North Wraxall 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
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. The village is about west of
Chippenham
Chippenham is a market town
A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village ...
, just north of the
A420 road between Chippenham and
Bristol
Bristol () is a city, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. Bristol is the most populous city in ...
.
The parish includes the village of
Ford and the hamlets of Upper Wraxall, Mountain Bower and
The Shoe
The Shoe is a hamlet in the parish of North Wraxall, in the north-west of Wiltshire in England. It lies at the junction of the Fosse Way (the old Roman road from Exeter to Lincoln) and the A420 (running from Bristol to Oxford). The settlement ...
. The
2011 Census recorded the parish population as 401.
The
Fosse Way
The Fosse Way was a Roman road built in Britain during the first and second centuries AD that linked Isca Dumnoniorum (Exeter) in the southwest and Lindum Colonia (Lincoln) to the northeast, via Lindinis (Ilchester), Aquae Sulis ( Bath), Corini ...
Roman road crosses the parish as a minor road. There was a Roman villa at Truckle Hill.
Danks Down and Truckle Hill
file:Path_on_Danks_Down_-_geograph.org.uk_-_445720.jpg, Danks Down, showing a footpath (part of the Macmillan Way) on the left and By Brook in the valley to the right. Long Dean Hamlet in middle-distance., alt=Green fields and a path on Danks Down ...
is a biological
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 ...
, as is
Out Woods
Out Woods () is a 14.3 hectare biological Site of Special Scientific Interest in Wiltshire, notified in 1975. It is an ancient Ash-Maple
''Acer'' () is a genus of trees and shrubs commonly known as maples. The genus is placed in the family Sa ...
. The name of the community originated from Wroxall, "derived from 'wroc' either meaning buzzard or a personal name and 'healh' seen as an angle or corner".
Early history
A
Roman villa stood in this area in the 2nd century. The site has been excavated on at least three occasions, firstly by one of the Scrope family of landowners in 1852 and most recently in 2010. Some reports refer to the site as the North Wraxall or Truckle Hill villa. Evidence of a bath-house and corn drying ovens was found, the latter from the 4th century. The villa itself apparently had 16 rooms, and there were additional buildings and a cemetery. Neolithic flint tools and Iron Age brooches were also discovered not far from the villa, in 1985.
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 manusc ...
of 1086 states that the land was held by "Baldwin in the reign of King Edward prior to the Norman Conquest" and by "by Godfrey" afterwards; 32 households were recorded. This was an agricultural area in the 1800s; the cloth industry was also important for a time and many of the buildings housed workers. During that century the population increased and then declined, to 371 by 1891. In 2001, there were 348 people. No industry remained by the early 1900s and nearly all buildings once used for by industry became residential.
Parish Church
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 James the Great are 13th-century. The
baptismal font
A baptismal font is an article of church furniture used for baptism.
Aspersion and affusion fonts
The fonts of many Christian denominations are for baptisms using a non-immersive method, such as aspersion (sprinkling) or affusion (pouring). ...
and south porch are 14th-century. The north aisle was rebuilt in the 18th century. The building is
Grade I listed
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 ...
. St James' parish is part of the Bybrook Benefice.
Bybrook Team Ministry
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References
Further reading
*
External links
*
North Wraxall Parish Council
{{authority control
Civil parishes in Wiltshire
Villages in Wiltshire