Common land is collective land (sometimes only open to those whose nation governs the land) in which all persons have certain common rights, such as to allow their livestock to graze upon it, to collect wood, or to cut turf for fuel.
A person who has a right in, or over, common land jointly with another or others is usually called a commoner.
A commoner, also known as the common man, commoners, the common people or the masses, was in earlier use an ordinary person in a community or nation who did not have any significant social status, especially a member of neither royalty, nobility, nor any part of the aristocracy. Depending on culture and period, other elevated persons (such members of clergy) may have had higher social status in their own right, or were regarded as commoners if lacking an aristocratic background.
This class overlaps with the legal class of people who have a property interest in common land, a longstanding feature of land law in England and Wales. Commoners who have rights for a particular common are typically neighbors, not the public in general.
Pelsall is a village in the Metropolitan Borough of Walsall, West Midlands, England. Forming part of the borough's border with Staffordshire, Pelsall is 3 miles (4.8 km) north of Walsall and midway between the towns of Bloxwich and Brownhills. It became a centre for coal mining and the site of an iron works in the 19th century. Pelsall is known for its commons. The Wyrley and Essington Canal is nearby.
Malvern (/ˈmɔːlvərn, ˈmɒl-/, locally also: /ˈmɔːvərn/) is a spa town and civil parish in Worcestershire, England. It lies at the foot of the Malvern Hills, a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The centre of Malvern, Great Malvern, is a historic conservation area, which grew dramatically in Victorian times due to the natural mineral water springs in the vicinity, including Malvern Water.
At the 2021 census it had a population of 30,462. It includes Great Malvern on the steep eastern flank of the Malvern Hills, as well as the former independent urban district of Malvern Link. Many of the major suburbs and settlements that comprise the town are separated by large tracts of open common land and fields, and together with smaller civil parishes adjoining the town's boundaries and the hills, the built up area is often referred to collectively as The Malverns.
Herding is the act of bringing individual animals together into a group (herd), maintaining the group, and moving the group from place to place—or any combination of those. Herding can refer either to the process of animals forming herds in the wild, or to human intervention forming herds for some purpose. While the layperson uses the term "herding" to describe this human intervention, most individuals involved in the process term it mustering, "working stock", or droving.
A herder or herdsman is a pastoral worker responsible for herding, i.e., the care and management of a herd or flock of domestic animals, usually on open pasture. It is particularly associated with nomadic or transhumant management of stock, or with common land grazing. The work is often done either on foot or mounted. Depending on the type of animal being herded, the English language can give different professional names, for example, cowboy for cows, shepherd for sheep, or goatherd for goat.
Enclosure or inclosure is a term, used in English landownership, that refers to the appropriation of "waste" or "common land", enclosing it, and by doing so depriving commoners of their traditional rights of access and usage. Agreements to enclose land could be either through a formal or informal process. The process could normally be accomplished in three ways. First there was the creation of "closes", taken out of larger common fields by their owners. Secondly, there was enclosure by proprietors, owners who acted together, usually small farmers or squires, leading to the enclosure of whole parishes. Finally there were enclosures by acts of Parliament.
The stated justification for enclosure was to improve the efficiency of agriculture. However, there were a range of motives, one example being that the value of the land enclosed would be substantially increased. There were social consequences to the policy, with many protests at the removal of rights from the common people. Enclosure riots are seen by historians as 'the pre-eminent form' of social protest from the 1530s to 1640s.
Clapham Common is a large triangular urban park in Clapham, south London, England. Originally common land for the parishes of Battersea and Clapham, it was converted to parkland under the terms of the Metropolitan Commons Act 1878. It is 220 acres (89 hectares) of green space, with three ponds and a Victorian bandstand. It is overlooked by large Georgian and Victorian mansions and nearby Clapham Old Town.
Holy Trinity Clapham, an 18th-century Georgian church overlooking the park, is important in the history of the evangelical Clapham Sect. Half of the park is within the London Borough of Wandsworth, and the other half is within the London Borough of Lambeth.
A village green is a common open area within a village or other settlement. Historically, a village green was common grassland with a pond for watering cattle and other animals, often at the edge of a rural settlement, used for gathering cattle to bring them later on to a common land for grazing. Later, planned greens were built into the centres of villages.
The village green also provided, and may still provide, an open-air meeting place for the local people, which may be used for public celebrations, such as May Day festivities. The term is used more broadly to encompass woodland, moorland, sports grounds, buildings, roads and urban parks.