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Amesbury in Wilts County England History and GeographyAMESBURY, a market town and parochial chapelry in the hundred of AMESBURY, county of WILTS, 7 miles (N.) from Salisbury, and 78 (W.S.W.) from London, containing 819 inhabitants. This place, anciently called Ambresbury, derives its name from Aurelius Ambrosius, a descendant of the Romans, who is said to have assumed the purple in Britain towards the decline of the Roman empire, and who headed the Britons in several attempts to repel their Saxon invaders. A monastery for 300 monks is stated to have been founded here by Ambruis, a British monk, or, more probably, by Ambrosius, which was destroyed by Gurthurm or Gurmundus, a Saxon chief. After the conversion of the Saxons to Christianity, a synod was held here in the reign of the Saxon king Edgar, to adjust the dnferences which existed between the regular and the secular clergy, which had been previously discussed in an assembly held at Calne. About 980, Elfrida, widow of the same king, founded here a nunnery of the Bencdictine order, which she dedicated to St. Mary and St. Melorius, a Cornish saint, in expiation, it is supposed, of the murder of Edward, her step-son, at Corfe Castle. In 1177, the abbess and nuns were expelled on the ground of incontinence; and Henry II. made it a cell to the foreign abbey of Fontevrault. Queen Eleanor, widow of Henry III., assumed the veil in this convent, where she died in 1291. It was at length made denizen; and, at the dissolution, its revenue was valued at £558. 10. 2. The mansion, which now occupies the site of the nunnery, was, after the French revolution, appropriated for several years to the use of a society of nuns from Louvain, in Flanders, who afterwards removed into Dorsetshire. The town is situated in a small valley on the bank of the Upper Avon, and eonsists of two streets: it is neither paved nor lighted, but is well supplied with water. The market, formerly held on Friday, has been discontinued: the fairs are held on the 17th of May, 21st of June and 21st of December. The town is within the jurisdiction of the county magistrates; constables and other officers for its internal regulation, are appointed at the court leet of the Lord of the Manor. The living is a perpetual curacy, in the archdeaconry of Wilts, and diocese of Salisbury, endowed with £400 private benefaction, and £700 parliamentary grant, and in the patronage of the Dean and Canons of Windsor. The church, formerly conventual, is a very ancient building, and probably of Saxon architecture, though much dilapidated. The Wesleyan Methodists have a place of worship. An English school for 20 boys was founded and endowed, in 1677, by Mr. John Rose; and a school, for teaching fifty children to read, was endowed with an estate left by Mr. Spratt; there is a charity school for clothing and instructing fifteen boys and fifteen girls; and a National school is supported by subscription. A fund is also appropriated to the apprenticing of children. Westward from the river there is an ancient encampment with a vallum and deep fosse occupying an area of 40 acres; though commonly attributed to Vespasian, it is undoubtedly of British origin: the road from Amesbury to Warminster is cut through its rampart. Within two miles, is Stonehenge, a remarkable and well known relic of British antiquity. From Lewis's Topographical Dictionary of England 1831, courtesy of Databases 4 Sale |
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