Kirtlington

Kirtlington is a village and civil parish in Oxfordshire about west of Bicester. The parish includes the hamlet of Northbrook. The 2011 Census recorded the parish's population as 988. The parish measures nearly north–south and about east–west. It is bounded by the River Cherwell to the west, and elsewhere mostly by field boundaries. In 1959 its area was . The Portway is a pre-Roman road running parallel with the Cherwell on high ground about east of the river. It bisects Kirtlington parish and passes through the village. A short stretch of it is now part of the A4095 road through the village. Longer stretches form minor roads to Bletchingdon and Upper Heyford. Akeman Street Roman road bisects the parish east–west passing just north of Kirtlington village. A minor road linking Kirtlington with Chesterton uses its course. Aves ditch is pre-Saxon. One end of the ditch is in Kirtlington parish about north of the village. Just east of the parish school is a moated site that is a Scheduled Ancient Monument. Just east of the moated site are the remains of fish ponds. The toponym "Kirtlington" is derived from the Old English for "the enclosure (tūn) of Cyrtlas people". The earliest known record of it is as Cyrtlinctune in a Saxon charter of AD 944–6, now included in the Cartularium Saxonicum. In the Anglo-Saxon era Kirtlington was a king's vill. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records that in AD 977 King Edward the Martyr held a witenagemot at Kyrtlingtun attended by Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury. The Domesday Book of 1086 records that Certelintone, Cortelintone or Cherielintone had been a royal manor of Edward the Confessor and was now held by the conquering Norman monarchy. The Domesday Book records the manor being a large and valuable estate of 111⁄2 hides yielding an income of £52 a year. The Pipe rolls of 1190 record it as Kertlinton. It remained a royal manor until 1604 when the Crown sold it to two wealthy Londoners. The manor house is recorded to have had a date-stone of 1563, but this has now been lost.