Charlbury Hill | |
---|---|
Highest point | |
Elevation | 253 m (830 ft) |
Prominence | 64m |
Geography | |
Parent range | The Ridgeway |
OS grid | SU2378582129 |
Climbing | |
Normal route | Path from The Ridgeway |
Access | Open Access Land |
Charlbury Hill is a hill near the villages of Hinton Parva and Bishopstone in the Borough of Swindon, England.
Historically within Wiltshire, the hill lies just north of The Ridgeway. The summit is 253m (830ft) above sea level with a prominence of 64 metres (210 feet). The hill is classified as a Tump (hill of 30m or greater prominence) on the Database of British and Irish Hills. There is an Ordnance Survey (OS) triangulation pillar (TP1392 Charlbury Hill) located 6m away from the highest point. The top of the hill is open access land with a permissive path from The Ridgeway. [1] [2]
Andrews and Dury’s A Topographical Map of Wiltshire (1773) gives the name as Shelbarrow Hill and later maps give the name Shalborough Hill. [3] It has also been called Skelbarrow Hill and has been spelt Charbury Hill. [4]
The OS first edition one-inch-to-the-mile map (1829–1830) gives the current name and spelling of Charlbury Hill [5] which has been used since, including the current OS 1:25k Explorer [6] and 1:50k Landranger maps. [7]
Despite the close proximity to The Ridgeway and other ancient sites such as Liddington Castle, there have been no archaeological discoveries recorded on the hilltop. There are two mounds resembling barrows but these have been recorded as natural features. [8]
The hill is a popular viewing point but has also been the site of antisocial behaviour. [9]
The Ridgeway is a ridgeway or ancient trackway described as Britain's oldest road. The section clearly identified as an ancient trackway extends from Wiltshire along the chalk ridge of the Berkshire Downs to the River Thames at the Goring Gap, part of the Icknield Way which ran, not always on the ridge, from Salisbury Plain to East Anglia. The route was adapted and extended as a National Trail, created in 1972. The Ridgeway National Trail follows the ancient Ridgeway from Overton Hill, near Avebury, to Streatley, then follows footpaths and parts of the ancient Icknield Way through the Chiltern Hills to Ivinghoe Beacon in Buckinghamshire. The National Trail is 87 miles (140 km) long.
A Munro is defined as a mountain in Scotland with a height over 3,000 feet (914.4 m), and which is on the Scottish Mountaineering Club (SMC) official list of Munros; there is no explicit topographical prominence requirement. The best known Munro is Ben Nevis, the highest mountain in the British Isles at 4,413 feet (1,345 m).
Wiltshire is a historic and ceremonial county in South West England with an area of 3,485 km2. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset to the southwest, Somerset to the west, Hampshire to the southeast, Gloucestershire to the north, Oxfordshire to the northeast and Berkshire to the east. The county town was originally Wilton, after which the county is named, but Wiltshire Council is now based in the county town of Trowbridge. Within the county's boundary are two unitary authority areas, Wiltshire and Swindon, governed respectively by Wiltshire Council and Swindon Borough Council.
The Uffington White Horse is a prehistoric hill figure, 110 m (360 ft) long, formed from deep trenches filled with crushed white chalk. The figure is situated on the upper slopes of White Horse Hill in the English civil parish of Uffington, some 16 km (10 mi) east of Swindon, 8 km (5.0 mi) south of the town of Faringdon and a similar distance west of the town of Wantage; or 2.5 km (1.6 mi) south of Uffington. The hill forms a part of the scarp of the Berkshire Downs and overlooks the Vale of White Horse to the north. The best views of the figure are obtained from the air, or from directly across the Vale, particularly around the villages of Great Coxwell, Longcot and Fernham.
The Borough of Swindon is a local government authority in South West England, centred on the town of Swindon and forming part of the ceremonial county of Wiltshire.
The Ordnance Survey National Grid reference system is a system of geographic grid references used in Great Britain, distinct from latitude and longitude.
Barbury Castle is a scheduled hillfort in Wiltshire, England. It is one of several such forts found along the ancient Ridgeway route. The site, which lies within the Wessex Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, has been managed as a country park by Swindon Borough Council since 1971. It is situated on Barbury Hill, a local vantage point, which, under ideal weather conditions, commands a view across to the Cotswolds and the River Severn. It has two deep defensive ditches and ramparts. The Old Ridgeway runs close by and the modern Ridgeway crosses through the castle. In the surrounding area are to be found round barrows, Celtic field systems and 18th-19th century flint workings.
Streatley is a village and civil parish on the River Thames in Berkshire, England. The village faces Goring-on-Thames. The two places share in their shops, services, leisure, sports and much of their transport. Across the river is Goring & Streatley railway station and the village cluster adjoins a lock and weir. The west of the village is a mixture of agriculture and woodland plus a golf course. The village has a riverside hotel. Much of Streatley is at steeply varying elevations, ranging from 51m AOD to 185m at Streatley Warren, a hilltop point on its western border forming the eastern end of the Berkshire Downs. This Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty is topped by the 87-mile The Ridgeway path, which crosses the Thames at Goring and Streatley Bridge.
Erlestoke is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England, on the northern edge of Salisbury Plain. The village lies about 6 miles (10 km) east of Westbury and the same distance southwest of Devizes.
Liddington Castle, locally called Liddington Camp, is a late Bronze Age and early Iron Age univallate hillfort in the English county of Wiltshire, and a scheduled monument.
The mountains and hills of the British Isles are categorised into various lists based on different combinations of elevation, prominence, and other criteria such as isolation. These lists are used for peak bagging, whereby hillwalkers attempt to reach all the summits on a given list, the oldest being the 282 Munros in Scotland, created in 1891.
Ordnance Survey (OS) is the national mapping agency for Great Britain. The agency's name indicates its original military purpose, which was to map Scotland in the wake of the Jacobite rising of 1745. There was also a more general and nationwide need in light of the potential threat of invasion during the Napoleonic Wars. Since 1 April 2015 Ordnance Survey has operated as Ordnance Survey Ltd, a government-owned company, 100% in public ownership. The Ordnance Survey Board remains accountable to the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. It was also a member of the Public Data Group.
Tolcarne is the name of a number of places in Cornwall, United Kingdom. The name Tolcarne is derived from Cornish Talkarn i.e. "hill-brow tor". A carn is a pile of stones and is the same as tor in Devon.
Castle Rings is a univallate hill fort in the parish of Donhead St Mary in Wiltshire in England. The fort is a Scheduled Ancient Monument, with a list entry identification number of 1005698. Castle Rings has been dated to the Iron Age and is situated at an altitude of 228 metres (748 ft) upon Upper Greensand sandstone beds. The main bulk of the fort enclosure lies within the boundaries of Donhead St Mary parish but some of the outlying earthworks are situated in the neighbouring Sedgehill and Semley parish. In the mid-1980s a metal detectorist unearthed a hoard of stater coins of the Durotriges tribe within the hill fort.
The Ordnance Survey Great Britain County Series maps were produced from the 1840s to the 1890s by the Ordnance Survey, with revisions published until the 1940s. The series mapped the counties of Great Britain at both a six inch and twenty-five inch scale with accompanying acreage and land use information. Following the introduction of the Ordnance Survey National Grid in the 1930s the County Series maps were replaced by a new series of maps at each scale.
Ellis Martin (1881–1977) was an English commercial artist. For most of his working life he was employed by Britain's map making organisation the Ordnance Survey, for which he performed painting, drawing and calligraphy for their map and book covers, and for their advertisements. He was the first person to be employed by the Survey specifically as an illustrator.