Talk:Grantchester

Ruined City
The Catholic Encyclopedia's article on St Sexaburga (for it is she) says (my emphasis):


 * She was still alive and acting as abbess in 695, when she presided at the translation of St. Etheldreda's relics to a new shrine she had erected for her at Ely, which included a sarcophagus of white marble from the ruined city of Grantchester.

A quick google turns up the same phrase in, believe it or not, "The Englishman and the Scandinavian; or, A comparison of Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse literature", although the copy of that online seems to be a victim of either some horrendous OCR, or a time-travelling William S. Burroughs (so hard to tell):


 * Thus speaks Eumenius of " That sumptuous cofBn of white Britain in the third century (Pan. marble, beautifully carved, which Const. C. C. 9-19). So much had it the brethren of Ely discovered at improved during a century and a half the ruined city of Grantchester, and of quiet and prosperity under the in which they deposited the relics Provincial Britains, that the corn of jEtheldritha, Abbess of Ely, many grown on the island was more than years later, was one of the striking was wanted for home consumption, survivals of ancient Roman magnifi-

Anyway, does anyone know if Grantchester is, or was, in any sense a ruined city, why there would have been white marble there, whether already in coffin form or not, or what on earth is otherwise going on here? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.96.235.0 (talk) 16:35, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
 * The tale in the Catholic Encylopedia is recognisably the same tale as Bede told and I suspect Bede was the encyclopedia's source. I've put the chapter number into the article as well as the book number. Like any place whose name ends -chester, Grantchester was inhabited by the Romans, but to call it a city is an exaggeration. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.53.69.150 (talk) 21:28, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Pink Floyd connection
I've deleted "Grantchester is where Pink Floyd member David Gilmour grew up and Syd Barrett lived." Syd's Wikipedia page records where he lived and it was not in Grantchester. Gilmour's page states that he lived in Grantchester Meadows, but that is the name of a road by the Cambridge end of the footpath to Grantchester, not the Grantchester end. Gilmour can scarcely have lived in a tent on the meadows themselves. Moreover I lived for several years in the village and never heard that he had lived there. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.53.69.150 (talk) 21:35, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Legend of the tunnel
I am highly dubious of the legend, quoted from the website of the Green Man pub in Grantchester, about a tunnel running from the old Manor House in Grantchester to Kings College Cambridge two miles away, supposedly for Kingsmen to escape the city of Cambridge in time of plague. Googling revealed on p132 of this book that the tunnel from the Manor House pointed toward the adjacent Grantchester church:

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=-K3WqCAUT0kC&pg=PA132&lpg=PA132&dq=grantchester+manor+house+kings+college+chapel&source=bl&ots=oueoHUNv9D&sig=gZl_lqlgrZqr1-olc3sfmm5CmUk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=MGpwULnxHc2O4gTvu4DIDQ&ved=0CB0Q6AEwADgK#v=onepage&q=grantchester%20manor%20house%20kings%20college%20chapel&f=false

Whether or not the church is the same direction from the Manor House as Kings College, this tunnel was more likely to have been a bolt-hole for priests at the time of the Reformation. Many such were built in England. The actual connection of the story to the plague is that Kingsmen holed up in the Manor House during the great plague, which took place in the 14th century; see

http://www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/CAM/Grantchester/index.html

If plague hit Cambridge then anybody could simply have walked out of the city to Grantchester, or anywhere else. No quarantine laws existed and only Eyam in Derbyshire quarantined itself - no need to go to the huge effort of digging a 2-mile tunnel. Moreover such a tunnel would in some places lie beneath the water table and therefore be flooded, as it would run roughly parallel and adjacent to the River Cam. Furthermore, even as a legend this story is not well-known. I lived in the village for years, drank often at the Green Man, and never heard it. The Green Man's website does not list any source for this tale; I say delete it! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.53.69.150 (talk) 17:48, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 2 one external links on Grantchester. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20140401032047/http://www.itv.com/presscentre/press-releases/itv-announces-cast-new-six-part-drama-grantchester to http://www.itv.com/presscentre/press-releases/itv-announces-cast-new-six-part-drama-grantchester
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20131020074926/http://www.thegreenmangrantchester.co.uk/flash/index-3.html to http://www.thegreenmangrantchester.co.uk/flash/index-3.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Cheers. —cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 00:28, 17 October 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Grantchester. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120110054543/http://www.rbgrantchester.co.uk/ to http://www.rbgrantchester.co.uk/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20031118220041/http://orchard-grantchester.com/ to http://www.orchard-grantchester.com/

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 15:53, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Grantchester. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20150913222711/http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/things-didn-t-know-Grantchester/story-23121959-detail/story.html to http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/things-didn-t-know-Grantchester/story-23121959-detail/story.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20151222125050/http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Pink-Floyd-spotters-guide-Cambridge/story-22364076-detail/story.html to http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Pink-Floyd-spotters-guide-Cambridge/story-22364076-detail/story.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 17:17, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Brooke Poem
The Brooke poem is mentioned in the Overview section: it would make more sense for it to be in the Popular Culture paragraph. Any thoughts? Cross Reference (talk) 21:20, 2 July 2021 (UTC)
 * you may not like the distinction, but Brooke's poem would be classified as 'High culture', not as 'Popular culture'. The section could be renamed to something like 'Cultural associations', with some of the content moved from the Overview section. Verbcatcher (talk) 15:49, 30 July 2021 (UTC)
 * You're right: I don't like the distinction which appears to be based on an arbitrary distinction between the Barbarians and the intelligentsia (to use two examples from the link), and which distinction is outside the remit of an editor to make. Besides, all high culture, however defined, was probably once popular culture. But I have no objection to 'Cultural associations' which seems to me to be suitably neutral. Cross Reference (talk) 13:02, 9 August 2021 (UTC)