Cretingham is a village and a civil parish in the East Suffolk district, in the English county of Suffolk. It is on the

River Deben The River Deben is a river in Suffolk rising to the west of Debenham, though a second, higher source runs south from the parish of Bedingfield. The river passes through Woodbridge, turning into a tidal estuary before entering the North Sea at F ...

, 2 miles south off the

A1120 road The A1120 is an 'A' road in the English county of Suffolk. It links Stowmarket to Yoxford passing through the centre of the county.Clark.R (2003The long and winding road ''The Telegraph'', 2003-04-12. Retrieved 2011-04-05. It is long. Route ...

. It is four miles west from

Framlingham Framlingham is a market town and civil parish in Suffolk, England. Of Anglo-Saxon origin, it appears in the 1086 Domesday Book. The parish had a population of 3,342 at the 2011 Census and an estimated 4,016 in 2019. Nearby villages include Ea ...

and eight miles northwest from Woodbridge. __TOC__

Description

It is based on a crossroads formed by The Street (north-south) and

Framsden Framsden is a village and civil parish located around north of Ipswich and south of the small market town of Debenham in the English county of Suffolk. The total population of Framsden in the census of 2001 was 299, with 125 households, 52 peo ...

Road (west) and Brandeston Road (east) and has a church, a pub and a golf course (to the northeast of the village). The church of St Peter is half the way up the north part of The Street. It dates from c.1300 and is a grade II* listed building. The old Bell Inn is now a dwelling called Dial House. The new Cretingham Bell pub opened in 1967 located at the crossroads. It dates from 1620s and was formerly four cottages. Several farms lie in the area: *Bungalow Farm in the southwest *Corner Farm in the southeast *Duck's Farm to the west *Rookery Farm and Manor Farm to the north

History

The village's name means ''The people of a gravelly village'' being derived from the

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th c ...

word ''grēot'' meaning gravel. In 1086 it was described as "Gretingeham" or "Gretingaham" in the

Domesday Book Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manus ...

and located in the old Hundred of Loes. The population was recorded as 78 households along with 30 acres of meadow, wood for 20 pigs, 4 cobs, 7 cattle, 40 pigs, 64 sheep, 32 goats, 4 beehives, and 1 mill. There are 21 listed buildings in the parish including the grade II* listed church of St Peter. Six bells are hung in the tower for change ringing with the heaviest weighing 7 cwt-2qr-23lb, and the oldest dating from about 1416 cast by Richard Baxter of Norwich, the tower is affiliated to the Suffolk Guild of Ringers. The bells were rehung and augmented to six with a new bell cast by

John Taylor & Co John Taylor Bell Foundry (Loughborough) Limited, trading as John Taylor & Co and commonly known as Taylor's Bell Foundry, Taylor's of Loughborough, or simply Taylor's, is the world's largest working bell foundry. It is located in Loughborough, ...

in 2017. The first

peal In campanology (bell ringing), a peal is the special name given to a specific type of performance of change ringing which meets certain exacting conditions for duration, complexity and quality. The definition of a peal has changed considerably ...

was rung on the bells on 30 Apr 1883; up to 2019 29 peals had been rung at Cretingham. During renovation work on a hunting lodge near

Aldeburgh Aldeburgh ( ) is a coastal town in the county of Suffolk, England. Located to the north of the River Alde. Its estimated population was 2,276 in 2019. It was home to the composer Benjamin Britten and remains the centre of the international Alde ...

in 1996, a carpenter uncovered a plank of wood revealing a chilling pencilled message: "A fearful murder was committed the first day of this month (October 1887) at Cretingham. A curate cut the vicar's throat at 12 o'clock at night." Sheila Hardy wrote a book about it called The Cretingham Murder.The Cretingham Murder
() Cretingham Primary School closed in the early 1960s (Miss Last being the final teacher).

References

External links

{{authority control Villages in Suffolk Civil parishes in Suffolk