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Leighfield Forest Also spelt 'Lyfield' which is how it is pronounced. Early spellings suggest it was leah feld. Which in two words tells the story of the region. Leah is 'woodland' but feld (modern English 'field') is 'land cleared for pasture or cultivation'. The Leighfield Forest was a royal hunting ground along the western edge of the county of Rutland. It was a remnant of a much larger area of Royal Forest comprising the Forest of Leicestershire and the Forest of Rutland, created by Henry I in around 1100 and 1122, respectively. These Forests covered a large area stretching from Tilton on the Hill in east Leicestershire up to the Rutland boundary and onwards to include much of the south of Rutland. Ridlington was a royal vill in 1086 so almost certainly an administrative centre. King John enclosed part of the Forest of Leighfield at Ridlington to create a deer park. The last stag known to have been hunted there was in 1800. The Norman castle at Hallaton was in Leighfield Forest and would also have functioned as an estate centre. The Leicestershire Forest was released from Forest Law by Henry III in 1235 and most of the Rutland portion by Edward I in 1299. The remaining Forest was a strip of land along the Rutland border from Braunston in Rutland in the north to Stoke Dry in the south. In 1630 King Charles I disafforested the remaining areas of forest and sold the land. The woodland was rapidly cleared so that today only Prior's Coppice, Stoke Dry Wood, Wardley Wood and two small fragments – Haycock Spinney (formerly Oldsale Wood) and Bushy Close (formerly Bushy Wood) – remain of the fifty-four woods listed in the gazetteer of the woods of the Leighfield Forest. This article attempts to locate some of these now-lost woodlands. The villages of Belton, Loddington, Launde, Withcote, Owston, Knossington, Braunston and Brooke are on the perimeter of a large area with no major roads, no villages and only a few farms (known as 'lodges'). These lodges are most likely the successors to the homes of medieval foresters. The area of Leighfield Forest in the early nineteenth century. View the map in more detailed resolution here. the village of Leighfield The earthworks of a deserted medieval village, called Leighfield, survive to the immediate east of Leighfield Lodge (built in the early seventeenth century) near the River Chater to the north-west of Ridlington. An aerial photograph taken in 1947 shows a large area of earthworks to the north but these had been ploughed out by the 1970s. R.F. Hartley thinks the settlement survived into the post-medieval era, which is consistent with the date of the Lodge. Roy Palmer, in his book on Leicestershire and Rutland folklore, states that during the First World War a band of deserters from the army lived rough in what was left of Leighfield Forest and fed themselves by poaching. Back to top of this page     Back to home page   This website does not gather or store any visitor information. Copyright Bob Trubshaw 2026 No unauthorised copying or reproduction except if all following conditions apply a: Copy is complete (including this copyright statement). b: No changes are made. c: No charge is made. www.hoap.co.uk/rutland

Rutland's history home page what's new? glossary bibliography Rutland's geology Rutland's boundaries Rutland's rivers long, long ago prehistoric Rutland Roman Rutland long ago Anglo-Saxon Rutland Rutland's place-names waterborne transport around the sixth century Rutland's early churches Anglo-Saxon sculpture in Rutland The Matter of Rutland what the Normans did for Rutland Romanesque sculpture in Rutland Rutland's royal forests Rutland in medieval times Rutland's scratch dials Rutland's medieval carvings Rutland's sepulchral effigies Rutland's saltways Rutland in Tudor times Dissolution in Rutland not that long ago Rutland in the 17th century pinfolds and pounds in Rutland dovecotes in Rutland Rutland in the 18th century turnpiking Rutland Rutland's springs and wells changes in Rutland's agriculture since 1800 seems like yesterday Rutland's dialect Rutland's folk customs travellers in Rutland watermills and windmills in Rutland breweries in Rutland gasworks in Rutland ironstone quarrying in Rutland Zeppelins over Rutland redundant telephone exchanges in Rutland Second World War in Rutland WWII airfields and pillboxes in Rutland the making of Rutland Water Rutland Weekend Television free online history resources Victoria County History: Rutland volume one Victoria County History: Rutland volume two free PDFs of Rutland Record issues 1 to 50 old OS maps Historic England Listed buildings database Sepulchral Effigies of Leicestershire and Rutland Open Domesday English Place-Name Society database Wikipedia list of places in Rutland (with links to village entries) Wikipedia list of people from Rutland researching and writing local history getting started free advice from 2005 asking curious questions (YouTube video) local history groups in and around Rutland Belton-in-Rutland History Society Cottesmore History and Archaeology Group Langham Village History Group Lyddington Manor History Society Rutland Local History and Record Society with free PDFs of over forty issues of the Rutland Record Uppingham Local History Study Group you may also be interested in free PDFs written by Bob Trubshaw Earliest Churches in Nottinghamshire How Anglo-Saxons Found Their Way Anglo-Saxon Leicestershire Conversations in Churchyards Little-known Leicestershire and Rutland Bob Trubshaw's YouTube channel Introduction to medieval carvings Anglo-Saxon and Romanesque carvings How Anglo-Saxons found their way Anglo-Saxon shrines at fords Meetings at triangles Rota's Land and Franni's Land Reading Romanesque fonts Church and manor The significances of square headdresses Early churches and waterborne trade Charnwood slate gravestones and C18th trade routes Ironstone quarries of Leicestershire Roman roads in north-east Leicestershire Salt ways in Leicestershire Why Melton Mowbray needed to called 'middle town' Evolving Anglo-Saxon agriculture Nottinghamshire's earliest churches Ploughs not piety? Economic regeneration in the C7th Were Anglo-Saxon weaving huts women-only places? Vale of Belvoir Chronicle Barrowby Until Now website