Search the tithe maps
Search through the tithe map collection for free. You can see the maps and apportionments, as well as a composite map of Wales through the tithe maps.
Search the tithe maps of Wales
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Tithes were payments made from early times for the support of the parish church and its clergy. Originally these payments were made in kind (crops, wool, milk, young stock, etc.) and usually represented a tenth (tithe) of the yearly production of cultivation or stock rearing.
There were 3 types of tithe:
It is more usual to refer to tithes as ‘Great Tithes’ and ‘Small Tithes’. The great tithes, also known as the ’rectorial tithes’, were payable to the rector and generally comprised the predial tithes of corn, grain, hay and wood while the small tithes, also known as the ‘vicarial tithes’, were payable to the vicar and comprised all other tithes.
The ownership of the tithe was a property right that could be bought and sold, leased or mortgaged, or assigned to others. This resulted in many of the rectorial tithes passing into lay hands - particularly after the dissolution of the monasteries. These tithes then became the personal property of the new owners, or lay impropriators. After the sale of the tithes forfeited to the Crown in the 1530s, about 22.8% of the net value of tithes in Wales were held by lay impropriators at the time of commutation in 1836. A vicar usually continued to have the spiritual care of the parish and to receive the vicarial tithes.
From early times money payments had begun to be substituted for payments in kind. Fixed sums (moduses) were substituted for some categories of production, particularly for livestock and perishable produce; while adjustable payments known as compositions, which were sometimes assessed annually, were increasingly being substituted in local arrangements in latter years.
The accuracy of the maps depended on the skill of the local surveyors employed on the task. More than 200 different surveyors worked in Wales.
The first specification (British Parliamentary Papers, Session 1837, Vol. XLI 405) for the mapping proved to be over-ambitious. This was drawn up by one of the Assistant Commissioners, Lieutenant R K Dawson of the Ordnance Survey, and was intended to be at the scale of 3 chains to the inch (1:2,376) with a standardised set of symbols.
Unfortunately, this was not adopted, because the landowners had to pay the costs of the survey and many were unwilling, especially if they already had estate plans that could do the job.
Amending legislation had to be passed in 1837 permitting the presentation of less accurate maps, often on a smaller scale. Many of these maps were compiled from existing estate maps and involved very little new surveying.
Those maps that met the standard were called first-class plans and received a seal from the Tithe Commissioners. The Tithe Commissioners refused their seal to inferior plans.
In Wales only 50 of 1,091 were sealed as first-class maps, mostly for Districts in Monmouthshire or Breconshire. The remainder were simply certified as being the documents on which the tithe rent-charge apportionment was based.
These second-class maps vary in scale and quality; there are some at the prescribed scale of 3 chains to the inch which for some reason were not sealed as first-class maps; while others are little more than topographical sketches and of no value for information about property boundaries, e.g. Llangeitho, Cardiganshire (1:7,920) and Nantglyn, Denbighshire (1:21,120). Some maps were simply enlargements of the Ordnance Survey One-inch maps.
The tithe apportionment schedules follow a more rigid formula and are usually set out on standard forms containing columns for the -
Not all schedules are uniformly detailed. All give details of landowners and occupiers but some give details for holdings only, and not for individual fields. A little over half of the Welsh schedules give details of tithe rent-charge on each field/enclosure. Likewise not all maps give details of land use or record the names of individual fields.
Surveyors and valuers were instructed by the landowners to apportion by holding rather than by individual field in order to keep costs down. Field-names and land use are most often recorded where the tithe documents are prepared from existing surveys. Users should be cautious when details of field-names and land use are studied; because they could be repeating information about an older landscape that had already changed by the time the Tithe Map was being prepared.
The landowners appointed the valuers and surveyors usually after placing advertisements in the local press. 305 valuers and surveyors worked in Wales. While most of them had a very local sphere of activity, others worked over several counties. One of the most notable was the firm of H P Goode and Philpott of Haverfordwest who worked in Pembrokeshire, Glamorganshire, Carmarthenshire and Cardiganshire on a total of 126 apportionments. By contrast 135 valuers and surveyors are associated with only a single apportionment.
No map should be used in isolation, other documentary sources are needed to determine the accuracy of maps, their purpose, the methods by which they were made, and to establish how much of the cartographer's information is new or unique and how much is merely a repetition of what has gone before. Tithe maps are no exception.
A number of Welsh tithe maps were compiled from old surveys. The researcher should seek to ascertain, therefore, how the maps were made. How much of the data was gathered from genuine fieldwork and how much was derived from other sources. While the maps often carry a wide range of information, certain aspects, such as rights of way, were of no interest to the Commissioners. On tithe maps, therefore, such information is often missing or inaccurate
Tithe commutation was the process by which the payment in kind was substituted for a cash payment. The Tithe Commutation Act was designed to ensure that this was achieved quickly throughout the country.
Tithes were still payable in almost all Welsh parishes (and in a majority of English parishes too) in 1836. The early 19th century had been an age of much political, social and economic reform. There had been an increasing demand for the Commutation of Tithe (some reformers campaigned for the abolition of tithe) and in 1836 the government of the day successfully steered the Tithe Commutation Bill through Parliament. The Act received the Royal Assent on 13 August 1836.
The 1836 Act set up the Tithe Commission headed by 3 Commissioners sitting in London:
William Balmire was the chairman. A Cumberland farmer, he had to resign as MP on his appointment to the Commission. The Rev. Richard Jones was the Archbishop of Canterbury's nomination.
The first tasks of the Commissioners were to find out where commutation had already taken place, and also to establish the boundaries of every unit in which tithes were paid separately. This unit was known as a tithe district to distinguish it from a parish or township. Enquiries were directed to every parish or township listed in the census returns. The results of these enquiries are found in the Tithe Files (Held in Class IR18 at The National Archives).
There are 1,132 Tithe Files for Wales and they include all districts in Wales, not only those places where tithe was still paid in 1836. Tithe districts are usually parishes, but a minority are townships, and some are chapelries, hamlets, or extra-parochial places, many of which enjoyed separate status solely for tithe commutation purposes.
In Wales only 41 files do not have a corresponding tithe map. Of these, 5 refer to duplicate files under alternative names for the same district; 9 refer to districts already included in other tithe districts. 14 of the 41 files, therefore, do not refer to defined tithe districts.
Of the remaining 27 tithe districts for which no map was prepared we find that in Ifton (Monmouthshire) the tithe had been commuted in the enclosure of 1776. In another 11 districts all the tithe rent-charge was merged before apportionment and the remaining 15 relate to districts where no tithe was paid in 1836, and probably had always been free of tithe. Of these, 9 were very small extra-parochial districts and 6 were former monastic lands. Declarations of merger were prepared for these districts also to regularise the position.
The contents of these files have been described in detail in Kain (1986).
There were 2 distinct stages to the commutation process, first, the fixing of a global assessment for the tithe district and second, the apportioning of the tithe rent-charge on the individual properties.
The apportionment was recorded on a map and in a written schedule. These maps and schedules together constitute what is usually termed by historians ‘the parish tithe survey’. The essential purpose of a survey was to provide an accurate measurement of the acreage of each parcel of land, or tithe area, and record its observed state of cultivation.
The Tithe Act provided for the making of an original and 2 copies of every confirmed instrument of apportionment; all were sealed and signed by the Commissioners. The originals were retained in the custody of the Commissioners and are now in The National Archives. The set is complete.
The copies were deposited with:
Search through the tithe map collection for free. You can see the maps and apportionments, as well as a composite map of Wales through the tithe maps.
Search the tithe maps of Wales
The Library holds a set of tithe maps and associated schedules for Wales.
All the tithe maps in the Library have now been catalogued and can be found in the Catalogue. Place names in the map titles often vary from the modern spelling and standardised forms of the names can be found by searching under subject.
Photocopies of both maps and schedules are available on open access in the Reading Room. The originals are not normally issued except in very exceptional cases (e.g. for legal purposes) where an examination of the map colouring or construction is important.
A volume of index maps showing the boundaries of the individual tithe districts is also available in the Reading Room. This is based on a photocopy of the Ordnance Survey’s ‘Index to Tithe Survey’ with the boundaries of the tithe districts highlighted.
For fuller details consult the bibliography below, especially Davies (1999), which provides a comprehensive guide to the maps and schedules held at the Library.