Monument record 2416 - Oundle

Oundle lies within a kilometre of the site of an un-walled Roman small town at Ashton (see separate EUS report by Taylor). Although the industrial and commercial central place functions were served by the Ashton site, it is unclear where local administrative functions were based in the Roman period. It is possible that the Roman evidence from Oundle itself might represent such a central place but no modern archaeological investigations have recovered any Roman material from the town. Oundle was probably the central place of one of the small tribal units which composed Middle Anglia in the early Saxon period. The physical proximity of Oundle to the Ashton site may indicate some degree of administrative continuity from the Roman period, either of the site itself or at least of a local territory. In the middle Saxon period Oundle was probably the capital of a sub unit of the Mercian kingdom, based upon an earlier tribal unit. At this time there was a monastery at Oundle, closely associated with the administrative centre, although the polyfocal nature of such Saxon central places may mean that the actual site of the ecclesiastical functions was in a nearby settlement. Other functions may also have lain at other nearby places, as is seen in other central places in the region. The monastery was presumably destroyed during the Danish hegemony of the 9th century, but it is unclear what administrative functions may have remained at Oundle. During the revival of monastic life following the re-conquest from the Danes, Oundle was chosen as the site of a new monastery. This was however soon abandoned in favour of Peterborough, the Oundle estate being granted to the new abbey at its foundation. By 1086 Oundle had a thriving market, one of only four documented by 1086, and it is probable that the presence of the market is a direct result of the earlier central place functions. It is however unclear when this marketing function was formalised or how early the commercial activity began. The development of the settlement as an urban centre was undoubtedly promoted by the abbots of Peterborough as part of their profit driven capital investment in their estates. By the early 12th century there were a number of tenants holding burgages in the town. Oundle grew substantially as the medieval economy expanded in the 12th and 13th centuries. The abbots protected their commercial interests in the town by the granting of limited freedoms to the non agricultural tenants, by the development of the road network through the construction of bridges to bring all traffic through the town and thus meeting challenges to its local marketing functions from new markets nearby. In one case, that of Barnwell, they had recourse to a legal challenge in order to have the competing new market extinguished. As a result, through the medieval period Oundle remained the main market centre for the middle Nene valley and its environs. However from the 11th century onwards it was always overshadowed by both Stamford and the rapidly growing town of Peterborough, which was developed by successive abbots around their monastery. Oundle rode out the economic recession of the 14th and 15th centuries and is revealed again in the 16th century as the dominant local marketing centre. Unlike Higham Ferrers or Rothwell, Oundle did not have successful nearby ‘new towns’ which survived the recession to challenge its dominance. As a result, and given the high agricultural wealth and population levels of the townships of the middle Nene valley, Oundle remained in the top level of the small towns of the county throughout the post medieval period. In 1712 it was described by Morton as 'a fair, well built, pleasant and Healthy Town advantageously and Sweetly Situated. Its situation encourages trade.' Oundle continued in use as a market town through the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries. However, although the town had some industrial production, with production of leather goods in the 16th century and brewing and malting in the 18th and 19th centuries, the main basis of its wealth and success seems to have rested on the commercial servicing of its local hinterland. It never developed an industrial specialism which, like boot and shoe production on Wellingborough or woollen cloth production in Kettering, could provide a sound base for its expansion in the industrial era. Although the town was on the Nene navigation and thus its economy was enhanced to a limited degree by the growth of heavy trade that this enables, it was bypassed by the main rail routes in the mid 19th century. As of this combination of non specialised industrial base and lack of mainline rail links, Oundle was largely bypassed by the Industrial Revolution which transformed the certain of the towns and villages of the Ise and Upper Nene valleys in the late 19th and 20th centuries. Today Oundle remains a small country town noted primarily for its public school. As a result of being bypassed by the industrialisation that led to massive redevelopment in some other towns in the county, the archaeological and historic building potential of the town remains remarkably high. Except where 19th and 20th century redevelopment has occurred for the public school, there are a wide range of building surviving from the late medieval, post medieval early modern periods. Good archaeological survival has also been demonstrated in a number of small scale investigations within the town. This potential is complemented by the excellent documentary record. The combination of excellent surviving evidence for the history of the town from the Saxon, medieval, post medieval and industrial periods means that Oundle is probably the town with the highest potential of any small town in Northamptonshire. Although the work which will be required to realise that potential will often have to be very piecemeal and small scale, in the long term the settlement warrants the very highest level of response on buried and standing remains of all periods.

{1} Oundle is first mentioned in an account of St Wilfrid by chantor, Eddi in AD 715. Refered to as Undolum the name is derived from a tribal name added to the Old English for "undivided" or "that has no share". Bede also refers to Inundalum and variations such as Undalana meogo and the Domesday Survey of 1086 calls the town undele. Oundle survives as one of the few British placenames in Northamptonshire.In AD963 Oundle was give by St Ethelwold to the nearby monastery of St Peter (at Peterborough) along with the Eight Hundreds, a market and toll. At the time of the Domesday Survey of 1086, the land was still in the possession of Peterborough Abbet and consisted of a mill, the market along with 23 villagers, 50 acres of meadow and income from 250 eels.Two plagues are known to have occured in Oundle in 1545 and again in 1666.

{6} The layout of the core of the town had probably been established by this date, as an agricultural village attached to the administrative and ecclesiastical centre. By 1086 the settlement had lost its importance as a monastic centre and was probably primarily an agricultural village. The development of the settlement as an urban centre was undoubtedly promoted by the abbots of Peterborough as part of their profit driven capital investment in their estates. There is no record of burgesses in the town in 1086 but by the early 12th century there were a number of tenants holding burgages there. Oundle grew substantially as the medieval economy expanded in the 12th and 13th centuries. The abbots protected their commercial interests by a series of measures. They extended the limited freedoms, first granted in the late 11th or early 12th century, to additional non agricultural tenants as the town expanded. They also developed the road network through the construction of bridges to bring all traffic through the town. This and the simple factor of being well established at an early date meant that Oundle was able to meet most of the challenges to its local marketing functions from new markets nearby. However in one case, that of Barnwell, the Abbot had recourse to a legal challenge in order to have the competing new market extinguished. Oundle rode out the economic recession of the 14th and 15th centuries and is revealed again in the 16th century as the dominant local marketing centre. Unlike Higham Ferrers or Rothwell, Oundle did not have successful nearby ‘new towns’ which survived the recession to challenge its dominance. As a result, and given the high agricultural wealth and population levels of the townships of the middle Nene valley, Oundle remained in the top level of the small towns of the county throughout the post medieval period. In 1712 it was described by Morton as 'a fair, well built, pleasant and Healthy Town advantageously and Sweetly Situated. Its situation encourages trade.' Thus it continued in use as a market town through the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries.
Although the town had some industrial production, with production of leather goods in the 16th century and brewing and malting in the 18th and 19th centuries, the main basis of its wealth and success seems to have rested on the commercial servicing of its local hinterland. It never developed an industrial specialism which, like boot and shoe production on Wellingborough or woollen cloth production in Kettering, could provide a sound base for its expansion in the industrial era. Although the town was on the Nene navigation and thus its economy was enhanced to a limited degree by the growth of heavy trade that this enabled, it was bypassed by the main rail routes in the mid 19th century and this was undoubtedly a major factor in its relative decline thereafter.
The earliest significant concentration of trades is in the early 13th century with the cloth industry. In 1214-22 there was a feltmaker, fuller, weaver, woolman. King notes the significance of this compared to the absence of any such evidence from the related source recording trades in Peterborough. By the late 13th century it seems possible that the industry had fallen into decline in Oundle for in 1292 only one person is named who is in any way related to the cloth industry, and that tunic maker involved in the manufacture of garments not in production of the cloth. Nor is there later evidence of cloth production, although not surprisingly a draper was present in the town in the earlier 16th century. In 1700 an attempt was made to establish the manufacture of serges in Oundle but it was not successful, and in 1777 the cloth industry still did not figure significantly in the trades present in the town.
The leather trade and related trades were represented in the town from 1214-22 but only by one skinner. In 1292 there were two tanners or barkers, as there were in 1400 and at least one remained in 1527-8, while a tannery was located within the town in 1565 comprising a tenement with various buildings, a yard and the ‘Tanne House’. In 1252, 1260 and 1292 there was a parchment maker while in 1292 and 1330 there was a furrier, and in 1292 and 1529 a shoemaker. The presence of glovers and tanners in the list of tolls in the market in 1565 is also probably significant as the only industrial group represented. It seems that if any industry replaced the wool industry in the town in the later medieval and post medieval period it was the leather industry. In 1777 the leather related industry was still the most important. Although there were still 6 glovers, shoemaking had begun to provide the largest number of workers though still only 9. There were also 1 tanner, 1 whitower, 1 currier and 3 fellmongers. A tannery still existed in the town in the early 19th century. A range of other more generalised trades, to be expected in any town, are recorded in Oundle at various times. What this seems to show is that overall in the early and late 13th century, that the town was largely one based on general commerce and craft production to serve the broad needs of its hinterland rather than focussing heavily upon a single industry. This pattern is clearly repeated in 1777 with a wide range of trades being present.
In 1086 at 3 leagues by 2 leagues Oundle’s woodland was almost the largest in the county. Although it was encompassed within the royal forest of Rockingham in the early medieval period it had been exempted from forest jurisdiction by the late 12th century, during the period of large scale assarting in Biggin by the Abbot. The woods were an important resource within the agricultural economy of the town, with tenants having rights of pannage for pigs in most of the woods. The history of the woodland in Oundle lordship and its environs has however been discussed elsewhere and so will not be further reviewed here.
Oundle is one of a distinct group of manors where a significant part of the open field demesne was largely consolidated, including a large block, partly enclosed by 1565, to the north of the manor site. A significant amount of the free land was also concentrated in the same way. This may have significance in terms of the origin and development of the field system and indeed of the township.
While the number of inns appears to have increased, the numbers of brewers and typlers appears to have declined in the 15th and 16th centuries. In 1400 most tenants paid aletoll, as in 1471-2, at the rate of 1d per tenement whether they were brewing or not, but they also paid 1d per gallon sold if they were brewing. By 1471-2 the aletoll itself was farmed for 8d per annum and so the numbers actually brewing is not recorded. By 1565 it is specifically stated that there were ‘not so many brewers or sellers of ale or beere to make up the said sum (8/-) at 2d per head’ and so some were rated at 2d and some at 4d. This implies that in the 15th or early 16th century there had been as many as 48 brewing or selling ale in the town. By 1520-1 there were just 36 brewers (8) and typlers (sellers) (18) of ale. Thereafter the numbers appear to continue in decline, to 12 by 1538-9. However in 1630 there were 19 inns and alehouses in the town. This apparently rose to 44 in 1673 and 47 in 1674, declining again by 1755 to 28 and then in 1828 to 18. In this Oundle lies close to the top of the list of towns in the county, and probably representing a good indication as to the degree to which the town drew custom to its shops and market.
Burgages
In the period following 1214-22 some of the burgages were certainly subdivided to accommodate the increase in population. Though we do not have a comprehensive record from the demographic peak in the early 14th century there is piecemeal evidence. For example in 1300-1 Robert Papillorn paid for entry into a third part of one burgage which John his father had held. The 1321 extent, a very incomplete source, shows 24 burgages held by 37 free tenants thus indicating subdivision was on a fairly large scale. By 1400, following half a century of major demographic decline there were 71 burgage or former burgage tenements created out of the original 53. 11 burgages had been subdivided, in most cases into three, to create 30 tenements and there had previously been even more subdivision, for there had previously been multiple tenants in 4 other burgages, making a further 10 tenements. These burgages were randomly distributed around the town. However the picture is further confused by the fact that engrossing had also already begun. In 1214-22 only in one case did a burgess hold two tenements. In 1292 John of Oundle, steward to the Abbott, held 2.5 burgages and one customary virgate in Oundle as well as leasing 90acres in Biggin.

{14} Between 1125 and 1128 ten burgesses are reported as paying 30s at Oundle.

<1> Cope-Faulkner R.P., 1997, Desk-Top Assessment of The Proposed Development on Land at Gardenways, Blackpot Lane, Oundle, (unchecked) (Report). SNN39888.

<2> 1565, Austell Survey of Oundle (Map). SNN54729.

<3> 1811, Enclosure Map (NRO Map 2858), (unchecked) (Map). SNN6697.

<4> MAP, (unchecked) (Map). SNN56084.

<5> PLAN OF THE TOWN OF OUNDLE, (unchecked) (Map). SNN56085.

<6> Foard G.; Ballinger J.;, 2002, Northamptonshire Extensive Urban Survey: Oundle, Section 1.0, 2.0, 3.4.5,3.6,3.5.3 (Report). SNN102637.

<8> Atkins, R., 1999, Archaeological Evaluation at East Road, Oundle Northamptonshire, March 1999, (unchecked) (Report). SNN103084.

<9> Weston P., 2006, Gardenways, Blackpot Lane, Oundle, Northamptonshire: An Archaeological Evaluation, (unchecked) (Report). SNN105824.

<10> Wilson D.M. (Editor), 1976, The Archaeology of Anglo-Saxon England, (unchecked) (Book). SNN107011.

<12> Page W. (ed), 1930, The Victoria History of the Counties of England: Northamptonshire, p.88 (unchecked) (Series). SNN100370.

<13> Thomas I., 2003, Sewers and Water Supply in 19th Century Oundle, (unchecked) (Chapter). SNN109353.

<14> Beresford, MW, and Finberg, HPR, 1973, English medieval boroughs: a handlist (Document). SNN33700.

<15> 1849, CAMDEN SOCIETY, 47/158 (Uncertain). SNN7006.

Record last edited

Feb 5 2025 7:04PM