Editing Ashdown Forest (section)

===Brief history===
<!--  [[File:AshdownForest1.jpg|thumb|right|Various trees in Ashdown Forest]] -->
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Ashdown Forest came into existence as a Norman deer hunting forest in the period following the [[Norman Conquest]] of 1066.

At the highest points of the Ashdown Forest are the remains of several Barrow Mounds dated by the University of Sussex to the late Iron Age. At the nearby Pippingford Army Training Area there is a large hilltop settlement mound that is a Class A Listed Protection Ancient Monument site. The site includes Iron Age stock and hunting enclosures with recent finds of leaf-cut flint arrow heads dated to the middle Bronze Age period now on display in the East Grinstead Museum. (2013). The Hilltop hunting settlement is thought to have been constructed by the local Wealden Chieftain named Crugh who was gifted lands by his High Wealden Chieftain Uncle who lived at Marks Cross in East Sussex.<ref>The Conservator's of Ashdown Forest Newsletter 1987.</ref>

Prior to the conquest, Ashdown seems simply to have been an unnamed part of the vast, sparsely populated, and in places dense and impenetrable woodland known to the Anglo-Saxons as ''Andredes weald'' ("the forest of Andred"), from which the present-day [[Weald]] derives its name. The Weald, of which Ashdown Forest is the largest remaining part, stretched for {{convert|30|mi|km}} between the chalk escarpments of the [[North Downs|North]] and [[South Downs]] and for over {{convert|90|mi|km}} from east to west from Kent into Hampshire.<ref>Brandon (2003), Chapters 2 and 6. Note that the Saxon prefix ''Andredes'' was probably derived from ''Anderida'', the name of the Romans' stronghold at [[Pevensey]].</ref>

Ashdown Forest is not mentioned in the [[Domesday Book]] of 1086 but, as part of the forest of Pevensel, the sub-division of the Weald that the Normans created within the [[Rape (county subdivision)|Rape]] of [[Pevensey]], it had already been granted by William the Conqueror to his half-brother [[Robert, Count of Mortain]]. This rape was strategically and economically important, extending as it did inland northwards from the English Channel coast towards London, and was guarded, as was the case with the other six Sussex rapes, by a castle. It was awarded to Robert, along with several hundred manors across England, in recognition of his support for William during the [[Norman conquest of England]]. Two important conditions applied to a forest like Pevensel: the king could keep and hunt deer there, while the commoners – tenant farmers who had smallholdings near the forest – could continue to graze their livestock there and cut wood for fuel and bracken for livestock bedding.

1095 – death of Robert de Mortain. Ashdown is then held by the lords of Pevensey Castle – a succession of high status members of the Norman and Plantagenet aristocracy, including several queens of England – for most of the next 200 years.

1100–1130 – Ashdown Forest is first referred to by name when Henry I confirms that monks can continue to use a road across the forest of "Essendone". The monks' claim that they have held the right since the Conquest implies the area was known by this name at least as far back as then.<ref>Small (1988), p. 156.</ref>

1268 – in the reign of [[Henry III of England|Henry III]], Ashdown Forest is vested in the Crown in perpetuity. The forest was subsequently used for deer hunting by [[Edward II of England|Edward II]], who built a hunting lodge near Nutley that was later to be used by John of Gaunt.

1282 – first documentary references to the forest pales appear in accounts prepared by a ranger recording the costs of timber that have been cut;<ref>Victoria County History of Sussex, Volume II, p. 315.</ref>

1372 – [[Edward III of England|Edward III]] grants the "Free-chase of Ashdon" to his third son, [[John of Gaunt]], Duke of Lancaster.<ref>{{cite web|title=Plea Rolls of the Court of Common Pleas; National Archives; CP 40/541, year: 1396|url=http://aalt.law.uh.edu/AALT6/R2/CP40no541a/bCP40no541adorses/IMG_0151.htm|quotation=entries 4 & 5, asserting his hunting rights|website=Aalt.law.uh.edu|access-date=16 December 2017}}</ref>  It becomes known as Lancaster Great Park. The park then reverts to the Crown along with the rest of the Duchy of Lancaster after John of Gaunt's death in 1399. But for the next 300 years, until 1672, the forest is still referred to as ''Lancaster Great Park''.

1662 – Lancaster Great Park is ''disafforested'' by Charles II, giving free rein to the Earl of Bristol to make 'improvements'.

1693 – Ashdown Forest (the former Lancaster Great Park) is divided up, and it assumes its present-day shape. Just over half of it – in portions of widely varying sizes, but with the largest ones tending to be located towards the centre of the forest – is allotted for 'inclosure and improvement' by private interests. The rest is retained as common land for use by those local landowners and tenants who possess rights of common.

1881 – the commoners of Ashdown Forest reach a successful conclusion to their defence of a lawsuit brought by the Lord of the Manor which contested the nature and extent of their rights of common on the forest (known as the "Great Ashdown Forest Case").

1885 – the [[Commons Regulation (Ashdown Forest) Provisional Order Confirmation Act 1885]] introduces bye-laws to regulate and protect the forest, and a Board of Conservators is established.

1984 – a significant part of the forest was set a blaze by a local school boy, Anthony Martin. Eight fire engines were called to the scene and the fire was controlled.{{citation needed|date=May 2021}}

1988 – the freehold of the forest is acquired by East Sussex County Council from the executors of the Lord of the Manor, forestalling the possibility that the remaining common land of the forest would be broken up and sold off into private hands.