Swaffham Prior
| Swaffham Prior | |||
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| Coordinates | 52 ° 15 ′ N , 0 ° 18 ′ E | ||
| OS National Grid | TL567639 | ||
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| Residents | 841 | ||
| surface | 19.7 km² (7.61 mi² ) | ||
| Population density: | 43 inhabitants per km² | ||
| administration | |||
| Post town | Cambridge | ||
| ZIP code section | CB25 | ||
| prefix | 01638 | ||
| Part of the country | England | ||
| region | East of England | ||
| Shire county | Cambridgeshire | ||
| District | East Cambridgeshire | ||
| British Parliament | South East Cambridgeshire | ||
| Website: http://www.swaffham-prior.org.uk/ | |||
Swaffham Prior is a civil parish in Cambridgeshire , England , on the edge of the marshland of East Cambridgeshire .
Location and naming
The place is roughly halfway between Cambridge and Newmarket . The immediate neighbors are Burwell , Reach and Swaffham Bulbeck . Swaffham Prior and Swaffham Bulbeck are often referred to collectively as The Swaffhams . Historical names were Great Swaffham for Swaffham Prior and Little Swaffham for Swaffham Bulbeck. In Norfolk there is a place of almost the same name, Swaffham .
The boundary between Swaffham Prior and Burwell has been formed by the Devil's Dyke since records began .
geology
A layer of limestone stretches through the whole place , which is only clearly recognizable in a few places. The best publicly accessible view of the step is from the main road opposite the community playground. The older houses of the village are in the lower part of the step, the newer houses are mostly built on the higher ground. The step separates two different vegetation zones, the humid and low marshland in the northwest and the dry and higher heathland in the southeast. The marshlands are known as Fens , the heather areas east of Swaffham Prior are part of the Greater Newmarket Kalkheide .
history
The country has been continuously settled at least since the Bronze Age, which has been proven by grave finds in barrows as well as Roman settlement traces and ceramic remains.
Swaffham Prior is an old place with a rich history. As early as the Domesday Book was The Swaffhams mentioned as Great and Little Swaffham Swaffham. There are a large number of historical houses in the village, the oldest of which date from the 17th century. The place was dominated by agriculture for much of its history, but also had local importance as a trading center. In the 20th century it became more and more a dormitory for Cambridge and Newmarket.
There has been a permanent school building in Swaffham Prior since 1744. From 1884 to 1964 the place had a railway tail, from which the former station building is still visible and whose route remains recognizable at some points on the dirt roads.
Churches and landmarks
The village is known for the two churches that have existed since at least the 12th century and which were initially used at the same time and alternately as the parish church. Since 1667 both buildings belong to a common parish . Swaffham Prior is the only place in Cambridgeshire where you can still find two churches on the same property.
The Church of St. Mary was built as early as the 12th century during the Norman rule, but fell into disrepair several times in the course of its history and was restored just as often. In the 13th century, Anglesey Abbey owned the church . Much of the rich medieval furnishings were destroyed in 1643 during the English Civil War. One of the largest renovations would have been necessary due to the severe damage to the church tower by lightning strikes in 1779. However, when the necessary demolition of the tower caused further damage to the nave, the project was abandoned due to the high costs. Throughout the 19th century, St. Mary was no longer used as a church. It was not fully restored until the beginning of the 20th century, so that the building has been used as a parish church since then. Inside there is a richly decorated rood screen and glass windows showing motifs from the First World War . Some of the rest of the furnishings come from the last furnishings in the neighboring church of St. Cyriac.
The Church of St. Cyriac and St. Julitta (named after Quiricus and Julitta ) is first mentioned in 1216, was built before 1200, and possibly even existed before 1066 . It had belonged to the Ely Cathedral since the 13th century and was the financially better off of the two churches in the Middle Ages. At the end of the 18th century the nave fell into disrepair and was rebuilt in the neo-Gothic style by Charles Humfrey at the beginning of the 19th century . At the beginning of the 20th century, the prevailing opinion was that the architecture of the building no longer suited the requirements of the church service, so the congregation stopped using the church and the building fell into disrepair again. It was not until the 1970s that the building became the property of the Churches Conservation Trust , and the restoration of what was left of the building halted its decline. The parts of the building that still exist today appear as a single-nave structure with a small choir and three side chapels in the transept. The tower shows much older buildings from the 15th century and houses six bells from 1791. The building now serves as an exhibition hall.
Funerals were held in the churchyard until 1899 . The new cemetery is directly adjacent to the churchyard in the south-east, where the grave of the Scottish poet Edwin Muir is also located .
Two windmills have survived in Swaffham Prior , one of which is still in operation today as a mill. Both mills, together with the double church towers, are symbols of the place and are shown on the place name sign.
In the southwestern part of the village there are two typical country houses on park-like grounds. Swaffham Prior Manor, the home of the Allix family, completely remodeled in 1753, and Baldwin Manor, traceable since the 15th century and divided into several smaller units in the 1980s.
population
The regular population counts show fluctuations over the last 200 years and a noticeable minimum around the middle of the 20th century:
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village life
In the village there is the inn The Red Lion , which was the last of three larger inns that were operated in the 19th century to survive. Most of the social and cultural events take place here and in the village's event hall.
For school education, the primary school Swaffham Prior Primary School is initially available in the village itself and then mostly the Bottisham Village College in one of the neighboring villages. There are secondary schools in Cambridge .
photos
View along the main street
Village sign with church towers and windmill
The two windmills on the outskirts
Event and assembly hall
St. Cyriac and St. Julitta
literature
- ONS (Ed.): Key Figures for 2011 Census: Key Statistics. Area: Swaffham Prior (Parish) . 2013 ( online [accessed July 12, 2016]).
- Wareham, Wright: A History of the County of Cambridge and the Isle of Ely . tape 10 , 2002, p. 273-303 ( online [accessed July 12, 2016]).
- Elisabeth Everitt, Roy Tricker: Swaffham-Two-Churches . EGM Mann & Son Ltd, Suffolk 1996 ( online [accessed July 13, 2016]).
- Lawrence Butler: Church of St Cyriac and St Julitta . Churches Conservation Trust , London 2009 ( online [PDF; accessed July 13, 2016]).
Individual evidence
- ^ Article in "Gazetteer of the British Isles (1887)" on "A vision of britain". Retrieved July 11, 2016.
- ^ Article in "Gazetteer of the British Isles (1887)" on "A vision of britain". Retrieved July 11, 2016.
- ^ History of St. Mary on the Cambridgeshire Churches website. Retrieved July 14, 2016.
- ↑ Various pictures of the stained glass windows of St. Mary. Retrieved July 14, 2016.
- ^ History of St. Cyriac and St. Julitta on the Cambridgeshire Churches website. Retrieved July 14, 2016.
- ↑ Description of Foster's Mill . Retrieved July 12, 2016.
- ↑ ONS (Ed.): Key Figures for 2011 Census: Key Statistics. Area: Swaffham Prior (Parish) . 2013 ( online [accessed July 11, 2016]).
- ↑ Census data up to 1961 from: Great Britain Historical GIS: A vision of Britain between 1801 and 2001 - Population of Swaffham Prior . University of Portsmouth, 2004 ( online [accessed July 11, 2016]).
- ↑ 2001 population for Swaffham Prior on the ONS homepage. Retrieved July 11, 2016.
Web links
- Swaffham Prior on "A Vision of Britain"
- The Swaffham Crier , the local online magazine
- History of the Churches on British History Online