Turbary is the ancient right to cut

turf Sod, also known as turf, is the upper layer of soil with the grass growing on it that is often harvested into rolls. In Australian and British English, sod is more commonly known as ''turf'', and the word "sod" is limited mainly to agricultu ...

, or peat, for fuel on a particular area of bog. The word may also be used to describe the associated piece of bog or peatland and, by extension, the material extracted from the turbary. Turbary rights, which are more fully expressed legally as ''common of turbary'', are often associated with

commonage Common land is land owned by a person or collectively by a number of persons, over which other persons have certain common rights, such as to allow their livestock to graze upon it, to collect wood, or to cut turf for fuel. A person who has a r ...

, or, in some cases, rights over another person's land. Turbary was not always an unpaid right (

easement An easement is a nonpossessory right to use and/or enter onto the real property of another without possessing it. It is "best typified in the right of way which one landowner, A, may enjoy over the land of another, B". An easement is a property ...

), but, at least in Ireland, regulations governed the price that could be charged. Turf was widely used as fuel for

cooking Cooking, cookery, or culinary arts is the art, science and craft of using heat to prepare food for consumption. Cooking techniques and ingredients vary widely, from grilling food over an open fire to using electric stoves, to baking in vario ...

and domestic heating but also for commercial purposes such as evaporating

brine Brine is a high-concentration solution of salt (NaCl) in water (H2O). In diverse contexts, ''brine'' may refer to the salt solutions ranging from about 3.5% (a typical concentration of seawater, on the lower end of that of solutions used for b ...

to produce salt. The right to take peat was particularly important in areas where firewood was scarce. The right to collect firewood was protected by estovers. In the New Forest of southern England, a particular right of turbary belongs not to an individual person, dwelling or plot of land, but to a particular

hearth A hearth () is the place in a home where a fire is or was traditionally kept for home heating and for cooking, usually constituted by at least a horizontal hearthstone and often enclosed to varying degrees by any combination of reredos (a low, ...

and

chimney A chimney is an architectural ventilation structure made of masonry, clay or metal that isolates hot toxic exhaust gases or smoke produced by a boiler, stove, furnace, incinerator, or fireplace from human living areas. Chimneys are t ...

Ecology

In more recent times, as the ecological significance of the bog lands has been better understood, and as the amount of remaining peat has been decreasing, partly due to fuel usage and partly due to usage of peat as fertiliser, as well as agricultural incursions into drained bog lands, some of the remaining bogs have come under environmental protection. This has created controversy over the rights of turbary, and in some cases extinguished the right.

Geography

Geographic regions of turbary works in Europe include the Netherlands, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, and The Broads in Norfolk and Suffolk, England, and the Audomarois marshlands near Saint-Omer, France The term is also used in colloquial language by older generations in Ireland, in places such as County Clare, to refer to the area where turf is cut, or to the material extracted.

Etymology

The word is derived from Anglo-French ''turberie'' and Low German, ''turf''. Compare Sanskrit ''darbhá'', meaning tuft of grass.Entries for ''turbary'' and ''turf''. ''The Oxford English Dictionary,'' Second Edition. Clarendon Press, 1989. .

Places

Turbary Park in

Bournemouth Bournemouth () is a coastal resort town in the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council area of Dorset, England. At the 2011 census, the town had a population of 183,491, making it the largest town in Dorset. It is situated on the Englis ...

, Dorset has a name derived from the term.

References

{{Wetlands Common law Legal terminology Property law English forest law Wetlands Peat mining