Ashmore

'The Stag's Head' a thatched house in Ashmore

Ashmore is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England, Template:Convert southwest of Salisbury. In the 2021 census the parish had a population of 176. It has a church and several stone cottages and farms, many with thatched roofs.

The village is the highest in the county. It is centred on a circular pond, or "mere", which gave the village its original name of "Ash-mere".<ref name=NDDC>North Dorset District Council,North Dorset Official District Guide, Home Publishing Co. Ltd.,c.1983. p30</ref> There are grounds for believing Ashmore to be a Romano-British village which has survived without a break to the present day.

History

Three round barrows have been found in the parish: two barrows south of the village near Well Bottom, and one west of the village near the boundary with the village of Fontmell Magna; this latter barrow was excavated in the 19th century and bones were recovered.<ref name=inventory/> Ashmore may have been the site of a Neolithic market place or settlement.<ref name=plan>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The Roman road from Bath to Badbury Rings passes through the east of the parish.<ref name=inventory/> The situation of the village is similar to Romano-British sites in the area,<ref name=inventory/> and there may have been a military camp and trading post in the area.<ref name=plan/>

In 1086, Ashmore was recorded in the Domesday Book as "Aisemare";<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> it had 24 households, 7 ploughlands and Template:Convert of meadow. It was in Cranborne Hundred and had a value of £15 to the lord of the manor, who was King William.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Until 1859, Ashmore had an open field system; the three fields—North Field to the north, and Sandpit Fields and Broadridge to the south—were roughly equal in size and covered an area of Template:Convert. At the same time there was also a considerable area of enclosed fields, covering Template:Convert in 1590.<ref name=inventory/>

Ashmore as an ancient continuously inhabited village

In his pioneering work The Making of the English Landscape (1955), historian W.G. Hoskins wrote that, although "It yet remains to be proved that there is any village in England which has been continuously inhabited since Celtic times", certain "exciting clues" led him to believe Ashmore was such a place.

Hoskins noted that Ashmore lies in an area thickly studded with Romano-British remains. It is a hilltop village, a fact "particularly suggestive of great antiquity". Furthermore, it was too far from the river valleys for it to be squeezed out by the Early English settlers, who would have let it be.

For Hoskins, a telling clue was the settlement's ancient nucleus: the village pond. Such embanked ponds may go back to "the beginning of the Christian era or a little earlier". The parish church lies some distance from the pond, on the outskirts of the village, suggesting that Christianity was a relative latecomer. "Ashmore may well be a Romano-British village which has survived without a break to the present day".<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Geography

Ashmore parish is situated on the hills of Cranborne Chase Template:Convert southeast of Shaftesbury and Template:Convert north of Blandford Forum. The underlying geology is chalk, overlain by clay-with-flints in the south and southeast.<ref name=inventory>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The village, which at Template:Convert above sea level is the highest in Dorset,<ref name=gant/> is sited on a spur of land between dry valleys which drain south and southwest.<ref name=inventory/> All of Ashmore parish is within the Cranborne Chase and West Wiltshire Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB).<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The nearest rail link is Template:Convert from the village at Tisbury railway station and the nearest air link (Bournemouth International Airport) is Template:Convert away.

Ashmore St Nicholas church

Church and Chapel

The parish church of St. Nicholas is about 100 metres west of the village pond, west of High Street. Its chancel arch is said to date from the 13th century and it was rebuilt in 1874.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> On the opposite side of the High Street is a Wesleyan chapel which dates from 1855. <ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Demography

In the first national census in 1891 the village had a population of 228.<ref name=plan/>

Census population of Ashmore parish

Census	Population	Female	Male	Households	Source
1921	192				<ref name="wikidata-9af5a3d0ef073a6f402cca72297dfe77a03ae63c-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
1931	198				<ref name="wikidata-9af5a3d0ef073a6f402cca72297dfe77a03ae63c-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
1951	173				<ref name="wikidata-9af5a3d0ef073a6f402cca72297dfe77a03ae63c-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
1961	156				<ref name="wikidata-9af5a3d0ef073a6f402cca72297dfe77a03ae63c-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
1971	140				<ref name="wikidata-9af5a3d0ef073a6f402cca72297dfe77a03ae63c-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
1981	160				<ref name="wikidata-9af5a3d0ef073a6f402cca72297dfe77a03ae63c-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
1991	160				<ref name="wikidata-9af5a3d0ef073a6f402cca72297dfe77a03ae63c-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
2001	162	77	85	76	<ref name="wikidata-7c1ffa29eb7d27e36d8d6cd7172c455eb8f6d77e-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
2011	188	101	87	87	<ref name="wikidata-23d93403bbd510e3eaf857bb0207b766770d8bc9-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>
2021	176	98	78	87	<ref name="wikidata-35b64ba7603f4c37c30fd0d900bad9d95201eeac-v18">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Culture

Ashmore Wesleyan chapel

In midsummer a celebration known as 'Filly Loo' (or 'Filleigh Loo'<ref name=ayres>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>) takes place around Ashmore pond, with a Green Man, country dancing, morris dancers and live music.<ref name=NDDC/><ref name=gant>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name=khorsandi>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The event's ancient origins are mysterious but may have pagan influences;<ref name=aslet/> theories include that it celebrated either the pond's constancy as a water supply,<ref name=gant/> the summer solstice,<ref name=khorsandi/> or the end of the cultivated filbert (hazelnut) harvest.<ref name=plan/> The meaning of the name 'Filly Loo' has also attracted more than one explanation, including that it is West Country dialect for 'uproar',<ref name=aslet>Template:Cite book</ref> a corruption of the French 'La Fille de l'Eau', ('maiden of the water'),<ref name=dark>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> or a corruption of 'Filbert Louis', a nickname of Louis Rideout, one of the historical instigators of the event. The event was revived in 1956<ref name=ayres/> as a folk dance festival, and takes place on the Friday night nearest to Midsummer Day or the Feast of St. John the Baptist.<ref name=dark/>

References

• Pitt-Rivers, Michael, 1968. Dorset. London: Faber & Faber.
• Taylor, Christopher, 1970. The Making of the Dorset Landscape. London: Hodder & Stoughton.

External links

• Template:Commons category-inline
• The Dorset Page: Ashmore