Township (England)

The term township generally means the district or area associated with a town. However in some systems no town need be involved. Specific use of the term to describe political subdivisions has varied by country, usually to describe a local rural or semi-rural government within a county.

In England the township has been generally been made obsolete in its original form. Before the Industrial Revolution northern England was sparsely populated and had few and large Parishes. For example, Sheffield constituted a single parish, which had six townships in it Ecclesall Bierlow, Brightside Bierlow, Attercliffe cum Darnall, Nether Hallam, Upper Hallam, and Sheffield itself. In southern England, it was more common for a borough to be divided between multiple parishes.

Because of the distances involved the parishes were divided into Townships which were the basic unit of government. Townships were eventually generally split out as independent civil parishes, becoming irrelevant.

The use of the term township persisted, and townships have recently been revived as a name for subdivisions of boroughs in northern England. For example, the Metropolitan Borough of Rochdale has township committees [1], and the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan divides the borough into ten townships, which each have a township forum [2]. Wirral is divided into forty-four, for planning purposes [3].

The 'ship' in township in England is thought to mean 'cheap' or 'chepe', an old name for a market. There are townships in England known by names like Shipley, Skipton, Shepton. Many Lords of the Manor specifically created townships on their land, with market rights. The land and the people there were no longer under the jurisdiction of the manorial court. Townships were set up with an incorporated body to run the market and they were centered around the market place. The lord of the manor often taxed transactions in the market. He would also make money out of it from rents. Free men could live and trade in townships (i.e. men who were not the lord's servants, villeins or bonded labour - these still had to live on manorial land). Some townships were established right next to the castle or manor house, others near a river crossing or crossroads. Later on, many townships grew and swallowed up the manorial lands, but in others the market declined and went out of existence.