Taynton Parva Toby Catchpole The site looking east. Recent work The county council became involved in Taynton Parva in 2008 when the previous owner caused some damage, which prompted ourselves and English Heritage to act and the site was designated as a Scheduled Monument, which should ensure its long term preservation and also helps to release funds for study and management. Until recently we were involved with a scheme funded by English Heritage, known as the Monument Management Scheme, which funded us to summarise the existing information about the site and to undertake a condition survey. The new and far more responsible owners of the site have entered it into Higher Level Stewardship which has allowed for a geophysical survey and management plan to be produced, which have furthered understanding and put a plan in place to conserve the site for the future.
Historic Environment Record (HER) The other element of the County Council s work that is relevant here is that we manage the Historic Environment Record which lists information about all archaeological sites and historic buildings in the county, represented by the green lines on the plot here. The Parva is indicated by the brown hatching in the centre of the plan, which indicates areas where archaeological surveys and digs have been carried out. The written history of the site is fairly scanty and although we understand quite a lot about what the site contains in terms of monuments and features, its development and detailed history is not known and any interpretations are provisional. Ordnance Survey 1903 The earliest plan to which I have access dates to 1840 (no slide) and it shows much of what you can see now. It indicates the swannery, motte, churchyard, old orchard, a strip called the patch and a moat to the east. The early Ordnance survey plans indicate the same features, with the addition of some detail of the earthworks. I ve arrowed the Old Church House and features labelled Intrenchements as we ll return to those.
Victoria County History (VCH) 2010 The Victoria County History for this area was written by John Jurica and published in 2010. I m assuming that the VCH account is as accurate as possible but it s worth saying that it differs in quite a few respects from previous accounts. It leaves some loose ends regarding the Parva, simply because it can only recount the written history that exists rather than answer questions that it would be nice to have answered. Some points the VCH history makes about Taynton in general is that the parish largely contains scattered settlement that developed during the piecemeal clearance of ancient woodland. The parish was largely within the official bounds of the Forest of Dean until the early 14 th century. You can see charcoal burning platforms on aerial photographs of the area just to the west of Taynton Court Farm, which supports this interpretation. The VCH account suggests that Taynton Parva began as a late 11 th or early 12 th century ringwork, but was rapidly remodelled as a motte and bailey. The Lords responsible were most likely to have been William Goizenboded and his successors. The Domesday Book of 1086 records William as either lord or tenant in chief of numerous parishes in Gloucestershire, plus some in Worcestershire, so although we don t know that he was responsible for building the castle he is the most likely candidate. It is also possible that a Maud de Wateville was responsible for constructing the church and motte but we don t really know, she was certainly recorded as giving the church to Gloucester Abbey in 1134. Many subsequent owners of the site are recorded but there is no historical evidence to suggest how any of them relate to the earthworks that we can see on the site. Further research on these subsequent owners to try and work out how many actually lived here, might significantly improve our understanding of the site. Subsequent to 1134 the church is recorded as being dedicated to St Lawrence by 1148 and is recorded as a chapel of Newent Priory in 1181 and 1291. The only record of the moat dates from 1525 and the VCH account suggests that it was occupied by the rector rather than the lord, but again the evidence is thin. It s been suggested that it was the manor house and also that it isn t a standard moated site but a civil war defence (unlikely). Finally the church and rectory house were burnt down by retreating royalists in 1643.
Dean Archaeology Group Survey 1995 Apart from a vague record of nineteenth century excavations on the church site the earliest archaeological attempt to investigate the site was by Dean Archaeology Group in 1995, which also included this accurate survey and a history of the site. 2012 survey The survey we undertook in 2012 records in detail the condition of the site as it now is and helpfully breaks the site down into areas for description.
1972 OS plan For comparison purposes, the 1972 OS plan looks at first glance as if it covers most of the features on site 2012 survey over 1972 OS plan...but when the more recent survey is overlain you can see that some features and much of the fine detail were missing and actually some features recorded in 1972 couldn t be recorded in 2012 due to the spreading of the hedges and scrub growth on the site.
Recent damage and dumping The vegetation present in 2012 is shown here in green and another purpose of the survey was to locate the damage that had been caused, seen here in brown. This included a trackway across the eastern field to the north of the moat, the clearance of the pond south of the castle site, with silt dumped on the earthworks to its north and damage caused by badgers on the motte.
2012 survey The features we recorded were: A, Motte or castle mound which is 40m diameter and 3.25m high, with a level platform, and badger setts. B Ringwork and later inner bailey C castle ditch surrounding the motte and inner bailey D large bank on the east side of the ditch. The outer bailey is not especially well defined but a possible interpretation is marked in orange. There may not have been a heavily defended outer bailey. E a platform presumably occupied by a building, measuring 20x10m with iron slag F The church which measures 28x10m with a possible porch on the south side, within an enclosure presumably representing the extent of the graveyard. A single stone was seen in 1995, but none were visible during the recent work. G Building platform for the Old Church House shown on the 1840s and 1904 maps and which had lost its roof by 1923. H, I and J are a pair of banks with accompanying ditch, which were marked as intrenchements on the early OS plan, which suggests they may relate to an attempt to refortify the outer bailey in the civil war. The next few earthworks relate to the swannery (in yellow), K is an inlet channel with L & M being outlet channels to both the brook and castle ditch. The mound N was a nesting island. O is the moated site, comprising a triangular platform 30m across, surrounded by a ditch up to 11m wide and 1.7m in depth. There are external banks to the east and north-west and the central platform is raised above the ground outside. The moat drained through leat P and it was also joined to a fishpond Q. We re not sure what the hollow R related to, it doesn t seem to be water management so it may have been the track to Kents Green from the site. S is the second fishpond that has been re-excavated and enlarged. T and U are possible building platforms, there may have been more of these before the fishponds were dug and this area may well be the site of village houses. V Is a third fishpond now silted up W, X and Y are further banks and a ditch around the Old Orchard shown on the 1840 plan, Z is a bank that divides it in half but may be the remnant of a track to Taynton. The original purpose of the area is unclear but it has been suggested (by comparison with Kilpeck) that it might have been a garden associated with the castle.
Scheduled Area The site has been protected as Scheduled Monument since 2008 and this indicates the extent of the protected area. The medieval defensive and settlement complex at Taynton Parva represents a truly remarkable survival of a significant number of well preserved monument types in close proximity and together they form a particularly interesting and informative insight into medieval life. Evidence relating to the Norman colonisation of this part of England and the subsequent consolidation of their way of life are clearly and graphically expressed as is the impact of the Civil War. Purpose built swanneries are relatively rare in the English landscape and the presence of the very well preserved one at Taynton Parva emphasises the original high status and therefore importance of the settlement. The archaeological remains at Taynton Parva are of national importance. Extract from Scheduling Assessment of importance. In terms of relative rarity there are 220 moats, 30 motte and bailey castles, 12 ringworks and 1 swannery recorded on the HER in Gloucestershire.
Ringworks Lidar image of Brimpsfield Castles The motte at the Parva sits strangely in the east side of the inner bailey and on that basis it has been suggested that it was originally built as a ringwork and only later converted into a motte and bailey. There are only about 200 ringworks known in England and 12 in Gloucestershire. They comprise an enclosing bank topped by a timber palisade fence with an external ditch. They presumably contained timber buildings as required, depending on whether they were intended to last for a short campaign or intended for longer term occupation. They were the simplest form of castle to construct and seem to have been mostly built by minor lords soon after the Norman conquest and probably also during the 12 th century anarchy. Many examples were probably destroyed by more complex castles built on the same sites. The example on the right of this Lidar image shows a good example at Brimpsfield in the Cotswolds. The site to the left is the later and much larger Brimpsfield Castle. Castle Hill Wood Parva Ringwork distribution (12 known) Ringworks are fairly evenly spread throughout the county with a slight bias to the west. Taynton Parish has two, although Castle Hill Wood is actually classed as a ring motte, which is basically a ring work with a raised platform rather than a high mound. Why is Taynton Parva called Parva i.e Little Taynton, when the VCH account presumed it was part of the manor of Great Taynton? Could the Parva name originate from its relationship to the castle in Castle Hill Wood?
Motte and Bailey distribution (30 known) Motte and Bailey distribution is similar to that for ringworks, just with more examples. Motte and Bailey (from castlewales.com) This reconstruction is included to indicate the general features of a high motte, usually eventually topped with a keep and a defended enclosure surrounded by a large ditch. We have only scant evidence for further development of the motte at Taynton beyond its original construction.
Badgers The motte at Taynton is now a fairly low mound occupied by large numbers of badgers. It might be possible that an original higher mound was lowered in order to create a larger building platform but that can t be proved. Medieval pottery Although the badgers are causing serious damage they do throw up finds from within the mound and some has been identified. The pottery was of two main types: 80% was unglazed sandy wares found and probably made in the Worcester area and the other main type was Jurassic limestone-tempered wares typical of the Cotswolds. All the sherds came from unglazed jars dating from between the late 11 th to early 13 th centuries, which ties very nicely with the period from when we think the castle was built until the most likely date of the moated that presumably replaced it. The whole pots aren t from Taynton but are there to give an indication of the appearance of medieval jars. Other finds include a piece of medieval roof tile and a lump of wall plaster, which may give some indication of what buildings were present.
Swannery The English Heritage pastscape website includes only four examples of medieval swannery. The management plan for Taynton states that there are 10 in England but that doesn t really change the argument that they are rare. The others recorded by English Heritage are at Abbotsbury Abbey in Dorset, the Bishop of Lincoln s Palace at Stow in Lincolnshire and one owned by Durham Abbey, so the presence of a swannery at Taynton is highly unusual and seems out of place. There doesn t seem to be easily available information relating to how they functioned so I can only say the obvious in that they provided a flooded area to attract the birds and provided a raised central area where the birds could nest in the dry safely removed from predators. Until someone wanted to eat them. Fishponds Lyddington Rutland Fishponds are more common, we have 120 medieval examples recorded in Gloucestershire but groups of as many as 3 are usually associated with high status sites, so again they don t fit in with the idea of what otherwise seems to be a manorial rather than aristocratic or ecclesiastical complex. The status of Taynton Parva is difficult to determine. Yes there is a motte but it doesn t seem to have been developed as much as might be expected for a wealthy establishment and it was replaced by a relatively small moat in the 13 th century. I don t think that firm conclusions that can be drawn at present either from historical or archaeological evidence as to why the swannery and fishponds are located here but the Abbey of Gloucester is the type of establishment more likely to require access to these sorts of products than the lord of the manor of Taynton. Records do state that the church was given to the abbey in the mid-12 th century and it presumably either retained enough rights to set up the swannery and fishponds to provide its needs or the owner spotted a commercial opportunity.
Geophysical survey So far we haven t seen any evidence for buildings on the site with the exception of the church earthworks, which is where the geophysical survey comes into play. The pink lines here indicate certain evidence for stone buildings, namely the church, a rectangular structure on the top of the motte and one or two buildings on the east side of the castle ditch. On the west side of the motte there is evidence for a defensive curtain wall or bank, with a funnel shaped entrance to the motte from the inner bailey. There are also further possible buildings in orange (21 and 22), associated with spreads of burnt and/or magnetic material, which may represents workshops such as the smithy Detailed geophysics - motte and church More detailed resistivity surveys were undertaken on the motte and church (lower right in this slide) that don t give a lot more detail regarding the motte but suggest a south porch and possible elaboration on the north side of the nave as well as indicating a priests door on the south side of the chancel. The other features may represent stone tombs.
Heath, Shropshire Shorncote, Glos These images are included as an unscientific effort to indicate what the church might have looked like. The magnetometer survey might have suggested a simple Norman nave and chancel affair but the detailed resistivity survey suggests something that probably developed over time. Perhaps we should envisage a combination of these two. The moat Moats are relatively common particularly in this part of Gloucestershire. The next closest one is as close as Taynton Court Farm, which is now largely destroyed. The VCH thought that the moat was occupied by the rector of the parish and its relatively small size doesn t seem to suggest a grand property was built there. Again we have little evidence as the geophysical survey team weren t able to investigate the platform within the moat. Most moats were built between the late 12 th -14 th century and it is thought that they served as an indicator of wealth as much as a defensive purpose. This is indicated by a number of incomplete circuits, where the moats are thought to have been placed to be visible with no need to pay for them where they couldn t be seen.
Landscape context How did the site relate to the surrounding area? This plot comes from our recording of archaeology visible on aerial photographs and shows the ridge and furrow in the surrounding landscape that survived at the end of the Second World War. The fields edged in blue and purple contained ridge and furrow at that time and indicate that the earlier wooded landscape was largely replaced by arable faming in the medieval period. You can also see the nearby moat at Taynton Court on this plot. Not Taynton 11 ploughs were recorded in Taynton in 1086 and in 1301 the manor of Great Taynton had 100a arable, 8a meadow and 5a pasture in its own land. Most of the population would have been customary tenants owing labour services to the manor. Records of trades at Taynton include a thatcher or weaver in 1287, a tailor in 1306 and a lead beater in 1327.