Nobottle

Further information: List of lost settlements in Northamptonshire

Nobottle
Townsend Farm, Nobottle
Nobottle is located in Northamptonshire
Nobottle
Nobottle
Location within Northamptonshire
OS grid referenceSP672630
Unitary authority
Ceremonial county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townNorthampton
Postcode districtNN7
Dialling code01604
PoliceNorthamptonshire
FireNorthamptonshire
AmbulanceEast Midlands
UK Parliament
List of places
UK
England
Northamptonshire
52°15′43″N 1°00′57″W / 52.26194°N 1.01583°W / 52.26194; -1.01583

Nobottle is a hamlet in West Northamptonshire in England. The population is included in the civil parish of Brington. It borders the Althorp estate, which owns much of the property. Nobottle used to have a 600yd rifle range (the only one in Northamptonshire), now shut by the MOD some 20 years (local knowledge). The Midshires Way long distance footpath passes through Nobottle. A Roman building was excavated here in 1927-9 and a hoard of 814 coins found, spanning several hundred years, but mostly of the late 4th century.[1]

The hamlet's name means 'New building'. Nobottle is in Brington parish.[2]

With only 13 houses, about half a mile long, Nobottle is one of the smallest hamlets in England. However, Nobottle gave its name to a Saxon hundred, which at the time of Domesday Book (1086) was the location of the hundred court.[3] In 1849 the Nobottle Hundred comprised 18 parishes, with 9,000 inhabitants, though the hamlet itself then only had 99 inhabitants.[4]

Nobottle is a place name in the Shire in the north west corner of the map on the front endpapers of The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, although it is not known if the author borrowed the unusual name from the Northamptonshire hamlet; the Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey takes it that he did.[5]

  1. ^ Pevsner, Nikolaus (1961) The Buildings of England: Northamptonshire.
  2. ^ "Nobottle Grove Hundred". Key to English Place-Names. University of Nottingham. Retrieved 31 October 2021.
  3. ^ Open Domesday Online: Nobottle Hundred
  4. ^ Whellan, Directory of Northamptonshire, 1849.
  5. ^ Shippey, Tom (2005) [1982]. The Road to Middle-Earth (Third ed.). Grafton (HarperCollins). pp. 115–118. ISBN 978-0261102750.