Begbroke

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Begbroke is a village and civil parish in the Cherwell district of Oxfordshire, England. It is a few miles north of Oxford on the A44, near Woodstock, Kidlington and Oxford Airport. The 2001 census recorded a population of 792.

Begbroke is home to the 17th century Royal Sun Inn, the 12th century Norman church of St. Michael, St. Philip's Priory (formerly Begbroke House), Hall Farm, a Post Office, and a modern village hall with cricket and bowling greens. The former Begbroke Hill Farm, owned by the Giffard and FitzHerbert families for 500 years, now belongs to the University of Oxford and is known as Begbroke Business and Science Park. Land belonging to the farm is slated for an upmarket residential development. Orchard House, next to the church, also belonged to the FitzHerberts and, more recently, was home to science fiction author Brian Aldiss (his short story Supertoys Last All Summer Long became the Steven Spielberg film A.I.) Begbroke Place became the home of St. Juliana's Convent School for Girls, which closed in 1984. Commuter homes were built in the village beginning in the 1930s, mainly on the east side of the Oxford-Woodstock Road. Begbroke is also the headquarters of Solid State Logic, the world's largest manufacturer of professional analogue and digital audio consoles for music, broadcast, post production and film.

The name "Begbroke" is Anglo-Saxon for "Little Brook" and refers to Rowel Brook, a protected watercourse that runs through the village and was also the reason for its early settlement. Rowel Brook is a tributary of the River Cherwell.

Fragments of early pottery have been found here, as well as flints, scrapers, and an axe and arrow head. Aerial photographs show ancient crop marks.

Begbroke Wood is home to muntjac deer that escaped from nearby Blenheim Park. The village has footpaths leading to Bladon, where Sir Winston Churchill is buried at St. Martin's Church, and Kidlington.