0:00:04 > 0:00:09I set out to understand some of the great landscapes of Britain,
0:00:09 > 0:00:13to piece together the history that shaped them.
0:00:13 > 0:00:18This seems amongst the most modern - the Vale of Evesham.
0:00:18 > 0:00:22It's rich land, from hill-top grazing to valley fields of crops,
0:00:22 > 0:00:26a landscape of gorgeous villages and farms.
0:00:26 > 0:00:29It should echo with history.
0:00:29 > 0:00:34But these are some of the hardest worked fields in Britain.
0:00:34 > 0:00:38I'm afraid that modern farming has scoured them of their past.
0:00:38 > 0:00:45Is it possible that this landscape still has roots that reach back into its history?
0:01:07 > 0:01:09I've come to the Vale of Evesham.
0:01:09 > 0:01:16It's part of that great swathe of lowlands that goes right up across the country.
0:01:16 > 0:01:20For me, this is the absolute heart of England.
0:01:20 > 0:01:23It's a landscape of beautiful villages,
0:01:23 > 0:01:27still rich in hedgerows, ancient farms.
0:01:27 > 0:01:29It looks timeless,
0:01:29 > 0:01:33but we know it's been intensively cultivated for centuries.
0:01:33 > 0:01:38My question is whether farming has smoothed out the traces of its past,
0:01:38 > 0:01:45or whether in this landscape we can still discover clues to the history that shaped it.
0:01:45 > 0:01:52For 250 years, agricultural revolutions have cut through these fields.
0:01:52 > 0:01:56What could possibly remain of their history?
0:01:56 > 0:02:00On my first morning, I called on archaeologist Julian Parsons.
0:02:00 > 0:02:05He told me to meet him at the Cheltenham Art Gallery,
0:02:05 > 0:02:10where there is a landscape painting completed just before the great agricultural revolution.
0:02:10 > 0:02:14It's known as the Dixton Harvesters.
0:02:14 > 0:02:17It's a remarkable picture.
0:02:17 > 0:02:23It's actually a lovely image of the landscape you're interested in,
0:02:23 > 0:02:28that little area of landscape, painted in the early 18th century,
0:02:28 > 0:02:30between 1700-1730.
0:02:30 > 0:02:36It's a wonderful snapshot of how this landscape would have looked then.
0:02:36 > 0:02:41The first thing that strikes you is how many people there are here.
0:02:41 > 0:02:44- They're all working away.- Yeah.
0:02:44 > 0:02:51It really is the countryside alive with people working in this large field.
0:02:51 > 0:02:53It's the hay harvest.
0:02:53 > 0:03:00- This is a countryside full of people. - It's a lonely occupation now. Where have all the people gone?
0:03:00 > 0:03:07The mechanisation of the agricultural revolution meant there wasn't the need for so many people.
0:03:07 > 0:03:10There was a depopulation of these areas.
0:03:10 > 0:03:17So the landscape, like the communities, was transformed by the agricultural revolution?
0:03:17 > 0:03:24You would think so, but if you see this view today, it has many similarities with this painting.
0:03:26 > 0:03:31That afternoon, I persuaded Julian to take me there.
0:03:31 > 0:03:36The old way of life was gone, the fields turned over by machinery,
0:03:36 > 0:03:43but Julian insisted we find the exact spot where the painter stood nearly 300 years before.
0:03:43 > 0:03:46Would anything still be the same?
0:03:50 > 0:03:53Can you orientate where we are?
0:03:53 > 0:03:58- Where would the painter have been? - He would have been just up the hill,
0:03:58 > 0:04:03- looking out in that direction. - It's becoming a bit recognisable.
0:04:03 > 0:04:08- It's familiar even though you haven't been here.- That's right.
0:04:08 > 0:04:12- I'll get out the map. - This should be about it.
0:04:12 > 0:04:14Now...
0:04:14 > 0:04:18We need to try and line up with that row here.
0:04:18 > 0:04:21- Here it is.- You can still see it.
0:04:23 > 0:04:28Yeah, that newer house sits in the corner there.
0:04:28 > 0:04:30On the road there.
0:04:30 > 0:04:34And the line-up of the hedges is pretty accurate.
0:04:34 > 0:04:38The one in the foreground there, just behind the pylon, is there.
0:04:38 > 0:04:42That's the old hedge.
0:04:42 > 0:04:46So just where those sheep are, they cut the hay.
0:04:46 > 0:04:49The grain of the land,
0:04:49 > 0:04:52the line of the hedges, is exactly the same.
0:04:52 > 0:04:56Even the new hedges fit into the older pattern.
0:04:56 > 0:05:00That's quite extraordinary.
0:05:00 > 0:05:04All that revolution, the depopulation,
0:05:04 > 0:05:07but the land has held its pattern.
0:05:07 > 0:05:10New hedges had appeared in between,
0:05:10 > 0:05:14but the outlines of this landscape,
0:05:14 > 0:05:20its fields and tracks, had hardly changed since the painter stood here in 1715.
0:05:20 > 0:05:27But if this landscape wasn't created around modern agricultural machinery,
0:05:27 > 0:05:30what was it created for?
0:05:30 > 0:05:34Down in the fields themselves was a clue -
0:05:34 > 0:05:38a pattern of long, curving humps and hollows.
0:05:38 > 0:05:42Julian said it was ridge and furrow.
0:05:42 > 0:05:47Before recent powerful ploughs, there had been much more.
0:05:47 > 0:05:50This, he said, is the secret of this landscape.
0:05:50 > 0:05:57That evening, we went to Gloucester to see a collection of aerial photos taken 50 years ago,
0:05:57 > 0:06:00before the heavy modern ploughing had begun.
0:06:00 > 0:06:07We asked archaeologist John Hoyell whether the photos showed any more of the old ridge and furrow,
0:06:07 > 0:06:11and if they would reveal the landscape's origins.
0:06:11 > 0:06:15This was taken in 1947, just after the Second World War.
0:06:15 > 0:06:19That's Dixton Hill over there. They join on.
0:06:19 > 0:06:24If you look behind the boundaries, you'll see these very faint lines,
0:06:24 > 0:06:29which is the ridge and furrow of the medieval field system.
0:06:29 > 0:06:36- These strange curved boundaries follow the lines that were there. - It seems absolutely everywhere.
0:06:36 > 0:06:43It is. In this area, this was the way the land was farmed from the early medieval period.
0:06:43 > 0:06:47And here appears to be a modern road,
0:06:47 > 0:06:53which is also curving around the edge of a field, parallel to the lines.
0:06:53 > 0:06:56This illustrates the sequence quite neatly.
0:06:56 > 0:07:01This modern road is following the course of the farm track,
0:07:01 > 0:07:04which followed the course of the ridge and furrow.
0:07:04 > 0:07:10The amazing thing is how extensive this is. It's everywhere.
0:07:10 > 0:07:13Everywhere is ridge and furrow.
0:07:13 > 0:07:16What the old aerial photographs tell us
0:07:16 > 0:07:21is that the fields in these valleys weren't shaped by modern farming.
0:07:21 > 0:07:26They are laid out on a pattern of gently curving ridge and furrow,
0:07:26 > 0:07:32a medieval farming system dating back long before the agricultural revolution.
0:07:32 > 0:07:37What is this ridge and furrow and how was it made?
0:07:41 > 0:07:44I want to try an experiment
0:07:44 > 0:07:51to discover how this medieval ridge and furrow pattern, with its lovely sweeping curves, was made.
0:07:51 > 0:07:57Charles Martell is a farmer here who has an interest in medieval agriculture,
0:07:57 > 0:08:01and he has a Gloucester long plough, which is the sort they used.
0:08:01 > 0:08:06I've asked him to plough a strip the way they would have done it.
0:08:14 > 0:08:19We've got something that looks like ridge and furrow up here.
0:08:19 > 0:08:22How are we going to work this?
0:08:22 > 0:08:26We go up this side and it'll throw the soil that way.
0:08:26 > 0:08:32If you notice, this plough has got a very abrupt mouldboard and it tends to push the soil sideways.
0:08:32 > 0:08:36It has a major impact on the landscape, ultimately,
0:08:36 > 0:08:40by tipping the soil this way and that.
0:08:40 > 0:08:45It pushes it to the middle, so you're going to get a build-up.
0:08:45 > 0:08:50- The aim was to bunch up the soil in the middle and have drainage down the side.- Yes.
0:08:50 > 0:08:55- Rather different from the modern concept.- Which is a big flat field.
0:08:55 > 0:08:59But it's interesting, the idea of piling the soil up.
0:08:59 > 0:09:04It's like nicking your neighbour's soil and keeping it in the middle.
0:09:04 > 0:09:11You get the advantage of the drainage as well. That's how you get the waves in the landscape.
0:09:11 > 0:09:14Each wave is someone's piece of ground.
0:09:14 > 0:09:17Come on.
0:09:17 > 0:09:23< We're all novices - horses, ploughgirl and the plough.
0:09:32 > 0:09:38It looks as though the ridge and furrow began because medieval fields were divided into strips,
0:09:38 > 0:09:42each farmed by an individual farmer.
0:09:42 > 0:09:46And as each one worked with his medieval plough,
0:09:46 > 0:09:49it piled the soil up into a ridge.
0:09:49 > 0:09:55But could our experiment show why the ridges and furrows were never straight?
0:09:55 > 0:09:58I noticed most had an S shape.
0:09:58 > 0:10:00Watching them turn gave me an idea.
0:10:00 > 0:10:08We're beginning to get this S-shape form, which must originally have related to the turning circle.
0:10:08 > 0:10:11It seems to be that was the case.
0:10:11 > 0:10:18You have the distance between the horses, the horses themselves, this plough's 15 feet long,
0:10:18 > 0:10:22so if you come up straight to a hedge, there's a big area unploughed.
0:10:22 > 0:10:28- So you veer off at an angle so that you're left with an S-shaped furrow. - Right.
0:10:30 > 0:10:35I felt I was getting close to the hidden blueprint of this landscape.
0:10:35 > 0:10:40All we needed now was a dozen generations to finish the job.
0:10:42 > 0:10:47- It seems to me you've got your hand in.- I'm puffing like a steam train.
0:10:47 > 0:10:49That's terrific.
0:10:49 > 0:10:56That one furrow - there's really a mass of soil pushed into the centre. It's terrific.
0:10:56 > 0:11:01- We have the beginnings of a ridge there with just a few turns.- Yes.
0:11:01 > 0:11:05And they'd be doing it year over year over year,
0:11:05 > 0:11:08going over the same lines.
0:11:10 > 0:11:15But medieval ploughmen worked with oxen, not horses.
0:11:15 > 0:11:18Charles was putting together his own team.
0:11:18 > 0:11:24He reckoned there were more clues here to the way this landscape was laid out.
0:11:26 > 0:11:29Oh, these are wonderful creatures!
0:11:29 > 0:11:35Now, oxen came before the great working horses, did they?
0:11:35 > 0:11:39They've been with us about 3,000 years.
0:11:39 > 0:11:42They're just marvellous!
0:11:42 > 0:11:46- Right, old boy. - You've got a yoke pair here now.
0:11:46 > 0:11:50But in practice, you can have up to eight oxen.
0:11:50 > 0:11:54The plough was handled by the ox man, or ploughman,
0:11:54 > 0:11:58and his boy would drive the oxen with a very long stick.
0:11:58 > 0:12:01I have one here.
0:12:01 > 0:12:05- A rod pole or perch. You learnt at school...- I remember that.
0:12:05 > 0:12:10- I bet you don't remember the length. - No.- It's 5½ yards.
0:12:10 > 0:12:15And it's just the right length for tapping them to keep them going.
0:12:15 > 0:12:20You lay this on the ground four times and you get 22 yards.
0:12:20 > 0:12:24- That's a cricket pitch. - That's right. One chain.
0:12:24 > 0:12:29That's that way. If you lay it 40 times that way, you get a furlong,
0:12:29 > 0:12:33or furrow long, which is where the word furlong comes from.
0:12:33 > 0:12:41So that 22 by 220 yards is one acre, which is the amount an eight-ox team would plough in a day.
0:12:41 > 0:12:44It all goes back to this 5½ yards.
0:12:44 > 0:12:49So this fundamental unit of area depends on the length of an ox?
0:12:49 > 0:12:52That's a natural unit in the English landscape.
0:12:52 > 0:12:58Modern machines may have ploughed out most of the ridge and furrow,
0:12:58 > 0:13:03but the length and breadth of the fields and their curving shapes
0:13:03 > 0:13:09still belong to the world of the medieval ploughmen, his oxen and his stick.
0:13:09 > 0:13:13The secret of this landscape
0:13:13 > 0:13:20is that it's been moulded and measured by the work of medieval farmers over centuries.
0:13:20 > 0:13:23One can't help wondering when it all started.
0:13:23 > 0:13:26As you stand here on Bredon Hill,
0:13:26 > 0:13:32it's striking how the hedgerow patterns that mark out the fields run down the slopes
0:13:32 > 0:13:37down towards the river, and then at right angles this way.
0:13:37 > 0:13:40And then there are the villages.
0:13:40 > 0:13:46There's Bredon and Kemerton and Overbury, very regularly arranged at the foot of the slopes.
0:13:46 > 0:13:49Did all this happen just by chance?
0:13:49 > 0:13:54Or was there some very old plan to it?
0:13:54 > 0:13:59Amazingly, there's a document which describes these fields at Bredon
0:13:59 > 0:14:02in the year 984.
0:14:02 > 0:14:07Was it possible the present layout could date back that far?
0:14:07 > 0:14:13I asked historian Michael Wood, who's a specialist on Anglo-Saxon England.
0:14:13 > 0:14:20And we set out to see if we could still find any of the features recorded by the surveyors
0:14:20 > 0:14:25as they marked out their land over 1,000 years ago.
0:14:28 > 0:14:31The surveyors must have...
0:14:31 > 0:14:35They're drawing a line from the Cheltenham Way to that hill.
0:14:35 > 0:14:40That "Way" that's referred to, that must be the Cheltenham Road.
0:14:40 > 0:14:43Yes, it's an Anglo-Saxon road!
0:14:43 > 0:14:45So we can mark that down here.
0:14:45 > 0:14:50And it's coming into Lower Farm here.
0:14:50 > 0:14:58"And long Hlydan..." Hlydan's the name of a little stream that comes down this way.
0:14:58 > 0:15:01- There could be a ditch here. - Let's have a look.
0:15:01 > 0:15:06This document, in basic terms, is a mortgage.
0:15:06 > 0:15:08It's a land document from 984.
0:15:08 > 0:15:15And the surveyors who drew up the boundary clause, saying, "These are the bounds of your property,"
0:15:15 > 0:15:18would have walked along this muddy track.
0:15:18 > 0:15:23It's an Anglo-Saxon track, difficult as that is to believe!
0:15:23 > 0:15:25That's the track.
0:15:25 > 0:15:28There's a ditch here.
0:15:31 > 0:15:37- There you go. - Well, that's a decent stream. - That's a decent stream.
0:15:37 > 0:15:45It's not stagnant water. This is the Hlydan. This must be the track the surveyors walked on 1,000 years ago.
0:15:45 > 0:15:50- This was an important boundary... - ..Between two estates.
0:15:50 > 0:15:53Big fields on either side. This is the divide.
0:15:53 > 0:16:01And it runs on - "..Of faern hylle on fa dic at crawan forne of faerne dic on caerent....'
0:16:01 > 0:16:07So somewhere down here we should reach the River Carrant.
0:16:08 > 0:16:13Just look at this. That wiggly line must be the line of the river.
0:16:13 > 0:16:18On the map, this wiggling hedge is the ancient boundary.
0:16:18 > 0:16:25What's really great about it is that you can say that this boundary was created in the 10th century.
0:16:25 > 0:16:30Anglo-Saxon kings reorganised the Midlands landscape.
0:16:30 > 0:16:35- They're setting out definite boundaries.- Creating shires -
0:16:35 > 0:16:39Worcestershire, Gloucestershire are being laid out at this time.
0:16:39 > 0:16:43What was the date of this reorganisation?
0:16:43 > 0:16:45The end of the 800s, the early 900s.
0:16:45 > 0:16:53They're fighting the Viking wars, reorganising the towns and the country to provide food for the army.
0:16:53 > 0:16:59They're laying out main boundaries and the field boundaries within it?
0:16:59 > 0:17:05You have this perfect pattern, Overbury, Kemerton, Bredon, the estates run to Bredon Hill.
0:17:05 > 0:17:11You get a share of the different kinds of land. You have this wonderful land here for the ploughs.
0:17:11 > 0:17:18- You have meadow land, woods. Each community...- Has a bit of each. - Has a bit of each.
0:17:18 > 0:17:21A complete reorganisation of this landscape.
0:17:21 > 0:17:29They created our world. We speak their language. We use their terms for the trees, flowers and fields.
0:17:29 > 0:17:32It's really their creation.
0:17:32 > 0:17:37The pattern of villages and fields dates back to a reorganisation of the landscape
0:17:37 > 0:17:42by Anglo-Saxon kings as they fought back the Vikings.
0:17:42 > 0:17:48They reordered the countryside into viable estates and gathered the farmers into villages
0:17:48 > 0:17:55so they could work their fields collectively. It was an Anglo-Saxon agricultural revolution.
0:18:08 > 0:18:14It is astonishing to think that the basic layout of the fields and most of the villages
0:18:14 > 0:18:18dates back to those enormous changes brought about by the Anglo-Saxons.
0:18:18 > 0:18:21This landscape is 1,000 years old.
0:18:21 > 0:18:24But is that the end of the story?
0:18:24 > 0:18:28Has nothing that went before left any traces?
0:18:28 > 0:18:35I feel as if I want to look below the landscape, to look beneath the surface, X-ray it.
0:18:35 > 0:18:40And the best way to see beneath the surface is to get above it.
0:18:42 > 0:18:50From 1,000 feet, you can detect faint patterns left by vanished trackways, ditches or walls.
0:18:50 > 0:18:55I took off with Jim Pickering. He was once a Spitfire pilot.
0:18:55 > 0:19:02But for 50 years, he's been flying these valleys, hunting lost landscapes.
0:19:02 > 0:19:07I think we're coming up to Bredon Hill now. Two ranges of ditches.
0:19:07 > 0:19:12- That's right.- An inner and outer. What age is that?- It's Iron Age.
0:19:12 > 0:19:15The inside one was probably used in Roman times.
0:19:15 > 0:19:17I see.
0:19:17 > 0:19:22The whole of the Avon Valley, which you can see here,
0:19:22 > 0:19:26there's archaeological sites in virtually every field.
0:19:26 > 0:19:29Although the...
0:19:29 > 0:19:34last phase that is recognisable is the Roman one,
0:19:34 > 0:19:39there is Iron Age and Bronze Age evidence underneath it.
0:19:39 > 0:19:45Have you been able to pick out ancient field boundaries?
0:19:45 > 0:19:49Here's one here. You can see it's a land division.
0:19:49 > 0:19:52- I see it.- It runs down there.
0:19:52 > 0:19:56How do you tell a modern boundary from an old boundary?
0:19:56 > 0:20:01They're usually out of phase with the hedges and fields of today.
0:20:01 > 0:20:08It means the landscape has changed. It's evidence of an earlier landscape organised on different lines.
0:20:08 > 0:20:12There's a possible Roman fort underneath.
0:20:12 > 0:20:14It's a soil mark.
0:20:14 > 0:20:19- There it is - on the right, in that field.- I see it.
0:20:19 > 0:20:24And that will just be patterns of wet and dry on the soil?
0:20:24 > 0:20:30That's right. There's even some internal features as well.
0:20:30 > 0:20:33Yes, I can see. That's right.
0:20:33 > 0:20:36At least one dividing wall.
0:20:37 > 0:20:43- That could be a find.- You haven't seen that before?- No.- Splendid.
0:20:43 > 0:20:48Even I could see that the Roman fort sat at diagonals to the fields.
0:20:48 > 0:20:54Now I knew what Jim meant by older patterns "out of phase" with the modern landscapes.
0:20:54 > 0:20:59But did anything of these ancient patterns survive ABOVE ground?
0:20:59 > 0:21:05What about roads like that Cheltenham Road mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon charter?
0:21:05 > 0:21:11I could see that it cut a diagonal clean at odds with the Anglo-Saxon fields in Bredon.
0:21:11 > 0:21:14I decided to investigate.
0:21:14 > 0:21:19Could the Cheltenham Road be a survivor from an earlier landscape?
0:21:19 > 0:21:24There's a way to find out, because Jim Pickering and his aviators
0:21:24 > 0:21:29discovered masses of archaeological sites alongside this road.
0:21:29 > 0:21:34And at Kemerton, archaeologists have been investigating them for a generation.
0:21:34 > 0:21:41So maybe they can tell us whether they've discovered traces of an earlier landscape showing through,
0:21:41 > 0:21:45and perhaps they include this road.
0:21:47 > 0:21:54At Kemerton, on Bredon Hill, I found archaeologist Robin Jackson starting work on a new site.
0:21:54 > 0:22:01We were right in those Anglo-Saxon fields that Cheltenham Road cuts so sharply through.
0:22:01 > 0:22:06Up here we have Bredon Hill and this is the bottom half of the parish.
0:22:06 > 0:22:11The boundaries are here and the Carrant is running at the bottom.
0:22:11 > 0:22:15- So Kemerton parish runs from top to bottom?- That's right.
0:22:15 > 0:22:19My interest is in the prehistoric landscape.
0:22:19 > 0:22:22- Is that right?- That's right.
0:22:22 > 0:22:28And if you look at these streams, they're following roughly the Saxon boundaries.
0:22:28 > 0:22:33But these are the marks of prehistoric field systems.
0:22:33 > 0:22:37Where we have pairs of them, they're probably droveways.
0:22:37 > 0:22:43- The ancient landscape is running counter in its grain to the Anglo-Saxon...- Yeah.
0:22:43 > 0:22:48It's an incredibly ancient pattern hiding behind our modern fields.
0:22:48 > 0:22:55- Is there anything left of this ancient landscape? - At first you think there won't be,
0:22:55 > 0:23:00but when you start to overlay these maps, there are intriguing lines.
0:23:00 > 0:23:07We're in the corner of this field. The path runs diagonally across the field.
0:23:07 > 0:23:12- It's in totally the wrong direction. - So there are traces still.
0:23:12 > 0:23:17And perhaps most interestingly of all is the Cheltenham Road.
0:23:17 > 0:23:21It's actually on that alignment.
0:23:21 > 0:23:28This, we know, is a saltway. They moved it from Droitwich, where they produced salt in prehistoric times.
0:23:28 > 0:23:35From one of our excavations we've had Droitwich salt containers to show that they're moving it down the road.
0:23:35 > 0:23:39So it's an ancient pattern hiding behind our modern system.
0:23:39 > 0:23:43But Cheltenham Road is a survivor,
0:23:43 > 0:23:48one of a sturdy band observing an ancient, perhaps Iron Age alignment,
0:23:48 > 0:23:51obliterated by the Anglo-Saxons.
0:23:51 > 0:23:55So how far back do the roots of this landscape go?
0:23:55 > 0:24:00Results were coming in from field walkers on Robin's new site.
0:24:00 > 0:24:07They were systematically scouring the field for ancient objects brought to the surface.
0:24:07 > 0:24:12The field walkers are bringing in their stuff in the form of flint.
0:24:12 > 0:24:17We have one piece which may have been used, which is this fine blade.
0:24:17 > 0:24:21If I was to put a date on it, I'd say it was Neolithic.
0:24:21 > 0:24:25That has a sharp cutting edge.
0:24:25 > 0:24:27How long ago is Neolithic?
0:24:27 > 0:24:33We're talking about 3,500-4,000 BC.
0:24:33 > 0:24:36So 5-6,000 years.
0:24:37 > 0:24:40On my last afternoon,
0:24:40 > 0:24:46I was faced with the thought that people had been living here for 6,000 years or more.
0:24:46 > 0:24:51But when did they first leave any lasting mark on the landscape?
0:24:51 > 0:24:54Liz Pearson is a soil specialist.
0:24:54 > 0:25:01She was working down at the Carrant Brook we'd found in the Anglo-Saxon charter,
0:25:01 > 0:25:09looking for organic remains and alluvium - old river silt - now buried deep underground.
0:25:09 > 0:25:16They date back thousands of years BC. But did they reveal anything changing in the landscape then?
0:25:18 > 0:25:20It's nice and stiff.
0:25:20 > 0:25:25So even if we don't get any organics, you have a nice alluvia sequence.
0:25:25 > 0:25:29What can you tell from the alluvia sequence?
0:25:29 > 0:25:36Well, you can get a lot of information on what's been going on in the environment around -
0:25:36 > 0:25:43the ploughing, the woodland clearances. It's exposing the soil to the rain.
0:25:43 > 0:25:48It's bringing all this silt down into the valleys.
0:25:48 > 0:25:51Then you get boggy areas appearing.
0:25:51 > 0:25:55What date would you think the forest clearance began?
0:25:55 > 0:26:00The main big clearance in this area is the early Bronze Age.
0:26:00 > 0:26:05We know that it was already cleared by 2,500 BC.
0:26:05 > 0:26:10So what do you think this landscape would have looked like then?
0:26:10 > 0:26:13What would we have seen?
0:26:13 > 0:26:17It would have been as open as it is here today.
0:26:17 > 0:26:21By that time, they had cleared most of the original wild wood.
0:26:21 > 0:26:29So you have evidence that from 4,500 years ago, human beings have been changing this landscape?
0:26:29 > 0:26:32- Yes.- In a big way. - In a very big way.
0:26:34 > 0:26:374,500 years ago, during the Bronze Age,
0:26:37 > 0:26:44the felling of trees and the start of ploughing sent soil streaming down the slopes.
0:26:44 > 0:26:48It eroded the hills and raised the level of the valley floor.
0:26:48 > 0:26:54It was a landscape revolution as profound as that of the Anglo-Saxons'
0:26:54 > 0:26:58or our agricultural revolution thousands of years later.
0:27:04 > 0:27:11Before I left, I climbed up Bredon Hill to the Iron Age hill fort I'd seen from the plane.
0:27:11 > 0:27:19I remembered wondering if modern farming had ploughed away every trace of history in the fields.
0:27:19 > 0:27:25It was amazing to discover that this landscape is still shaped by agricultural revolutions
0:27:25 > 0:27:28that stretch over 50 centuries,
0:27:28 > 0:27:35and that the fields and villages were first set out perhaps to supply the men who fought the Vikings
0:27:35 > 0:27:381,000 years ago.
0:27:38 > 0:27:43A week ago, I was standing on the steep slope of the Cotswolds there,
0:27:43 > 0:27:50looking out across this wonderful 20th-century landscape, which I now see through different eyes,
0:27:50 > 0:27:54because I realise this is in fact an Anglo-Saxon landscape.
0:27:54 > 0:28:00The pattern of the land was set 1,000 years ago, when the villages were formed.
0:28:00 > 0:28:05There are hedgerows running down this hill which are 1,000 years old.
0:28:05 > 0:28:11There are tracks and roadways of Roman and pre-Roman times.
0:28:11 > 0:28:17And even before that, people began clearing the trees, altering the land.
0:28:17 > 0:28:21The making of this landscape began 5,000 years ago.
0:28:36 > 0:28:41Subtitles by Graeme Dibble BBC Scotland - 2001
0:28:41 > 0:28:45E-mail us at subtitling@bbc.co.uk