Shaftesbury is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England. It is on the A30 road, 20 miles west of Salisbury and 23 miles north-northeast of Dorchester, near the border with Wiltshire. It is the only significant hilltop settlement in Dorset, being built about 215 metres above sea level on a greensand hill on the edge of Cranborne Chase.
Shaftesbury Abbey was an abbey that housed nuns in Shaftesbury, Dorset. It was founded in about 888, and dissolved in 1539 during the English Reformation by the order of Thomas Cromwell, minister to King Henry VIII. At the time it was the second-wealthiest nunnery in England, behind only Syon Abbey.
Iwerne Minster is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England. It lies on the edge of the Blackmore Vale, approximately midway between the towns of Shaftesbury and Blandford Forum. The A350 main road between those towns passes through the edge of the village, just to the west. In the 2011 Census the civil parish had a population of 978.
Melbury Abbas is a village and civil parish in north Dorset, England. It is situated at the edge of the Blackmore Vale under the scarp of Cranborne Chase, 2 miles (3.2 km) south-southwest of the town of Shaftesbury. The parish includes West Melbury and part of Cann Common.
Cheselbourne is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England, situated in the Dorset Downs, 7 miles (11 km) north-east of Dorchester. The parish is at an altitude of 75 to 245 metres and covers an area of 1,175 hectares ; the underlying geology is chalk. In the 2011 census the parish had a population of 296.
Compton Abbas is a village and civil parish in north Dorset, England. It lies 3 miles south of the town of Shaftesbury. It is sited on greensand strata on the edge of the Blackmore Vale, below the chalk downs of Cranborne Chase. On top of these hills is Compton Abbas Airfield. The A350 road between Wiltshire and the south coast passes through the village. In the 2011 census the civil parish had a population of 216. The name Compton Abbas derives from the Saxon "cumb-ton", meaning 'village in a narrow valley', plus "abbas" which refers to Shaftesbury Abbey. The church, St. Mary's, was built in 1866 to replace the older structure which was more remote from the village.
Fontmell Magna is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England. It is situated in the Blackmore Vale, close to the chalk hills of Cranborne Chase, on the A350 road five miles south of Shaftesbury and eight miles north of Blandford Forum. In the 2011 census the parish had a population of 734.
Tarrant Monkton is a village and civil parish in north Dorset, England, situated in the Tarrant Valley about four miles east-northeast of Blandford Forum. Within the parish boundary, 1+1⁄2 miles over hills to the west, lies the major part of Blandford Camp army base. In the 2011 census the parish—including the army base—had a population of 1,986. The village is centred on the All Saints Parish Church, opposite which is the Langton Arms, a public house and restaurant.
Gold Hill is a steep cobbled street in the town of Shaftesbury in the English county of Dorset. The view looking down from the top of the street has been described as "one of the most romantic sights in England."
Amesbury Abbey was a Benedictine abbey of women at Amesbury in Wiltshire, England, founded by Queen Ælfthryth in about the year 979 on what may have been the site of an earlier monastery. The abbey was dissolved in 1177 by Henry II, who founded in its place a house of the Order of Fontevraud, known as Amesbury Priory.
Ælfgifu of Shaftesbury was the first wife of King Edmund I. She was Queen of the English from her marriage in around 939 until her death in 944. Ælfgifu and Edmund were the parents of two future English kings, Eadwig and Edgar. Like her mother Wynflaed, Ælfgifu had a close and special if unknown connection with the royal nunnery of Shaftesbury (Dorset), founded by King Alfred, where she was buried and soon revered as a saint. According to a pre-Conquest tradition from Winchester, her feast day is 18 May.
Stoke Wake is a hamlet and civil parish, formerly part of the Whiteway hundred in north Dorset, England. It is situated under Bulbarrow Hill on the edge of the Blackmore Vale, west of Blandford Forum. Dorset County Council's 2013 mid-year estimate of the parish population is 60.
Encombe House is a privately owned, Grade II* listed country house built in 1735 on the Encombe Estate near the village of Kingston and about 1-mile (1.6 km) inland of Dorset's Jurassic Coast in southern England. The parkland is Grade II* listed in the National Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.
Eulalia was a French nun who became abbess of the monastery at Shaftesbury in 1074. She is mentioned in a few contemporary documents including a charter in 1089 and a charter of King Stephen. She is also mentioned in the 1122-23 obituary rolls of Vitalis, abbot of Savigny and in the 1113 roll of Matilda, abbess of Caen.
Elizabeth Shelford was abbess of Shaftesbury Abbey from 1505-1528. She was the second-last person to serve as Abbess before the monastery's closure under Henry VIII's dissolution.
Ælthelfreda may have been the abbess of Shaftesbury at the beginning of the second millennium. During her time as abbess, the relics of Edward the Martyr, held in Shaftesbury, seem to have been translated from a place north of the principal altar to another spot within the sanctuary of the abbey's church. The translation was recorded to have occurred on 20 June 1001. This translation may have been done in response to Viking raids, which made the Anglo-Saxons believe that they needed to bestow greater honours on the relics of saints to gain God's favour; after the translation took place, the Vikings who were in Devon stayed where they were, and then returned to their base on the Isle of Wight.
Marie was an abbess of Shaftesbury Abbey during the 12th century, from at least 1181 to 1215. She was the illegitimate daughter of Count Geoffrey V of Anjou, thus the half-sister of King Henry II of England. It is possible that she may have been the same person as Marie of France, but it is not known for certain. She became abbess sometime in the 1170s or 1180s and died in 1215 or 1216.
Emma was an abbess of Shaftesbury Abbey at the beginning of the 12th century. It is not certain, but it is possible that she was the successor of Eulalia after her death in 1106. A charter of King Henry I of England in 1121-1122 mentions her.
Elizabeth Zouche, was an English abbess. She was the last abbess of Shaftesbury Abbey, a Benedictine nunnery founded by Alfred the Great which was one of the largest and richest in England. She signed the deed of surrender on 23 March 1539 which brought the 650 year life of the abbey to an abrupt end and granted all its property and wealth to Henry VIII.
