Alnham : The Components Of The Medieval Settlement

The clearest evidence for the form of the village in the medieval period is provided by a very large and detailed map of the township (Aln Cas O.XI.1-1a) completed by the engineer Robert Norton in 1619, to accompany Mayson's detailed descriptive survey of Alnham and the other townships of the Percy estate compiled between 1612-30 (Aln Cas A.V.5).

Unlike so many of the maps assembled in the Village Atlas this one predates the radical changes which transformed the pattern of nucleated rural settlement in the Northumbrian uplands during the 18th and early 19th centuries. Instead of looking for clues in the later settlement pattern to reconstruct the late medieval and early modern village plan, it is laid out before our eyes.

Church of St Michael The Archangel Alnham