Edenfield

Edenfield is a village within the Rossendale borough of Lancashire, England. Lying on the River Irwell, it is around north of Ramsbottom, south of Rawtenstall, and west of Norden, and has a total population of 2,080, reducing to 2,053 at the 2011 Census. Edenfield village centre lies at the intersection of three A roads; the A676 from Bolton, the A680 from Accrington and Rochdale and the A56 from Rawtenstall and Bury. The M66 motorway terminates its course at Edenfield, whereupon it becomes the A56 dual carriageway known as the Edenfield Bypass. The village has recently seen growth as a commuter settlement for Greater Manchester. The origins of the Edenfield place name are not entirely clear, but it seems extremely unlikely that it derives from "fields of Eden" or similar. Given the large number of Norse-derived place names in Rossendale and bearing in mind that documents from the 17th century and older spell the name as Aydenfield or some variant of this, a likely etymology is the Norse "øy" (riverside ground/island; see for instance the village of Øyer) + "tun" (farmstead) + field; in other words, the land belonging to the farmstead by the river (Irwell). Edenfield Chapel of Ease (the precursor of the parish church and part of the benefice of Bury) is extensively mentioned in 16th-century documents. It probably had its own curate before the Reformation. A deed of 1564 mentions one Ralph Nuttall making payments to Richard Nuttall for a land settlement and that these payments were to take place "in Edenfield Chapel". A century later there were "aboute foure and twenty tenements and houses w th in Shuttleworth in the Lordshippe of Burghe [Bury], beinge all the houses w th in Shuttleworth afforesaid who are appointed by the said Orders to' pay theire tyths to Bury, who are much nearer to the Chapel of Aydenfield [Edenfield] afforesaid, and vsually repaire thither to the ordinances when they have a mister". Like other villages in Rossendale, Edenfield later became involved in industry and some quarrying activities still continue.