Bungay (Suffolk)
| Bungay | |||
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| Coordinates | 52 ° 27 ′ N , 1 ° 26 ′ E | ||
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| Residents | 5138 (as of 2017) | ||
| administration | |||
| Post town | BUNGAY | ||
| ZIP code section | NR35 | ||
| prefix | 01986 | ||
| Part of the country | England | ||
| region | East of England | ||
| Shire county | Suffolk | ||
| District | East Suffolk | ||
Bungay is a small British town in Suffolk , East Anglia (East Anglia) , England . There is also a community ( Parish ) and carries the title of Town .
geography
Bungay is located in the East Suffolk District in northeast Suffolk on the right bank of the River Waveney . Here it forms a loop about two kilometers to the north , at whose narrowest point, about four hundred meters wide, lies the old town. It extends on the west as well as on the east side of the river, which can be crossed there with a bridge. Since the Waveney forms the northern border of Suffolk here, Bungay borders the county of Norfolk in three directions .
Neighboring parishes to Bungay are, starting to the east and going clockwise, Mettingham , St John, Ilketshall , St Margaret, Ilketshall , Flixton (The Saints Ward) , Earsham , Ditchingham and Broome . The latter three are in the Norfolk area. After Beccles there are about seven kilometers downstream. The next larger cities are Lowestoft, on the east coast of England's North Sea , and Norwich , the administrative seat of Norfolk, both around 25 km away. The capital of Suffolk, Ipswich , is a good 50 km. At the time of the 2011 census, the population was 5127, in 2017 it was estimated at 5138. The area of the district is 10.7 km² .
history
The settlement of the urban area in Roman times suggests numerous individual finds as well as the remains of a Roman road in the area. The Borough Well , one walled source , may also be traced back to this period. In the area of Joyce Road there was a cemetery from the earliest Anglo-Saxon times (6th to 7th centuries). The origin of the name Bunincga-haye with the meaning of the fenced-in area of a Saxon tribal leader named Bonna is also located in this phase .
Important landowners in the early 11th century were a Godric and Bishop Stigand . After the conquest of England by the Normans in 1066, their property went to William de Noyers. He is considered to be the one who had a moth built on the site of the later Bungay Castle to protect against the local population . In the Domesday Book , written in the late 11th century, the landlords named Stigand for 1066 and Warin, son of Burnin for 1086. It reports of 215 households, which makes the settlement relatively large.
With the expansion of the Motte into a castle under Hugh Bigod and his descendants , the street system of the inner city, which still exists today, developed on its edge in the course of the 12th century. Bungay was initially given the right to hold a fair in May and September . This was expanded in 1382 by King Richard II to hold a weekly market every Thursday, which is still practiced today. As Roger Bigod, 5th Earl of Norfolk had no descendants, the castle fell to the crown. It subsequently came into different hands, but increasingly fell into disrepair. In 1382 it was described as old, ruined and worthless. The town, on the other hand, flourished, probably thanks to local weaving mills and tanneries as well as trade along the river.
In March 1688 large parts of the city were devastated by a major fire. This affected, among other things, the Benedictine convent founded in 1160 , the school that had existed since at least 1592, the Church of St Mary, both market crosses and the houses of 190 families. The subsequent reconstruction, which also included a generously designed market square, lifted the city from other places in eastern England and subsequently led to Bungay becoming a popular place of residence for the landed gentry . The streets were paved and lighted, there was a large selection of different specialty shops as well as numerous accommodation options and restaurants. The upswing continued in the 18th and 19th centuries. One of the two market crosses, the Butter Cross with its distinctive roof, received a statue of Justitia in 1754 . In 1773 a theater was built in the courtyard, and a small spa was built in neighboring Ditchingham . This gave Bungay the reputation of “Little London ”.
Bungay today
Today, Bungay is considered a lively small town and at the same time the starting point for excursions in the surrounding area. There are two primary schools and one secondary school. The theater, which was reopened around 1858 at a location different from the Fisher Theater , was later converted into a cinema, and today it functions as an event and cultural center. Medical care is provided by a medical center, the closest hospital is in Ditchingham.
Politics and administration
In the traditional county system of England , the two parts of Bungay within Suffolk were part of the Wangford Hundred. As a communal unit, Bungay was only created in 1910 from the merger of Bungay St Mary and Bungay Holy Trinity and at the same time upgrading to an urban district . With the entry into force of the Local Government Act 1972 in April 1974, this went on in the Waveney district , at the same time Bungay received as a so-called "Successor Parish" the status of a community with the title of a town . As a result of Waveney's merger with Suffolk Coastal , Bungay has been in the East Suffolk district since April 2019 .
Bungay has a town council of thirteen, the Town Council , which is chaired by a mayor, the Town Mayor , who is elected annually from among its own ranks .
A special feature, and now almost unique for England, is the existence of a Town Reeves , who is at the head of a group of Feoffees . Such institutions, dating back to the time of the Anglo-Saxons, also carried out administrative tasks in other communities, but were abolished there in the course of the late 19th century. They are also available in Ashburton in Devon and as Portreeve in Laugharne in Wales . In Bungay, among other things, they are responsible as trustees for the maintenance and administration of the market cross, the agricultural areas owned by the city and 13 social housing, the Almhouses .
Buildings
The Druid's Stone (also known as the Devil's Stone or Giant's Grave) is a boulder in the St Mary's cemetery .
A total of 190 buildings and facilities in the city are classified as culturally and historically significant. As listed buildings in the highest category I, these are the churches Holy Trinity and St Mary as well as Bungay Castle and the Buttercross market cross , whereby the latter two are also designated as Scheduled Monument . Another four structures are classified in category II *, 181 in category II. There is also another Scheduled Monument with the Castle Hills , remains of the castle's fortifications.
Black Dog of Bungay
Legend has it that on August 4, 1577, during a heavy storm, the devil appeared in the city disguising a large black dog . He attacked a group of believers gathered in prayer in St Mary's Church and killed some of them. As suddenly as it had come, it disappeared again, only to appear a short time later in Blythburgh, twenty kilometers away, and appear similarly destructive. This Black Dog of Bungay can now be found as a helmet ornament in the city's coat of arms, and a weather vane on a street lamp in the form of a dog reminds of this incident, which belongs to the group of sightings of a Black Shuck .
traffic
In Bungay, the A 143 on its way from Lowestoft to Bury St Edmunds meets the A 144 coming from Halesworth .
In 1860 Bungay received a station on the newly built Waveney Valley Railway . It linked the city with Beccles and Tivetshall . In 1953 the passenger and 1966 the freight traffic on the route was stopped. The line has meanwhile been dismantled, and the city's bypass road now runs along its route. Today, Bungay can be reached in public transport by several bus routes. Local transport needs are covered by a system similar to that of citizens , which was originally built in Beccles, but has now also included the area around Bungay.
Personalities
Born here
- Clarke Abel (1789–1826), physician, naturalist and botanist
- Andrew Gilding (* 1970), darts player
Known residents
The singer Charlie Winston grew up here; the writer Elizabeth Jane Howard lived and died here.
literature
- William White: Bungay . In: History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Suffolk, and the Towns Near Its Borders , Sheffield 1844, pp. 424–436 (English)
- Alfred Suckling: Bungay . In: The History and Antiquities of the County of Suffolk: Volume 1 , Ipswich 1846, pp. 119–161 (English)
Web links
- City Council website
- City website
- Bungay Parish, Local Area Report Population statistics on the Office for National Statistics website NOMIS, as of 2011
- Bungay on the Ordnance Survey website
- Bungay at Vision of Britain
Individual evidence
- ↑ Population data on the county administration's data server, accessed April 21, 2019. (English)
- ↑ Entry on Bungay at Opendomesday.org, accessed on April 19, 2019. (English)
- ↑ Entry Bungay Castle in Historic England's List of Listed Objects , accessed April 19, 2019. (English)
- ↑ Wangford Hundred at Vision of Britain, accessed April 23, 2019.
- ↑ Number 1 in: The English Non-metropolitan Districts (Definition) Order 1972, Schedule 1, Part 35 on the UK Government's Law Server, accessed on April 14, 2019 (English)
- ↑ The Local Government (Successor Parishes) Order 1973, Schedule Part I on the UK Government's Legislative Server, accessed April 23, 2019
- ↑ The Town Reeve and the Town Trust on the Bungay website, accessed April 22, 2019.
- ^ Website of the Bungay Town Trust , accessed April 21, 2019. (English)
- ↑ Database query Bungay Parish on the website of Historic England, carried out on April 19, 2019. (English)
- ↑ Key facts about the Waveney Valley Railway on the county administration's Norfolk Heritage Explorer, accessed April 21, 2019. (English)
- ^ Bungay Station on the East Anglian Railway Archives website, accessed April 21, 2019. (English)
- ↑ Overview of bus routes in the Bungay and Beccles area on the county administration's website, accessed April 21, 2019. (English)
- ^ Website of the Citizens Bus Association , accessed on April 21, 2019. (English)