THE VOLUME relates the history of the south-east corner of
Somerset. The area comprises the outliers of Salisbury Plain on the
east and part of a clay vale to the west. It included a natural
route followed by the two principal roads from London to Exeter and
by the railway. Of the towns, Milborne Port and Wincanton each owed
its prosperity to one of those roads. Bruton and Milborne Port were
royal urban centres in the late 11th century, both centres of
minster parishes. Milborne Port, a borough in 1086, returned
members to parliament for some years from 1298; at Wincanton a
borough had been created by the mid 14th century. Settlement in
nucleated villages was dense in the clay vale but ancient scattered
farmsteads were found both south of Wincanton and west of Selwood
forest. Quarries in most parishes provided local building stone;
millstones from the Upper Greensand at Penselwood were widely
distributed in the 13th and 14th centuries. The area remains
chiefly agricultural. Arable farming was at first often in paired
open fields, mostly inclosed and consolidated by private agreement
before 1800. Acts between 1771 and 1821 inclosed and allotted
surviving common meadow and pasture. Dairying, significant by 1600,
predominated by 1700. The heart of Selwood forest, still heavily
wooded, supported a timber industry in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Deer parks preceded two 18th century landscaped parks at Redlynch
and Bruton Abbey. Textiles were long made in the countryside as
well as in the three towns. Milborne Port, from the 1670s a centre
for tanning, was from the early 19th century to the late 20th an
important gloving town, employing outworkers in surrounding
villages. PARISHES: BLACKFORD, BRATTON SEYMOUR, BREWHAM, BREWHAM
LODGE, BRUTON, CHARLTON HORETHORNE, CHARLTON MUSGROVE, NORTH
CHERITON, ABBAS AND TEMPLE COMBE, CORTON DENHAM, CUCKLINGTON,
EASTRIP, HENSTRIDGE, HOLTON, HORSINGTON, MARSTON MAGNA, MILBORNE
PORT, MILTON CLEVEDON, PENSELWOOD, PITCOMBE, RIMPTON, SHEPTON
MONTAGUE, STOKE TRISTER, STOWELL, UPTON NOBLE, WINCANTON,
YARLINGTON
General
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