Melling-with-Wrayton 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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...
in the
City of Lancaster
The City of Lancaster, or simply ''Lancaster'' (), is a non-metropolitan district, local government district with City status in the United Kingdom, city status in Lancashire, England. It is named after its largest settlement, Lancaster, Lanca ...
in the English county of
Lancashire
Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated ''Lancs'') is a ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Cumbria to the north, North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and the Irish Sea to ...
. It includes the village of Melling and the
hamlet
''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play. Set in Denmark, the play (the ...
of Wrayton, to the northeast. The parish had a population of 290 recorded in the
2001 census, increasing slightly to 299 at the 2011 census.
Melling forms part of a cluster of sites along the
Lune Valley – the densest distribution of
Norman
Norman or Normans may refer to:
Ethnic and cultural identity
* The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 9th and 10th centuries
** People or things connected with the Norma ...
castle
A castle is a type of fortification, fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by Military order (monastic society), military orders. Scholars usually consider a ''castle'' to be the private ...
s outside the
Welsh border countryside. Each has evidence of a
motte
A motte-and-bailey castle is a European fortification with a wooden or stone keep situated on a raised area of ground called a motte, accompanied by a walled courtyard, or Bailey (castle), bailey, surrounded by a protective Rampart (fortificati ...
– as with
Arkholme and
Whittington – but Melling has no surviving
bailey.
Railway lines
Until 1952
Melling railway station
Melling railway station is the terminal station on the single track Melling Line in Lower Hutt, New Zealand. The single platform station serves the suburb of Melling. The station is served by Metlink's electric multiple unit trains.
The Mel ...
was served by the
Furness and Midland Joint Railway. The line continues in use for through traffic, although stopping trains ended on the branch in 1960. To the south-east, a tunnel takes the line to
Wennington, where it connects to the
Midland Railway
The Midland Railway (MR) was a railway company in the United Kingdom from 1844 in rail transport, 1844. The Midland was one of the largest railway companies in Britain in the early 20th century, and the largest employer in Derby, where it had ...
; in the opposite direction, the next station was
Arkholme. The line is now used by trains travelling between
Morecambe
Morecambe ( ) is a seaside town and civil parish in the City of Lancaster district of Lancashire, England, on Morecambe Bay, part of the Irish Sea. In 2011 the parish had a population of 34,768.
Name
The first use of the name was by John Whit ...
/
Lancaster
Lancaster may refer to:
Lands and titles
*The County Palatine of Lancaster, a synonym for Lancashire
*Duchy of Lancaster, one of only two British royal duchies
*Duke of Lancaster
*Earl of Lancaster
*House of Lancaster, a British royal dynasty
...
and
Leeds
Leeds is a city in West Yorkshire, England. It is the largest settlement in Yorkshire and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds Metropolitan Borough, which is the second most populous district in the United Kingdom. It is built aro ...
, as the Midland Railway between Lancaster and Wennington closed in 1966.
Geographical and architectural features
On the edge of the first terrace 6m above the
flood plain
A floodplain or flood plain or bottomlands is an area of land adjacent to a river. Floodplains stretch from the banks of a river channel to the base of the enclosing valley, and experience flooding during periods of high Discharge (hydrolog ...
– and within St Wilfrid's vicarage garden – the motte at Melling is located centrally in the village, some distance from the present course of the river. The mound has been damaged by landscaping activities, but former channels of the varied course of the Lune can still be detected – on the Melling side of the plain.
Locally attributed as, "The Cathedral of the Lune Valley",
St Wilfrid's Church, with a belfry of six bells appears, originally, to have formed the manorial chapel within the, now missing, castle bailey.
See also
*
Listed buildings in Melling-with-Wrayton
Melling-with-Wrayton is a Civil parishes in England, civil parish in City of Lancaster, Lancaster, Lancashire, England. It contains 22 Listed building#England and Wales, listed buildings that are recorded in the National Heritage List for England ...
References
External links
Castles in the Lune ValleyLancaster Council Parish Plan for Melling-with-Wrayton, 2003
{{City of Lancaster geography
Civil parishes in Lancashire
Geography of the City of Lancaster