An investigation into the eighteenth-century land surveyors of Essex and an analysis of the Estate maps they produced.

Michallat, Caroleen (2026) An investigation into the eighteenth-century land surveyors of Essex and an analysis of the Estate maps they produced. Doctoral thesis, University of East Anglia.

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Abstract

This investigation examines the value of old estate maps, in today’s world when modern technology can be employed to seemingly answer the questions we have about the past history of an area of land. Asking how the land was used, changes made to boundaries and the sources of water. The focus of this investigation has been on the two parties to a land survey, the landowner and the independent surveyor chosen to make the survey.

In 1947 the Essex Record Office published a Catalogue of the maps held in its collection. This investigation has shown that by publishing the Catalogue they brought maps, particularly estate maps to public attention. The Catalogue describes each estate map and, where known, gives the name of the surveyor that drew the map and the landowner that commissioned the survey. In 1952 and 1968 the Catalogue was brought up to date with the publication of two supplements. Essex remained the only county to publish in such detail its collection of maps, and to make them available for inspection and study. In 1990 Essex Record Office published a work Essex on the Map seen as a continuation to the Catalogue but with a focus on the estate maps drawn in the eighteenth century that represent the lands of private estates in Essex. The author of this work included what he was able to discover about the background of each surveyor, and the alternative occupations that many of them had. Thus, suggesting that estate land surveying was not always seen as a full-time occupation.

In 1997 the Dictionary of Land Surveyors was published, the focus of this work, as its title suggests was the Land surveyors and Local Map Makers of Great Britian and Ireland 1530 – 1850. The Dictionary aimed to include all persons likely to have measured or made land in areas of less than a complete county. It was realised that the format of the entries makes no distinction between the commissioned surveyor who took full financial responsibility for the survey of a private estate and who treated the work as a business and any assistant surveyor whose only responsibility was to fulfil the task he had been assigned.

This investigation makes the claim that the Dictionary requires a separate index that gives direct access to the names of the surveyors commissioned to make an estate survey. These are the surveyors who accepted all the responsibilities of such a survey. The significance of the Catalogue is that it draws attention to the fact that landed estates are lands that are privately owned, the landowner being a private person who commissioned and financed any survey. Therefore, any communication and instruction between landowner and surveyor is estate property. However, with the aid of the data set out in the Dictionary and the naming of the sources and persons that have supplied the information used to compile each entry the problem of the privacy of the records has been overcome. The Dictionary gives us access to what in the past were private documents, the consequence being we now can follow the process by which private surveys were made. In addition, estate papers, other estate records, and of course the maps themselves now in the public domain, can be scrutinised to extract any information found that indicates the skills required by a commissioned surveyor, skills that set him apart from any surveyor hired only to complete a specific task. The skills he has that support the claim for a separate index of commissioned surveyors. An index that would also include his biographical details that would assist in the analysis of his maps. The maps indicating cartographic development, the inclusion of new ideas, new ways in which features can be represented on a map. The influence of a surveyors alternative occupations might also be found in his maps has been discussed.

The importance of a surveyors biography has been discussed as it suggests contacts with other surveyors, possibly through his alternative occupations. The contribution of this investigation is that it gives an insight into the work of a commissioned estate surveyor. An analysis of his maps indicates cartographic development; the influence of a surveyor’s work on other mapmakers and the influence of their work on him. This investigation has shown that estate maps as stand-alone items still have a relevance and importance in modern times and that careful scrutiny of the maps can yield information about the land they represent that cannot be discovered by the use of modern technology.

Item Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities > School of History
Depositing User:	Bethany Turner
Date Deposited:	29 Sep 2026 11:49
Last Modified:	29 Sep 2026 11:49
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/104653
DOI:

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