History of Mapledurwell

The name Mapledurwell means 'maple tree spring'.   At the time of the Doomsday Survey the land was held by Anschill for Edward the Confessor and in 1086 the land became the sole estate in Hampshire of Hugh de Port.  It covered the modern parishes of Newham, Up Nately and Andwell.   In 1172 Adam de Port great grandson of Hugh was outlawed for treason and forfeited all his possessions.   The King gave the manor to Alan Basset, it was then transferred to Hugh de Despenser in 1306.  However the forces of Queen Isabel hanged him and his son in 1326.

In 1337 the manor returned to the Despenser family and remained in their possession for over two centuries.   In 1528 William Frost of Avington granted the manor to Corpus Christi College in Oxford 'for support to the end of time of a fellow of his own blood'.   The college remained the major landowner from 1616 to 1839 and some of the manor land still belongs to the college.   Winchester College also held parts of the Manor of Mapledurwell.

The long continuity of ownership of the lands of Mapledurwell by Corpus Christi resulted in little change to the village in the 17^th to 19^th Centuries in terms of the pattern of roads building, woodland, opens fields and commons.   Mapledurwell was untypical of other villages in the area during this time as the land within the village was enclosed very late and remained as open fields until 1795.  There were a number of small farms in the village in contrast to the general trend of large farms and extensive early enclosure that are found in many part of Hampshire.

The present area of allotment land was awarded to the village under and Enclosure act of June 1863, demonstrating that enclosure within the parish was not completed until the 19^th Century.   The formal procedures of the college statues and internal arrangements for disposal of estate revenue mean a continuity of manorial 'guardianship' of the village long after it had ceased in other places.

Expanded History

The version appearing  in the Village "welcome pack"  is substantially similar to the web site history but adds some detail, see below.  

If there are other researchers out there with even more information, please get in touch,  I would be particularly interested in the role of Queens College in the Church or further architectural history. TEO. 

At the beginning of the twelfth century Adam de Port was the Lord of Mapledurwell and founded the Priory of Andwell in the latter half of the reign of Henry I. In 1172 Adam de Port was outlawed for treason and forfeited all his possessions to the Royal Exchequer. The king granted the manor to Alan Basset and it passed eventually to Hugh le Despenser in 1306. However he and his son, Hugh the Younger, were hanged in 1326 by the forces of Queen Isabel during her military coup. The manor eventually returned to the Despenser family in 1337 and although it was to remain with this family for two centuries it was intermittently forfeited, when Thomas Despenser was put to death at Bristol in 1400 for taking part in a conspiracy to restore the dethroned Richard II. In 1529, with the reformation poised to rage throughout Europe and Henry VIII about to marry Ann Boleyn, William Frost of Avington gifted the manor to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, 'for the support to the end of time of a fellow of his own blood'.  The College remained the major landowner from 1616 to 1839 and some of the land remains in their hands to this day.

Up Nately was included in the Great Manor of Mapledurwell until the early twelfth century, when Adam de Port gifted it to the Cistercian Abbey of Tiron in France. The French Abbot sent a colony of monks to settle in this new estate, which was subsequently known as the Manor of Andwell. As an ‘alien priory’ with allegiance to Edward III's enemy it was sequestered by the monarch although it was later sold in 1391 to William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester, who bestowed it on his newly founded College of Winchester some of which still remains in its possession.

Later in the 18th century the opening of the Basingstoke Canal, which runs through the northern half of Up Nateley, and the expansion of the nearby brickworks brought many jobs to the area.

Historically though, agriculture has played an important part in the area and to this day Mapledurwell although being part of a conservation area is regarded as a ‘working’ village with active farms and small-holdings.

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