Research Group - Annual Report, 25/7 1979 (Book). SCH2179.

<4> Various, Aerial photographs, Spurstow 1-6 & 1014 Williams S R 1978 (Aerial Photograph). SCH128.

<5> Williams S R, 1997, West Cheshire from the Air, p.55-56 (Book). SCH3851.

A series of small roughly rectangular enclosures which look like tofts and crofts which once fronted onto a lane or perhaps a small green where Haycroft Farm now stands. Wide curving ridge and furrow runs up to the enclosures but not over them. Possibly an attempt to colonise some of the rich land around the village in the medieval period.

<6> English Heritage, Various, Schedule Entry (Scheduled Ancient Monuments Amendment), 30388 (Scheduling Record). SCH2950.

Earthwork remains of a medieval settlement concentrated to the north-east and south-west of a former watercourse. Remains probably part of the village of Spurstow, which was important in Domesday for the production of salt, as well as a saline spa in the eighteenth century. The earthworks comprise platforms 25m - 40m square, with a ditch 2m wide to define it, for c.6 houses with adjoining enclosures. Each platform would have been occupied by one or more medieval buildings. A recent causeway runs north-south across the settlement. Settlement may have fronted the present lane running south-east from the farm, which was a former route from Ridley Green to Beeston Moss and Beeston Castle. Traces of medieval ridge and furrow in the northern part of the site, which run up to, but not in to the area of the house platforms - interpreted as field system associated with village.

<7> Royal Air Force, 1944-1947, 1940s RAF Aerial Photographs from Operation Review (Aerial Photograph). SCH8041.

<8> The GeoInformation Group, 2005, 1940s RAF Aerial Photographs from Operation Review (Aerial Photograph). SCH4608.

More earthworks are visible to the north/north west of the farm on aerial photographs dating from the 1940s. They also suggest that further earthworks may have once survived to the north and east of the scheduled area.

<9> Ordnance Survey, 1871-1882, Ordnance Survey County Series (Epoch 1) 25 inch to 1 mile - Cheshire, SJ5557 (Maps and Plans). SCH2462.

Some of the field boundaries and a well survived to be recorded on the Ordnance Survey First Edition 25" maps.