Wixford
| Wixford | |
|---|---|
 Wixford with St. Milburga's in the background |
|
 Wixford
|
|
| Wixford shown within Warwickshire | |
| Population | 155 (2011 Census) |
| OS grid reference | SP088543 |
| District | |
| Shire county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | Alcester |
| Postcode district | B49 |
| Police | Warwickshire |
| Fire | Warwickshire |
| Ambulance | West Midlands |
| EU Parliament | West Midlands |
| UK Parliament | |
Wixford is a hamlet and civil parish in the Stratford district of Warwickshire, England, situated 1.5 miles (2.4 km) south of Alcester. The population at the 2011 census was 155. The name derives from a compound of the Old English personal name Whitlac with the noun for a river crossing "ford".William Shakespeare is said to have joined a party of Stratford folk which set itself to outdrink a drinking club at Bidford-on-Avon, and as a result of his labours in that regard to have fallen asleep under the crab tree of which a descendant is still called Shakespeares tree. When morning dawned his friends wished to renew the encounter but he wisely said "No I have drunk with "Piping Pebworth, Dancing Marston, Haunted Hillboro', Hungry Grafton, Dodging Exhall, Papist Wixford, Beggarly Broom and Drunken Bidford" and so, presumably, I will drink no more. The story is said to date from the 17th century but of its truth or of any connection of the story or the verse to Shakespeare there is no evidence. The reasons for the village being described as papist remain unclear but may be a reference to the Catholic Throckmorton family as in 1541 it passed to Sir George Throckmorton, in whose family it remained until 1919, when the estate was sold and the manorial rights extinguished.
The village is first mentioned when Ufa, a Saxon Earl of Warwick, gave the land at Wixford and his body to be buried to the monastery of Evesham Abbey in 974. However, Godwine a powerful man who had purchased the inheritance of that abbey from King Ethelred, granted it to Wulfgeat, son and heir to Ufa, for life, upon condition it was returned. Notwithstanding this agreement, Wulfgeat's heirs retained the land until, the time of King Edward the Confessor when Abbot Agelwyne purchased it from Wygod, a potent baron and heir to Wulfgeat, for a valuable price and regained it for the monks. It is recorded in the Domesday Book "In Ferncombe Hundred, Evesham Abbey holds 5 hides in Witelavesford. Land for 6 ploughs. In lordship 2; 3 male and 2 female slaves; 4 villagers and 6 smallholders with 2 ploughs. A mill at 10s and 20 sticks of eels; meadow, 24 acres; woodland 1 furlong long and 1/2 wide. Value before 1066, 40s; later 30s; now 50s. Wigot held this land before 1066."
...
Wikipedia