Topography, Geography and Landscape

Good morning Lovely photo and shows coppicing better than I could. I'm guessing that the area is no longer coppiced? Most of the clumps look quite mature. Though I believe that trees differ in the length they are best left between cutting eg Oak (50 years), Sweet Chestnut (15-20 years), Hazel (7 years). I'll just coppice the quote if you don't mind. It occurs to me that Oak, Sweet Chestnut and Hazel would have been particularly useful to keep, because they had secondary crop of nuts, chestnuts and acorns.

Good morning, Helen , yes, coppice my quote please, it is probably taking more space than is needed, but I didn't have the know how/fingers to do it No, the area is no longer coppiced, (although work is talked about and being argued about at the moment, not a subject for this forum) that is why I referred to it as lapsed coppice. We should admire what our ancestors learn and achieved and if we don't shortly buck up our ideas, we may have to re-learn this old knowledge.

Many times I've heard about the two parks. The Great Park had a logical outer boundary but the Little Park has been an unknown. Handily though, we discovered that there was a map in the Aylesford Collection. Using landmarks I've tried to tie it to the 1850 map. I'm very much guessing that the south gate was in line with the Charterhouse road. Black lines were paths and the red line was the rough boundary of the park. I will accept corrections from Rob etc if they have other ideas.

One of the confusing things about the Little Park and the Great Park is the existence of Little Park Street and Much Park Street. I assumed that the Great Park was connected to Much Park. Not so apparently. Early references to the two streets in Latin, mention an upper and lower park streets. These were partially misconstrued to mean that the lower park street was Little Park Street but in fact the reference was physical, with Much Park Street being lower in altitude. Add to that the myriad of names that Much Park Street has had (eg Midsford Street), then it becomes clearer that there is no actual connection between Much Park and Great Park.

Oh, wow! I'd only ever heard about "Much" & "Little" Park streets referring to "big" and "small" parks, but this is extremely interesting and turns what most of us thought we knew on its head! Wonderful! Whereabouts, Helen, did you see the reference to "upper and lower" park streets?

I found Upper and Lower Park Streets when I was rummaging about trying to find the White Cellar in the Coventry Collections. I'm 100% certain that the place stood on one of the two corners Much Park Street shared with Earl Street (that extended as far as Mill Lane before Jordan Well was created). Later references were clearly Much Park Street but where Lower Park Street (in Latin) was mentioned the staff had decided that Lower mean Little. Despite references to Upper Park Street being correctly attributed to Little Park Street., or at least where I looked. There may be other instances where Upper might be confused with Much. It's that mistake that caused some to have the thought the White Cellar was on or near Little Park Street. I still hadn't determined which corner it sat on and until Coventry Collections returns in some fashion, I don't stand a chance. pre-1340: Stan Beasley's early medieval plan has the White Cellar on the corner of Little Park Street. Interestingly Much Park Street is just Vicus Parci on the same map. I'm guessing that the Little and Much might refer to the width of the road or because after the city wall was built Much Park Street was longer. As a related issue, I doubt that Much Park Street was connected to the London Road before the south of the city was extended because it exited into the park and would have needed a gate out of the park as well as out of the city. The London Road probably continued through what became Whitefriars and joined the east/west road (either Gosford Street or Earl Street). The eastern boundary of the wider park and the true location of the Red Ditches might give clues about that. More on that here.