Sunbury-on-Thames

History

The earliest evidence of human settlement in Sunbury has been the discovery of Bronze Age funerary urns dating from the 10th century BCE in Green Lane, Sunbury Common. There is an important scheduled monument by Rooksmead Road, a prehistoric bowl barrow, known as Cloven Barrow, on low-lying ground that was part of the flood plain of the Thames, now around 1 km to the south. The place-name 'Sunbury' is first attested in one of the many Anglo-Saxon charters, one of to 962, where it appears as Sunnanbyrg. Another charter of 962 lists it as Sunnanbyrig. Sunbury appears in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Sunneberie. The name means 'Sunna's burgh or fortification'. The same first name is found in Sonning in Berkshire. Sunbury's Domesday assets were: seven hides. It had five ploughs, meadow for six ploughs, and cattle pasture. It had about 22 households, including one priest and included the manor of Kempton, Kynaston, Chennes[-ton]/[-tone], Kenton or Kenyngton, listed separately. The manor rendered £6 per year to its feudal system overlords. That of Kempton rendered £4. Lower Sunbury presented for two centuries a mainly rural and quite gentrified village as still visible in many conserved buildings and structures, see Landmarks. Of particular note are the wealth and community tie of its parish church as well as many ornate and unusual houses and mansions (or mansion remains). The oldest and most extravagant homes are those from the Georgian era: throughout and for three decades after the 18th century, the time when the body of Sunbury's oldest church dates to – many of those on large plots of land have been demolished and subdivided. Gilbert White described Sunbury, in The Natural History of Selborne, letter , 4 November 1767, as "one of those pleasant villages…