Cheselbourne

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]

Cheselbourne

Parish Church of St Martin
Cheselbourne
Location within Dorset
Population296 [1]
OS grid referenceSY763997
Unitary authority
Shire county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townDorchester
Postcode districtDT2
PoliceDorset
FireDorset and Wiltshire
AmbulanceSouth Western
UK Parliament

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, numerous gargoyles[4] and a canonical sundial.

Canonical sundial on the parish church

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. In 1957, a Dutch barn was built over the ruins.[4]

References
  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. 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. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 27 February 2015.


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