Calverton is a

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authority ...

in the

unitary authority area A unitary authority is a local government, local authority responsible for all local government functions within its area or performing additional functions that elsewhere are usually performed by a higher level of sub-national government or the ...

of the

City of Milton Keynes The City of Milton Keynes is a unitary authority area with both borough and city status, in Buckinghamshire. It is the northernmost district of the South East England Region. The borough abuts Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire and the remainder o ...

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-ea ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

and just outside the

Milton Keynes urban area The Milton Keynes urban area or Milton Keynes Built-up Area is a designation established by the United Kingdom's Office for National Statistics. Milton Keynes has no statutory boundary: the 1967 designated area only determined the area assi ...

, near

Stony Stratford Stony Stratford is a constituent town of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. Historically it was a market town on the important route from London to Chester (Watling Street, now the A5). It is also the name of a civil parish with a town cou ...

. The parish consists of one

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

, Lower Weald and two

hamlets A hamlet is a human settlement that is smaller than a town or village. Its size relative to a parish can depend on the administration and region. A hamlet may be considered to be a smaller settlement or subdivision or satellite entity to a lar ...

: Upper Weald and Middle Weald. Lower Weald is the largest of the three settlements, and Manor Farm, the parish church and the former parochial school are within its boundaries. The settlement name is

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, Anglo ...

, and means 'farm where calves are reared'. In the

Domesday Book Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manusc ...

of 1086 the village was recorded as ''Calvretone''. The west side of nearby Stony Stratford was once included with the

ecclesiastic parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest, often termed a parish priest, who might be assisted by one or m ...

of Calverton (the east side being in

Wolverton Wolverton is a constituent town of Milton Keynes, England. It is located at the northern edge of Milton Keynes, beside the West Coast Main Line, the Grand Union Canal and the river Great Ouse. It is the administrative seat of Wolverton and Gre ...

). "The manorial rights over the west side were held with those of Calverton,

hich Ij ( fa, ايج, also Romanized as Īj; also known as Hich and Īch) is a village in Golabar Rural District, in the Central District of Ijrud County, Zanjan Province, Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also ...

led to the manor of Calverton being often called 'the manor of Calverton with Stony Stratford', and the fair and market of Stony Stratford were included among its

appurtenance An appurtenance is something subordinate to or belonging to another larger, principal entity, that is, an adjunct, satellite or accessory that generally accompanies something else. until an

Act of Parliament Acts of Parliament, sometimes referred to as primary legislation, are texts of law passed by the Legislature, legislative body of a jurisdiction (often a parliament or council). In most countries with a parliamentary system of government, acts of ...

in the 18th century separated them. The parish of Calverton was part of

Stratford and Wolverton Rural District Stratford may refer to: Places Australia * Stratford, Queensland, a suburb of Cairns * Stratford, Victoria, a town in the state district of Gippsland East ** Stratford railway station, Victoria, a railway station on the Bairnsdale railway line in ...

from 1894 to 1919, when the rural district became an urban district, subsequently renamed

urban district in 1920. The area was re-established as a separate parish in 2001. The parish church is dedicated to All Saints. "It was rebuilt in stone in the 12th- and 14th-century styles between 1818 and 1824, when some of the old details were re-used". On 2 August 2011, the Grade 2*

Listed Building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

Calverton Manor featured in

BBC2 BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...

's Restoration Home television series. The manor was sold in 1616 to Sir Thomas Bennet, who had been

Lord Mayor of London The Lord Mayor of London is the mayor of the City of London and the leader of the City of London Corporation. Within the City, the Lord Mayor is accorded precedence over all individuals except the sovereign and retains various traditional powe ...

in 1603. It was extended in 1659 by his grandson Sir Simon Bennet. The manor is reputedly haunted by the ghost of Simon's wife, Lady Grace Bennett, who was murdered there in 1694. The Bennet family also owned the nearby manor of

Beachampton Beachampton is a village and civil parish beside the River Great Ouse in the unitary authority area of Buckinghamshire, England. The village is about east of Buckingham and a similar distance west of Milton Keynes. History The village toponym i ...

References

External links

{{Milton Keynes parishes Areas of Milton Keynes Civil parishes in Buckinghamshire