Landscape
The entire Weald was once heavily wooded and, even though the vast woodland that lay between the North Downs and South Downs, which was known to the Celtic Britons as Coit Andred, to the Romans as Silva Anderida, and to the Saxons first as Andredesleage and later Andredesweald, has been much reduced and fragmented as the result of human activity over the last 1,500 years, woodland remains at a much higher density in the High Weald than elsewhere.
At the time of the Domesday Book, 1086, the High Weald was the most wooded natural area in England. Today, 24.6% of the AONB is woodland, compared with a national average of about 9%. Of this, 17.6% is ancient woodland; in other words, over half the area's woodlands are ancient. The area of the High Weald AONB represents only 1% of England yet it has 3.4% of England's woodlands, making it one of the most densely wooded landscapes.
All this gives the High Weald a wooded appearance when viewed from a distance from a hilltop, but on closer inspection a close patchwork of small fields, hedges and woods connected by sunken lanes created by centuries of transhumance which patterns the rolling wooded ridges and valleys becomes apparent.
The unique Wealden landscape of small fields and scattered farmsteads was created by pioneer farmers of the late medieval period. The early settlements in this period were formed on the better warm soils, the drier ridge tops and the river valleys, the latter two being the main lines of communication.
The wooded relief and comparative inaccessibility historically provided the High Weald with a sense of enclosure and remoteness that can still be appreciated today, and which contrasts strongly with the more open nature of the surrounding Low Weald and the generally populous and urbanised nature of south-east England as a whole.
The highest sandstone hills of the High Weald are referred to as the Weald Forest Ridge. This ridge includes a number of ancient heathland forests, notably Ashdown Forest, St Leonards Forest, Worth Forest and Dallington Forest. Ancient woodland covers 22% of the Weald Forest Ridge (total woodland cover is 40%), which represents a significant proportion of the resource in the UK.
Read more about this topic: High Weald AONB
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
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Familiar to the stranger’s child;”
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