Sutton Courtenay: An Idyllic English Village || English Countryside Walk

Sutton Courtenay is a picturesque village in Oxfordshire (formerly in Berkshire) with a long and varied history. The name means "South Town" (i.e., farm), located south of Abingdon. The original Saxon village, consisting of sunken‑floor "grub‑huts" and post‑built houses, was excavated in the 1920s and is the first Anglo‑Saxon settlement discovered by archaeologists, dating from the 5th and 6th centuries. The Domesday Book of 1086 records that King William I (the Conqueror) held the manor of Sudtone, which included three mills, 300 acres of river meadows, and extensive woodlands. All Saints Church contains the graves of notable figures such as UK Prime Minister H. H. Asquith and his second wife Margot Asquith, newspaper owner David Astor, and novelist George Orwell (under his real name, Eric Arthur Blair).