Little Faringdon

Coordinates: 51°42′40″N 1°40′30″W / 51.711°N 1.675°W / 51.711; -1.675

Little Faringdon is a village in West Oxfordshire, about 1 mile (1.6 km) north of Lechlade in neighbouring Gloucestershire. The 2001 Census recorded its population as 63. Little Faringdon was a separate civil parish, but since 2001 it has become part of the neighbouring parish of Kelmscott.

Manor

In the late Anglo-Saxon era Little Faringdon was part of a large estate that included Faringdon (formally Great Faringdon), from which it took its name. The manor was one of several in the area granted to the Cistercian Beaulieu Abbey as part of its Faringdon estate by a charter of 1204 or 1205. Beaulieu held its estates until it had to surrender them to the Crown in the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1538.

The manor was then held by the Bourchier and Perrott families. In about 1860 it was sold to Charles Ponsonby, 2nd Baron de Mauley, whose descendants hold it today.

Until the 20th century Little Faringdon was an estate village. In 1910 the lord of the manor owned almost all the houses.

Faringdon

Coordinates: 51°39′25″N 1°35′10″W / 51.657°N 1.586°W / 51.657; -1.586

Faringdon is a market town in the Vale of White Horse, Oxfordshire, England, about 18 miles (29 km) southwest of Oxford and about 10 miles (16 km) northwest of Wantage. It is a large parish, its lowest parts extending to the River Thames in the north and its highest ground reaching the Ridgeway in the south. It was part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred it to Oxfordshire.

The civil parish is formally called Great Faringdon, to distinguish it from Little Faringdon in West Oxfordshire. The 2011 Census recorded its population as 7,121.

On 1 February 2004, Faringdon was granted Fairtrade Town status, becoming the first Fairtrade Town in South East England. Faringdon is the base for the Faringdon Enterprise Gateway, which is run by the South East England Development Agency to help and advise businesses in rural west Oxfordshire.

History

The toponym "Faringdon" means "fern covered hill". Claims that King Edward the Elder died there are incorrect.