Firle (;

Sussex dialect English in Southern England (also, rarely, Southern English English; Southern England English; or in the UK, simply, Southern English) is the collective set of different dialects and accents of Modern English spoken in Southern England. As of ...

: ''Furrel'' ) is a village and

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 authorit ...

in the

Lewes Lewes () is the county town of East Sussex, England. It is the police and judicial centre for all of Sussex and is home to Sussex Police, East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service, Lewes Crown Court and HMP Lewes. The civil parish is the centre of t ...

district of

East Sussex East Sussex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England on the English Channel coast. It is bordered by Kent to the north and east, West Sussex to the west, and Surrey to the north-west. The largest settlement in East ...

, England. Firle refers to an old-English/

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons were a cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo-Saxons happened wit ...

word ''fierol'' meaning overgrown with oak. Although the original division of East Firle and West Firle still remains, East Firle is now simply confined to the houses of Heighton Street, which lie to the east of the Firle Park. West Firle is now generally referred to as Firle although West Firle remains its official name. It is located south of the

A27 road The A27 is a major road in England. It runs from its junction with the A36 at Whiteparish (near Salisbury) in the county of Wiltshire, follows the south coast of Hampshire and West Sussex, and terminates at Pevensey (near Eastbourne and Bex ...

four miles (9 km) east of Lewes.

History of the village

During the reign of

Edward the Confessor Edward the Confessor ; la, Eduardus Confessor , ; ( 1003 – 5 January 1066) was one of the last Anglo-Saxon English kings. Usually considered the last king of the House of Wessex, he ruled from 1042 to 1066. Edward was the son of Æt ...

(1042–66) Firle was part of the Abbey of Wilton's estate. Following the

Norman conquest of England The Norman Conquest (or the Conquest) was the 11th-century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Norman, Breton, Flemish, and French troops, all led by the Duke of Normandy, later styled William the Conqu ...

the village and surrounding lands were passed to

Robert, Count of Mortain Robert, Count of Mortain, 2nd Earl of Cornwall (–) was a Norman nobleman and the half-brother (on their mother's side) of King William the Conqueror. He was one of the very few proven companions of William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hast ...

. Half-brother of King

William I William I; ang, WillelmI (Bates ''William the Conqueror'' p. 33– 9 September 1087), usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman king of England, reigning from 1066 until his death in 10 ...

, Robert was the largest landowner in the country after the monarch. The village is mentioned 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 ...

, referred to as 'Ferla'. The value of the village is listed as being £44, which was amongst the highest in the county. The manor house, the site on which

Firle Place Firle Place is a Manor house in Firle, Sussex, United Kingdom. The Gage family have owned the land at Firle since acquiring it from the Levett family in the 15th century. The manor house was first built in the late 15th century by Sir John Gage, ...

now stands, was occupied from the early 14th century by the 'de Livet' (

Levett Levett is a surname of Anglo-Norman origin, deriving from eLivet, which is held particularly by families and individuals resident in England and British Commonwealth territories. Origins This surname comes from the village of Livet-en-Ouche, no ...

) family, an ancient Sussex gentry family of Norman descent who owned the manor. The Levett family would later include founders of Sussex's iron industry, royal courtiers, knights, rectors, an Oxford University dean, a prominent early physician and medical educator, and even a lord mayor of London. An ancient bronze seal found in the 1800s near Eastbourne, now in the collection of the Lewes Castle Museum, shows the coat-of-arms of John Livet and is believed to have belonged to the first member of the family named lord of Firle in 1316. On the bankruptcy of

lord of the manor Lord of the Manor is a title that, in Anglo-Saxon England, referred to the landholder of a rural estate. The lord enjoyed manorial rights (the rights to establish and occupy a residence, known as the manor house and demesne) as well as seig ...

Thomas Levett in 1440, the ownership passed to Bartholomew Bolney, whose daughter married William Gage in 1472. Following the death of Bolney in 1476 without a male heir, the seat of Firle Place was passed to William Gage and has remained the seat of the

Viscount Gage Viscount Gage, of Castle Island in the County of Kerry of the Kingdom of Ireland, is a title in the Peerage of Ireland. It was created in 1720 for Thomas Gage, along with the subsidiary title of Baron Gage, of Castlebar in the County of Mayo ...

ever since. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, Firle Plantation to the south of the village was the operational base of a four-man Home Guard Auxiliary Unit.

The Greengage at Hengrave Hall, Suffolk

The commonly used word

greengage The greengages are a group of cultivars of the common European plum. The first true greengage came from a green-fruited wild plum ( fa , گوجه‌سبز, Gowjehsabz) which originated in Iran (Persia). Greengages are grown in temperate areas ...

is linked with another branch of the Gage family who lived at Hengrave Hall in Suffolk. It would appear that Sir William Gage, 2nd bart (c. 1650-1727), introduced the Gross Reine Claude fruit tree to England from France ca. 1725, and later became known as the greengage plum. Francis Young, author of The Gages of Hengrave, Suffolk Catholicism 1640-1767

Notable residents

Thomas Gage General Thomas Gage (10 March 1718/192 April 1787) was a British Army general officer and colonial official best known for his many years of service in North America, including his role as British commander-in-chief in the early days of t ...

, British army general, was born in Firle. *

Alexandra Gage, Viscountess Gage Alexandra Murray Gage, Viscountess Gage (née Templeton; born 1969) is a British academic, businesswoman, and aristocrat. She is a senior lecturer at the University of Brighton, teaching fine art at the university's School of Art and Media. As ...

, businesswoman and fine arts lecturer *

Katherine Mansfield Kathleen Mansfield Murry (née Beauchamp; 14 October 1888 – 9 January 1923) was a New Zealand writer, essayist and journalist, widely considered one of the most influential and important authors of the modernist movement. Her works are celebra ...

, writer, had close ties with the Bloomsbury Group, lived in Firle for a brief time. *

John Maynard Keynes John Maynard Keynes, 1st Baron Keynes, ( ; 5 June 1883 – 21 April 1946), was an English economist whose ideas fundamentally changed the theory and practice of macroeconomics and the economic policies of governments. Originally trained in ...

, economist, another member of the Bloomsbury Group, took an extended lease in a house in Firle in 1925 and died there in 1946. Keynes was cremated and his ashes scattered above the downs of nearby Tilton. *

Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf was born ...

, writer, visited nearby Lewes in December 1910 and decided to relocate in Firle, where she rented a house and renamed it ''Little Talland House''. Pointz Hall, a fictional manor from her novel ''Between the Acts'', is believed to be inspired by Firle Place. Woolf's sister, the painter and interior designer Vanessa Bell, moved to Firle in 1916 taking residence with her live-in lover

Duncan Grant Duncan James Corrowr Grant (21 January 1885 – 8 May 1978) was a British painter and designer of textiles, pottery, theatre sets and costumes. He was a member of the Bloomsbury Group. His father was Bartle Grant, a "poverty-stricken" major i ...

Charleston Farmhouse Charleston, in East Sussex, is a property associated with the Bloomsbury group, that is open to the public. It was the country home of Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant and is an example of their decorative style within a domestic context, represen ...

, which subsequently became a regular haunt of the

Bloomsbury Group The Bloomsbury Group—or Bloomsbury Set—was a group of associated English writers, intellectuals, philosophers and artists in the first half of the 20th century, including Virginia Woolf, John Maynard Keynes, E. M. Forster and Lytton St ...

. Vanessa Bell, her son

Quentin Bell Quentin Claudian Stephen Bell (19 August 1910 – 16 December 1996) was an English art historian and author. Early life Bell was born in London, the son of Clive Bell and Vanessa Bell (née Stephen), and the nephew of Virginia Woolf (née Ste ...

, and Duncan Grant are all buried in the churchyard of St Peter's, Firle.

Village features

St Peter's Church notably contains an alabaster effigy of Sir John Gage wearing his

Order of the Garter The Most Noble Order of the Garter is an order of chivalry founded by Edward III of England in 1348. It is the most senior order of knighthood in the British honours system, outranked in precedence only by the Victoria Cross and the Georg ...

and lying beside his wife Philippa. It also has a John Piper stained-glass window in warm colours, depicting Blake's

Tree of Life The tree of life is a fundamental archetype in many of the world's mythological, religious, and philosophical traditions. It is closely related to the concept of the sacred tree.Giovino, Mariana (2007). ''The Assyrian Sacred Tree: A Hist ...

. There are also memorials for those named Bolney, Moreton, Levett, Swaffield and others. The current vicar is the Reverend

Peter Owen-Jones Peter Owen-Jones (born 1957) is an English Anglican priest, author and television presenter. Owen-Jones dropped out of public school at the age of 16, and moved to Australia, where he worked as a farm hand. He moved back to Britain, and worke ...

. The ''Ram Inn'' is the only remaining one of the village's three original

public house A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and wa ...

s, that previously all acted as resting stops on the

Alfriston Alfriston is a village and civil parish in the East Sussex district of Wealden, England. The village lies in the valley of the River Cuckmere, about four miles (6 km) north-east of Seaford and south of the main A27 trunk road and part ...

coach road. It was also the village court room where the rents for tenants farmers were collected and set. The area in front of the Ram is called the Beach, not to be confused with the Dock which is further up the street. Firle

Cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by st ...

Club was founded in 1758 and is said to be one of the oldest in the country. Even earlier in 1725 Sir William Gage, 7th Baronet challenged the Duke of Richmond to a game of cricket, one of the first recorded matches. The club continues to be central to village life and has two teams which both compete in the East Sussex Cricket League. The Firle 1st XI are in ESCL Division 3 and the Firle 2nd XI are in ESCL Division 9. Previously both teams played in the Cuckmere Valley League; 2007 was their first year in the ESCL. South of the village lie the

South Downs The South Downs are a range of chalk hills that extends for about across the south-eastern coastal counties of England from the Itchen valley of Hampshire in the west to Beachy Head, in the Eastbourne Downland Estate, East Sussex, in the eas ...

and Firle Beacon, which reaches a height of 712 feet (217 m). The beacon was once a lighting beacon used as part of a warning system during the time of the

Spanish Armada The Spanish Armada (a.k.a. the Enterprise of England, es, Grande y Felicísima Armada, links=no, lit=Great and Most Fortunate Navy) was a Spanish fleet that sailed from Lisbon in late May 1588, commanded by the Duke of Medina Sidonia, an ar ...

in 1588. On the site there are also around 50

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...

burial barrows. The Monument of Sir John Gage in Firle Church

Firle Bonfire Society is first mentioned in 1879 in a diary of the then vicar of Firle, Reverend Crawley, though it was re-formed in 1982 to encourage and promote traditional bonfire festivities in the village. The society forms part of a network of bonfire societies in the Lewes area which serve the purpose both of remembering the

Gunpowder Plot The Gunpowder Plot of 1605, in earlier centuries often called the Gunpowder Treason Plot or the Jesuit Treason, was a failed assassination attempt against King James I by a group of provincial English Catholics led by Robert Catesby who sough ...

and of recalling the fate of the Sussex Martyrs. The village holds its celebrations in October before the main event in Lewes. Traditionally the Firle Bonfire Society Pioneers wear Valencian costumes. It is customary to burn an effigy other than Guy Fawkes; in 2003 an effigy of a Gypsy family in a caravan was burned, sparking a controversy that resulted in members of the bonfire society being arrested.

Governance

On a local level, Firle is governed by Firle Parish Council, which meets every two months in the Firle village memorial hall. Its responsibilities include footpaths, street lighting, playgrounds and minor planning applications. The parish council has five seats available which were uncontested in the May 2007 election. The next level of government is the district council. The parish of Firle lies within the Ouse Valley and Ringmer ward of

Lewes District Council Lewes () is the county town of East Sussex, England. It is the police and judicial centre for all of Sussex and is home to Sussex Police, East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service, Lewes Crown Court and HMP Lewes. The civil parish is the centre of the ...

which returns three seats to the council. The election on 4 May 2007 elected two Liberal Democrats and one

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

East Sussex County Council East Sussex County Council is the local authority for the non-metropolitan county of East Sussex. East Sussex is divided into five local government districts. Three are larger, rural, districts (from west to east: Lewes; Wealden; and Rother ...

is the next tier of government, for which Firle is within the Ouse Valley East division. The council has responsibility for education, libraries, social services, civil registration, trading standards and transport. Elections for the county council are held every four years. The Liberal Democrat Thomas Ost was elected in the 2005 election. The UK Parliament constituency for Firle is

. The Liberal Democrat Norman Baker served as the constituency MP since 1997, before losing his seat in the 2015 general election to the Conservative

Maria Caulfield Maria Colette Caulfield (born 6 August 1973) is a British politician and nurse serving as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Mental Health and Women’s Health Strategy and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Women since Octobe ...

. She had her majority reduced to just over 2,000 in the 2019 general election by runner up Lib Dem candidate, Oli Henman.

Landmarks

Firle Escarpment is a

Site of Special Scientific Interest A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle ...

(SSSI) within the parish which extends into the neighbouring parish of

Beddingham Beddingham is an English village and civil parish in the Lewes district of East Sussex, at the junction between the London–Newhaven ( A26) and south coast ( A27) roads south-east of Lewes. The parish council joined with that of Glynde shortly ...

. The site is an extensive area of chalkland which hosts a wide range of flora. The rarest of these is the early spider orchid '' Ophrys sphegodes''.

References

External links

{{authority control Villages in East Sussex Civil parishes in East Sussex Lewes District