Melsome Wood Viewed from the West

Melsome Wood is a large and dense deciduous woodland blanketing the escarpment above the Avon Vale between Christian Malford village and Bradenstoke, which used to be called 'Clack'. It rises about 215 feet in less than half a mile. There were once two large wood mills in this area with a hamlet called 'Mills Ham'. 'Mills Ham' became corrupted to Melsome. The accent be quite strong round these here parts. That is to say, it used to be. I expect it's all RP now.

White Cleeve, Pepper Cleeve, Cleeve and Cleavancy, Lyneham and Lousy Clack, Cris Mavord and Dauntsey.

Clack is the name by which Bradenstoke was known for centuries. “Clack’ means ‘hill’, and ‘lousy’ is from the teutonic ‘lloew’, also meaning hill. ‘Cleeve’ is an alternative way of saying ‘cliff’, and a place with ‘Cleeve’ in the name probably sits at the top of an escarpment - like Clyffe Pypard (‘Pepper Cleeve’ in the local nursery rhyme quoted above). ‘Cris Mavord’ is, of course, the way local people would have said ‘Christian Malford’.

As part of a Survey of English Dialects undertaken between 1950 and 1961, 313 localities were studied which included Sutton Benger, the village next to Christian Malford as you travel towards Chippenham. The Sutton Benger dialect was one of the furthest away from Standard English that was recorded. Before this part of the Avon valley became home to well-to-do commuters attracted by high speed Inter City express train services and the proximity of the M4 motorway, and property prices rose, and poorer folk moved to the town for work, agriculture being decimated, the local accent was scarcely intelligible to outsiders. If you are very lucky you might still find some aged local person to engage in a conversation which you will find completely mystifying.

Nikon D2Xs and Nikkor 70-210mm f/4 AF lens.