Leicestershire Villages: A
Having completed my walk round the Leicestershire Border in April, my next challenge is to visit all the c270 villages in the county1: Over the last few years I have walked to about half of them, so there are still plenty of gaps, particularly in the north and west of the county. I’m now working my way down the list alphabetically, planning each walk to visit any other nearby villages that I’ve not been to before - it’s a good way of seeing a different part of the county each week. At a very rough guess I expect it’ll take me until next summer to complete the list.
I’ve started a Twitter thread of the villages, and will cross-post here, letter by letter. So here are the ten Leicestershire villages starting with “A”.
1. Ab Kettleby, north-west of Melton Mowbray. A Roman mosaic and pavement were found beneath the churchyard of St James’s, indicating the presence of a villa. The Everard Digby memorialised in the church died in 1628 so is not (contra Wikipedia)2 the Gunpowder plotter.
2. Allexton, on the border with Rutland, west of Uppingham, and mentioned in the Domesday book. Some of the north aisle arches of St Peter’s church date to around 1160. The church has a monument to Richard Smith (d. 1762), a rector here for 48 years, inscribed with a whimsical doggerel poem.
3. Anstey, north-west of Leicester, is mentioned in the Domesday book but has its origins much earlier - it was known by the Saxons as Hanstige. Ned Ludd, the original Luddite - or rather the person on whom the legend was based - is supposed to have come from Anstey.
4. Appleby Magna in the far west of the county was, until the late C19th, part of an exclave of Derbyshire, and also had counter-exclaves (parts of Leicestershire within the parts of Derbyshire within Leicestershire). County borders are less interesting/confusing these days.
5. Arnesby is south of Leicester on the Welford Road, which to the south goes to Welford on the Northamptonshire border and to the north goes to a rugby stadium. As well as the C12th St Peter’s Church, Arnesby has an 1815 windmill (which is on private land so I was unable to go and look at it).
6. Asfordby is to the west of Melton Mowbray. Asfordby Colliery was the last deep coal mine built in England, but was closed in 1997 after only a few years’ operation. The Old Dalby Test Track, still used to test new trains and railway infrastructure, runs to the north of the village.
7. Ashby Folville is situated between Melton Mowbray and Leicester. In the C14th, the notorious Folville Gang, made up of members of the family after whom the village was named, murdered the Baron of the Exchequer, Sir Roger Beler, an ally of Edward II, at nearby Rearsby.
8. Ashby Magna, just to the east of the M1 between Leicester and Lutterworth. The village is recorded in the Domesday Book as 'Essebi' or 'Asseby'. Its name derives from an Ash tree, 'By' (the Old Danish for a farmstead or settlement) and 'Magna', Latin for great.
9. Ashby Parva, on the other side of the M1 from Ashby Magna. A C19th rector, William Clement Ley, was a weather prophet, and would post Harvest forecasts on the rectory gates. He made a Nephoscope to observe cirrus clouds, which can indicate a warm front and a change in the weather.
10. Aston Flamville, on the other side of the M69 from Hinckley, sounds like a foppish Dickens character. During the Civil War, troops from the Parliamentary garrisons in north Warwickshire ‘visited’ this and other villages, stealing horses and availing themselves of ‘free quarter’.
Spoiler alert: it’s the “B”s next.
I’m sure there’s room for an exciting debate about exactly what a village is (as distinct from a hamlet, a small town, or a suburb). I will leave the debate to others, though - I generally take the view that if Wikipedia says a settlement is a village it probably is, provided that feels right to me (and especially if it has a church). But the Wikipedia list includes, for example, Albert Village, which despite the name doesn’t seem to me to qualify (it is part of Swadlincote), and Asfordby Hill, which is a hamlet I passed through on the way from Asfordby to Melton; and it misses a few too. In any case, my decisions are final and I will not be taking questions.
I wrote this post in April 2023, since when the Wikipedia entry has been corrected.