Aberford 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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

on the eastern outskirts of the

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, England. It had a population of 1,059 at the 2001 census, increasing to 1,180 at the 2011 Census. It is situated east, north east of

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and west of the

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Etymology

The name 'Aberford' comes from the

Old English Old English ( or , or ), 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 developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...

woman's name ''Ēadburg'' and ''ford'', which, then as now, meant 'ford'. The name meant 'Eadburg's ford'. This suggests the settlement's once-strategic importance. The name was recorded as ''Ædburford'' in 1176 and ''Ædburgford'' in 1177, ''Ebberford'' in the 13th century and ''Aberford'' from 1208.

History

Aberford is where the ancient Great North Road crosses over the Cock River (now reduced in volume as the Cock Beck). Aberford was the midway point on the road between London and Edinburgh, being around distant from each city. The construction of the

bypassed the village starting at Hook Moor. On the north side of the river the Aberford Dykes earthworks were constructed to defend the crossing. The buried remains of a Roman fort have been found beneath Aberford House. The bridge dates from the 18th century. Aberford was in the ancient Kingdom of Elmet, the name given to the parliamentary constituency. An

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons, in some contexts simply called Saxons or the English, were a Cultural identity, cultural group who spoke Old English and inhabited much of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. They traced t ...

gold ring, inscribed with the name of King Alfred the Great's sister Æthelswith, was found in a ploughed field near the village in 1870. It was bequeathed by A. W. Franks to the

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

in 1897. In the 17th century the village was a major place for the manufacture of pins. Aberford's growth was along the road and the village has developed a linear rather than nucleated profile. Since the early 1990s much new housing has been constructed, as increasing

affluence Wealth is the abundance of Value (economics), valuable financial assets or property, physical possessions which can be converted into a form that can be used for financial transaction, transactions. This includes the core meaning as held in the ...

allows people to move away from city centres to

rural In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry are typically desc ...

and

suburban A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

areas. Aberford adjoins the Parlington Estate, and was the northern terminus of the private Aberford Railway.

Geology

Geologically, Aberford lies slightly east of the narrow basal sandstone boundary between the central Leeds Coal Measures and much harder magnesian limestone deposits, in an area shaped heavily by

subsidence Subsidence is a general term for downward vertical movement of the Earth's surface, which can be caused by both natural processes and human activities. Subsidence involves little or no horizontal movement, which distinguishes it from slope mov ...

of the underlying Coal Measures.

Buildings

Aberford is considered "a place of special architectural and historic interest". Some notable buildings are: * St Ricarius Church. The parish church is an 1861 rebuilding of a 12th-century one. * The Gascoigne Almshouses designed by George Fowler Jones was built by sisters Mary Isabella and Elizabeth Gascoigne of Parlington Hall in 1844 to commemorate their father, Richard Oliver Gascoigne and two brothers who died in quick succession. They are grade II* listed buildings. * Aberford House is a classical 18th century mansion on Main Street. * The Swan Hotel, previously a staging post used by those travelling the Great North Road. * The Arabian Horse Inn is one of a very few

public house A pub (short for public house) is in several countries a drinking establishment licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption Licensing laws of the United Kingdom#On-licence, on the premises. The term first appeared in England in the ...

s in the UK with this name, and a landmark with the conservation area. Aberford

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

primary School is affiliated with the parish church adjacent to it. The school was originally a

tithe barn A tithe barn was a type of barn used in much of northern Europe in the Middle Ages for storing rents and tithes. Farmers were required to give one-tenth of their produce to the established church. Tithe barns were usually associated with the ...

and is owned by the Archdeacon of York following its transfer from the Vicar of Aberford. Previously, it and much of the village was owned by Oriel College, Oxford, which received tithes from Aberford. At the northern boundary is the A64 road from Leeds to York and

Scarborough Scarborough or Scarboro may refer to: People * Scarborough (surname) * Earl of Scarbrough Places Australia * Scarborough, Western Australia, suburb of Perth * Scarborough, New South Wales, suburb of Wollongong * Scarborough, Queensland, sub ...

. At the south end of Aberford is what used to be Hicklam Mill Farm now a small certified caravan and camping site.

Gallery

File:St Ricarius Church, Aberford 31 May 2017.jpg, St Ricarius Church File:White Swan at Aberford.jpg, The Swan a former public house File:Aberford Almshouses 14 June 2017.jpg, Gascoigne Almshouses File:Arabian Horse, Aberford (22nd March 2014) 002.JPG, The Arabian Horse public house File:Aberford Bridge over Cock Beck, Aberford 31 May 2017.jpg, Aberford Bridge over the Cock Beck. The arches show the former width File:Royal Oak at Aberford.jpg, The Royal Oak a former public house

Location grid

References

Sources

* *

External links

Aberford community website with local news and parish council informationA comprehensive History of Parlington Hall, and features associated with the hall like the Ice House, the Dark Arch and the Triumphal Arch.'Aberford C of E School
* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20030929025857/http://www.biffvernon.freeserve.co.uk/contents.htm Details on the Great North Roadbr>The Aberford Railway (Fly Line), at the LNER EncyclopediaPhotos of Aberford and surrounding area on geographLeodis
View photographs of Aberford on the Leeds photographic archive. {{authority control Villages in West Yorkshire City of Leeds Civil parishes in West Yorkshire