Background

The site is crossed by three streams and has a history or man-made water courses and moats. This part of the project was aimed at understanding the relationships of these features.

Illustration: SyAS

South Park Medieval Moat

The Surrey Archaeological Society owns and maintains a medieval moated site at Grayswood, near Haslemere in Surrey. The illustration shows the site as it may have appeared c AD1350 (no buildings are visible today).

It was probably the manor house of the small royal manor of Ashurst but this may have later declined to become the keeper’s lodge of Ashurst Park. Moated manors and lodges are not uncommon and most were constructed between the 12th and 14th centuries to emphasize, it is thought, the social standing of the house and its occupants, possibly imitating the great castle moats of the time.

It is open to the public and is the best-preserved example of its type in the county. Full details and membership information are are available from www.surreyarchaeology.org.uk

Three streams flow into the upper half of the park before joining and sweeping round in a curve.

Map: David Stokes

Documented History Research

The Chertsey Cartulary tells us that Abbot John Rutherwyck was busy in his manor at Chobham:

(1307) made running water to run round the Manor of Chobham.
(1308) stopped up and caused to be made a certain pond called Crachattespond [usually understood to be Gracious Pond which feeds into Chobham Park]
1309 Obtained a large area of mixed moor and fields to the west of Stanors (Chobham Park estate?)
1329 the construction of an earthen wall about the Manor (house) of Chabeham.
1336 the construction of a chamber, a chapel and a kitchen at Chabeham. (Usually understood to be at the Manor House)

The dates in brackets are those given in the Lansdowne version of the Cartulary.

Does the 'running water' refer to a moat? - or maybe the words should be taken literally to mean that he diverted a stream to run around his property?

In this area in the 14th century, it is unlikely that a 'moat' would be built for defence. The most common reasons to construct a moat were as a status symbol or to protect an area from thieving.

The Abbot's need to later supplement his 'running water' with an 'earthen wall' is interesting. It may be that the running water and earthen wall protected his tithe barns which would normally have been just outside any 'moated' area.

The next reference we have is two hundred years later. James Nedeham, Henry VIII’s ‘Surveyor of the King’s Works’, in his account books for Chobham Park recorded the making of a pair of steps “going forth of the kitchen down to the moat”. which suggests that we definitely have a moat by this date and that the moat was close by the house. Formal moats tended to enclose an area approximately 2-3 times that of the house.

	Norden's map of 1610. Gracious Pond, with its dam (coloured in orange) can be clearly seen top right - its outlet flows into the park. There appears to have been a dammed pond in the park. It clearly is not in the stream coming from Gracious Pond and must therefore be one of the branches coming from Langshot and Westways to the NW. There is still a lake in the Westways stream and a dam. An enclosing pale can be seen to run around the park. Disappointingly there is no sign of a moat or a house or even a road to Chertsey. The map is however very inaccurate in its topology; for instance, the village of Chobham is shown as being north of the Bourne.
In about 1811, Manning & Bray reported “The Mansion stood on the left of the road from Chobham to Chertsey, where is now a farm house: the sight [sic] within is very visible, double moated; one very near the house, the other very large and deep, and about 10 rods [1 rod = 5.5 yards] further out; both are traceable, though nearly dry.”
Image: David Stokes	A map contemporary with Manning and Bray's report (from deeds dated 1815 held at the Surrey History Centre). Two of the fields listed are 27 - Great Moat Field and 28 Field Adjoining Moat. Waterways appear to be indicated by double parallel lines. It shows a feature just north of the house which M&B may have interpreted as an inner moat; and one about 50m from the house which could be interpreted as an outer moat. The names of the fields give some clue as to the original position of the moat.

PM Johnston in his 1913 'Schedule of Surrey Antiquities' p 18 simply says that there are the remains of a moat at Chobham Park.

Dennis Turner [ SAS Bulletin 122, 1975] only records: Chobham Park Farm (SU 987628) - One pond may indicate remains of moat.

Survey

Early medieval ' moats' could be quite simple; just a bank and ditch about 3-6m across ^{1 p8 & 40} And since the ground around the house is pervious gravel, and would need to be lined with clay, we may be looking for a feature at the smaller end of the scale.

Aerial photograph marked up with rivers and ditches (blue) and banks (yellow).

NMR - RAF/106G/UK/687 RP 3248 Aug 1945

The 'envelope' pattern in the field west of the house is caused by farm equipment working around the field in an ever decreasing rectangle (called 'square ploughing' when a plough is used). At each diagonal there is a change of direction and this causes the pattern running to the corner of the fields. Interestingly, despite the square pattern of cultivation, there is an underlying SW-NE parallel pattern which may be the relic of medieval ridge and furrow cultivation.

Image: David Stokes

'A' is a pond, 'L' is a linear dam. Together with 'B' do these not seem to suggest medieval fish ponds?

'J' is the Ram Stream coming down from Langshot whilst 'K' flows from Gracious Pond (both enclosed in the 14th C).

The ditch 'H' roughly follows the contours in this area. It appears that water could flow into the ditch from the dammed pond top left and flow out to downriver at bottom right.

'E' and 'G' - if their inward curving ends once linked would have formed a moat running close along the eastern boundary of the house?

The outlet from the pond, 'C' to 'M', appears to be man-made. It is possible that 'C' was cut when it was decided to divert the watercourse to leave the 'moats' dry. It, of course could also have been constructed as a leat allowing the water to be diverted for occasional maintenance of the 'moat'.

Could it be that the curved bank shown in yellow to the east of the gardens represents the Abbots 'earthen wall'?

This, the earliest aerial photograph we have, is the only one that shows features D & E.

Photo: Lenka Stokes

This over large and apparently dry ditch ('H' on the aerial photograph) runs along the western boundary of the house grounds.

Photos: Lenka Stokes

Views of Ditch 'G'

The house is on ground which slopes to the south east. It is built onto a mound which creates a level area. This photograph shows the edge of the mound at the SE side; the mound tapers to nothing on the NW side. It is difficult to build a classical static-water moat on sloping ground. Where it has been tried it usually involves either:

dams across the moat
a shallow flowing-water moat
a moat which encloses the moat only on the lower side. Downside Farm at Cobham appears to have this design²

The photograph shows one area close to the mound on which the house stands which has not been too disturbed and shows greener crop marks in the grass of a size commensurate with a moat.

This area was confirmed by resistivity analysis - see the 'Results' page.

The mound on which the current house stands and ground immediately surrounding

Photo: Lenka Stokes

Conclusion

The evidence seems to suggest that in the 14th century, Abbot John Rutherwyck dammed the stream to the north of the house site thus creating a head of water and also possibly a fish pond. He dug a ditch to the west of the site to take water from the pond around the site and back to the river some 600 metres downstream. This action enclosed what is shown on 19th century map as the 'great moat field'. The water-filled ditch system was probably created to provide some security to the Abbot's house and tithe barns.

However, when Henry VIII purchased and developed the site he may have created, or already had, a moat closely encompassing the house area - more in line with royal expectations. It is even possible that he might have resited parts of any existing moat to allow expansion of the house area.

The site map below shows the relationship between all these ditches and streams:

Further Work

Geophysical analysis and auguring are likely to be able to help us trace the moat. Geophysical analysis is difficult around the house because or the many modern buildings, paths, drives and trees. Auguring has the advantage that can be used in very confined spaces and may detect a puddling layer.

Surveying the site levels will help establish the feasibility of running water to the Abbots ditch and Henry's moat.

References:

1	Medieval Moated Sites. CBA Research Report, Ed. F. A. Aberg 1978.
2	Trial Trenching at a Probable Moated Site at Downside Farm, Cobham. Surrey Archaeological Collections, 92, p217, 2005. David Graham, Audrey Graham, David Taylor