Melbury Osmond
Encyclopedia
Melbury Osmond is a village in north west Dorset
, England
, situated on the A37 road
seven miles south of Yeovil
. The village has a population
of 190 . It is mentioned in the Domesday Book
as a possession of the Arundell
family, and remained so until the 19th century. The parish church, St. Osmund's, has registers dating to 1550; it was totally rebuilt in 1745, and restored
in 1888.
Thomas Hardy
's mother lived in Melbury Osmond as a child, and the village appears in his novel The Woodlanders
as "Little Hintock" (the heroine's name is "Grace Melbury".)
Dorset
Dorset , is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The county town is Dorchester which is situated in the south. The Hampshire towns of Bournemouth and Christchurch joined the county with the reorganisation of local government in 1974...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, situated on the A37 road
A37 road
The A37 is a major road in southern England. It runs north from the A35 at Dorchester in Dorset into Somerset through Yeovil and Shepton Mallet before terminating at the Three Lamps junction with the A4 in central Bristol...
seven miles south of Yeovil
Yeovil
Yeovil is a town and civil parish in south Somerset, England. The parish had a population of 27,949 at the 2001 census, although the wider urban area had a population of 42,140...
. The village has a population
Population
A population is all the organisms that both belong to the same group or species and live in the same geographical area. The area that is used to define a sexual population is such that inter-breeding is possible between any pair within the area and more probable than cross-breeding with individuals...
of 190 . It is mentioned in the Domesday Book
Domesday Book
Domesday Book , now held at The National Archives, Kew, Richmond upon Thames in South West London, is the record of the great survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086...
as a possession of the Arundell
Arundell
The Arundell family were a very old Norman family settled in Cornwall and dating back to about the middle of the thirteenth century.*Baron Arundell of Trerice*Baron Arundell of Wardour*Arundell family of Lanherne,...
family, and remained so until the 19th century. The parish church, St. Osmund's, has registers dating to 1550; it was totally rebuilt in 1745, and restored
Victorian restoration
Victorian restoration is the term commonly used to refer to the widespread and extensive refurbishment and rebuilding of Church of England churches and cathedrals that took place in England and Wales during the 19th-century reign of Queen Victoria...
in 1888.
Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...
's mother lived in Melbury Osmond as a child, and the village appears in his novel The Woodlanders
The Woodlanders
The Woodlanders is a novel by Thomas Hardy. It was published in 1887.-Plot summary:The story takes place in a small woodland village called Little Hintock, and concerns the efforts of an honest woodsman, Giles Winterborne, to marry his childhood sweetheart, Grace Melbury...
as "Little Hintock" (the heroine's name is "Grace Melbury".)