The River Hooke is a small river 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 ...

. It runs from its source at

Toller Whelme Toller Whelme is a small hamlet in Dorset, England, situated in the civil parish of Corscombe approximately east of Beaminster, north of Bridport and north-west of Dorchester. There are seven homes in the hamlet: West Farm, Norcombe Hayes, Man ...

through the villages and hamlets of

Hooke Hooke may refer to: * Hooke, Dorset, England ** River Hooke, nearby watercourse * Robert Hooke (1635–1703), English natural philosopher who discovered Hooke's law * Hooke (surname), a surname * Hooke (lunar crater) * Hooke (Martian crater) * ...

, Kingcombe,

Toller Porcorum Toller Porcorum () is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England, situated in the Toller valley northwest of Dorchester. In the 2011 census the civil parish—which also includes the small settlements of Higher and Lower Kingcombe to the n ...

and

Toller Fratrum Toller Fratrum () is a very small village and civil parish in Dorset, England, near Maiden Newton, anciently in Tollerford Hundred. The name is taken from the village's situation on the brook formerly known as the Toller, now called the Hooke. ...

to join the River Frome at

Maiden Newton Maiden Newton is a village and civil parish in the county of Dorset in south-west England. It lies within the Dorset Council administrative area, about north-west of the county town, Dorchester. Geography The village is sited on Upper Greens ...

, a course of some 6 miles. The river was formerly called the River Toller, whence the name of the three Toller villages, as well as of the hundred of Tollerford. At some point, however, this former name was replaced in use by reference to a particular feature in the river's course: "Hooke" is a derivation of ''hoc'',

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 ...

for "sharp bend in a stream". It is possible that this description gave the village of Hooke its name, which then transferred to the river by back-formation. Although the River Hooke is flanked on both sides by

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 ...

slopes 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 ...

, in its course it has cut down to

greensand Greensand or green sand is a sand or sandstone which has a greenish color. This term is specifically applied to shallow marine sediment that contains noticeable quantities of rounded greenish grains. These grains are called ''glauconies'' and co ...

. According to the Dorset-born author and broadcaster

Ralph Wightman Ralph Wightman (26 July 1901 – 28 May 1971) was an English lecturer, journalist, author, and radio and television broadcaster. He wrote many books on farming and the countryside and in the 1950s and 1960s became a well-known national figure, esp ...

, this has resulted in "many springy and boggy patches which are not typical of chalk valleys." Writing in 1965, Wightman commented that at Hooke village itself "the largest spring I have ever seen used to gush out of the steep hillside, and was immediately used for watercress."Wightman, R., ''Portrait of Dorset'', Hale, 1983, p94

References

External links

Geology and map of the Hooke Valley
*

2Hooke {{England-river-stub

See also

References

External links