News & Events | Great Bowden Heritage

Latest News

June 2023

Mike Eason got in touch with us last year after spending a week

excavating at the Rutland Roman Villa site. The excavation was his first experience of a large “dig”.

We are sure some of you will have been following the excavation news from the Roman Villa site but this is a bit different and Mike’s detailed experiences and his feelings during the excavation are very interesting and the illustrations are excellent.

For those of you who have not used flipbook before, you turn the pages by dragging in the top righthand corner.

“I’m Mike Eason and have always been interested in history, especially ancient Roman, Greek and Egyptian. An avid fan of programmes such as Time Team, I finally got the chance to experience a live dig and shout about it!

I wondered if visitors to your website would be interested in viewing a flipbook I made after my excavating experience at the Rutland Roman Villa complex?”

https://heyzine.com/flip-book/e30753bdf6.htm

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June 2023

We have opened up a new page on this website.

The new page is entitled:

Your Page

This space is for the local Community to contribute with projects,

articles, events and research that meet the heritage criteria

given below.

“Our heritage is what we have inherited from the past, to value and enjoy in the present, and to preserve and pass on to future generations and comprises both our cultural and natural heritage.

Tangible heritage includes historic buildings, monuments, archives, excavated sites and artefacts from archaeology.

Natural heritage includes landscapes, woodland, waterways, fields and meadows, open spaces, all forms of wildlife and plant life.

Cultural heritage includes traditional skills, customs and folklore.”

Now it’s over to you……..

…………………please get in touch.

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June 2023

The Heritage Group is still very dormant although there are a couple of news items.

1. The Festival of Leicestershire and Rutland Archaeology runs from1st July to 30th July 2023. and there are lots of places to visits, events to attend and walks to take on the website, https://leicsfieldworkers.org/festival-of-archaeology/

They have included the self guided New Archaeological Tour of Great Bowden from last year although I didn’t ask them to do so. That is fine although there is a possibility that the path from the Rec. over the footbridge towards Bowden Ridge may be closed sometime this summer for the rail electrification work. if anyone sees someone looking lost in the area could you please re direct them back through the Rec. and up to Main Street where they can turn left and pick up the footpath going south just opposite Upper Green. They can then join the original route to the top of the hill and beyond. The walk details and supporting information can be found on this website on the Historical Research page.

2. 1-3rd June 2002 was a very busy period for those of us who were involved with Great Bowden Heritage 21 years ago. We held our first exhibition in the

Mud Barn in Sutton Road. The Farming Exhibition looked at farming in this area over the past 50 or so years - within living memory in fact and was very well attended. This was before the group had its own website, and before digital cameras and so a lot of searching and adapting and scanning of material was needed to produce the Farming Exhibition Report on the Historical Research page of this website.

Maybe you were part of the exhibition team and would like to reminisce or maybe you were taking part in the school’s maypole dancing demo. Or even took part in the Harry Potter Quiz putting your completed quiz form in the box that Mrs Norris was guarding.

The Mud Barn was demolished and a new house constructed in 2016.

3. We are having some interest in joining the Heritage Group particularly from metal detectors. We will endeavour to write to everyone who contacts us and apologise for any delay in getting in touch. We really need people who will take responsibility moving forwards.

RC

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November 2022

November 2022

September 2022

Howgate Wonder

There is in a garden in Great Bowden an old apple tree.

Evidence from old photographs suggests it is at least

100 years old but it still produces annually large quantities

of very large cooking apples enjoyed by the neighbours.

This year one neighbour did some research and has

managed to identify the tree. He is fairly sure it is a

Howgate Wonder, created in the Isle of Wight in 1915,

by Mr George Wratten.

Legend has it that it is a cross between a Newton Wonder

and a Blenheim Orange. And apparently in 1997 one

Howgate Wonder apple made it to the Guinness Book of Records

as the world’s heaviest apple, weighing in at 3lbs 11 oz (1672 grams) .

Unfortunately the current world record seems to be held by a

Japanese apple. The name Howgate came from Howgate Lane

in Bembridge, Isle of Wight where the first tree grew.

The Great Bowden tree produces many apples and so individually they are not so large. The largest uneaten so far this year (2022) is 395 grams (13.93 ounces). Each apple in the photo below is over 380 grams in weight.

Great Bowden Heritage would love to know if there are any more old and interesting trees in Great Bowden gardens. Please contact us via our email if you have a story to share.

July 2022

2022 New Archeological Tour of Great Bowden.

We have re written the Tour, first produced in 2008. Click on the link above. So much more has been discovered since then. If you fancy a walk through history, about 2.75 miles long with just one hill to climb and options to shorten the distance, use this link to the New Archaeological Tour of Great Bowden in our Historical Research section.

You can follow the walk on your mobile phone with 10 information stops, and then use the Supporting Information document to explore things further if you wish.

May 2022

Furlong & Furrow Booklet.

On this website under What we do / Fields, Routes and Borders, you can now read the full text of the translation of the medieval field survey, titled Furlong & Furrow. We have now run out of the printed version and wanted to make this interesting document available for all to read. So a slightly adapted PDF document can be downloaded from our website: Furlong & Furrow: The Booklet.

Summer 2022

Ridge & Furrow and field names in Great Bowden Parish

In 2016 we carried out a field by field survey of the medieval ridge and furrow remaining in the 200 or so fields in the parish. This was part of Great Bowden’s Neighbourhood Plan. The Plan is currently being reviewed and we have updated the Ridge and Furrow survey and have taken this opportunity to include all known field names, past and present.

The best way to see the ridges and furrows of the open field form of farming is from above and so Lidar or satellite images are used. The Lidar of this area is now a bit out of date and so we have concentrated on viewing the fields using Google Earth images. Changes have been noted on the survey form for each field and we have also added past and present field names as far as we know them.

It is interesting to note that development completely destroys the former ridge and furrow but ploughing does not necessarily do so. The shadows showing the earthworks do fade after repeated ploughing but much depends on the time of day, season of the year and even weather conditions when the satellite photograph was taken.

Some areas of ridge and furrow are of course visible at ground level from the many footpaths crossing the parish.

Here is the link to the revised survey under Field, Routes and Borders.