Beaminster
| Beaminster | |||
|---|---|---|---|
 |
|||
| Coordinates | 50 ° 49 ′ N , 2 ° 44 ′ W | ||
| OS National Grid | ST4701 | ||
|
|||
| Residents | 3097 (as of 2014) | ||
| surface | 2.097 km² (0.81 mi² ) | ||
| Population density: | 1477 inhabitants per km² | ||
| administration | |||
| Post town | Beaminster | ||
| prefix | 01308 | ||
| Part of the country | England | ||
| Ceremonial county | Dorset | ||
| Unitary authority | Dorset | ||
| Civil Parish | Beaminster | ||
| Website: Beaminster Town Council | |||
Beaminster is a small town with the status of a town and at the same time a civil parish in Dorset in the south-west of England with 3097 inhabitants, as of 2014.
geography
Beaminster is located in a basin on the upper reaches of the Brit , which rises from several source streams a little north and flows into Lyme Bay , a bay of the English Channel , after around ten kilometers at West Bay . In the north and east of the city stretch the Dorset Downs , a ridge that marks the sparsely populated southwestern extension of the Cretaceous limestone found in southern England . The highest point in the district is located here on the 244 meter high Beaminster Down . To the west of Beaminster is the 174 meter high Gerrard's Hill, the city area itself is between 50 and 80 meters high.
Neighboring parishes, starting north and going clockwise, are South Perrott, Chedington, Corscombe, Mapperton , Netherbury, Stoke Abbott, Broadwindsor, and Mosterton . The area of the municipality is 2,097 square kilometers, it extends in the north to the heights of the Dorset Downs.
history
The place was first mentioned in the seventh century as Bebyngminster . The name goes back to a woman named Bebbe and also refers to a minster . It is mentioned in a pamphlet with donations to Gloucester Abbey , possibly in the ninth century . As a result, the minster lost its leading role to the church in the southern village of Netherbury.
The 11th century Domesday Book gives Betminster 79 households. In 1284, Beaminster was given the right to hold a weekly market and a three-day fair once a year. The regional trade in wool and the processing of the locally grown flax into canvas, sacks, ropes and cords were of particular economic importance .
In his travel reports, published between 1535 and 1543, John Leland described Beaminster as a pretty market town ( English a praety market town ). Beaminster sided with Parliament during the English Civil War . Royalist units that occupied the city in 1644 set it on fire: three quarters of all buildings were destroyed. Beaminster was hit by other fires in 1684 and 1781.
With the Horn Hill Tunnel, which opened in 1832, the road connection between Beaminster and the north improved. The city was not connected to the railway network.
Buildings
Around the central market square, The Square, with the Robinson Memorial built in 1906 , as well as on the roads leading to it, there are numerous two to three-story houses from the 17th to 19th centuries. A total of 183 buildings and facilities in the city are classified as culturally and historically significant: 164 listed buildings in Category II, 13 in Category II * as well as Parnham House and the Church of St. Mary in the highest Category I. There are also two Bronze Age barrows on Beaminster Down as a Scheduled Monument and the parks of Parnham House and Beaminster Manor.
Personalities
- Thomas Sprat (1635–1713), Bishop of Rochester
- Graham Stansfield, pseud. Graham Field (1940-2018), organist & composer, founder of the prog rock band " Rare Bird " (Song 'Sympathy', No.1 hit in EU 1969)
- PJ Harvey (* 1969), alternative singer and songwriter, went to school in Beaminster
- Samuel Hearne (1745–1792), explorer, fur trader, author and naturalist, grew up in Beaminster
literature
- Her Majesty's Stationery Office: An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Dorset, Volume 1, West, London 1952, pp. 17-27. Digitized on the British History Online website. (English)
- John Newman; Nikolaus Pevsner : Dorset. The Buildings of England. (1972) ISBN 0-14-071044-2 .
Web links
- Beaminster Town Council (English)
- Visit Beaminster (English)
- Population statistics on the Dorset Administration geoserver
- Beaminster at opcdorset.org
- Beaminster, Dorset at visionofbritain.org (English)
- Beaminster in the Ordnance Survey database
Individual evidence
- ^ NCA Profile 134: Dorset Downs and Cranborne Chase (NE494). Landscape profile on Natural England website , accessed November 26, 2017
- ↑ Information on the location and area of the district on the website of the Office for National Statistics . (English)
- ↑ Information on the minster at Pastscape.org, Historic England , accessed on November 28, 2017. (English)
- ↑ Beaminster at Opendomesday.org, accessed on November 26, 2017 (English)
- ↑ Beaminster Parish database query on the Historic England website, carried out on November 27, 2017. (English)