Melbury Hill, whose summit is also called Melbury Beacon,''Melbury Hill, Compton Abbas and Fontmell Down''
at DorsetLife. Accessed on 26 Mar 2013. is a prominent hill, 263 metres high, on the high chalk escarpment of the North Dorset Downs above the village of

Melbury Abbas Melbury Abbas is a village and civil parish in north Dorset, England, 3 km SSW of the town of Shaftesbury, east of the A350 Shaftesbury to Blandford Forum road. Local Features Melbury Abbas is on the western edge of Cranborne Chase in hilly ...

in the county of

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 England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. From Melbury Beacon there are superb panoramic views of

Blackmore Vale The Blackmore Vale (; less commonly spelt ''Blackmoor'') is a vale, or wide valley, in north Dorset, and to a lesser extent south Somerset and southwest Wiltshire in southern England. Geography The vale is part of the Stour valley, part of th ...

and

Cranborne Chase Cranborne Chase () is an area of central southern England, straddling the counties Dorset, Hampshire and Wiltshire. It is part of the Cranborne Chase and West Wiltshire Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB). The area is dominated by, ...

, as well as the Saxon hilltop town of

Shaftesbury Shaftesbury () is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England. It is situated on the A30 road, west of Salisbury, near the border with Wiltshire. It is the only significant hilltop settlement in Dorset, being built about above sea level on a ...

less than 2 miles to the north. In 1588 an Armada beacon sited here formed part of a chain of signal beacons from

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

to Plymouth. There is a trig point on the summit and a

National Trust The National Trust, formally the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, is a charity and membership organisation for heritage conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, there is a separate and ...

-owned wood on its western flank above the A350 from Blandford Forum to

.Ordnance Survey 1:50,000 Landranger series, No. 183.

References

{{Reflist Hills of Dorset