We featured well-known villages such as Harewood, Sledmere and Wentworth, all popular with visitors, as well as some lesser-known examples. The article was so popular that we have detailed several more below. Not all are still in the ownership of the original lords of the manor, and in some cases only a few estate properties remain, but all carry signs of their feudal pasts.
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1. Escrick
Well-known because the A19 between Selby and York passes straight through it, Escrick's story is an example of a landowning family having to sell the 'big house' as costs rose after the world wars, but retaining their farms. The Thompson family remodelled the village in the 18th century, moving the church, St Helen's, to its present location. It was later inherited by Beilby Lawley, who did not have a son, so the holdings passed in 1920 to the family of his daughter's husband, the Forbes-Adams. The village still has many traces of the Thompson and Lawley eras - they built a fine rectory and a dower house in the 1840s, a police station and court, almshouses and a social club. During World War One, Escrick Hall was used as an officers' hospital, and by the 1920s it was being let out as flats. In 1949, Queen Margaret's School moved into the village, originally occupying the rectory, dower house and hall, which they bought in 1972. The parsonage is now a hotel and the dower house is flats. The Forbes-Adam family still own farms, business units and a holiday park in the area. Photo: Jonathan Gawthorpe
2. Farndale
In the heart of the North York Moors National Park, Farndale is the 'daffofil dale' which attracts large numbers of visitors in spring. The estate was originally owned by the Lords Feversham of Duncombe Park in Helmsley, and the pub in the hamlet of Church Houses is named after them. In 1981, it was sold to housebuilder Sir Lawrence Barratt, of Barratt Homes, and it remains in his family. There is a large shoot and various agricultural assets, but also a number of properties that are rented out to tenants, holiday cottages - among them converted farm buildings, the vicarage and the schoolhouse - and a village shop, which the estate recently opened due to high demand. Photo: James Hardisty
3. Elsecar
Elsecar, near Barnsley, was built by the powerful Earls Fitzwilliam as an ''industrial estate village' for the miners and ironworkers who laboured at the collieries and foundry nearby. It was always different in character to the more rural Wentworth, where their servants and estate staff lived. They provided cottages, a lodging house for single miners that is now flats, a coaching inn, park, cricket club, church and school. The Fitzwilliams gradually sold their assets and by the 1980s the workshops were in the ownership of British Coal, who sold them. The site is now the Elsecar Heritage Centre. Photo: Simon Hulme
4. West Witton
A traditional Dales village between Hawes and Leyburn, the estate was once owned by Jervaulx Abbey. The monks' Cathedral Hall became a pub, The Fox and Hounds, in the 18th century. After confiscation by the Crown, it passed through various families until the estate was sold to the Lords Bolton in the 19th century. The Bolton Estates remain one of the major landowners in the Dales today. Photo: Simon Hulme