Dewlish 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 authorit ...

in the

county A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposes Chambers 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. Covering an area of , ...

in southern England, and is situated approximately north-east of the county town Dorchester. The village is sited in the valley of the small Devil's Brook among the

chalk Chalk is a soft, white, porous, sedimentary carbonate rock. It is a form of limestone composed of the mineral calcite and originally formed deep under the sea by the compression of microscopic plankton that had settled to the sea floor. Ch ...

hills of the

Dorset Downs The Dorset Downs are an area of chalk downland in the centre of the county Dorset in south west England. The downs are the most western part of a larger chalk formation which also includes (from west to east) Cranborne Chase, Salisbury Plain, H ...

; the parish covers about and extends west to include part of the valley of the small Cheselbourne stream, and east to include a dry valley at Dennet's Bottom. The surrounding area is part of the Dorset

Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty An Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB; , AHNE) is an area of countryside in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, that has been designated for conservation due to its significant landscape value. Areas are designated in recognition of ...

(AONB). In the 2011 census the parish had a population of 284. Dewlish was also the main part of the

Liberty Liberty is the ability to do as one pleases, or a right or immunity enjoyed by prescription or by grant (i.e. privilege). It is a synonym for the word freedom. In modern politics, liberty is understood as the state of being free within society fr ...

of the same name, including Dewlish itself and a part of

Milborne St Andrew Milborne St Andrew is a village and civil parish in the county of Dorset in southern England. It is situated on the A354 road, northeast of the county town Dorchester, in a winterbourne valley on the dip slope of the Dorset Downs. In the 2 ...

Dewlish House

One of the most significant properties in the area,

Dewlish House Dewlish House is a country house near Dewlish in Dorset. It is a Grade I Listed building. History Dewlish House, built in 1702, became the home of the Michel family in the 1756. It served as the childhood home of John Michel (who later became a ...

was built in 1702. It served as the childhood home of

John Michel Field Marshal Sir John Michel (1 September 1804 – 23 May 1886) was a British Army officer. He commanded the 6th Regiment of Foot during the Eighth Xhosa War in 1851 and served as Chief of Staff of the British Army's Turkish contingent during ...

(who later became a field marshal) from 1804 to 1823 and later served as his retirement home between 1880 and 1886. Recently owned by Mr and Mrs Anthony Boyden (from 1962 to 2020) the Grade I-listed Queen Anne style house and its property were sold in 2020. The buyer was an American already living in the UK.

Church of All Saints

The parish church of All Saints, south of the village, is a Grade II* listed building.The oldest parts of the building are of the 12th century, and it was modified and enlarged in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries. There was restoration in 1872 by T. H. Wyatt, when the south aisle was remodelled and an organ chamber was added. In the north aisle is a monument to Sir John Michel (1886).

History and prehistory

Court Close

To the east and south of the parish church and west of the Devil's Brook there are earthworks, the remains of a former settlement. They are a

scheduled monument In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change. The various pieces of legislation that legally protect heritage assets from damage and d ...

. On the

tithe map The term tithe map is usually applied to a map of an English or Welsh parish or township, prepared following the Tithe Commutation Act 1836. This act allowed tithes to be paid in cash rather than goods. The map and its accompanying schedule gave ...

of 1844 it has the name Court Close. It covers an area of about . Most of it is occupied by a large embanked enclosure, within which there are banks and scarps; its purpose is unknown. In the east there is a small rectangular moat, once probably enclosing a manor house.

Roman villa

About 1740 the

tessellated A tessellation or tiling is the covering of a surface, often a plane, using one or more geometric shapes, called ''tiles'', with no overlaps and no gaps. In mathematics, tessellation can be generalized to higher dimensions and a variety of ...

pavement of a

Roman villa A Roman villa was typically a farmhouse or country house built in the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, sometimes reaching extravagant proportions. Typology and distribution Pliny the Elder (23–79 AD) distinguished two kinds of villas n ...

was discovered in the village, near Michel's Farm. In 1971 a full excavation began of the site; by 1973, 24 rooms of the villa, including a bath suite, had been revealed. Further excavation established that there were three main settlement areas, dating from the

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 ...

, early

Roman 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 ...

and late Roman, an occupation period of 400 to 500 years. In February 2021 it was announced that a mosaic from the Roman villa, discovered in 1974, showing a leopard attacking an antelope, would be displayed in the Dorset County Museum at Dorchester, after £150,000 was raised to buy it. It had been bought at auction in 2018 for an international collector, but export was suspended. Jon Murden, director of the museum, said that the piece was "one of the most significant 4th-century Roman mosaics in the country"."Dewlish Roman mosaic: Museum bids to save artwork from export"
BBC, 16 October 2020. Retrieved 19 April 2021.

Mammoths

In the 19th century the remains of two prehistoric

mammoths A mammoth is any species of the extinct elephantid genus ''Mammuthus'', one of the many genera that make up the order of trunked mammals called proboscideans. The various species of mammoth were commonly equipped with long, curved tusks and, i ...

, dating from about one million years BC, were found in the hillside above the village; two of the tusks were taken to the county museum at Dorchester.

References

External links

Dewlish Cricket Club
{{authority control Villages in Dorset