Kingston Lisle is a village and civil parish in the Vale of White Horse

Vale of White Horse

The Vale of White Horse is a local government district of Oxfordshire in England. The main town is Abingdon, other places include Faringdon and Wantage. There are 68 parishes within the district...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. Kingston Lisle was part of Berkshire

Berkshire

Berkshire is a historic county in the South of England. It is also often referred to as the Royal County of Berkshire because of the presence of the royal residence of Windsor Castle in the county; this usage, which dates to the 19th century at least, was recognised by the Queen in 1957, and...

 until the 1974 local government boundary changes

Local Government Act 1972

The Local Government Act 1972 is an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales on 1 April 1974....

 transferred the Vale of White Horse to Oxfordshire.

Location

Kingston Lisle is at the foot of the Berkshire Downs

Berkshire Downs

The Berkshire Downs are a range of chalk downland hills in southern England, part of the North Wessex Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty...

 escarpment

Escarpment

An escarpment is a steep slope or long cliff that occurs from erosion or faulting and separates two relatively level areas of differing elevations.-Description and variants:...

 64 miles (103 km) west of London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

. The local town is Wantage

Wantage

Wantage is a market town and civil parish in the Vale of the White Horse, Oxfordshire, England. The town is on Letcombe Brook, about south-west of Abingdon and a similar distance west of Didcot....

 5 miles (8 km) to the east, and the large town of Swindon is 10 miles (16 km) to the west. The village is at the foot of Blowing Stone Hill and is one of many spring line settlement

Spring line settlement

Spring line settlements occur where a ridge of permeable rock lies over impermeable rock and there will be a line of springs along the boundary between the two layers....

s at the foot of the scarp

Escarpment

An escarpment is a steep slope or long cliff that occurs from erosion or faulting and separates two relatively level areas of differing elevations.-Description and variants:...

 of the White Horse Hills. The Uffington White Horse

Uffington White Horse

The Uffington White Horse is a highly stylised prehistoric hill figure, 110 m long , formed from deep trenches filled with crushed white chalk...

, Uffington Castle

Uffington Castle

Uffington Castle is all that remains of an early Iron Age hill fort in Oxfordshire, England. It covers about 32,000 square metres and is surrounded by two earth banks separated by a ditch with an entrance in the eastern end...

 and the Ridgeway are nearby.

Amenities

The village has one public house

Public house

A public house, informally known as a pub, is a drinking establishment fundamental to the culture of Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. There are approximately 53,500 public houses in the United Kingdom. This number has been declining every year, so that nearly half of the smaller...

, which is also a restaurant. The village area is served by Uffington Primary School just over 2 miles (3 km) away, to which there is a free bus service.

Kinston Lisle is also home to several racehorse trainers, being 5 miles (8 km) from the horse racing centre of Lambourn

Lambourn

Lambourn is a large village and civil parish in the northwestern part of the ceremonial county of Berkshire in England. Its metropolitan district has a population of 4,017, and is most noted for its associations with British National Hunt racehorse training....

.

History

The Blowing Stone

Blowing Stone

The Blowing Stone is a perforated sarsen stone, located at in a garden at the foot of Blowingstone Hill just south of the Icknield Way , at Kingston Lisle, near Uffington, in the English county of Oxfordshire .-Notability:...

, King Alfred's supposed means of summoning his troops before the momentous Battle of Ashdown

Battle of Ashdown

The Battle of Ashdown, in Berkshire , took place on 8 January 871. Alfred the Great, then a prince of only twenty-one, led the West Saxon army of his brother, King Ethelred, in a victorious battle against the invading Danes.Accounts of the battle are based to a large extent on Asser's "Life of...

, is at Kingston Lisle.

The nave

Nave

In Romanesque and Gothic Christian abbey, cathedral basilica and church architecture, the nave is the central approach to the high altar, the main body of the church. "Nave" was probably suggested by the keel shape of its vaulting...

 and north door of the Church of England parish church

Church of England parish church

A parish church in the Church of England is the church which acts as the religious centre for the people within the smallest and most basic Church of England administrative region, known as a parish.-Parishes in England:...

 of Saint John the Baptist

John the Baptist

John the Baptist was an itinerant preacher and a major religious figure mentioned in the Canonical gospels. He is described in the Gospel of Luke as a relative of Jesus, who led a movement of baptism at the Jordan River...

 was built in about 1200. The east window of the chancel

Chancel

In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar in the sanctuary at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building...

 is Decorated Gothic. St. John's parish is part of the Benefice of Ridgeway, along with the parishes of Childrey

Childrey

Childrey is a village and civil parish about west of Wantage in the Vale of White Horse. The parish was part of the Wantage Rural District in Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred the whole of the Vale of White Horse from Berkshire to Oxfordshire.Childrey was originally an island...

, Letcombe Bassett

Letcombe Bassett

Letcombe Bassett is a village and civil parish about southwest of the market town of Wantage in the Vale of White Horse. It was part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred the Vale of White Horse to Oxfordshire....

, Letcombe Regis

Letcombe Regis

Letcombe Regis is a village and civil parish in the Vale of White Horse. It was part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred the Vale of White Horse to Oxfordshire...

, Sparsholt

Sparsholt, Oxfordshire

Sparsholt is a village and civil parish about west of the market town of Wantage in the Vale of White Horse. The village is a spring line settlement at the foot of the Berkshire Downs escarpment. The parish includes the hamlet of Westcot about west of the village...

 and West Challow

West Challow

West Challow is a village and civil parish about west of the market town of Wantage in the Vale of White Horse. The village is on Childrey Brook, which is a tributary of the River Ock...

.

Literary connections

The village is featured in Thomas Hughes

Thomas Hughes

Thomas Hughes was an English lawyer and author. He is most famous for his novel Tom Brown's Schooldays , a semi-autobiographical work set at Rugby School, which Hughes had attended. It had a lesser-known sequel, Tom Brown at Oxford .- Biography :Hughes was the second son of John Hughes, editor of...

' novel Tom Brown's Schooldays

Tom Brown's Schooldays

Tom Brown's Schooldays is a novel by Thomas Hughes. The story is set at Rugby School, a public school for boys, in the 1830s; Hughes attended Rugby School from 1834 to 1842...

.