Hampstead Heath

Archaeological discoveries on Hampstead Heath, including tools from the Mesolithic, pits, postholes, and charred stones, point to the presence of a hunter-gatherer community around 7000 BC. Documentary evidence of Hampstead Heath dates from 986, when Ethelred the Unready granted five hides of land at "Hemstede" to the Abbot of Westminster. This same land is later recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as held by the monastery of St. Peter's at Westminster Abbey, and by then it is known as the "Manor of Hampstead". Westminster held the land until 1133, when control of part of the manor was released to Richard de Balta; then during Henry II's reign the whole of the manor became privately owned…

Ken Wood and North Wood are a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest called Hampstead Heath Woods, designated by Natural England.

by John Constable, 1827]] The Vale of Health is a hamlet accessed by a lane from East Heath Road; it is surrounded entirely by the heath. In 1714, one Samuel Hatch, a harness maker, built a workshop and was granted some land. By 1720, he had a cottage at what was subsequently called Hatch's or Hatchett's Bottom. A new name, regarded as a deliberate attempt to change the image of a developing location, the Vale of Health, was recorded in 1801.

by Joseph Severn, 1845]] While living in London, Karl Marx and his family went to the heath regularly, as their favourite outing. Hampstead Heath provides the backdrop for the opening scene in Victorian writer Wilkie Collins' novel The Woman in White. Bram Stoker's novel Dracula is partly set on Hampstead Heath, in scenes when the undead Lucy abducts children playing on the heath. Hampstead Heath forms part of the location for G. K. Chesterton's fictional story "The Blue Cross" from The Innocence of Father Brown. The Heath is mentioned in Ralph Vaughan Williams' Symphony no. 2 A London Symphony with the subtitle 'Hampstead Heath on an August Bank Holiday'. The photos used for the cover of…