Grovely Wood is one of the largest woodlands in southern

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated Wilts) is a historic and ceremonial county in South West England with an area of . It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset to the southwest, Somerset to the west, Hampshire to the southeast, Gloucestershire ...

, England. It stands on a chalk ridge above the

River Wylye The River Wylye ( ) is a chalk stream in the south of England, with clear water flowing over gravel. It is popular with anglers for fly fishing. A half-mile stretch of the river and three lakes in Warminster are a local nature reserve. Cour ...

Barford St Martin Barford St Martin is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England, about west of Wilton, around the junction of the A30 and the B3089. Barford is known as one of the Nadder Valley villages, named for the River Nadder which flows through ...

parish, to the south-west of the village of

Great Wishford Great Wishford is a village and civil parish in the Wylye Valley in Wiltshire, England, about north of Wilton and northwest of Salisbury. The village lies west of a bend in the River Wylye and has a triangular street layout comprising Sou ...

, within the

Cranborne Chase and West Wiltshire Downs Cranborne Chase and West Wiltshire Downs is an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) covering of Dorset, Hampshire, Somerset and Wiltshire. It is the sixth largest AONB in England. The area was designated as an AONB in 1981 and confirmed i ...

Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty An Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB; , AHNE) is an area of countryside in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, that has been designated for conservation due to its significant landscape value. Areas are designated in recognition of thei ...

. It is recognised for its nature conservation importance through designation as a

County Wildlife Site County Wildlife Site (often abbreviated to CWS) is a conservation designation in the United Kingdom, which despite conferring no statutory protection onto a site, does affirm a site's importance and value for wildlife in its county context. The d ...

. Among the species found here is the

Purple Emperor ''Apatura iris'', the purple emperor, is a Palearctic butterfly of the family Nymphalidae. Description Adults have dark brown wings with white bands and spots, and a small orange ring on each of the hindwings. Males have a wingspan of , an ...

butterfly. To the west of Grovely, on the same ridge, lies another large block of woodland,

Great Ridge Wood Great Ridge Wood, formerly also known as Chicklade Wood, is one of the largest woodlands in southern Wiltshire, England. Mostly within the parishes of Boyton and Sherrington, and entirely within the Cranborne Chase and West Wiltshire Downs Area ...

. Adjacent to Grovely, to the north, lies the grassland

Site of Special Scientific Interest 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 ...

Ebsbury Down. Another SSSI,

Baverstock Juniper Bank Baverstock Juniper Bank () is a 2.6 hectare Biological Site of Special Scientific Interest to the north of the village of Baverstock in Wiltshire, England. Baverstock Juniper Bank is within the Cranborne Chase and West Wiltshire Downs Area of ...

, is also nearby. There is much

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...

and

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

archaeology in the vicinity of the woods. A

Roman road Roman roads ( la, viae Romanae ; singular: ; meaning "Roman way") were physical infrastructure vital to the maintenance and development of the Roman state, and were built from about 300 BC through the expansion and consolidation of the Roman Re ...

runs east to west through the centre of the wood, and at the western end are the Iron Age/

Romano-British The Romano-British culture arose in Britain under the Roman Empire following the Roman conquest in AD 43 and the creation of the province of Britannia. It arose as a fusion of the imported Roman culture with that of the indigenous Britons, a ...

settlements of Hanging Langford Camp and Church End Ring. Just to the north of the woods lie the sites of two Iron Age

hillfort A hillfort is a type of earthwork used as a fortified refuge or defended settlement, located to exploit a rise in elevation for defensive advantage. They are typically European and of the Bronze Age or Iron Age. Some were used in the post-Roma ...

Ebsbury The site of Ebsbury, in Wiltshire, England, includes the remains of an Iron Age enclosed settlement, field system and possible hill fort, and a Romano-British enclosed settlement. The site occupies the spur of a downland hill with the possible h ...

, and

Grovely castle Grovely Castle is the site of an Iron Age univallate hill fort in the parish of Steeple Langford, in Wiltshire. The remaining ramparts stand approximately high, with deep ditches, although ploughing has damaged the earthworks in some parts of ...

; as well as an Iron Age farm enclosure, known as East Castle.

Boundaries

In the 13th century, Grovely Forest extended north and east to the

, and south to the Nadder; on its western boundary were the villages of

Wylye Wylye () is a village and civil parish on the River Wylye in Wiltshire, England. The village is about northwest of Salisbury and a similar distance southeast of Warminster. The parish extends north and south of the river, and includes the h ...

and

Teffont Evias Teffont Evias is a small village and former civil parish in the Nadder valley in the south of Wiltshire, England. Edric Holmes described the village as "most delightfully situated", and Maurice Hewlett included Teffont in his list of the half ...

. At a Grovely swainmote held in March 1603, a jury drawn from Great Wishford and Barford St. Martin declared that the forest then consisted of fourteen coppices. Seven lay north of 'Grim's Dyke' in Great Wishford, while the others lay south of the dyke in Barford St. Martin. The combined areas of these fourteen coppices correspond to what was formerly the

extra-parochial In England and Wales, an extra-parochial area, extra-parochial place or extra-parochial district was a geographically defined area considered to be outside any ecclesiastical or civil parish. Anomalies in the parochial system meant they had no ch ...

area of Grovely Wood. By 1839, the boundary of Barford parish had moved north to include almost all of the woodland.

Ancient custom

According to a mediaeval custom, villagers of

have a right to gather firewood in Grovely Wood on

Oak Apple Day Restoration Day, more commonly known as Oak Apple Day or Royal Oak Day, was an English, Welsh and Irish public holiday, observed annually on 29 May, to commemorate the restoration of the Stuart monarchy in May 1660. In some parts of England the ...

, May 29. On this day, villagers claim their ancient rights to collect wood from Grovely, said to date back to the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

and to have been confirmed by the Forest Court in 1603, thanks to a

charter A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified. It is implicit that the granter retains superiority (or sovereignty), and that the rec ...

for the collection of wood in the

Royal Forest A royal forest, occasionally known as a kingswood (), is an area of land with different definitions in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The term ''forest'' in the ordinary modern understanding refers to an area of wooded land; however, the ...

of Groveley.

Folklore

Grovely Wood has two stories associated with it.

The Handsel sisters

The four Handsel sisters were of Danish origin but they had moved to the Wilton area. Coincidentally, an outbreak of smallpox in 1737 killed 132 people. The local people became convinced that the sisters were responsible for the deaths and accused them of witchcraft and an alliance with the devil. Without an official hearing the sisters were taken to Grovely Wood, murdered by being bludgeoned over the head, and buried a little way apart from each other so that they could not conspire against their murderers. There are four gnarled beech trees associated with the sisters; because either the trees were planted to mark their graves or they mysteriously grew on top of the unmarked graves to remind the locals of their dreadful deed. Sightings of the sisters have been reported over the years. There is a hollow at the back of the largest tree where people leave offerings. The trees are located approximately 50 meters away from the Roman road some ten minutes walk from the Wilton end of the wood.

The Burcombe Woodsman

The ''Burcombe Woodsman'' is thought to be a poacher who was hanged from a tree for his 'crimes', or possibly an artist who painted in watercolour and was accidentally shot in the woods during a deer cull. It is said that he lodged in Burcombe thus earning him the title of the Burcombe Woodsman. Sightings of him have been reported, usually after hearing the cracking of a twig. An image on

Purbeck marble Purbeck Marble is a fossiliferous limestone found in the Isle of Purbeck, a peninsula in south-east Dorset, England. It is a variety of Purbeck stone that has been quarried since at least Roman times as a decorative building stone. Geology Strat ...

found at Steeple Langford in 1857, a portrait of a man wearing a long robe, with a

horn Horn most often refers to: *Horn (acoustic), a conical or bell shaped aperture used to guide sound ** Horn (instrument), collective name for tube-shaped wind musical instruments *Horn (anatomy), a pointed, bony projection on the head of various ...

hanging from his left shoulder, may be of Alan de Langford,

Verderer Verderers are forestry officials in England who deal with common land in certain former royal hunting areas which are the property of the Crown. The office was developed in the Middle Ages to administer forest law on behalf of the King. Verderers ...

of Grovely Wood at the end of the 13th century.

''The Beauties of England and Wales'' (1814)

The

antiquary An antiquarian or antiquary () is an fan (person), aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient artifact (archaeology), artifac ...

John Britton reports in a volume of his ''The Beauties of England and Wales'' (1814) that

Second World War

The Royal Air Force had an ordnance depot at Chilmark, west of the wood, during and after the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, and parts of the wood provided cover for munitions storage. Until , use was made of sidings at the nearest station,

; the area was also used for the same purpose by the United States Air Force, via Wishford station.

Present day

The Old Sarum Way long-distance footpath enters the wood.

References

{{coord, 51.107, -1.932, dim:10000_region:GB-WIL, display=title Forests and woodlands of Wiltshire County wildlife sites in England