Cumnor Hurst

Cumnor Hurst, also known as Hurst Hill, is a wooded hill in the neighbourhood of the village of Cumnor, Oxfordshire, England. It lies to the north of Boars Hill. In 1974 it was transferred from Berkshire.

The hill is a landmark on the ridge of Corallian limestone that is topped by Lower Greensand and Kimmeridge Clay. The Kimmeridge Clay provided bricks and tiles, from clay extracted at the Chawley Brick and Tile Works. It was there that fossilised remains of the dinosaur Cumnoria were found, in 1879-1880.[1] Remains of plesiosaurs and ichthyosaurs have also been found there. A housing estate was built on the site of the Chawley Brick and Tile Works in the period 2012 to 2015, and this estate now adjoins the Hurst, with new roads Kimmeridge Road, Oakwood Way and Seven Sisters Way.

The hill is owned by All Souls College, Oxford.[2] It is mentioned in Matthew Arnold's poem The Scholar Gipsy.[3]

Older maps show 'Cumnor Folly' on the hill, for example National Library of Scotland's map of Berkshire, 1938. This is likely to indicate not a building but a small wooded area, following a local dialect usage, recorded in the Oxford English Dictionary. The area is now extensively wooded. Cumnor Hurst is a Site of Special Scientific Interest.

References

  1. ↑ Oxford University Museum of Natural History, Dinosaurs in the Museum p.4
  2. ↑ This is Oxfordshire, April 16, 2004
  3. ↑ Poetseers website, The Scholar Gipsy

Coordinates: 51°44′00″N 1°18′40″W / 51.73333°N 1.31111°W / 51.73333; -1.31111

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.