History
The first Saxon settlement at Earls Barton was one of various settlements built on a spring-line on the Northern bank of the River Nene. The site is to be found on a spur above the flood plain. Originally (i.e. before 600 AD) the Saxon village was known as Bere-tun - which means "a place for growing Barley. Following the Norman invasion, the Domesday Book records the village as being called Buarton(e), with Countess Judith, the King's niece is listed as both the land and mill owner. She married Waltheof, Son of Siward, Earl of Northumbria who in 1065 AD became Earl of Northampton - it was from these links and with another Earl - the Earl of Huntingdon, that gave the village its prefix "Erles" from 1261 AD.
Later, in the 14th and 15th centuries a major change took place in the local economy, when sheep rearing gave prominence to the manufacture of woollen cloth, which remained a major cottage industry until the shift to the newly industrialised north several centuries later. With the wool industry, it is thought there would also have been:
- Basket making,
- Chair bodging
- Rush mat weaving,
Another change took place in the 13th century when shoes began to be made from leather bought in nearby Northampton. At this time the village had its own tanyard, which remained in operation until 1984. The census of 1801 shows that the population had by then grown to 729. By 1850 the population had trebled.
Between 1913 and 1921 ironstone was quarried locally with the ore being removed either by train or by an aerial ropeway.
Read more about this topic: Earls Barton
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Three million of such stones would be needed before the work was done. Three million stones of an average weight of 5,000 pounds, every stone cut precisely to fit into its destined place in the great pyramid. From the quarries they pulled the stones across the desert to the banks of the Nile. Never in the history of the world had so great a task been performed. Their faith gave them strength, and their joy gave them song.”
—William Faulkner (1897–1962)
“I cannot be much pleased without an appearance of truth; at least of possibility—I wish the history to be natural though the sentiments are refined; and the characters to be probable, though their behaviour is excelling.”
—Frances Burney (1752–1840)
“A great proportion of the inhabitants of the Cape are always thus abroad about their teaming on some ocean highway or other, and the history of one of their ordinary trips would cast the Argonautic expedition into the shade.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)