Will of Alfred the Great (New Minster Liber Vitae) - BL Stowe MS 944, f 30v

Compton is a village and

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authority ...

in the

Chichester Chichester () is a cathedral city and civil parish in West Sussex, England.OS Explorer map 120: Chichester, South Harting and Selsey Scale: 1:25 000. Publisher:Ordnance Survey – Southampton B2 edition. Publishing Date:2009. It is the only ci ...

district A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions o ...

West Sussex West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ar ...

. The village lies on the B2146 road, southeast of

Petersfield, Hampshire Petersfield is a market town and civil parish in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is north of Portsmouth. The town has its own railway station on the Portsmouth Direct line, the mainline rail link connecting Portsmouth a ...

and northwest of

. The parish also includes the villages of West Marden and

Up Marden Up Marden is a small village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Compton, in the Chichester district of West Sussex, England. It is on the South Downs north-west of Chichester, close to East Marden and North Marden. In 1931 the paris ...

. The village has a long history, perhaps first being mentioned in the will of King

Alfred the Great Alfred the Great (alt. Ælfred 848/849 – 26 October 899) was King of the West Saxons from 871 to 886, and King of the Anglo-Saxons from 886 until his death in 899. He was the youngest son of King Æthelwulf and his first wife Osburh, who bot ...

. It is in the

Sussex Downs The South Downs are a range of chalk hills that extends for about across the south-eastern coastal counties of England from the Itchen valley of Hampshire in the west to Beachy Head, in the Eastbourne Downland Estate, East Sussex, in the east. ...

Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. High ground nearby is known as

Compton Down Compton Down is a hill on the Isle of Wight just to the east of Freshwater Bay. It is part of the chalk ridge which forms the "backbone" of the Isle of Wight. It runs east to west, is approximately long and is predominantly grass downland. The ...

and on a part of the down known as Telegraph Hill there was an Admiralty semaphore station. The

church of England parish church A parish church in the Church of England is the church which acts as the religious centre for the people within each Church of England parish (the smallest and most basic Church of England administrative unit; since the 19th century sometimes ca ...

dedicated to

Saint Mary the Virgin Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother of ...

, dates from the 12th and 13th centuries, but was heavily restored in 1849. The building is flint-faced with stone dressings and a tiled roof. It has a

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may terminate in an apse. Ove ...

and

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

with south

aisle An aisle is, in general, a space for walking with rows of non-walking spaces on both sides. Aisles with seating on both sides can be seen in airplanes, certain types of buildings, such as churches, cathedrals, synagogues, meeting halls, parl ...

, north porch and western bell turret, which is weather boarded with a shingled

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spires are ...

. It is a Grade II*

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

, and currently forms part of the Octagon Parish

team ministry Vicar is a title given to certain parish priests in the Church of England and other Anglican churches. It has played a significant role in Anglican church organisation in ways that are different from other Christian denominations. The title is v ...

References

External links

'Compton'
in ''A History of the County of Sussex: vol 4'' (ed.

Louis Francis Salzman Louis Francis Salzman (26 March 1878 – 4 April 1971) was a British economic history, economic historian who specialised in the medieval period. He was born in Brighton in 1878, the son of Dr. F. W. Salzmann, and educated at Haileybury College ...

, London, 1953, pp. 91–94), from the ''

Victoria County History The Victoria History of the Counties of England, commonly known as the Victoria County History or the VCH, is an English history project which began in 1899 with the aim of creating an encyclopaedic history of each of the historic counties of En ...

'' at

British History Online ''British History Online'' is a digital library of primary and secondary sources on medieval and modern history of Great Britain and Ireland. It was created and is managed as a cooperative venture by the Institute of Historical Research, Universi ...

Villages in West Sussex {{WestSussex-geo-stub