Ledsham, West Yorkshire

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Coordinates: 53°45′43″N 1°18′36″W / 53.762°N 1.310°W / 53.762; -1.310

A game of Cricket in Ledsham, 2003 (note church spire in the background)

Ledsham is a village and civil parish 4 miles (6 km) north of Castleford and 11 miles (18 km) east of Leeds in the county of West Yorkshire, England. The village is in the City of Leeds metropolitan borough and near to the A1 Great North Road. It has a population of 162,[1] increasing to 181 at the 2011 Census.[2]

Etymology[]

Ledsham is first mentioned in a charter of around 1030 in the form Ledesham. Like nearby Ledston, the name seems to refer to Leeds (or the Old English precursor of this name, Loidis, which denoted a region rather than a town); the second element is the Old English word hām ('homestead, farm'). The name thus meant 'the farm belonging to the region of Loidis'.[3]

Ledsham parish once also included the township of Fairburn, whose name is likewise first attested around 1030, as Faren-burne. This name comes from the Old English words fearn ('fern') and burna ('spring, stream'), and thus meant 'spring characterised by ferns'.[4]

Charactistics[]

There is a late seventh-century Anglo-Saxon church (the oldest church and the oldest building standing in West Yorkshire),[5] and nearby Ledston Hall. The village school, like schools in Collingham and Thorp Arch, is named after Lady Elizabeth Hastings.

Ledsham have a cricket team, who currently play in the Wetherby League.[6]

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ Office for National Statistics : Census 2001 : Parish Headcounts : Leeds retrieved 2009-09-10
  2. ^ UK Census (2011). "Local Area Report – Ledsham Parish (E04000200)". Nomis. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 13 October 2020.
  3. ^ Victor Watts (ed.), The Cambridge Dictionary of English Place-Names, Based on the Collections of the English Place-Name Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), s.v. LEDSHAM WYorks.
  4. ^ Harry Parkin, Your City's Place-Names: Leeds, English Place-Name Society City-Names Series, 3 (Nottingham: English Place-Names Society, 2017), p. 45.
  5. ^ 1987 publication by West Yorkshire Archaeology Service: HC/2/SW,CP "Historic Churches of West Yorkshire - Ledsham Church"
  6. ^ Ledsham Cricket Club Archived 2012-03-04 at the Wayback Machine

External links[]


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