Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
which bear a place-name no longer known: Bromelerge. The large house is labelled as that of
'Wybarn': Anthony Wybarn, who claimed some of the lands shown on the map. Below this,
four houses are shown with the legend 'All this sometyme was a hamelet called bromelerge'.
This may well be the first deserted hamlet to be depicted and described as such on a map.
Other features on the map give an idea of the geographical layout of the area, with roads,
a gate through the park pale, and a note to the right of the hamlet, written against a diag-
onal line, that this hedge was planted within living memory; 'ther be men a lyve that know
when this hedge was made'. Field boundaries and acreages were shown, since the case rested
upon identification of fields across several centuries. Text on the map gives wording from a
grant in 1330 of certain lands in 'Southfrethe' by Lady Clare, who founded Clare College,
Cambridge; a copy of this is in the archives. The lands passed to the Crown and, by the time
that this map was made, were part of the estate of the queen, Catherine of Aragon. The way
that the text is used on the map counters Wybarn's claim, on the grounds that the acreage of
claimed fields was wrong. The outcome of the case is not clear; Wybarn's will of 1528 men-
tions 'londes in Tonbrigge', but does not specify exactly which lands.
There are two even sketchier maps of the same area, apparently drawn by the same hand,
but from different angles and showing confusion about their orientation. All this suggests that
the person who made this map was not used to doing so. Even if the result here appears rather
diagrammatic to our eyes, it does use the visual aspect of mapping to help to clarify where
the important features in the case lay. It thus represents a metamorphosis in the recording of
land, from written records to maps.
