Walsingham () is a

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 ...

North Norfolk North Norfolk is a local government district in Norfolk, England. Its council is based in Cromer. The population at the 2011 Census was 101,149. History The district was formed on 1 April 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972. It was a ...

, England, famous for its religious

shrine A shrine ( la, scrinium "case or chest for books or papers"; Old French: ''escrin'' "box or case") is a sacred or holy sacred space, space dedicated to a specific deity, ancestor worship, ancestor, hero, martyr, saint, Daemon (mythology), daem ...

s in honour of

Mary, mother of Jesus Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jews, Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Jose ...

. It also contains the ruins of two medieval

monastic Monasticism (from Ancient Greek , , from , , 'alone'), also referred to as monachism, or monkhood, is a religion, religious way of life in which one renounces world (theology), worldly pursuits to devote oneself fully to spiritual work. Monastic ...

houses.Ordnance Survey (2002). ''OS Explorer Map 251 – Norfolk Coast Central''. . Walsingham is northwest of

Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. Norwich is by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. As the seat of the See of Norwich, with ...

. The civil parish includes Little Walsingham and Great Walsingham, together with Egmere (a depopulated medieval village at ), and has an area of 18.98 km². At the 2011 census, it had a population of 819.Office for National Statistics & Norfolk County Council (2001).
Census population and household counts for unparished urban areas and all parishes
''. Retrieved 2 December 2005. Walsingham is a major centre of

pilgrimage A pilgrimage is a journey, often into an unknown or foreign place, where a person goes in search of new or expanded meaning about their self, others, nature, or a higher good, through the experience. It can lead to a personal transformation, aft ...

. In 1061, according to the Walsingham legend, an

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons were a Cultural identity, cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo- ...

noblewoman,

Richeldis de Faverches Richeldis de Faverches, also known as Rychold, was a devout Catholic Church in England and Wales, English Catholic noblewoman who is credited with establishing the original shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. The story of the vision of "Rychold" wa ...

, had a vision of the Virgin Mary in which she was instructed to build a replica of the house of the Holy Family in

Nazareth Nazareth ( ; ar, النَّاصِرَة, ''an-Nāṣira''; he, נָצְרַת, ''Nāṣəraṯ''; arc, ܢܨܪܬ, ''Naṣrath'') is the largest city in the Northern District of Israel. Nazareth is known as "the Arab capital of Israel". In ...

in honour of the

Annunciation The Annunciation (from Latin '), also referred to as the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Annunciation of Our Lady, or the Annunciation of the Lord, is the Christian celebration of the biblical tale of the announcement by the ange ...

. When it was built, the Holy House in Walsingham was panelled with wood and contained a wooden statue of an enthroned Virgin Mary with the child Jesus seated on her lap. Among its

relic In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains of a saint or the personal effects of the saint or venerated person preserved for purposes of veneration as a tangi ...

s was a phial reputedly of the Virgin's milk. Walsingham became one of

northern Europe The northern region of Europe has several definitions. A restrictive definition may describe Northern Europe as being roughly north of the southern coast of the Baltic Sea, which is about 54th parallel north, 54°N, or may be based on other g ...

's great places of pilgrimage and remained so through the remainder of the Middle Ages, with a revival in the 20th century.

Name

The village's name means 'Homestead/village of Wæls' people/the Wælsings', a family known in

Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...

as the Vǫlsungar.

Priory

priory A priory is a monastery of men or women under religious vows that is headed by a prior or prioress. Priories may be houses of mendicant friars or nuns (such as the Dominicans, Augustinians, Franciscans, and Carmelites), or monasteries of mon ...

Canons Regular Canons regular are priests who live in community under a rule ( and canon in greek) and are generally organised into religious orders, differing from both secular canons and other forms of religious life, such as clerics regular, designated by a ...

was established on the site in 1153, a few miles from the sea in the northern part of Norfolk and it grew in importance over the following centuries. Founded in the time of

Edward the Confessor Edward the Confessor ; la, Eduardus Confessor , ; ( 1003 – 5 January 1066) was one of the last Anglo-Saxon English kings. Usually considered the last king of the House of Wessex, he ruled from 1042 to 1066. Edward was the son of Æth ...

, the Chapel of

Our Lady of Walsingham Our Lady of Walsingham is a title of Mary, mother of Jesus venerated by Catholics, Western Rite Orthodoxy, Western Rite Orthodox Christians, and some Anglicans associated with the Marian apparitions to Richeldis de Faverches, a pious English peo ...

was confirmed to the Augustinian Canons a century later and enclosed within the priory. From the first, the shrine was a famous place of pilgrimage and the faithful came from all parts of England and the Continent until the destruction of the priory under

King Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disag ...

in 1538. To this day the main road of the pilgrims through Newmarket,

Brandon Brandon may refer to: Names and people *Brandon (given name), a male given name * Brandon (surname), a surname with several different origins Places Australia *Brandon, a farm and 19th century homestead in Seaham, New South Wales *Brandon, Q ...

and

Fakenham Fakenham is a market town and civil parish in Norfolk, England. It is situated on the River Wensum, about north west of Norwich. The town is the junction of several local roads, including the A148 from King's Lynn to Cromer, the A1067 to Norwic ...

is still called the Palmers' (Pilgrims') Way. Many gifts of lands, rents and churches were given to the canons of Walsingham and many miracles were sought and claimed at the shrine. Several English kings visited the shrine, including Henry III (1231 or 1241),

Edward I Edward I (17/18 June 1239 – 7 July 1307), also known as Edward Longshanks and the Hammer of the Scots, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from 1272 to 1307. Concurrently, he ruled the duchies of Aquitaine and Gascony as a vassal o ...

(1289 and 1296),

Edward II Edward II (25 April 1284 – 21 September 1327), also called Edward of Caernarfon, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from 1307 until he was deposed in January 1327. The fourth son of Edward I, Edward became the heir apparent to t ...

in 1315,

Edward III Edward III (13 November 1312 – 21 June 1377), also known as Edward of Windsor before his accession, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from January 1327 until his death in 1377. He is noted for his military success and for restoring r ...

in 1361, Henry VI in 1455, Henry VII in 1487 and finally

Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disa ...

, who was later responsible for its destruction when the shrine and abbey perished in the Dissolution of the Monasteries.

Erasmus Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (; ; English: Erasmus of Rotterdam or Erasmus;''Erasmus'' was his baptismal name, given after St. Erasmus of Formiae. ''Desiderius'' was an adopted additional name, which he used from 1496. The ''Roterodamus'' wa ...

, in fulfilment of a vow, made a pilgrimage from

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

in 1511 and left as his offering a set of Greek verses expressive of his piety. Thirteen years later he wrote his

colloquy Colloquy may refer to: * Colloquy (religious), a meeting to settle differences of doctrine or dogma * Colloquy (company), a loyalty marketing company based in Milford, Ohio * Colloquy (law), a legal term * Colloquy (IRC client), an IRC client for ...

on pilgrimages, wherein the wealth and magnificence of Walsingham are set forth and some of the reputed miracles rationalised. Henry VIII's first two wives –

Catherine of Aragon Catherine of Aragon (also spelt as Katherine, ; 16 December 1485 – 7 January 1536) was Queen of England as the first wife of King Henry VIII from their marriage on 11 June 1509 until their annulment on 23 May 1533. She was previously ...

and

Anne Boleyn Anne Boleyn (; 1501 or 1507 – 19 May 1536) was Queen of England from 1533 to 1536, as the second wife of King Henry VIII. The circumstances of her marriage and of her execution by beheading for treason and other charges made her a key ...

– made pilgrimages to the shrine. In 1537 while the last Prior, Richard Vowell, was paying obsequious respect to

Thomas Cromwell Thomas Cromwell (; 1485 – 28 July 1540), briefly Earl of Essex, was an English lawyer and statesman who served as chief minister to King Henry VIII from 1534 to 1540, when he was beheaded on orders of the king, who later blamed false charge ...

, the Sub-Prior, Nicholas Mileham, was charged with conspiring to rebel against the suppression of the lesser monasteries and, on flimsy evidence, was convicted of high treason and hanged outside the Priory walls. Eleven people in all, including two lay choristers who had been instrumental in organising the revolt were hanged, drawn and quartered. What they feared would happen came the following year. In the July Prior Vowell assented to the destruction of Walsingham Priory and assisted the king's commissioners in the removal of the figure of Our Lady and many of the gold and silver ornaments and in the general spoliation of the shrine. For his ready compliance the Prior received a pension of 100 pounds a year, a large sum in those days, while 15 of the canons received pensions varying from four to six pounds. With the shrine dismantled and the priory destroyed, the site was sold by order of Henry VIII to Thomas Sidney for 90 pounds and a private mansion was subsequently erected on the spot. Gold and silver from the shrine was taken to London along with the statue of Mary and Jesus which was later burnt. The fall of the monastery gave rise to the anonymous Elizabethan ballad, '' The Walsingham Lament'', on what the Norfolk people felt at the loss of their Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. The ballad includes the lines: :''Weep, weep, O Walsingham,'' :''Whose days are nights,'' :''Blessings turned to blasphemies,'' :''Holy deeds to despites.'' :''Sin is where our Ladye sat,'' :''Heaven turned is to hell;'' :''Satan sits where Our Lord did sway,'' :''Walsingham, O farewell!''

20th century revival

By a rescript of 6 February 1897,

Pope Leo XIII Pope Leo XIII ( it, Leone XIII; born Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci; 2 March 1810 – 20 July 1903) was the head of the Catholic Church from 20 February 1878 to his death in July 1903. Living until the age of 93, he was the second-old ...

blessed a new statue for the restored ancient sanctuary of Our Lady of Walsingham. This was sent from Rome and placed in the Holy House Chapel at the newly built Roman Catholic parish church of

King's Lynn King's Lynn, known until 1537 as Bishop's Lynn and colloquially as Lynn, is a port and market town in the borough of King's Lynn and West Norfolk in the county of Norfolk, England. It is located north of London, north-east of Peterborough, no ...

(the village of Walsingham was within the parish) on 19 August 1897 and on the following day the first post-Reformation pilgrimage took place to the

Slipper Chapel The Basilica of Our Lady of Walsingham, informally known as the Slipper Chapel or the Chapel of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, is a Catholic basilica in Houghton Saint Giles, Norfolk, England. Built in 1340, it was the last chapel on the pilgrim ...

at Walsingham, which was purchased by Charlotte Boyd(e) in 1895 and restored for Catholic use. Hundreds of Catholics attended the pilgrimage and committed themselves to an annual pilgrimage (from 1897 to 1934 on

Whitsun Whitsun (also Whitsunday or Whit Sunday) is the name used in Britain, and other countries among Anglicans and Methodists, for the Christian High Holy Day of Pentecost. It is the seventh Sunday after Easter, which commemorates the descent of the Ho ...

) to commemorate this event. The

Guild of Our Lady of Ransom The Guild of Our Lady of Ransom is a charity, founded in 1877, which supports projects and initiatives in the Catholic Church in England and Wales, through its grant programme and network of members. History In 1886, the Catholic priest, The R ...

were instrumental in the revival of the Walsingham pilgrimage, as the Guild's leader Father Fletcher had experience of organising large-scale pilgrimages of this kind all over England and Wales. Archives are kept at King's Lynn and Walsingham. In 1900, a caretaker was placed in the Priest's House at the Slipper Chapel (said to have been built in 1338); to facilitate its use by Catholic pilgrims, under the custody of the monks at

Downside Abbey Downside Abbey is a Benedictine monastery in England and the senior community of the English Benedictine Congregation. Until 2019, the community had close links with Downside School, for the education of children aged eleven to eighteen. Both t ...

. Both Father Wrigglesworth (the Catholic parish priest of King's Lynn and Walsingham) and Father Fletcher (Founder and Master of the Guild of Ransom) laid the foundations and left others to declare the Catholic National Shrine at the Slipper Chapel on 19 August 1934 with over 10,000 pilgrims present. Attempts to purchase the abbey site were unsuccessful (even though one of the Lee-Warners became a Catholic in 1899); however in 1961 the site of the original Holy House within the priory ruins was excavated by members of the

Royal Archaeological Institute The Royal Archaeological Institute (RAI) is a learned society, established in 1844, with interests in all aspects of the archaeological, architectural and landscape history of the British Isles. Membership is open to all with an interest in these ...

. As a result of the initiative of the Anglican vicar of Walsingham (from 1921), Father Alfred Hope Patten, an

Anglican Anglicanism is a Western Christian tradition that has developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the context of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. It is one of th ...

Marian shrine has been established in Walsingham. First established in the parish church of St Mary and All Saints in 1922, the image of Our Lady was translated to a purpose-built building in 1931 and pilgrimages are now held through the summer months. The Anglican National Pilgrimage takes place on the Late Spring Bank Holiday (the last Monday in May) and is regularly met by Protestant picket lines. The

Student Cross Pilgrim Cross (formerly known as Student Cross) is the annual, Ecumenical, cross-carrying, walking pilgrimage to Walsingham that takes place over Holy Week and Easter. It is the longest continuous walking pilgrimage in Britain and is walked by pilg ...

pilgrimage on

Good Friday Good Friday is a Christian holiday commemorating the crucifixion of Jesus and his death at Calvary. It is observed during Holy Week as part of the Paschal Triduum. It is also known as Holy Friday, Great Friday, Great and Holy Friday (also Hol ...

visits both the Anglican and Catholic shrines and the National Youth Pilgrimage is in the first week of August, also visiting the Anglican shrine. The Catholic shrine continues to be based at the

, near the hamlet of

Houghton St Giles Houghton may refer to: Places Australia * Houghton, South Australia, a town near Adelaide * Houghton Highway, the longest bridge in Australia, between Redcliffe and Brisbane in Queensland * Houghton Island (Queensland) Canada * Houghton Townsh ...

. Many significant occasions have been celebrated here, including the Pilgrimage of Catholic Youth (1938), the Cross Carrying Pilgrimages (since 1948), and the Crowning of Our Lady (

Marian year A Marian year is a designation given by the Catholic Church to calendar years in which Mary the mother of Jesus is to be particularly reverenced and celebrated. Marian years do not follow a set pattern; they may be declared by a bishop for his di ...

1954 and 1988). On 22 May 1982, the statue of Our Lady of Walsingham was taken to

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...

at the

Wembley Wembley () is a large suburbIn British English, "suburb" often refers to the secondary urban centres of a city. Wembley is not a suburb in the American sense, i.e. a single-family residential area outside of the city itself. in north-west Londo ...

Mass and given a place of honour during his British visit. In 2000, a new Feast of Our Lady of Walsingham was approved by the hierarchy, to be celebrated in England and

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

on 24 September.

Ecumenical Ecumenism (), also spelled oecumenism, is the concept and principle that Christians who belong to different Christian denominations should work together to develop closer relationships among their churches and promote Christian unity. The adjec ...

opportunities have been seen in Walsingham, and there is an interaction between the two shrines. In the Anglican shrine there has long-been established a small Orthodox chapel. The

Orthodox Orthodox, Orthodoxy, or Orthodoxism may refer to: Religion * Orthodoxy, adherence to accepted norms, more specifically adherence to creeds, especially within Christianity and Judaism, but also less commonly in non-Abrahamic religions like Neo-pa ...

have furthered their presence at the Church of the Holy Transfiguration, formerly the Methodist chapel at Great Walsingham, and also at the former

Walsingham railway station Walsingham was a railway station on the Wells and Fakenham Railway, later part of the Great Eastern Railway. It opened on 1 December 1857, and served the villages of Great Walsingham and Little Walsingham. It closed on 5 October 1964. The stat ...

which has been converted into the church of St Seraphim.Walsingham village website
Churches & Chapels

Little Sisters of Jesus The Little Sisters of Jesus are a community of Catholic religious sisters inspired by the life and writings of Charles de Foucauld, founded by Little Sister Magdeleine of Jesus (Madeleine Hutin). Little Sister Magdeleine of Jesus 1898 - 1989 ...

have a community of sisters in Little Walsingham since the late 1960s. There is currently also a community of

Carmelites , image = , caption = Coat of arms of the Carmelites , abbreviation = OCarm , formation = Late 12th century , founder = Early hermits of Mount Carmel , founding_location = Mount Car ...

in the village.

List of Christian sites

Little Walsingham

Shrine

Anglican Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham The Anglican Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham is a Church of England shrine church built in 1938 in Walsingham, Norfolk, England. Walsingham is the site of the reputed Marian apparitions to Richeldis de Faverches in 1061. The Virgin Mary is there ...

(

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...

) **The Chantry Chapel of Saint Michael and the Holy Souls (

Guild of All Souls The Guild of All Souls is an Anglican devotional society dedicated to prayer for faithful departed Christians. As stated on its website, it is a "devotional society praying for the souls of the Faithful Departed, and teaching the Catholic doctrin ...

) **Chapel of the Life-Giving Spring of the Mother of God (

Russian Orthodox Russian Orthodoxy (russian: Русское православие) is the body of several churches within the larger communion of Eastern Orthodox Christianity, whose liturgy is or was traditionally conducted in Church Slavonic language. Most ...

)

Churches

* St Mary and All Saints (

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 ...

)Walsingham Parishes
(Church of England) * Church of the Annunciation (

Roman Catholic 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 lette ...

parish church) *Walsingham

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's b ...

Chapel * St Seraphim (Russian Orthodox church)

Monastic ruins

Walsingham Priory Walsingham Priory was a monastery of Augustinian Canons regular in Walsingham, Norfolk, England seized by the crown at the Dissolution of the Monasteries under King Henry VIII. The priory is perhaps best known for having housed a Marian shri ...

(St Mary's Priory, or ...Abbey) Augustinian (

) - ''open to the public (fee)'' * St Mary's Friary (

Franciscan The Franciscans are a group of related Mendicant orders, mendicant Christianity, Christian Catholic religious order, religious orders within the Catholic Church. Founded in 1209 by Italian Catholic friar Francis of Assisi, these orders include t ...

; the 'Greyfriars')

Great Walsingham

Churches

*St Peter (Church of England parish church) *The Holy Transfiguration (Russian Orthodox parish church) *The Church of Our Lady of the Annunciation (Roman Catholic parish church)

Church ruin

*All Saints and St Mary (former parish church)

Houghton

Shrine

Basilica of Our Lady of Walsingham The Basilica of Our Lady of Walsingham, informally known as the Slipper Chapel or the Chapel of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, is a Catholic basilica in Houghton Saint Giles, Norfolk, England. Built in 1340, it was the last chapel on the pilgrim ...

(the "Slipper Chapel") (Roman Catholic National Shrine) **Chapel of Reconciliation (Roman Catholic)

Church

*St Giles (Church of England parish church)

Egmere

Church ruin

*St Edmund (former parish church)

Nearby

to the northeast is

Binham Priory St Mary's Priory, Binham, or Binham Priory, is a ruined Benedictine priory located in the village of Binham in the England, English county of Norfolk. Today the nave of the much larger priory church has become the ''Church of St. Mary and the Hol ...

Geography

Village green - Great Walsingham - geograph

The village is the result of a conjoining of two ancient settlements, Great Walsingham and Little Walsingham. A 19th century gazetteer describes Little Walsingham as a small town, known simply as Walsingham and which had also been known as New Walsingham,GENUKI
Little Walsingham and Great Walsingham as a smaller, separate village which had also been known as Old Walsingham. A

market Market is a term used to describe concepts such as: *Market (economics), system in which parties engage in transactions according to supply and demand *Market economy *Marketplace, a physical marketplace or public market Geography *Märket, an ...

once held on Tuesdays had already become defunct by 1845, whilst the Friday market was already "small" in 1845 and had ceased by 1883. The

River Stiffkey The River Stiffkey is a chalk stream running through an area of north Norfolk, England from its source near Swanton Novers to flow out into the North Sea on the north Norfolk coast near the village of Stiffkey. The river has been dredged histori ...

flows through the parish, from south to north, passing to the east of bulk of the village. The centre of Little Walsingham is at an elevation of around and lies within the Stiffkey valley, with the land rising to the east and west — to the west it rises to around at Egmere.

National Cycle Route 1 The cycle-path is located in the United Kingdom. Route Dover to Canterbury Dover , Deal , Sandwich , Canterbury Links with National Cycle Route 2, Regional route 16, and Regional route 17 in Dover. Leaves Dover passing Dover Castle. S ...

passes through the village.

Ordnance Survey , nativename_a = , nativename_r = , logo = Ordnance Survey 2015 Logo.svg , logo_width = 240px , logo_caption = , seal = , seal_width = , seal_caption = , picture = , picture_width = , picture_caption = , formed = , preceding1 = , di ...

1:25000 The former North Creake airfield lies within the parish, just north of Egmere, together with the area known as Bunker's Hill, which is a commercial/industrial area following the disuse as an airfield.

Governance

There is a parish council, which meets at the Village Hall. The parish is divided into Great and Little wards, which reflect the two former

es that have merged. A

ward Ward may refer to: Division or unit * Hospital ward, a hospital division, floor, or room set aside for a particular class or group of patients, for example the psychiatric ward * Prison ward, a division of a penal institution such as a pris ...

exists, for the purpose of electing a councillor to

North Norfolk District Council North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography. Etymology The word ''north'' is ...

(one of 40), called Walsingham. The current councillor is Tom FitzPatrick, with the most recent election in 2019. The ward had a population of 2,167 in 2011. Since 2019 boundary changes, the ward comprises the parishes of Barsham,

Great Snoring Great Snoring is a rural village in North Norfolk by the River Stiffkey, in the east of England. It is situated approximately north-west from the city and county town of Norwich, and north from the larger village of Little Snoring. At th ...

, Little Snoring, Sculthorpe and Walsingham. From 1894 to 1974

Walsingham Rural District Walsingham Rural District was a rural district in the county of Norfolk, England. It was created in 1894. On 1 April 1935 it was enlarged by the addition of the parishes of Hindolveston, Thurning, Wood Norton (from the disbanded Aylsham Rural ...

existed, though the council was based in

. ''The Shirehall'' on Common Place served as a courtroom until 1974. In present times the building is open as a museum, and belongs to the Walsingham Estate. The village has another museum building: the former House of Correction, or ''The Bridewell''. Egmere and Quarles were merged into the civil parish of Great Walsingham in 1935, but Quarles then transferred to Holkham in 1947. In ecclesiastic respects, Walsingham falls within the Church of England

diocese of Norwich The Diocese of Norwich is an ecclesiastical jurisdiction or diocese of the Church of England that forms part of the Province of Canterbury in England. History It traces its roots in an unbroken line to the diocese of the Bishop of the East A ...

and the

Roman Catholic Diocese of East Anglia The Roman Catholic Diocese of East Anglia is a diocese of the Latin Church of the Roman Catholic Church covering the counties of Cambridgeshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, and Peterborough in eastern England. The diocese makes up part of the Catholic Ass ...

Transport

Wells and Walsingham Light Railway

Walsingham used to be connected to the national railway network, being on the Wymondham to Wells Branch line, but this was closed during the

Beeching Axe The Beeching cuts (also Beeching Axe) was a plan to increase the efficiency of the nationalised railway system in Great Britain. The plan was outlined in two reports: ''The Reshaping of British Railways'' (1963) and ''The Development of the ...

in stages from 1964 to 1969. In 1979 work began on constructing a gauge

heritage railway A heritage railway or heritage railroad (US usage) is a railway operated as living history to re-create or preserve railway scenes of the past. Heritage railways are often old railway lines preserved in a state depicting a period (or periods) i ...

on the old track bed to

Wells Wells most commonly refers to: * Wells, Somerset, a cathedral city in Somerset, England * Well, an excavation or structure created in the ground * Wells (name) Wells may also refer to: Places Canada *Wells, British Columbia England * Wells ...

. The line re-opened in 1982 and now operates with a fleet of steam and diesel scale locomotives. A new station was constructed in Walsingham. The

building (with platform still intact and visible) is now

Saint Seraphim Seraphim of Sarov (russian: Серафим Саровский; – ), born Prókhor Isídorovich Moshnín (Mashnín) �ро́хор Иси́дорович Мошни́н (Машни́н) is one of the most renowned Russian saints and is vener ...

's Orthodox church.

Public transport

A regular bus service is provided as Walsingham is on the ''Coastliner'' bus route (service number 36) with destinations including Fakenham, Wells,

Hunstanton Hunstanton () is a seaside town in Norfolk, England, which had a population of 4,229 at the 2011 Census. It faces west across The Wash, making it one of the few places on the east coast of Great Britain where the sun sets over the sea. Hunstant ...

and

.LynxBus
Coastliner 36

Other places named Walsingham

Walsingham, Ontario Norfolk County in the Canadian province of Ontario consists of a long list of communities. Its four designated population centres are Simcoe, Port Dover, Delhi, and Waterford. The population of the County at the time of the 2016 Census was 64,0 ...

, Canada *Walsingham,

Canterbury, New Zealand Canterbury ( mi, Waitaha) is a region of New Zealand, located in the central-eastern South Island. The region covers an area of , making it the largest region in the country by area. It is home to a population of The region in its current f ...

*Walsingham and Walsingham Bay in

Hamilton Hamilton may refer to: People * Hamilton (name), a common British surname and occasional given name, usually of Scottish origin, including a list of persons with the surname ** The Duke of Hamilton, the premier peer of Scotland ** Lord Hamilt ...

, Bermuda * Walsingham House School, South Bombay, India.

References

External links

Walsingham Village Website
including information from Walsingham Parish Council and other groups in the village {{authority control Civil parishes in Norfolk North Norfolk Anglo-Catholicism Shrines to the Virgin Mary Christian pilgrimages Monasteries in Norfolk Religion in Norfolk

Name

Priory

20th century revival

List of Christian sites

Little Walsingham

Shrine

Churches

Monastic ruins

Great Walsingham

Churches

Church ruin

Houghton

Shrine

Church

Egmere

Church ruin

Nearby

Geography

Governance

Transport

Wells and Walsingham Light Railway

Public transport

Other places named Walsingham

See also

References

External links