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Hello in the early 19th century the North Hampshire so-called peasant poet

John Clare took a look at the countryside and didn't like what he saw he wrote

fence meeting fence in owner's little bounds of field and meadow large as gardens grounds

in little parcels little mines to please with men and flocks imprisoned ill at ease.

He is referring to the effects of the 18th century enclosures, literally the fencing in of land to stop others from using it.

This apparently simple act has been hugely controversial.

For some, enclosure underpinned the economic and agricultural development of modern Britain.

For others, it was an act of theft, the turning of common land into private property that

impoverished the many for the sake of the few. But what really happened during the era of 18th

and early 19th century enclosures, who gained, who lost, and what role did enclosures play

in the agricultural and industrial transformation of this country.

With me to discuss the enclosures of the 18th century, a Mark Overton professor of economic and

social history at the University of Exeter, Rosemary Street, director of the Center for Urban

...