Monument record MDO1682 - Medieval settlement of Melcombe Horsey

Melcombe Horsey DMV earthworks. Rectangular closes, and the remains of building sites, are readily identifiable on the ground, and OS air photographs. A few small sherds of undecorated Medieval ware were retrieved from mole-heaps on the south west side of the site, which is now kept under permanent pasture.

Area centred ST 74820256: Melcombe Horsey DMV earthworks are generally as described by RCHM <1>. Rectangular closes, and the remains of building sites, are readily identifiable on the ground, and OS air photographs <3.1>. A few small sherds of undecorated Medieval ware were retrieved from mole-heaps on the south west side of the site, which is now kept under permanent pasture.

Surveyed at 1:2500 on MSD in conjunction with RCHM plan. <3>

<1> Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, 1970, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume III (Central) Part 2, 136 (Monograph). SDO136.

'(8) SETTLEMENT REMAINS of Melcombe Horsey (749025) lie in 'Chapel Close', 100 yds. N.W. of (3) The village was one of two in the parish, both now deserted. In Domesday Book, presumably, they are noted together as Melcombe with a combined recorded population of thirty-three. Subsequently the two settlements were divided into various manors (Hutchins IV, 363–4), but in the 14th-century Subsidy Rolls both settlements were again recorded together. In 1333 twenty-one taxpayers were listed, which perhaps shows some decline in population. The taxation of 1428 (Feudal Aids, II (1899), 71) indicates that there were still more than ten people in the parish, but both villages appear to have been granted a tax reduction in 1435 (P.R.O. E179/103/79). By 1662 (Meekings, 49) only nine households are recorded; three of them were apparently in the two manor houses. Melcombe Horsey had a chapel, the foundations of which were still visible in the late 18th century (Hutchins IV, 368), but the site can no longer be identified. The chapel in (3) presumably replaced it.
The remains, covering about 10 acres, have been damaged by quarrying and by tracks. They consist of several roughly rectangular closes, bounded by low banks and ditches only 2 ft. to 3 ft. high, with a hollow-way running S.E.-N.W. through them. To S. and W. of the closes the fragmentary remains of rectangular building sites are defined by low banks, 3 ft. to 4 ft. wide and 6 ins. to 9 ins. high; an irregular circular mound 30 ft. in diameter and 3 ft. to 4 ft. high also remains.'

<2> Royal Air Force, 17-JAN-1947, RAF/CPE/UK/1934 3179-81, 3180-1 (Aerial Photograph). SDO17530.

<3> Stone, J W, Field Investigators Comments JWS, F1 JWS 07-DEC-78 (Unpublished document). SDO11902.

<3.1> Ordnance Survey, OS 74/058/185-86 (Aerial Photograph). SDO17532.

<4> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), 1994, Medieval Village Research Group Index, PRN 506 (Index). SDO16386.

<5> National Record of the Historic Environment, 202070 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Jan 27 2022 11:36AM