The Vale of White Horse is the local government district of Oxfordshire in England. Located south of the River Thames, within the confines of Berkshire's historic area.
Most of the districts had been part of the Wantage Rural District in the Berkshire region until the reorganization of local government in 1974. In 1974, the rural district was divided, with Ardington parishes, Blewbury, Childrey, Chilton, Denchworth, East Challow, East Hanney, East Hendred, Goosey, Grove, Harwell, Letcombe Bassett, Letcombe Regis, Lockinge, Sparsholt, Upton, West Challow, West Hanney and West Hendred became part of the Vale of White Horse district in Oxfordshire, and the remainder became part of the Newbury district of Berkshire. smaller. The main town is Abingdon; Other places include Faringdon and Wantage. There are 68 parishes in the district. The Vale of White Horse District Board is located in Milton Park, Milton, and in April 2018, Council Leader is Matthew Barber.
This is a different geographical area, located between Berkshire Downs and the River Thames, named after the Bronze Age Uffington White Horse. The district was formed on April 1, 1974, under the 1972 Local Government Act, from Borough Town Abingdon, Wantage Suburb, Abingdon District, Faringdon Rural District, and part of the Wantage Rural District of Berkshire. The southern border of the district is roughly the same as the Ridgeway Line. This area is often referred to as 'Vale of the White Horse'.
Video Vale of White Horse
Geography
The Vale is the Ock valley, a river that connects the Thames River from the west in Abingdon. It's almost flat and well wooded, green pastures and leaves are in sharp contrast to the crest of the Berkshire Downs, flanking it in the south. Many of the elm trees that used to be the main features of the Vale were lost to Dutch Elm Disease. To the north, the lower ridge separates it from the upper Thames Valley, withstanding the soft sediment of Jurassic sediments (Greensand, Gault and Kimmeridge Clay) behind the steep cliffs of hard coral limestone, in what is technically a hanging valley; but local use sometimes extends the vale to cover all the land between the Cotswolds (in the north) and the Berkshire Downs. By geographical definition, however, the Vale is from two to five miles wide, and the distance from the road from Abingdon to Shrivenham on its head is 18 miles.
Wantage is the only city in Vale (though Faringdon, on the northwestern edge, is also the "Vale" town), lying in a hole that is sheltered at the foot of the hills, in addition, more villages than elsewhere in vale. There are many springs coming from limestone hills, which allow these settlements to flourish in the past.
Maps Vale of White Horse
Sites of interest
Toward the west, above Uffington, the hills reach a peak of 261 m (856 feet) at White Horse Hill. On the north side, just below the summit, the giant figure of the horse is cut, the grass removed to show the white calcareous soil underneath. This number gives a name to the hill, range and Vale. Its length is 114 m (374 ft) and is very stylish, neck, body and tail slightly different width.
The origin of the figure is unknown. The tradition asserts it to be a monument to victory over Denmark by King Alfred, who was born in Wantage, but the site of Battle of Ashdown (871 CE), has been widely located. What's more, the figure has been dated to the Bronze Age, so this has already been fighting for centuries. Many ancient remains occur around the Horse.
At the top of the hill was a large and well preserved round camp, which seemed to be used by the Romans but much earlier. This is an Iron Age hill fort named Uffington Castle, after the village in the vale below. Within a short distance is Hardwell Castle, a near-square work and, on the southern slopes of the hills near Ashdown House, a small camp that is traditionally called Alfred's Castle. Further west, there is Liddington Palace.
A slippery, slippery valley on the north side of White Horse Hill is called the Palungan, and on its west appears a bald mound called Dragon Hill, the traditional place of St. George over the dragon, the blood that made the ground naked grass forever. But his name probably comes from Celtic Pendragon ("dragon head"), which is a title for a king, and probably points to the place of the beginning of the cemetery.
To the west of the White Horse Hill lies a long barrow called Wayland's Smithy, which is said to be the home of a blacksmith who has never been seen, but who pinned the horses of tourists if they were left in place with payment. The legend is described, and the blacksmith appears as a character, in the novel Sir Walter Scott Kenilworth , and in Rudyard Kipling's Puck of Pook's Hill . The Vale as a whole appeared at the beginning of Schooldays Tom Brown , as a scene of an innocent Saxon childhood adventure, before eponymous heroes were sent to school at Rugby. Rosemary Sutcliff's 1977 novel novel Sun Horse, Moon Horse happened in Vale, telling the story of the creation of the White Horse in ancient Celtic days.
The White Horse is carefully cleansed from the plants from time to time. The figure remains clear from the grass during its long existence, except to be covered as a precaution during the Second World War. The cleaning process, known as Scouring of the White Horse, was once made at the festival. Sports of all kinds are held, and fierce competition is maintained, not only between local villagers but also between local champions and those from distant regions of England. The first of the known festivals occurred in 1755 and they died only later into 1857.
The Ridgeway
The grassy path symbolizes the Ridgeway, claimed to be the oldest street in Europe, perhaps five thousand years or more. It moves along a hilltop, way above what was then a swampy lowland or forest, continuing Icknield Street, from Chilterns to Goring and Streatley on the River Thames. It connects the Wash and Salisbury Plains, and will become an important artery for trade.
Other Earthworks, other than those near the White Horse, ignore the Vale, such as Letcombe Castle (also known as Segsbury Camp) above Wantage. At the foot of the hills, not far east of the Horse, preserved so-called Kingston Lisle Stone Blowing, the mass of sandstone (sarsen) is pierced with a hole such that, when blown like a trumpet, it produces a harsh note. It is believed that, in ancient times, the stone served the purpose of the trumpet.
Some of the village churches in Vale attracted attention, especially the Early English cross building at Uffington, which has hexagonal towers and is known as The Cathedral of the Vale.
Economy
The Vale used to have a rapidly growing livestock industry, especially in the 1960s. It has shrunk into just a few dairy herds, in the first years of the 21st century. Agriculture is now mostly cultivable.
Natural mineral resources mined (excavated) in Vale. These include sand, gravel and (formerly) Earth Fuller.
With the closure of MG's long established works at Leyland in Abingdon in 1980, there was no motor industry, apart from some specialist car makers and component manufacturers. Macdermid Autotype at Wantage remains one of the few major industrial entrepreneurs in the region.
Long Vale is traversed by Great Western Main Line and Cherwell Valley Line. The railway station of Appleford and the Radley railway station is now the only station in Vale, although there used to be stations in Challow, Uffington, Grove (near Wantage), Abingdon, and Steventon. All this was closed as part of Beeching's cuts, in the early 1960s. Nearest mainstream stations now are Swindon, Oxford, and Didcot Parkway.
At one time Amey plc had its headquarters in Sutton Courtenay, Vale of White Horse.
See also
- Pendon Museum - the main exhibit is an extensive model featuring a replica of the building scale of Vale.
- Vale of the Red Horse - another vale of the same name that once carried some 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 hill figures of a horse.
Note
References
- Thomas Hughes, The Scouring of the White Horse (1859).
- G. K. Chesterton, "The Ballad of the White Horse" (1911).
- Rudyard Kipling, "Puck of Pook's Hill".
- Schooldays Tom Brown
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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