Ripe

Ripe
Sussex
Ripe
Location
Grid reference:	TQ510100
Location:	50°52’14"N, -0°8’42"E
Data
Post town:	Hailsham
Postcode:	BN27
Dialling code:	01323
Local Government
Council:	Wealden
Parliamentary constituency:	Lewes

Ripe is a small village in Sussex. in the joint valley of the upper streams of the River Cuckmere and the River Ouse, north of the South Downs, between the A27 and the A22 roads, some 15 miles north-west of Eastbourne. Immediately to the south-east is Ripe's twin village and neighbouring ancient parish, Chalvington.

The 13th-century parish church is dedicated to St John the Baptist.

There used to be one public house in the village, though it has since closed.

History

The Romans built a road through the two villages, and remains of the layout can still be seen.

The village, in a mainly rural area, is mentioned in the Domesday Book and has had a number of names, including Alchitone, Achiltone, Achintone, Echentone and Eckington.

At the end of the Anglo-Saxon period, the manor was owned by Earl Harold Godwinson, whose brief reign as King Harold II ended at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. The Domesday Book mentions 'Rype' and 'Echentone' which were owned by Richer de Aquila (L'Aigle), and the church is also mentioned in Pope Nicholas IV's Taxatio Ecclesiastica of 1291, an ecclesiastical tax assessment survey.

In the Middle Ages the area had a profitable wool trade.

The novelist Malcolm Lowry, best known for Under the Volcano, died at age 47 in a boarding house in Ripe on 27 June 1957. Lowry is buried in the village churchyard.

("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Ripe)