Speed's Map of Lancashire

Speed’s Map of Lancashire Locate the following places on the map below: 1. Barley (about half a mile north of Newchurch) 2. Samlesbury Hall 3. Samlesbury 4. Read 5. Pendle Hill 6. Lancaster 7. Gisburn 8. Whalley Of these eight places, five are within around eight miles of each other. Which five are they? Further Information about each location Gisburn Gisburn (sometimes spelled as Gisburne) lies in the Yorkshire Dales, within the Ribble Valley. It is 8 miles northeast of Clitheroe and 11 miles west of Skipton. It is still an agricultural community, although their seventeenth-century inn (dated 1635) has been converted into housing. Lancaster Lancaster was not recognised as a city until the twentieth century, but it is an ancient settlement. Located on the river Lune, it gave its name to the county of Lancashire and also the House of Lancaster, a branch of the English royal family. Read Read is a village 2 miles east of Whalley. The name is thought to be a contraction of Old English words meaning ‘female roe deer’ and ‘ridge’ or ‘headland’. Pendle Hill Pendle Hill is in the east of Lancashire. Its summit is 557 metres (1,827 feet) above sea level, and a Bronze Age burial site has been discovered there. In the thirteenth century it was called Pennul or Penhul, apparently from Cumbric and Old English words both meaning ‘hill’. The modern English term ‘hill’ was added when the original meaning of Pendle had become obscure. Barley Barley lies just below Pendle Hill. In recent years a seventeenth century cottage, complete with a cat skeleton, were found during a waterworks construction project near Lower Black Moss Reservoir. The cottage is sometimes claimed to have belonged to one of the Lancashire witches. Samlesbury Hall Samlesbury Hall dates from 1325. Built as a manor house, it has had many different uses, including periods as a public house and a girls' boarding school. It narrowly avoided being demolished in the early twentieth century, and is now visited by more than 50,000 people each year. Samlesbury Samlesbury is a village in South Ribble. The village's name is probably derived from the Old English sceamol, meaning ‘ledge’, and burh, meaning ‘fortification’. Whalley (Whaley) Whalley is a large village in the Ribble Valley on the banks of the river Calder. It is overlooked by Whalley Nab, a large wooded hill across the river from the village; the ruins of Whalley Abbey, a fourteenth-century Cistercian abbey, lie beneath Whalley Nab. Modern Map Look at this modern map of the Ribble Valley, and compare it with John Speed’s. How many of the eight places are connected by water? (Note: If you look at Speed’s map, you can see that Whalley, Whalley Abbey and Read lay close to the Calder tributary of the Ribble. Lancaster is at the mouth of the northernmost river, the Lune.) The village of Gisburn (“Gisborn”) is currently in Lancashire. In which county was it according to Speed’s map? What significance did Gisburn’s location have for the Pendle witch trials? Now go back to FutureLearn (Back to course button at top) and contribute your views on whether the geographical spread of these eight places tend to support or challenge the suggestion that that rumours and accusations of witchcraft arose out of tensions between close neighbours. .

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