Monument record MDO6155 - Deer Park, Sturminster Marshall

A medieval deer park of 66 acres. The course of the park pale can be traced for large parts of its length as an earthwork bank and inner ditch. Elsewhere the boundaries are projected along existing field boundaries. There is a documentary reference dated 1244 recording the gift of 12 deer from the King to William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, for his park at Sturminster.

"Only one contemporary reference to the park at Sturminster Marshall has been found: the Close Rolls for 1244 record the King's gift of twelve deer from the Forest of Blackmore to William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, for his park at Sturminster (Cal CR, Henry III, 1242-1247, p271). Though no place-names give a clue, it is suggested that the park lay in the extreme western corner of the modern parish, where a good specimen of deer-park bank and ditch survives in Great Coll Wood, 1.5 miles west-north-west of Almer.

The rounded bank is not of exceptional size, being 11ft-13ft wide and rising 4ft-5ft above the inner ditch but is impressively well-preserved and consistent in size and shape throughout the line A-B on the sketch map (fig 1) [through the middle of Great Coll Wood], except for a gap where several rides cross and cottage once stood. North of the wood, no sign of bank or ditch remains along the narrow hedge from B to C, though this can confidently be taken to represent the line of the park boundary. The hedge from C to D [along the parish boundary] has been slightly less interfered with, though many of the trees shown on early editions of the 6in OS map have disappeared; the bank and ditch too have been largely obliterated, but enough remains of them to show that they ran along this line to point D. Within the wood, no trace of the earthwork could be found through a plantation of young conifers between D and E. South of the ride at E it reappears, much eroded but recognisably similar to that along the line A-B, with inner ditch as before. A short distance further on it crosses Combs Ditch. The RCHM description of the Ditch mentions the park earthwork, describing it simply as 'a small bank and ditch of later date' (RCHM III, pt 2, p313). South of the Ditch it is better preserved that at point E. From F to G it runs along the edge of the wood and though bank and ditch are clear enough the bank is somewhat eroded, rising little more than 3 ft above the ditch. However, when at A it turns back at an angle into the wood it immediately becomes the well-preserved earthwork already described.

The re-entrant angle at the southern tip of the park is uncharacteristic and can be compared with abrupt changes in direction of the bank at Harbins Park, described in Proceedings Vol 86. The cause, presumably some conflicting land use at this point, can only be conjectured. The area of the park as described amounts to some 66 acfres; it will be noticed that the park boundary follows the parish boundary, adjoining Anderson on the west and Spetisbury on the north." (1)

<1> Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society, 1980, Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society for 1978, 30-31 (Serial). SDO78.

<2> National Record of the Historic Environment, 455817 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Mar 15 2023 6:55PM