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LEWKNOR, OXFORDSHIRE :
Village: Lewknor
Civil Parish: Lewknor
VILLAGE SURVEY -
John Steane
District: South Oxfordshire
Former District: Bullingdon Rural
Hundred: Lewknor
O.S. 1:10,000:.SU79NW
0.S. 1:2500 SU7097
Aerial Photographs. Fairey Air Surveys 11 May 1961.
1,184, 1,185, 1,186, 2,025, 2,026
LEWKNOR .
1. The Hundred and.the Parish
The hundred of this part of South East Oxfordshire takes its name
from the village of Lewknor. The name_means 'Leofeca's slope:and.
the hill,nol4 called 'The.Knappl, just south of the village is a
likely site for early meetings of the hundred. ReMains of Early
Iron.Age.,settlement and nfAn Anglo Saxon cemetery have been tound
here. 'The village of Lewknor seems,to be the earliest Saxon .
settlement in the area. South Weston'clearly relates to it (The
West Farm); also to the east is. Aston Rowant (The,East Farm).
To the north is NethercOte which again may refer indirectly to
.the earlier settlement ('at the other cote'). The parish is a
narrow strip 2 miles broadAt its widest and 5 miles in
.length frommorth-west to.south-east., In the Chilterns there
weie formerly another 2,000. acres which were three detached 'portions
of Lewknor parish; called Lewknor Uphill. In 1844 they went to
Buckinghamshire.
Geology
The village lies near the junction of the Upper Greensand and the
Lower Chalk. In the south east of the parish the ground rises
steeply to the chiltern scarp and includes the middle and upper
chalk, overlain in places by clay with flints. A spring of water
fills a quarry like depression known in 1716 as Town Pond and
hence a stream flows through Nethercote towards South Weston.
It eventually joins the River Thames.
Route Pattern
Two prehistoric routes cross the parish trom North-East to
South-West. The Chiltern Ridgeway runs along the top of the chalk
scarp. The Icknield Way makes its way along the foot keeping
approximately to the 500 ft. contour. it takes the form of a
multi-rutted green way and is thought to have been originally an
alternative to the Ridgeway for use in the summer. There are also
roads connecting Lewknor with the villages to the north east and
south west, known in medieval times (and so referred to in the 1598
Langdon map) as the Aston and Watlington ways.