Laxton Nottinghamshire
Laxton in Nottinghamshire is the only village in England to maintain the medieval open field system of communal agriculture, a system of farming in large unenclosed strips that was the standard agricultural arrangement of medieval England before the enclosure movement of the seventeenth through nineteenth centuries converted the great majority of agricultural land to the enclosed fields recognisable in the modern English countryside. The continuation of the open field system at Laxton under the management of the Crown Estate provides the only living example of this ancient agricultural tradition in England.
The three open fields of Laxton, West Field, South Field and Mill Field, are still farmed in strips by the tenant farmers of the village in a system managed by the Court Leet, the medieval manorial court that continues to meet annually to adjudicate disputes and allocate strips in a continuation of a tradition that has operated on this site for at least 800 years. The Court Leet is the oldest surviving court of its kind in England and its annual meeting provides a direct connection to the medieval agricultural and legal traditions of the English countryside.
The visitor centre in the village provides an excellent account of the open field system and the history of Laxton's remarkable survival, and the walking on the field paths provides direct access to the strips and the field boundaries that demonstrate the system in its working form.