Sixpenny Handley Hundred was a

hundred 100 or one hundred (Roman numeral: C) is the natural number following 99 and preceding 101. In medieval contexts, it may be described as the short hundred or five score in order to differentiate the English and Germanic use of "hundred" to de ...

in the

county A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesChambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset (unitary authority), Dors ...

, England. It originally consisted of two distinct hundreds: Sexpena and Hanlega.Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments and Constructions of England, (1975), ''An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset: East'', page 64 Sometime around the 14th century, the two hundreds were united as the hundred of "Sexpenne et Henle". Sixpenny Handley Hundred contained the following parishes: *

Cann Cann may refer to: *Cann (surname), a list of people with the name *Cann River, a river of Victoria, Australia *Cann, Dorset, a village in England *Edward du Cann, British businessman and politician *Claire and Antoinette Cann pianists, known as t ...

Compton Abbas Compton Abbas is a village and civil parish in north Dorset, England. It lies south of the town of Shaftesbury. It is sited on greensand strata on the edge of the Blackmore Vale, below the chalk downs of Cranborne Chase. On top of these hills i ...

* East Orchard *

Fontmell Magna Fontmell Magna is a village and civil parish in north Dorset, England. It is situated in the Blackmore Vale, close to the chalk hills of Cranborne Chase, on the A350 road south of Shaftesbury and north of Blandford Forum. In the 2011 census ...

Iwerne Minster Iwerne Minster ( ) is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England. It lies on the edge of the Blackmore Vale, approximately midway between the towns of Shaftesbury and Blandford Forum. The A350 main road between those towns passes through th ...

Melbury Abbas Melbury Abbas is a village and civil parish in north Dorset, England, 3 km SSW of the town of Shaftesbury, east of the A350 Shaftesbury to Blandford Forum road. Local Features Melbury Abbas is on the western edge of Cranborne Chase in hilly te ...

Sixpenny Handley Sixpenny Handley or Handley is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Sixpenny Handley and Pentridge, in north east Dorset, England, situated on Cranborne Chase ten miles (16 km) north east of Blandford Forum. In the 2 ...

(originally known as just Handley) * West Orchard Sixpenny Hundred took its name from its meeting place at Sixpenny, now a farm, in the south west of the parish of

. Sixpenny was first recorded in 932 as ''Seaxpenn'', and means "hill of the Saxons" (from Old English ''Seaxe'' and

Brythonic Brittonic or Brythonic may refer to: *Common Brittonic, or Brythonic, the Celtic language anciently spoken in Great Britain *Brittonic languages, a branch of the Celtic languages descended from Common Brittonic *Britons (Celtic people) The Br ...

''penn''). The reference is to the hill now known as Pen Hill east of the modern farm, which probably marks an ancient boundary. Handley Hundred took its name from Handley (now known as

). Its meeting place is not known, but a possible location is a neolithic

long barrow Long barrows are a style of monument constructed across Western Europe in the fifth and fourth millennia BCE, during the Early Neolithic period. Typically constructed from earth and either timber or stone, those using the latter material repres ...

known as

Wor Barrow Wor Barrow is a Neolithic long barrow on Cranborne Chase, about east of Sixpenny Handley in Dorset, England. It is a scheduled monument. Its excavation by Augustus Pitt Rivers in 1893–1894 has been described as "an important event in the study ...

, 1 km east of Handley. When the barrow was excavated by

Augustus Pitt Rivers Lieutenant General Augustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt Rivers (14 April 18274 May 1900) was an English officer in the British Army, ethnologist, and archaeologist. He was noted for innovations in archaeological methodology, and in the museum display o ...

in 1893–94, execution burials were found at the site.

References

Sources

*Boswell, Edward, 1833: ''The Civil Division of the County of Dorset'' (published on CD by Archive CD Books Ltd, 1992) * Hutchins, John, ''History of Dorset'', vols 1-4 (3rd ed 1861–70; reprinted by EP Publishing, Wakefield, 1973) *Mills, A. D., 1977, 1980, 1989: ''Place Names of Dorset'', parts 1–3. English Place Name Society: Survey of English Place Names vols LII, LIII and 59/60 Hundreds of Dorset {{Dorset-geo-stub

See also

References

Sources