Origins Of Burley Two

After the dis-establishment of the monasteries in the 16th Century the Abbey's lands passed through various hands until by 1671 the area embracing present-day Headingley and Burley had passed to Francis Brudenell, son of the second Earl of Cardigan: their names live on today in the names of local streets and amenities.

A map of 1711 shows an area called 'Burley Green', near to the location of the present village green. Running past Burley Green a road from Leeds passed up Burley Hill - another name already in use then - through the surrounding farmland to Kirkstall and beyond.

In 1752 this road became the 'Burley Road Turnpike'. Travellers paying the princely sum of 6d. (six old pence) to the toll-keeper could travel to Kirkstall, Otley and Bradford: this was the only road from Leeds to such far-flung places then. The profits from the tolls went towards the upkeep of the road.

At least, that was the theory. In practice, during the 19th Century, the turnpikes became ill-maintained and, owing to their exorbitant cost, discredited, and were replaced by public roads. But the line of the road, and the toll-house itself, still remain.

Was Burley Village first built because the turnpike passed nearby, so people could live there and travel to work elsewhere? The date of its first construction certainly coincides with the opening of the road. Or was the village linked with the opening of nearby quarries for stone for roads and, later, railways? Some of the sites of the quarries can still be identified by areas where landfall has created open spaces between houses (such as the patch of grass opposite the corner shop on St Michael's Lane)? Or did the Village indeed provide homes for servants for The Grange'?

An entrance to Burley Village

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