Romney Marsh is a sparsely inhabited marsh location in the counties of Kent as well as East Sussex in the south-east of England. It covers concerning 100 square miles (260 km2). An electoral ward in the exact same name exists. This ward had a population of 2,358 at the 2011 census. The Romney Marsh has actually been slowly built up over the centuries. The most substantial function of the Marsh is the Rhee Wall (Rhee is a word for river), developing a popular ridge. This function was expanded as a waterway in 3 stages from Appledore to New Romney in the 13th century. Sluices controlled the flow of water, which was after that launched to flush silt from the harbour at New Romney. Eventually, the battle was lost; the harbour silted up as well as New Romney declined in importance. The Rhee kept part of the old port open until the 15th century. The wall surface at Dymchurch was developed around the exact same time; tornados had breached the tile obstacle, which had shielded it until that time. It is a common misunderstanding that both these frameworks were developed by the Romans. In 1250 as well as in the adhering to years, a collection of violent storms appeared the seaside roof shingles banks, flooding substantial locations and also returning it to marsh, and also destroying the harbour at New Romney. In 1287 water destroyed the port town of Old Winchelsea (now located some 2 mi (3 km) out in Rye bay), which had actually been under threat from the sea given that at the very least 1236. Winchelsea, the 3rd largest port in England as well as a significant importer of wine, was transferred on higher land, with a harbour containing 82 wharfs. Those same storms, nevertheless, helped to accumulate much more shingle: such coastlines now ran along practically the entire seaward side of the marshland. By the 14th century, a lot of the Walland and Denge Marshes had actually been redeemed by "innings", the process of throwing up an embankment around the sea-marsh as well as making use of the low-tide to allow it run dry using one-way drains established right into the brand-new seawall, escaping right into a network of dykes called locally "sewage systems" in 1462, the Romney Marsh Corporation was established to mount drainage and sea protections for the marsh, which it continued to build right into the 16th century. By the 16th century, the program of the Rother had actually been altered to its channel today; most of the remainder of the location had actually currently been recovered from the sea. The shingle remains to be transferred. As a result, all the original Cinque Ports of the Marsh are currently far from the sea. Dungeness Point is still being contributed to: although (specifically near Dungeness as well as Hythe) an everyday procedure is in location to respond to the reshaping of the roof shingles banks, making use of watercrafts to dig up and also move the wandering tile. The Marsh ended up being the home of the Priory of Canterbury in the 9th century, that gave the initial occupancy on the land to a man called Baldwin, at some point between 1152 and also 1167, for "as much land as Baldwin himself can confine and also drain pipes versus the sea"; Baldwin's Sewage system (drainage ditch) stays being used. The marsh has because become covered by a dense network of water drainage ditches and once supported huge farming communities. These gutters are preserved as well as managed for lasting water levels by the Romney Marsh Area Internal Drainage Board. Romney Marsh adjoins the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, which is much less developed than numerous various other locations in Kent and Sussex. The decrease in sheep rates meant that also the local stock (sold around the globe for reproducing for over 2 centuries) came to be unsustainable. Turfing had constantly been a lower practice because of the meadow maintained brief by the lamb reared upon it, but farms are increasing in dimension to make up for the decrease in sustainable livestock farming. Some sight this as unsustainable due to the damages to soil ecology of the Marsh. The only various other choice, considering that 1946, has actually been for farmers to resort to arable farming, altering the landscape from a patchwork of small family members farms to a few comprehensive cultivatable production devices.