Stonesfield
| Stonesfield | |
|---|---|
 St James the Great parish church |
|
 Stonesfield
|
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| Stonesfield shown within Oxfordshire | |
| Population | 1,527 (2011 Census) |
| OS grid reference | SP3917 |
| Civil parish |
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| District | |
| Shire county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | Witney |
| Postcode district | OX29 |
| Dialling code | 01993 |
| Police | Thames Valley |
| Fire | Oxfordshire |
| Ambulance | South Central |
| EU Parliament | South East England |
| UK Parliament | |
| Website | Stonesfield ~ Oxfordshire |
Stonesfield is a village and civil parish about 5 miles (8 km) north of Witney in Oxfordshire, and about 10 miles (17km) northwest of Oxford.
The village is on the crest of an escarpment. The parish extends mostly north and north-east of the village, in which directions the land rises gently and then descends to the Glyme at Glympton and Wootton about 3 miles (5 km) to the north-east. South of the Stonesfield, below the escarpment is the River Evenlode.
The 2011 Census recorded the parish's population as 1,527.
The Domesday Book of 1086 records Stonesfield as Stunsfeld, meaning "fool's field". This was because of the stony soil in the area, so the toponym's mutation is most appropriate. Thomas Hearne used the spelling "Stunsfield" in 1712 and Akerman spelt it "Stuntesfield" in 1854.
Stonesfield is on the Taynton Limestone Formation, a type of Cotswold stone that until the 20th century was mined as a roofing stone called Stonesfield slate. It is common on roofs of older buildings in the Cotswolds and Oxfordshire. Many of the older buildings of the University of Oxford have Stonesfield slate roofs.
The mines were also one of Britain's richest sources of Middle Jurassic vertebrate fossils. The first fossil bones to be identified as those of a dinosaur were found early in the 19th century near Stonesfield. They are part of the skeleton of a bipedal carnivore, and in 1824 the pioneering palaeontologist William Buckland named it Megalosaurus. The bones are now displayed in the Oxford University Museum of Natural History. Other reptiles found at Stonesfield include the crocodile Steneosaurus, pterosaur Rhamphocephalus and the type specimen of the theropod genus Iliosuchus.
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Wikipedia