Transforming Fell and Valley

Landscape and Parliamentary Enclosure in North West England

Many areas of the north west had their landscapes transformed by the enclosure of upland commons during the later eighteenth and nineteenth century. Parliamentary enclosure created new, regular landscapes of fields, access roads, quarries and new farmsteads. These features still form a distinctive element of the modern countryside and contrast sharply with the landscape in those upland areas which were not enclosed.

Transforming Fell and Valley is the first detailed survey, based on original source material, of why this enclosure was undertaken, who was responsible for the decision-making, how the new landscapes were created and the effect the changes had on rural society. The book is lavishly illustrated with photographs and maps, demonstrating the impact enclosure has left on the upland landscape of today.

Ian Whyte is Professor of Historical Geography at Lancaster University. His research interests are focused on landscape, social and economic change in Scotland and northern England from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. He is the author of many books including Scotland Before the Industrial Revolution: an Economic and Social History c1050-c1750, Longman, 1995 and Migration and Society in Britain 1550-1830, MacMillan, 2000.

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