Kitwood

Etymology

First mentioned in AD 1403 as kyteswode meaning the "Kite('s) wood" from Old English * 'cýta' * and * 'wudu' *. The actual woodland that is referred to stood somewhere near where Kitwood Plantation is nowadays.

History

The earliest signs of human activity in Kitwood are a number of Mesolithic flint implements that have been found near the hamlet since the 2000s. Later evidence of Roman activity may also be present nearby as it has been suggested that Swelling Lane, which runs through the hamlet toward Ropley, is the remains of a Roman Road. However, no conclusive evidence exists of this.

Medieval

Archaeological evidence of activity in around the hamlet is minimal with only a few medieval potsherds found around the area. Since the early 1400s, Kitwood is also regularly mentioned in legal documents relating to Ropley. Kitwood Lane is recorded in a court roll record from 1413 as "kitteswodeweye" and during a hedgerow dating survey, commissioned for the Four Marks Village Design Statement, the hedgerow on either side of Kitwood Lane was dated to "approximately 800 years old". The wealth of records suggests significant activity in the area since the 1400s but little evidence of settlement. It is known that since the 13th Century there was settlement near Old Down Wood, northwest of the Hamlet.

Post Medieval

Long, parallel field boundaries running on a NE-SW alignment are visible north of Kitwood Farm are said to have been laid as a result of the inclosure act of which Ropley was the first parish to be enclosed by act of Parliament, the Ropley Inclosure Act 1709 (8 Ann. c. 16 Pr.).

Kitwood Farm

This farm, not to be confused with the more modern 19th century farmhouse that sits to the east of the main hamlet, was an 18th-century farmhouse that existed from around the early 1700s up to about 1908/9 when it disappeared from maps. The farmhouse stood roughly where Autumn Cottage on Kitwood Lane stands now.

References

References

1. "Search the Historic Environment Record (HER)".
2. "Old English Dictionary: Find Old English Words | Old-Engli.sh".
3. held in the records of Winchester College
4. "Four Marks Village Design Statement".
5. Heal, Chris, Ropley's Legacy, The Ridge Enclosures, 1709 to 1850: Chawton, Farringdon, Medstead, Newton Valence and Ropley and the birth of Four Marks (Chattaway and Spottiswood, Four Marks 2021) {{ISBN. 978-1-9161944-3-4