Market Weighton

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Market Weighton
Yorkshire
East Riding
All Saints Church Market Weighton.jpg
All Saints Church
Location
Grid reference: SE879417
Location: 53°51’51"N, 0°39’45"W
Data
Population: 6,429  (2011)
Post town: York
Postcode: YO43
Dialling code: 01430
Local Government
Council: East Riding of Yorkshire
Parliamentary
constituency:
East Yorkshire

Market Weighton is a small town in the East Riding of Yorkshire. It is one of the main market towns in the eastern Yorkshire Wolds and lies midway between Hull and York, about 20 miles from each one.

The Domesday Book lists Market Weighton as "Wicstun". It was granted its charter to become a market town in 1251.

The town

Notable architecture includes: a parish church, parts of which are Norman, the Londesborough Arms (an 18th-century coaching inn), a Wesleyan chapel, a Methodist chapel and a high street still recognisable from the 1800s.

Other sights of interest include the post office, the duck pond and Station Farm. Market Weighton history includes William Bradley, the Yorkshire Giant who at the age of 20 was seven feet and nine inches tall. Another resident was Peg Fyfe, a local witch, who reputedly skinned a young local resident alive in the 1660s and was later hanged for the crime, but swallowed a spoon to save herself only to be "finished off" by two passing knights.

In May of each year local residents take to the streets of Market Weighton for the Giant Bradley Day festival in a celebration of the life and times of William Bradley.

Industry in the town is largely based around agriculture. The town is known geologically for having given its name to the Market Weighton Axis.

The Yorkshire Wolds Way National Trail, a long distance footpath, passes through the town.

Parish church

The church is dedicated to All Saints. It was designated in 1967 as a Grade I listed building.[1]

Outside links

Commons-logo.svg
("Wikimedia Commons" has material
about Market Weighton)

References

  1. National Heritage List 1160460: Church of All Saints
  • Gazetteer — A–Z of Towns Villages and Hamlets. East Riding of Yorkshire Council. 2006. p. 8.