Attractions and Places To See around Weston And Weedon - Top 20

The Fane of Pastoral Poetry is a small octagonal temple of ashlar stone, four sides pierced by semi-circular headed arches. The building originally had a steeply domed roof it is now maintained as a roofless ruin. The temple was built by Gibbs in about 1726-7 on the site now occupied by Queen Caroline's Monument and was known as the Gibbs building. It was originally surrounded by the eight Rysbrack British Worthies. Plans were prepared by Borra to convert it to a Temple of Diana but this was never carried out. It was demolished and re-erected in a simpler form on its present site in the mid 1760's. Also known as the Belvedere and in the sale catalogues as the Egyptian Building. Small roofless structure 1727/3 by Gibbs, as The Belvedere. Re-erected on present site 1760's. Ashlar stone with moulded cornice. Octagonal, 4 sides pierced by semi-circular headed arches, with keyblocks, stepped architraves and impost mouldings. Blank oculi in angled faces. In a glade in the wood at the far end of the Grecian Valley is the small open-sided temple or belvedere designed by Gibbs for Lord Cobham, and first set up as part of the early, western phase of the garden in September 1729. It was originally known simply as ‘Gibbs’s Building’ and stood on a mound (accommodating an ice-house) in an almost exactly opposite relationship to the house, to the south-west, where it provided a viewpoint towards the Rotondo and the Queen’s Theatre, and housed the series of busts by Rysbrack (Bacon, Hampden, Locke, Milton, Newton, Shakespeare, Queen Elizabeth and William III) which were later transferred to the Temple of British Worthies in the Elysian Fields. Gibbs’s Building was repositioned by Earl Temple in the 1760s to frame a view of Wolfe’s Obelisk, which he had recently set up outside the gardens to the north, and was rechristened the Fane of Pastoral Poetry. The building also provided framed prospects over the surrounding park, reached via the shady groves of the Grecian Valley. Van Nost’s lead figure of Thalia, the Muse of Pastoral Poetry, was placed just to the north of it. The statue was one of his series of Apollo and the Nine Muses which was removed from the South Vista in the 1740s (see p. 24), but she no longer survives at Stowe. The four terms once outside the Fane are now at Port Lympne. Statue - Muse of Pastoral Poetry - was installed on Tuesday the 4th December 2018. This statue is a direct copy of the c18th lead statue of Heroic Poetry located on the Grenville Column which is attributed to van Nost. Originally (1720s) this statue was locatd on the south front parterre. Source: https://heritagerecords.nationaltrust.org.uk/HBSMR/MonRecord.aspx?uid=MNA130213

During his tenure as Head Gardener at Stowe, Brown created the Grecian Valley, a long sweeping view out across the landscape from the Temple of Concord and Victory. Within the valley, Brown carefully situated a series of statues, including the Circle of the Dancing Faun. The group of statues, with the Dancing Faun in the centre, represent the shepherds and shepherdesses from the nearby village of Dadford. Folklore says they came to Stowe and danced and played music with the faun when he came to life at night, before turning to stone again when the sun rose. Barry Smith, Head of Gardens and Estates at Stowe, explained that ‘The statues of the shepherds and shepherdess are painted in polychrome, whilst the faun is bare stone, to differentiate between real and mythical people.’ The Seeley guidebook from 1766-1798 noted about the figures ‘…The Circle of the Dancing Faun, surround with the statues of shepherds and shepherdesses…and every shepherd tells his tale, under the hawthorn in the dale…’. The sculptures in the Grecian valley did not, unfortunately, remain in their places for very long. Throughout the nineteenth century, the Buckingham family lost a vast amount of wealth, and so they began to sell off possessions. Lady Mary Arundell, the 1st Duke of Buckingham’s sister, recalled in a letter the removal of the Circle of the Dancing Faun, and the faun’s replacement with an urn, on 4 August 1813: ‘…the vase put up on the Pedestal where the statue stood surrounded by sundry gentlemen and ladies that [they] were pulling down when I was at Stowe…’ The restoration of the Grecian Valley has been underway for 25 years now. Two of the stone statues that formed part of the circle were returned to Stowe from the garden of a local house in 2008. The original dancing faun was never found again, so a mould was taken from a similar marble version at Hughenden Manor, another National Trust property in Buckinghamshire. The recent arrival of three more copies of the original statues, expertly recreated by Cliveden Conservation, complete the circle after 200 years of separation. Source: https://visitsoutheastengland.wordpress.com/2016/12/13/circle-of-the-dancing-faun-returns-to-stowe-after-200-year-absence/ /

Great to walk around looks very impressive

Chipping Warden is a typically pretty village for the area. Smaller than some of its more famous neighbours but no less picturesque. A good spot to rest and seek refreshment.

Chipping Warden is a Northamptonshire village with a rich history. On the River Cherwell, to the east, are the remains of a Roman villa, while just to the south of the village is an Iron Age hillfort, Arbury Banks. The village sits on the Jurassic Way long-distance trail. Walkers in need of a pitstop will be delighted that there are two pubs: the Griffin and the Rose and Crown.

"A tranquil Tudor manor house set in rare terraced gardens, with the 'antient' Dryden family at its heart Built by the Drydens using the remains of a medieval priory, the house and gardens have survived largely unaltered since 1710 and are presented as they were during the Victorian era. The warm, welcoming house features grand rooms, stunning tapestries and Jacobean plasterwork, contrasting with the domestic detail of the servants' quarters. Stroll in the historic parkland and catch glimpses of early medieval landscapes, while a wander through the priory church reveals the story of the canons of Canons Ashby." Cit. https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/canons-ashby#Overview

I love his hidden treat, great spot for a picnic of the westher turns with four benches inside to take a pew.

The Name The story of a village starts with its name.  Chipping Warden is the village with a market and a hill from which a watch may be kept.  In the Domesday book (1086) Warden is found as Waredon.  The word is compounded from ‘weard’ meaning to watch and ‘dun’ a hill.  The hill referred to is Warden Hill which lies to the East of the village. ‘Chipping’ comes from the Old English verb ‘ceapan’, meaning to buy, and refers to the market which was possibly first held here in Saxon times. The Romans At Chipping Warden Black Grounds, and in a field called the Cauldwells, lived a Roman land proprietor in his villa.  The foundations of the villa were discovered about a hundred years ago, also fragments of Samion and Castor pottery used in the house.  The house included a bathroom 36ft long and 10ft wide which has been excavated, a feature which would not again figure in the homes of the village for several hundreds of years.  Roman coins have been found in the locality dating from A.D. 250-390. The Domesday Survey (1086) William 1, having defeated the English Army under Harold of Hastings, proceeded to deprive the English Lords of their lands bestowing them to Norman Knights.  In 1086 at the time of the Domesday Survey the lands in Chipping Warden which had been previously held by a Saxon named Tosti, were in possession of Cuy de Reinbuedcurt, who held them directly from the King.  At Edgcote, lands which in former times had been held by a Saxon thane named Burred, were handed over to a lord named Walchelin, who held them from the Bishop of Coutanes in Normandy. The market of the village A great distinction of Chipping Warden during the Middle Ages was the possession of a market. By the reign of Henry III, the market was highly successful, for in 1227 the King, at the request of Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln, in whose diocese Banbury lay, withdrew the privilege of the market as it was proving an important rival to the Banbury one. In 1238 the ‘Manor’ of the village had passed to Girard de Furnivall who obtained from the king once more the right to hold a market in the village on a Tuesday. The market was still active in 1362 as an action was taken against the Vicar of Blakesley for disturbing the market – the exact nature of which is not disclosed.  However there is no more mention on the market in history after that time, not even the date on which it ceased to be held, but the base of the Market Cross may still be seen near the Church. The World Wars The village like every English village, made its tragic contribution to the success of the Wars with the lives of some of its men.  The stones in the Church bear testimony to this loss. In the Second World War the aerodrome was built, which enlivened the village with the sound of aircraft and crew.  RAF Chipping Warden opened in 1941 as a Bomber Command Operational Training Unit.  On 1 December 1942 a Vickers Wellington bomber crashed on take off, hitting the control tower and hangars, killing two people and causing many other casualties.  The memorial on the Edgcote House drive (pictured above) commemorates the crew of a Wellington Bomber that crashed there on the 18 April 1945.