Monument record MDO49094 - Deer Park, Clifton Maybank

Wilson, J D, The Medieval Deer-Parks of Dorset XIII. Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society 95, 49 (Article in serial). SDO20720.

‘CLIFTON MAYBANK (11). Two contemporary references to the park at Clifton Maybank, a couple of miles south-east of Yeovil, have come to light. The first from the Curia Regia Roll: in 1244 Beatrice, widow of William Maubank, disputed with Alice Basset the possession of various lands in Clifton “with the exception of the park of the said manor.” [Fry, Vol.E.2, pp30-31.] In 1306 Simon de Monte Acuto was convicted of breaking the park of Philip Maubank of Clifton. [Cal. PR. Ed.I 1301-07, p.438.] It had evidently been disparked by the time of the 1583 Certificate as to Parks in Dorset, and little if anything now remans to show the extent – or even the precise location – of the park of Maubanks.
As previous articles in this series have shown, medieval park sites are often marked by field or other place names, but such clues are lacking at Clifton. It seemed most likely that the park lay at the southern end of the parish, furthest from the Manor House, in the neighbourhood of Clifton Wood, and the single surviving fragment of possible park bank supports this view. The hope that the Wood might contain part of the park boundary was note realised; the size and shape of the park remain so conjectural, and clues on the ground so few, that no map of the area has been included in the present article, and the reader is referred to the appropriate Ordnance Survey sheets.
These show a right of way running northwards from the by-road to Ryme Intrinseca, passing Frankham Farm, skirting the western end of Clifton Wood, and continuing northwards to Stoford and Barwick. Immediately south of the point where this track reaches the Wood, the somewhat eroded remains of a bank border the track, which here marks the boundary between the parishes of Clifton Maybank and Ryme Intrinseca. The bank, which is at the most some 15ft wide by 2ft to 3ft high, shows signs of a ditch on the eastern side, but could not be traced for more than some 300 yards south of the Wood. No embankment could be found around the sharp salient in the parish boundary pointing southwards towards Frankham Farm, and it was conjectured that the park boundary may have turned eastwards across the base of the salient to rejoin the parish boundary half a mile north-east of the farm, where it runs first due east, then north-east. There was no sign of such a connecting bank, but where the parish boundary turns east a low flat bank appears. In some places a much as 18 ft wide and 2ft to 3ft high, but varying considerably in size and for a little distance completely obliterated, the bank can be followed for almost a mile, to a point where an old road called Cole’s Lane comes up from Yetminster. It must be said that this bank is nowhere very characteristic of park earthwork, though it is somewhat reminiscent of the conjectured boundary of Crekelade Park in Marshwood Vale, where it runs through the north-eastern part of Prime Coppices [Proceedings, Vol. 95.] This feature does not appear to continue east of the line of Cole’s Lane, and the parish boundary here turns southward to follow the Lane for a short distance.
The line of Cole’s Lane continues northwards past Clifton Farm to Clifton Maybank. Professor Good suggests that the lane was in medieval times part of an important route from Dorchester into southern Somerset [The Old Roads of Dorset, p. 72] and it could this be fairly taken to set an eastern limit for the park. No sign of embankment could however be found along this continuing line northwards. Professor Good also points out [ib.p.67] that an old road from Sherborne to Ryme, possibly followed by Leland, crosses Cole’s Lane and runs south-westwards for some distance along the line of the parish boundary already described, before turning off due south to Ryme along the picturesquely-named Jennycroft Lane. These two old roads, together with the track from Frankham Farm to Stoford, would seem to define the possible maximum extent of the park to east, south and west. Its northern side remains obscure, since no embankment could be found in the Wood or along its northern edge.
When the site was first visited scrub clearance and other agricultural improvements were already affecting relevant hedge-lines south of Clifton Wood. But it seems safe to say that the earthworks of Clifton Maybank Park, if indeed it were ever completely embanked, had already been largely obliterated at an earlier period.’

Record last edited

Feb 3 2025 12:37PM