Fen and Sea: Medieval and Early Modern Landscape Evolution in South-East Lincolnshire Before 1700

ABSTRACT The low lands of south-east Lincolnshire are often described and interpreted as if they were a single landscape with a homogeneous history. Concentrating on the pre-industrial era this paper aims to show that there is a finer texture to both the visual landscape and the details of its evolution since Roman times. The keys to these developments are (a) reclamation from the wetlands of the sea fringes and from the freshwater fen, and (b) water management thereafter. In the course of the reclamation from the sea, new lands were created as a by-product of salt-making as well as deliberately for agricultural expansion; in this region the Fen stayed as a wetland until the nineteenth century unlike its equivalents in the Great Levels south of the Wash. Modern intensive agriculture has removed many traces of the history of land and water manipulation but a combination of documents, maps and aerial imagery allows a great deal of reconstruction, though gaps remain. Overall, the work is a reminder that de-watered terrain is prone to shrinkage and that modern efficient pumps do not remove the land from the threat of inundation; neither do any of the plans put forward by conservation-minded bodies. Abbreviations: BA: Bethlem Royal Hospital Archive; CUCAP: Cambridge University Collection of Aerial Photography; LAO: Lincolnshire Archives Office; LHER: Lincolnshire Historic Environment Record; NMR: National Monuments Record; TNA: The National ArchivesA context