Village Walks in Britain Will you walk with me through our village, courteous reader? MARY RUSSELL MITFORD, OUR VILLAGE CONSULTANT EDITOR: ROGER SMITH BCA LONDON • NEW YORK • SYDNEY ■ TORONTO COVER PICTURE: Wendens Ambo, Essex. Title Page: Castle Combe, Wiltshire, in 1907. Contents Page: Castle Combe as it is today. authors: Geoff Allen, Malcolm Boyes, Hugh Dyer-Westacott, Leigh Hatts, George Keeping, Kevin Patrick, Brian Pearce, Ben Perkins, Don Philpott, Kev Reynolds, Mark Richards, Richard Sale, Roger Smith, Roland Smith, Colin Speakman, Clive Tully, Paddy Welsh. INTRODUCTORY features by Richard Cavendish typeset by Microset Graphics Ltd, Basingstoke, Hampshire. repro by Scantrans PTE Ltd, Singapore. printed and BOUND by Brepols, Turnhout, Belgium. Maps produced by Ordnance Survey and derived from the OS 1:10,000 Scale Map Series. Copyright © Crown Copyright 1991. Mapping specially designed by The Automobile Association and Ordnance Survey. Produced by the Publishing Division of The Automobile Association. Published and distributed in the United Kingdom by Ordnance Survey, Romsey Road, Maybush, Southampton, SO9 4DH, and the Publishing Division of The Automobile Association, Fanum House, Basingstoke, Hampshire, RG21 2EA. The contents of this publication are believed correct at the time of printing. Nevertheless, the Publishers cannot accept responsibility for errors or omissions, or for changes in details given. The Automobile Association 1991 Ordnance Survey 1991 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by an means - electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise - unless the written permission of the Publishers has been given beforehand. A CIP catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library. This edition published 1991 byBCA by arrangement with The Automobile Association. CN 1419 CONTENTS About This Book 4 the Evolution of the Village 5 - 7 VILLAGES: THEIR SHAPE AND APPEARANCE 8 - 11 VILLAGE SOCIETY 12-13 THE VILLAGE YEAR 14-16 LOCATION MAP 17 Symbols 18 the West country 19-76 South and South east England 77 -132 Central England and east Anglia 133 -172 THE NORTH COUNTRY 173 - 211 WALES 215-236 SCOTLAND 237-260 INDEX 261 - 264 A T B bout his ook All the routes in this book have been carefully researched and written by experienced walks authors, and every effort has been taken to ensure accuracy. However, villages and their surrounding lands are prone to change and features mentioned as landmarks may alter or disappear completely. The changing seasons also greatly affect the appearance of the walks and paths may become overgrown during the summer months. It is of great importance to note also, that some of the routes pass close to dangerous features in the landscape and need particular care if children are in the party. Wherever possible, such hazards are highlighted in the text. HOW THE BOOK WORKS OPENING TIMES The position of individual villages in relation to Opening times of places of interest in the villages the rest of Britain can be found on the location map or in their vicinity are given where applicable. on page 17. However, it is always advisable to check the cur­ All 165 villages in the book are divided into one rent details in advance to avoid disappointment. of six regions: The West Country; South and South East England; Central England and East Anglia; REFRESHMENTS The North Country; Wales; and Scotland. The villages within each region are arranged, where Where possible, brief details of where to find possible, in alphabetical order. Approximately a refreshments in the villages have been given. third of the villages are two pages long - the Inclusion in this book does not necessarily mean remaining two thirds are one page long. that an establishment is approved by The The book is arranged in a ring-binder to enable Automobile Association. walkers to remove a particular village and carry it on the walk with them. A plastic envelope is USEFUL ADDRESSES included for the purpose. Each walk comprises brief location details, an Several organisations concerned with the country­ introduction to the village, a map of the route, side and places of interest are referred to walk directions and points of interest (both keyed throughout the book and anyone wishing to learn in to the map), an information section, and more about them can do so by writing to the occasionally a short feature on a local character, following addresses. folk tale or speciality. Symbols and an explanation of how to use the Council for the Protection of Rural England maps are given on page 18. 4 Hobart Place, London, SW1W OHY Council for the Protection of Rural Wales TERRAIN Ty Gwyn, 31 High Street, Welshpool, SY21 7JP Countryside Commission fohn Dower House, The greater part of most of the walks lies on Crescent Place, Cheltenham, GL50 3RA surfaced roads and paths, but where difficult Countryside Commission for Scotland ground or obstacles occur, this has been noted for Battleby House, Redgorton, Perth, PHI 3EW the benefit of people in wheelchairs or for those English Heritage (EH) with young children and pushchairs. Fortress House, 23 Savile Row, London, W1X 1 AB Ancient Monuments in Wales are the PARKING responsibility of Cadw, Brunel House, 2 Fitzalan The walks in this book should have adequate Road, Cardiff, CF2 1UY parking space available within the village area, Ancient Monuments in Scotland are the usually in close proximity to the starting point. responsibility of the Scottish Development Office, However, where no distinct car park exists, 20 Brandon Street, Edinburgh, EH5 5DX walkers should park carefully and considerately National Trust (NT) where they can. Individual parking details are 36 Queen Anne's Gate, London, SW1H 9AS given in the information section of each walk. National Trust for Scotland (NTS) Please remember that it is an offence to park in 5 Charlotte Square, Edinburgh, EH2 4DU such a way that your car obstructs the highway, Nature Conservancy Council (NCC) and a landowner can sue for damages if a car park Northminster House, Peterborough, PEI 1UA is parked on his land without permission. Ramblers' Association Remember too, that whatever the time of day or 1/5 Wandsworth Road, London, SW8 2XX year, farm vehicles must always have clear access Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) to field entrances and tracks. The Lodge, Sandy, Bedfordshire, SGI 9 2DL 4 VILLAGE WALKS IN BRITAIN pending Christmas at Gloucester in S the year 1085, William the Conqueror 'held very deep speech with his council about this land - how it was peopled and T E he volution with what sort of men.' The outcome of this discussion, reported by the Anglo- Saxon Chronicle, was the painstaking V survey of England known today as of the illage Domesday Book. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was shocked that the king should lower himself to count every cow and pig in the country, but the results of the survey make it clear that the great majority of villages and hamlets in Britain were already in existence in 1086. People had lived together in small settlements for long before that. Skara Brae, a Stone Age fishing hamlet in the Orkneys, has been dated to about 3000bc. The stone houses were furnished with stone bedsteads and cupboards, and were linked by covered stone alleys. Ensconced under a huge mound of the inhabitants' own refuse, it developed into a snug, if smelly community. At Chysauster on the Land's End peninsula in Cornwall, it is still possible to walk along a diminutive village street of IOObc or so, with the remains of eight stone houses still standing up to 6ft high. The houses had inner courtyards, covered drains and small gardens. The villagers probably panned for tin in a nearby stream, and a hill fort a mile away provided a refuge in case of danger. THE COMING OF THE ENGLISH Small villages and hamlets like this continued to exist through Roman times and until the arrival, from the 5th century ad onwards, of the Anglo-Saxons. Groups of these newcomers settled at sites they found suitable, sometimes enslaving or driving out the British inhabitants. Later, Scandinavian immigrants moved into many of the eastern counties of England in the same way. Not that all country people lived in villages or hamlets by any means. There were plenty of separate, isolated farmsteads where a single farmer, with his family and slaves, hacked down trees, cleared thorns and brambles, and made a successful living. Most villages in England have English or Scandinavian names, but there are indications here and there of older, native Celtic settlements being taken over by the new arrivals. The remains of 'courtyard houses' (above) at the The village of Callington in Cornwall, Iron Age village of Chysauster Inset shows for instance, has a Saxon name, but it surviving remnants of an even earlier Bronze Age was earlier called Celliwic, meaning settlement in Wiltshire. 'village by the grove' in Old Cornish. windy headland above a sheltered fishing harbour, with huge prehistoric earth­ works protecting it against attack from the inland side. THE DESERTED VILLAGE Some villages failed. They were founded on marginal land, or some other natural disadvantage made them impossible to sustain. The Viking coast village of Jarlshof in the Shetlands was engulfed by sand in the Middle Ages and abandoned. A few villages were completely wiped out by the Black Death, which came from the Continent and first ravaged Britain in the 14th century. From Weymouth, in 1348, the disease spread rapidly over the next two years, wiping out almost half the population. For several centuries there were localised epidemics and national outbreaks, which again took their toll of village life. The fishing village of Stanhes, North Yorkshire Some villages were closed down later (abovel is a fine example of a settlement in the Middle Ages because their exploiting a natural feature in the coastline. The landlords could make better money by sheltered harbour provides a safe haven for the dispersing the inhabitants and using the fishing fleet. Wharram Percy (left) on the other hand, failed to thrive and although extensive fields for pasturing sheep. There was a excavations of the site revealed several phases of village called Bittesby, for instance, near rebuilding since its Saxon origins, the village Lutterworth in Leicestershire, where in suffered badly during the Black Death in 1350, 1494 the 60 inhabitants were turned out of and was finally abandoned in the 15th century. their homes by the Earl of Shrewsbury to make room for sheep. The same CASTLE AND COAST phenomenon recurred in Scotland in the Closeness to a stronghold was always an 19th century. In 1943 the Dorset village of advantage. In the Middle Ages Tyneham was handed over to the Army settlements sprouted near to castles, as an artillery practice ground. The empty themselves sited for geographical reasons. Salisbury Plain village of Imber is used The village would supply food and only for battle training. services to the garrison. At Dirleton in Here and there across the country Lothian, Scotland, for example, a ruined strange humps and bumps in the ground fortress with a grim and bloody history may be all that is left of what was once a looms above an idyllically peaceful village with people and houses and BY STREAM AND FORD village. At Rockingham in Northampton­ streets, and lives being lived. Lost villages Villages are sited where they are, in most shire a castle which goes all the way back like this lie away from the roads, which cases, because of some geographical to William the Conqueror stands on a hill, no longer serve them, along cart tracks or advantage. They are the product of the on guard above the cottages of the village green lanes. accumulated tria Land-error experience of below. At Manorbier in Dyfed, Wales, the A ruined church and some mounds in many generations, hence they tend to village grew up on the landward side of the fields are all that remains of Wharram cluster in river valleys, making use of the another Norman castle, which protected it Percy in North Yorkshire. It is in the care rich soil and shelter from the elements. against attack from the sea. of English Heritage and archaeological Needing well-drained ground and plenty All along the coast, fishing villages excavations have revealed its buried of fresh water, they were often sited close established themselves at points where a houses and farms, manor house and to a spring, which became the communal harbour or a sheltered bay offered calm village green, mill and fishponds. It was well. water for the boats. At Clovelly in North abandoned in the 15th century. Villages also grew up at fords, as at Devon, where the houses tumble down Kersey in Suffolk, where cars descending the cliff like a cascade, the squire built a THE MODEL VILLAGE the main street today must still splash solid stone quay to improve the moorings If some villages were destroyed by their through the stream at the bottom of the in the 16th century. In Sussex, Bosham landlords, others were created out of hill, scattering the resident ducks. At stands on a minor peninsular (the 'ham' whole cloth. At Edensor in Derbyshire in Christian Malford in Wiltshire, the ford in its name) jutting out into Chichester the 1830s, the Duke of Devonshire across the Avon was so dangerous and Harbour. In Wales, Aberdyfi shelters in became irritated by the sight of the village the scene of so many drownings that it the Dyfi estuary, shielded from Cardigan across his stately park - it was spoiling was marked by a cross, or 'Christ sign', Bay. Over on the Humberside coast, the his view. He consequently had it removed cristelmael (hence the village's name). village of Flamborough stands on a high, and substituted a new, unobtrusive one. 6 VILLAGE WALKS IN BRITAIN Milton Abbas, Wiltshire, was demolished by the Wales and Cornwall many Village names were also landowner as an interruption to his view. A more Celtic names have subject to changes. 'model' village was erected a mile away in a survived. Wendens Ambo, in Essex, wooded valley (above, right). Lanark (above) takes Some village names, such lies in a shady vale by a the idea of the model village a step further to the as 'Allen', which occurs in winding stream, which creation of the purpose-built industrial settlement, Allendale and Alnmouth, gives rise to the first half of in direct contrast to the rural village. belong to a language so old its name, from the Old This had comfortable houses and all that we do not know what it English verb Windan, 'to modern conveniences, plus a fine church was called, or who spoke it, wind'. Ambo is a 17th- designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott, who a tongue that is simply century addition, a Latin also rebuilt the Staffordshire village of referred to as 'Pre-Celtic'. word meaning 'both', Ilam for Jesse Watts-Russell of Ilam Hall. Most village names referring to what had Other villages, if not built completely seem to be related to previously been two anew, were extensively reconstructed by features of the land­ separate parishes, improving landlords. Old Warden in scape. The existence Great and Little Bedfordshire, for example, is mainly a of a spring, or well, Wenden. picturesquely rustic creation of the 19th inspired names like Burwell New placenames have century. In Scotland, the village of in Lincolnshire and the two been coined right up to the Kenmure in Tayside was rebuilt in Amwells in Hertfordshire, present day and some gracious 18th-century style by its while settlement by a lake, names are distinctly odd. Campbell lord, the Earl of Breadalbane, of or mere, accounts for the name of There is a Welsh village in Clwyd called nearby Balloch Castle. One of his Grasmere in Cumbria. Brentwood, in Sodom, and another called Babel. Baldock successors added picturesque Victorian Essex, means 'the burnt wood'. Another in Hertfordshire was eccentrically named cottages. Such are the tricks of time and reference to clearing land by burning after Baghdad (Baldac in Old French) by fortune that the castle had eventually to survives in the name of Brindley in the Knights Templar, who owned it in the be pulled down, while the village still Cheshire, 'the burnt clearing'. Middle Ages. Westward Ho! in North flourishes. Names ending in -ley (or -le, -leigh, -ly) Devon was named after a Victorian generally come from an Old English term adventure novel by Charles Kingsley. PLACES AND NAMES for a clearing in a wood. Names which Some wonderfully poetic and magical The meaning of a placename is almost end in -ton, -ham, -worth and often -wich names were created in medieval times by always a matter of guesswork. The main are frequently descended from Old adding the name of the landowner to that fact about village names in England is English words for a house, a village, a of the village, thereby distinguishing that they are in origin overwhelmingly farm, a hamlet. In Norse areas the between, say, Swaffham Prior and English or Norse. This reflects the equivalents are placenames ending in -by Swaffham Bulbeck, two villages a mile occupation of England by the Anglo- or -thorp. apart in Cambridgeshire. Medieval clerks Saxons and the later settlement of much Some names ending in -ing or -ings introduced Latin as well, giving birth to of eastern England by the Vikings. seem to refer to the followers of an Toller Porcorum ('of the pigs') and Ryme Traces of older Celtic placenames crop individual leader who all settled down to­ Intrínseca ('within'). Some names are a up here and there, sometimes in odd gether. Peatling in Leicestershire is trans­ remarkable mixture. In Gwent the name ways. Bre was the Celtic word for 'hill' lated as 'Peotla's people'. In Yorkshire, of Llanvihangel juxta Rogiet means 'the and dun meant 'hill' in Old English. So Asmunderby is explained as the village of church of St Michael' (in Welsh) 'next to' Breedon on the Hill in Leicestershire is a man named Asmundr and Helperby as (in Latin) 'a road-gate' (in English). named 'Hill hill on the hill.' In Scotland, the village of a woman called Hialp. Placenames are a very rich tapestry. 7 VILLAGE WALKS IN BRITAIN sked to imagine the typical A . traditional English village, most people would picture in their mind's eye VILLAGES: a group of rustic thatched cottages set around a well-kept green - perhaps with a cricket match in progress and a T S heir hape and venerable pub at one side. The church tower (on which the hands of the clock are set forever at teatime) and the A handsome gables of the manor house rise ppearance behind sheltering trees to preside over the timeless scene. There are certainly attractive villages which fit this picture, but they are not typical. Villages come in different patterns and varied building materials. The study of their history and development is still in its infancy, but the more closely they are looked at, the more mythical the 'typical' chocolate box specimen becomes. Broadly speaking, there are four different types of village plan. The first is the 'nucleated' village, where the houses cluster round a centre. This may be the green, a square, the church or some other focal point, with roads and lanes leading in from outside. More complicated is the 'polyfocal' village, which has more than one nucleus. Then there is the 'street' village, where the houses lie along one main street, running in at one end and out again at the other. Finally, there is the sprawling, muddled village, with the houses set higgledy-piggledy and with no clear pattern at all. Although these four types can be distinguished from each other in theory, in practice the distinctions are far less clear. Many villages combine characteris­ tics of more than one type. The fact that villages grow and change as the centuries go by complicates matters. They do not stay the same shape. It is often impossible to know what a village's original ground plan was, and even when that is established, nobody really knows why it was planned in that particular way. THE VILLAGE GREEN Nucleated villages occur most often in lowland areas. They are found especially in southern and south-eastern England, in East Anglia, the Midlands and the North- East. There may be a link between them and the medieval lowland pattern of huge open village fields, the harvesting of which involved much communal labour and co-operation between the villagers, possibly reflected in a centrally organised village layout. Many of these villages duster round A typical linear or 'street' village forms along the line of a main by-way. 8 VILLAGE WALKS IN BRITAIN a village green, whose original purpose is when the big open fields were enclosed. gently evolving over the centuries. This in considerable doubt. The theory that the Elsewhere, greens have been encroached may well be true of many places, but green was a place of refuge, where the upon, and many have disappeared there are also clear signs of deliberate cattle could be kept safe in time of danger altogether. planning. Appleton le Moors in North seems unlikely in most cases. Yorkshire, for example, still keeps its Greens were actually used for grazing EVOLUTION AND PLANNING medieval plan. The houses stand well the smaller livestock, including ducks and Many villages have got along very well back on either side of the main through- geese, which might also have a pond to without a village green or a single centre street, which was originally a rectangular dabble in. This adds to a village's of any kind. Napton on the Hill in green. Each house has a strip of garden to picturesque quality - the pond at Warwickshire is a typical example of a the rear, behind that is a back lane, and Finchingfield in Essex is the centrepiece polyfocal village which has three different beyond is the countryside - in medieval of one of the prettiest villages in England. sections: a northern one along a road, a days the open fields. Quite often the village well with its central one round a green, with the parish A.A. Milne once wrote of the communal pump was on the green. The church off to one side, and a southern sprawling, shapeless type of village, stocks and the lock-up might be erected section which is probably a later addition. which is extremely common: there, and in this century it was thought a The three are linked together by a road. Between the woods in folded lands fitting place for a war memorial, at the Street villages sometimes grew up in An accidental village stands, psychological heart of the community. that pattern simply because of geogra­ Untidily, and with an air The green was also used for recreation. phical factors. At Combe Martin in North Of wondering who left it there. The butts for archery practice were set up Devon, for instance, houses line each side Some settlements like this may have there, and the maypole to celebrate the of a long street running down a narrow grown up haphazardly in the first place, approach of summer. Cricket and football valley to the sea. Others grew up along a with no leadership or central planning, are still played on village greens road where the villagers could make a but in other cases it is the other way throughout the country, and there's often living providing services for travellers. round and the original pattern has been a playground for children. The conventional idea is of a village gradually worn away. Stoneleigh in The simple notion of a village growing growing spontaneously, unplanned, and Warwickshire was by 1886 a vague up around its green may be true agglomeration of houses with four main in some cases, but is certainly routes leading in to a central green, but it not in others. In some villages is known that it had a far more regular the green was not there plan 300 years before. Twentieth-century originally, but was added later, additions to many villages have similarly perhaps by the local lord. He blurred earlier outlines. would knock down houses to clear an open space for a market, which would bring him a profit. Some villages have more than one green. In others the green is not in the middle, but off at one side; perhaps where a stretch of land at the edge of the settle­ ment was kept for common use The dispersed appearance of the scattered village (left) contrasts sharply with the more centralised shape of the nucleated village (above), of which, in this case, the focal point is the green. The extensive green at Elsdon in Northumberland (above, left), features the village church and an old cattle pen, lasting reminders that the site once served a far more important role in the communities life than it does today. VILLAGE WALKS IN BRITAIN THE REGIONAL ROOTS The look of a village is largely determined by the materials of which it is built. In medieval times only castles, churches and other important buildings were made of stone. Ordinary houses were constructed of sticks and mud, and when they fell down they were easily rebuilt. With increasing prosperity, houses and cottages came to be built in a more solid fashion. The vast majority of them date from the 17th century or later. Naturally, the local stone or other materials closest to hand were used - granite in Cornwall, limestone in the Cotswolds, flint in Norfolk. Where there was no suitable building stone, houses were made of timber and plaster or mixtures of clay and straw. The consequence was that villages in different parts of the country looked local granite and roofed with Cornish different, according to the characteristic slate, as at Boscastle or Morwenstow. local building materials. That was Granite crops up again in Leicestershire, changed by the industrial revolution. and in Cumbria, where villages in shades New systems of transport - canals, from grey to pink granite shelter beneath improved roads, railways - made it cheap the towering Lake District fells. and simple to move bricks, tiles and slates In Wales, Snowdonia is another area of to anywhere in the country. Mass granite and slate, while the prosperous production of bricks and tiles meant that farming valleys of Clwyd and Glamorgan houses were built quickly for a rapidly yield sandstone villages of a gentler sort. increasing population. Towns and villages In Scotland there are dour and lonely began to bulge with rows of mass- granite settlements in the Highlands, with Brick and flint at Cley next the Sea, Norfolk (top); produced, mass-designed houses which the stone usually 'harled', or covered with millstone grit at Askrigg in the Yorkshire Dales no longer had regional roots or local (above); and limestone at Great Tew in the a mixture of lime and crushed gravel or flavour. Cotswolds (below). sand for weatherproofing. By contrast, in People were more comfortably fishing villages along the coast to housed than ever before, but the Fife, like Culross or Crail, pink and individual character of most yellow sandstone walls, white villages was severely diluted. Too harling and tiled roofs make a much standardisation - of houses, charming picture. telephone boxes, road signs and markings, rubbish bins, lamp FLINT AND BRICK standards - helps to destroy local Flint has probably been used as a identity. Even so, in the more building stone longer than any attractive villages there is still old- other in Britain. Impervious to style vernacular architecture to weathering, it is difficult to use and please the eye. the nodules have to be set in so much mortar that some flint walls SYMPHONIES IN STONE contain more mortar than flint. It is Limestone and sandstone in their often combined with brick, for different local varieties are far and away Similarly in Somerset, Montacute and support, as at Cley next the Sea and other the most commonly used building stones many other villages are dominated by the villages in Norfolk, where flint was the in England. The Cotswolds area is famous brownish stone quarried from Ham Hill, only building stone. Sussex is another for its villages in mellow limestone - west of Yeovil. A harsher impression is flint region and Steyning, for example, Snowshill and The Slaughters among created by villages built in the variety of rejoices in buildings in flint, timber, stone, them. Almost every Cotswold settlement sandstone called millstone grit in the slate and brick. had its own little quarry, with the colour Pennines and parts of the North. This is a The Romans built in brick, but after of the stone varying slightly from one to rugged stone, difficult to work, and in their time brick-making did not restart the other. The use of the same stone, not places like Haworth and Heptonstall in until the 12th and 13th centuries, in only for houses large and small, but for Yorkshire and Cromford in Derbyshire, Suffolk. In the Tudor period, palaces and churches, schools, barns, farm buildings the greyish-black cottages have a grand mansions were built in brick, but and field walls - and often for roofs as Wuthering Heights air of grimness. for the ordinary person it was still just as well as walls - created a harmonious and There's a similar harshness about the expensive as stone. Its golden age came in satisfying unity. traditional Cornish village, built of the the 18th and 19th centuries, when brick 10