Talk:Norfolk Burnhams

Quotations from:

The Shell Guide to Britain

Copyright: Shell-Mex and B.P. Limited, 1964 and 1969

SBN number 7181 4029 X

"Burnhams, The. Domesday Book notes seven Burnhams within a radius of two miles, all 'by sea' and all with churches, three of which have disappeared, while the sea has receded beyond the marches."

(End quotations from The Shell Guide to Britain).

Johannes.Richter 12:52, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * "have disappeared" - which the villages or the churches? "the sea has receded" - that suggests that nothing has been swallowed by the North Sea. I would put more faith in the Public Records Office than the Shell Guide. -- RHaworth 18:08, 2005 Jun 4 (UTC)

You are right. The sentence is dubious.

Obviously the number of towns, recorded in the Domesday Book should be corrected to 4. Is that OK?

Johannes.Richter 04:47, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * I have no idea what was in the Doomsday Book, but at one stage there were indeed 7 Burnham villages and parishes. These were:


 * Burnham Westgate
 * Burnham Sutton
 * Burnham Ulph
 * Burnham Deepdale
 * Burnham Norton
 * Burnham Thorpe
 * Burnham Overy


 * Westgate, Sutton and Ulph have been subsumed into a larger village called Burnham Market. Burnham Market is also a single civil parish, but as it has two Church of England churches (serving respectively Burnham Westgate and Burnham Sutton with Ulph) it is possible there are still more than one ecclesiastical parishes.


 * Deepdale, Norton and Thorpe still exist as seperate villages and civil parishes, much as they always have.


 * Overy is still a single civil parish, but in modern times a distinction is often made between the two settlements of Burnham Overy Town (actually a small settlement adjacent to the parish church) and Burnham Over Staithe (a rather larger settlement about a mile away and next to the creek-side harbour). The Staithe is more recent than the Doomsday book (until the 15th century ships could reach what is now Burnham Overy Town) and the name more recent than that.


 * -- Chris j wood 18:14, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

It is in fact Sutton cum Ulph, not sutton with Ulph. Possibly slightly too precise... Petsco 15:31, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Derivation of the name
The article states:


 * The name Burnham derives from amber and indicates that the town was a centre for the amber trade - see Amber in British place names.

Which is a nice theory, but kind of ignores the rather more obvious fact that the villages are located on or about the River Burn. I guess it is possible the river is named after the amber trade too, but I'd like to see some kind of citation for this. Adding the fact template to that effect. -- Chris j wood 18:25, 17 October 2005 (UTC)