Hambledon
county:
coords:
Hampshire
SU646151
otherwise: hamelandunae, 956-12; Hamledune, 1086
HAMBLEDON
There are a number of names of this or a similar form in England (Surrey Durham, Yorkshire NR (x 2), Rutland, Dorset, Northumberland, Lancashire Yorkshire WR). They are generally assumed to mean 'crooked hill' or 'scarred hill', the first element being Old English 'hamel'='maimed'. (Cf Old High German 'hamalscorro'='collapsed cliff'.) The site of the village church suggests that Windmill Down is intended. Not connected with the river HAMBLE.
The place is described in text Cobbett 1830
CAME from Alresford to Hambledon, through Titchbourne, Cheriton, Beauworth, Kilmston and Exton. This is all a high, hard, dry, fox-hunting country.
...
... Hambledon is a long, straggling village, lying in a little valley formed by some very pretty but not lofty hills. The environs are much prettier than the village itself, which is not far from the North side of Portsdown Hill. This must have once been a considerable place; for here is a church pretty nearly as large as that at Farnham in Surrey, which is quite sufficient for a large town. The means of living has been drawn away from these villages, and the people follow the means. ... Cheriton and Kilmston and Hambledon and the like have been beggared for the purpose of giving tax-eaters the means of making 'vast improvements, Ma'am'.
...
... to Mr. Goldsmith's at West End, where we are now, at about a mile from the village of Hambledon. A village it now is; but it was formerly a considerable market-town, and it had three fairs in the year. There is now not even the name of market left, I believe; and the fairs amount to little more than a couple or three gingerbread-stalls, with dolls and whistles for children. If you go through the place, you see that it has been a considerable town. The church tells the same story; it is now a tumble-down rubbishy place; it is partaking in the fate of all those places which were formerly a sort of rendezvous for persons who had things to buy and things to sell. Wens have devoured market-towns and villages; and shops have devoured markets and fairs; and this, too, to the infinite injury of the most numerous classes of the people. ... Does not every one see, in a minute, how this exchanging of fairs and markets for shops creates idlers and traffickers; creates those locusts, called middlemen, who create nothing, who add to the value of nothing, who improve nothing, but who live in idleness, and who live well, too, out of the labour of the producer and the consumer. ...
Period - 19th century, early
a town in Hampshire, with a market on Monday, 15m SE Winchester, and 64 WSW London.
Shown on an old map by Harrison 1788
- settlement, town - Hambledon Hundred - Hampshire
Period - 1780s
Shown on an old map by Badeslade 1742
- settlement, village - Hampshire
Period - 1740s
Shown on an old map by Morden 1695
- settlement, village - Hambledon Hundred - Hampshire
Period - 1690s-1720s
Shown on an old map by Blaeu 1645
- settlement, village - Hambledon Hundred - Hantshire
Shown on an old map by Speed 1611
- settlement, village - Hambledon Hundred - Hantshire
Shown on an old map by Norden 1607
- settlement, village - Hambledon Hundred - Hamshire
Period - 1590s-1600s
Shown on an old map by Saxton 1575
- settlement, village - Southamtoniae
Listed in Domesday Book
- Menestoc Hundred - Hantescire
Period - 11th century
TERRA WILL~I DE PERCI ... WILL~S de P~ci ten. AMBLEDENE cu~ femina sua accep~ . Aluuin tenuit de rege E ...
Listed in Domesday Book
- Menestoch Hundred - Hantescire
Period - 11th century
TERRA COMITIS ROGERII ... Eduuard ten. una~ hida~ in HAMLEDVNE . Ipse tenuit de Goduino ...
Listed in Domesday Book
- Menestoches Hundred - Hantscire
Period - 11th century
