Agister (New Forest)

In the New Forest, an agister (/ˈadʒɪstə/) is a local official whose role is to assist the verderers with their duty to manage the free-roaming animals that the New Forest commoners are allowed to release onto the forest.^[1] Several thousand semi-wild ponies run free, along with several thousand cattle and smaller numbers of donkeys, sheep and (in autumn) pigs.^[2] These are owned by the commoners who pay an annual grazing fee known as the ‘marking fee’.^[1] There are currently five New Forest agisters employed by the Court of Verderers, each with responsibility for a specific forest area.^[1]

The post of agister is medieval in origin, the name deriving from the word ‘agist’ meaning 'to take in to graze for payment'.^[1] Originally agisters were known as ‘marksmen’, from their role in collecting the marking fees – a role which they still have today.^[1]

Agisters spend much of their time out on the forest, often on horseback, checking the condition of the land and of the commoners’ ponies and other stock.^[1] They are on call 24 hours a day to deal with problems such as stuck, straying or injured animals.^[1] They also watch out for breaches of the verderers’ bylaws and for the presence on the forest of unauthorised animals.^[1][3]

Each year between mid August and early November the agisters organise regular ‘pony drifts’, in which the commoners gather in their ponies for an annual welfare check. Rounded-up ponies are recorded and checked by the agisters against the marking fees paid by their owners.^[4] Any pony that the owner wishes to sell or to take in for the winter can be removed from the forest at this point.^[4] The remaining ponies have their tails clipped in a distinctive manner to identify those normally living in a particular agister’s area, and they are turned back out for another twelve months.^[4]