Bishop's Waltham

The town's name comprises three parts 'walt' – forest; 'ham' – settlement'; and 'Bishop's'. It started off as a very early Anglo-Saxon settlement between 450 and 550 AD, and steadily grew to become one of Hampshire's largest villages, despite being burnt to the ground by Danes in 1001 AD. By the time of the Domesday Book (1086), it had a population of around 600 living in 115 households - at the time, the 11th largest settlement in Hampshire. In 904, King Edward the Elder (King Alfred's son) exchanged it with Denewulf, Bishop of Winchester, for the Bishop's estate at Portchester. In 1136 Henry de Blois, a later bishop, built a new church and in 1158 started the now-ruined Bishop's Waltham…

The Moors, Bishop's Waltham is a Site of Special Scientific Interest. It is a nationally significant tract of alkaline wetland and open waters located south of the Chalk outcrop in southern Hampshire at the head of River Hamble displaying a good diversity of habitat types, plant and animal communities and rare species. As a result, not only is the majority of the site designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) under the UK Wildlife and Countryside Act, but also as a Nature Conservation Review (NCR) site, in recognition of its special national interest. The land comprises some mainly of hydrologically sensitive fen, fen meadow and wet woodland dissected by a series of south…