The team at Gloucestershire Archives dust off the documents

Photograph of the Month

This photograph from 1912 shows a magnificent Oxford Downs ram. It was owned by Mr Horlick of Cowley Manor and was champion sheep at the 1911 Royal Agricultural Show. The Cotswolds are famous for sheep and popularly the name ‘Cotswold’ is taken to mean ‘sheep enclosure in rolling hillsides’, with ‘cot’ or ‘cote’, being an enclosure and ‘wald’ meaning ‘woodland, a tract of wood land or rolling hillside’. However, ‘cote’ can also come from ‘coed’ meaning ‘wood’ and so, in fact, the true etymology of the word ‘Cotswold’ has not yet been fully explained. The English Place-Name Society suggests that it derives from the word ‘Codesuualt’ or ‘Cod’s-wold’ which dates from the 1100s and means 'Cod's high open land'. In this instance, ‘Cod’, is interpreted as an Old English personal name, which may be recognised in other place names, notably Cutsdean, Codeswell (an old name for the Upper Windrush) and others, some dating back to the eighth century AD. But recently it has been proposed that ‘Cod’ could derive from the word, ‘Cuda’, the name of a hypothetical mother goddess with Celtic links who may have had cult status in the Cotswold region and whose image has appeared on Romano-British sculptures found in the area.

Great British Life: 1838 tithe map of Alderton, showing Dixton Hill with Dixton Manor1838 tithe map of Alderton, showing Dixton Hill with Dixton Manor (Image: Gloucestershire Archives GDR/T1/4 & Know Your Place - West)

Spotlight on Maps

One problem faced by historic cartographers and surveyors was how to represent a three-dimensional world on a two-dimensional surface. Today’s maps use contours, lines which join points of equal elevation (height) above a given level (typically mean sea level), so that valleys, hills and the gradient of slopes can be visualised. However, in the past, the most common way was to use lines that went from high to low, as this example shows. These lines were often bolder at their high end and were often curved to try to help show the gradient better. This image is taken from the 1838 tithe map of Alderton and shows Dixton Hill with Dixton Manor, a Grade II*-listed 16th-century manor house lying on the south-western side of the hill. This map was surveyed by Nathan Izod of Great Hampton (Worcestershire). He is listed in the 1855 Billings Directory as a land surveyor and valuer, one of many who found gainful employment after the Tithe Commutation Act 1836 became law and required many new maps to be made.

Great British Life: The household accounts of the Whitmore Family of Lower Slaughter, recording re-stocking fishThe household accounts of the Whitmore Family of Lower Slaughter, recording re-stocking fish (Image: Gloucestershire Archives D45/F15)

Document of the Month

This page from the household accounts of the Whitmore Family of Lower Slaughter records re-stocking fish (eels, tench and carp) into the Manor House ponds from 1762 to 1764. Since medieval times, the keeping and eating of freshwater fish was the realm of the aristocracy or the monasteries as they were luxury items requiring land and ample water. Although most villages had a pond, these were for watering stock animals. Fish played an important role in the diet of the upper classes because church rules frequently forbade meat consumption, not only in lent, but also on Fridays, Saturdays, and the vigils of many religious festivals. This didn’t affect the lower classes (who rarely ate meat or fish as these foods were too expensive) but in aristocratic households, plentiful amounts of fish were deemed a necessity on non-meat days. The bulk of these were marine species, but freshwater fish made up about one-third of the total. Although fish consumption dwindled after the renaissance, private fishponds remained a mark of social status and helped reinforce class differences well into the 20th century. The fish in these accounts were probably intended both for sport and the plate, as by this date, the pastime of angling was very popular in the upper classes.

Great British Life: Mr Thomas Peach of Bourton-on-the-Hill, who died on April 29, 1922Mr Thomas Peach of Bourton-on-the-Hill, who died on April 29, 1922 (Image: Cheltenham Chronicle & Gloucestershire Graphic, May 1922)

Gloucestershire Character

This image shows Mr Thomas Peach of Bourton-on-the-Hill, who died on April 29, 1922 at the grand old age of 101. He was born in 1821 but wasn’t baptised until the age of five, in 1826. At some later date he spoke to the resident vicar about his baptism and the latter wrote notes about it in the parish baptism register – including that the font was white, and the church organ was in a different place. Thomas lived in the parish all his life and had several different jobs over the years, including agricultural labourer, shepherd, and by 1891 stonebreaker at a local quarry. On July 17, 1859, at the age of 38, he married a local girl, Hester Hopkins, who was ten years his junior, although his age on the marriage certificate stated he was only 31! The couple went on to have ten children, consisting of seven sons and three daughters. Hester died in March 1909, aged 69, after which Thomas went to live with his youngest daughter, Rosa. He lived out his last years surrounded by his daughter’s six grandchildren!

Gloucestershire Archives, Clarence Row, Alvin Street, Gloucester, GL1 3DW, gloucestershire.gov.uk/archives