Earlier in the week I was fortunate to have a day off of work, and no rain on the weather forecast (a real rarity in Yorkshire!). I agreed to meet my parents at a village that isn’t too far from my own - so we could take the dogs for a walk in the country and look at some local history. We agreed to meet at Thixendale - a small rural village, where we could complete a 12km circular walk that would take us through some beautiful scenery in the Yorkshire Wolds, before arriving at the Medieval Village of Wharram Percey.
After about 5km of walking (much further for the dogs constantly running back and forth) up and down the rolling hills of the Wolds, we caught our first glimpse of the Medevil Village in the distance, as we could see what is left of the church showing through a break in the trees.
After another kilometer of walking we finally reached the main part of the village, which is now in the care of English Heritage as it is “one of the largest and best preserved of Britain’s 3,000 or so known deserted medieval villages” according to English Heritage.
The village was abandoned soon after the year 1500, about 500 years ago. It is thought that the landlords kicked the peasants who occupied the village out to make space to graze cattle for Britain’s rapidly growing wool industry back then. Sadly most of the village has gradually been buried over time and only the church remains with some headstones nearby making a small graveyard. The one pictured has a brother and sister who died at ages 6 and 8 in 1804. It’s amazing how much medicine has improved since then!
After the village, we walked back to the cars and went home with some very tired dogs!