Ebernoe is a
hamlet
''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...
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 authorit ...
in the
District of Chichester in
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ...
, England, and north of
Petworth near the A283 road.
The parish has a land area of . In the 2001 census 234 people lived in 102 households of whom 107 were economically active. The 2011 Census indicated a population of 213.
[
Hidden from the road by trees is the Anglican parish church, built from locally made brick in the nineteenth century. Walled to exclude rabbits the churchyard is a haven for wild flowers. Adjoining the church there is another old building, the Old Schoolhouse.
There is a ]cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by str ...
field where the village team plays and through which a road runs. This is also the venue for the Ebernoe Horn Fair
Ebernoe Horn Fair is held in the small Sussex village of Ebernoe, the location of which is about five miles north of Petworth (). The fair is held annually on Saint James's Day, 25 July. The tradition is centuries old though it appears to have ...
held every 25 July.
Landmarks
Ebernoe Common is a national nature reserve and Site of Special Scientific Interest managed by the Sussex Wildlife Trust. Among its ancient woodland, glades and ponds it supports a diversity of plants and animals, including 14 out of 16 species of bat which occur in the UK, including the rare Bechstein's and Barbastelle bats. Adjoining farmland has been purchased with a grant from Restore UKRestore UK
/ref> which will be allowed to revert to pasture woodland over a long period with managed grazing by cattle.
The Barbastelle bats need old dying trees with loose bark for their roosts and travel great distances along traditional flight lines to feed over damp meadows, which may be as much as 20 kilometres from the roost, in the Arun and Rother valleys. Local landowners are being encouraged to maintain and enhance continuous tree cover along these routes so that the bats can travel out on summer evenings avoiding predation by sparrow hawks.
The ponds on the common were constructed for the iron industry and there is also an old brick works which is thought to have been supplying bricks to Petworth House. Ebernoe Furnace Pond was established in 1594 by the Smythes of Wassell to make pig iron for Wassell Forge, at Kirdford. The waters are hidden in woodland on the large Ebernoe Common, an ancient woodland and nature reserve managed by the Sussex Wildlife Trust.
Wassell Mill was formerly a corn-mill and prior to the mid-17th century was a forge for iron working. A stream was dammed to give water power and this arrangement was visible in the area in 1980s, although the water-wheel itself was missing. A short distance from Wassell Mill is a house called Little Wassel, which is believed to have been the miller's house until 1843, when corn milling ceased.
References
{{authority control
Villages in West Sussex