Cheselbourne

Cheselbourne

Parish Church of St Martin
Cheselbourne
 Cheselbourne shown within Dorset
Population 296 [1]
OS grid referenceSY763997
DistrictWest Dorset
Shire countyDorset
RegionSouth West
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Police Dorset
Fire Dorset
Ambulance South Western
EU Parliament South West England
List of places
UK
England
Dorset

Coordinates: 50°47′48″N 2°20′17″W / 50.7966°N 2.338°W

Cheselbourne (sometimes spelled Chesilborne[2] or Cheselborne) is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England, situated in the Dorset Downs, 7 miles (11 km) north-east of Dorchester. The parish is at an altitude of 75 to 245 metres (approximately 250 to 800 feet) and covers an area of 1,175 hectares (2,900 acres); the underlying geology is chalk.[3] In the 2011 census the parish had a population of 296.[1]

The village, which contains a mix of buildings of different ages and styles, is spread along four lanes which meet here. It has a public house called the Rivers Arms. The 13th- to 14th-century parish church has a pinnacled tower with battlements and numerous gargoyles.[4]

In 1086 in the Domesday Book Cheselbourne was recorded as Ceseburne;[5] it had 36 households, 10 acres (4.0 ha) of meadow and one mill. it was in the hundred of Hilton and the lord and tenant-in-chief was Shaftesbury Abbey.[6]

Cheselbourne used to be the site of a tradition known as 'Treading in the Wheat', in which young women from the village would walk the fields on Palm Sunday, dressed in white.[4]

At Lyscombe Farm in the northwest of the parish are the remains of an early 13th-century chapel. The nave was once used as a bakehouse and then a farmworker's dwelling, then in 1957 a Dutch barn was built over the ruins.[4]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 "Area: Cheselbourne (Parish). Key Figures for 2011 Census: Key Statistics". Neighbourhood Statistics. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
  2. ↑ Ralph Wightman (1983). Portrait of Dorset (4 ed.). Robert Hale Ltd. pp. 107–8. ISBN 0 7090 0844 9.
  3. ↑ "'Cheselbourne', An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Dorset, Volume 3: Central (1970), pp. 73-79". British History Online. University of London & History of Parliament Trust. November 2013. Retrieved 8 June 2014.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Roland Gant (1980). Dorset Villages. Robert Hale Ltd. pp. 88–9. ISBN 0 7091 8135 3.
  5. ↑ "Dorset A-G". The Domesday Book Online. domesdaybook.co.uk. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  6. ↑ "Place: Cheselbourne". Open Domesday. domesdaymap.co.uk. Retrieved 27 February 2015.

External links

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