Post-medieval pillow mounds at The Warren, Epping Forest (EHER 81442)

A group of fourteen post-medieval pillow mounds are visible as earthworks on 2023 0.25m lidar data (commissioned by City of London Corporation). The features were mapped as part of the 2024-2025 Epping Forest Aerial and Investigation Project carried out by Historic England.

2024-2025. Epping Forest Aerial Investigation and Mapping Project. A group of fourteen post-medieval pillow mounds are visible as earthworks on 2023 0.25m Lidar data (commissioned by City of London Corporation). The group is situated within a former part of the Copped Hall estate known as The Warren. The former boundary of the estate can still be traced and still forms the boundary of the current Warren plantation (EHER 81421). The mounds range between 15m and 100m in length and between 5m and 6m in width. Nine of the mounds are aligned ENE/WSW, three NW/SE and two NE/SW. Each mound also has a surrounding ditch. The pillow mounds were likely created before the area saw dense tree plantation. Research carried out as part of the 2018 Copped Hall Park Management Plan (PMP) <3> found that the oldest surviving trees within The Warren were planted during the late 18th or early 19th century. Subsequent ground visits have also found trees growing out of pillow mounds to be a common occurrence, with features also truncated by later rides, routeways and field boundaries across the area. These features are also likely to have been part of wider-scale rabbit farming across the estate. <3> references a 1677 document from the Sackville Collection detailing the amount of ‘coneys at Copthall Warren’ which lists ‘forty-seven and a half dozen’ across the estate, far more than currently survive within The Warren. The pillow mounds were mapped as part of the 2024-2025 Epping Forest Aerial and Investigation Project carried out by Historic England. <1> <2> <3>