Anglo-Saxon Romsey
The Evidence in the Landscape
Water Management
The construction of the Fishlake demonstrated the ability of the Anglo-Saxon engineers to manage the flow of the Test. By redirecting water from the river into an aqueduct and onto the river terrace the monastic community at Romsey was provided with an artificial waterway. A major benefit of this project, perhaps its main objective, was the access to a new power supply - water power to drive mills within the town. A further project involving the management of the Test appears to have been undertaken by the engineers. The main channel of the river was shifted from the west to the east side of the floodplain where it powered a mill at Nursling.
LiDAR image of the lower Test valley with modern surface water. The main channel of the Test naturally flowed along the western side of its floodplain. It was diverted to the east where it would be accessible to the settlements on the river terrace.
Elevation map of the Test Valley at Nursling with dark green at the lowest level. The main channel of the Test now flows through the higher, eastern side of the floodplain, coloured a paler shade of green, and runs at the edge of a projecting spur of river terrace. Large areas of the terrace at Nursling have been quarried for gravel, resulting in a variation in the surface heights. The M27 crosses the floodplain and terrace along a causeway to the north of the man-made Testwood Lakes.
Elevation map of the Test Valley with the location of a profile indicated by a red line. The Blackwater, a major tributary of the Test. enters the valley from the west.
LiDAR map of Romsey with land use symbols with the Nursling land use tithe map added. The boundary of Nursling described in the charter of 877 ran northeast along Stemn’s path, red arrows, then south along Tanner’s Brook. This area, Rownhams, later became part of North Baddesley.
Nursling land use tithe map. The arrow points to the location of Nursling mill at the tip of a spur of river terrace projecting into the floodplain. The land on the floodplain was mainly managed as meadowland.
Nursling mill on the Test. The Domesday mill here was the most valuable of the mills in the area of the lower Test valley covered by the Anglo-Saxon Project. The Test had been diverted to the edge of the river terrace on the east side of the valley to provide water to power the mill.
Geology with modern surface water. Brown represents the alluvium on the floodplain and grey the river terrace. The red lines are parish boundaries. An arrow points to Nursling mill. Charter landmarks are numbered - yellow squares for the Nursling boundary described in 877 and green diamonds for Romsey’s a century later, c. 972. Each boundary survey proceeded in a clockwise direction.
The map above numbers landmarks used to describe the boundaries of Nursling and Romsey as they crossed the Test floodplain. The earlier Nursling circuit is represented by numbered squares, as follows:
1 - the boundary heads north from Redbridge along the Test (∂onon andlang testan)
2 - until it reaches the tidal boundary creek (on mercfrot)
3 - it heads east and then north along the tidal creek (∂onon anlang fliotes)
4 - to Bodding Mead (on boddingmed)
From there it continues onto the river terrace to Bodda’s stone (∂onon on boddanstan).
The Romsey charter a century later also uses boddanstan as a landmark. It leaves the terrace and heads into the withies, onto an altered floodplain. Its features are labelled by diamonds:
1 - from the withies, west into the water (Of ðan wiðie in an ðe heat )
2 - the boundary runs south along the water (andlang heae)
3 - then turns west into the dead lake and from there to hunter’s island (in ðan dede lake Of ðare dedelake to huntesige)
4 - from hunter’s island into the Old Test (of huntesige in and ðan alde tersten)
The boundary continues north along the Old Test until it returns to the start of the survey, to the street where the Test ‘corners’ (andlang ðar ealde terste ond ðe hit comeð in ðare streit ðare wurstan seyt).
A comparison of the two charters shows that the watercourses on the floodplain had been altered. The Test on the west side of the floodplain in the Nursling charter was described as the Old Test a century later, implying that there was a ‘New’ Test channel. The project to divert the river could have been carried out during King Edgar’s reign, at the time when the Fishlake was constructed. The king was known as Edgar the Peaceable. The provisions made for the defence of Wessex deterred would-be attackers. With a lesser requirement for military service manpower could have been utilised for infrastructure improvements. Mills would have been valuable assets for their owners and taxable assets for the king.
Elevation map of the Test Valley at Nursling with the location of the profile indicated by a red line. The main channel of the Test adjacent to the river terrace at x=80 is at a higher level than the former tidal stream at x=40, the mearcflot mentioned in the 877 Nursling charter.
The work of Saxon engineers in transforming rivers is becoming more widely recognised. Large-scale water management projects in the Fens of East Anglia were the subject of a book published in 2021 by Professor Michael Chisholm, Anglo-Saxon Hydraulic Engineering in the Fens. During a talk in March, 2021 to the Society of Antiquaries he proposed that the work was undertaken by the newly founded or reformed Benedictine monasteries. A total of 30 miles of channels were dug between 970 and 1000, beginning during the reign of King Edgar (959-975) at around the time of the construction of the Fishlake and the changes to the Test.
Map of the waterways in the Fens used in the talk by Michael Chisholm in his talk to the Society of Antiquaries.
Meadowlands - Managing the Floodplain
Anglo-Saxon farmers depended on their oxen to pull their ploughs. Domesday Book recorded a total of 23 ploughs for Romsey. A plough team was made up of eight carefully trained oxen, giving a total of 184 oxen required for each season’s planting. The plough oxen, the young cattle in training, and the breeding cows had be kept in good health over the winter when the grass available on the pastures was limited. Hay from the meadows would have been essential winter fodder. The floodplain was ideal land to manage as hay meadows, with fertile alluvium and water available in the dry summer months. Grazing livestock on the hay fields in the spring and autumn benefited the animals and supplied manure to maintain the fertility of the soil. The grass was left to grow through the summer and harvested as hay.
The management of the water on Fishlake Meadows seems to have been undertaken when the Fishlake was constructed. The Fairbourne, a tributary of the Test on the northern boundary of Romsey, was diverted away from the Test and south to the river terrace. The boundary description in the Romsey charter in c. 972 reaches the Fairbourne by turning into the Fishlake. The land in Fishlake Meadows between the Fishlake and the Fairbourne was divided up between Romsey, Timsbury and Michelmersh. These two parishes north of Romsey border the Test and had land on the floodplain. Michelmersh means Great Marsh in Old English. The marsh would have had to be drained before the floodplain could be used as meadow. Perhaps this accounts for the division of the meadowland resources adjacent to the Fishlake.
Detached parts of Timsbury, in green, and Michelmersh, pink, on the Romsey tithe map. A drove road provides access to the fields belonging to Michelmersh. The artificial banks of the Fishlake aqueduct would have reduced the risk of flooding on the land lying alongside Greatbridge Causeway. The division of the land east and west of the Fishlake into small fields is an indication of its value.
A 3D Google Earth view of the Test valley north of Romsey. Housing estates cover the river terrace with the Fishlake and Fishlake Meadows to the north.
Fishlake Meadows is now a nature reserve managed by the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust.
The Michelmersh drove road has been resurfaced to allow access to the nature reserve.
Read more:
The Romsey-Nursling Boundary - Moving the Test
Notes for a PowerPoint presentation: Fishlake Meadows - A Managed Medieval Landscape