In an age when building developments seem to be advancing on every small plot of unspoilt countryside, it seems hard to imagine times when well-established settlements were declining and dying. Such times certainly did exist, and thousands of villages have perished. In fact, deserted settlement sites are all around us, and most British people will live within very few miles of an example. Empty houses only stand at the relatively recent settlements, like failed quarry villages. Elsewhere, hollows in the pasture marking former lanes and level platforms where dwellings once stood are more normal. In several of the more evocative cases, a ruined church presides over the site. Villages are not symbols of timeless stability as we are led to believe, and exist only for so long as they have a role to play. All the evidence suggests that villages can be lost and that a period of widespread abandonment might well return. This accessible, illustrated history and guide from Britain`s leading popular author on landscape history explores the contributing factors behind the desertion of our villages, and offers the reader practical advice for investigating lost villages in their locality.