Floods
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The River Avon at Bradford on Avon has always been liable to burst its banks. The river rises quickly with heavy rainfall and usually falls just as quickly after a brief flood.
It spills fairly harmlessly over the floodplain above Bradford, with the roads to Staverton Bridge becoming inundated very easily. At Bradford it is...
Read MoreThe Medieval Period
Bradford on Avon, Wiltshire
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In Britain the Medieval Period, the Middle Ages, covers the time from the end of the Roman occupation in the 5th century until the beginning of the Tudor Dynasty in 1485.
Bradford on Avon enters history in 652 when Cenwalh, the Saxon King of Wessex fought a battle here. The area was dominated from 1001 to...
Read MoreThe English Civil War
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Civil War battle re-enactment in Bradford on Avon 2016
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The area around Bradford figured slightly in the English Civil War. Royalist troops under Sir Ralph Hopton are assumed to have crossed the Avon at Bradford and headed towards Bath, culminating in the Battle of Lansdown in July...
Read MoreThe Bradford Manor Charter of 1001
A copy of the grant by King Æthelred II gives details of the boundary of the manor in 1001.
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The letter ð in the Anglo Saxon text represents a voiced “th”, as in “these”; so forð = forth.
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“Ærest of seuen pirien on ðere here wai, ðe schet suðward...
Read MoreThe Bradford Hundred
A Hundred was the administrative division below that of the Shire, or County. The name was probably originally related to the area of land nominally required to support a hundred eligible families. Hundreds and Shires came into being in the Saxon period, perhaps as early as the 7th century.
The Bradford Hundred Court was held by the Abbess of Shaftesbury, but was in fact presided over...
Read MoreBradford Hundred Timeline
c2000 BC: Early Bronze Age burial at Jugs Grave, Inwood
7th century BC: Early Iron Age Budbury hilfort
late 3rd century: Bradford and Atworth Roman villas built
652: King Cenwalh fought at Bradanforda be Afne
705: A monastery at Bradford mentioned by St Aldhelm
709: Death of St Aldhelm
955: King Eadred granted the Manor of Bradford to Nunnaminster...
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