rodeland

1) A regional word for land cleared of trees.

First encountered in an undated thirteenth-century document: ‘that parcel of land called rodeland’, Thurstonland. The term was used in the Wakefield area to distinguish between ancient town arable and land that had been assarted: it was a type of land and I have found no evidence to link it with place-names, unlike ‘royd’ and ‘ridding’ with which it shares much of its meaning: 1307 ‘it is called rodeland because it was cleared from growing wood’, Alverthorpe

1339 ‘John de Bouderode gave 40d to the lord for … an inquiry as to whether the land which he holds is from the ancient bovates or rodeland’, Ossett. The dialect spelling ‘roydland’ is on record from the early fifteenth century: 1402 ‘one acre of meadow called Roideland’, Methley

1515 ‘half a bovate of land, four acres of land de Roidelande’, Hipperholme.

spellings roydland
dates 1200-1299 1307 1339 1402 1515

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