Belaugh is a small village

Village

A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet with the population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand , Though often located in rural areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods, such as the West Village in Manhattan, New...

 (population 105) that occupies a bend in the River Bure

River Bure

The River Bure is a river in the county of Norfolk, England, most of it in The Broads. The Bure rises near Melton Constable, upstream of Aylsham, which was the original head of navigation. Nowadays, the head of navigation is downstream at Coltishall Bridge...

 in Norfolk, England - within The Broads National Park. It is accessible via the road between Hoveton

Hoveton

Hoveton is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. It is located within the Norfolk Broads, and immediately across the River Bure from the village of Wroxham...

 and Coltishall

Coltishall

Coltishall is a village on the River Bure, west of Wroxham, in the English county of Norfolk, within the Norfolk Broads.Coltishall was a place of note even when the Domesday Book was compiled. For 250 years it was a centre of the malting industry...

 or from the river. It contains no pubs, bars or shops. The main civic features are the church of St Peter, Belaugh and the Old School, which also belongs to the church and is used for parish council meetings and for celebrating the harvest festival. The local broad is Belaugh Broad. Most of the land around Belaugh - about 850 acre (344 ha) - is owned by the Trafford family, who are Lords of the Manor

Lord of the Manor

The Lordship of a Manor is recognised today in England and Wales as a form of property and one of three elements of a manor that may exist separately or be combined and may be held in moieties...

.

History of Belaugh

The Domesday Book

Domesday Book

Domesday Book , now held at The National Archives, Kew, Richmond upon Thames in South West London, is the record of the great survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086...

 of 1086 contains one of the earliest recorded mentions of the village, at the time known as Belaga. Other records from around the time name it as Belihagh, Belaw, Bilhagh or Bilough, names based on combinations of Norse

North Germanic languages

The North Germanic languages or Scandinavian languages, the languages of Scandinavians, make up one of the three branches of the Germanic languages, a sub-family of the Indo-European languages, along with the West Germanic languages and the extinct East Germanic languages...

, Danish

Danish language

Danish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in the country of Denmark. It is also spoken by 50,000 Germans of Danish ethnicity in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where it holds the status of minority language...

 and Anglo-Saxon

Old English language

Old English or Anglo-Saxon is an early form of the English language that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons and their descendants in parts of what are now England and southeastern Scotland between at least the mid-5th century and the mid-12th century...

 words that collectively mean 'a dwelling place by the water'.

Belaugh St Peter

Belaugh St Peter is a Church of England

Church of England

The Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England and the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The church considers itself within the tradition of Western Christianity and dates its formal establishment principally to the mission to England by St...

 church located at the top of a steep slope above the village. It was built circa 14th century and contains an ornate rood screen

Rood screen

The rood screen is a common feature in late medieval church architecture. It is typically an ornate partition between the chancel and nave, of more or less open tracery constructed of wood, stone, or wrought iron...

 decorated with images of the apostles that appears to have been added in the early 16th century. In the 17th century a soldier loyal to Oliver Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell was an English military and political leader who overthrew the English monarchy and temporarily turned England into a republican Commonwealth, and served as Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland....

 (described in a letter to Sheriff Tofts of Norwich as a 'godly trooper') scraped away the faces of the apostles, such images being regarded as idolatrous by many of Cromwell's followers. According to records displayed in the church, the letter writer also added disapprovingly that, "The Steeple house [of Belaugh St Peter] stands high, perked like one of the idolatrous high places of Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

". The font of the church is shaped in the Norman style as a cauldron made of a blue stone.

One unusual feature of the church is the remains of blank arcading on the outside of the south wall of the nave. If original this looks more Saxon than Norman.

The church organ was built between 1886 and 1904 by the Reverend George Buck, who was rector between 1880–1907 and son of Dr Zephaniah Buck, organist of Norwich Cathedral

Norwich Cathedral

Norwich Cathedral is a cathedral located in Norwich, Norfolk, dedicated to the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Formerly a Catholic church, it has belonged to the Church of England since the English Reformation....

. George Buck also built church organs for Edingthorpe

Edingthorpe

Edingthorpe is a small village in the county of Norfolk, England, about 10 miles south-east of Cromer. Edingthorpe civil parish was added to Bacton civil parish under the County of Norfolk Review Order, 1935....

 and Little Melton

Little Melton

Little Melton is a village on the outskirts of Norwich in the South Norfolk district of Norfolk, England. It covers an area of and had a population of 851 in 373 households as of the 2001 census....

.

The Belaugh Ghost

According to information displayed in the church of St Peter Belaugh, in 1695 Richard Slater - a servant at the village's rectory - stole money and jewels from the church and buried them in the rectory garden. When he later returned to dig up the stash, he was discovered by the rector. In the scuffle that followed, the thief drowned in the river. He is supposed to rise up nightly to recover the money, only to be forced down again by the weight of the stolen loot.

Rectors of Belaugh St Peter

• ---- John de Catfeld
• 1330 Robert de Hurdeshulle
• 1349 John de Ludham
• 1364 William Putyn
• 1370 William de Swukbrook
• ---- Henry Rondolph
• 1397 Thomas Herteshorn
• 1399 John Williamson
• 1427 John Joneson
• 1430 Henry Bettys
• 1439 Robert Popy
• 1441 John Hecham
• 1467 Robert Ippeswell
• 1478 Robert Kyng
• 1491 John Felds
• 1508 William Franklin
• 1510 Thomas Acton
• 1518 Thomas Jannys
• 1536 William Pawe
• 1552 Thomas Abbot
• 1554 Gilbert Warren
• 1555 Edward Fisher
• 1556 Robert Certayn
• 1560 John Robinson
• 1561 Leo Howlet
• ---- Edward Dunton
• 1602 Christopher Witton
• 1607 Rogert Fowkes
• 1612 Thomas Jermyn
• 1660 John Philips
• 1663 john Cutelin
• 1678 William Newton
• 1681 Guwin Nush
• 1691 Bainbridge (Dean)
• 1711 William Hay
• 1763 Henry Headley
• 1768 Lancaster Adkin
• 1807 John Prowett
• 1811 William Newcome
• 1824 Robert Bathurst
• 1829 Dennis Norris
• 1830 William Ferguson
• 1834 John Labbock
• 1857 John Horatio Nelson
• 1873 Francis Humphrey
• 1882 George Buck
• 1919 Austen Watt
• 1929 John Priest Miller
• 1929 Henry James
• 1932 Alfred Sheffield
• 1949 David Davies
• 1950 Harry Skellern
• 1956 Albert Carling
• 1976 Henry Stapleton
• 1981 Cedric Bradbury
• 1993 Andrew Parsons