Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for CUMNOR

CUMNOR, a village, a township, a parish, and a sub-district, in Abingdon district, Berks. The village stands on the brow of a hill, 2 miles E of the river Isis, and 3¾ WSW of Oxford; and has a post office under Oxford, and an inn. The township includes the village. The parish includes also the liberty of Chilswell, and the tythings of Bradley, Chawley, Henwood, Hill-End, Stroud, Swinford, Whitley, and part of Botley. Acres, 7, 730. Real property, £7, 096. Pop., 1, 021. Houses, 212. The property is divided among a few. The manor belonged to Abingdon abbey; was given, at the dissolution, to the last abbot; and passed, in 1560, to Anthony Forster. The mansion on it was the scene of the murder of Amy Robsart, as related in Mickle's ballad of "Cumnor, " and Sir Walter Scott's novel of "Kenilworth;" but was really a low quadrangular edifice surrounding a small court, and not the spacious and towered structure depicted in these works; and it has entirely disappeared. The surface of the parish is hilly; and there is a mineral spring. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Oxford. Value, not reported. Patron, the Earl of Abingdon. The church is partly Norman; consists of nave, north aisle, south chapel, and chancel, with a western tower; and contains an altar-tomb of Anthony Forster, and brasses. Charities, £81. John Drope, physician and poet, and Francis Drope, author of a work on fruit trees, were natives.—The sub-district contains seven parishes, and an extra-parochial tract. Acres, 13, 113. Pop., 2, 853. Houses, 598.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a village, a township, a parish, and a sub-district"   (ADL Feature Type: "populated places")
Administrative units: Cumnor CP/AP       Cumnor SubD       Abingdon RegD/PLU       Berkshire AncC
Place: Cumnor

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