Corscombe 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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

in the English county of

Dorset Dorset ( ; Archaism, archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north and the north-east, Hampshire to the east, t ...

, in the Dorset Council administrative area. The parish includes the small settlements of Benville and Toller Whelme to the south and in the 2011 census had a

population Population is a set of humans or other organisms in a given region or area. Governments conduct a census to quantify the resident population size within a given jurisdiction. The term is also applied to non-human animals, microorganisms, and pl ...

of 445. Corscombe village is sited "into hollows and along sunken lanes"Gant, R., ''Dorset Villages'', Hale, 1980, p105 on the northern scarp slope of the

Dorset Downs The Dorset Downs are an area of chalk downland in the centre of the county Dorset in south west England. The downs are the most western part of a larger chalk formation which also includes (from west to east) Cranborne Chase, Salisbury Plain, ...

, approximately south-south-west from the town of

Yeovil Yeovil () is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in Somerset, England. It is close to Somerset's southern border with Dorset, west of London, south of Bristol, west of Sherborne and east of Taunton. The population of the bui ...

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

. Evidence of early human occupation within the parish includes

lynchet A lynchet or linchet is an Terrace (earthworks), earth terrace found on the side of a hill. Lynchets are a feature of ancient field systems of the British Isles. They are commonly found in vertical rows and more commonly referred to as "strip lyn ...

s and, south of the village, three standing stones. On the higher ground in the village stands the 15th-century parish church of St. Mary, which was restored in 1875–7. In 1905 Sir Frederick Treves described the church as a "handsome building" with an "exceedingly fine" situation. Nearby Corscombe Court dates from the 13th century and is partially surrounded by a moat. It has a 15th-century tithe barn which was once used by the monks of

Sherborne Abbey Sherborne Abbey, otherwise the Abbey Church of St. Mary the Virgin, is a Church of England church in Sherborne in the English county of Dorset. It was formerly a Saxon Catholic cathedral (705–1075) and a Benedictine abbey church (998–1539) ...

. About 2 kilometres to the south of Corscombe village, across the A356, is Toller Down, one of the highest hills in Dorset, with good views of the surrounding countryside. The musician Polly Jean Harvey is a former resident.

References

Villages in Dorset {{Dorset-geo-stub