Challacombe is a small village on the edge of the

Exmoor National Park Exmoor is loosely defined as an area of hilly open moorland in west Somerset and north Devon in South West England. It is named after the River Exe, the source of which is situated in the centre of the area, two miles north-west of Simonsbath. ...

, in

Devon Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devo ...

, England. The village has a small general shop/Post Office and a single pub, the Black Venus. The village is on the B3358 road and is 5 miles west of Simonsbath.

Landmarks

Believed to be the only inn in England bearing this name, The Black Venus Inn is an old stone-built pub, a historic 16th century building with low ceiling and original beams. West Challacombe Manor is a medieval manor house in the area. It is described as a "white-washed house with rendered walls and Georgian framed windows on the south slope of Little Hangman Hill and looks like an archetypal Devon farmhouse rather than a medieval manor house." It was restored between 1993-1999. Also of note is the historic Packhorse Bridge and Challacombe Church. The nearby Shoulsbury castle is an

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 mostl ...

hill fort 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 ...

Etymology

Challacombe, Simonsbath road at the Black Venus - geograph

The name 'Challacombe' literally means 'cold valley'. The name derives from the

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th c ...

words ''ceald'' ('cold') and ''cumb'' ('valley'). The village was recorded as ''Celdecomba'' in 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 manus ...

References

External links

Official site
* Villages in Devon * Exmoor {{authority control