Part 2The village of Grafton Flyford from

medieval times to the early 18th century

Copyright British Library

Let us look a bit closer at the beautifully coloured 18th century

John Doharty map which is very accurate and well drawn. Can you see the church? - look for the large building with the tower and

crosses. Can you see the farms, cottages and barns? Click for Questions

Some arrows will point out the buildings which are no longer there today.

Click Again for Arrows

Did you notice all the missing buildings?

Now compare your Doharty map to the modern map and the aerial photograph.

Have things changed much since this old map was made?

Write down the things you think have changed. For example, are all the buildings still there?

Then write down the things which you think are still the same now as they were in the 18th century.

When you have finished Click Again

One of my great, great,great, great, great,

great, great grandchildren might have lived in one of these farms.

Copyright Worcester Record Office

If you visit Grafton Flyford today, all you can see of the original village are lots of strange lumps and bumps in the grassy fields. This is where the peasants’ trackways, cottages and gardens used

to be.

Make a list of six things that we might have in our own houses today that ordinary medieval people did not have in their cottages?

What were roofs, walls and the floors like. Was there a hearth for a fire and did they have chimneys?

What it would be like inside a poor peasant’s cottage?

What materials were the peasant cottages made from?

How would be different inside the lord’s manor house?

How many rooms did a peasant cottage have?

Where was the toilet and bath?

Click to Show Trackways between House Plotsthen Click for Questions

I built my ownhouse with the help of

my neighbours and I was very proud of it!

Here are some of the places where the village houses once stood. Archaeologists call them ‘house platforms’ - raised ground that the cottages and barns would have been built on. All you can see now are these grassy mounds with paths and trackways around them.

Click to Show Trackway

Arrow then Click for Questions

How do you think the house plots and gardens ended up higher than the tracks and lanes around them?

Why do you think that these lumps and bumps have survived all this time - but the buildings have not? Think about what the buildings were made from.

If a team of archaeologists excavated this site, what do you think they would find under the grass?

Our cottage had a ditch around it to

drain the rain away.

Click to see a simple timber-framed and thatched house.

Some of these house platforms still had buildings on them at the time when John Doharty made his map in about 1740.

Arrows will show the platforms with trackways in between. Click for Arrows

then Click for Questions

Were all the village buildings abandoned at once, or do you think it would take many years for them to slowly disappear?

Write down or discuss in class, all the possible different reasons why there are no people or houses left in the village of Grafton Flyford.

Did they just leave? Were they evicted? Did their crops fail. Did they die? If they died, what sort of things could they have died from?

What has happened to all the farm houses, cottages and barns - where have they all gone?

All the houseswere built of wood.

If they weren’t lookedafter properly, they

would fall down.

This photograph shows the remains of a moated site - a house on an island surrounded by a big ditch full of water. It was an

important house and would make a big impression on visitors. The moat helped to get rid of waste from the house by washing it away and out into the fish ponds. These ponds also supplied the owners with easy-to-catch fresh fish for their dinners!

Click for Questions

Do you know what sort of fish they ate in medieval times?

People were supposed to eat only vegetables and fish and no meat on a certain day of the week. Do you know which day that was?

What sort of person would have lived in a big house surrounded with water like this one?

How do you think they caught their fish?

I knocked the miller’sson into the moat - by accident, of course.

Hee hee hee!

Here is a picture showing what a moated site might have looked like in the 14th century.

Imaginative illustration of a typical Worcestershire medieval moated site – Copyright Deborah Overton

You can just make out a large timber-framed building behind the church. This is Church Farm and was probably the place where the medieval manor house once stood. The house we can see today is mostly 17th century but parts of it might be much older. Click for Questions

Look closely at your Doharty map. There might have been a private chapel at the farm as well as the church nearby.

What symbol can you see on another building which might mean the building is a chapel?

Click again to see Arrow

Who do you think would have lived in this large house? And why is it still there when the other cottages have all disappeared?

This is an imaginative sketch of what the village of Grafton Flyford might have looked like when lots of people were living and

working there in the early 14th century. If you have a copy of this ask your teacher if you can colour it in and put on some labels.

See the next slide for ideas for labels.

Our cottage was on the small piece of land in the

middle of the bottomrow. It was my job to

feed the chickensand collect the eggs.

Copyright Deborah Overton

Here is a coloured picture of the village and some examples of labels to give you some ideas: the church, church farm, cottage, barn, chicken coop, ponds, arable field, pasture field or orchard.

Imaginative illustration of Grafton Flyford during the 14th Century - Copyright Deborah Overton

Our photographic tour around the deserted village Grafton Flyford is now complete.

As the sun goes down we can watch the long shadows appear on the abandoned house

platforms, trackways and fields. Perhaps you have learnt a little bit more about the people who lived and worked there for over a thousand years, and understand what happened to their village to

make it disappear.Hope you enjoyedyour visit to our

village. If you like, you could go and visit

the church now too.

Extensions for use with the Grafton Flyford Deserted Village

Educational Presentation• The Deserted Medieval Village

Use the picture of what the village might have looked like in the medieval times, colour it in and label up the church, farms, cottages, barns, ponds, trackways and ridge and furrow fields.

• Compare and ContrastUse the Worksheet chart to compare and contrast the life of the son or daughter of a medieval peasant and lord of the manor with the life modern day young person.

• Think about - Food, Houses, Clothing, School, Work and Play - decide what is the same and what is different.

The End of Part 2Grafton Flyford Educational Presentation

was produced by Worcestershire County Council

Historic Environment and Archaeology Service Farewell.

Please visit our village again. But have

a look at the church before you go.

Copyright Worcester Record Office