Little Stretton is a small village and civil parish in the Harborough

Harborough

Harborough is a local government district of Leicestershire, England, named after its main town, Market Harborough. Covering , the District is by far the largest of the eight district authorities in Leicestershire and covers almost a quarter of the County....

 district of Leicestershire

Leicestershire

Leicestershire is a landlocked county in the English Midlands. It takes its name from the heavily populated City of Leicester, traditionally its administrative centre, although the City of Leicester unitary authority is today administered separately from the rest of Leicestershire...

.

Within the parish, to the west of Little Stretton village, lies a deserted medieval village

Deserted medieval village

In the United Kingdom, a deserted medieval village is a former settlement which was abandoned during the Middle Ages, typically leaving no trace apart from earthworks or cropmarks. If there are fewer than three inhabited houses the convention is to regard the site as deserted; if there are more...

 called Stretton Magna (or Great Stretton).

Gartree Road, a Roman Road

Roman road

The Roman roads were a vital part of the development of the Roman state, from about 500 BC through the expansion during the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire. Roman roads enabled the Romans to move armies and trade goods and to communicate. The Roman road system spanned more than 400,000 km...

, runs through the parish, adjacent to both Little and Great Stretton, and is the reason for those settlements' names (see: Stretton

Stretton

-England:Stretton means "settlement on a Roman Road" . Of the seventeen places in England, all but two are situated on a Roman Road, the exceptions being Stretton Westwood and Stretton en le Field.-Cheshire:...

).

External links

Village history

Census 2001 Parish Profile from Leicestershire County Council

Detailed history of Little Stretton (originally part of Kings Norton parish)

Ordnance Survey mapping of Little Stretton

Photographs of the OS grid square for Little Stretton from Geograph

Search for designated historic sites and buildings in Little Stretton

Account of the Green Bicycle murder at Little Stretton 5 July 1919