Pinfolds, sometimes known as pounds, are small enclosures where stray animals were fastened up.
“A hundred years ago, the pound was a familiar feature of the village scene, the place of confinement of a diversity of creatures, as need arose. Within living memory, though much reduced in numbers, and decayed in function, it was still a going concern. Today, it is by comparison a rarity, too often falling into ruin, its purpose forgotten. As a reminder of a way of life so different from our own, as well as for the wealth of history belonging to it as an institution, the pound, where it survives, should be preserved. Fortunately, there is some evidence of increasing concern, and here and there the Parish Council or a local group is undertaking restoration; but many more examples await rescue, and rescue must be prompt.
The word pound is of Saxon origin: pund, an enclosure; and so is its near relative: punfald, the modern pinfold. The south and west favour the former term, the north and east, the latter. It is becoming harder to find the constructions themselves, but you will find memories of them in many a Pinfold Street, Road and Lane in cities, towns and villages the length and breadth of England.
“There is no more ancient institution in our history than the village pound. Seizing another man’s property, taking distress, in recompense for a debt, or in order to force payment, is such an obvious remedy that it was doubtless adopted early in the development of settled communities.” (Sir Henry Maine, legal historian, in 1875).
From Willmott Dobbie, B.M.
Pounds or Pinfolds, and Lockups: beast and man in custody.
Bath University Press, 1979. The man (and it probably was a man!) in charge of the pound was a pinner, or pinder, and it was his job to round up strays. Owners had to pay him a fee to get their animals back. In feudal times the custodian of the pound was an official of the manor, appointed and sworn at the court leet, and responsible to the lord.
 The pinner received a small amount for every animal impounded, another, similar amount was payable to the lord of the manor. The office is, as it were, fossilized in a variety of surnames: Pinder, Pounder, Poynder, Ponder, and also in Pinfold, Penfold and Pinfield.
One cannot help reflecting here to the modern practice of clamping cars parked in the ‘wrong’ place. Most of these schemes are self-financing, the clampers obtaining their income from a proportion of the charge levied to release the vehicle to its owner. Presumably, there were similar emotions on the part of the owners of impounded cattle to those experienced nowadays by drivers who must pay to get their vehicles back!
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