Approximate location and scale of the Hundred Parishes within the East of England.The Hundred Parishes - indicative places within the area are shown in BOLD.
The Hundred Parishes is an area of the East of England with no formal recognition or status, albeit that the concept has the blessing of county and district authorities. It encompasses around 450 square miles (1,100 square kilometres) of northwest Essex, northeast Hertfordshire and southern Cambridgeshire. The area comprises just over 100 administrative parishes, hence its name. It contains over 6,000 listed buildings and many conservation areas,[1][2][3][4] village greens, ancient hedgerows, protected features and a historical pattern of small rural settlements in close proximity to one another.
The idea of recognising the area for its special heritage characteristics was originally conceived by local historian and author David Heathcote.[5][6] A steering group of local historians, conservationists and a local authority representative, spearheaded by the Essex branch of the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE), progressed the idea and defined a boundary.[7] The name arose in response to the fact that the defined area covered just over 100 administrative parishes. The initiative steadily gained support and the Hundred Parishes name was approved in 2012 at a constitutional conference to which all local authorities and many other local organisations were invited.[8] The conference was attended by delegates from more than 30 authorities and organisations and The Hundred Parishes Society was established as a company limited by guarantee immediately afterwards.[9][10][11][12]
The Hundred Parishes Society
This society[13] was formed to raise public consciousness of the area and to encourage preservation of the area's special characteristics. It was formed in 2012 and launched to the general public in 2014 after being registered by the Charity Commission. [10] Its website www.hundredparishes.org.uk includes introductions to each of the area's 103 administrative parishes and to a number of notable people associated with the area, as well as a wide range of articles about the area and an extensive series of walk routes which website visitors are encouraged to download at no cost: each parish is included in at least one route. Some 20 routes start and finish at railway stations and a growing number of "quiet lane walks" avoid footpaths. Membership of the Society is open to households and organisations and includes a growing number of parish councils.
In 2018 the Society published the first book to focus on the area, The Hundred Parishes: An Introduction ( ISBN978-1-5272-1881-9). This hardback book comprises 432 pages and includes almost a thousand photos. The text and photos focus on the area's history and extensive heritage. The book was well received and is now out of print, although copies are available through libraries.
Geography
The Hundred Parishes is at its highest in the chalk hills in the northwest of the area, generally sloping down towards the southeast. The whole area lies between 100 and 500 feet (30 and 150 metres) above sea level.
There are no major rivers but the many small ones follow valleys that give the area its attractive, gentle landscape. In the west, the rivers Rib, Ash and Stort flow south from the Hundred Parishes to meet the Lea and then the Thames. In the east, the Chelmer and Pant flow from the Hundred Parishes into the Blackwater and then the North Sea. The Cam flows northwards through the middle of the northern half of the Hundred Parishes, gathering up the Granta and Rhee before leaving the Hundred Parishes bound for Cambridge and the North Sea. And in the south, the Roding, which gives its name to several villages in the Hundred Parishes, flows south to meet the Thames at Barking Creek.
Features and attractions
Many of the area's individual parishes appear in the Domesday Book of 1086, and there is considerable evidence of earlier settlements. Relics from the Iron Age and Bronze Age have been found in a number of locations. Roman roads including Stane Street and Ermine Street cross the Hundred Parishes. An ancient long-distance trackway, the Icknield Way, which may pre-date the Roman roads, passes from west to east through the northern part of the area.
Saffron Walden is the area's largest settlement, with a population of 17,000 in 2021. It has been a market town since the 12th century. There are three more market towns: Buntingford, Great Dunmow and Thaxted. Most of the area's villages have a historical church, a pub and a village green, and most are within easy walking distance of the next settlement.
Individual visitor attractions include Audley End House, a Jacobean mansion now cared for by English Heritage, and Hatfield Forest, a medieval royal hunting forest now within the care of the National Trust. The area has several small museums and galleries.
Architecture
The Hundred Parishes has over 6,000 listed buildings, an especially high number for its population of around 150,000 – around 5 times the average ratio of listings to population for England as a whole. Of these listings, 106 are Grade I, including 60 churches.
Typical architectural features include timber-framed buildings, flint (especially for churches), thatched roofs, whitewashing and/or pargeting on external walls.
Uttlesford is a local government district in Essex, England. Its council is based in the town of Saffron Walden. The district also includes the town of Great Dunmow and numerous villages, including Stansted Mountfitchet, Takeley, Elsenham, Thaxted, and Newport. The district covers a largely rural area in the north-west of Essex. London Stansted Airport lies within the district.
East Hertfordshire is one of ten local government districts in Hertfordshire, England. Its council is based in Hertford, the county town of Hertfordshire. The largest town in the district is Bishop's Stortford, and the other main towns are Ware, Buntingford and Sawbridgeworth. At the 2011 Census, the population of the district was 137,687. By area it is the largest of the ten local government districts in Hertfordshire. The district borders North Hertfordshire, Stevenage, Welwyn Hatfield and Broxbourne in Hertfordshire, and Epping Forest, Harlow and Uttlesford in Essex.
Thaxted is a town and civil parish in the Uttlesford district of north-west Essex, England. The town is in the valley of the River Chelmer, not far from its source in the nearby village of Debden, and is 97 metres above sea level.
Saffron Walden Rural District was a rural district in the county of Essex, England. It was created in 1894 and later enlarged by the addition of the parishes of Berden, Birchanger, Elsenham, Farnham, Henham-on-the-Hill, Manuden, Stansted Mountfitchet and Ugley from the disbanded Stansted Rural District. It was named after and administered from Saffron Walden.
Saffron Walden was a constituency in Essex, represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament from 1922 to 2024 by members of the Conservative Party.
Barnston is a village and civil parish in Essex, England. The village is on the B1008 road, about 1+3⁄4 miles (2.8 km) south-east of Great Dunmow and 9 miles (14 km) north-north-west from the county town of Chelmsford.
Little Hallingbury is a small village and a civil parish in the Uttlesford district of Essex, England.
Stansted was a rural district in Essex, England from 1894 to 1934.
Little Chesterford is a small village and civil parish in Uttlesford, Essex, in the East of England. Close to the Cambridgeshire border, it is built principally along a single sunken lane to the east of a chalk stream tributary of the River Cam or Granta and is located 1 km southeast of Great Chesterford and some 5 km northwest of Saffron Walden. The small hamlet of Springwell is just to the south of the village. Up the hill to the east is Chesterford Park, with a mid-19th-century mansion in a 250-acre estate and now a science park called Chesterford Research Park. The wide and relatively deep valley of the river Cam provides a rolling landscape of chalky boulder clay with extensive and wide views. The surrounding farmland is mostly in intensive arable use and except for areas alongside the river, some of which is liable to flooding, is classified as being of grade 2 quality.
Stanley Clifford-Smith (1906–1968) was an English Expressionist painter and textile designer who was active as an artist in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s.
The Saffron Building Society is a regional building society which has branches and agencies in the East of England, spanning Essex, Hertfordshire and Suffolk. It is a member of the Building Societies Association.
Residents for Uttlesford (R4U) is a localist political party in the United Kingdom. The party was launched in 2014, and formed from a number of residents groups in the area. The party is based in the Uttlesford administrative district in Essex and promotes a localist agenda that seeks to give residents a greater say in the future of their district. Residents for Uttlesford has elected representation at multiple levels of local government: Uttlesford District Council, Essex County Council and various town and parish councils, including the councils for both towns in Uttlesford, Saffron Walden and Great Dunmow.
High Roding is a village and civil parish in the Uttlesford district of Essex, England. The village is included in the eight hamlets and villages called The Rodings. High Roding is 9 miles (14 km) northwest from the county town of Chelmsford.
Monk Street is a hamlet in the civil parish of Thaxted, in the Uttlesford district of Essex, England. It is 1.5 miles (2.4 km) south of the town of Thaxted, on the main B184 road to Great Dunmow. The name of the hamlet is probably linked to the former Cistercian abbey in nearby Tilty.
Edwinstree was a judicial and taxation subdivision of Hertfordshire, in the east of the county, that existed from the 10th to the 19th century.
North West Essex is a constituency of the House of Commons in the UK Parliament. Further to the completion of the 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies, it was first contested at the 2024 general election, since when it has been held by Kemi Badenoch of the Conservative Party, who is also the current leader of the opposition. She was MP for the predecessor seat of Saffron Walden from 2017 to 2024.
The Saffron Trail is a long-distance footpath in Essex, England. The 71-mile (114 km) path leads from the pier in Southend-on-Sea to St Mary's church in Saffron Walden. It is waymarked, and shown on Ordnance Survey mapping.
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