The history of Badby through the ages
Contents: Saxon Badby | Norman Badby | Evesham Abbey & The Grange | Post-mediaeval Badby | A Badby timeline | Back to History Section overview
Saxon Badby
Badby is found spelt in various ways since Saxon times, through the Norman period, until printing stabilised it in the present form. Badby, Badbye, Baddebi, Baddeby, Badebi and Badeby are all found. Baddanbyrg or Baddan Byrig were used in the 944 AD charter, but these more likely refer specifically to Arbury Hill in the south west of the parish, which at 734ft. is the highest land in the county.
There are several mediaeval charters referring to the area around Badby, but some are suspect. The land around Badby and Newnham changed hands frequently as the swirling forces of Mercia and the invading Danes ebbed and flowed across middle England. Charters record that the land was given by a Saxon sheriff (or shire reeve), Norman, to the Abbey of Croyland around the year 726 AD. To fund defence against the invading Danes around 871, Beorred seized it back and gave it to his army officers in order to secure their services.
In a charter dated 944, King Edmund I of England gave an estate comprising Dodford, Everdon and all of Badby with Newnham to Bishop Aelfric of Hereford. After Edmund’s murder in 946, the estate was returned in 948 to Croyland by his brother, King Edred (or Aedred, Ædred, Edric) on the advice of Turketul (or Turketulus), his chancellor. Abbot Godric II of Croyland, again to buy protection against the threatening Danes, leased Badby in 1006 for 100 years to Norman, son of Leofwine, earl of Leicester (or Chester), a great military officer under King Edred.
The Danes attacked and prevailed in 1013 under their King Sweyn (or Sveyn), who died in 1014. He was eventually succeeded by his son Canute (or Cnut, Knud, Knut). In 1016 Norman was killed and in 1017 Edred was executed by King Canute. Canute thus acquired Badby and later transferred it to Norman’s brother, the Earl Leofric of Mercia, who had supported Canute and was married to the famous Godiva (or Godgifu). In turn, Earl Leofric gave the lordship of the manor of Badby and Newnham to the Benedictine Abbey of Evesham, for the remainder of the 100-year lease supposedly granted by Abbot Godric II of Croyland. This was ratified by King Canute in 1018. The fire which burned down Croyland Abbey in 1091 destroyed any deeds, if they actually existed.
Norman Badby
In the Domesday Book of 1086, Badby is listed under the lands owned by Croyland Abbey, ignoring the lease to Evesham. The Badby entry reads:
II Land of Crowland Church.
…in Budby 4 hides. Landfor 10 ploughs; 8 male and 5 female slaves; 12 villagers and 8 smallholders with 6 ploughs. A mill at 2s; meadow 28 acres; woodland 4 furlongs long and 2 furlongs wide. Value was and is £8
The £8 value for Badby in the Domesday Book is high compared with other entries for the County. While King William held estates of high value (Fawsley £15), only 1 in 20/25 other estates had a value of £8 or over. The Woodland, from its measurement, is likely, but not certainly, Badby Wood.
Evesham Abbey and The Grange
The church benefice has always been Badby with Newnham (or Badby-cum-Newnham), Newnham being a chapel of the parent church at Badby in the initial times, but for a few years was recorded as the main church. (The current-day shared rector or vicar is no modern arrangement here, it goes back 750 years.) In the ninth century, the parish had been in the Diocese of Dorchester (Oxon), a safer location adopted by an earlier Bishop of Leicester to avoid the invading Danes. The seat was moved to Lincoln in 1073 by Bishop Remigius.
From the twelfth century to 1539 Evesham Abbey was the greatest influence in Badby. Around 1124, as the 100-yr lease had ended, elderly Abbot Joffrid of Croyland set about resolving with Evesham the ownership of Badby. Abbot Reginald of Evesham convinced Joffrid that Croyland had no claim. The retention by Evesham was confirmed in 1246 in a charter by King Henry III and again in 1330 by King Edward III after a court hearing.
Evesham Abbey built a grange or farm headquarters in the village. The noble, almost regal, moated house was built by the notorious Abbot Roger Norreys in 1189. There are several references to the building of the grange in the The Evesham Chronicle, referring to the building of noble, almost regal, houses “at Badby, where he [Norreys] feasted on delicacies with some of his brethren, and sometimes for a quarter of the year, and sometimes longer he would be staying”. Recent (1960s) excavations showed that a large “hall” existed. Oyster shells were also found. The Chronicles had worse to report: “He lived in a most courtly and sumptuous style, with a magnificent table, overflowing with food and drink in plenty, which he lavished liberally and generously, for he was more drunken and excessive than any other English monk, and did not consider simple fornication to be a deadly sin, thus seducing women, unless adultery and incest were added, and it is said he showed no moderation in either of these.”
In 1246 King Henry III granted free warren within Badby Wood and authorised the formation of a deer park for hunting and food, the enclosing embankments and ditches of which still exist to the east of the village.
In 1316, King Edward II appointed Thomas de Evesham, one of his Chancery clerks, as rector of the benefice. The licence, which moved more control of, and finance from, Badby and Newnham to the Abbot of Evesham, was effected through Pope John XXII with Henry Berghersh, Bishop of Lincoln. It was in 1343 that the endowment for a vicar was laid down in a Lincoln diocesan document (Ordinacio Vicarie in Ecclesia de Baddeby; 1343), and Reginald Musard became the first vicar.
The Evesham Chronicle also mentions other periods of building at the moated site, which can be matched with other levels of the excavation – three bakehouses were added to the grange in the 1350s and its hall and chapel were renovated in the 1380s.
From 1539, Henry VIII carried through the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Since its foundation in 709, Evesham Abbey had successfully developed an independent existence but it could not avoid being dissolved in November 1539. Lincoln Diocese was itself split on 4th September, 1541 and Badby church, in Daventry deanery, came within the new but poorly endowed Diocese of Peterborough, in which it remains. (It is now closer to six other cathedrals of the Church of England, which are, in order of distance: Coventry, Leicester, Oxford, Birmingham, Lichfield and Worcester.) In 1546 the rectorship and patronage of Badby and Newnham were passed to Christ Church Oxford. It remained with Christ Church Oxford, except for disruption by the Commonwealth, until 1919 when the Bishop of Peterborough became the patron.
Following the Dissolution of Evesham Abbey, the Grange continued in a variety of uses until its ruins finally tumbled down in 1722. Its remains lie hidden in a thicket at Ordnance Survey reference SP562592, 500 yards north east of the church and the site is now a Scheduled Monument (List Entry Number: 1009844: Remains of a moated monastic retreat house, manorial courthouse and inn). It was the subject of archaeological excavations undertaken in 1965–69. Importantly, the pottery from the site is one of the major chronological dating series in the County.
Post-mediaeval Badby
With the decline of the Monastic life in the 14th century it had became the practice for Evesham Abbey to lease out land in Badby. The Spencer family rented the “Manor” from 1451–71 and may well have carried out renovations marked on the plan. In 1530 they still held a lease on part of the Manor lands. This family is now associated with Althorp. The second family, the Knightleys, who purchased Fawsley in 1416, was to influence Badby for the next five hundred years; they took over land in Badby and the use of the Deer Park which they joined to Fawsley.
A Royal Commissioners document from 1540 lists the tenants of both Badby and Newnham and gives the values of rents for: houses, cottages, wind and water mills, meadows, strips of land in the open fields and bake houses. It shows that the Knightley family rented Badby Wood at £6 per annum before the Dissolution.
King Henry VIII granted the manors of Badby and Newnham in 1542 to Sir Edmund Knightley and his wife Ursula and their heirs. Badby and Newnham manors were treated as one until the Knightleys sold Newnham manor to the Thorntons of Brockhall in 1634.
The dower house in Fawsley Park, last inhabited in 1704 and now in ruins, was built for Lady Ursula after Sir Edmund died. It is Listed, Grade 2 (Historic England, List Entry Number: 1343554).
There was considerable unrest in the parish in the last 20 years of the 16th century, when Valentine Knightley attempted to transfer much acreage of arable to pasture and to restrict tenants’ rights to woodland. Several tenant families, despite being puritans like Valentine, used aggressive action as well as national legal arbitration to protect their rights. The manor lands and courts were dissolved in the early 20th century.
A commission visited Badby to formalise the change from the old Open Field System to the new Enclosed Fields (ending the practice of a holder working a number of strips of land, often widely separated in the Open Fields). The details collected by the Commission led to the Parliamentary Enclosure Act of 1779 for Badby. It included a map and lists of properties with names and other details.
Sources:
1. A History of Badby Church (2018). A5, 48 pages including 26 photographs, available price £3, from the Church in aid of church restoration funds.
2. Parish 2000 Badby Appraisal
3. A Short History of Badby & Fawsley, AE Ivens, 1933
Amended 27 March 2021, updated 4 March 2025