Grantchester

The village of Grantchester is listed in the 1086 Domesday Book as Grantesete and Grauntsethe.{{cite web|title=Open Domesday: Grantchester|url=https://opendomesday.org/place/SU8604/chichester/|access-date=28 February 2023}} Before, it is also mentioned briefly in book IV, chapter 19 of Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People. John de Grauntsete, a lawyer who had a successful career as a judge in Ireland, was born in Grantchester, {{circa|lk=no|1270}}, and took his surname from his birthplace. The present name derives from the common Old English suffix -ceaster (variously developed as "-cester", "-caster", and -"chester"), used in names of forts or fortified cities throughout England.

Grantchester is sometimes identified as the {{nowrap|Cair Grauth}}Nennius ({{abbr|attrib.|Traditional attribution}}). Theodor Mommsen ({{abbr|ed.|Editor}}). Historia Brittonum, VI. Composed after AD 830. {{in lang|la}} Hosted at Latin Wikisource. ("Fort Granta") listed in the History of the Britons among the 28 cities of Britain,Ford, David Nash. "[http://www.britannia.com/history/ebk/articles/nenniuscities.html The 28 Cities of Britain] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160415120312/http://www.britannia.com/history/ebk/articles/nenniuscities.html |date=15 April 2016 }}" at Britannia. 2000. but the Roman Duroliponte and subsequent major British and Saxon settlements in the area were at Castle Hill in Cambridge, whose Old English name was Grantabrycge. The confusion arises from the lower stretches of the Granta having been renamed the Cam after the city.

Grantchester is said to have the world's highest concentration of Nobel Prize winners, most of these presumably being current or retired academics from the nearby University of Cambridge.{{cite news|title=Nine things you didn't know about Grantchester|url=http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/things-didn-t-know-Grantchester/story-23121959-detail/story.html|access-date=20 December 2015|work=Cambridge News|date=13 October 2014|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150913222711/http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/things-didn-t-know-Grantchester/story-23121959-detail/story.html|archive-date=13 September 2015|df=dmy-all}}

Students and tourists often travel from Cambridge by punt to picnic in the meadows or take tea at The Orchard. In 1897, a group of Cambridge students persuaded the owner of Orchard House to serve them tea in its apple orchard, and this became a regular practice.{{cite news|last1=Kelly|first1=Tony|title=Yes Rupert, there's still honey for tea...|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/yes-rupert-theres-still-honey-for-tea-1244687.html|access-date=20 December 2015|work=The Independent|date=10 August 1997}} Lodgers at Orchard House included the Edwardian poet Rupert Brooke, who later moved next door to the Old Vicarage. In 1912, while in Berlin, he wrote a poem of homesickness entitled "The Old Vicarage, Grantchester". The house is currently the home of the Cambridge scientist Mary Archer and her husband, Jeffrey Archer. Grantchester has been the home since 1969 of the sculptor Helaine Blumenfeld OBE.{{cite news|last1=Wright|first1=Karen|title=Helaine Blumenfeld: 'Art is a commitment to risk, a reflection of life – nothing stays the same'|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/helaine-blumenfeld-art-is-a-commitment-to-risk-a-reflection-of-life-nothing-stays-the-same-7827250.html|access-date=20 December 2015|work=The Independent|date=9 June 2012}}

The footpath to Cambridge that runs beside Grantchester MeadowsCambridge: A Cultural and Literary History Martin Garrett - 2004 -- Page viii 1902669797 "Its propensity to flood has threaded through Cambridge from the pubs in Grantchester to the Ditton Plough, a broad green ribbon of flood plain — Grantchester Meadows, The Iammas Land, the Backs, Jesus Green, Midsummer Common, ... " is nicknamed the Grantchester Grind. Grantchester Grind is the title of a 1995 comic novel written by Tom Sharpe.{{cite news|last1=Reynolds|first1=Stanley|title=Tom Sharpe obituary|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/jun/06/tom-sharpe-dies|access-date=20 December 2015|work=The Guardian|date=6 June 2013}} Further upstream is Byron's Pool, named after Lord Byron, who is said (by Brooke, at least) to have swum there.{{cite news|last1=Jordison|first1=Sam|title=Going swimming with Roger Deakin|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2009/jul/08/going-swimming-roger-deakin|access-date=20 December 2015|work=The Guardian|date=9 July 2009}} The pool is now below a modern weir where the Bourn Brook flows into the River Cam. Byron's Pool is a Local Nature Reserve.{{cite web|url= http://www.lnr.naturalengland.org.uk/Special/lnr/lnr_details.asp?C=0&N=byron&ID=1123|title= Byron's Pool|series=Local Nature Reserves|publisher=Natural England|access-date=4 August 2013}}{{cite web|url=http://magic.defra.gov.uk/MagicMap.aspx?startTopic=Designations&activelayer=lnrIndex&query=REF_CODE%3D%271084814%27 |title=Map of Byron's Pool|series=Local Nature Reserves|publisher=Natural England|access-date=4 August 2013}}

Grantchester is the subject of "Grantchester Meadows" (composed and performed by Roger Waters) a song by Pink Floyd, with the village being home to band member David Gilmour.{{cite news|title=A Pink Floyd spotter's guide to Cambridge|url=http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Pink-Floyd-spotters-guide-Cambridge/story-22364076-detail/story.html|access-date=20 December 2015|work=Cambridge News|date=26 August 2013|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151222125050/http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Pink-Floyd-spotters-guide-Cambridge/story-22364076-detail/story.html|archive-date=22 December 2015|df=dmy-all}} A few years later, Gilmour also wrote a song about Grantchester Meadows, called "Fat Old Sun". The village is also the setting for James Runcie's sleuth novels The Grantchester Mysteries, adapted as an ITV drama titled Grantchester shown in the UK from autumn 2014[http://www.itv.com/presscentre/press-releases/itv-announces-cast-new-six-part-drama-grantchester] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140401032047/http://www.itv.com/presscentre/press-releases/itv-announces-cast-new-six-part-drama-grantchester|date=1 April 2014}} and filmed on location in Grantchester.

The village is the subject of Rupert Brooke's poem The Old Vicarage, Grantchester.

File:St Mary and St Andrew, Grantchester, Cambridgeshire - geograph.org.uk - 334067.jpg

The oldest parts of the Church of St Andrew and St Mary (Church of England) date from the twelfth century. The chancel is mid-fourteenth century and the tower is late-fourteenth or early fifteenth century. The porch is sixteenth century. The nave was extensively restored in 1876–1877. The church is a Grade II* listed building.{{National Heritage List for England|num=1309436|desc=Church of St Mary and St Andrew|access-date=11 May 2018}} Rachel Rosborough became vicar in 2017.{{Cite news|last=Elliott|first=Chris|date=20 April 2017|title=The new vicar of Grantchester is a woman - and she won't be trying to solve crimes|work=Cambridge News|url=https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/new-vicar-grantchester-woman-wont-12920123|access-date=15 May 2021}}

The church is surrounded by a graveyard, where the burials include:{{cite web|title=Interesting People|url=http://church.grantchester.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Interesting-People.pdf|website=Grantchester Church|access-date=11 May 2018}}

• Constantine Walter Benson (1909–1982), ornithologist and author
• Francis Burkitt (1864–1935), theologian
• Anne Clough (1820–1892), the first principal of Newnham College, Cambridge
• Dermot Freyer (1883-1970), Irish author and political activist
• {{ill|Irving B. Fritz|de}} (1927–1996), physiologist and endocrinologist
• Sir James Gray (1891–1975), zoologist
• Dame Elizabeth Hill (1900–1996), academic linguist
• Sir Robert Yewdall Jennings (1913–2004), President of the International Court of Justice.
• Frank Kingdon-Ward (1885–1958), botanist and explorer
• Sir Desmond Lee (1908–1993), classical scholar, headmaster of Clifton College and Winchester College, President of Hughes Hall, Cambridge.

File:Gravestones at Grantchester.jpg

• J. Rawson Lumby (1831–1895), theologian
• Arthur Henry Mann (1850–1929), organist and composer of hymn tunes
• Michael McCrum (1924–2005), Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, Master of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and Headmaster of Tonbridge School and Eton College.
• Jean Purdy (1945-1985), embryologist and co-founder of the Bourn Hall Clinic with Patrick Steptoe and Robert Edwards
• G. W. Shaw (1928–2006), biologist and expert on academic dress
• Robert Stevenson (1905–1986), film writer and director
• Charles Swainson (1820–1887), theologian
• David J. Thouless (1934–2019), physicist
• Robert H. Thouless (1894–1984), psychologist and parapsychologist

It also contains the Commonwealth war graves of three British Army soldiers of the First World War and an airman of the Second World War.{{cite web |title=GRANTCHESTER (SS. ANDREW AND MARY) CHURCHYARD |url=https://www.cwgc.org/find-records/find-war-dead/search-results/?Cemetery=GRANTCHESTER+(SS.+ANDREW+AND+MARY)+CHURCHYARD |website=www.cwgc.org |access-date=9 November 2020 }}

{{float right clear none|File:cmglee Grantchester barrel race.jpg}}

Every year on Boxing Day (26 December), Grantchester holds an inter-village barrel race which is around 40 minutes long and ends with a hog roast at the Rupert Brooke pub. This tradition dates back to the 1960s.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2009/dec/20/boxing-day-activities#,|title=Where to go bonkers on Boxing Day|work=The Guardian|date=20 December 2009 |access-date=3 November 2014 |last1=Thorpe |first1=Annabelle }}

An underground passage is said to run from the Old Manor house to King's College Chapel {{convert|2|mi|0|spell=in}} away. It was said that a fiddler who offered to follow the passage set off playing his fiddle; the music became fainter and fainter, until it was heard no more and the fiddler was never seen or heard of again.{{cite book |last=Ash |first=Russell |date=1973 |title=Folklore, Myths and Legends of Britain |publisher=Reader's Digest Association Limited |page=235 |isbn=9780340165973 }} This story is told of many supposed tunnels. On a 17th-century map of Grantchester, one of the fields is called Fiddler's Close.[http://www.thegreenmangrantchester.co.uk/flash/index-3.html] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131020074926/http://www.thegreenmangrantchester.co.uk/flash/index-3.html|date=20 October 2013}}

Grantchester1.jpg|The Green Man

Grantchester2.jpg|Grantchester Meadows

Manor Farmhouse, Grantchester.jpg|alt=A large farmhouse with many red-brick chimneys|Manor Farmhouse

GRantchester Meadows Sign.jpg|alt=Road name sign in front of foliage|Grantchester Meadows sign

Grantchester Village Hall.jpg|alt=Small thatched building|Grantchester Village Hall

{{Reflist|30em}}

{{Commons category|Grantchester}}

• [http://www.grantchester.org.uk/ Grantchester village website]
• [http://church.grantchester.org.uk/ Church website]
• [http://www.grantchestercricket.com/ Grantchester Cricket Club]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20120110054543/http://www.rbgrantchester.co.uk/ "Rupert Brooke's Grantchester" : the full text of the famous poem, plus a commentary and photographs by two local residents]
• [http://www.theorchardteagarden.co.uk/ The Orchard]
• {{cite web|last1=Colburn|first1=Ben|last2=Ynys-Mon|first2=Mark|title=Grantchester, SS. Andrew & Mary|url=http://www.druidic.org/camchurch/churches/grantchester.htm|website=Cambridgeshire Churches}}

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Category:Villages in Cambridgeshire

Category:Civil parishes in Cambridgeshire

Category:South Cambridgeshire District