The inclosure acts created legal property rights to land previously held in common in England and Wales, particularly open fields and common land. Between 1604 and 1914 over 5,200 individual acts enclosing public land were passed, affecting 28,000&nbsp;km<sup>2</sup>.

History

Before the enclosures in England, a portion of the land was categorized as "common" or "waste". "Common" land was under the control of the lord of the manor, but certain rights on the land such as pasture, pannage, or estovers were held variously by certain nearby properties, or (occasionally) in gross by all manorial tenants. "Waste" was land without value as a farm strip – often very narrow areas (typically less than a yard wide) in awkward locations (such as cliff edges, or inconveniently shaped manorial borders), but also bare rock, and similar. "Waste" was not officially used by anyone, and so was often farmed by landless peasants.

The remaining land was organised into a large number of narrow strips, each tenant possessing a number of disparate strips throughout the manor, as would the manorial lord. Called the open-field system, it was administered by manorial courts, which exercised some collective control. The system facilitated common grazing and crop rotation.

The tenants displaced by the process often left the countryside to work in the towns. This contributed to the Industrial Revolution – at the very moment new technological advances required large numbers of workers, a concentration of large numbers of people in need of work had emerged; the former country tenants and their descendants became workers in industrial factories within cities.

The Inclosure (Consolidation) Act 1801 (41 Geo. 3. (U.K.) c. 109) was passed to tidy up previous acts. The Inclosure Act 1845 (8 & 9 Vict. c. 118) instituted the appointment of Inclosure Commissioners, who could enclose land without submitting a request to Parliament.

List of acts

  • The Inclosure Act 1773 (13 Geo. 3. c. 81)

The Inclosure Acts 1845 to 1882 mean:

  • The Inclosure Act 1845 (8 & 9 Vict. c. 118)
  • The Inclosure Act 1846 (9 & 10 Vict. c. 70)
  • The Inclosure Act 1847 (10 & 11 Vict. c. 11
  • The Inclosure Act 1848 (11 & 12 Vict. c. 99)
  • The Inclosure Act 1849 (12 & 13 Vict. c. 83)
  • The Inclosure Commissioners Act 1851 (14 & 15 Vict. c. 53)
  • The Inclosure Act 1852 (15 & 16 Vict. c. 79)
  • The Inclosure Act 1854 (17 & 18 Vict. c. 97)
  • The Inclosure Act 1857 (20 & 21 Vict. c. 31)
  • The Inclosure Act 1859 (22 & 23 Vict. c. 43)
  • The Inclosure, etc. Expenses Act 1868 (31 & 32 Vict. c. 89)
  • The Commons Act 1876 (39 & 40 Vict. c. 56)
  • The Commons (Expenses) Act 1878 (41 & 42 Vict. c. 56)
  • The Commons Act 1879 (42 & 43 Vict. c. 37)
  • The Commonable Rights Compensation Act 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c. 15)

See also

  • English land law
  • List of short titles
  • Primitive accumulation of capital

Notes

Citations

References

  • The Parliamentary Debates, Volume 80. By Great Britain. Parliament.p. 483
  • Parliamentary Papers, House of Commons and Command, Volume 12. By Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons 104 p. 380
  • Edinburgh Review, Or, Critical Journal, Volume 62. p. 327
  • The Pictorial History of England, Volume 6. By George Lillie Craik, Charles Knight p. 781
  • The English Peasantry and the Enclosure of Common Fields. By Gilbert Slater
  • An Analytical Digest of the Reports of Cases Decided in the Courts of Common Law, and Equity, of Appeal, and Nisi Prius. By Henry Jeremy. p. 40
  • The Fence. By Washburn & Moen Manufacturing Company p. 21
  • The Contemporary Review, Volume 67. p. 703
  • Alienated tithes in appropriated and impropriated parishes. p. 38

Further reading

  • Chambers, Jonathan D. "Enclosure and labour supply in the industrial revolution", Economic History Review 5.3 (1953): 319–343 in JSTOR
  • Linebaugh, Peter. The Magna Carta Manifesto: Liberties and Commons for All. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008.
  • Thesaurus of Acts
  • Parliamentary enclosure – Surrey County Council
  • Archive details and description
  • The Enclosures of the 18th Century, BBC Radio 4 discussion with Rosemary Sweet, Murray Pittock & Mark Overton (In Our Time, 1 May 2008)

fr:Mouvement des enclosures

ru:Огораживания