If the term "new town" conjures up an image of Milton Keynes and concrete cows, visit Overton, which was designated a "new town" back in the thirteenth century! Mentioned in 909 in a grant of land by King Edward to the Bishop of Winchester, the manor was still held by the bishop at the time of the Domesday Survey. The early village was on the north bank of the Test, buy in the thirteenth century a new town was planned by Bishop de Lucy on the south bank. By the early seventeenth century the original mediaeval village around the church had decayed, leaving only the thirteenth century new town, still known as Overton. The twelfth century Church of St Mary was restored in 1853 and 1897, and the tower rebuilt in 1909. There are remains of an eleventh or twelfth century chapel at Quidhampton Farm.

Overton is still in the news, with the nearby Watership Down inn winning a CAMRA award of merit for "fine spicy food and a prize choice of real ales" in 2002.

My picture, courtesy of David Sadler, shows St Mary's.

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