Greetham 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 county of

Rutland Rutland () is a ceremonial county and unitary authority in the East Midlands, England. The county is bounded to the west and north by Leicestershire, to the northeast by Lincolnshire and the southeast by Northamptonshire. Its greatest len ...

in the

East Midlands The East Midlands is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. It comprises the eastern half of the area traditionally known as the Midlands. It consists of Leicestershire, Derbyshire, Li ...

of England. The village's name means 'homestead/village which is

gravel Gravel is a loose aggregation of rock fragments. Gravel occurs naturally throughout the world as a result of sedimentary and erosive geologic processes; it is also produced in large quantities commercially as crushed stone. Gravel is classifi ...

ly' or 'hemmed-in land which is gravelly'. The village is on the B668 road between the county town of

Oakham Oakham is the county town of Rutland in the East Midlands of England, east of Leicester, south-east of Nottingham and west of Peterborough. It had a population of 10,922 in the 2011 census, estimated at 11,191 in 2019. Oakham is to the west o ...

and the A1 and on the north–south

Viking Way The Viking Way is a long distance trail in England running between the Humber Bridge in North Lincolnshire and Oakham in Rutland. History The route was officially opened on Sunday 5 September 1976 at Tealby, by the Deputy Chairman of Lincoln ...

long distance footpath A long-distance trail (or long-distance footpath, track, way, greenway) is a longer recreational trail mainly through rural areas used for hiking, backpacking, cycling, horse riding or cross-country skiing. They exist on all continents exc ...

linking the Humber Bridge and Oakham. The population of the

at the 2001 census was 609 increasing to 638 at the 2011 census. The oldest parts of 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 ...

of St Mary the Virgin are

Norman Norman or Normans may refer to: Ethnic and cultural identity * The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 10th and 11th centuries ** People or things connected with the Norm ...

, but the church today is largely as it was rebuilt in the 13th–15th centuries. The west tower and

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 ...

are 13th or 14th century and the south porch was built in 1673. The church was restored in 1897 by

Jethro Cossins Jethro Anstice Cossins (7 July 1830 – 1917) was a British architect, who practised mainly in Birmingham during the 19th century. Background He was born on 7 July 1830 in Kingsdon, Somerset, the son of John Cossins. He died on 5 December 1 ...

. The church is a

Grade I 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 ...

. It is on

Historic England Historic England (officially the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England) is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is tasked wit ...

’s

Heritage at Risk Register An annual ''Heritage at Risk Register'' is published by Historic England. The survey is used by national and local government, a wide range of individuals and heritage groups to establish the extent of risk and to help assess priorities for actio ...

, at priority category: C - "slow decay; no solution agreed".

Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust The Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust (LRWT) is one of 46 wildlife trusts across the United Kingdom. It manages nature reserves in Leicestershire and Rutland, and was founded in 1956 as the Leicestershire and Rutland Trust for Nature Con ...

owns Merry's Meadows nature reserve, a

SSSI A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle of ...

in the parish that is important for species characteristic of unimproved grassland. East of the village just before the

Sewstern Sewstern is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Buckminster, in the Melton (borough), Melton district of east Leicestershire, England. It lies just south of Buckminster, with which it shares a primary school, situated between ...

Lane junction, just north of the B668 is Greetham Lime Quarry owned by the Dickerson Group of

Waterbeach Waterbeach is an expanding village north of Cambridge on the edge of The Fens, in the South Cambridgeshire district of Cambridgeshire, England. It was designated a "new town" in 2018. History Early periods Waterbeach is on the Car Dyke, a Rom ...

. Greetham has two pubs: the Plough and the Wheatsheaf, both on the B668. To the east is the Greetham Valley golf course. On the A1 near Stretton is a former pub, the Olde Greetham Inn, now owned by Construction Interior Design. The village well, of mid-19th century, has an inscription; "All ye who hither come to drink/Rest not your thoughts below/Remember Jacob's well and think/Whence "living waters" flow." It is Grade II listed.

Notable people

Harold Lawton Harold Walter Lawton (27 July 1899 – 24 December 2005, Greetham, Rutland) was an English scholar of French literature and, prior to his death, one of the last surviving veterans and the last prisoner of war of World War I in Britain. Bo ...

(1899–2005), one of the last First World War veterans * John Senescall (1853–1937), cricketer

References

Sources

External links

The Holy Well
{{authority control Villages in Rutland Civil parishes in Rutland