The parish of Nutfield largely follows the boundaries of the ancient Manor of Nutfield, which is recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086. Like many other East Surrey manors, it forms a long, narrow strip of land. At its widest point it is only about two miles across, yet it stretches for six miles from north to south. Why was it laid out in this way?
The distinctive strip shape is shared by several neighbouring manors that extend from the crest of the North Downs southwards towards the Sussex border. Historians believe these may once have formed part of a much larger estate that had been divided into smaller, economically viable manors by the time of the Domesday Survey.
Each manor was designed to include a variety of landscapes and soils. The northern part contained the well-drained and easily cultivated greensand soils along the ridge, while the southern part extended onto the heavier Weald Clay.
Clay soils were difficult for medieval farmers to cultivate. They became waterlogged and sticky in winter, then baked hard in summer. By including both types of land, each manor had access to arable fields, woodland, pasture and other natural resources. The landholdings within the manor of Nutfield also followed this same north south alignment.
The lighter soils on the ridge were settled and cultivated first. The heavier clay lands to the south remained woodland, heath or common for much longer. These areas provided valuable resources for the manor's inhabitants, who often held rights of common, including grazing livestock and pannage. Pannage was the right for livestock owners to bring their pigs to forage in the woodland during the autumn, feeding on acorns, beechnuts and other fallen mast to fatten them before they were slaughtered for the winter.
The pattern of roads reflects this early landscape. East-west routes followed the higher, drier ground along the ridge. The modern A25 almost certainly follows one of these ancient ridgeways. In contrast, the north-south lanes ran down the length of the manor, providing seasonal access to woodland and later to newly cleared farmland as settlement gradually spread southwards.
Over the centuries, the forests of the Weald were progressively cleared and enclosed for agriculture. Much of this process had been completed by the time of the Black Death in the mid-fourteenth century, although some areas were enclosed later. The clay ridge between King's Cross Lane and the Henhaw to Crab Hill footpath was probably among the last parts of the manor to be brought into cultivation.
Although there have been some changes to parish boundaries over the centuries—for example, the transfer of the area around Chilmead Farm and Cormonger’s Farm to Reigate—the present parish of Nutfield shown in the map above still closely follows the boundaries of the ancient manor. Its unusual shape is therefore a reminder of how medieval landowners divided the landscape to ensure that each manor possessed a balanced share of the area's most valuable natural resources.
Nutfield: Our village since Domesday, (1995), Richard Deacon
Early Medieval Surrey, Landholding, Church and Settlement, (1991), John Blair
Parish Map, Nutfield Parish Council, https://www.nutfieldpc.com/parish-maps/