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Isle Of Ely
The Isle of Ely () is a historic region around the city of Ely in Cambridgeshire, England. Between 1889 and 1965, it formed an administrative county. Etymology Its name has been said to mean "island of eels", a reference to the creatures that were often caught in the local rivers for food. This etymology was first recorded by the Venerable Bede. History Until the 17th century, the area was an island surrounded by a large area of fenland, a type of swamp. It was coveted as an area easy to defend, and was controlled in the very early medieval period by the Gyrwas, an Anglo-Saxon tribe. Upon their marriage in 652, Tondbert, a prince of the Gyrwas, presented Æthelthryth (who became St. Æthelthryth), the daughter of King Anna of the East Angles, with the Isle of Ely. She afterwards founded a monastery at Ely, which was destroyed by Viking raiders in 870, but was rebuilt and became a famous Abbey and Shrine. The Fens were drained beginning in 1626 using a network of canals d ...
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Fenland Hall, March
Fenland Hall is a municipal building on County Road, March, Cambridgeshire, England, which serves as the headquarters of Fenland District Council. The building was originally called "County Hall", and was built in 1908–1909 by Isle of Ely County Council to be its meeting place and offices. History Isle of Ely County Council was created in 1889 under the Local Government Act 1888. The Isle of Ely Quarter Sessions, which preceded the county council, had met alternately at Ely and Wisbech. The county council decided instead to hold its meetings in March, being a more central location within the Isle, and with better railway connections. For the first twenty years after its creation the county council met at the Temperance Hall in March, an assembly hall and hotel which had been built in 1885 opposite March railway station (and which was later renamed the Station Hotel). After nearly twenty years of meeting at the Temperance Hall, in which time the council's staff were based in ...
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St Etheldreda's Church, Ely
St Etheldreda's Church is a Roman Catholic parish church in Ely, Cambridgeshire, UK. It is part of the Diocese of East Anglia within the Province of Westminster. The church notably contains the shrine and relics of St Etheldreda, an Anglo-Saxon queen and abbess who died on 23 June AD 679 and went on to become one of the most popular of the medieval saints in England. She has even been described as one of "the most significant of all native English Saints." History of the parish and church By the middle of the nineteenth century the town of Ely had approximately 600 families and there were some 30-40 Catholics living in the district. but there was no resident priest. At that time there was a single missionary rector based in Cambridge, Canon Thomas Quinlivan. The opening of the London to Norwich railway line in July 1845 made it easier for Canon Quinlivan to travel to Ely and say occasional masses in a private house in the town. The parish of St Etheldreda began as a distinct ...
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First Barons' War
The First Barons' War (1215–1217) was a civil war in the Kingdom of England in which a group of rebellious major landowners (commonly referred to as barons) led by Robert Fitzwalter waged war against King John of England. The conflict resulted from King John's disastrous wars against King Philip II of France, which led to the collapse of the Angevin Empire, and John's subsequent refusal to accept and abide ''Magna Carta'', which John had sealed on 15 June 1215. The rebellious barons, faced with an uncompromising king, turned to King Philip's son, Prince Louis, who, in 1216, then sailed to England with an army despite his father's disapproval, as well as the Pope's, who subsequently excommunicated him. Louis captured Winchester and soon controlled over half of the English kingdom. He was proclaimed "King of England" in London by the barons, although never actually crowned. Louis' ambitions of ruling England faced a major setback in October 1216, when King John's death led ...
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Burwell, Cambridgeshire
Burwell is a village and civil parish in Cambridgeshire, England, some 10 miles (16 km) north-east of Cambridge. It lies on the south-east edge of the Fens. Westward drainage is improved by Cambridgeshire lodes (waterways), including Burwell Lode, a growth factor in the village. A population of 6,309 in the 2011 census was put at 6,417 in 2019. History Etymology The name "Burwell", Anglo-Saxon in origin, refers to a fort ''(burh-)'' close to a spring ''(-well)''.British History Online: 'Burwell', A History of the County of Cambridge and the Isle of Ely: Volume 10: Cheveley, Flendish, Staine and Staploe Hundreds (north-eastern Cambridgeshire) (2002), pp. 334–341. URLhttp://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=18903Retrieved 13 October 2010. The first record of the name dates from 1060. It appears in the 1086 Domesday Book as Burewelle, Burwella and Burwelle. There is a spring in the south of the village, close to remains of the 12th-century Burwell Castle, and eviden ...
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Geoffrey De Mandeville, 1st Earl Of Essex
Geoffrey de Mandeville II, 1st Earl of Essex (died September 1144) was a prominent figure during the reign of King Stephen of England. His biographer, the 19th-century historian J. H. Round, called him "the most perfect and typical presentment of the feudal and anarchic spirit that stamps the reign of Stephen". That characterisation has been disputed since the later 20th century. Early career He succeeded his father, William, sometime before 1129, possibly as early as 1116. A key portion of the family patrimony in Essex was in the King's hands. William had incurred a debt to the crown, perhaps in part due to a large fine levied in 1101 by Henry I due to his displeasure at the escape of the important political prisoner, Ranulph Flambard, when William was in charge of the Tower of London. The King also held the substantial estate of Geoffrey's maternal grandfather Eudo ''le Dapifer'' to which Geoffrey laid claim. Geoffrey gained Eudo's lands and his father's offices during the ...
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Empress Matilda
Empress Matilda ( 7 February 110210 September 1167), also known as the Empress Maude, was one of the claimants to the English throne during the civil war known as the Anarchy. The daughter of King Henry I of England, she moved to Germany as a child when she married the future Holy Roman Emperor Henry V. She travelled with her husband to Italy in 1116, was controversially crowned in St Peter's Basilica, and acted as the imperial regent in Italy. Matilda and Henry V had no children, and when he died in 1125, the imperial crown was claimed by his rival Lothair of Supplinburg. Matilda's younger and only full brother, William Adelin, died in the '' White Ship'' disaster of 1120, leaving Matilda's father and realm facing a potential succession crisis. On Emperor Henry V's death, Matilda was recalled to Normandy by her father, who arranged for her to marry Geoffrey of Anjou to form an alliance to protect his southern borders. Henry I had no further legitimate children and nomi ...
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Stephen Of England
Stephen (1092 or 1096 – 25 October 1154), often referred to as Stephen of Blois, was King of England from 22 December 1135 to his death in 1154. He was Count of Boulogne '' jure uxoris'' from 1125 until 1147 and Duke of Normandy from 1135 until 1144. His reign was marked by the Anarchy, a civil war with his cousin and rival, the Empress Matilda, whose son, Henry II, succeeded Stephen as the first of the Angevin kings of England. Stephen was born in the County of Blois in central France as the fourth son of Stephen-Henry, Count of Blois, and Adela, daughter of William the Conqueror. His father died while Stephen was still young, and he was brought up by his mother. Placed into the court of his uncle Henry I of England, Stephen rose in prominence and was granted extensive lands. He married Matilda of Boulogne, inheriting additional estates in Kent and Boulogne that made the couple one of the wealthiest in England. Stephen narrowly escaped drowning with Henry I's son, ...
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The Anarchy
The Anarchy was a civil war in England and Normandy between 1138 and 1153, which resulted in a widespread breakdown in law and order. The conflict was a war of succession precipitated by the accidental death of William Adelin, the only legitimate son of King Henry I, who drowned in the sinking of the '' White Ship'' in 1120. Henry sought to be succeeded by his daughter, known as Empress Matilda, but was only partially successful in convincing the nobility to support her. On Henry's death in 1135, his nephew Stephen of Blois seized the throne, with the help of Stephen's brother Henry of Blois, who was the bishop of Winchester. Stephen's early reign saw fierce fighting with disloyal English barons, rebellious Welsh leaders, and Scottish invaders. Following a major rebellion in the south-west of England, Matilda invaded in 1139 with the help of her half-brother Robert of Gloucester. In the initial years of civil war, neither side was able to achieve a decisive advantage; ...
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Tom Hickathrift
Tom Hickathrift (or sometimes Jack Hickathrift) is a legendary figure of East Anglian English folklore — a character similar to Jack the Giant Killer. He famously battled a giant, and is sometimes said to be a giant himself, though normally he is just represented as possessing giant-like strength. Life and adventures Various stories of his exploits have grown up. In one version he is fabled to have been a simple labourer at the time of the Norman Conquest and to have killed a giant in the marsh at Tilney, Norfolk armed only with an axle-tree stuck into a cartwheel. When his makeshift weapon broke he grabbed a "lusty rawboned miller" and used him as a weapon instead. This exploit earned him the governorship of Thanet. At the church in Walpole St Peter there is a depression in the ground, where it is said a cannonball landed after he threw it to scare away the devil (in this version Tom is a giant). In the fairy tale as told by Joseph Jacobs, Tom lived in marsh of the Is ...
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William The Conqueror
William I; ang, WillelmI (Bates ''William the Conqueror'' p. 33– 9 September 1087), usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman king of England The monarchy of the United Kingdom, commonly referred to as the British monarchy, is the constitutional form of government by which a hereditary sovereign reigns as the head of state of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies (the Bailiw ..., reigning from 1066 until his death in 1087. A descendant of Rollo, he was Duke of Normandy from 1035 onward. By 1060, following a long struggle to establish his throne, his hold on Normandy was secure. In 1066, following the death of Edward the Confessor, William invaded England, leading an army of Normans to victory over the Anglo-Saxons, Anglo-Saxon forces of Harold Godwinson at the Battle of Hastings, and suppressed subsequent English revolts in what has become known as the Norman Conquest. The rest of his life was marked by str ...
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Hereward The Wake
Hereward the Wake (Traditional pronunciation /ˈhɛ.rɛ.ward/, modern pronunciation /ˈhɛ.rɪ.wəd/) (1035 – 1072) (also known as Hereward the Outlaw or Hereward the Exile) was an Anglo-Saxon nobleman and a leader of local resistance to the Norman Conquest of England. His base, when leading the rebellion against the Norman rulers, was the Isle of Ely in eastern England. According to legend he roamed the Fens, which nowadays covers parts of the modern counties of Cambridgeshire, Lincolnshire and Norfolk, leading popular opposition to William the Conqueror. ''Hereward'' is an Old English name, composed of the elements ''here'', "army", and ''ward'' "guard" (cognate with the Old High German name ''Heriwart''). The epithet "the Wake", first recorded in the 14th century, may mean "the watchful", or derive from the Anglo-Norman Wake family who later claimed descent from him. Primary sources Several primary sources exist for Hereward's life, though the accuracy of th ...
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