SC - Re: common land for grazing, etc.

[Deloris Booker]

In the middle ages, the term "common land" refered to land worked
communally by the peasants/serfs for their own benefit, as opposed to
"demesne lands" which were worked by the peasants/serfs for the benefit of
the lord of the manor.  All the land, whether common or demesne, belonged
to the lord.

"Common land" included fields (grain, vegetables, etc.), pasturage,
woodlands, fish ponds, etc. 
 Animals (cattle and pigs) were pastured on the stubble after the crops
were cut, on "pasturage" - land used exclusively for that
purpose due to its being unfit for one reason or another for croping -,
on mast (the fallen leaves and acorns of oak forests - this mostly for
pigs), and on binds - the stems left over after the beans have been
harvested.  

Sheep, if being raised for the wool crop as opposed to being just meat
animals, were pastured on permanent pasturage on land that was either too
wet (the fens) or too rough - most of yorkshire for example - for
convenient cropping given the level of medieval farm technology.

The notorious "enclosures " began in the Elizabethan period and continued
right up until the 19th century.  They resuluted in the movement of large
numbers of rural poor into the towns and provided cheap labour for the
expanding industrial base of the elizabethan/stewart period as well as for
the much more famous "industiral revolution" of the georgeian / regency
period.  (This is, by the way, a gross over-simplification of a very
complex socio/ecoonomic/political upheaval.)

Anyway, hope this is of some help.  

Aldreada of the lakes