Bartlow
Encyclopedia
Bartlow is a small village and civil parish in the South Cambridgeshire
South Cambridgeshire
South Cambridgeshire is a mostly rural local government district of Cambridgeshire, England. It was formed on 1 April 1974 by the merger of Chesterton Rural District and South Cambridgeshire Rural District. It surrounds the city of Cambridge, which is administered separately from the district by...

 district of Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire is a county in England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the northeast, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire to the west...

, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, about 12 miles (19.3 km) south-east of Cambridge
Cambridge
The city of Cambridge is a university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It lies in East Anglia about north of London. Cambridge is at the heart of the high-technology centre known as Silicon Fen – a play on Silicon Valley and the fens surrounding the...

 and 7 miles (11.3 km) west of Haverhill
Haverhill, Suffolk
Haverhill is an industrial market town and civil parish in the county of Suffolk, England, next to the borders of Essex and Cambridgeshire. It lies southeast of Cambridge and north of central London...

 in Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...

. The River Granta runs through the village.

History

At 385 acres (155.8 ha) Bartlow is one of the smallest parishes in Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire is a county in England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the northeast, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire to the west...

. Its southern border, which was partially straightened in the 19th century to follow the former railway line, divides it from Essex
Essex
Essex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...

. It also has borders with the neighbouring parishes of Castle Camps
Castle Camps
Castle Camps was a Norman Castle located in what is now the civil parish of Castle Camps, Cambridgeshire.-Owners:Castle Camps was originally a Saxon manor, belonging to Wulfwin, a Thane of King Edward the Confessor. After the Norman invasion, William the Conqueror gave the manor to Aubrey de Vere...

 and Shudy Camps
Shudy Camps
Shudy Camps is a village in Cambridgeshire, England. As of the 2001 census the population is 310. The area of the village is .-External links:*...

 to the east, Horseheath
Horseheath
Horseheath is a hamlet in Cambridgeshire, England, situated a few miles south-east of Cambridge, between Linton and Haverhill, on the A1307 road....

 to the north, and Linton
Linton, Cambridgeshire
Linton is a village in rural Cambridgeshire, England, on the border with Essex. It has been expanded much since the 1960s and is now one of many dormitory villages around Cambridge. The railway station was on the Stour Valley Railway between Cambridge and Colchester, now closed. The Rivey Hill...

 to the west.

Though the area has been occupied since Roman times, there is no record of Bartlow itself as a village until 1232.

Recorded as Berkelawe in 1232, the name "Bartlow" means "mounds or tumuli
Tumulus
A tumulus is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds, Hügelgrab or kurgans, and can be found throughout much of the world. A tumulus composed largely or entirely of stones is usually referred to as a cairn...

 where birch
Birch
Birch is a tree or shrub of the genus Betula , in the family Betulaceae, closely related to the beech/oak family, Fagaceae. The Betula genus contains 30–60 known taxa...

 trees grow".

Bartlow Hills

Bartlow is also home to Bartlow Hills, a Roman tumuli cemetery with three remaining mounds, though only one falls into the parish of Bartlow. There were originally seven mounds. The tallest is, at 15 metres in height, the largest barrow north of the Alps
Alps
The Alps is one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria and Slovenia in the east through Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany to France in the west....

.

For centuries the mounds were believed to cover the bodies of those killed at the Battle of Ashingdon
Battle of Ashingdon
The Battle of Assandun was fought on 18 October 1016. There is dispute over whether Assandun may actually be today's Ashdon, or the long supposed Ashingdon, in southeast Essex, England....

 in 1016, but excavation demonstrated that they are the graves of a wealthy family and date from the 1st or 2nd century AD. Excavations in the 19th century found large wooden chests, decorated vessels in bronze, glass and pottery and an iron folding chair, most of which were lost in a later fire at Bartlow Hall. A small Roman villa, occupied until the late 4th century, was situated north of the mounds and was excavated in 1852.

Church

It has long been maintained that the church in Bartlow was built by King Cnut near the site of the Battle of Ashingdon (Assandun), but no evidence for a building of that age has been found. The present parish church, dedicated to St Mary, consists of a chancel, a nave with north porch, and a circular west tower. The tower is all that remains of what is believed to be the original church and dates from the late-11th or early-12th century. The nave and chancel were built in the 14th century.

Bartlow St. Mary is one of only two existing round-tower church
Round-tower church
Round-tower churches are a type of church found mainly in England, almost solely in East Anglia; of about 185 surviving examples in the country, 124 are in Norfolk, 38 in Suffolk, 6 in Essex, 3 in Sussex and 2 each in Cambridgeshire and Berkshire. There is evidence of about twenty round-tower...

es in Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire is a county in England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the northeast, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire to the west...

, the other one being in Snailwell
Snailwell
Snailwell is a small village and civil parish in East Cambridgeshire, England around north of Newmarket.-History:The parish of Snailwell covers an area of in the extension of eastern Cambridgeshire that surrounds the town of Newmarket in Suffolk...

.

The church is also known for its 15th-century wall-paintings whose fragments include depictions of St Christopher, St Michael weighing souls, and St George's dragon.

Village life

The village has one remaining pub; The Three Hills pub was open by 1847 and is housed in a 17th-century building. Bartlow was listed as having two alehouses in 1682.

Railways

The railway reached the village in 1865 when the Stour Valley line
Stour Valley Railway
The Stour Valley Railway is a partially closed railway line that ran between , near Cambridge and in Essex, England. The line opened in sections between 1849 and 1865...

 from Great Shelford
Great Shelford
Great Shelford is a village located approximately four miles to the south of Cambridge, in the county of Cambridgeshire, in eastern England. In 1850 Great Shelford parish contained intersected by the river Cam. The population in 1841 was 803 people...

 to Haverhill
Haverhill, Suffolk
Haverhill is an industrial market town and civil parish in the county of Suffolk, England, next to the borders of Essex and Cambridgeshire. It lies southeast of Cambridge and north of central London...

 opened, running along the southern edge of the parish, with a secondary line on the Saffron Walden Railway
Saffron Walden Railway
The Saffron Walden Railway was a branch of the Great Eastern Railway between Audley End and Bartlow on the Stour Valley Railway between Shelford to Haverhill, a distance of ....

 branching at Bartlow opening in 1866. Bartlow railway station
Bartlow railway station
Bartlow railway station was a station in Bartlow, Cambridgeshire on the Stour Valley Railway at the junction with the Saffron Walden Railway. There were two platforms on the Stour Valley line and a separate linked platform for the line to Saffron Walden....

was open at the railway bridge on Ashdon Road until closing when the Haverhill line was axed in 1967. The station is now a private house called Booking Hall.

External links

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