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Tithe maps and apportionments

Background

A tithe or one tenth of the yearly profits from farming was an ancient payment to the Church and originally was paid ‘in kind’ with crops, livestock or other produce.  Tithe barns were built to store the produce handed over.  From the 17th century it became increasingly common for landowners in an individual parish to pay an agreed sum or ‘modus’ in cash.  These private arrangements continued into the early 19th century so some parishes don’t have a formal tithe map and apportionment.  The whole system was rationalised by the Tithe Commutation Act, 1836 and all remaining tithe payments in kind were converted or ‘commuted' to cash. 

Under the terms of the Act new parish maps and apportionments were drawn up to establish who owned or occupied the land, its value and the tithes payable.  Copies were sent to the Diocese, the individual parish and the Tithe Commission Office in London, now held in the National Archives; sometimes copies were made for local landowners.  For this reason there is often more than one copy of the same map.  Although they should be same, there may be slight differences, e.g. in colour or scale. 

What information do they contain?

Tithe maps vary in size, scale and accuracy.  The maps generally cover the whole parish and individual fields or plots of land, are numbered.  Roads, rivers and other major landmarks are shown; sometimes the name of the field is given.  The numbers on the maps refer to information in the apportionments.  These list the name of the landowner, the occupier, the land use and value, and how much was to be paid in tithes.  The apportionments are arranged alphabetically by the name of the landowner.

Tithe maps are often one of the earliest detailed maps of an area. They can be used with other maps to track changes in the landscape and land ownership over time, establish when houses were built and chart the development of towns and villages. Tithe apportionments can tell you where your ancestors lived, the land they owned or occupied and how they used it.

How to find and access them

The tithe maps (but not the apportionments) have been digitised by the Know Your Place West of England digital mapping project. They can be viewed via the KYP website where they can be compared with other historic maps for the same area.  The tithe apportionments are best accessed by using the tithe apportionment database on our website.  You can search the database by name (of landowner or occupier) or by place (parish, hamlet, plot name, plot number). They have also been redrawn by Geoff Gwatkin and his copies are available for consultation at Gloucestershire Archives. 

Transcripts of tithe apportionments for all parishes in the Diocese of Gloucester have been compiled by members and friends of the Gloucester and District Archaeological Research Group.  Special mention should go to Heather Cole, Geoffrey Pitt, John Newbury and Geoffrey Jones. 

The apportionment is the descriptive part of the award, created subsequent to the Tithe Commutation Act of 1836, which gives details of owners and occupiers of individual plots of land within a parish, together with a description (fieldname), state of cultivation and acreage.  All detail was transcribed for this project except the financial amount of rentcharge and details of waste land. 

Search Tithe Apportionments

  • You can search on the name of owner or occupier, parish and hamlet as well as description/fieldname or plot number.
  • Surnames are treated as truncated, so that a search on Hall will retrieve Halling, a search on Ha will retrieve Hale, Hall and Halling.
  • You can search one parish or the whole database.  Choose a parish from the drop down list.
  • If you know the parish and plot number you can go straight to the detail of that plot.
  • If you are searching for a particular field-name you can choose whether the name 'contains' or 'begins' with the word you enter. Try 'castle' with each to see the difference. Depending on how the name was rendered in the original document, you might get different spellings or spaces between words. Try 'cowleaze' and then 'cow leaze' to see the difference.

Results

  • Your search will give you results in tabular form. Where a plot is held by more than one Landowner or Occupied by more than one person a code L or O will appear in the Joint column. If you click on Plot Detail you will be able to retrieve the full detail of that plot with all the joint owner/occupier names displayed.
  • If the Occupier field gives eg.' Anne Vardy and others', the 'others' are not named in the apportionment.
  • You can display the holdings of one particular landowner and calculate the extent of his estate by selecting the rows you require and clicking on the Total Area button. This reconstitutes the subtotal lines which appear in the original award.
  • Notes relating to particular plots  which were recorded in the original survey can be seen in the Plot Detail, as can notes or comments from the transcriber.

Further search

The double arrow 'select' icon on the left hand side of the screen enables you to progress your search.

If you select a row, a filter option appears above the search button. You can then further search by filtering on Landowner, Occupier, Plot Name and Plot Number. You will retrieve all occurrences within that parish. This is deliberately restricted to one parish in order to avoid any implication that a landowner or occupier in one parish is the same as one of the same name in another parish. If you wish to search for that landowner in other parishes, you will need to start a fresh search using the basic Search box.

  • You can search on the name of owner or occupier, parish and hamlet as well as description/fieldname or plot number.
  • Surnames are treated as truncated, so that a search on Hall will retrieve Halling, a search on Ha will retrieve Hale, Hall and Halling.
  • You can search one parish or the whole database.  Choose a parish from the drop down list.
  • If you know the parish and plot number you can go straight to the detail of that plot.
  • If you are searching for a particular field-name you can choose whether the name 'contains' or 'begins' with the word you enter. Try 'castle' with each to see the difference. Depending on how the name was rendered in the original document, you might get different spellings or spaces between words. Try 'cowleaze' and then 'cow leaze' to see the difference.

Results

  • Your search will give you results in tabular form. Where a plot is held by more than one Landowner or Occupied by more than one person a code L or O will appear in the Joint column. If you click on Plot Detail you will be able to retrieve the full detail of that plot with all the joint owner/occupier names displayed.
  • If the Occupier field gives eg.' Anne Vardy and others', the 'others' are not named in the apportionment.
  • You can display the holdings of one particular landowner and calculate the extent of his estate by selecting the rows you require and clicking on the Total Area button. This reconstitutes the subtotal lines which appear in the original award.
  • Notes relating to particular plots  which were recorded in the original survey can be seen in the Plot Detail, as can notes or comments from the transcriber.

Further search

The double arrow 'select' icon on the left hand side of the screen enables you to progress your search.

If you select a row, a filter option appears above the search button. You can then further search by filtering on Landowner, Occupier, Plot Name and Plot Number. You will retrieve all occurrences within that parish. This is deliberately restricted to one parish in order to avoid any implication that a landowner or occupier in one parish is the same as one of the same name in another parish. If you wish to search for that landowner in other parishes, you will need to start a fresh search using the basic Search box.

Want to know more?

See the National Archives’ research guide, available at http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/records/research-guides/tithe-records.htm

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