Shardlow is in East Midlands, in the United Kingdom — coordinates 52.8700°, -1.3580°.

Castles · East Midlands

Shardlow

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Typical visit: 1.5 h–3 h

Shardlow is a village in Derbyshire, England about 6 miles (9.7 km) southeast of Derby and 11 miles (18 km) southwest of Nottingham. Part of the civil parish of Shardlow and Great Wilne, and the district of South Derbyshire, it is also very close to the border with Leicestershire, defined by the route of the River Trent which passes close to the south. Just across the Trent is the Castle Donington parish of North West Leicestershire. An important late 18th-century river port for the trans-shipment of goods to and from the River Trent to the Trent and Mersey Canal, during its heyday from the 1770s to the 1840s it became referred to as "Rural Rotterdam" and "Little Liverpool". Today Shardlow is considered Britain's most complete surviving example of a canal village, with over 50 Grade II listed buildings and many surviving public houses within the designated Shardlow Wharf Conservation Area.

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Background

History

Due to its location on the River Trent, which up to this point is easily navigable, there is much early evidence of human activity in the area, dating back to 1500 BC. In 1999 the 12 ft 1300 BC Hanson Log Boat, a Bronze Age log boat was discovered at the nearby Hanson plc gravel pit. Sawn into sections so that it could be transported and conserved, the boat is now in Derby Museum and Art Gallery. Five years later, a JCB in the quarry unearthed a bronze sword embedded in a vertical position in the gravel. In 1009 Æþelræd Unræd (King Ethelred the Unready) signed a charter at the Great Council which recognised the position and boundaries of Westune. The land described in that charter included…

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