Osney
| Osney | |
| Oxfordshire | |
|---|---|
 Osney Island viewed from Osney Bridge | |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | SP502060 |
| Location: | 51°45’7"N, 1°16’26"W |
| Data | |
| Post town: | Oxford |
| Postcode: | OX1 |
| Dialling code: | 01865 |
| Local Government | |
| Council: | [Oxford |
| Parliamentary constituency: |
Oxford West and Abingdon |
Osney or Osney Island is a riverside community in the west of the city of Oxford. In modern times the name is applied to a community also known as Osney Town astride Botley Road, just west of the city's main railway station, on an island surrounded by the River Thames, Osney Ditch and another backwater connecting the Thames to Osney Ditch.
Until the early 20th century the name was applied to the larger island of Oxford Castle and New Osney (between Castle Mill Stream and the main stream of the Thames) on which Osney Abbey and Osney Mill were established during the Middle Ages. The place plays a minor but significant role in The Miller's Tale in Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales.[1]
History
The name "Osney" is Old English, and means either "island in the Ouse" Ouzen Ait being a base form and Ouse being an Old English word for a (large) river[2] or "Osa's Island".[3] Until the early twentieth century the name was applied to the island formed by two streams of the River Thames immediately west of the centre of Oxford, Castle Mill Stream and the stream which is now the main channel of the river.[4] To the north the island is bounded by a short channel between the River Thames and the Castle Mill Stream, the Sheepwash Channel, which separates it from Fiddler's Island.[5]
Osney Abbey was founded on the south part of the island in 1129, and Rewley Abbey was founded in the north of the island in 1280. Osney Mill was established by Osney Abbey on the west side of the island. The lands of both abbeys passed to Christ Church following the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1538.[6] The island formed part of St. Thomas's parish.
In 1790 the mill stream feeding Osney Mill on the west side of the island became the main navigation channel of the river, when Osney Lock was opened.[7]
Until the beginning of the 19th century, only the side of the island east of St Thomas's Church was developed. In the nineteenth century the island changed significantly. The Great Western Railway built its line across the island from north to south in 1850, with new bridges across the Thames at the south end of the island, and across the Sheepwash Channel to the north. A new railway station was opened on the island two years later. In 1851 the Buckinghamshire Railway opened its line from the north across Sheepwash Channel to its Rewley Road station next to the GWR station. To house railway workers Osney Town was laid out in 1851 by George P. Hester, on an island west of Osney leased by Hester from Christ Church. In the 1860s New Osney was developed around Mill Street, south of Botley Road between the railway and the river. The Cripley estate, north of Botley Road, was laid out in 1878.[8] Osney Cemetery was opened in 1848 in the south of the island.
Modern Osney
The name Osney is today usually applied to Osney Town. Most of Osney's two hundred-odd households live in 19th-century terraced cottages built on Hester's original grid. A minority of buildings are less than 50 years old, all on Bridge and West Streets, as well as a few significantly larger houses scattered throughout.
The island presently has two public houses, The Punter and The Hollybush. A Working Men's Club and Institute Union affiliate, the West Oxford Democrats Club has premises.
References
- ↑ Canterbury Tales Miller's Tale, Chapter 4, line 88.
- ↑ Hibbert, C. (ed) (1988) Encyclopedia of Oxford Macmillan ISBN 0-333-48614-5, s.v. Osney
- ↑ Marriott, Paul (1977). Oxford Street Names Explained. ISBN 0-9505730-1-9.
- ↑ VCH vol.4 Outlying parts of the liberty
- ↑ "River Thames (Sheepwash Channel)". UK. http://canalplan.org.uk/waterway/edm8. Retrieved 15 September 2012.
- ↑ VCH vol. 4 Sites and Remains of Religious Houses
- ↑ VCH vol. 4 Communications:Rivers and river navigation.
- ↑ VCH vol. 4 Modern Oxford: Development of the city
Sources
- Crossley, Alan; Elrington, C.R. (eds.); Chance, Eleanor; Colvin, Christina; Cooper, Janet; Day, C.J.; Hassall, T.G.; Selwyn, Nesta (1979). A History of the County of Oxford, Volume 4. Victoria County History. (VCH)
- Prior, Mary (1982) [2011]. Fisher Row: fishermen, bargemen and canal boatmen in Oxford, 1500-1900. Chichester: Phillimore. ISBN 978-1860776526. http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1860776523/ref=rdr_ext_tmb#reader_1860776523. Retrieved 26 September 2012.
- Sherwood, Jennifer; Pevsner, Nikolaus (1974). Oxfordshire. The Buildings of England. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. pp. 334–335. ISBN 0-14-071045-0.
